Monday, February 28, 2011

A Very Tasty Roast

Johnny and I didn't make it to the 100 Acre Wood Rally this weekend. We stayed home in favor of getting the house puppy-proofed and tidy. I picked up a whole lot of meat on Saturday- Sam's Club had excellent prices, and I am a big fan of buying in bulk and using my vacuum sealer to freeze small portions- including a chuck roast. Johnny's mother provided us with her favorite pot roast recipe and we made it yesterday; it was absolutely delicious.

Jackie's Pot Roast

  • 1 3 lb roast
  • 2 tbsp garlic pepper
  • 2 tbsp lemon pepper
  • 1 beef bullion cube
  • 1 c. hot water
  • 1 onion, cut into wedges
  • 1 c. baby carrots (or carrots cut into 2 inch sticks)
  • 3 red potatoes, diced in 1 inch pieces
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Season roast with garlic pepper and lemon pepper. Place into large Dutch oven. Dissolve bullion cube in hot water and pour over roast. Cover, and cook in oven for 1.5 hours. Remove from oven and add vegetables. Return Dutch oven to oven and cook for 1 hour. Let roast rest for 15-20 minutes before serving.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

Puppy Time!

Johnny and I will be welcoming a puppy into our home next week! I am really excited about it- the puppy is a female Corgi/Dachshund cross that we've preemptively named Buttons. We headed out to PetSmart today and bought all the necessary equipment for puppy: collar, leash, chews, toys, and food. (We still need to find a crate and bed.) Johnny's been reading puppy training books nonstop for the last couple of weeks, too. I'm super pumped for little Buttons to join us!

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Dressage

Dressage: a French term, most commonly translated to mean 'training'; an equestrian sport in which the horse and rider perform a specific test of movements; often referred to as 'equine ballet'.

Image courtesy of Game Ready Equine
I'm not a dressage person. Even though it's the first test of a three-day event, even though its principles are used in every riding discipline, even though it's beautiful and exciting at the highest levels of the sport, I am not a dressage person. To be honest, I've always found it kind of dull. Cantering in circles, lengthening the trot- where's the fun in that?? 

In the right horse and right instructor, that's where. Yesterday I had a genuine dressage lesson on Gina with one of the program's volunteers, Anne. Anne is a dressage person- she competed on fairly advanced levels aboard her horse Sophie (who died several years ago) and studied with some of the country's best trainers. She offered to come out and give her opinion on Gina's dressage abilities, as well as offer any tips for improvement that she could think of. I was more than happy to have her out, as my experience in the discipline is limited to short stints of flat work in between schooling jumps. Anne ended up working Gina and me for an hour, putting both of us through our (pretty basic) paces. It was an amazing lesson! Gina is much more advanced in her training than I had originally thought and it's my opinion that she will be a phenomenal event horse once she's back in shape. Anne was so happy to have a protégé and to feel like she was helping. She offered to give me lessons on Saturdays, and I couldn't be more excited. I don't know if I'm a dressage person yet- the heart-pounding excitement of cross-country jumping is hard to resist- but I'm definitely more excited about it than I used to be! 

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Bamboo Pink

Bamboo Pink. Have ya'll seen this? Have ya'll heard about this? If you haven't, let me be the first to tell you about it! It's a spanking new jewelry line from a stellar established designer whose pieces I already love. The best part? You can win some jewelry (and other neat stuff like an iPad) just by signing up for more information. There's no cost. There's no pressure to do anything right now. If you decide you like it, you can host online parties and trunk shows and make extra cash. If you don't, then you'll be out nothing but a few minutes of your time. Now's the time to sign up though- free sign up doesn't last forever, and you don't want to miss getting in at the ground level. At the very least, you enter to win some great free stuff! Just visit http://www.bamboopink.net/stejpeck and you'll be good to go!

Monday, February 14, 2011

Valentines

Happy Valentine's Day, friends! Because I am a huge dork and a big fan of the show, I'm sharing Valentine's wishes via BBC America & Doctor Who! (Apologies to those of you who don't watch the show and don't get the jokes.)




Thursday, February 10, 2011

Cooking With Beer

I adore beer, I really do. I'm a picky beer drinker, though- none of that Budweiser swill or Michelob nastiness for me. I usually stick with wheat beers like my all-time favorites Blue Moon and Paulaner, but I always enjoy trying new brews. That's how I discovered goodness like Blind Tiger Raspberry Wheat and Warsteiner Premium Dunkel. I like to support local breweries, too, which is how I ended up with a six-pack of Oklahoma-based Choc Beer's Waving Wheat.  I wasn't keen on Choc's bitter, spicy flavor, so after drinking two bottles and forcing Johnny to try one, I was left with three bottles of unwanted beer in the refrigerator. What to do? Throwing it away seemed wrong. Drinking it was unappealing. Thankfully. the March issue of Women's Health arrived with a solution: cook with it!

The issue includes all sorts of delicious-sounding recipes for beer, and today I baked a loaf of Roasted Garlic Beer Bread. Here's the recipe:

Roasted Garlic Beer Bread
from Women's Health Magazine, March 2011

  • 2 whole garlic bulbs
  • 2 c. whole wheat pastry flour (I only had whole wheat all purpose flour, so I used that.)
  • 1 c. all purpose flour
  • 2 tbsp. sugar
  • 2 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tbsp. baking powder
  • 1 tbsp. fresh rosemary (I used dried rosemary.)
  • 3/4 tsp. salt
  • 1.5 c. lager or pilsner (I used one bottle of Choc Waving Wheat.)
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Remove the papery covering of the garlic and slice off the tops. Wrap heads in foil and bake for 45 minutes, or until garlic is very soft. Let cool.
2. Grease a 9"x5" loaf pan. In a large bowl, squeeze out the soft garlic pulp and mix with flours, sugar, olive oil, baking powder, salt, and rosemary. Add beer and stir until just combined. (Don't overmix.) Pour into loaf pan. Bake for 50-55 minutes until golden and toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let cool before unmolding and slicing.

Overall, the recipe was very easy to put together. I think my garlic could have been roasted a bit longer, as it didn't squeeze out very easily. The bread was very garlicky (surprise!) and had a somewhat dense texture, but I think it's because I didn't use pastry flour. I think it's good and plan on having some for dinner tonight with my pork chops and roasted potatoes!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Polyvore

I'm late to the game on this one, I know, but have you checked out Polyvore? It is an amazing collective of fashion and style where you can put together your own sets of items. You can find thousands of items on the site from retailers or clip images from any website if something is lacking. I'd seen sets of items put together by many bloggers, but hadn't done anything with the site myself until yesterday. Not Soap, Radio is currently running a contest on Facebook that involves building a collection featuring up to five of their products. Here's what I came up with:


It was super fun to put together! I think I just found a new way to pass the time at the hotel!

Monday, February 7, 2011

Gift Conundrum

My least favorite thing about being a responsible, gainfully employed adult is that I'm now expected to handle gift-giving to various family members. In the past, my mother included gifts sent on my behalf with her packages. Last year, she continued to do most of my gift-giving for birthdays but left Christmas up to me. I did pretty well- I managed to get a gift for everyone, stay in a reasonable budget, and ship everything on time.

2011 is off to a rocky start, though- I forgot all about my cousin Jennifer's birthday until my mom sent me a text yesterday, asking if I'd gotten her anything. Jenn's birthday is Saturday. Oops. I imagined my mom sighing as she replied that she would handle it, but I needed to send my cousin Andy's wife (Mandy) something for her birthday (2/23). 

A brief explanation on my family: I don't see or speak to my father's side of the family often. (I believe 2004 was the last time I received correspondence from them.) My mother's side is small- I have 3 first cousins, 2 aunts, and 4 uncles. As a result, we are all fairly close. So while some might think it's odd to be so concerned with gift giving to extended family, bear in mind that I feel closer to my older cousins than I do my older half-sister.

That said, I know next to nothing about Mandy. I met her once, at her and Andy's wedding last summer. She was extremely kind, with a generous laugh and big smile. Looking through Andy's Facebook photos that include her (she doesn't have an account), she seems down-to-earth, into simple style, and outdoorsy. But what to get her? Here are my ideas thus far:

Image via Preppy Princess
Jonathan Adler tumblers- I think the Greek Key (blue & orange) or Multi Chevron (obvious) are the front runners...everyone can use more cups, and these are an excellent value. I'm not sure if they're dishwasher safe, though, and have no idea if they fit with Mandy's general taste.

Image via A Touch of Whimsy

Luggage tags- Another gift I think everyone could use. Although now that I think about it, I only have a PO box address for Andy and Mandy. Scratch this. Still cute, though.

Image via Olive Barn
Herb garden kit- this biodegradable bowl comes filled with organic seeds and would make an excellent window garden. Plus, they just bought a house with a great big yard; perhaps if this grows well, it could be transplanted outside to a garden!

Image via Not Soap, Radio
I'm not here, I'm really...gift set- I hate to give generically girly gifts like candles and soap, but I really think this Not Soap, Radio gift set of 3 body souffles is a good choice. They have fun names like "I'm not here, I'm really walking the red carpet" and with 3 scents, one of them is bound to please!




Sunday, February 6, 2011

Dancing With Myself

Heather over at Crawdads in my Sink made an important point a few days ago: even though the weather might be dreadful, it's not an excuse to skip daily exercise. If the roads are too bad to get to the gym or it's too cold to go outside, one can always turn to Netflix for fitness videos. This was a revelation to me. It had never crossed my mind to look online for exercise instruction. 

Since Netflix doesn't support Google Chrome (boo!), I started looking on Hulu for videos. I have nothing but time at the hotel where I work, so a 30-minute workout is easy to do. I found my answer last night in the form of dance workout videos. I thought they would be a good fit because they don't require special equipment and can be performed in a tank top and jeans. 

I tried out Dance and Be Fit: The Bollywood Dance Workout. A smiling Indian lady informed me I would tighten and tone, all while releasing waves of joy and energy. While I can't say I felt particularly joyful or energetic, the workout was relatively fun and kept me moving and shaking for the better part of 20 minutes. (The video is 50 minutes long, but I didn't want to get too sweaty at work, just in case guests needed to actually see me.) The instruction is clear and well-demonstrated and very positive. As someone who is totally uncoordinated and un-rhythmic, I appreciated encouraging statements like "just do what feels good!" and "don't worry about keeping time!"

For the most part, I felt like I was jiggling around like an idiot, but according to my fitness app, I burned approximately 130 calories. Woohoo! Tipperary vest, here I come.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Back on Track

The house & yard covered in snow
It snowed an astounding twenty inches this week. Johnny and I were stuck inside for the better part of four days and I let my eating habits get totally out of control. I ate because I was bored. And I didn't even eat good things; taquitos, cheese, all kinds of things that are bad for me were at the top of my snack list! Worse yet, I didn't exercise at all. Usually, my job at the barn keeps me active, whether it's mucking stalls or walking alongside a kid for half an hour. Trapped in the house and left to my own devices, I played games on the PS3 with Johnny all day or watched television! Terrible! I feel totally guilty and kind of icky, so I've resolved to clean up my act. I downloaded an excellent calorie-counter/exercise tracker to my phone (MyFitnessPal) to help me keep track of what I'm doing to my body. I have to stay focused- not too much longer and it will be bikini weather!