Baby, It's Cold Outside...

The weather here in the Boston area is frigid.  I'm talking 12 degrees (F) with an 18 mph wind chill of -1.  Brrrr.  Do you want to know something crazy, though?  I love it.  I love this bitterly cold weather, especially on days like today when the sun is shining brightly (so deceptive, that sun).  It reminds me of my days in college at the University of Maine; in the morning, you would look out your window at the brightly shining sun, then step out of the dorm only to be completely bombarded by a wall of freezing cold air, and your nasal passages instantly turned to ice... Call me crazy, but I love it.

So, this week hasn't been the greatest.  I've had a run of pretty bad luck.  Do you ever have weeks like that?  I guess I should re-phrase that, because nothing truly bad has happened to me this week.  It's just been one of those weeks where I felt like the Universe was doing everything in its power to thwart all of my attempts at being happy.  I know... that's dramatic.  I tend to lose sight of the positive side of things, but seriously, this week it was difficult to stay optimistic.  I've refrained from typing about all the negative things that happened this week, because nobody needs to read that kind of downer-crap and some of it is personal information that I'm not entirely comfortable putting out here, but there's one story that I have to tell, because it's actually kind of funny:

For the past week, I've been trying to complete a recipe from an Ina Garten cookbook that a friend of mine gave me.  I've been dreaming of this lemon tart for months; obsessing over which flavor complement lemon without taking away from it, trying to decide whether to use a shortbread crust or pie crust, then wondering if I should add a flavor tot he shortbread, like lavender or rosemary... After what seemed like a century, we went to Williams-Sonoma to buy a tart pan with our $10 off coupon (score) and bought organic lemons and rich, creamy delicious European-style butter at Whole Foods.  It was going to be delicious....  Until I burned the crap out of the shortbread crust.  Ha!  And, to make matters worse, when I attempted to make the lemon curd, I thought I curdled it and searched for a new recipe that never set properly in the burned shortbread crust.  So, on Tuesday night, I started again with new, not especially organic, or creamy, ingredients.  I did lots of research on lemon curd, and knew that the cook-time for the crust was too long, so I was prepared. 

I made the dough for the crust and was baking it in the oven (blind-baking, actually, so it would cook evenly), then started the lemon curd.  Everything was going smoothly -- lemon curd not curdling, pie crust not burning... Great, until I decided to remove the blind-bake beans from the tart shell and forgot that I was using a false-bottom tart pan.  Yup.  The fluted ring part of the pan separated from the crust and fell around my arm like a scorching 350 degree bracelet.  I freaked, screamed like a little girl, and tossed the whole thing, beans and all, into the oven.  Destroyed.  I'm talking 100%, crust completely collapsed, destroyed.  We spent the rest of the evening scraping shortbread and beans out of our oven, and I now have a scallop-pattern burn on my wrist that isn't as bad as it is funny.  To make matters worse, the pot we used to cook the lemon curd was aluminum (I had no idea at the time that it was aluminum), and the acid from the lemons reacted with the pan when it was heated, and the curd tasted metallic.  It's actually quite funny, now that I'm thinking about it, but at the time, I felt so defeated.  

We're starting from scratch again tonight, and this time, it will work.  It will work, because for the first time this week, I feel rejuvenated and optimistic again.  It's amazing what weather will do to my outlook on life. :)

On another note, it was my birthday this past Wednesday, and I was completely astonished and overwhelmed by the number of well wishes and kind gestures I received, many from the people who continue to read this blog, even if I am sporadic with my posting and pessimistic in the few posts that actually leave my brain.  So, thanks to the many people who made my day so much better.  xo

2010 Photographic Calendar

As I mentioned a week ago (or so), I've been working on a top secret project for the past two months and finally found a camera (although it's not a great one) to snap some crappy photos of it!!  Yay!  So, without further ado, here's a couple shots of the 2010 Calendar I made with a friend of mine and the images in it.  You can find it listed in my Etsy shop if you're interested in purchasing one, or two, or a bunch: 

 

Onyx & Alabaster's 2010 limited edition photographic calendar is a collaboration between Ally & her friend Kathryn, which includes some of their favorite photographs from 2009.

Limited edition of 75.

Calendars are 6 x 11" printed on 80# smooth card stock in antique gray. Each calendar is punched with two holes at the top with cotton Bianco e Nero twine for hanging, and the pages are perforated for easy month changes.

The calendars were printed on a professional quality laser printer and lovingly cut, pasted, and assembled by hand.

If you use the code "Get a New Camera" in the notes to seller section, you will receive a whopping discount of $4 off the sale price, which will be refunded via paypal. 

New York State of Mind, Part II.

On day two of our New York Minute, we met up with a friend of mine from college and headed down to Battery Park for some wintry, tourist fun!  It was frigidly cold outside, and we obviously picked the colder of the two days to go on a boat ride out to Liberty Park and Ellis Island.  Genius.

It was a really fun and interesting trip, but I did feel bad for my friend who is not from New England and was not used to the cold weather like we were. 

After seeing the Statue of Liberty, we decided to get something to eat before heading to Ellis Island.  My friend and I both got french fries and over priced Statue of Liberty water bottles, while James decided that he wasn't hungry.  The place was packed, so we decided to take our food outside to wait in line for the ferry.  This would have been a great idea, had we not run into a pack of hungry (and very, very ferocious) sea gulls.  They began to circle us, and as soon as my friend murmured, "If one of those birds tries to take one of my fries, I'm going to..." Bam!  Sea gull foot in her fries.  As I was standing off to the side laughing at her, a sea gull dive bombed me and landed on my head, trying to get at my fries.  Meanwhile, our chivalrous escort, James, was walking as fast as he could in the opposite direction, looking back at us the whole time while we threw french fries into the wind, trying to appease the angry mob.  It is absolutely repulsive (and humiliating) when a sea gull lands on your head, especially when his foot gets caught in your hair as he's flying away.  Trust me. 

None of us were looking forward to Ellis Island.  I forced everyone to go, however, because I knew it was something that shouldn't be passed by, no matter how boring you think it will be, or how dirty you feel after being mauled by a sea gull.  Everyone was thankful that we went, in the end, because it was the most interesting part of the day.

We took the subway back to our hotel and stopped at Gray's Papaya (corner of 8th & 37th) on the way to the bus station.  Don't let anyone tell you that Gray's Papaya isn't worth a visit.  It was the best hot dog I've ever had.  Plus, it was really inexpensive, and their fruit juices are very tasty. 

We did some other things, like shopping J. Crew at Rockefeller Center, walking around the Upper West Side, and a nighttime stroll around Time Square, but we didn't get to do a lot of the other touristy things, like a carriage ride around Central Park, the Empire State Building, The Met, H&H Bagels...  The great thing about New York, is that it's such a huge city that it would be nearly impossible to see and do everything in one weekend, or even a week, so it gives you a reason to keep on going back for more.

Anyway, I was feeling a little reminiscent of our trip and realized that I never shared any of the photos....

P.S. I hate not having a camera. 

New York State of Mind, Part I.

Almost a year ago to the day, James and I took a short weekend trip to New York City as the "second leg" to our honeymoon.  As many of you know (or maybe only some of you), James is a chef and his passion in life is for food.  He wanted to do a culinary tour of a city, and New York was the perfect destination, with so many amazing restaurants concentrated in the city.  So, we headed down one Friday evening on a Bolt Bus and had a really great weekend full of site-seeing, eating at amazing restaurants, and visiting with a friend.  I'm going to do this in two parts, because it will get boring fast.  I promise. awww (sad face).  Not really.  Well, maybe.

We stayed at the Wyndham Garden Hotel in Times Square, which was a really convenient location for us.  We had stayed at a Wyndham on our wedding night and remembered how comfortable the beds were, so we decided to try it again and did not regret it.  After all of the walking we did, we were so relieved to be able to go back to a really comfortable bed every night. Our room was a bit small and didn't really have a great view (except into some sort of pottery studio next door), but it was worth it.  The hotel had just opened a few months before we stayed there, so they were still working out a few kinks in the place.  The only restaurant that was open at the time, Greenhouse 36, was amazingly good for an in-hotel restaurant.  We only had breakfast there, but it was the best breakfast we had had in a long time.  I had the "Mid-town French Toast" with rosemary-infused maple syrup and caramelized banana.  I forget what James had -- probably an omelet... 

We did a bunch of site-seeing during the day.  On Saturday, we went to the Museum of Natural History, because after seeing Night at the Museum, we were intrigued.  It was a great experience, other than the swarms of people there...  I guess that's to be expected on a Saturday.  In a Museum.  IN NEW YORK.

 The outside of the museum, facing Central Park, is beautiful and I would totally sleep there if I was a hobo.

 This lady had an amazing, furry, purple coat, and reminded me of Grimace from Ronald McDonald Land.

 Watch out!

 I especially liked the animal exhibits...

A particularly interesting exhibit was the butterfly house, which brought me straight into the dungeon scene from Silence of the Lambs, minus a very naked Buffalo Bill, thankfully.  Thousands of butterflies were fluttering around you and some were even landing on people.  You could hear the fluttering (flapping) of their wings and you could not swat at them, or a scary lady would yell at you. 

It was terrifying and magical at the same time. 


We had dinner that night at The London, Gordon Ramsay's fancy pants restaurant.  I loved it, but James swears up and down that he hated it.  Of course, I should probably stop leading you to believe that we actually are fancy enough to eat at The London, because we are not.  We ate at Maze, which is the way less formal restaurant adjacent to the bar area.  People were wearing jeans, but of course I scoffed at them, because I was all fancied up in a skirt (in January) and of course that makes me better than others... not really -- I'm obviously just kidding because I'm the most self-conscious person on the planet when in fancy restaurants.  We enjoyed the chef's five course menu, because there were so many things we wanted to try and didn't feel like spending an absolute fortune.  I don't remember specifically what we ate, because it was a year ago, but I do remember tasting some amazing sea salt ice cream, and the risotto was very good (as all viewers of Hell's Kitchen should hope).  I may remember having an amazing fennel confit and beet salad.  As a side note, and as the wife of a very picky chef, I highly recommend ordering a tasting menu whenever at an expensive restaurant (that offers one, of course).  You'll get to pick from the chef's specialties and you'll have many courses of smaller portioned food.  It truly is the way to go.

After dinner at Maze, we headed back to the Upper West Side to Cafe Lalo, the famed cafe from You've Got Mail.  You've Got Mail is on my list of Top 5 Favorite Movies of All Time, so it was only natural that I sought out a few of the locations.  It's a very small, very crowded cafe that serves all sorts of things, including very good vanilla lattes.  We went at around 9pm (I think) and it was incredibly crowded.  Don't be deceived by the scene in the movie (where Joe Fox realizes that Kathleen Kelly is actually his online penpal), because it's a lot more crowded and the tables allow barely enough room to escape without your butt grazing the foam on someone's cappuccino.

I didn't get any photos from inside, because it was crowded, and I felt like a fool...

Afterward, we took a taxi back to our hotel, because we were exhausted!!!  Stay tuned for Part II tomorrow.

Also, my camera is still broken, so I haven't had a chance to photograph the item from the Sneek Peek.  It's coming soon... I promise!!

Sneak Peek

While I haven't exactly been the most active blogger recently (ha!  what an understatement), I haven't just been sitting around the entire time doing nothing.  I have been working on a project with a very good friend of mine that I'm just about ready to share with everyone.  I'm far, far behind on the project (what's new?), but still feel that all this work should not be left unnoticed.  I'm really excited about the results, so here's a peek at something I've been working on, rather diligently I might add, for the past few weeks:

Hopefully, my broken camera will magically turn itself into a brand new DSLR, or begin to work again, so I can take some photos of this project!!

Get out of my yard, Lame-O!

* if anyone can tell me which movie I quoted in my post title, then I will give you a notecard from my shop... or just major kudos... *

Last night, while on our way to Target, a bully in a mini-van tailgated us the whole way there, then almost rear-ended us in the parking lot, multiple times.  I was so amped-up by this douche, that as soon as we parked our car, I fast-walked my way to the door just so I got there before him.  Magically, as I yanked my shopping cart out of its snug resting spot with the gusto of an angsty teenager, an idea popped into my head; the kind of idea that only comes around once in a very great while, and clearly not when you're in the mood to act your age...

I tailgated him through the whole store with my cart.

We were in need of dish soap and toilet paper and he was clearly going to the extension cord aisle, but it didn't matter.  It was on, like Donkey Kong.  As I madly dashed behind him, nearly clipping his Achilles' heels with every step, I had to muffle my childish giggles in my scarf, while James followed at a safe distance behind us both.  I couldn't have been more than two feet behind him, and could see his discomfort increasing.  We weaved through the card aisle, down by the woven baskets, and finally, as we approached the diaper aisle, he turned sharply and I couldn't maneuver my cart without hitting a store clerk.  I had to give up, or die laughing.  I chose the former.  Although I succumbed to this small defeat, he was clearly sketched out by my actions, as I could tell by his frequent peripheral glances.  You won this time, Mini-(Van)-Douche!

* A side note: the mini-douche was in such a rush to pull into the Target parking lot that he nearly hit us, yet he left the store at the same time we did, with nothing in his hands.  It figures, right?

Waffles? Why, yes.

Are any of you like me and simply had-to-have-a-waffle-iron-or-your-head-might-explode?  Probably not...  I received our waffle iron as a wedding present and have used it once.  Maybe twice.  James continuously teases me about the kitchen electric that is taking up valuable (very valuable in our tiny kitchen) cabinet space.  Finally, I have a, "see, I told you so" excuse for owning a waffle iron:

Waffleizer.

Awesomeness in its most concentrated form.

image from here, obv.

I love homemade waffles, even if I've only made them once... maybe twice.  I have to say that the s'moreffles look divine. 

Anyway, just thought I'd pass along this very important discovery.  That is all.