A Social Butterfly

Happy Friday!

Hopefully you have fun plans for the weekend, I know I do! This week was terribly busy, and I feel like it is the most social week I've had in a while.

There was the outdoor movie on campus:

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Have you seen this? I thought certain parts were funny, but I don't think I'd watch it again. It wasn't bad...

Then there was an end of the year banquet for one of my clubs at this place:

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It was pretty fun! We had our officer elections (next year the VP is yours truly), too. I'm usually not one for places with games like this, but it was quite amusing to watch my friends and club members rack up the tickets. It's kind of ridiculous how many tickets you need for the "big ticket" (pun intended) items, like ipods and such. I think it turns out to be more money-wise using the tickets than if you just purchased it in the store.

This afternoon I have my work-abroad meeting...the last one before I leave! Eek! More on that later.

Saturday afternoon/night I'm going to the military ball and Sunday I'm going out to dinner with another club.

Whew, it's going to be fun, but I'll have to fit homework in here somewhere...boo.

So, onto the food:

I picked up this salad at the grocery store last week; twas delicious.

Does it look boring? That's because all the goodness is hiding inside...

Don't worry, it's not chicken...it's cinnamon grilled pineapple. Holy delicious!

Herbed roasted carrots

Butternut squash. It's part of a pre-made salad at the salad bar that consists of the squash, dried cranberries, roasted onions, and spinach. But I'm all over the squash.

Can you see the wonderful berry medley that hiding amongst the veggies?

The salad was delicious! And on the subject of delicious things, I've been reading about PB & Co. for quite some time, so when I was at the store last weekend, I picked up a jar of this deliciousness: Cinnamon Raisin Swirl.

Step one: Open and observe the jar of deliciousness.

Step Two: Utilize a scooping utensil.

Step Three: Ensue scoopage.

Step Four: Taste the results.

I really liked this flavor. It tasted a lot of cinnamon and had little crunchy bits in it, which I assume were sugar? There were also raisins scattered in it, which I thought was a little weird. I like to keep my peanut butter in the fridge, so the raisins got hard and chewy. It was kind of odd to have that texture in the peanut butter.

The stats, if anyone's interested:

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Funny story: I was looking forward to having tea this morning, but when I made it downstairs to the microwave, I found a sign on it saying that it was broken. Boo...I was still in my bathrobe, so I didn't want to go to another building. Oh well. The tea will have to wait for later.

Questions: Do you have any big plans for the weekend? 


                 What's your favorite flavor of PB&Co., if you have one, or which one would you like to try?

My Addiction

So, while browsing through my recent pictures to develop this post, I realized I have a theme going on. Then I looked at all my receipts from this week and realized I have an addiction. You probably can already guess what it is...

Hmmm...this is not good. Not good for my wallet, at least. Now I feel like I have to be a spokesperson for Naked now,  I apparently drink so much of it.

Song of the day: You and I by Ingrid Michaelson

I found this song today and really started to like it...the banjo-esque instrument in the background makes me happy.

So, my friend (the one I went to visit in DC) gave me this to try, since he didn't care for it:

I'm not usually one for milk chocolate, but why would I ever turn down free chocolate? So I sampled.

Can you tell it went through a little melting ordeal before I got to it?

The inside....

The verdict? Not that great. There wasn't a pronounced peanut butter flavor and the chocolate was just okay. Perhaps some of it had to do with the fact that it had melted and re-solidified multiple times...I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt.

So I had some of the real stuff, some organic PB I bought (and finished the jar):

The PB was smooth, but it had flecks of peanuts in it, which made it taste like freshly ground PB, so good...

I feel a lot better eating organic PB than regular, but I'd rather have almond butter, but it's super expensive. I did go to the store today, so tomorrow I'll show you the loot. Yum.

Questions: What's your favorite kind of nut butter?

                 What's your latest song obsession? I'm always looking for new songs...

Bubble Tea, Foreign Films, and ... Peanut Butter

To finish up my trip (I feel like I've taken a trip nearly every weekend this semester...I promise I actually do work sometimes, haha):

A few of the random things we did throughout the weekend: 

- went to a classical vocal concert dress rehearsal

- saw a great movie, "Farewell," at the DC International Film Festival (it was in Russian and French with English subtitles, and was by the same director as "Joyeux Noel," another great movie)

- walked around Georgetown

- did some real estate browsing

- visited TJ's

-took the Metro a LOT...

-and I had my first bubble tea!

It was lychee flavored...delicious!

On Saturday morning we ate at Busboys and Poets, an activist cafe named after the poet Langston Hughes. The food there was terrific. I knew that later that day we'd be eating at a tea shop, so I didn't want to have too much (partially prompted by the copious amounts of chocolate and German cookies graciously offered to me by my friend). One of the first things I saw when I walked in were the homefries. They looked absolutely delicious and I immediately settled on having that, although the sweet fugi apple and gorgonzola sandwich with fig spread on walnut raisin bread (whew, what a mouthful!) was calling too. I also got some freshly squeezed carrot juice. It was so creamy and carroty; just the way I like it. I'm sorry I don't have pictures; we ate with some of his friends and it just would have been awkward to take pictures. I'd definitely go there again.

The restaurant highlight of my trip was to Teaism, a tea shop and restaurant. There are three locations, and we went to the one in Dupont Circle, which was right by Embassy Row. It was fun to see all the flags of the different countries there.

I like eating little portions of a lot of different foods, instead of eating a meal with say, three items of a normal portion. So we decided to do a tapas type thing and order a lot of their side dishes. First the tea. I am an avid tea drinker; NOT a coffee person at all, haha. We got the Africa Star tea, which was a fruity tea, to share. Next up, the sides. We decided on the:

Naan with mango chutney 

Sweet Potato Salad with miso sauce 

Asian Slaw with spicy mayo dressing

and 

Palak Paneer: Indian spinach curry with homemade cheese, Indian brown rice & raita.

It was all very delicious. My favorite was the sweet potato salad, followed closely by the naan. My friend's was the Asian slaw. It was creamy at first, then you got the kick from the pepper in the dressing.
We saved room for dessert and got the chocolate tort with green tea gelato and a salty oatmeal raisin cookie (this one to go). The chocolate tort was alright; it improved on eating. The cookie was delicious; not too salty, but very oaty.

The spread...

The green tea gelato...

See the salt grains on top of the cookie?

I would highly recommend Teaism if you're in the DC area. I can't wait to go back again.

Haha, just a quick note on WF again. I forgot to mention in my last post that we tried the So Delicious green tea coconut ice cream. Did we like it?

We ate the whole pint.

That dinner was a wild one. I can now say that I've experienced peanut butter on brussel sprouts, citrus roasted potatoes, and green tea coconut ice cream. And you know what, it was pretty good.

Question: What's the weirdest/oddest food combination you've had? (Evan, I was thinking of you and PB with homefries...)


Checkout Madeline's giveaway for a tea press!

The "Last " Meal

So, last night I got a bit hungry and decided to use up some sweet potatoes I bought, since my spring break starts TODAY! I sliced them up to facilitate faster baking, then stuck them in the dorm's convection oven and waited. And waited. And waited. It took forever. 

Sort of dried out...

A slightly darker close-up view of an especially tasty little gem...

They didn't turn out exactly how I wanted, but it was the best I could do with a convection oven. I ate them straight up, with no condiments or anything. It was only after I ate them all did I remember I wanted to try them with peanut butter, per Evan's suggestion. Whoops, sorry Evan. But don't worry, I guarantee there will be a next time.


I'm heading off to my cousin's baby shower, then finally home. I'll probably be visiting my friend at ND for a night too. I'm looking forward to fresh food and my mom's stash of dates (I've been dying to have some, so I asked her to bring them with her to the shower, haha). I can't get enough of sweet potatoes, dates, and figs right now. You know when people ask what your "last" meal would be? Most people might answer "pizza" or "a hamburger," but mine would probably consist of the above list.


Questions: What foods can't you get enough of? What would your "last meal" be?


Have a wonderful weekend and I'll be back on Monday!

The Best Breakfast Ever

Who doesn't love bananas and peanut butter? Not me, for sure. 

(Notice the lovely banana peel and my computer in the background...)

I pretty much re-discovered its deliciousness two weeks ago, and I think I'd had it everyday since then. I love slicing up the banana and spreading it up with creamy peanut butter. I would rather use almond butter or another nut butter, but I'll take what I can get here. (I didn't want to run out to the store with only a few days left until spring break) The cafeteria has these little packs of peanut butter that come in these adorable cups. I have a horrible sense of estimating sizes and amounts, so I naturally thought that each of these little cups was a tablespoon. Um...a few days ago I realized I was pretty much wrong. Whoops. Guess I shouldn't have eaten four of them... :-/


I know a lot of you are fans of oats in the morning, but I just can't get into them. Oatmeal has never been something I've liked. I would love to just eat the toppings that all of you garnish your oatmeal with, but I don't think it would keep me full, haha.


Today my friend and I are going to set up an appointment with one of the execs on campus to talk about a possible revamp of our dining system. We had written a proposal detailing how the hospitality students on campus would run the whole dining facility (getting credit for it) and presented it to the Hospitality dean, who surprisingly went for it! We were so happy. He suggested presenting it to the next level, so that's what we're going to do today. Hopefully the project works, because better dining would make college SO much better AND keep more money in my wallet, so I don't have to keep running to the grocery store for sustenance.


So, what's your normal breakfast? Anything you have to religiously have everyday?


It's almost Friday...hooray!

Enter this awesome giveaway for Funky Monkey freeze-dried fruit!