The Friday Five 6.15.12

1. What I’m Reading: Yesterday I called Martha Stewart pretentious. I’ve always loved her and still think she’s superwoman. So today I will redeem myself and call her a genius. This cookbook is awesome!

2. What I’m Listening to: I love this song so much! It gets me going in the morning. You should see how bouncy I am on my ball when this comes on my Spotify. PS: Who uses Spotify? I just purchased the premium package and LOVE it.

3. What I’m Eating: WHERE ARE THESE IN SOUTH CAROLINA? I have called everywhere. You think I’m joking? You’re wrong.

4. What I’m Bookmarking: I want this cake for my birthday!! Please! Please!  Mandarin Orange Cake with Pineapple Whipped Cream Frosting: 

5. GIFs I’m Loving:

WHEN I THINK ABOUT VODKA:

Ok, I’m not addicted to vodka, but I *do* love it almost as much as I love Britney Spears.

SOME GIRLS MY AGE:

ME:

True story. Kids are cute…but not with my last name!

HAPPY WEEKEND!!!

Hummingbird Cake Smoothie

…in a bowl.

Inspired by Stefanie, who posted about a Carrot Cake smoothie last Tuesday, I woke up this morning wanting cake. Alas, cake is inappropriate for a Tuesday morning breakfast, unless of course, you make it in smoothie form with plenty of milk, fruit, and protein powder.

Hummingbird Cake Smoothie

• 1 sliced, frozen banana
• 1/2 cup frozen pineapple chunks
• 1/3 cup light vanilla soy milk
• 1 rounded scoop vanilla protein powder
• walnuts, for topping
• cinnamon, to taste

Process in blender or food processor until smooth and creamy.

This has the flavor of cake and the texture of ice cream – how can your day go wrong when you start it out with this!?

What’s your favorite cake? What are your favorite smoothie ingredients?

. . .

Last night I went to my friend Noah’s house to help him pick out an outfit for a first date he’s going on tonight. We picked out his clothes, a restaurant, and a time. I’d love to tell you his whereabouts, but he’s too cute and you guys might want to go crash his date. We talked about all the must-dos (pick her up, open doors, ask her what she wants to drink) and the no-no conversation topics. Noah was about to tell her how last week he picked up some deodorant and when he got home there was a black hair on it. I told him to not tell her that story over dinner.

. . .

Lastly, Britney Spears’ new c.d., Femme Fatale, came out today!

I pre-ordered it so it immediately started downloading when I turned on my computer today. I’m listening to it now, and so far it’s very clubby. Not sure how much I’ll like playing this in the kitchen, but it will be great for the gym. I’m currently loving the songs Selfish, I Wanna Go and Inside Out. Any Britney fans out there?

Sweet & Summery Chicken Salad

Despite the fact that it’s 46* and raining here in Charleston, I was feeling Summery. Maybe because I was just at the pool last weekend? There were a bit too many Coor’s lights and Peeps this weekend so I together an easy chicken salad with some ingredients I found in my kitchen. It came together quite nicely…and Summery.

Sweet & Summery Chicken Salad, serves 2

Ingredients:

• 1 cup shredded, cooked chicken (6 oz.)
• 1/2 cup pineapple tidbits
• 1/2 cup shredded carrots
• 1/4 cup walnut pieces
• 2 tbsp. plain Greek yogurt (I love you, Fage!)
• 1 tbsp. honey
• 2 tsp. Dijon mustard
• 1/8 tsp. cinnamon
• s&p to taste

Directions:

1. In a medium bowl, toss together chicken, pineapple, carrots, and walnuts.
2. Add Greek yogurt, honey, mustard, cinnamon, and salt & pepper. Mix well. Serve atop a bed of lettuce or in a pita.

The Guzzini bowl and silverware pictured above were purchases from Eataly in NYC. This is my most recent green obsession purchase. The amount of green objects I have is obnoxious.

- my laptop

-my Blackberry cover (Matt was creeping on my text messages.)

- my Camelbak

- kitchen bowls

- one of my bedroom walls

-Longchamp bag

- mittens

– blankets

- dumbbells

–kitchen utensils

- and the unnecessary collection of Menchie’s spoons

I think everyone has an affinity for a particular color, but I probably need an intervention.  Yesterday when I was at Menchie’s, I noticed they now have hot pink spoons! I immediately texted Lucy, knowing she’d be psyched. She replied, “No freaking way! Take their spoon supplies!!!!!!! It’s you and me in spoons!”

Obviously I asked the girl at the counter if I could buy some. She smiled, handed me a bowl and said “Here. Have a nice day!”

SCORE!! But now Lucy and I are wondering what the heck we’ll do with 60 pink spoons.

What is YOUR color?

Snowpocalypse 2011: The Day We Had No Snow

Sunday evening news reports were claiming icy rain and possible snow in Charleston on Monday. We already had flurries a couple weeks ago, so I wasn't really surprised. Charleston is the new North. Except the people aren't rude. (I am originally a Masshole, I am allowed to say that.) I begrudgingly got out of bed at 7:30, got ready, and headed into work. On my way there, Victoria called me and yelled "TURN AROUND! The office is closed!" I nearly screamed into the phone like a 5-year-old, veered onto the next exit ramp, and turned around to go home. I was overjoyed! But on my way home, I spent over an HOUR on the Ravenel bridge. I saw 5 different accidents, with cars facing all different directions. Maybe one or two of these accidents were caused from black ice, but I actually think people just panic while driving under "inclement weather conditions" and end up driving worse than I do. Which is really, really bad. 

So how did I spend my random Monday off? 

As soon as I got back home, Lucy asked if I wanted to go to Target. That was a big fat yes. She, Rebecca, and I spent well over an hour in every department in Target (other than Men’s and the baby section, of course). Purchases included some rainbow-heart printed dish towels (very necessary), chocolate, mints, biore strips, and other womanly things. These are all things worth driving in the Snowpocalypse for. 

We also made a quick stop at the pet store. Now here's why Lucy might also be a bad driver. Instead of letting me get out to move this grocery cart, she said, "Don't worry about it! It's fine." And just parked. Like this. Haha.

When we got home, we did what we do best: sit on the couch with our laptops and surround ourselves with  magazines, books, and food. We usually leave the t.v. on too - any random channel will do. Every 5 minutes it seems that one of us asks the other, "Um, what are we watching?" or "Why are we watching Rachael Ray? She is soooo annoying." or "You can totally change it if you want." Yet we never really change the channel.

Lucy was itching to bake something so I suggested we make homemade granola. We again decided to brave Snowpocalypse 2011 to pick up supplies at Whole Foods. Very worth it. I was inspired by the Carrot Cake granola on Allie's blog, but I made mine a little differently.

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups rolled oats
• 3/4 cup shredded coconut
• 1/2 cup rice crisp cereal
• 1/2 cup shredded carrots
• 1/2 cup walnut pieces
• 1 tsp apple pie spice (or 1 tsp total of cinnamon + nutmeg + all spice)
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/3 cup honey
• 1/4 cup pineapple juice
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup raisins (save for the end)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325*. In a medium-sized bowl, mix together oats, coconut, cereal, carrots, walnuts, raisins, and apple pie spice, and salt. 2. Add honey, pineapple juice, and vanilla extract. Stir until dry mixture is fully coated.3. Spread mixture evenly over a baking pan. Bake for 20-25 minutes, flipping granola halfway through baking time.4. Once cooled, toss raisins into granola.

This granola can be enjoyed by the handful, over Greek yogurt, or atop oatmeal.

Immediately after baking, I again braved Snowpocalypse 2011 so I could go to Spin class. Today was my first class with David Cross, and he is fantastic! His high-energy level was so encouraging, and I loved how during our cool down song, he came around and high-fived everyone. But my absolute favorite thing from yesterday's class was that he played Meatloaf's "I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That).” Now that is how I want to start my Mondays. With this guy:

After Spin class, I hurried to get ready to watch Auburn play in the National Championship game. At the end of the game, a 19-yard field goal by Wes Byrum at the end gave Auburn the National Championship, with a 22-19 win over the Oregon Ducks. Champagne bottles were definitely popped!(Look, I’m Asian!)

In summary, Snowpocalypse 2011 meant great things: shopping for unnecessary crap, watching mindless television, baking, exercising, and drinking champagne for football games. I decided that work is overrated and anyone willing to financially support these habits of mine should feel free to call me on my telephone. I may or may not silence your call and text you back. That's just what I do.

WAR EAGLE!

Carrot Cake Is The Only Cake You Should Eat. Ever.

For a birthday party on Saturday night, I decided to make a carrot cake. Not your typical birthday cake, I know, but it was one of the birthday boy’s favorites as well as mine. I had never made a carrot cake before, so I tweeted asking for recommendations. Allison immediately suggested Martha Stewart’s recipe. Well duh, she is the master!

I was already a bit nervous about making a cake. I am a cookie girl, and the only cakes I’ve ever made are angel food cake and pumpkin chiffon cake. This particular recipe is a 3-layered cake, so I knew I was in for some fun. What I didn’t realize is how messy this fun would be.

Take a peek at what I did to my kitchen. This is what you would call a disaster.It took nearly the entire time the cakes were in the oven for me to clean up. Another thing about the cake-baking process is that you can’t sample it before your serve it! This scared me, a lot. I did, however, sample plenty of the batter. Because my hands were covered in cake frosting, I was afraid to use my dslr too much, so I snapped a few pics with my blackberry. Excuse the poor quality photo and know that my phone is currently covered with dried up frosting. It smells great, though!Unveiling the cake at the party was pretty fun because Margaret and I made a pretty big deal about it. That’s just what we do. We decided that it was no longer a birthday cake – it was a bestie cake and we were going to be the first to indulge in my creation.

And this would be a very blurry photo of us feeding each other.Believe it or not, we decided to share with others and everyone’s response was the same: “Omg, you made this? This is amazing. And I don’t even like carrot cake.” Seriously, I heard that about 50 times. It is true. This recipe is perfect. The only change I made to Martha’s recipe (I know, how dare I!) was substitute water for crushed pineapple to add more flavor and added in raisins. Both added ingredients made for a delightful texture!

After feasting on cake, we feasted on too much beer. Kegs + carrot cake = quite the rager of a party. Especially when I brought out…the SWORDS! Call me a five year old, but when I saw these ONE DOLLAR foam swords at Target, I knew I had to have them. My friends and I are really mature.And then we realized the swords could fall apart. Whoops!

Question 1: What is your favorite cake? Have you ever made it?

Question 2: Do you bring stupid toys to parties/the bar for extra entertainment? It is perfectly fine for you to tell me that I am out of control, but I will keep doing it.

Hope everyone had a great weekend!