Mandatory ME Time

I've missed you bloooog! Oh boy, this year has really started off hectic. In order to keep myself sane, I am officially instituting mandatory ME time (sans work computer) each day. I've always thought of myself as a hard worker, but I never would have imagined that I would become one of those people who let their job take over their life. I'm fighting with all my might!

There's been a lot going on, but luckily I've managed to squeeze in some fun stuff. I made a cranberry cheesecake for Kavan's return. It was super yummy :9 The recipe is from Cooking Light, and the cheesecake is made with 1/3 less fat cream cheese and greek yogurt. I've never heard of greek yogurt being used in a cheesecake, but I am pretty sure that is why this cheesecake turned out to be the creamiest cheesecake I've ever made.

 

My Kuckie Koo made it back safe and sound! =) Shortly after, we had a lovely dinner in the North End with his Dad and Step Mom. It was a treat to finally get to meet them! It was also a treat to finally celebrate Christmas, just the two of us, a few days later. Can I just say Wow! :) It really meant a lot to me that Kavan picked out such thoughtful gifts, and he is most definitely 4 for 4 on picking out jewelry that is both beautiful and "me".

The next day, Kav got to enjoy his Christmas present, tickets to the Bruins game! Ovi and the Caps still hold the keys to my heart however ;)

Onto the practical side of things. Kavan also got me a food processor!! Picture one of those kids in the we're going Disney World commercials, and that pretty much sums up my reaction. hehe I am gonna have some fun with this! First line of business was to make something I would never dream to attempt without a food processor, scalloped potatoes. They are made lickity split with my fancy slicer blade. I am definitely making these again.....

In other news:

There was a blizzard and corresponding work from home day :)

It was grand.

To celebrate her return, my roomie Amelia and I made chocolate port lava cakes.

These little things should be illegal........

Here's to ME time! Thanks for joining :)

The Turkey That Keeps on Giving

What a great Thanksgiving break!  Four work-free days of pjs, apple pie, and shameless tv viewing.  This Thanksgiving was wonderful.  Even Kavan took a day off from studying! (which was more than deserved) Of course the holidays aren't complete without barely avoiding disaster, and this Thanksgiving was no exception.  Come Thanksgiving Day around noon -- turkey-less -- I planned to meet Kavan in front of the Shaw's Super Market to buy the turkey that I should have already been cooking. 

CLOSED in big bold letters was printed on a piece of paper taped to the door. There must be another store that's open right? I bet the other super market, Stop N Shop, is open, or Trader Joes, or Whole Foods, or maybe the Greek grocery has turkeys??? Nope. I walked home chilled to the bone still turkey-less with tears welling up in my eyes. I felt defeated. How was I going to break the news to my roomies who were expecting a turkey for Thanksgiving?? Kavan, however, was still out in full force biking to any grocery or convenience store that showed up on the google map search. He was determined to be the victor of this Thanksgiving Day fiasco.  As the day went on, the probability that he would even find an open grocery store was diminishing by the minute.

Who would have thought that the turkey-that-almost-wasn't was the best Thanksgiving turkey I have cooked to date.  A little over 2 hours into the search, Kavan rang with good news. He had found a turkey, and better yet, the turkey had been killed under kosher rules the day before. (The owner of the Middle Eastern hole in the wall grocery had a few no shows for their turkey orders this year.) SUCCESS!!! Kavan saved the day, and in all of the excitement even remembered to get the ingredients for our Salty Chihuahuas and Cranberry Spritzers. That's my man <3

I don't know if it was the salty chichuahuas or the cranberry spritzers, but I didn't manage to get a picture of the crispy brown turkey when it was all said and done. Luckily at dinner Kavan mentioned how his Mom, Kate, makes broth out of the turkey carcass and creates unbelievable soup from it. I had just found my new project for the break! :) Kate was kind enough to send me her recipe on how to make broth, and now I have 5 frozen ziploc bags of yummy broth stored in my freezer, in addition to the broth used in the soup.  For the soup recipe, I didn't really use one. I looked up some recipes online, and kind of did my own mash up of their ideas.  I remembered my mom always fixing soup with wild rice when I was younger so I wanted to incorporate that into the soup, plus of course the usual carrots and beans and chunks of turkey.  Add some seasoning and Voila! Turkey Soup :)

Luckily, I has not had any salty chihuahuas before cooking the soup, and happily captured some images of the after-turkey cuisine. 

Carrots

 and green beans

and rice

 makes TURKEY SOUP!

MMMmmmmmmmm :-9