Candied Bacon, Oh My!

Okay, seriously. This recipe claimed that it would take all of my willpower not to eat the whole batch as soon as it came out of the oven. I was skeptical. And then I took a bite. It was like everything that makes bacon awesome combined with the tastes of caramel, maple syrup, and pure epicness. It's like when you get syrup on your bacon when eating pancakes on Sunday morning, except approximately a million times better. Basically, it's the most wonderful thing in the world.

The recipe goes something like this: take some bacon (8-12 strips), put on a baking sheet, cover with brown sugar (I think it's something like 1.5 T per strip) and put in the oven for 20-25 minutes (at 350). When they come out, wait for them to cool enough to eat, throw some salt on them, then proceed to shove into your face as you die of pleasure. (The link to the recipe I followed is on the pictures... it's Apartment Therapy's The Kitchn. )

.... Some helpful tips that I discovered... the recipe said to line the cookie sheet with parchment paper or silpat or wax paper or whatever. And I thought, meh, what the heck, I don't have any and I want to make this stuff. Well, the pan was a little intimidating to clean, since it was basically covered with hardened caramlized sugar and bacon fat. So next time, I will be listening to the recipe.

It's just a good cold as it is hot, and that's pretty much how you store it-- by sticking it in the fridge. I will have to say, even thinking about how awesome candied bacon is, when I took my first bite of the pieces that escaped my post-oven removal rampage, I was still shocked at how amazing it was!

Other opinions on candied bacon are not as unconditionally excellent; for example, there has been some debate over whether or not bacon or candied bacon is better. I would say the latter, because bacon is good as a side dish for food, but is a little salty for straight snacking, while candied bacon is wonderful on its own. I have friends who disagree with me, saying that it is not an improvement over the original, so why bother? I suggest you should make your own judgment if you can.

Those Damn Millionaires.... Seatle Edition

Drooling over pretty houses currently for sale at realtor.com, I noticed something horribly unfair: over about 1.3 million, the houses were a thousand times more awesome! Aroud a million, it was hit or miss, but the moment you got down to 999,999, the houses wouldn't be worth the sacrafice required to afford them. But JUST OUT OF A NON-RICH PERSON'S REACH are really amazing houses that if I had that extra money, I would totally buy, even if it meant using my life's savings. So what's up with that????

So here's my reasonable example, and I assure you, it's the only thing remotely in that price range that is nearly as awesome. 4 bed, 5 bath, 1.21 acres, a couple blocks off of Puget Sound, and just under 1.1 million. That means I could reasonably afford the mortgage if I (or my household) made 195k a year. Not entirely impossible, if a little bit of a stretch. So what am I complaining about exactly? (Besides the fact that I am MANY years off of having an income remotely resembling that.)

Well, that house is awesome, but it's the only one that's remotely in that price range. The other ones I thought were amazing were much more expensive. Good schools, views of the ocean, Puget Sound, or Lake Washington, and architecturaly interesting! I'm looking through them, and I can't even come to a conclusion as to what to show you. I should have just done this while I was looking at them yesterday.

So why the hell am I looking at house in Seattle? (If you ask me why I'm looking at houses at all, I will ban you from this blog forever --not that I know how to do that.) Well, I may be complaining about prices, but compared to this area, Seattle's amazing. It might just be my tastes in architecture; I have two rather opposite proclivities as far as exteriors go: really modern, or swiss alps cottage/ castle looking (there must be a better phrase then that, and I don't even know if you know what I mean.) My area in the price range of 1-1.5 million is all colonials. I mean, most of them are a step up from the standard cookie cutter models, but most include siding and older interiors. Some of them have bigger lots, but that's pretty much all that's going for them (in terms of notability). I was going to post a picture of such a horrible thing, but ultimately I don't want to waste blog space.

OH LOOK. I found a house that I love in the DC area..... 4 bedroom, 5.5 bath, good school, modern style, nice scenery.... want to guess the price? (I'm sobbing internally by the way because I want that house... anyone who wants to buy it for me, give me a call ;) ) (The pictures are linked to the listings, by the way.) Anyway! 7.1 million! Now I'm not saying that would be the cheapest I could get a house I'd really love, but you get the idea. And I'm not saying the Seattle picture is my dream house for 1.1 either, I'd much rather get the 7.1 house, but I am at least SORTA reasonable in my expectations.

Basically my point is, there are million dollar houses in my neighborhood. They are crappy cookie cutter things on no land. I mean, they're pretty, prettier than my parent's house (which is fairly pretty). But the point is, if I'm going to spend that much money, I want it to be on something that's really amazing, not just pretty.

I've always wanted to stay in the general area I grew up (+/- an hour or two), or at least on the east coast, but the point of this whole thing is... you might see me in Seattle in 15 years!

My First Venture into Interior Design: My New Apartment

I absolutely love my new place! I've been here for a couple weeks (just got pictures up, woops...) and it's amazing! One of the exciting things about it is that it definitely doesn't just look like a bunch of college kids live here, and that's mostly due to my fun times this summer... drawing and browsing the internet and shopping at Ikea. The size of the apartment helps as well.... one advantage to going to school in the middle of nowhere is that space isn't exactly at a premium. (The private half bath and walk in closet I get also helps.)

My room in particular is very satisfying! I put the most effort into it, if only because it didn't require coordination with all my roommates (and I could spend as much money as I wanted on things without having to pitch it to them first.) I'm so happy with the result. The walls and carpet are white (well the carpet is actually kind of a tan, it turns out, but still) So I wanted to go with a black and white basic color scheme with purple color accents. Basically, I love a modern design aesthetic but I didn't want the room to be too cold. I also looked for accent pieces in black and white that had a more organic feel to them. Not sure things turned out perfectly, but the result (above) was definitely great for my first realized attempt at interior design. And I could afford the whole thing on the budget of a full-time college student. Not too shabby.

The rest of the apartment turned out pretty well too. I love the dining room table we got, and it was a pretty great deal at Ikea. I pointed at it from across the room, said, "if I could get any table, I'd get that one, but I'm sure it's too expensive," and found out that it and its set of four chairs was actually quite reasonable! (picture to the left) I decided to compliment the wood tones with red, picked up a few place mats from Walmart, and got a couple posters for the wall. (A side note: I really need to get in the habit of framing things. It looks so much more finished. Unfortunately, $15 feels like a lot of money to those of us who get by on summer jobs alone.) Caffeine, wine and bread. Three things I very much like.

The kitchen is nothing too exciting, but it is pretty sizable compared to some apartment kitchens I've seen. Without the table there, it really looks too empty. It's fairly well stocked on appliances as well; we have a George Foreman grill (wish we could have a charcoal grill, but they're not allowed), a blender (for smoothies, I swear), an electric griddle (because I love it for making pancakes and bacon), and a microwave. There's also a fish tank, but it's not for storing live fish just in case I'm in the mood for some seafood. I have a cheap wine rack from Ikea sitting on one of the counters, but otherwise I'm trying to leave as much of the counters open as possible; big or not, it does not have an excess of counter space. One of the more crazy things about the apartment is that it's a four bedroom that's really just two two-bedrooms put together; this means that there are two kitchens! Makes it pretty easy to share that (right) between two people and our guests.

The living room was a challenge, design and budget wise. Since it's a double wide living room, like I said, there's a lot of room to fill up, and couches and the like are the most expensive and least easily craigslisted items we had to deal with. Somehow, though, we ended up getting everything but the lamps and the beanbag chair free! Basically, my roommate's sister's boyfriend's family was redecorating their basement and gave away two massively comfortable, basically new, decidedly not ugly couches as well as an amazing wood coffee table and side table. (It's possible our tv watching side (left) is their basement transplanted.) The other side (right) is much more loungy, more like something you'd find in a college student's place (the Van Gogh prints possibly excluded from that statement): A massive bean bag chair, a second-hand bar, and a couch that is my mother's first couch, hidden beneath a blue cover. I'd say the beanbag chair has gotten the most use, but that's probably partly because we haven't yet gotten our cable box for our tv. I did the design scheme for the living room too, but I had a lot less flexibility and a much lower budget.

So I did say this was a four bedroom place, right? What can I say about the rest of the apartment, since I've only shown you a few rooms? Well, one of my roommate's rooms is -frighteningly- pink, one pretty typical college girl -y, the other messy in the CS major way that only her computer stuff seems to have any dedicated furniture space (but she has a puzzle on her wall, and that is pretty awesome.) As for decoration of the common spaces, the other side is pretty bare... the roommate on my side did a good job of decorating her bathroom (it's a shared shower though, so I'd know...).

Anyway, looking at those pictures, I'm sure you'd agree that my room was the most notable thing, from an interior design standpoint anyway. The biggest issue was the space... too many big white walls without the money or coordination to buy big posters to match the scale of the space. The apartment on the whole still has a really nice feel to it, very homey. I tried very hard to avoid a temporary mood in the common space decorating as much as I could. In any case... Bienvenue!!

Food Blogging

A couple weeks ago, an acquaintance of mine showed me a bunch of sites, including a million food and drink blogs. Ever since, I've been picking up links of things I'd love to cook. But as much as people to try to convince us damn kids eating out is more expensive, cooking anything interesting is too!! Particularly with a kitchen that I don't have entirely stocked. (It's probably better than other college students haha.) The same thing goes for the bar... liquor and liqueurs and wines are all just so expensive, it's hard to just try things. Basically in conclusion.... Here are the blogs:

**http://www.thekitchn.com/ This site has a mix of recipies, ingredient spotlights, and kitchen information. I'm most interested in the recipies, which are sometimes links to other sites. The picture to the right is from the recipie for ice cream sandwiches! Every day there's a lot of updates, so there's a lot there to work with. On the interior design side... there's a lot of pretty kitchens~ There's also a couple of things on wines and liqueurs, usuallly in terms of pairings with food. It's pretty much my favorite of all my new blogs.

**http://foodgawker.com/ The first time I showed this to my boyfriend, he said, "This must be made by a foodie who wants to be a photographer." Basically, the site has links to interesting food articles, each link represented by *mouthwatering* pictures of food. I have a tendency also to browse this site during my midday classes when I'm starving... not sure if it hurts or helps. In any case, some of the links end up not being very helpful, and I tend to mostly be attracted to the sweet things, most of the savory dishes are too.... complex for casual cooking. If I were to be having a dinner party though.... a lot looks quite excellent. It's really hard for me to come to a conclusion, just from the things on the front page at the moment, what to show you. I actually found a twice-baked potato picture that I SWEAR I will be cooking sometime soon. I just need more people to come over for me to cook for :) I didn't realize how many updates there were each day, but going back to look at the site for this blog, there are another couple rows of pictures compared to when I looked during my noonish class. It's more of a looking site than an informative one, some of the links are kind of hit or miss.

**http://www.liqurious.com/ I'm way underqualified to appreciate this site, much less evaluate it. Mostly, it makes me want to take a bartending class, just for fun. That, or get my bar stocked, which is complicated by many things-- namely, a student's budget. Anyway, a lot of the liquors involved are not to my tastes, others, I don't even know what they are!! (elderflower, anyone??) On the other hand, there's a lot of things involving watermelon that look quite good. Like that to the right, a watermelon margarita! I absolutely love margaritas, and then, watermelon? There are a couple gems there even for the likes of me, and I'll get back to you in a couple of years on the rest. Right now, I'll stick to fantasizing about making skittles vodka.

Now that I have access to a kitchen all the time, and I have to make my own food at least most of the time, I'm very excited about exploring my options regarding cooking. 'Til next time!

I Don't Know Why, But I Really Hate Rachel Ray

You know that cheery personality lady on food network and a million other places? (Including dunkin' donuts coffee commercials) Well. I have an irrational hatred of her! I have no idea why... it has something to do with her voice and her constant upbeatness and her annoying abbreviations. Haha. E-V-O-O! :(

Why am I talking about Rachel Ray? I tend to avoid her as much as possible on TV, so while yes, I was just watching Top Chef Masters, that has absolutely nothing to do with THAT WOMAN. The reason, however, that I am mentioning her is that I just realized I have a relatively short amount of time (considering work and all) before I move into my very own apartment!

I'm a fair cook. I can follow recipies pretty well but I've never really cooked much more than once (lack of experience and all) and I have to ask/look up a bazillion things that cook books just assume you know. I own a brownie/fruit bar pastery type cook book, but nothing that'll help me COOK. I'd really like someone to buy me a housewarming Joy of Cooking type thing, but I'm not sure that'll happen, so I think I'll just photocopy my mother's cookbooks, put them in a binder or whatnot. And she has this Rachel Ray cookbook with, as much as I hate to admit it some decent recipes.

BUT I CAN HEAR HER VOICE WHEN I READ IT, it's clear she actually wrote it, no ghost writing for her. Which in her case (or rather, my case) isn't a good thing! I hate using it because of that, even though the dishes are quickish and there are quite a lot of things I'd like to try (particularly the cocktails!!)

Hopefully this'll turn out like my irrational distaste for Bobby Flay.... which is to say that it dissipates. Of course, he's only my favorite iron chef now because Morimoto and Batali disappeared and well. Cat Cora is just like. Blarg. and Michael Symon is..... OH MY GOD so much worse than Flay (Besh should have won >_<).

Would You Really Walk Down the Aisle to This?

This video has been going around recently. All I can say to it is.... what the hell? Walking, no, dancing, down the aisle to Chris Brown's "Forever". I mean, let's not even discuss the quality of the song itself. (Because I WILL have something to say about that, too, not being such a Chris Brown fan.) But really? You want to walk down the aisle to something that you wouldn't otherwise even remember in 10 years?

Does sophistication have less value in the modern day? I suppose that's a loaded question... Let's say, does classic style have no support among us youngin's ? I'm not saying there can't be variety, or fun, but for a once in a life time thing, it really should last a life time! It's like a getting a tattoo... you don't want to get a reference to some TV show you just fell in love with, or name your child Sabrina because you can't get enough Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

See look, there's this video... See, it's a fun pop culture reference, but it takes place at the reception, which is basically just one hyped up party! That's the time for fun, not the ceremony. That being said... I'm not a big fan of this video either... Sure it's at the reception, but you're going to ruin your first dance? I dunno. I guess I like keeping once in a life time things special. You'll only have your first dance as Mr. and Mrs. once.

I suppose my conclusion is.... please, nothing except the wedding march for walking down the aisle okay? Anything I can at least stomach (if not exactly approve of) but seriously. You'll thank me later.

Cakes! Yum yum.

So, I was watching Ace of Cakes and I thought to myself, "MAN, wouldn't it be awesome to have an excuse to order an awesome insane cake?" Unfortunately, the only time I'm liable to have a reason to buy a complex cake is... well, a wedding cake? So here we go....

First off, jeez, wedding cakes can be expensive. The cheap ones appear to be $5... a serving. And a wedding cake is something like 150 servings. So cheap is what? $750? I guess that's okay. But I'm sorry. Like I saw one cake, $13.50 a serving ($2000!), that was dusted with pearl dust. The place that I saw the most pretty cakes, http://somethingsweetbymichelle.com/ , they don't even post the prices on the website!! (If you have to ask, you can't afford it?)

How much can you really justify paying for something that you eat in one evening, that's the question. I read a tip regarding this: make everything except one layer cardboard that's beeniced, and then just give out sheet cake to everyone else except the bride and groom. And thereally short cakes just kinda look pathetic. I think I'd rather have a fake cake, haha. This one to the left is pretty cool though, as short cakes go.

There are some really cool cakes out there. I mean, really. I saw a beehive cake on Amazing Wedding Cakes (although I don't think that would be such a good choice for a wedding cake). And some of the more wedding themed ones are very fun looking, even modern. I seem to have a pretty classic taste though. I prefer them to be predominantly white or beige or gold or light pink, and my favorite decoration is flowers. There are some other rather pretty ones, but anything with black is too dark ( in my opinion) for a wedding!!

And then there's this "Groom's Cake" thing that all these shows seem to suggest that I've never heard of before this. WHAT'S UP WITH THAT?! Haha. The cakes are kind of crazy, maybe pretty fun though. I think it'd only be a good idea for a bachelor's party or maybe the rehersal dinner? But I don't think it'd be worth spending a lot of money, and it looks like they typically use a bunch of fondant (fondant being the more expensive, slicker/harder icing...). I realy don't know anything about them, besides the fact that those are usually the more interesting (interesting vs. beautiful) cakes.

Do I Really Need a Rug?

My theme is something like this: basic modern black and white meets organic blues and purples. The walls in my room go along well with this idea- all white, so with other black and silver and white furniture we have a very good (but very plain base). I'll have candles and vases with flowers and posters and pillows to make things a little more beautiful, but what about the floor? It's carpeted, so I hardly NEED a rug.

The problem is, rugs are expensive. Anything that would cover the area I'm looking at will probably be $80 minimum, and from what I've seen looking, there isn't too much that really matches my theme! I could always wait until I find something just right and add it later, but I know when all my heavy furniture is in place, I won't want to go to the trouble to put it under everything.

Does anyone know where I could see a good selection of relatively cheap rugs, or can anyone think of something they've seen that'll match my design scheme? The closest thing I've found is $250 so I'm definitely still on the lookout.

To Bean Bag Chair or Not to Bean Bag Chair...

So, the bean bag chair. Well, couch really. I went into LoveSac (lovesac
.com) with one of my roommates for fun and indeed. Love. Now, the one we thought was heavenly certainly deserved to be... it was about $800. The sales associate let us in on an awesome deal- $450 for the bag (and footstool!) to the right.

Now that is by no means cheap. It would be the single most expensive item in the apartment, and I didn't exactly spare any expense in my bedroom. But we were originally going to buy a nice new TV and that would have been about the same amount.

Besides, when else besides college can you justify using a bean bag chair as a couch?

Bienvenue!

Interior design, food, weddings... I have a limited need to think about these things right now. Still, I do, and my boyfriend has finally snapped, refusing to listen to another word about realty or $5000 dresses. Enter this blog: I will present to you my thoughts and inspiration for my future (particularly the domestic parts!!) and you can have the chance to look at the inside of my head... or not!

Enjoy :)