101 Salads, Thank-you Mark Bittman

Check this out!!

101 amazing salads thanks to Mark Bittman. Awesome x 101! Seriously, this is such a wealth of knowledge/recipes, perfect for summer.

Some favorites:

12. Combine sliced fennel and prune plums; serve with vinaigrette spiked with minced ginger. Nice pairing.

27. Cook whole, unpeeled eggplant in a dry, hot skillet or on a grill, turning occasionally, until completely collapsed and soft. Chop and toss with toasted pita, toasted pine nuts, cooked white beans and halved cherry tomatoes. Dress with olive oil, lemon juice and lots of black pepper. Or a (non-vegan) yogurt dressing is good, especially one laced with tahini.

29. Pit and halve cherries (or halve and pit cherries), then cook gently with olive oil and a little balsamic vinegar until they break down. Toss with chopped radicchio, endive, escarole or a combination, some toasted hazelnuts and more oil and vinegar, if necessary.

81. Soak sliced prune plums or figs in balsamic vinegar for a few minutes, then add olive oil, chopped celery and red onion, shreds of roasted or grilled chicken, chopped fresh marjoram or oregano and chopped almonds. Serve on top of or toss with greens. So good.

Merry Cat-mus

Another fab video, cat style.



via Juste Une Illusion

New Cat

New cat new cat new cat new cat new cat!
Her name is Isabelle.

Spring Break

California, I'm on my way!

Post Halloween Post

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!







General mayhem...

(but in other news, it's November!)

HOLY COW! EMERGENCY BLOG POST!

GUYS! Guess what! A photo I took in India is featured on the National Geographic Magazine website!

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/photo-contest/people-gallery

It's the 2nd one in the row (of September - Week 5); the one of the kid with the kohl on his eyes. I can't believe it! I am so excited. It's too late to vote for the photo though...I didn't check the website until today and it was already onto voting for October photos, so boo hoo.

But this means that I am in the running to win the contest or get some sort of prize!

Excuse me for being obnoxious in this post, but I am just so surprised!!

A Successful MWMH!

Okay, I think this is the first legit Mid-Week Magic Hour! I beginning to think this is just an incredibly dorky idea, but I'm going to go through with it until someone tells me so to my face. (Please, I won't be offended.)

Anyways, I just need to express my love of autumn once again. Right now, the weather is just perfect, more or less, here in the city. It's breezy, 70 degrees, perfect. I can wear a coat or a scarf or a sweater or a t-shirt or a dress (although the latter might blow up due to the gusty winds) and I'll feel great. And in the evening it gets cool and perhaps, dare I say it, cold. So, what better way to celebrate devastatingly perfect evening weather than by curling up in the perfect P.J.s and tea and everything like that? I will choose a coziness over mayhem any day:

What's up there::
~Tregaron Blanket by Toast [£95.00]
~Wool Felt Slippers by Toast [£49.00]
~Dhuggie by Toast [£45.00]
~Cashmere Bedsocks by Toast [£39.00]
~Betty Teapot by Toast [£25.00]
~Lavender and Peppermint Body Lotion by C.O. Bigelow Chemists [$4.00]
~Marvis Classic Mint Toothpaste by C.O. Bigelow Chemists [$10.50]

Yeah, so you can definitely see that I'm on a little Toast kick, to say the least. Seriously, if I had lots of money, that would be one of the stores very high on my list to shop at. But in case you hadn't noticed, there is not a way in the world that I could afford that stuff. Because the prices are in British pounds mind you. Ugh, oh woe.

Yep, that's that! Go MWMH! I don't know if I will be able to post on Saturday exactly because I am going to my cousin's wedding, but I will probably be able to on the bus ride back, because the bus has WiFi and I have a surprisingly small amount of work to do. Oh, I am quite excited to go to this wedding because not only will I get to see a lot of extended family, but I will get to see my mom and dad and brothers too, whom I miss lots! I've only been away for a month, which at some points seems like not very long at all, but at other points seems like an age.

I hope that at the wedding I will get to take some really great pictures because I am renting out a large format 4x5 field camera! I am so excited, I can't even tell you, but I'm pretty sure that my first round will not turn out because the camera is quite cumbersome and difficult to use. And the film costs $2 per frame, so it's not like this is going to be a common thing. But I have high hopes and am feeling quite inspired. More to come, to be sure!!

Until next time...

Success in the Dorm Kitchen!

I did it! I made something in the dorm kitchen, and it worked! Granted, I did make brownies before, and they worked out, but this was the first legit dinner that I've made using our mini/fake stove. It's more of a hot coil with an Easy Bake Oven underneath it, which is funny because I always wanted an Easy Bake Oven as a kid, and I never got one, and now that I basically do, I hate it.

But, enough complaining!! The food was successful and tasty and I had leftovers too.

[NOTE: Thanks to a very astute reader named Taylor, i just realized that I forgot to actually write what I had cooked! It's once again the Big Bowl Quinoa from 101 cookbooks, which I made before, and simply had to make again because it's so easy and so delicious.]

So I cut, and I chopped, and I stir-fried, and it smelled like grilled onions with garlic and everyone in the dorm room/hall said that it smelled good. Score! Food for me, not for you! Ah-ha-ha!

In other news, I was quite productive this weekend. I went to the Union Square Farmers Market again on Saturday and I took a lot of photographs, which I got to contact and print today. I should scan them in and post them here...when I get around to it. We actually have a nice scanner or two in the darkroom, but I digress. While at the farmers market I watched this band from Santa Cruz perform, and they were quite good, so I bought their CD! Check Blackbird Raum out; they're a little like Gogol Bordello and Beirut and all that alt-folky-gypsy-hippie stuff. And one of they play washboard, accordian, musical saw, wash-tub bass, mandolin, and banjo. Cool.

And now I am watching the Emmy's and I swear, I always think that these award shows are going to be entertaining, but they are really boring and disgusting. It's just so nauseating having a bunch of vapid Hollywoodians all in the same room patting themselves on the back. Eck...

Okay, see you on Wednesday for Mid-Week Magic Hour! (Yessss, so excited)

Hello College

So I guess this is college! It's here! First post in NYC! Living in a dorm is exactly as I expected it to be, especially because my dorm is such the quintessential dorm. Shitty furniture, ugly linoleum floor, fluorescent lights...you know. But I'm working on making it nicer with posters (which I have yet to buy) and postcards. I'm pretty sure my roommate thinks I'm really weird because I have a postcard of Einstein, a turkey (its an Audubon print), and Louise Bourgeois holding a giant metal sculpture of a penis. And then I'm going to put up another one which is a Cindy Sherman photograph of this weird, mutilated face.

Anyways, today I went with the studio art department on a field trip to PS1 on Long Island. It's a museum, I think an extension of MoMA, and I really loved it. The building is an old public school that has been entirely converted into a museum, but without being remodeled, so it still looks like a school. There is art everywhere: in the stairwells, basement, bathrooms, dusty corners, etc. There were a lot of installation pieces, my favorite of which was a bunch of old scuba diving outfits (think metal helmet and all that) which were constructed just a little larger than life, and they were hanging in this dark, small room. They would alternate having a light turn on inside their helmets and then the ones in the back would raise their arms and hit this giant metal sheet with a hammer. It was cacophonous, scary, and amazing. It was actually pretty frightening, especially because they moved on their own accord and were pretty big.

Tomorrow I am going to the Guggenheim with two other girls in the studio art department to see the Louise Bourgeois exhib and whatever else is being shown there. I can't believe I am in New York City!!

Thin Mints and More Summer Parties

I swear this summer is going by all together way too fast. Fortunately, I feel that I have been using it the best to my advantage by seeing many movies and eating. I saw The Dark Knight twice, which was fantastic. I want everyone to go see it! I also saw Wall-e, which was also great! I really enjoyed it; the animation was spectacular, and it was just cute overall. I rented Persepolis as well, and I enjoyed it too. I think I've seen too many good movies, and therefore, I should see some god-awful ones to balance myself out. Next stop: The Love Guru. No, I can't do it. That's more than crossing the line.

Anyways, it was my friend's birthday (actually, I don't think her actual date of birth has come up yet...) but, point being, I made her delicious Thin Mints from 101 cookbooks. Seriously, these are the way to go. I have been (was?) a Girl Scout for 11 years, and have both sold and eaten my fair share of Thin Mints, but these take the cake. I really love how fluffy soft the actual cookie is. They are time consuming, however; the dipping-into-chocolate part takes a while and the cookies, at least for me, break in half all the time.

So, anyways (do I say anyways too much?), we ate the cookies and watched Jane Eyre. And then my friend busted out the birthday cake she made and decorated herself. Which was unbelievable. I see cake decorating in her future.

And it was tasty too! A nice white layer cake with a raspberry almond filling running through the center.

In other news, I have shot 4 rolls of 120 format color film from my Holga camera and I don't know what to do. I can develop my own black and white 120 film at home, but I have to take the color rolls to get developed some place that actually ACCEPTS this type of film. End result: pricey. I can't afford to spend $15 per roll! So, I modified my Holga camera so I could put 35mm film in it! Yes! Score! And, I covered it with this sticky paper that looks like wood, so now it's even more awesome.
Glamor shot:

Sold!

I sold my tea bags!! First sell on Etsy and only 1 day after I listed the item! Woo!

Anyways, I graduate on Friday. And I won a photography scholarship for $5000 and an internship with a professional photographer! Good times...


My cat, Sophie, channeling my excitedness.