Cuteness

Sooooo in case a picture of TJ wasn't cute enough, how about a video of him snoring? You're welcome ;)

That's all I have for today. Just thought I'd share. Make sure your volume is turned up :) Have a good evening!

Mini Update

Hey everyone. Long time no see. Not a whole lot to report other than it's balls hot here AAAAAAAAAAND there is a new addition to the family ;) His name is TJ and here he is!!

Haha look at that face, I can't even deal with him. Long story short TJ's family couldn't really take care of him so my sister in law took him with the intention of him living at my house. Well, Delilah got attached so now TJ is staying with them. He looks a lot like Tyler just a bit bigger (and TJ is a Lhasa Apso from what I understand while Tyler is a Maltese). He is also the biggest goofball. He's so cute and very sweet. Oh and apparently he snores which is hilarious.

That's the only real news happening on my end. I went grocery shopping at Trader Joe's today but couldn't take a pic because it was just too many people around. I did get some fun stuff to make some meals next week so hopefully I won't be too lazy to photograph what I make.

The other interesting pics I do have to show you are some cool classic cars that I've seen parked across the street from the studio. There is Custom Car & Truck place across the street that works on classic and new cars and I see some pretty cool ones hanging out on the sidewalk so I figured I'd start taking pics of them to show you.

I'm not really a car person but I LOVE this one. I have no idea why but I just think it is a really cool car and would probably be great for a photo shoot of some sort. I wonder what they are doing to it and who owns it.

There are actually two really cool cars in this photo. The one in the foreground is definitely really cool but I would be so freaked out to drive that! Just like the first car I showed you, I kind of wonder about the car and the person that owns it. You don't see cars like that on the road too often!

I also love the rusted out truck behind the other car. It has been sitting there for a while and I also wonder what they are doing with it. It looks really cool with all of the different colors and it looks like it's about to disintegrate but I'm curious to see what they are going to do with it.

So that's all I've got for you for now. I hope to be back in a few days with some meals... I already have a couple of pics so there should be at least something... we'll see how many pics I can collect though. I'll be doing some prep tomorrow though so I will try to remember to take pics to show you :)

I hope you are all doing well and enjoying the warmth!

Show & Tell Sunday: A Perfect Morning

Hey everyone! I know I haven't kept up on my word of posting more often but I hope that today's post will make up for it. It's only noon and I've already had the best morning I've had in a REALLY long time. As I'm sure a lot of you know or can tell, I haven't been feeling amazing lately... partially because of feeling yucky from allergies but mostly from anxiety and depression issues I have. On the heels of kind of an exciting epiphany I had this week of where I want to be and goals for my future I decided to get off my ass, take some damn Allegra and get outside.

My plan was to get up really early and make the 30ish minute trek out to Huntington to go to the Sunday Farmer's Market. It is one of my favorite drives on Long Island. To give you an idea of the area, I passed three of the Gold Coast Mansions between my house and the furthest destination. In addition, in a Scandinavian fascination frenzy last week I discovered that there is a Danish bakery 10 minutes past the Farmer's Market traveling on the same road so I figured what the hell, let's check it out! You know I love some good bread. So I left at 7:30 this morning and hit the Farmer's Market then traveled the extra 10 minutes to the bakery. It happened to be across the street from the marina in the town of Northport so I took a few pictures so you could see how amazing of a morning it was.

I'll show you those pics first:

This is probably my favorite picture of the day. The sky was so blue and gorgeous and it was so peaceful there. There were tons of boats in the marina and it was a beautiful view the whole way around. I should have taken a panoramic shot...

Looking in the complete opposite direction there are a few more boats and some really beautiful houses. The town was really small and very cute. Definitely a beautiful place to spend a Sunday morning.

There was also a park with a little gazebo, lots of tables and benches for picnicking by the water.

A kind of crappy picture of the bakery. There is outside seating so you can enjoy some treats and coffee with a gorgeous view of the marina. I'm really glad I decided to check it out.

After I went to the bakery I traveled back down the same road (25A for any curious New Yorkers) and stopped into Wild By Nature, a natural grocery store (kind of Whole Foodsesque I guess) on the opposite end of Main Street in Huntington that was on my way home. They have a lot of vegan options and I picked up much more than I was anticipating!!

I'm sure (or at least I'm hoping!) you are curious to see what I picked up on this excursion? Well, let's check out the haul! I took the pics on my phone, sorry about the crap quality. At least Instagram allows for some really great photo editing as you can see above but I did my best to make these presentable.

First, the Farmer's Market haul:

Truthfully, I've never really been impressed by the Long Island farmer's markets that I've been to. They are small and they only have one organic produce vendor. I was pleasantly surprised today! There was still only one organic produce vendor but they had more stocked than usual for this early in the season and everything was GORGEOUS. I got a HUGE head of Boston lettuce for salads and lettuce wraps, gorgeous strawberries and a bag of tuscan kale for juices and smoothies. The berries smell incredible and are super sweet and juicy.

New to the market this year was The Green Neveet. I was drawn in by the vegan sign :) She was so sweet and helpful. I believe she said she is a nutritionist and she sold a few different kinds of cookies, granola and hummus. I wasn't even going to sample the cookies but she just kept breaking off little pieces and handing me samples and I'm glad she did! In my first glance I immediately dismissed the sesame cookies because while I enjoy sesame, I'm not a huge fan of sesame cookies. I was immediately drawn to the coconut and luckily she let me sample it because I wasn't blown away by it. I also tried lemon (really fresh and beautiful), a chocolate mint one (also delicious), a raw cookie and the sesame. I was prepared to hate the sesame but I was blown away, it is delicious! It has almond flour, coconut oil, tahini, maple syrup, anise (I really can't believe I liked it, I am not a huge fan of anise either!), vanilla extract and baking soda. Really good, gluten free and all natural. Gotta love that!

I also tried the sun dried tomato hummus and it was absolutely incredible. Really smooth and creamy with a lovely flavor. I had to pick that up as well. I am so glad I wandered over to her table!

After I went to the Farmer's Market I continued along to the Copenhagen Bakery. It was really cute inside but it was crowded and I didn't really feel comfortable asking questions while there was such a huge crowd so I just settled on a loaf of bread. I don't know which products are authentic Danish products but I wish I knew which bread was. Maybe I'll try going back at a slower time to see if I can ask some questions.

I ended up with a gorgeous loaf of really dark pumpernickel. As you know, pumpernickel is my favorite :)

Finally, here is the Wild By Nature haul. I had gone in to grab some Tofutti for my pumpernickel and ended up grabbing a few more interesting things. I may be going to my brother's house for a BBQ tonight so I figured I'd make my life and everyone else's lives easy and grab this Bento Box for dinner. I've had it before and it's good. I also saw the Hail Merry tarts which I don't come across often and grabbed the Persian Lime flavor! I'm excited to try this, I've heard a lot of amazing reviews of the brand and these tarts. I also picked up Just Persimmons by the Just Tomatoes, Etc. brand (they make the freeze dried fruits and veggies, you've probably seen them at some point). I've never had a persimmon before and thought it would be a fun snack to try. Finally, I grabbed a cucumber to have for juicing, salads and lettuce wraps :)

After I got home I was starving and parched so I put my haul to good use and made breakfast. I had a huge jar of ice water to quench my thirst and enjoyed a pile of super sweet and juicy farmer's market strawberries alongside the ends of the pumpernickel (I love the ends) with some Tofutti. It was a perfect breakfast to cap off a gorgeous morning.

As you can see my morning started early but was really fun, invigorating and peaceful. I felt really happy to be out and enjoying the beautiful morning and finding new, fun foods to try. Being by the marina was really peaceful and was a nice break for me since things have been so crazy lately. And to think I did all of this by 10am! I'm an early bird for sure. The best part is that my weekend just started ;)

So there you have it, my absolutely perfect morning. I hope that you have all had a great weekend and enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

What I Ate Wednesday

Hey everyone. So I sort of followed through on photographing some meals... and by sort of I mean I barely photographed anything but something is better than nothing, right? This'll be a quick one ;)

I've been eating a lot of fruit. This weather begs for cool, refreshing meals and nothing beats fruit. This is a mixture of cantaloupe, strawberries and grapes and I snacked out of this big bowl for a few days. I've got some amazing watermelon waiting for me to devour it next!

Lots of salads as well. This one is romaine, cucumber, tomato, carrot and sun dried tomatoes. Balsamic vinaigrette added later.

I got to snack on the Earth Balance Vegan Cheddar Crackers and wow!! If you liked Cheez-Its you will LOVE these. The flavor is spot on and they are nice and savory. A third to a half cup is all you need to be completely satisfied, yum! I definitely recommend this snack.

These are the Salt & Vinegar Pop Chips. These were also really tasty. I love salt & vinegar so the flavor choice was perfect. The chips are light and crispy and not at all greasy. Definitely a great choice for your potato chip cravings.

You guys, I am so excited about this find I couldn't wait to share it with you! I haven't made it yet but I was FINALLY able to find this frozen Malawach. This is by far my absolute favorite "Jewish food" I've ever had in my life and the last time I ate it was pushing 20 years ago. My cousin made it for me for the first time and it was so delicious. It is basically a flaky, layered fry bread that originated in Yemen but is very popular in Israel now as well. When my cousin came home from Israel she made it for me and I loved it. I have eaten it maybe two or three times in my life because I could never find it but I finally found it in the freezer section of Fairway Market!

Malawach is made similarly to a croissant with the layers and the "butter" and the folding and oy, what a process. I've always been entirely too lazy to make it myself so when I found this I read the ingredients 400 times to see if it was vegan. It contains margarine but the lack of mention of inclusion of dairy (the allergy warnings which I always check first) as well as the "Pareve" label made me feel confident that it is vegan and I grabbed it! In it's frozen form it doesn't look like anything special but when it cooks it gets puffy and flaky and amazing.

Malwach is traditionally eaten with honey as a sweet breakfast (make mine maple syrup) or with tomato sauce as a savory component. I'm going to try it several ways and I'll summarize and let you know which way I enjoyed it most! I'll probably make it for a yummy brunch on Sunday.

That's all I've got for you. I hope you are all having a great week!