Arrogant Bastard Ale

One of the coolest places we visited (multiple times) in Chicago was this massive wine and beer warehouse. They had a ton of imports, in addition to brews from all sorts of small, regional breweries--and that's just the beer selection! This particular beer is actually available at specialty liquor stores in Sioux Falls (so I've been told), but I just had to get it once I read the bottle (which I really wish I had with me so I could quote it exactly). Basically, the entirety of the label on the back is a rant about how you are not good enough to drink this beer and this is the best beer in the world and if you don't like it then just just means that you are not worthy, not that the beer isn't good. Well, apparently I am not worthy. But I certainly won't go around tarnishing the name of this beer--because while it wasn't for me, it certainly wasn't bad. I was kind of expecting something like a Newcastle meets Killian's based on it's coloring and description, and it was really more like Newcastle meets Killian's meets massive amounts of hops. Which Darrell, who has recently become a big IPA fan, was all over. But I suppose I should have expected the hops--or at least something--in there; after all, it is called Arrogant Bastard, and deservedly so!

GOOOAAAALLL!!!

After three years of playing adult co-ed soccer in the summer, it's finally happened--I scored a goal! I was too stunned by the fact that the ball went into the net to do any real celebration, although Darrell was rocking some fist-pumps for me from the sideline. And I'd like to pretend like it was an important, meaningful goal, but we were pretty well dominating the game, so it was fairly anti-climatic. Not to mention it was like the third or fourth shot I'd taken that game, including a breakaway, so I was pretty relieved that I'd redeemed myself from totally botching the other attempts. There's a reason I primarily play defense--I've been trained for so long to keep the ball out of the net that when I get in the open field taking a ball toward the net I tend to panic. But, the stars must have been aligned on this one because it sailed right over the outstretched hands of the keeper and into the top corner of the net. Definitely an exciting--although somewhat surreal--moment. Here's to hoping I can manage to score another sometime soon!

Chicago Weekend

So, as I alluded to yesterday, I did actually take a brief vacation which attributed to a small portion of my absence. Three of my good friends from middle school/high school and myself have been talking for years about taking a road trip, and we finally found the time to go on one! We took off early on a Friday morning to head out there and came back early Monday morning, so we only had a few short days in the city itself, but it was a total blast.

Friday night we went out for pizza at Giordano's, which has amazing Chicago-style deep-dish pizzas. We split one pizza between the five of us (my friend Kelly met up with us for dinner and drinks), and still had leftovers. If you ever go there, don't expect to eat more than one slice. And if you do--expect to be uncomfortably full for the next several hours.

Kelly and I hanging out after dinner

Saturday we slept in, then walked a couple miles to this fantastic breakfast/brunch place called The Bongo Room. Unfortunately, everyone else in the Chicago area apparently also knows how delicious the food is, because we had a 45-minute wait. It was totally worth it though--my red velvet pancakes were to die for, although brunch really shouldn't be allowed to be that sweet. We walked around for a little while, but decided to head back to our hotel when we noticed a storm rolling in. Well, apparently we didn't decide to head back soon enough, because even though we took public transit for nearly three-quarters of the distance, we still got pretty soaked. But it was nothing that a nap couldn't fix.

Saturday night we went out for dinner at Fornello Trattoria, which we didn't really know much about other than the fact that we had a Groupon to use there. It ended up not disappointing--the food was delicious, the wine was wonderful, and the tiramisu was to die for. Definitely a worthwhile Italian restaurant to check out in the Chicago area.

Jenna and Kristen at dinner

Megan and I at dinner

Megan was our resident-expert on the Chicago area over the weekend because she used to attend school out there, and she insisted that one place we had to visit was Kingston Mines. It's a jazz and blues bar located a few miles north of downtown, but it was totally worth the extra taxi fare to get there because it was a great time. The music and people and atmosphere and everything were just a blast. We watched an older woman go crazy on the dance floor, reliving the days of her youth, at the same time we watched a woman probably a third her age try to land a hook-up (because I can't imagine she was looking for anything else with a dress that barely covered her butt-cheeks). There were people who literally danced themselves out of their seats, and guys who never lost hope after getting shot down by woman after woman. And, because we couldn't spend the whole evening just people-watching from our table near the stage, we got up and did a little dancing of our own. It was such a great night--and the latest I've been up in a long time.

Sunday we slept in and recovered a little. Since the weather was beautiful, we decided to take the bus into downtown and do a little shopping and walking along the lake. It was the perfect Sunday afternoon escapade.

Millenium Park

Sailboats in the harbor

For dinner Sunday night we ventured into Greek town. We'd been recommended to the Parthenon by multiple, unrelated groups of people, so we figured it was worth a shot. And man, are we ever glad people recommended us there. I've never really had Greek food so I don't have much to compare it to, but Kristen and Megan had both visited Greece in college, and they said the food was authentically delicious. As an added plus, they have a family-style meal available, so we got to try three different appetizers, soup, salad, four entrees, and two desserts for under $25 a person. Everything was sooo good, but we were so stuffed by the time we finished (and that was even after spreading the meal out over three hours).

Even though our sleep and wallets and waistlines took a little bit of a hit over the weekend, it's safe to say that we'll be planning another road trip again as soon as we can. And maybe this next time we'll wisen up and not plan our entire trip around food--but then again, what would be the fun in that?

I'm baaack!

Well, I've actually be back for almost two weeks. But things have been certifiably crazy around these parts, and I just haven't had the time to sit down and collect my thoughts, let alone put together a coherent blogpost. And, to be fair, today won't really be anything all that spectacular because I received a frantic email from my mom earlier asking me to do some baking before dinner at 6:30, so I'm off to do that. But, things have finally returned to as close to normal as they'll ever be, so I'll be able to get back to putting recipes and garden news and book reviews and all sorts of other fun stuff up here with more regularity!

From Bad to Worse

Well, apparently the death and destruction being wrought by pests in our garden wasn't done yet. Remember this picture from last week?

Well, here's the picture from today.



Totally bare in the middle of the plot, except for a few vines from our winter squash plant. We've officially lost all four summer squash/zucchini plants. Saddest day ever. 

And, as helpful as the Internet can be, we still aren't entirely sure of the problem. This is what the stems looked like prior to pulling them.

Here's a close up shot of the stem after we broke it off (which, believe me, wasn't a difficult task at all as broken down as these stems were).

So, I did some research, and the best explanation I could find for this was that it was frass, which is a common indicator of an infestation of squash vine borers. And sure enough, as I looked at the pictures, I remember thinking that I saw black and red bugs like that in the garden but just didn't know what they were. Squash vine borers lay their eggs at the base of the plant and the larvae burrow into the stem and grow there, which is basically what kills the plant (and what causes the frass). So, I grabbed my gloves and a box cutter and decided to dig a little deeper into the plant, hoping to find a larvae to confirm the presence of squash vine borers. And all I found was this.

Little black beetle-looking things. Which we also found in one of the other plants. But we never found any larvae, and bugs like this are not consistent with squash vine borers. So, back to the Internet I went. The only other common squash pest are squash bugs--which, coincidentally--look strikingly like stink bugs. And we definitely had one or the other in our garden this spring, because I happened to see one while Darrell was out there with me and he identified it as a stink bug. However, squash bugs lay their eggs on the leaves (which we never saw, but then again, we weren't looking there), and the have longer legs and antennas than the bugs we found in the stem (plus they never really have a black coloring). So who knows. We'll definitely try a few things differently next year, so here's to hoping that something actually works and we can enjoy a full summers worth of squash and zucchini. Fingers crossed!

In the Nick of Time...

I'll warn you now, the picture accompanying this post is a little gross. Actually, it's a lot gross. But this is what happens when you have wasps all over the frickin place.

Here's the background. Even though we killed three fairly decent sized wasps nests this spring, another one a month ago, and had one blow off the house in a storm, we kept seeing wasps fly around. So we went out to investigate again. We found one underneath our deck, but decided that as long as we were checking we'd be absolutely thorough. Up on the roof we went to check where our eaves overlap. And boy, was that ever a good decision. Not only did we find a handful of a nest, but it had six wasps on it. We also got two additional ones that were trying to fly back to the nest as we were sitting on the roof. But that's not the gross part. Apparently when you spray the wasps nest with Raid (which, for the record, we will never use anything else for wasp control), it not only kills the adult wasps that are perched on it, but also the larvae that are growing. And by kills them, I mean makes them fall out of the nest. You ready for this picture?

Isn't that disgusting?!? We counted just over twenty larvae that fell out of the nest--and some of those larvae have got to be close to maturity; they're about the same size as the dead adult wasps! Can you imagine if we hadn't gotten to that nest when we did?? It honestly makes my stomach churn just a little bit.

Cake Box Cookies

Here's how I know I've found a good recipe. It shows up on my blog three times in the past five months. It all started with the Fudgy Crinkles back in March, then my red velvet variation for our anniversary in May, and most recently the varieties I made for my mom's jewelry party. After making the recipe so many times, I figured that it was time I made some comments and reviews on it, because I've definitely noticed some differences from time to time.

The biggest difference? The type of cake mix used. Not the flavor of cake mix being used, but rather the brand of cake mix (although I suppose that in order to do a true comparison, I should do the same flavor in different brands).

Notice how much flatter the lemon, and especially the red velvet, are compared to the chocolate? They all came out of the oven at roughly the same thickness, but only the chocolate didn't flatten significantly upon cooling. The difference? The chocolate is made from Pillsbury, while the other two are Duncan Hines. And not only did the cookies cool differently, but the dough was also significantly different. The use of my mixer may have impacted this slightly, but I found that the red velvet and lemon dough were far too sticky to be rolled into balls like the recipe calls for. Instead, I ended up loading the dough into my icing decorator and pressing out the dough like they were spritz cookies (although I did shape them like a ball and not flat, so I don't think that's why they flattened so much with cooling). All three of those varieties were made with half a cup of butter, but I've also made them with half a cup of oil before. If my memory serves me correctly, the ones made with oil were a little bit more moist, while the ones with butter definitely had a little butter flavor.

Truthfully, despite these differences, I haven't had a bad batch of them yet. They are definitely worth making, and they are easily customizable to any occasion. And just as a reminder, here is the basic recipe!

1 box cake mix
2 eggs
1/2 cup butter or oil

Mix all ingredients together. Roll into balls and place on a greased baking sheet. Bake at 350* for 8-10 minutes, although this may vary depending on the size of the cookie. The cookies should still seem a little doughy when they come out of the oven. Cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack.

Road Race Fun

As I mentioned earlier this week, one of my good friends was home from Hong Kong with her boyfriend from a short period of time. And for whatever reason, we decided that it would be a good idea to do a road race while they were in town. So, last Saturday, we drove to the booming metropolis of Madison SD (population 6000) for a 5K race. Although, to be fair, Linda's boyfriend was really the only one who "raced" the event. Here he is at the start, at the front of the pack.

He stayed with that pack for pretty much the entire race, finishing in the top 10 with a time just over 20 minutes later. Damn Canadians.

The rest of us took it much easier (mostly out of necessity, but whatever). We ran together with the middle of the pack for awhile, but it didn't take long for Darrell to split off from Linda and me.

And even though Linda probably could have finished faster than the pace I was running at (just faster than a 10 min/mile), we ran the whole thing together and got a fun picture of the finish.

Okay, so maybe I make it look more painful than fun, but whatever. The best part of the event actually came after the 5K was over; as a part of the day's festivities they had a half-mile fun run for the kids. So as we were walking around and cooling down this mob of kids, ranging in age from 2 to 12, came dashing down the street. It was super cute, and almost worth the grueling 5K race on mostly uncovered highways. Almost.

Seriously?!?!

Our house is apparently a haven for insects. We have spiders a plenty in the basement (part of the reason why cleaning it keeps getting put off), we have wasps a plenty outside (I think we're on nest six or seven for the summer), and we recently had ants a plenty in the house (you can bet that I sent Darrell out for some ant killer almost instantly). And as much as all of those suck, I suppose I can understand them a little bit; after all, they all tend to be common household pests. But this?!?!

I am soooo not okay with that being in my house. We have absolutely no idea where it came from, nor do we know what it is (Darrell thinks it's some sort of grasshopper--but it's frickin huge!!). It's just a good thing Darrell was home when I found it--I've started taking on some of our other household enemies, but no way was I going to take on this thing. I'm usually not much of a girly-girly, but when stuff like this shows up in my house, all bets are off.

Casualties

Well, it was bound to happen. Our garden has suffered some casualties. Can you spot the differences?

June 23rd

August 2nd

Aside from the obvious differences in size, you might notice that the middle and front center of the garden seems a little under-populated (that leafy thing you see front and center is not actually something rooted there but rather a vine from one of the winter squash plants). All three of our spinach plants died, and (the saddest news of all), so did one of our zucchini plants. We're not entirely sure what happened to the zucchini plant; in the past few weeks we've gotten three or four good sized zucchinis off it, and just a week ago Darrell picked two. A few days later when I went out to water, the entire plant was yellowing and completely limp. Upon closer investigation, it appeared that the stem was starting to disintegrate near the soil. Darrell thinks he may have damaged the stem when he picked the zucchinis, but I'm not sure it would have died that quickly. To make matters worse, when I was out taking these pictures it appeared the same thing was happening to the other zucchini plant. I may have to do some investigating into this--I've already used the Internet to determine that our summer squash keep rotting on the stem because they are suffering from blossom end rot, which can be caused by low calcium levels. We might be doing a few things differently next year if a similar ailment has affected our zucchini.


In happier news, it seems that the remaining plants are thriving. Our tomato plants are going pretty crazy--nothing has ripened yet, but two of the biggest ones looked like they were starting to darken this afternoon, so I'll have to keep an eye on them.

I count six tomatoes in this shot alone--how many do you see?

Our broccoli appears to be making broccoli, but we're not entire sure when and how to pick it. I think we're waiting for it to get a little thicker? We'll see.

Although the fate of our remaining zucchini plant and summer squash plants remains uncertain, our winter squash plant doesn't seem to be facing any of the same issues. It's vined several feet outside of the garden (in addition to all over the garden itself), and the rabbits that were living under our front step must have died because it doesn't appear that anything has been snacking on the vines. Which is fortunate, because it's starting to produce some good-looking squash.

Still no produce on the green bean or bell pepper plants, but they continue to grow and are flowering a little more consistently, so hopefully we're on our way to getting something out of those.

As a parting shot, I can't help but share what might be the last zucchini picked from our garden. Here's to hoping the remaining plant and summer squash plants start making a recovery!

Easy Fancy Treats!

My mom recently hosted a jewelry party, and, being the wonderful daughter that I am, I offered to bake her some treats for it (okay, maybe I was just dying to have an excuse to use my new mixer. Whatever). She wanted them to be a little on the "fancy" side, but nothing that would be terribly messy or sticky since people would also be touching and trying on her jewelry. After some brainstorming and deliberating, I had the perfect treat.

Are those cute or what? I had fun playing around with the flavors too--the one on the furthest left is lemon with strawberry filling, then chocolate with mint filling, and finally red velvet with cream cheese filling. And the best part is that they looked super cute with minimal effort! I'll do a full post on the recipe soon, but they were all variations on the cake-box cookies that I've blogged about before. And with the mixer, they were easier than ever. It went from this...

To this...

in under five minutes! Then just roll them into balls, bake them, pipe a little frosting in the middle, sandwich two together, and life is good! And they display nicely too!

These just might become my go-to treat. They're so great!

Good Friends, Good Fun, Good Grill

I was a little MIA last week because my good friend who has been living in Hong Kong for the past three years was back in town for a short visit. And we also got to finally meet her Canadian boyfriend (who she met in HK... It's a little random, I know). So we spent a good bit of time out and about last week showing him all of the exciting things Sioux Falls has to offer (and subsequently plan to recover this week). We also learned that since space is such a precious commodity in Hong Kong (and really, most of Asia), grilling is a fairly uncommon occurrence. And if you do find stuff that's been grilled, chances are that it's also been drenched in teriyaki sauce. Not that teriyaki is altogether bad...just a little boring after like the second time. So, thanks to some great weather and surprisingly open schedules, we were able to get a group together for a grill out. And grill we did.

It was quite the assortment of meats and veggies on the grill that night. Which is why grilling is an absolutely perfect choice for dinner with a group of people. And why buying a big grill was a great investment. Haven't regretted that purchase for a minute!

I'll share a few more of the things we did with the Asian and Canadian later this week (or once I get pictures!)--Sioux Falls is just so full of boring exciting things to do that I don't want to overwhelm you all at once!