Having eggs for breakfast every day could potentially be boring. I’ve avoided the doldrums by spicing up my routine with hot sauce and green onions. A little Christmas-colored spirit is enough to get my morning kick-started and my taste buds tingling. Yowsers!

This recipe comes straight from Cooking Light magazine (which also has a fabulous online recipe database). I was looking for a light, yet flavorful lunch– and one that would re-heat nicely. It was easy enough to whip up a large batch of this soup and it’s been feeding me for days! If you’re looking for something a bit more filling, I would recommend putting it over noodles or rice.  Also, I like my soup a bit spicier, so I added more chili paste to the pot.

Recipe can be found here.

I wouldn’t say that Vegas has ever been on my bucket list of things to do before I die. But when my ol’ college roommates and I started brainstorming about our next reunion, it seemed like an obvious choice. I saved all my pennies and started gathering sequined articles of clothing, in preparation for our 2nd annual reunion (the tradition began a year ago in sunny San Diego– thank you B Boyer). 

It is a special thing, getting to experience the crazy in person.Vegas is the strangest combination of tacky, shiny, surprising and decadent. Nothing is like real life, but you have the limits of being a mere human (and with only so much cash in your wallet). It’s like being in an unending cycle of dehydration, excitement and exhaustion.

I gambled 1 dollar in a slot machine and lost it within 23 seconds. The biggest win we had, between the 5 of us, was 10 dollars! I believe that was promptly spent on a 10 dollar beer (and yes, it was domestic). Will I ever go to Vegas again? Probably not. Was my favorite part of the weekend holing up in the hotel room, wearing robes, drinking champagne and watching the Golden Globes? Maybe. :)

My dear Kelly is a monster of a dog. Yes, literally, he is quite huge. But he also has a terrible habit of destroying our home while we are away (anxiety, boredom, loneliness?). After putting up and decorating our Christmas tree, we became concerned about the havoc he would bring to our resident pine tree.

We left the apartment to buy a crate, with the hopes of containing his madness. Before we headed out to the pet store, we locked the Kelly Monster in the bathroom, away from said Christmas Tree. We thought that we had cleared away all tempting items, but this turned out to be false.  The loofas were pulled down from their hooks and completely destroyed. I’m still finding pieces of orange and green around the apartment– days later! And, obviously, the shower curtain is a total goner.

PS. it’s really hard to get mad at him.

I’ve written about kale chips before, but it’s worth repeating how much I love them.

You can find my original recipe here. This round was slightly different. I didnt’ have any nutritional yeast on hand, so I sprinkled the kale leaves with Parmesan cheese before baking. A wonderful non-vegan version– and it was cheesy deliciousness. Don’t ever be put-off by the shriveled-up nature of these snacks, they taste far better than they look.  I promise. :)

Apparently, a picture is worth a thousand words. Here are 24,000 words about my Thanksgiving Yacht Adventure. 

I placed this post in the Food We Should Eat category and I do realize that most of this food is meant for special occasions. However, I couldn’t resist taking a picture of our bounty, as foreshadowing to our feast!

The night before Thanksgiving is a busy time at the grocery store, however Fred Meyer rewarded our consumerism by giving us a FREE TURKEY. That’s right. Apparently, if you spend over a certain amount on this certain day, you qualify for a free 10-23 pound frozen turkey. Tim and I felt like we had won the lottery! We pranced back to the freezer to pick our prize and walked out of the store with beaming faces. After pondering about (and eventually finding) a freezer to stash our turkey in, we proceeded into Thanksgiving preparations.

Tim has taken over his mother’s long-standing tradition of making Chex Mix for the holiday season. That evening I was reminded of the intoxicating smell of freshly baked Chex Mix. And we ate a LOT of it. As far as the frozen turkey is concerned… stay tuned… we have plans for that bird!

I recently had the joy of participating in a cheap beer and pizza tasting. This is a genius idea for a dinner party, it suites the needs of competitive people,  food people and everyone in between. It ends up being a bit of work for the host(ess), since it is easiest to have one person pick up all of the pizzas (for the sake of confidentiality).

For the pizza-tasting portion, we thought it was important to represent national chains as well as local favorites. We stuck with either cheese or margherita pizzas, for consistency. Our hostess cut off all of the crusts, which increased confidentiality. Each pizza was numbered and everyone ranked, according to taste. The cheap beer tasting was just a fun add-on. They were all pretty terrible.

So, I don’t completely remember the final rankings of all of the pies and beers. But, I do remember the best and worst in each category.

Pizza
Best: Apizza Scholls (hands down the best of the bunch)
Worst: Hot Lips (a surprising loser)

Cheap Beer
Best: Rainer (everyone easily agreed)
Worst: Bud Light (yikes….ugh)

I am surprised and maybe a little embarrassed to admit that my number two pizza was Domino’s. Well, they have improved their recipe lately. However, I’m not sure that they deserved to ranked above Ken’s Artisan. It is possible that I have cheap taste.

Thanks to our pal Becs, for introducing us to the glory of Pine Sate Biscuits.Many delicious items were consumed that morning including; sausage gravy, fried eggs, mushroom gravy, fried green tomatoes, chard, fluffy biscuits and the biggest single hash brown I’ve ever seen in my life. Next time I go, I will be tempted to order just the giant hash brown plate because I was very disappointed when I ran out of eating-steam and couldn’t finish it. Oh yah, another awesome thing worth mentioning is that they were serving Heart coffee, which is a major plus in my (humble coffee opinion) book.

In case you aren’t aware of the wonder that is Zenni Optical, I suggest you surf on over to their site right now. You can buy (prescription) glasses for as cheap as $6.95. Over the years, Tim and I have frequented this site and we’ve discovered duds and gems, alike. To be honest, at 7 bucks a pair… who cares?! Suddenly, risk-taking becomes an option with glasses, which is (obviously) super-fun!

Our latest batch of glasses from Zenni Optical were particularly fabulous. Mine are so silly and I can’t resist wearing them. Tim says they look like two windows on my face! Ha ha! This isn’t the greatest picture, but you get the idea. You can also purchase prescription sunglasses. Don’t give into the temptation, Pacific North-westerners… you won’t see the sun for another 6 months.