NEW POST AT NEW SITE

Hello all,

You can find my most recent post about my trip to San Francisco HERE.  

My new website is at dazzlefullife.com and is where you can find all new and old posts.

Mad love,

Kristy

THE NEW DAZZLEFUL LIFE WEBSITE!!!

www.dazzlefullife.com

Hello All,

If you’ve found yourself here then you should mosey on over to the new website at dazzlefullife.com where all new updates are being posted.  Eventually I’ll have this figured out where if you come to this site it will automatically direct you to the new site, but my brain is working on that still.  I love you all and hope you enjoy the new site I designed.

xoxo

Kristy

Flasher Mac: Broccoli, Bratwurst, and Mustard Macaroni and Cheese

I was minding my own fur clad business when walking home from work last night when I was met with the most unpleasant of surprises. While passing under the freeway I saw an elderly gentleman who I assumed was one of our friendly neighbors, who sometimes sleeps there, setting up shop and was surprised to find he was not setting up shop but had pulled down his knickers to flash his didley widley at me! Slightly disturbed and surprisingly violated I made my way home after calling my experience into 911. (Don’t worry, my wonderful co-worker Jen has now supplied me with the non-emergency line.) After locking the door tight, putting my pepper spray into my purse, and calling my mom I opened a bottle of wine and contemplated how I was going to erase the image that was so recently burned into my brain. The answer of course was in the kitchen. What I needed was some stove therapy.

After eying the blue box in my roomies cupboard I decided to pass on the easy route and instead opened her Macaroni & Cheese cookbook by Marlena Spieler. Reading recipes relaxes me, so I read the entire thing. Back to front, then front to back, mentally noting the recipes that were possible with the contents of my fridge. It was between the Broccoli Mac from the back or the Yankee mac in the middle. The note at the bottom of the Yankee mac had the brilliant idea of adding broccoli to it, so that was that. I used the recipe from the book as a base and went into the kitchen, turned on my Reba pandora station, and dove into the prep for my flasher mac.

^Lunch leftovers: The perks of making way too much food^

Pinteresting

Last week my roommate asked me if I was still blogging.  I replied yes, and realized I hadn’t had the time to finish any of the blogs I’ve started in the last few weeks.  Over the holidays I got to go on two epic foodie adventures that are both completely unblogged about.  I promise, I will eventually share the over-indulgent amazingness that were my trips to Ox and The Woodsmans Tavern, but until then I have something to share with you.  It’s more of an admission than a share.  I am officially addicted to Pinterest.  I know, I know, I’m late to the game.  But man oh man am I finding all sorts of inspiration on that time sucking site.   Since I haven’t had the courtesy to stay up to date on my blog posts  I thought I would share some of my favorite finds from Pinterest I’ve found during my weeklong Pinning binge.  And here they are in no particular order:

Cream Cheese Coffee Cake was pinned by my friend Penny and promptly whipped up for company that evening.  Penny was one of the lucky ones who got to try it, even though she was a bit miffed that I made it before she had a chance.  Just a little miffed, because she still got to eat this yummy breakfast/dessert/snack item.

I also learned how to get candle wax out of containers.  Technically, I haven’t tried this yet.  But around my house we are really into candles.  (I MUST GET RENTERS INSURANCE) We’ve tried freezing them, which worked okay, but took up a lot of room in our already stuffed freezer.  Since I’m going to try this in the future I went out yesterday and bought the yummiest vanilla candle in a beautiful vase, so I have something to try it on.  I definitely needed another reason to buy candles…

I just got Kissa Bear, my beautiful cat.  Now I’m looking for a piece of art so I can decorate her area like this.  My room is already pretty decorated so now I’m being inspired to find new places to get creative in my house.  Kissa is going to love her nook art.

Not only have I found myself staring at my Pinterest feed for long periods of time, I’ve also discovered another reason to scour the interwebs for things like the Pasha Skeleton Watch with Panther.  It makes me feel amazing to have a reason to cruise the Cartier site for a reason other than to make myself cry, but to share with the masses pretty dazzleful items I can only dream of owning.

If you haven’t gotten an invite to join Pinterest yet, give me a holler and I’ll invite you.  Then you can follow me into the abyss of addiction….:)

So, that’s what I’ve been up to.  I hope you are all having a wonderful new year and getting a lot more done than I am!  Keep your eyes peeled for the belated but complete posts on my foodie adventures from the past few weeks.  Until then, have a dazzleful day!

xoxo

Foodie Adventure: The Woodsman Tavern

Since I started chronicling my foodie adventures, my dinner date requests have increased exponentially. It was no surprise that my sister Amy was quick to ask if we could go on a foodie adventure when she was home for Christmas. As my list of must try restaurants grows daily, I was happy to oblige. My wonderful roommate Melissa was along for the ride(And she did literally drive us. Thanks, Mel!) for our adventure to the high brow hipster joint, The Woodsman Tavern. Next door to the original Stumptown off of SE Division this “tavern” is so popular we had an hour and a half wait for a table for three. There sure are a lot of high brown hipster lovers in Portland!

The menu is separated into separate specialties and plates. It includes drinking snacks, raw & chilled seafood, country ham, first plates, second plates, and side plates. It is quite a menu, but it doesn’t hold a candle to their drink menu. Pages and pages of bottles, glasses, and tumblers. I went with a glass of Montepulciano, while Amy and Mel each chose a glass of white. I don’t drink white wine, so I don’t keep track of it. I believe drinking white wine is for sweltering summer evenings or beginners. If you want to prove me wrong, go ahead. You’re buying.

Get to Gather: Christmas Eve Dinner

Every year since I can remember my family has done the real Christmas celebrating on Christmas Eve. We go to a Christmas Eve candlelight service, eat dinner, and then open all of our gifts. Not one, all of them. Yes, you heard that right, we open all of our gifts on Christmas eve. Okay, I suppose we save our stocking gifts for the Christmas morning, but all of the big-ticket good stuff is received on Christmas Eve. Patience is not a family virtue.

This year for dinner I volunteered to make the same ham I feasted on at Thanksmas. The rest of the meal was left to my mother.  I’ll take the rest of this post to share our meal and the semi-homemade cooking style she exudes.

Foodie Adventure: Toro Bravo

You would think that the wait for a table would be reasonable on a Monday night, right? Not at the famous tapas restaurant Toro Bravo. The wait for a group of four was over an hour when we arrived at 6:30, and boy was it worth it!  My cousin Beth, our friends Vashti and Amy, and I weathered out the wait upstairs at Secret Society. Toro Bravo called us when our table was ready, but that wasn’t until after the Red Cross called and roped me into my next blood donations.  I don’t think a group of people have ever been as disappointed by a red cross cold call as we were.

Above is the menu for Toro Bravo. You see that star next to the Griddled Bacon Wrapped Date, that was my way of marking a dish we ate. My group and I chose to embrace the adventure of the evening and order the Chefs Choice Tasting Menu. We were informed the Chefs Tasting Menu consisted of six to eight separate dishes with enough for everyone. On a previous trip to Toro Bravo the server had been very clear on the strict nature of the Chefs Menu, so I was surprised when our wonderful server said she could just do the choosing and keep our tasting within budget and low on the gluten side for our gluten free party members. After going over the menu that I took for research purposes there are twelve dishes with stars by them. Our server was a rock star.