Gratuitous food and flower pictures

Bundled bread 

Squid ink pappardelle and lobster tail

 Everyone loves cannoli

Rieslingggg

 Scallops and pigs ear (winning combo)

Braised veal and gnocchi

Most important meal of the day....

Aftermath...

Bucatini Carbonara

This was a dish I had at Cibo Matto, a restaurant in my fave hotel in Chicago (the Wit). There was really nothing special about it, just cheesy pasta, but I never forgot about it. 

All you need:

Pancetta - bucatini - pecorino romano - lots of salt and pepper  - egg yolk

I really can't stand runny eggs, but the egg yolk is really critical here. 

No the Giada brand is not important. It happens to be the only bucatini I have ever seen in the store. While you can use spaghetti, and probably linguine, bucatini is both tubular (cylindrical!) and hollow. Thus, maintaining roundness and fatness, without making it impossible to cook. Cooking time was only ~10 minutes til al dente. 

Pecorino Romano. Grate until your hand gets tired. 

Drat! Broke the egg yolk

Really simple, though admittedly heavy dish.

Really bad indulgence and very nice butterfly

Shiny and blue

Freakishly amazing October weather

Brunch

Brunch means holidays, weekends and sleeping in!

Last Meal: Mom's cold spicy noodles

By semi popular request I am putting up the recipe for my mom's cold spicy noodles aka the dish I would have on death row as my last meal.

Ingredients:
thick round, rice noodles (I happen to stumble on a very good guide)
red chilli flakes
vegetable oil
2 cloves garlic
2 cups soy sauce

1 cup white vinegar

shallots optional

Method:

1. Boil noodles until they are al dente. ~20 minutes. 
2. Rinse in cold water until noodles are cool and drain in a colander. Thick noodles don't retain so much water and hence don't dilute out the sauce as much as the thin vermicelli-esque kind.

Meanwhile, prepare the sauce. 

2. Slice or mince garlic and put in a bowl on the counter. The smaller the pieces of garlic, obvi the garlickier your sauce..

3. Add oil to saucepan. Enough to cover the bottom of a pan.

4. Add chilli flakes, about enough to cover the pan in one layer. Let them sizzle until golden brown. 

5. Pour hot oil with chilli flakes into bowl with the raw garlic.

6. Add soy sauce and vinegar to the oily chilli flakes.

7. My mom would now add sliced shallots, along with some good ol' mSG but these are both optional since I never have those on hand. 

[Note: I basically made up the amounts of each ingredient for the blog as in real life, I eyeball everything. The portions are completely modifiable. You can scale up on the soy sauce + vinegar as you please. I very roughly stick to a 2 parts soy sauce to 1 part vinegar ratio but really I just taste and adjust as I go.]

Now just serve the noodles on separate bowls. Spoon sauce over it to taste. I like it salty as humanely possible.

Plants etc.

Pix with the new camera and potato+leek soup

Three ingredients

Potato and Leek Soup

Fashion blogs

I love fashion blogs for the same reason as everyone else who has discovered them: real people, street fashion and great photography. 

Here is my daily reading list: 

Fashiontoast

To me, Rumi Neely is THE original fashion blogger. Many girls have since tried to follow in her well-heeled footsteps but few have been able to match her "effortless" style and the breath-taking photography. Her site is still the most creative, spunky, and witty. 

Cupcakes and Cashmere

Emily Schumann is a girl's girl who appeals to my inner suzie homemaker. Fashion, food, interior design and helpful DIY. Her posts are meticulous and timely: I anticipate her post every morning Monday to Friday.

TheGlamourai

Kelly Framel's style is incredibly luxurious. Everything she wears looks magical. She has a particularly enviable collection of vintage sunglasses.

Other notable mentions

Chriselleinc

Not a fashion blogger so to speak but an ex-model turned stylist. I like her creativity in reusing key pieces in various ways. Her statement jewelry is particularly memorable. I can only stand so much of her posing though.

The Blonde Salad

This blondie has the most extensive designer wardrobe I've ever seen. An extremely prolific blogger who details almost every second of her picturesque life. Her website takes too long to load and has too much bling (i.e. adverts) for me to visit regularly.
Keiko Lynn
I don't love most of the things she wears, but she has great makeup tutorials and the perfect face for dramatic looks.
Poise Polish
A lot of fashion commentary which are all very interesting, but very few of her own looks. I also want her hair.

Little Camera. Big Lens.

http://www.techrific.com.au/images/olympus_pen_e-pm1_pink_l.jpg

On. it's. way.

My first real camera in YEARS. I'm hoping it's the little camera that could. Stay posted.

Rabbit food

Found this at the grocery store and didn't know what to do with it. I think it's a sprout of some kind. I thought it would be good in a salad so I tasted one sprig of it but no bueno. It tasted too grass-like. Too fiber-ous? 

So then I put a little bit of it in on a frying pan. And then it was GREAT!!!

Crunchy. Fresh. Splendid. 

So then I put it in some lo mein.  

It's nice that it has the same shape as the noodles so with every bite of lo mein, you get a bit of noodle + sprout.

and of course added hot sauce (in this case Sriracha)  

and ate it. 

THE END!