love is blonde

I’m stealing this idea from Janssen, and if you know Janssen you’ll agree that pretty much all of her ideas are steal-worthy!

Things I’ve been loving in January:

• My shiny new MacbookPro. Sure, it technically belongs to the office, but I am having no problem at all pretending that it’s mine.
• Global warming. I don’t actually like global warming, but I have been loving our warm winter. It was 64 degrees here today! I wore open-toed shoes! I believe that probably we are all screwed and should move northward and inland, but in the meantime, I’ll enjoy it.
• The book Zeitoun. It was chosen for my February book club and I was smitten right away once I heard it was about New Orleans, during and after Katrina. But it’s about so much more. It’s non-fiction but reads like an adventure novel. The story follows a Syrian-American man and his family during the storm, the flood, and through a Homeland Security/FEMA disaster that more closely resembled Guantanamo Bay than Bourbon Street.
• Spinach & Artichoke Dip. My friend Alyssa over at Everyday Maven was kind enough to take a special request from me. I wanted a healthified version of cheesy spinach dip, and she totally came through. I highly recommend this for the Super Bowl party you are hosting or attending. (Also, I’ve been eating it for lunch all week, with red bell pepper dipping sticks, and it’s the best homemade lunch I’ve had in awhile.)
• Homemade breakfast sandwiches. On Sundays I’ve been making breakfast sandwiches in bulk for the week ahead. Ingredients: whole wheat english muffin (toasted then cooled), 1 piece turkey bacon or 1 patty of Morningstar fake sausage (cooked then cooled), and then I make a thin fritatta (you could add cheese or veggies or just do egg whites) and use the rim of a drinking glass to cut the egg into circles. Assemble, saran wrap, freeze, and reheat!
• Living life like I’m 21 years old again. Going to bars in Adams Morgan, sake bombs, sleeping in til noon, eating frozen waffles, hanging out with my friends talking about life/boys/clothes, etc. It’s not so bad.
• Bright pink tights paired with a dark gray skirt and a black sweater. Y’know, before it became 64 degrees.

Here’s a view from my parents’ newly finished “retirement” “cabin” (both words meant to be taken lightly). Apparently it’s winter somewhere!

Tell me, what are you loving right now?

My sister, brother-in-law, and super cute nephew are coming to DC this weekend. My BIL is running the Marine Corps Marathon and we will be cheering him on.

What else is making me happy?

MY NEW iPHONE4s! It was love at first sight. And do you like the girly case I chose for it?

The leather purse my parents brought back for me from Florence. I feel so Euro-chic when I wear it.

Oh, and you guys have got to make this salad that my sister introduced me to last weekend. It is so simple and yet seems so fancy.

• Baby spinach
• Sliced Strawberries
• Chopped up walnuts – put them in a pan with a spoonful of sugar and drop of water and heat it up until it gets caramelized (don’t burn!)
• This dressing:

It’s pretty sweet, so if you’re inclined to enjoy sweet, fruity salads you will love it. I’ve been thinking about adding goat cheese to give it some more savoriness.

Last thing? Nail polish. Which makes me sound like I’m nine years old again, but as one of my friends said to me this week (after we did a nail-painting girls night), “It is sort of like getting a new outfit for 1/1000th of the cost.” I’m really into gray polish right now, thanks to a bottle that Liz sent me. And I’ve added this to my Christmas wishlist:

What’s making you happy right now?

Do you ever feel like sangria is just a bit (or a lot) too sweet, and on a really hot day in the middle of the hottest summer, you’d rather sip on a crisp, cold beer?

Yeah, me too.

I had a little epiphany at Trader Joe’s last weekend when I came across this bottle of peach lambic, a sweet peach Belgian beer.

Into each glass went 3 parts Belgian White beer (Blue Moon used here but Hoegaarden would be lovely, too), 1 part peach lambic, and frozen diced peaches (prepped earlier in the week at peak ripeness).

Lambic also comes in framboise, which is just French for raspberry. I bet this would be delicious with framboise lambic and frozen berries. Or possibly with some mixing and matching of the fruits.

What do you think– sacrilegious or delicious? What else would you add? And if you try it, let me know if you like it!

Today’s post was written for Slice of Pink as part of Pink University, and is cross-posted here. Go get your learnin’ on over there though now.

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Hello, lovelies! It’s Janet here from Love is Blonde. Thank you to my fellow Janet for having me here at Pink University today, where I will show you how to make delicious coffee in a french press pot.

Some of you probably already have coffeemakers, or perhaps you just get your daily caffeine fix from your local barista. But if you can learn the simple few steps below, I promise you will wow yourself and your houseguests with really smooth coffee, without spending a lot of money, and you can get rid of that ugly, hulking plastic appliance taking up precious countertop space!

Step 1: Buy yourself a french press. Mine is from IKEA (cheap!), and there’s really no need to spend more than $20 or $25. Here’s a 32 oz. one and here’s a small, pink 12 oz. one.

Step 2: Head on over to your local coffee shop to buy a pound of coffee beans, and ask them to grind your beans for a french press setting. This should be included in the price. Bonus — at my local Peregrine Espresso, a pound of beans comes with a free cup of coffee, maybe yours will too!

You don’t really need to know the difference between a french press grind and a regular grind, except to know french press is coarser than regular. Let the experts do the dirty work, just get yourself some coarse ground coffee. I like to pick a roast that has the word chocolate in the description, like this one below: “…flavors of caramel, chocolate, black cherry, and wine.”

Step 3: Boil as many cups of water as you’d like coffee. Except don’t let the water get too boiled. Ideally, you want the water to be just below boiling point when you pour it into the french press.

Step 4: While your water is heating up, measure out two tablespoons of ground coffee per cup of water, and put it in the french press.

Step 5: Take your just-shy-of-boiling water, and pour it into the french press pot, slowly to get all the grinds soaked. Give it a small stir if you’d like. (You can either measure your water before or after it’s boiling. I generally measure mine after, so the water goes from the stove, to the measuring cup, to the french press. But you could measure first, then boil, then pour. The key here is mixing 1 cup of near-boiling water per 2 tablespoons of coffee grinds.)

Step 6. Put the lid on, but keep the plunger up, and set the timer for 4 minutes. Now go do the dishes so you can enjoy your coffee in a clean kitchen.

Step 7: Once 4 minutes are up, slowly press the plunger down, which pushes the grinds down, and separates the grinds from the coffee. You’re done!

Step 8: Pour your coffee into a mug and add cream, milk, or sugar to your liking. If you’re used to highly-acidic, almost-burned coffeepot coffee, you might be surprised at how smooth and sweet french press coffee tastes, and how much less sugar you need. Which means it’s totally fine to have an extra cup.

If you like your coffee stronger, you can either increase the coffee to water ratio, or increase the brewing time. Or vice versa if you like your coffee mild. The measurements and times above are standard and will give you a good starting point. If you don’t finish all the coffee on one sitting, you can put the french press in the fridge and enjoy iced coffee later.

I hope you’ve enjoyed your lesson today, please report back if you have success (or any questions).

Signed,
Prof. Blonde

The worst part about Sunday nights is how quickly they turn into Monday mornings. The best part about Sunday nights is our tradition of  “family dinners.” We only have one family member within 100 miles, so we use the phrase loosely; it’s usually my DC-BFF and occasionally a few other friends.

Together we plan the menu (full honesty: 75% of the time it’s homemade pizza or tacos), pick up ingredients, then chop, cook, clean, and best of all – eat together! Sometimes we even get really wild and eat at the dining room table instead of the coffee table. We get to catch up on gossip from the week and plan when we’ll hang out during the week ahead. And since my DC-BFF doesn’t have cable, we usually manage to sneak in an episode or two of trashy television without too much complaint from the husband.

Tonight we branched out from pizza/tacos and made a really yummy quiche. It’s so easy: storebought pie crust, any veggie you can imagine, eggs/milk, cheese, salt, pepper, then bake until it looks done. No recipe needed. Tonight we included: zucchini, mushrooms, bell pepper, asparagus, spinach, bacon, and two kinds of cheese. And we made enough for leftovers for weekday lunches.

I know that someday we may not live here, or our friends may not live here, but until that time comes, I hope we have many more Sunday night family dinners together.