Thai at Home

While shopping without a list last night I ended up with some Bolthouse juice in my cart.  Better than winding up with Cheetos in my cart!

Sipped a glass this morning alongside my yummy new-to-me coffee…straight from Guatemala thanks to a generous Navy friend…

…and *tears* the last of my delicious Tofino peasant toast with sunflower butter and pomegranate jelly.

Breakfast and lunch were almost back to back because I got wrapped up in a work call for the billionth time and of course didn’t think to eat before I dialled.  So the toast was followed up an hour later by a much needed bigass salad…

Featured protein for the big silver bowl today was leftover salmon with capers.  Yum!

On top of a bed of spinach, carrots, tomatoes and yellow peppers tossed with olive oil, lemon juice, and coarse salt.

I made all of that hold me over until late evening when Tiffaney and I attended Truly Thai at Home…a basic Thai cooking class by Chef Heidi Fink.  It was so fun, delicious and educational. 

I will do a full recap for you sometime this week but we sat down to a delicious six course Thai meal…each course prepared by a different pair of students.  Everything was fresh and flavourful and I enjoyed every bite.

Now quick, someone get me a bowl of coconut sticky rice.  Stat.

Friday night…

…a boy made me dinner.  That’s all the dirt you are getting! ;)

The point being that since I’ve been living on my own for over six months it’s pretty rare that anyone else cooks for me so I was quite excited when the offer presented itself.  Especially since I was fairly certain his claims about being a good cook were likely true. ha.

My little point and shoot didn’t do the meal any justice but it was delicious (and I didn’t get laughed at for playing paparazzi!).

While our dinner baked we snacked on spanakopita and sipped Montepulciano…

Our main course revolved around this gorgeous piece of salmon he was gifted and had been dying to cook up.  He told me the marinade for documenting here but of course I don’t remember…um…mayo, salt & pepper, herbs, and stuff. :)  Whatever, it was good!

With salad and rice (which makes for a terrible picture…big white blob). 

And um, oh yeah!  Homemade apple pie!! 

Apparently the way to girl’s heart is through her stomach. ha.

Not Now

See this gorgeous orange?  Isn’t she a beauty?

Doesn’t she scream fresh and sunny?  Wouldn’t you be excited to eat her?  Yes, me too!

Sadly, she tasted like azz. Bitter and yucky. Booooo. 

Thank gawd for the uber-delicious peasant bread with sunflower butter and bananas.  Almost made me forget about that dirty, disappointing orange.  Almost.

Coffee helped too.  I must have been too busy mourning the citrus to capture the coffee.

For lunch I decided to make a snack plate because there was fresh shrimpies to use up and multigrain Wheat Thins just crying to be cracked into.

After stating I had just bought my first ever bottle of sriracha sauce for the Tom Yum soup I received multiple comments about how it’s unbelievable I’ve made it this far in life without it.  So I decided to take Ingmarie’s suggestion to mix it with mayo for a quickie shrimp salad.

Don’t worry, I added more.  Just started out small. :)  Sadly I don’t have any pickles or green onions so the shrimp salad was tres basic…but still delicious scooped on my favourite crack-ers…alongside light cheddar, carrots sticks, and perfect red grapes.

There was still coffee left in the pot so I made an after lunch misto using UVAB and a smidge of vanilla syrup.

And snacked on a flattened banana during a Skype call to discuss a new project I’ve taken on to make a couple of bucks and help a friend out.

The call intervened on my gym time (I’ve had my gym clothes on since about 3pm…guess I’m not going!) but it was nice to sort everything out and I was able to get through the first part of the project tonight.

Before tackling the draft I whipped up a batch of soup.  Every single time I check my Google Analytics without fail the most searched term that leads people to my blog is “healthy broccoli soup”.  I decided the other day that it’s stupid I’ve only ever made such a popular recipe once (!!) and picked up the super simple ingredients to make it again.

So quick and easy!!

In order to make it cheesy I made a fast and light cheese sauce on the side and then drizzled it into the soup.  Worked perfectly…smooth and lovely…no lumpy cheeeese! 

Light Cheese Sauce:

• 1 tsp butter
• 1.5 tsp corn starch
• 3/4 cup skim milk
• salt, pepper and nutmeg to taste
• 3/4 cup grated light cheddar
• 2 tbsp grated parmesan (optional)

Directions:

1. In a small saucepan melt butter over medium heat.  Add corn starch, whisk thoroughly and let cook approx. 30 seconds (keep whisking).
2. Gradually whisk in the milk 1/4 cup at a time.  Adjust heat if boiling…should just be a quick bubble.  Season.
3. When desired thickness is reached, remove from heat and stir in cheese.
4. Serve!

I’ve used this sauce on baked potatoes, steamed veggies, atop chili or to make nachos.  Nom.

After dinner I got back to work on my project and ended up breaking into these candies leftover from girl’s weekend.  I find it hilarious that talking hearts now have VERY different sayings than when we were kids.

How very 80s!

Traditional.

What the heck?  Now that’s not very friendly.

LOL.  What is that?  The old married couples sweet heart? ;)

frilly lily

Oh the joy of remembering to set the coffee maker the night before!

Fresh brewed coffee I promise never to abandon you again! (Um, unless of course fresh coffee is delivered to my door again…that was sweet!)

I made the mistake of not making breakfast before my conference call and then of course it ran long so I didn’t actually eat breakfast until…oh I don’t know…12:30? Can you say HANGRY?!

Lemon yogurt, blueberries, blackberries, Kashi Go Lean.

I hopped in for a quick shower after eating then promptly made my second meal of the day.  I knew I’d be out all afternoon and needed to make sure I’d stay full until dinner.

Sammich made with that deeeelish Tofino peasant bread…with turkey, avocado, tomato, spinach, olive oil mayo and Dijon mustard.

nom. nom. nom.

After another hour or so of work I was off to get some girlie pampering.  Fresh new haircut.  She styled it all wavy for me…alas I had no fun places to be so only my fuzzypants boyfriend got to see it.

Front doesn’t look much different but she did such a slick job on the back!

I sipped a grande non-fat half sweet hazelnut coffee misto between appointments.

**And now! Here I have a PSA for any local Victoria ladies. (Gentlemen, you may wish to skip this part…tee hee.)**

I found the awesomest (yes it’s a word!) little boutique for a really good wax!  I didn’t start bikini waxing until I moved to Halifax (hello Dominican resort!) so I didn’t have any idea where to go when I moved back.  The place I tried before going to Vegas in September left me feeling…well, let’s just say it was um, “abrupt”…so I didn’t want to go back.

A bikini wax is no time to be cheap!

While walking down Fort Street one day I noticed this shop ‘frilly lily’ that specializes in “down there” (among other waxing as well as manicures and pedicures, etc) so gave them a Google.  I was pleased to learn they are a small franchise with a huge following and decided to give them a try.

A bikini wax is never a fabulous event but Jess took excellent care, was a great conversationalist, and did a beautiful job.  So if anyone is looking for a new esthetician for your girl’s business I definitely recommend frilly lily.  (There are locations in Vancouver and Calgary too…and I assume more on the way.)

As a side note: the shop is super cute, sells their line of bath and beauty products, has an upstairs studio for pedicures…and get this…pedicure parties!  I want one. :)

**OK boys, I’m done.**

Back at home I had work to do since I’d been out playing hooky all afternoon.  Wine was necessary.  Not good wine, but whatevs. ha.

I snacked on a banana and Sunflower Butter until I found a few minutes to cook dinner.

Dinner was a super simple Salmon Salad. 

I made a paste of olive oil mayo, Dijon, smidge of honey, fresh rosemary, salt and pepper…then spread it atop a fresh wild Coho salmon filet which I had squirted with lemon juice.  Baked the fish at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

Popped it on top of a bigass salad made from spinach, tomatoes, carrots, yellow peppers, bean sprouts, and beets dressed with olive oil and lemon juice.

My late-ish dinner kept me from snacking while I spent my evening working, Tweeting and watching American Idol (I think Steven Tyler may have single handedly rescued the show for me!)

Sipping yummy tea while I blog away and it’s off to bed with me.  There’s a Castle episode just awaiting my snuggles under the covers.

Night!