We've been in a lunch food rut. Carly is tired of buying school lunches, and I've been looking for something different to pack for lunch. Then it hit me -- a crab-shaped wiener!
Actually, the process was more drawn-out than that.
In doing a little surfing, I came to the realization that I was missing a food and culture trend. It has apparently become cool to mimic all things Japanese. From Hello Kitty to anime to Iron Chef Morimoto, we will stop at nothing to steal good ideas from the Japanese.
This now extends to bento boxes, the Japanese box lunch tradition. Not a bad idea -- there's a lot to like about the concept. And bonus! There are a LOT of cool bento box designs, at least one of which Ramona has already covered. If I can combine a high-wow-factor bento box and some healthy foods that appeal to a seven-year-old's palate, I may have something here!
Coincidentally, my friend Maki just opened a sister site to her Just Hungry site called Just Bento. So I know there will be plenty of mouthwatering recipes and drool-worthy photos to reference.
Are you still with me? I'm getting to the crab-shaped wienies now...
So anyway, I was checking out Maki's new site for inspiration and noticed her link to J-Box, which offers online shopping for almost all things cool and Japanese. There must be hundreds of amazing bento boxes there...and a whole variety of unique accessories for making bento box fare. Like the aforementioned (and pictured) crab-shaped wiener shaping tool! J-Box offers some other intriguing wiener-shaping devices as well, in case you want an octopus-shape to your dog.
And there you have it: A complete explanation of how I started looking for a good sammich for a 1st grader's lunch and ended up at crab-shaped wieners. Ah, the power and beauty of the interwebs!
It's just one of the many expressions we used to hear from my mom.
She had some other good ones, but that's another post. Because this is the expression that came to mind when I heard from Jen Y (thanks, Jen Y!) about my insightful soda versus pop post, though.
Yep, not only was this a question that has been pondered previously, but someone named Matthew T. Campbell took the trouble to devise a survey and map the nationwide results. If you take the time to go to the linked map, you can actually click on individual stats for complete survey information by county, thanks to Matthew T. Campbell and whatever grant was used to do this critical research.
Note that Pennsylvania is one of the few bipolar states with strong opinions and a clear dividing line. Innnneresting. Those Appalachian mountains were a bigger barrier than I thought!
And WHAT could possibly be going on in Alaska with this great debate? That's what I want to know.
"Soda" was among the many words I had to learn or redefine when I moved to Central PA.
You see, where I grew up in Western PA, a carbonated beverage is a "pop." There, a "soda" consisted of a scoop of ice cream in your glass of pop. So when someone in an online forum asked about soda versus pop last week, it piqued my interest...and made me wonder a little, too.
Where is the soda/pop line in Pennsylvania? Why is it a "tonic" in Boston and a "coke" in Charleston? And what do you call it where you live?
Now I've gone and done it. I've committed to writing at least one post each day for the month of November. It's all part of the National Blog Posting Month challenge, which was inspired by National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).
I could say I was inspired by the challenge to improve my writing. But I'd be lying. I was, in fact, drawn in by the LOLcat banner you see here.
Feel free to stop by the blog to see if the quirky cat motivates me to write new and better stuff, and hey -- leave some creative ideas while you're here, would ya? Or just look at the pretty pictures that will take the place of thousands of words (they're easier to post!)
And have a happy, more literate November, everyone!
So there I was, the night before Halloween, hunched over the dining room table with a plastic saw in my hand.
That's right, I did not get the coveted Dremel tool for carving this year.
Nor did I do much planning in advance -- this was strictly a hack-and-slash project. Thanks to the Pumpkin Lady, there were several easy (but still cool) patterns to crank out on the printer. What did we do before the internets?
But the pumpkins are finished in time for Halloween!
At least that's what the Epicurious "Name That Food" game tells me! In the spirit of complete disclosure, I have to admit that it took me two weeks to finally get all ten foodie questions correct. But it was a fun journey, a great game, and there's always the small chance of winning a Major Prize. Check it out!
If I were a real culinary genius, I would have devised an innovatively delicious meatloaf and blogged about it by now. It is, after all, National Meatloaf Appreciation Day today. To see what real culinary geniuses do with meatloaf, click here.
For the first time in nearly ten years, I'm not having a crazy-busy early October. It's all because there's no Unconvention this year.
From 1998 on, I hosted a gathering of garden railway fans here in Hershey. It was a loosely formed group of fun people who wanted to just get together, ride a few trains, watch old Monty Python movies and have fun. Because there was no politics involved and no rubber chicken dinners with long-winded speakers, we called our gathering the "Unconvention." It was the antithesis of a boring old convention.
This is the first year without an Unconvention—it just got too big and unwieldy, and took too much time to organize for one person with two little kids and a growing business. Plus, we were starting to require nametags since more and more people showed up each year—in short, the Unconvention was getting to be more like a convention than I wanted it to be!
But now that I have all this free time, I'm starting to miss the anticipation of friends arriving this weekend. Since part of Unconvention always involved a train ride on the Strasburg Railroad, John and I took the kids there last weekend. It was nice—another great tourist attraction in our backyard—but it wasn't the same without all our unconventional friends along for the ride.
We'll also miss going to the Stoudt's Brewery Oktoberfest this year, too. And the barbeque we always hosted. And the trips en masse to Hersheypark in the Dark.
Maybe it's time to resurrect the Unconvention. Maybe next year...
So it's the end of the work week and I'm daydreaming about travel again. Well, not JUST about travel...more about travel and food (I'm hungry). This is completely narcissistic, so feel free to look away unless you'd like to navel-gaze with me. And do feel free to post your own Top Five, those of you who bravely continued without averting your eyes.
So here's my thought: when teleportation becomes safe and available, what five restaurants would I most like to visit (and naturally, eat and drink at) during five days of my Best Food Week Ever? I didn't put too many parameters on this; heck, it's Friday. I just wanted to designate five cool places to eat, based on my admittedly limited experience -- with no requirements for fine dining at all. And here's what I came up with:
1. Weisses Brauhaus, München
Arrive by 10 a.m. for fresh Weisswurst with a side of radishes and Brez'n, lots of stoneground Bavarian mustard and the bubbly and refreshing Schneider Weisse Kristall. Perfection!
2. Ana Mandara, San Francisco
I'd want to do an early dinner here. It's a gorgeous space that deserves to be enjoyed in as much solitude as possible. When I was here last, the Vietnamese-inspired food was bright and full of flavor, just incredible.Our servers were knowledgable, never condescending, and wholly unobtrusive. Since I was pregnant during my last visit, I feel a real need to return and try a few of the drinks with my meal.
3. The Equator, Caneel Bay, St. John
Can anyone recapture the excitement of a wedding and honeymoon? I'll have to try it and let you know! We were here for a week with friends and family in April, 2000 (yes, it was *our* wedding and honeymoon, and yes, we had an entourage with us most of the time) and enjoyed two exquisite dinners in this open restaurant. I'd want to arrive about an hour before sunset so I could enjoy the changing light. I remember a spectacular ceviche and perfectly just-walked-by-the-pan pepper encrusted ahi tuna filet.
4. Abbott's Lobster in the Rough, Noank, CT
Hot lobster roll, cold beer, waterfront location, sunset again. Nothing more need be said.
5. My secret grocery store, lakeside, Montreux
The proprietor of my favorite little shop near the lake in Montreux makes the perfect picnic sandwich to enjoy on a summer afternoon. He slices the freshest crusty baguette and rubs a slice of tomato, and then a clove of garlic into the soft insides. A swath of sweet cream butter goes on. He adds a few slices of Emmenthaler cheese and sausage cured by the gods. And you have The.Best.Sandwich.Anywhere.
Ahhhh, virtual traveling and dining. It may be the next best thing to being there...and I even feel inspired to head to the farm market and find some freshness for dinner!
If you have a short attention span or feel the need to expand your library of cool avatars, head to this site and honor another long-standing icon of animated fun by creating your own South Park avatar.
Defying Gravity
Idina Menzel: Wicked (2003 Original Broadway Cast)
