Bundts of Steel

11.04.2011

Bing Bong and Chickadees

This was a really good tv week. The Office was great, Modern Family never disappoints, but for me, the highlight was New Girl!

I really missed Jess and the boys while New Girl was on hiatus. So happy to welcome my favorite Zooey back into my living room. This week's episode was amazing and literally laugh out loud funny. Accidentally seeing roommates naked makes for a great episode and Zooey is so adorable! If you aren't watching this show yet, please do, it's my favorite of this year's new shows.

Video clip here and complete recap here.
While checking out that recap, peak around HelloGiggles if you haven't already. It's Zooey's blog with her bff's.

PS- I'm really sad to hear about the Deschanel and Gibbard split. I had high hopes for them. :(

Past tv highlights:
Mad Men
Treat Yo Self- From Parks and Recreation

Move Over Coffee Houses, You've Got Competition

I was pretty excited to check out The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. Considering LA has such a large Jewish population and that bagels aren't really just a Jewish food anymore, but a wide spread breakfast staple, it's surprising that there aren't more good bagel places (Noah's Bagel and similar chains excluded). For that reason alone, I was looking forward to trying this place. My previous go to had been The Bagel Factory- a pretty solid bagel, but it's not the kind of place you want to sit at and eat your bagel- lox sandwich.

The tagline for The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. is "It's all about the water", but I disagree- it's all about the coffee station! It's amazing. The bagels are good, the wraps are good, the muffins are enormous and look delicious, but I really can't get over how much I love their drink station- in particular, the create your own drink coffee set up! They have about 4 blends of iced coffee, maybe 6 of hot coffee, coffee ice cubes (!!!), whipped cream, various milk and creamer options, Fox's U-Bet syrup and cherry syrup for coke, plus the usual fountain drinks. I have an unusually high sensitivity to caffeine, but I also love coffee- such a conundrum! Luckily, they have decaf coffee (hot and iced), so I am free to indulge. My current favorite decaf coffee concoction is the Medium Roast Iced Coffee, Coffee Ice Cubes (why didn't I think of this?!!), and a pump or 2 of French Vanilla creamer. I highly recommend a visit if you haven't been already or if you're in need of an Egg Cream fix. Have you been here yet? Are you addicted to the coffee ice cubes? What did you think? Share, share!

Thank you Larry King for bringing better bagels and coffee to Beverly Hills!

11.03.2011

Societal Travesty: The Khaki Pant

The ~~Devil~~ Khaki Pant

We really need to discuss something here and it's been bothering me for quite some time. My apologies to those of you who may have fallen victim to this epidemic. I hope you will take the necessary steps to protect yourself from experiencing worse symptoms. The plague in question seems to have spread throughout most 3rd world countries and continues to affect those across the socioeconomic divide, regardless of race or religion. It's a problem that one by one, we can help to solve. This disease is otherwise known as "KHAKI pants"! It needs to go away! We need to rid our world of khaki. I suppose if you worked at the Gap in the 90s you might feel nostalgic for khaki, but it's SOOOO terrible. Please find your khaki article of clothing and put it in quarantine and throw it away. Don't even donate it, it belongs in the trash!

If they can't make it look good, how can we?!

Khakis do nothing for you. No one looks good in khakis, butts look bad, and they are predisposed to highlight your flaws, and seem to hang in the most unflattering of ways on just about everyone. Khakis come in a variety of fabrics and cuts, and it appears as though all are doomed. I'd like to take a moment to distinguish there is a difference between khaki and camel. I am very pro camel, it's richer in color and typically reserved for a superior style pant. Khaki- meh! Below are several styles of khaki failures:

Have you ever found a pair of khakis that wasn't a disaster? Please share!

Almost acceptable, except not

11.02.2011

I Said No No No

It's a really hard time of year for a lot of women. On top of the holiday stress (which we will discuss!), there is food everywhere- mainly sweets. I have an insatiable sweet tooth and I have to try to control this almost daily. It's really hard. I was talking to a friend yesterday and she has set up a challenge of her own- bringing lunch to work everyday until Thanksgiving and if she completes this she will use the money not spend on lunch to treat herself to a new bag. Sounds like a good plan to me!

A few years ago I challenged myself by not eating any sweets from the week before Halloween until Thanksgiving. It was excruciatingly hard the first week. Controlling my thoughts and cravings were really difficult. Eventually it got pretty easy and I pretty much curbed my cravings and I made it through right to the pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving dinner. I felt really good about this and a tremendous sense of pride about my will power, which usually is lacking. I'm revisiting my challenge and doing it with previously mentioned friend, P. Brainstorming rewards will be fun and a helpful motivational tool. I've so far survived day 1 of my Just Say No to ~~Drugs~~ Sweets Challenge- that means no baked goods, no candy, no chocolate, and no extra sweet coffee drinks.

How do you handle the constant sweet feast this time of year? Any suggestions are helpful. Do you just give in and work hard later on? If you want to take the challenge with me, let me know. We'll hold each other accountable and commiserate together!

11.01.2011

Date Night Done Right!

As a Wedding gift, we were given this very nice bottle of wine. This was a very thoughtful gift and we wanted to drink the wine sooner than later, but found ourselves in a conundrum about when and where to pop the cork. We knew if we took the bottle to a nice dinner, we probably wouldn't be able to finish it and we'd hate to see it go to waste. Opening the bottle at home would be a much better decision for us and gives us the opportunity to do some extra delicious cooking as well using some nicer serving platters we also received as wedding gifts. This was clearly the winning decision!

Now that we decided on a plan, we needed to pick out a few dishes worthy of the wine. Steak was a no brainer. I thumbed threw a few cookbooks and Momofuku came through with their Pan Roasted Dry-Aged Rib Eye recipe along with a Wedge Salad recipe from ~~The Bible~~ Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc cookbook, and I also threw in a couscous salad I make based on the Israeli couscous salad with mushrooms from Joan's on Third. For dessert I made crostatas with peaches and raspberries. Our dinner and the wine did not disappoint and I can't say enough good things about this Rib Eye recipe!