the hamburgular.

blake had at least 2 birthday parties at mcdonalds. ages 3 and 4? i am unsure. but not me. i was a lettuce-eating kind of girl. and i am not sure about the popularity of the mcdonalds birthday party for my generation.

i tell my students every day, it seems, to eat food that is food. they think i have some weird obsession with corn, which to them means i want to eat it all the time. they eat junk food for most daytime meals, as shown in the wrappers filling the student lounge. i especially remind them about places like mcdonalds and taco bell, which seem to be the worst culprits in serving non-food food. if the food from a certain place continually makes one's stomach hurt, it makes sense to stop eating it. but, the kids are from another generation--the one of iphones, dvr, and instant gratification. they've never had to wait for anything.

and today, i saw this post. a 12-year old hamburger! and it looks the same as the new one!
please, kids, don't eat the mcdonalds. it's obviously not food.

damn splenda.

bad news day for splenda. apparently, it "contributes to obesity, destroys 'good' intestinal bacteria and prevents prescription drugs from being absorbed," says the new york times.

the research was done by the sugar lobbyists. so there's that.

i would rather eat sugar any day. preferably organic. not bleached.
it's best to eat things that occur in nature. overall. really.

an apple a day.

and, yes, i got a new computer. my first apple. it's lovely and pretty and so much faster than the old one.

i still want to write about all the things in this post, but as days go by, there are more foods and issues of which to talk.

so, we'll see. are there certain things you want me to write about? do you know the grossly awesome dish that is frito pie? let me know.

fake meat.

i am not a fan of fake meat. you know, that "meat" that vegetarians often eat, that's not real, that many pretend tastes real.

well, after my new roommate, elizabeth, and i cleaned and re-organized the entire kitchen, we ate sandwiches made of some sort of fake barbeque meat on hotdog buns. we felt as though we had to eat something from the almost-overflowing freezer. i keep thinking that they might have been wonder bread brand, but that just seems shocking. why would there be wonder bread in a house that has a co-op shopper? so many questions.

anyhow, the fake meat. i don't know its brand, and i would probably choose not to injest it again, but it tasted like meat. at least the horomone-full, not organic meat of my youth. it was probably textured vegetable protein, but i am not sure. maybe they were these? it's all just wrong.

this food was not food.

the home of botched elections.

i went to florida for the weekend. i realize that sounds really jet-set, but my grandparents were celebrating their 65th wedding anniversary. that's a long time. i mean, really long.

blake and i spent a lot of time in the backseat of a car, reliving the road trips of our youth, wishing we'd had a digital camera as kids, for we apparently really enjoy taking pictures of ourselves. even while blowing bubbles. or attempting.
we ate ridiculous amounts of bagels and had dinner plans at the "late" hour of 630pm. our hotel breakfast was surely not meant for photographs, but the camera has produced shockingly flattering pictures that i have to share.

this is blake's breakfast. an omelet made just for him, topped with salsa, and served with potatoes. oh, and bacon. people love bacon.

and mine. also, potatoes. and a bagel, though not so good. i am positive that it came from a freezer. you would think the bagels would be more exciting, with all those new yorkers that relocated south. and an omelet: spinach, cheddar, and mushrooms. canned mushrooms, the kind you get on delivered pizza from a chain. it looks better than it tasted.

i am not a professional omelet-maker, but these were not really omelets, but almost-scrambled eggs. i was wishing for eggs of weekends past. thank god florida has a beach; the one we visited was lovely. also, most of family was there. that was awesome too. the best part.

hurricane ike.

so, my parents are dealing with a hurricane. they've lost electricity and phone lines and are probably pretty happy they boarded the windows. in terms of food, my mother promises me that they have, in no particular order: peanut butter, pasta, bread, cake, bottled water, and flank steak. i kept telling my mother to buy canned beans, but i don't think they really eat beans anyhow.they have a propane grill, as do many texans, so that they can cook even without the electricity. i've been thinking a lot about what food i would get to prepare for an emergency.

here's what i would want:
chips (potato and corn), canned beans (black and garbanzo), salsa, green apples, beer (obviously), peanut butter and jelly and bread, carrots, pickles, bottled water. i would probably get cans of other things, like tomatoes, vegetarian chili, maybe even potatoes. i would heat water on the grill (if i were in houston and had one) and use my french press to continue to make coffee. maybe some cheese, like cheddar, that i could eat for a few days at least.

as far as i am concerned, chips are the most important item. i am sure i could live on chips alone.

why?

among the other reasons why i can't stand sarah palin, there is this one. really? she's even messing with what we eat?

hey, hermano.

blake makes great mexican food, which is awesome because new york does not do the same. as far as we are concerned, the best things to eat in the morning are breakfast tacos. blake's are a bit like burritos, overfilled and hard to close, but certainly tasty.

the most incredible thing is that a person can make breakfast tacos with just about any random vegetable you have in the fridge, as long as you have some eggs and something spicy. and hopefully cheese, but you could survive without it. you would just be sad.

a short recipe: put some oil or butter in the skillet. cook your onions and other harder veggies first. add spinach and tomatoes. pour in your already-whisked eggs, and cook to scrambley goodness. heat your tortilla (could be in the microwave. boo! or over the range, turning if over and over a flame until hot and not hard). put some salsa and shredded cheese on the tortilla and scoop the egg mixture over it. voila! it's the best.

as we ate our way through the refrigerator, one of our last attempts at cooking while packing was breatfast tacos: spinach, eggs, onion, maybe some tomato. it's hard to remember at this point, but we set the timer on the camera to record the moment for posterity. (we had packed the plates, so we are eating over the sink here.) the pictures aren't pretty, but i know blake is probably crying in austin about no longer being the star of the blog, so this is really for him.

one more, for the kids in the back.

this is the end of the boston adventure: blackberries.

we went on a boat to the harbor islands. we chose spectacle island and georges island, though there are quite a few a person can visit.


georges island isn't that exciting. it's mainly a fort that you can walk in and around, but not much greenery really. we really wanted to go spectacle island. it's called that because it is supposed to resembles spectacles. heh. barely.
what is weird and gross about spectacle island is that it was a landfill. yes, kids, we hiked on a landfill. and what's even more insane, we ate food from there. an island once known for gambling and garbage has blackberries growing all over it.

this was the main reason lindsey wanted to visit, even though she was weirded out by the idea.

but she was an incredible explorer, walking and looking through the thorny brambles for the berries. she was successful. i ate a few but i felt like we were stealing from the insects or birds or whatever animal might typically eat them. lindsey did not have the same worries.

fruit sushi.

in addition, lindsey was dying to go eat fruit sushi. she had written me emails telling me how incredible she thought it would be, and so when i went to visit, we drove to brookline and went to some organic sushi place called genki ya. it was almost 10pm and we were the only ones there, but that's besides the point. (lindsey plans to go every day, i think, so that it remains open.)

what do i mean by fruit sushi?
well, there were so many bizarre and lovely options: with mango, sweet potato, banana, plums, honey. our roll had cream cheese, cucumber, carrot, sweet potato, and banana. other things, too, maybe.

it was delicious. and organic. and inexpensive.

toad in the hole.

i did not grow up eating eggs like this one. i went to boston for labor day weekend. (i drove a prius, by the way. it was incredible. someone should buy me one.) lindsey bought all sorts of fancy foods to feed me for breakfast: good coffee, goat cheese brie, ciabatta rolls.

and eggs. probably cage-free, no horomone. but, that's not the point at this moment.

she made a dish called "toad in the hole." i'd seen her do it before, when we were roommates, but, well, she was always eating dinner foods at breakfast, so i ignored much of her morning ritual. i like breakfast at breakfast. and any other time.

she cuts a hole in the bread, and then toasts it in the skillet a bit. then, she cracks the egg into the hole, and fries it there. in the hole. the toad in the hole. ha.

it was super. lindsey said there were other names, but i want to call it "bee in the bonnet."

gosh.

i think about writing often, and then i come home and my computer hates the internet, hates i-tunes, hates opening files. so, i am behind. there will be a new computer soon, and an external hard drive, which i actually think is the root of the problem. too many files in the computer. and it's not even close to full! anyways.

here's a short list of things i plan to discuss:
1. fruit sushi.
2. toad in the hole.
3. frozen pineapple drinks.
4. my new kitchen.
5. corn (but i guess that's a given).
6. my brother (also, predictable).
7. blackberries on the landfill.
8. breakfast tacos.
9. food from the bodega.
10. popsicles.
11. lasagna.
12. frito pie.

it seems like a long list. the end of the summer, with the moving and all, was not so good for this blog. i have a backlog (backblog? ha. bob loblaw. ) of photographs and ideas. i just need to get started, and i need my computer to promise not to overheat in the process.

please come back soon.