Spaghetti Squash Carbonara & Salted Chocolate Chip Cookies

Happy (belated) Valentine's Day! Yesterday was a pretty low key day for us.
We didn't want to do anything fancy and just wanted to relax. So, we went out and got some brunch at Serious Biscuit. The biscuits were actually pretty good. After brunch, we decided to walk to Pike Place Market. Probably the worst idea ever. There were a ton of people walking around getting flowers/chocolate. So Wayne quickly bought me some pretty tulips and we headed back home. I like getting flowers but I'm kind of picky about which ones. I don't like getting a bouquet of red roses. But I like white roses, one single red rose or bright flowers like tulips. To be honest, I think a bouquet of red roses is really cliche on Valentine's Day. I loved the tulip bouquet I got from Wayne though. It was really pretty and brightened up our bathroom. 

After coming back home, we both worked out, relaxed and then made dinner together. I have to say that I'm not into the whole balloons, teddy bears, or fancy dinners for Valentine's Day. All I really need is good food and good company (which I already have.) So, we made Zen Belly's Spaghetti Squash Carbonara and Not Without Salt's Salted Chocolate Chip Cookies.I didn't really plan on making the cookies on Valentine's Day, but the cookie mix arrived before and I figured why not make something with chocolate in it. Ashley Rodriguez, is a food blogger from Washington. I saw some other bloggers raving about her chocolate chip cookies. I decided to pay tribute to a Washingtonian and buy the mix to see what the hype was about. Oh man. These were sooooo effing good and worth the price for shipping. Woo wee these were pricey cookies. When I bought the mix, I was skeptical. It was a good chunk of money and I mean it is REALLY hard to make a really good chocolate chip cookie. Sometimes they are too dry, too chewy, to soft or not enough chocolate in them. BUT these fit the bill. I'm tempted to buy the mix again because they are THAT effing good.

I also bought her new cookbook, Date Night In. In the cookbook, she talks about how her and her husband are busy with life and their family. They lost touch for a while, and brought it back by rekindling their relationship in creating a drink and date night meal together. I love that. I think that often, most couples get into the routine of doing the same thing every day. They eventually lose touch with how they fell in love and those emotions. One of the things I love about my relationship with Wayne, is that we both see food as an adventure. It's a new experience and a way to create memories together. When I cook, every meal is a new experience not only for our taste buds but also our relationship. When we travel, we always go to a Farmers Market to explore the produce in the area. We also scope out awesome restaurants to try out too. Then at home, I try new recipes and we enjoy it together. It's fun and food has always been a part of our relationship. We're always trying new things and enjoy being around each other. :) I love you Wayne.

Anyways, let's get started!

 

First, we baked some spaghetti squash in the oven. For some reason, I only could find small spaghetti squashes. I guess they are slowly going out of season? 

Wayne helped by cooking up some bacon. Yum bacon.

 

We also mixed up some egg whites and Parmesan cheese. 

We also saved the egg yolks to put on top.

Then we mixed up the bacon, bacon grease, parm cheese egg mixture and cooked spaghetti squash together.

While Wayne was helping out with dinner, I got started on the cookies. I put some softened butter in the bowl. Paula Deen that sh*t!

Added an egg to the the appropriate packages in the cookie mix. 

Then added the huge chocolate chunks from the cookie mix.

Rolled them into ball and sprinkled the salt that came in a package.

Ta-da! Oh man, these were glorious. The sea salt on top gave it a slight salty touch, while the cookies were a little crunchy on the outside but soft and chewy on the inside. Plus every bite had chocolate in it. That's what you call a damn good chocolate chip cookie. I already ate like seven fresh out of the oven. 

The finished product with a glass of wine of course. I topped it with some fresh cilantro. The spaghetti squash carbonara was delicious. The cheese, egg and bacon grease went together perfectly. It was a romantic and simple evening. I wouldn't have it any other way. <3

Zenbelly's Cookbook here & Not Without Salt's Cookie mix here. I'm not asked to endorse them, I just really like their recipes and am sharing where you can get their books/cookie mixes.

Emma 

Thai Green Curry Mussels

Last night we celebrated Wayne's birthday at Shiro's Sushi. His birthday is not until Tuesday but we wanted to go out and get some sushi. Probably because we have been craving it. By far, this is our favorite restaurant out here. The sushi is phenomenal. I mean, the first time we went out here to Seattle, we got this Norwegian Mackerel at Shiros and it was like butter. Oh man...so delicious! My mouth is salivating thinking about it.

We got omakase and I thought Wayne was going to drift off in a food coma! He got 17 pieces of sushi/sashimi! Omakase is nice because you get to see the sushi chef's flair. Plus most of the fish is market price so super fresh! The fish from Puget Sound were really delicious. I got a blackened cod that had been marinated in sake and miso. Oh man, that was probably my favorite of the night. .Wayne really liked the 4 levels of fresh tuna he got. They presented it as the tail, middle, belly and upper part of the fish. That way you can taste the full flavors of the one tuna. As for customer service, I really liked it. The waiter took notice that I said it was Wayne's birthday and he came out with a birthday flan for Wayne at the end! In short, super delicious sushi! I don't think I can go back to the Midwest and eat sushi or seafood. It's not the same once you have fresh fish out west!

Then today, we woke up pretty early today and decided to venture out and get some Crumpets from The Crumpet Shop. The last time we went there, we got a lemon curd crumpet. Omg that was so good. I got a hazelnut butter crumpet this time around. It was also really good but not as good as the lemon curd. Anyways,  after breakfast, we walked around Pike and the Elliot Bay Trail.

Since we were out and about so early, we decided to go to the Seattle Aquarium. We walked past it right when it opened at 9:30am and thought why the heck not. It was well worth the money as we got some extra entertainment. There was a guy (probably in his thirties) was super excited to go in the aquarium.  He kept pacing the doors until they opened and when they opened, he sprinted to go inside. I mean, seriously. He full out sprinted to the door. I did not even see a kid that excited to go in and see fishes. It was pretty amusing.

I think he was in a good number of photos I took. He was all over the place...
While we walked throughout the aquarium the dude kept running around the place. We think he might have been high (despite it being 10:00am) as it would explain his erratic/hyper behavior. Or then again, he might just REALLY like fish. I found it pretty funny. One of the girls that worked there jutted towards us. He had been talking to her non-stop, so she threw out the educational seal fur coat (she was showing the kids as they walked by) and asked me if I wanted to touch it.

Poor girl, her eyes had the "Please don't have me talk to this guy any longer" look in them. So I pretended to be interested in learning about seals so she wouldn't need to keep talking directly him. Wayne laughed on how a date must be with the guy. Besides that entertainment, we enjoyed wandering around before all the crazy families and children arrived. It was smaller than Chicago's and not as nearly as impressive as San Francisco's aquarium. But I will say, it was really neat they had pool exhibits where you could touch the sea animals. We touched a sea urchin, starfish and some other creatures.

Poking a sea urchin felt weird.

Wayne and the Starfishes

Jellies!

We found Nemo!
After the aquarium, we decided to go on the Seattle Great Wheel. I was excited. I mean yeah, it's a tourist trap. But you might as well try it once! Besides, I was excited for the views. It was a lot smoother than Chicago's Ferris Wheel. Plus they took you around more times. I remember Chicago was like 2 times around then they kicked you off. While Seattle's Ferris Wheel took you around 4 times. The view was breathtaking. I can't get over the fact I live near the ocean and the mountains! 

Before I get on the ride...

He's so cute hehe.

The view of the city

Then for dinner I made  ZenBelly's Paleo Thai Green Curry Mussels. I've never cooked mussels before so I didn't realize you had to put ice over them to keep them fresh and alive. So, we lost a good chunk of the mussels because they were all dead. womp womp womp :(

Cleaning the mussels. They're bad if they are opened while if they are still closed then you can still use them. We had to de-beard some of them too. I guess, I'll just need to make sure I prep them with ice before and buy cleaner ones. 

The good mussels we had left were going to have to do for now. I chopped up some lemongrass and ginger. I've never used lemongrass before but it was fairly easy to prepare and smelled pretty good.  Then I added the lemongrass and ginger to the pot with a bit of coconut oil.  I let the simmer and prepared the broth. Pretty much it was some coconut milk, two jalapeno peppers and a good helping of chicken broth. 

I love ginger. Wayne doesn't care for it too much because growing up he often got the big chunk in his stir fry or soup. Garlic and ginger are two of my favorite seasonings. I admit, too much can ruin a dish, but a little bit of ginger can go a long way and change the flavor palette. 

Then I added some Thai Green Curry Paste, threw in the good mussels and I boiled the broth until the good mussels popped open! It was pretty easy.

Ta-da! Finished Product. Not bad to a eventful weekend. I don't think I would make this again though. It took a lot of time to clean the mussels and wasn't enough for eat for dinner. I had to make something on the side to satisfy our tummies. But I could see if I had people over for dinner, this would be a good appetizer. 

Simone Miller's cookbook has been on my list of books to get for a while. I love the fact that she is self taught chef and started her own gluten-free catering business. To read more about her and read her blog click here. I'm sure I'll have to dapple again in her cookbook. I think it just was a disappointment, I didn't take care of the mussels and couldn't salvage them all. Oh well, you live and you learn! :)
Stay tuned for more posts.

Emma

Mongolian Beef over Green Cauliflower Rice

Today, I got some awesome training/workout shoes! I decided to go with the Reebok's ZQuick TR 3.0. They had pretty good reviews online and were within my budget. I didn't want to spend over a $100 on a shoe. I also wanted a shoe that was light for my gym workouts. I'm kind of digging the neon yellow shoes. I like how bright they are and it kind of jazzes up my gym outfit without buying a ton of new clothes. 

I like getting new gym clothes, but I'm not in the being "fashionable" while working out even though some of the "trendy" work clothes are pretty cool looking. I know I just wouldn't be comfortable working out in them. I don't need to look all fashionable or sexy while I'm lifting. Personally, I believe if you can workout with makeup on and it still have it on your face, you're not working out hard enough. Anyways, I kicked my butt working out. There were like three different types of push ups. It was arms/abs day and at the end my arms were shaking like JELLO. Let's get started. I didn't take a lot of photos this round. Probably because my arms were so sore.

First, I made some Cauliflower Rice. Pretty much I put the cauliflower in a food processor and chopped it till it was small pieces. Then I sauteed it with some coconut oil, chicken stock and salt/pepper till it was warm. I thought green "rice" would look kind of cool. I found green cauliflower and orange cauliflower at Whole Foods and it inspired me to make this dish. 

Beautiful Green Cauliflower Rice! The coconut oil in this makes it SOOO good. I then made the Mongolian beef sauce. The sauce had a bunch of things like garlic, ginger, honey, coconut aminos etc. It made the apartment smell like an Asian food restaurant. lols

Then I sliced up the meat. Once the meat was cut, I placed the meat in the sauce until the it was fully cooked through. 

 Ta-da! Finished product! I wasn't too impressed with the meat. I think the flank steak was too thick or I made the pieces too big. But it was pretty tasty and easy to make!

I've used The Paleo Kitchen cookbook before. They have a ton of great recipes in there.
To see more on the actual book, please click here.

Emma 

Bacon Meatballs with a Mango Honey Mustard Sauce

Yesterday, I made Paleomg's Bacon Meatballs with a Mango Honey Mustard Sauce.

 Our apartment had a Super Bowl party on the rooftop lounge so we went to that instead of a bar. After devouring probably way too many free cookies and popcorn, I felt I needed to cook something a little bit healthier (and substantial) for dinner. Plus I was annoyed after the game, and needed to blow off some steam. Can't believe we lost and didn't give it to Marshawn Lynch at the end. I'm not even a huge football fan and I was upset. lols. It just made sense to try and run it rather than throw it when you are that close and only have so much time left. :(

Seahawks!

Hanging out at the roof-top loung area

As for the actual Super Bowl commercials, I was actually pretty impressed. There was one by Chevy that pretended to disconnect the broadcast. Everyone in the community area was like, "Huh? What's going on?" We all thought the TV was messed up. I gotta say that one was pretty good. Another one that got me all teary eyed was Toyota Camry's My Bold Dad commercial probably because it reminded me of my dad. In every decision I've made my dad has always supported me. Sometimes, the decisions I made growing up were tough, and I think sometimes my dad might not have always liked them, but he always was there to support my decision and support me. 

2015 Chevy Super Bowl Commercial: 4G LTE Wi-Fi – 2015 Colorado | Chevrolet

My Bold Dad | Presented by The Bold New Camry | Toyota

As for the half time show, I was kind of lost. It felt like I was on drugs or something. I did like how Katy Perry performed Firework at the end though. It added a nice touch and plus since The Interview movie, it has only become more popular. I did get confused with the beach balls and sharks. I think those shark costumes may make an appearance for Halloween 2015? They were pretty funny costumes. Or maybe people will get them for Shark Week? 

Katy Perry Halftime Show (I do not take credit for this photo)

Ta-da! Finished product! This was actually really good. I've made the creamy cucumber dill salad before and it's one of my favorites because it is so easy to make. The meatballs and the mango honey mustard sauce were really good together. The sauce at first tasted kind of weird. We had too much mustard instead of honey. But with the meat it was fantastic. It was just enough sweet, tangy and brought out the meaty, juicy flavors of the bacon meatball. I think we will have to save this on our list of easy favorite recipes. :)

Bacon Meatballs with a Mango Honey Mustard Sauce recipe found here. I've done a couple of Juli's recipes before. Her newest cookbook is on my list of books to get. It's hard being a foodie AND a bookworm. I have like 15 cookbooks I want to get! 

Emma