Seattle Recap

I left Friday night to Seattle to visit my amazing friend who I hadn't seen in a little over a year. 

My view from the plane was spectacular. 

I got there late Friday and Natasha was working so I hung out with her until she closed. 

Saturday we went to eat brunch at this cute little place that was converted from a house into a restaurant. Then we went to the U-district to walk around and check out some thrift stores. 

We then went to trader joes to grab some stuff for a picnic we would be having before The National concert. 

The show was amazing. Okkervil River opened the show and they were pretty good. When The National came on we abandoned our blanket and picnic stuff to enjoy them from a much closer distance. 

Here are a bunch of pics from that night 

The next day, Sunday, her boyfriend made breakfast, we watched a little bit of football and then went to a few local places I read about. 

First stop the Fremont troll 

We went to the Fremont Marketplace after that to walk around the little booths. Nothing really fancied my liking so I didn't buy anything. We also went to Theo chocolate to pick some up since it's some of the best chocolate I've ever had. 

Then we went to Ballard to visit the Edith Macefield "Up" house. 

It's a house this woman wouldn't sell to developers and so they had to build around it. She passed away a little after she refused to sell her house, though it still remains...probably because people would object to it being torn down. 

Then we stopped at Trophy Cupcakes in Wallingford. It's so pretty there. 

Natasha had to work Sunday night  :(  so we headed home so she could get ready. I walked to a local used bookstore and bought 4 books. It was a nice walk, makes me wish we had cute little stores just as close so I could walk to those. Her boyfriend made us dinner, then we headed to her bar to hang out. 

Tino's old roommate and his girlfriend happened to be visiting at the same time so they came up to hang out as well. I talked to a lot of locals that night and I think that's the night I felt like I understood a little more about people and their environment. 

 Monday was very relaxing. Natasha made a delicious breakfast, we headed to Ballard to get more cupcakes from Cupcake Royale and some Stumptown coffee. Then we went to Mr. Gyro for lunch before I left to come home and make myself snap back to reality and the responsibilities I have.

Pretty new toy, pretty damn good food

The long weekend has made it hard for me to get back into the swing of things, including blogging. 

Friday Tino treated me to a nice dinner at Cheesecake Factory but not before buying me this blurry little beauty. 

It's the Nook e-reader from Barnes and Noble. I almost bought it for myself a couple months ago but decided to hold off. He bought it for no reason, and I got the pretty pink cover as well. I guess that's pretty much what I've been doing all weekend. 

Saturday the original family plans didn't happen but Tino and I ended up at my dad's for a "bbq." People brought food, there wasn't any bbq-ing going on. We both drank too much and stayed over. 

Sunday was spent completely relaxing and getting over our hang over. 

I met up with Monique and Bill after their bike ride to have lunch. We went to The Village Bakery & Cafe in Atwater Village. They have some awesome desserts there. 

our food 

  dessert: brownie and a donut muffin

 Moe (on the phone) and Bill

 Monday Tino's mom came to visit us for the first time and we took her to see Going the Distance and for lunch/dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (twice in one weekend).

Failed 5 Minute cake

I decided to make a 'special' dessert for my significant other, and thought this was a fantastic idea. It looked like fun to try, easy, and quick. This project was beyond deceiving. 

The 5 minute cake in a mug. 

This took me longer to mix than a regular cake would. And although the cook time was much shorter, so was the taste. I will say it looked kind of pretty but the texture wasn't appetizing at all. It was rubbery and the S.O. didn't like it either. (it's not hard to please him, so that's saying a lot) 

I followed those directions step by step but it wasn't as delicious as some of the reviews say it is. Maybe I'm just spoiled by really good cake. 

 

Iced coffee craziness!

I was browsing Food Gawker as I do in my free time now and recipes that look amazing I star and will hopefully go back and make some of these food creations. 

I saw one last week that I decided was easy enough not to wait and looked good enough that I had to try now. 

I'm a skeptic when someone says this is the "perfect thingy thing ever" because everyone has their perspective on what might be perfect. So I decided to try out this recipe titled "Perfect Iced Coffee" Partially because it looked promising using coffee ice cubes, and partially because who doesn't want to prove something wrong? 

So I brewed a pot of coffee, let it cool down a bit, and poured the coffee into an ice cube tray. I put the coffee pot in the fridge to get cold. 

The next morning this is what I got. 

My ingredients....

Final product

My verdict: 

This is THE PERFECT ICED COFFEE! The coffee ice cubes are a genius idea. It doesn't water the coffee down and you end up with more coffee rather than some watered down crap. I also like the use of the syrup rather than sugar because it mixes better in the cold coffee, unlike sugar. 

I will note that I forgot to eat breakfast and got the jitters about an hour later, but that is my fault. The taste was amazing though, and I'll definitely be figuring out other things to use my coffee ice cubes for also. 

Hump day drink I will

I like to enjoy the occasional drink after work, I'm no lush by no means, however a good beer can really get me going. 

I'm not usually the one to decide to have a drink during the week unless work was hectic. Well my new job isn't ever really "hectic" so I pretty much need to be invited to even consider going out during the week, otherwise it just doesn't come to mind. 

Leo (see pic below) texted me yesterday to see if I wanted to grab a drink at Verdugo Bar, our local watering hole/beer bar. I decided I could use a mid-week drink. 

Leo and Tino are always happy guys when they have a beer, but then again, who isn't?

Okay so I went out today after work to meet up with my friend Megan. We went to Spitz in Little Tokyo, and they have a bar, and decent happy hour. So I couldn't resist and I got a $4 sangria. Okay....I got 2! But I only took a picture of one. 

Doesn't that look like the most refreshing summer drink ever? I think so, and it was quite delicious! 

So I only came on here to blog about drinking, it only means I know how to unwind sometimes. I also will say I had no more than 2 drinks both times this week.

Looking forward to making some S'more cupcakes this weekend! Will show the results when I'm done with them.

Food, hair cut, food, movie, food...

In a nutshell here's how the weekend went: 

Dinner at Outback Friday night, hair cut and lunch with Monique Saturday day, LA Street Food Fest Saturday evening, Inception Sunday morning, Clancy's for the 'Early Bird Special' Sunday evening, and then home to rest. 

And now the pictures that follow: 

We sat on the balcony at Outback overlooking the Americana. It was a beautiful night on Friday. 

 The crowd at LA Street Food Fest

The band Warpaint

This totally awesome pic Tino and I took at the Oh! Snap photo thing. Haha still makes me laugh, and I love it! 

 Inception was an awesome movie. I recommend it to everyone. It goes along the lines of the types of movies Leonardo DiCaprio has been making and I loved it. Apparently you need to listen at the very end. 

Great weekend, and it was back to work today :( 

Weekend update

This weekend wasn't anything spectacular, but I enjoyed it. 

Saturday I decided to take a walk to a new restaurant I've never tried called Spitz, home of the doner kebab. I got the chicken doner wrap with sweet potato fries and an iced tea. I really want to try the street-cart fries (they're too big to eat with a wrap and by myself) and their gelato.

   

On the walk to and from there I took a few street photos. 

 An abandoned house on a busy street

On my walk home it started raining, that was weird. After that I had fun hanging out with my friends Leo and Jorge at the Verdugo Bar. 

After that I drove down to Bellflower to hang out with Tino and his friends Richard and Edgar who was visiting from Colorado. 

They're dorks...or Tino is :)

Sunday Tino and I hung out at his mom's house for a little while, watched the World Cup Finals and got ourselves some free 7-11 slurpee!!! 

 Like I wrote, nothing exciting, just an overall enjoyable weekend.