Home Sick

Blah. Doesn't having a cold just stink? Your nose is running, you're stuffed up, your tired....Well, that is how I'm feeling and how Erik felt earlier in the week.

I worked from home today and luckily got to take a nap in the afternoon. Sleep always makes me feel better. 

I had my partner in crime sitting rigggggght next to me the entire day. 

Also, drank some of this tea. So good!

Unfortunately, our first track workout is tonight and I do NOT feel like running :-( I think we might skip tonight and just go on Saturday. 

The Sickness & Today Top 5

 Erik was out sick earlier this week due to his cold and guess what, now I have it. I just feel so tired and have a runny nose. Let's hope some DayQuil will keep this thing at bay and we can all move on with life!!

Some random things from our day.

1. It was pretty warm out and sunny out here today. Always appreciated!

2. Our meal planning didn't get us til today since my plan really just set us up for one week. Instead of going across the street, I went to Safeway and probably saved $15 just by going there. Well worth the 5 minute drive!

3. Picked up this fun wine for a mere $5 while I was there!

4. Evie is turning 7 THIS FRIDAY. Reminds me of Marta Von Trapp telling Frauline Maria, "I'm turning 7 on Tuesday and I'd like a pink parasol," What she really wants is to run around outside, eat some dirt, and maybe finish the day off with a car ride and a nice fish dinner.

Follow us on Instagram: hedder02

5. Each week, we DVR Saturday Night Live. It's easy to watch and skip through the crappy skits. This week, there was a diamond in the rough. cracks me up. Plus, love that it is set in New Haven, CT.


Too funny. "In the words of my hero Miss Mary Jay Blige, "I'm leaving this and I ain't NEVER coming back."

What is your favorite SNL skit?
Mine is anything with Mary Katherine Gallagher, specifically the Christmas episode with Whitney Houston

Anyone caught this cold or flu?

Drama in the 'hood

Some craziness was going on in our neighborhood yesterday...investigation in connection to a murder from the 1980's!!

Here's what went down:
Local and federal law enforcement officers found bones during a search of a Haight-Ashbury home Tuesday, but it’s believed that they belong to some kind of animal and not Kevin Collins, a 10-year-old boy who went missing nearly 29 years ago.

San Francisco police executed a search warrant at the home on Masonic Avenue near Page Street, with the FBI and cadaver dogs from the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office assisting in the search.
Several bones were turned over to the San Francisco Medical Examiner’s Office. Police said preliminary assessment of the bones indicated that they are from an animal, but that further analysis is necessary.
********
After work yesterday, Evie and I walked up to the crime scene. The house was taped off with police tape and about six news trucks were up there.

How crazy that a murder could've happened in our neighborhood many years ago. The story is so sad - a 10 year old boy disappeared. If they did find something in that house, imagine the closure that would bring his parents.

Always something going on in this city!!

Chez Panisse....Cafe

On Monday night, it was our monthly Tres Amigas dinner. My friend Andrea chose the Chez Panisse, a well known restaurant in Berkeley.


Alice Waters, a famous chef, started this restaurant. Alice is an American pioneer of a culinary philosophy that maintains that cooking should be based on the finest and freshest seasonal ingredients that are produced sustainably and locally. She is a passionate advocate for a food economy that is “good, clean, and fair.”(as told on the restaurant website)

It's located in Berkeley's "Gourmet Ghetto" which is essentially a street FULL of great restaurants.

Chez Panisse is a pre-fixe restaurant but they have the Chez Panisse Cafe upstairs from the restaurant which is a regular menu. Since Andrea and I don't eat everything that could be on the menu, we ate at the Cafe.

Service and food were both awesome. For dinner, we shared two appetizers:

Local halibut tartare with radishes, avocado, and lemon vinaigrette
Chicory salad with avocado

For dinner, I had.....QUAIL. 
















There was a chicken dish on the menu but the quail looked so much better. It came with white beans and squash. My friend Nicole said quail tastes like chicken so I decided to go for it. It was delicious!

For dessert, we shared a grilled pear galette which was also very good.

Dinner was great and it was fun to check out this Berkeley staple. I'd definitely go back...to the Cafe!

Ready for the Week

We are ready for a new week and are wondering, how is it end of January already!? We have a fun & busy week ahead but have planned out some meals.

Monday - YOYO (You're on your own!)
Tuesday - Turkey meatballs and pasta
Wednesday - Veggie Quesadillas
Thursday - Homemade Pizza
Friday - TBD

I also wanted to share one of my new FAVORITE products....Soy Vay Teriyaki sauce.This is one AMAZINGGGGG sauces. I have used on salmon, as a dip for baby carrots, topped on chicken...you name it, it tastes great!!

Highly recommend this one. 

Oaklandia

Today starts training for San Diego RNR! I went out and did a measly 1.5 miles around our park but at least I went! I felt fine running so maybe I still have a little bit of running-ness in me after our fall season.

After running, cleaning, finishing the laundry, and eating lunch, we headed out to Oakland. We wanted to go to two open houses just to see what homes for rent look like out there. The first one was billed on Craigslist as in the Oakland Hills. It was really in the ghetto.  We have a friend in the Oakland Hills in this beautiful neighborhood, on a nice quiet street. This house looked awesome inside but the 'hood was sketchville. We didn't even get out of the car.

From Wikipedia

 After looking at Sketchville, we drove out to San Leandro where there was a townhouse for rent. San Leandro does not offer much. The neighborhood had decent homes but was dead quiet and all we saw were chain restaurants. We did get out of the house this time, but only to walk Evie. We knew by the 'hood that we didn't want to live there.

Here's Evie just riding in the back seat. She came to Oakland with us.

 We drove home & I was definitely feeling discouraged. Erik is much more positive over the whole finding a new place to live situation. We both really want to live in Marin instead of the Oakland area so maybe we just concentrate up in Marin and just look at everything we can. We're actually hoping our friends Lisa & Justin will buy a house and we can just take their apartment. Ya never know!

 We got home from Oakland and Evie & I headed out for one of our weekend walks. We drove up to the Presidio (probably our fave spot to go) and went to an area we haven't been to. We literally just drove up, took a few turns, parked, and started walking.

 We found a cute new-to-us trail called "Lover's Lane."

 Such a cute story of the path!

 It was pretty nice out today. Chilly but sunny and in the 50's...

 After our walk, we stopped at Trader Joe's on our way home. We picked up a bottle of wine for a whopping $6, popcorn, and shelled edamame. Both Evie and I love shelled edamame. I cannot wait to get home so I always open it in the car and give her some. haha!

 This wine was awesome - a little fruity, a little crisp, a little buttery. Love it, especially for $6!

Once we got home, Evie and I chilled on the couch. She was tired and so was I. We watched some TV, had some popcorn, & wine....that is what Sundays are for!

 For dinner, I made a Quinoa Veggie Paella. I am obsessed with Quinoa lately so any chance to use it is fine by me. Get the recipe, HERE.

 Erik added steak to his dinner and he said he loved it, so this recipe is a WIN!

In other news, Erik still has a cold. He is blowing his nose like crazy and needs to get some REST. Hoping he stays home from work and gets some sleeeeeep tomorrow.

Anyone get my title post reference of another Pacific Northwest City that's now a TV show?? 
I think this show is hit & miss. One skit will be hilarious and the next is Meh. 

Anyone else in the process of finding a new place to live??

Babysitting Oliver

Another fun thing that happened on Saturday was that I got to hang out with my pal, Oliver!

 

Our friends Lisa & Justin have this adorable 8 month old who is very sweet. He is pretty calm and chill! We offered to babysit for them anytime and we were set to sit last night. Unfortunately, Erik has a cold so he stayed home though.

Oliver did NOT cry when his parents left. We played for about an hour and then he went to bed. Probably the easiest babysitting I've ever done. He just wanted to play with his toys and crawl all over.

 Lisa & Justin are also CA transplants and their family is in Ohio. It must be so hard to be parents and have to pay for babysitters all the time. We offered to babysit to just let them go out and not have to worry about any of that. They had a fun night out, so it was a success! I really feel like all of us without family out here just need to look out for one another and help each other out with stuff like this.

He went to bed without too much of a fuss, too. They can definitely call us anytime so hopefully we'll see him again soon!

Summer Season Kick-Off

 On Saturday, we were up early to attend the Summer Season Kick-Off for Team In Training. We went downtown to the SF Marriott for the big event. There was a big conference room set up and a lot of vendors in the hallway to help everyone train for and finish their endurance event this season.

 They had a fun photo area with props, which we HAD to take advantage of!

 There were a ton of people there to kick off the season. It was inspiring to see so many people who have come back to TNT for many, many seasons. One woman has participated for over 40 seasons!! Wow!

We heard a great presentation talking about the season and the difference our team will make in fundraising to fight cancer. We heard from a young cancer survivor, who is now a participant in TNT. We also met more of our teammates. It was a great morning!

Training starts today (Sunday) with a short run on our own. Our first team run is THURSDAY at the track and then Saturday is our first team run. Woohoo!

Eating In

It was a pretty nice day out on Friday so after work, Erik and I walked to The Page for happy hour. We came home though to have dinner - enchiladas. No real recipe there and I don't think this is truly an "enchilada" dish. Here's what we mixed inside the tortillas:

• Quinoa
• Mashed sweet potato
• Ground Turkey
• Cilantro
• Hot Sauce
• Shredded cheese

Rolled up the tortilla. Fit 6 in a dish. Put more cheese on top and topped them all with salsa. Baked for a few minutes and we're done! Delish!

This week, I really tried to meal plan. I realized we make too many runs across the street to this little gourmet, EXPENSIVE, grocery store and buy whatever we need for whatever we decide to eat that night. That, of course, adds up quick. Plus, it's so annoying to have the "what are we going to eat tonight" conversation every night AND decide who's going across the street to get dinner.


Last week, I found a bunch of recipes to make and went to Safeway so we had dinner at home basically all week. We both said how much we like eating at home vs. eating out most of the time. You get a great meal, usually have leftovers for lunch the next day, and save some money.

We already have our meal plan for next week. Hooray!

Do you plan out your meals or just decide what to eat on a daily basis?

Flora

On Thursday night, I had a work dinner at a restaurant in Oakland called Flora. I've never been to this restaurant and always like trying new spots. The food and the service were very good!


For dinner, the three of us shared two salads:

Harvest garden lettuce, toasted walnuts, fuji apples, red wine vinagrette
Blood orange, roasted sunchokes, upland cress, black garlic aioli, pickled okra

For dinner, I had the:
Stuffed chicken breast, chicken sausage, celery root remoulade, frisee, beets, sherry, chile oil

I don't usually order chicken that often at restaurants but this looked so good and it was!

Now, dessert was the true star of dinner - Salted caramel pudding. Oh My. So so good. It was very rich though so just a little bit went a long way. Yum!

Every thing was very good!

Here we come, TNT!

Last night, Erik and I attended a Staff Meeting for Team In Training. It was great to meet everyone and this season seems like it will be a lot of fun! We have our official "Kickoff" this Saturday and our first team workout is NEXT THURSDAY! Ahhhhh.

This season I am going to try harder to stick to the schedule. Last season, I wouldn't follow everything or run as much as the schedule told us to. I  KNOW it will make race day a lot easier and so I'm going to try to stick to it.

I know what shoes I need to wear and still have some life in the Brooks I got last season, so that is great. We know what fuel we like once we hit a certain mileage. We might be pretty set to start the season. Then, there is that whole "we haven't been running because its's cold and dark out" thing....I'm sure the first few weeks are going to be harrrrd to get back into it. But, like always, as soon as you start doing it more and more, it gets a lot easier!

If anyone reads this, are you running any big races this year??

Brown Sugar Chicken

Tonight I tried another Pinterest recipe for Baked Garlic Brown Sugar Chicken. It seemed like it would be so good. Here's the recipe:

Ours did not really look like this...

Ingredients
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
4 garlic cloves, minced
4 tablespoons brown sugar
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 500°F and lightly grease a casserole dish.
2. In small sauté pan, sauté garlic with the oil until tender.
3. Remove from heat and stir in brown sugar.
4. Place chicken breasts in a prepared baking dish and cover with the garlic and brown sugar mixture.
5. Add salt and pepper to taste.
6. Bake uncovered for 15-30 minutes

Sooooo....not sure why we had to cook it at 500 degrees. The brown sugar mixture essentially burned the crap of out of the pan the chicken was baking on. The garlic also burned in the mixture so instead of being carmelized, it was more crispy/burned-ish.

The chicken tasted good, it just wasn't delicious. It wasn't in a sauce like I thought it would be. I MIGHT try this again but I would cook this at a lower heat for sure. 

So, not all Pinterest recipes can be winners!

Sweet Potato Burgers

Tonight, dinner was a Pinterest meal and it was great! I made sweet potato bean burgers with a side of garlic peas. They were easy to make but I will say they were very mushy when you are trying to get them from the mixture into the Panko. Here's the recipe:

Sweet Potato Veggie Burgers
makes 7-8 large patties

2 cans cannellini white beans, drained
1 large sweet potato, baked/peeled/mashed (about 2 cups)
2 Tbsp tahini
2 tsp maple or agave syrup
1 tsp lemon pepper seasoning OR Cajun seasoning (or another fave spice!)
1/4 cup wheat flour
optional: additional seasoning (whatever you have on hand - I used a few dashes cayenne, black pepper and a scoop of nutritional yeast)
salt to taste if needed

plentiful Panko crumbs
safflower oil for pan

burgers: avocado, Dijon mustard, grain buns, romaine, onion, olive oil, pepper

Directions:

1. Bake sweet potato. Peel, place in large mixing bowl.
2. Add drained beans to mixing bowl. Mash beans and potato together.
3. Mash in seasoning, flour and any additional seasoning. Your mixture will be quite soft and moist. But you should be able to form a patty. Add more flour or a scoop of breadcrumbs - or dry rice to thicken the mixture if needed.
4. Heat 1 Tbsp safflower oil in a pan over high heat.
5. Form a patty from mixture and coat in Panko crumbs. Thick coating. Then drop the patty in the pan. Repeat until the pan is filled. Cook until browned on both sides. You could also bake. If baking, use less Panko.
6. Transfer cooked patties to paper towel. Cool for a few minutes.
7. Serve on toasted bun with lotsa toppings.

We topped them with some mashed avocado, lettuce, and hot sauce. Erik also had a fried egg on his which he said was delish!

Delicious, NEW recipe!

Homemade Sunday

Hello from Evie! You can tell she is back to normal because she sprinted from the kitchen, up on the couch, and was standing like this on the couch to bark out the window. Look at her looking at me like, Can I help you?

We went to Goodwiill and Storage. We dropped off some stuff and picked up my scrapbooking supplies. Man, I have so much stuff. I'm trying to organize things by year and just get moving.

Also, went to Safeway and got a great deal on this wine. It was $12 on sale for $7. Then I had two coupons totaling $3.50 so I got the wine for a whopping $3. What a steal!!

I made a lasagna for dinner with roasted eggplant, zuccini, and spicy chicken sausage. Deeeelish!

Erik also made something. Do these look familiar?

 Yep! He made English Muffins. They seemed pretty easy to make and they tasted good!

Also, the 49ers are going to the Superbowl! The city was loud after the win last night with people cheering and honking in the street! 

Here's to a good week! We both have to work on Monday ;-(

Oh Lord Jesus, It's a Fire!

Something crazy happened last night but first, I want to share with you a video that I saw earlier in the day and was dying laughing over:

This woman was cracking me up and the remix is so funny. "Ain't nobody got time for that!"

Well, it wasn't so funny when we were walking home from Kezar and smelled fire. We have seen and smelled quite a few apartment fires here in SF and let me tell you, it is super scary. It is one of my fears living here that one day I will come home and our building will be on fire or burning.

We were walking home, smelling smoke, and I said, "I hope our building is not on fire." As we get closer, we saw smoke NEXT TO OUR APARTMENT BUILDING. I started running towards our building and as I got closer, a woman said, "A car is on fire!"

Oh yes. A car RIGHT NEXT TO OUR BUILDING was literally a blaze. It was on fire and the fire was spreading to the bushes in front of the car. I was shaking and running to our building to get Evie. As I was doing so, this girl ran up and asked me to tell everyone in our side of the building because it was spreading to our building! Oh Lord Jesus, It's a fire!

At that point, I didn't know if the fire was truly spreading or what. I just wanted to get the dog and get out of there. The Fire Dept showed up in minutes and put the car fire out. The fire did NOT spread, it just looked like it was happening because the smoke was going up and over the building. 

Here are the firemen putting the fire out. The hood of the car was on literally melted. The cars parked next to this one were NOT damaged at all. Turns out it belonged to a guy in our neighborhood who came out and was talking to the SFD. SO scary. 

We were going to go out and meet up with some friends but we stayed home. After all that craziness, it was too late AND I was still trying to calm down. 

The car was towed and here is the aftermath this morning...

Pile of charred car parts

 Burnt Bushes

Broken glass where the car was

This just hit TOO close to home. What if it was our building!!?? Where the heck would we go. We have some great friends who would take us in, for sure. We wouldn't have any clothes or anything. Too awful to think about....

Everyone is safe. We are now saying how crazy it was that we were laughing over the video and then we had a Fire. Ain't nobody got time for that! I'm going to start thinking about finding money on the sidewalk and see if that comes true. haha