Moorea

We took a trip to Moorea (an island in French Polynesia, part of the Society Islands) last year. Can't believe I never shared pictures! Here are a few:

Looking every bit the rap star:

View from our over water bungalow. Hello!

Stayed at the Hilton Moorea Lagoon & Spa - so awesome.

If I'm not wearing a black turtleneck, I'm usually donning some kind of beater tank.

I went running around the island and managed to find my brethren!

Pretty breathtaking.

I went snorkeling!

Ate at Le Mayflower - my first time (I think) eating French food.

The husband had the healthy steamed fish and vegetables.

Of course I had the fattening cream sauce lobster ravioli. Mmm!

Snail egg roll. First time eating snails. Yeah, I won't be doing that again.

Hiking to the grocery store. So beautiful.

Hodgepodge

Work has been bananas, both before and after my recent vacation. I needed some freaking R and R like you wouldn't believe. I got some! Wewww hewwww!

I took this weekend to decompress. Got a little bit of exercise and reading in. No other obligations. Oh thank you God for weekends like this.

5 mile walk/hike at Crystal Cove in Laguna Beach with Aline, Ili, and Tasha. So gorgeous! And the views weren't bad either. ;-)

Picked up a lot of great new (and used) books to read.

Helped my husband get his new wardrobe ready. Men have it so much easier than women, IMO. He can wear anything. I picked the tie!

I'll post some pictures and have a touch of commentary on my recent vacation soon.

Updates on MOI

Creative title, no?

Some minor updates on me. Not much changes in my life. That's more of a good rather than a bad thing, if you ask me.

Presents! I love presents!

My friend Gold Digger went to Canada to watch the Olympics and got me these!

And my super sweet friend Wan MADE me this - who does that?! Wan does! It's the best laptop sleeve I've ever had in my life to be be honest. I've gotten so many compliments on it. Let me know if you want one, she custom makes them and they are worth every penny. Isn't it pretty?

Thank you so much Gold Digger and Wan!

Work is fine. Surprisingly, my little book of clientele is growing nicely. I continue to see how treating your family, friends, and clients well really comes back to you full circle in the karma department. Did I use correct grammar?

Some other notables:

I found some new friends!

My dogs are still cute as ever!

My husband is HOME and has some new clothes thanks to me. I like the color combos, do you? Thank you Brooks Brothers outlet!

And lastly, I'm still overweight. Gee I wonder why. I give up.

Before:

After:

I should probably mention that I'm also going on a much deserved vacation in 48 hours. Thank you God.

Can I please just get this damn race over with already?

It's raining cats and dogs right now. It's expected to rain tomorrow morning when I do the Surf City Half Marathon in Huntington Beach, CA tomorrow.

God help me. I'm serious. I haven't trained. I've ran about 5 times in the past 2 months. Wtf was I thinking?

Bring it on and let's get this party started and over with already.

(looks like me, no? I wish I had her legs)

I am boringggg! Oh so boringggg!

I really am boring. Oh who gives a F, right? I don't write this blog for anyone else but me. I like to keep track of whatever crap I am doing at the moment.

This weekend I:

- got my entire to-do list done

- flaked on my weekend long run. I am going to be a disgrace the Surf City Half Marathon. Whatevs.

- got excited about February being a new month. Time to get it together.

- COOKED!

- did 3 miles with my doggies! They are so fucking fetch I tell you.

- went to dinner with Mr10yt. So glad he's home, even if only for a few days.

I am that stinkin boring.

Sunday night dinner. I have AW'd (non-Nest and blog people, AW = attention whore) my cooking before but I will do it again. Stuffed peppers thanks to Marshy, and Salade Olivieh.

Stuffed Peppers recipe here.

What I did differently. I used 2 small cans of tomato sauce because I had them rather than diced tomatoes. I used the residual bell pepper in the turkey mix rather than tossing it. I also didn't use ketchup on top while baking, I used the residual tomato sauce that I set aside.

Salade Olivieh.

6 small/medium potatoes

5 hard boiled eggs

5 tablespoons light mayo

4 dill pickles, chopped

3/4 cup green olives

juice from pickle jar, juice from olive jar, as desired

3 tablespoons garlic salt (as you like it)

3 tablespoons mustard

1 tablespoon of paprika

12 ounce bag of frozen peas and carrots

Pepper to taste

Directions: boil the potatoes for 20 minutes or until fork pierces it and comes out smoothly. Hard boil eggs. Rinse both with cold water. Peel potatoes and dice into pieces comfortable to you. Chop the eggs, pickles, and olives. Mix them all up with the mayo (I used light mayo). Add olive and pickle juice, garlic salt, paprika, mustard, and pepper as desired.

Mix and serve. Honestly you can add as little or as much of each ingredient as you want.

I loved it and so did Mr1oyt. PLENTY of leftovers too!

Just like home

My parents didn't cook very much when I was growing up, but there were a few dishes that they made a lot that I really loved! One of those was called adobo. It's a traditional Filipino dish that is really easy to make, with simple ingredients. Mr10yt loves it, and so do I!

If you don't make it in a crockpot, it can take some time to make. I'd say about 1.5 hours from start to finish for everything. But it's worth it.

My recipe isn't totally exact, but no decent Filipino recipe is.

Chicken Adobo Recipe

2 pounds bone-in chicken (you can use pork, beef, boneless chicken, whatever. I find that chicken wings and drummettes are easiest).

2 tablespoons cooking oil (I used EVOO)

2/3 cup apple cider vinegar

3/4 cup soy sauce

4 cups water (give or take a cup depending on how flavorful you want it to be)

7-ish cloves of garlic

7 bay leaves (optional)

1.5 - 2 tablespoons of peppercorns, or just plain pepper (optional)

1 large onion, cut into strips (optional) - I use brown or yellow onion

If you're using drumsticks, thighs, or breasts, I'd recommend boiling the chicken for about 5 to 7 minutes in water just to get it cooked a bit. It lessens the time for cooking.

Saute garlic cloves.

Toss in the boiled chicken.

Pan fry for about 5 to 7 minutes

Put in the soy sauce, vinegar, water, peppercorns. Stir and bring to a boil. Stir.

Put the bay leaves in and onions on top.

Reduce heat to very low. Cover with lid but leave a crack for the steam to escape.

Simmer for about 30 to 45 minutes, or until the meat is falling off the bone.

Stir every 10 or so minutes. Taste as you go. If the sauce is too potent, add water to dilute. Too vinegary? Add more soy and/or water. Too soy saucy? Add more vinegar and/or water.

Makes about 4 large servings, 5 regular sized servings, or 6 diet-ish servings. =P

Best with steamed white rice! I put a lot of soup on my rice. Veggies on the side. Easy-ish meal with minimal ingredients. Plenty of leftovers for lunch!

I kind of felt like I was back home again.

Before the simmering starts, it looks a bit like this

Brussel sprouts and butternut squash. Pan fried/saute with some olive oil and garlic salt.

If you have a rice cooker, an easy way to make hardboiled eggs is to stick them into the pot once the rice is cooked and close the lid for another 10 minutes.

Finished product!

Shopaholic no more!

Lately I have been majorly decluttering and getting rid of excess stuff around the house. Aside from the things we donate, I still had a few things that I spent a pretty penny on that didn't get much use. Well, thanks to Craigslist and ebay, my piggy bank is oinking like a maniac.

Things I've gotten rid of:

Kitchenaid mixer and pasta roller attachments. Omg used like 3 times or less, pasta rollers once.

Boxing set

Wii and Wii Fit, used like 5 times:

Nikon zoom lens - yeah, never used. I had to dig around to find it. It was in a drawer with clothes that I barely use.

LESSON LEARNED: Think before buying. I guess I've made some stupid impulse purchases over the past year or so. It's really sad that I had these things laying around my house and garage that went totally neglected.

I still have oodles of crap. Stamping and scrapbooking supplies (not just supplies, I could seriously host a workshop for at least 10 people with the amount of stuff I have for this), knitting and crochet materials. Not sure what else, as I've done a good job of donating, tossing and selling stuff off.

Feels good.

OINK OINK!

Skin, Farming, and Thai Coconut Curry Shrimp

I will never win a contest that requires thinking of a clever title or name. Serious.

Anyway, my latest obsessions:

Clarisonic! Wahooo! I've been using it for about 5 days. I am just now getting over the "purging" stage where my skin turns nasty before supposedly getting fab. We'll see. I'll update as I see progress.

Farming! I currently love Farmville! I just bought a cottage last night, and since I now have a home instead of just a rest tent, I also bought a mailbox. I love this game.

Thai Coconut Curry Shrimp.

Yummay. Jonesy recommended this dish to me, and even got me a bottle of red curry paste that I could not find at the 4 stores I looked in. This was gooooood. I'm so proud of myself!

Recipe here. I doubled the sauce portion. Next time, I think 'll use more basil and onion, and more red curry paste for a bigger kick. Best part - it was LIGHT!

Channeling my inner Martha

Practice doesn't make perfect but eff it - I'm going to try my best in the cooking department. Since I have a lot of chicken in the freezer, I'd like to make some things from Cooking Light this month, as well as a seafood dish.

Let's see how I do!

Roast Chicken with Balsamic Bell Peppers

Chicken Potpie

And thanks to Amber's suggestion, Thai Coconut Curry Shrimp

And from Liz at Savory Spicy Sweet - Macaroni and Cheese! I'll probably serve this with some kind of protein on the side. This is her beautiful photo:

Cooking Fail, Cooking WIN!

Mr10yt and I eat out A LOT. I really wanted to change that for at least the beginning of 2010. Forget that it's insanely pricey to eat out so much, it's just plain stupid considering we go to the same places for 75% of the time (Outback, CPK, BJ's, Hooters). We also drink more than half of the bill.

I am a horrible cook, but sometimes I like trying things.

Chicken marsala was a BIG FAT FAIL. PSA - I Can't Believe It's Not Butter + Soymilk =/= heavy cream. This dish was seriously disgusting.

Tonight, however, I tried my hand at Asian Grilled Pork Chops (only not grilled but pan seared instead) and Asian Coleslaw - WIN!!! Mr10yt even got seconds!

PLENTY of leftovers for my and the Mr's lunch tomorrow, and even more.

Super economical too, surprisingly. Pork chops were on sale, and the ingredients were things I already had for the most part!

Go me!

Beauty steals, and deep thoughts on Lee Press Ons

I needed new facial lotion so I headed over to CVS. Oil of Olay was on sale for $8.99. Revlon polishes were on sale for $3.99 and you got $3 reward bucks for each polish purchased. So, I bought 3 of them for $12, and got my Oil of Olay for FREE with my reward bucks!

Total cost was about $13 for Olay face lotion and 3 polishes. I love deals.

And so, I know this may sound lame. But I love the way the first 2 photos look. Think they are her real nails? I wonder if I can get the same thick nail look with Lee Press Ons. Hmmm. My own nails seem so flat and lifeless.

Revlon Frankly Scarlet (for toesies lest I look like a hoor at work)

Revlon Plum Seduction (for hands - a tad risky but considering I wear all black most of the time, I think I'll be ok)

Revlon Silver Screen (hands - I couldn't find a better picture)

First two photos from mariannaoust on Flickr. I love her nail pictures!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mariannaoust/