100 Recipes. Done.

#1: 100 new recipes.

So, after just over a year and a half, this goal is complete. When I was thinking about what to make for my 100th new recipe, I decided to attempt something that I've always wanted to make but never have because I thought it was too intimidating. That way, I'd end this goal either on a high note, or by laughing about how horribly I had failed. Well, as it turns out, I got a little of both.

Behold, the high note...the incredibly decadent wonderment that is crème brûlée. And you know, it's surprisingly easy to make. (Hey, if I can do it, anyone can.)

Then, of course, there's the epic fail...I dropped the last ramekin when taking it out of the baking dish that was full of water. Yep.

I have the greatest husband in the world, by the way. He cleaned up the whole custardy mess. Maybe he figured I had suffered enough. Good thing I had crème brûlée to console me...

I should also mention, we definitely went and hopped on the old elliptical almost immediately after consumption. You pretty much have to, I think...but how cool is it to know that I can make this whenever I want (and you can too)?! Dangerous, but cool.

Exciting Progress

#28: Watch every Best Picture winner from 1961-2013.
Scott and Amanda were visiting Louisville a few weeks ago, and we got to have a double-date with them! We met up for dinner and then rented The Artist to watch afterward. And you know, I really liked it! It was a big risk, doing a silent film in this day and age, but it was worth it..."the Academy" seemed to think so, anyway!

#1: 100 new recipes.
Crossing had a church-wide picnic on Sunday evening. Everyone with a last name beginning with A-M brought a side item, and N-Z brought a dessert. The Duttweilers' contribution was a tomato cucumber feta salad, which seemed to be a big hit; at least, that's what I'm going to assume since there were no leftovers. Then we had two new things for dinner this week: spinach artichoke pasta which tasted a lot like the dip, but you can eat it with a fork (what's not to love?), and crockpot chicken with a barbecue sauce made from pineapple juice and sriracha, among other things. Both were "faboo," which I've been saying a lot around the house lately...for some reason. So I'm up to 99 recipes now. Recipe #100 had better be a real humdinger.

#64: Watch every season of ER.
Speaking of humdingers, we're more than halfway through ER! We finished Season 8 last week, and boy, that season finale was...well, you know. Dr. Greene (my favorite character) is gone, and now we're seeing the beginning of what Tom refers to as the "Carter administration." Hardy-har-har.

#54: Donate my hair.
And in other news...I measured my hair yesterday while it was in a ponytail (well, OK, I held it up while Tom measured it); the longest layer is currently 12 inches, and the shortest layer is 7. The minimum requirement for Locks of Love is 10 inches, but I don't think it's too early to start psyching myself up for the big cut!

Weeknight Winner

#1: 100 new recipes.
Baked chicken fajitas! This one's a keeper, for sure. Easy, delicious, and FAST, which is in stark contrast with the veggie fajitas I made as my first recipe toward this goal.

Yes, most nights we eat dinner in the living room, at the coffee table. Don't hate.

Scratch That

#1: 100 new recipes.
Wow, I am really in the home stretch with this goal...just 5 more to go! Recipe number 92 was a coffee cake made with applesauce and fat-free sour cream...but you would never know it's healthy by the way it tastes!

Number 93 was a strawberry yogurt cake. I found the recipe on Pinterest, and Tom picked it to be our contribution for the neighborhood cookout on Saturday. Man oh man. It was amazing. And our neighbors must agree, because this entire cake was gone within 20 minutes of bringing it to the cookout!

The next one was really exciting because it required the use of our new George Foreman grill (!)...chicken kebabs in a honey-lime marinade that was deeeeelicious!

Most recently, I tried a recipe that I got from a friend in my community group. It's a layered chicken enchilada casserole named "Enchilada-Zagna." My friend made it for the group when we all went on a retreat last month, and it was so good! I made it for one of Tom's co-workers who recently hurt her ankle, so she wouldn't have to worry about making dinner for at least one night, and she loved it too!

#79: Go to a zoo that has polar bears.
Phil was visiting with us last weekend (!), and one of the things we did while he was here was a trip to the zoo! Louisville has a pretty good zoo; Tom and I went there during Valentine's Day weekend last year, and it was a lot of fun, but the one animal I was most excited about seeing had not yet arrived. See, when I was a kid, I visited the Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia, SC a few times, and my favorite animal was always the polar bear. However, it's not there anymore. As you can imagine, South Carolina isn't exactly the most climate-friendly location for a polar bear, no matter how you try to recreate their habitat. That being said, it's been years since the last time I saw one, and I've been itching to see one again. Well, that itch finally got scratched, as did another item from my list!

This little cutie (I say "little" only because she's still technically a cub, even though she's enormous) is Qannik. She was orphaned as a cub in Alaska and brought to the Louisville Zoo last summer. She seems to be have adjusted well, though. See that little stick right in front of her? She picked it up in her mouth, flung it into the water, and dove in to retrieve it. She then repeated this process several times. SO. CUTE. It was so hot outside, the other animals weren't really doing much of anything, so this was probably the coolest thing we saw all day (no pun intended).

#85: Jeff Street once a month.
We visited Jeff Street this morning, but only for about an hour...the day shelter is currently undergoing some renovations so there wasn't a whole lot there for us to do, but Danny put us to work anyway, making sandwiches for the residents. To be honest, I wish we could do that sort of thing more often; anything involving food preparation is okay by me! :) I would really love to cook a meal for those guys sometime; I think that's become one of my favorite things to do for people. Hmm. I wonder if cooking might be considered one of those unnamed spiritual gifts...?

Confession

I know you're just dying of suspense, so here is my confession: the reason I've been trying all these low-cal recipes lately is that I joined WeightWatchers about a month ago. A few people already knew this, but I just wanted to put it out there. I think it's going to be really good for me in a lot of ways, one being that it will hopefully help with some more goals crossed off this list. (Fitting into my old jeans and going out in public with bare arms are the two that come to mind most readily...) Ah, confession is good for the soul. A burden has been lifted. Well, moving on then...

#1: 100 new recipes.

Eggplant dip, anyone? I know the color might make it look somewhat unappealing, but it is so, so good and super easy to make. In addition to the eggplant, it has roasted garlic, fresh tomatoes and scallions, and a plethora of wonderful Mediterranean seasonings. It tastes a lot like hummus, but I personally think it sits a little lighter on the ol' tummy because it's less starchy. I had some for lunch the other day, with a couple of big, fat pieces of flatbread, but it would probably make a good veggie dip too. My favorite thing about it, though? One hefty serving of dip is only 2 WW points! I think producing this in mass quantities is in my future; I could definitely get used to having some around all the time...

Curry, Comfort Food, and Cupcakes

Oh my goodness, more than half my time is up! I'd better get a move on; there are still way too many goals that I haven't even started yet!

#1: 100 new recipes.

Blame it on the Indian in me...I tried two more new curry recipes last week. Last Sunday night I made a vegetable stew with curry, chickpeas, and coconut milk...yum!

The next night, it was a curried quinoa salad with cranberries and veggies. It was my first time ever cooking quinoa, and it certainly won't be the last...it is so easy to cook, and it goes with just about everything! Unfortunately, I wasn't all that crazy about the salad by the second or third time I ate it. Too much raw onion, I think. It looked pretty, though.

This week, it was all about some comfort food. In my opinion, there is no greater comfort food than macaroni and cheese. I really wanted to try making it from scratch, but I also wanted to see if I could find a version that was slightly less bad-for-you. Well, look no further than thenest.com! I'm really starting to love cauliflower; I never really cared for it much before, but I am realizing that it is really versatile and a great substitute for pasta or potatoes, and this was no exception. It was fantastic! Once again, I didn't miss the carbs at all!

Speaking of food that's low-cal but still feels indulgent, I also tried a new dessert this week: mini cheesecakes made with pudding mix and Greek yogurt. Delicious!

And one more! My office does a Reward & Recognition party with a different theme every quarter, and this quarter's theme was Cupcake Wars! My entry was sort of a hybrid of two recipes: chai latte cupcakes and Hungry Girl's healthified cake recipe using applesauce and water instead of oil and eggs. The result was amazing: all the delicious wonderfulness of a chai latte-flavored cupcake with less guilt! Unfortunately they didn't rise very much, and they were a little difficult to frost, so they didn't have a chance at winning in the Appearance category, but whatevs. They tasted great, but then again, what else would you expect from chai?

Good grief. I have got to start remembering to take pictures of all this good food.

Eating Lighter

#1: 100 new recipes.

Tried a few new recipes over the last week or so. The first one was a no-noodle lasagna, courtesy of Dr. Oz. What replaced the noodles, you might ask? Sliced, roasted eggplant! And sliced, roasted squash! And it was great; there was so much flavor, I never even missed the carbs. :) Obviously, I was so excited about it, I didn't even remember to take a picture until after I had already enjoyed a piece...oops!

The next one was a light dessert, made with just two ingredients: pie filling and angel food cake mix. So easy, so good. The recipe called for blueberry pie filling, but we tried it with cherry, and it came out this pretty pink color...so cute.

The next new recipe was very loosely based on a recipe I found on Pinterest...and when I say "loosely," I mean I pretty much ended up with a completely different recipe. The recipe was for Thai chicken enchiladas, but I wanted to cut some calories (to make room for the coconut milk, I guess), so I took out the tortillas and replaced the chicken with some extra veggies. Well, that removed the "chicken" and "enchilada" parts, but I kept all of the other ingredients more or less the same, and what I ended up with was a Thai coconut veggie soup that was really, really, REALLY good. However, I didn't take a picture of it. The combination of coconut milk and sweet chili sauce made the soup sort of a pale pink. That works for cake; for soup, not so much.

Thank Goodness for Weekends

#28: Watch every Best Picture Oscar winner from 1961-2013.
About two weeks ago, I got an interesting email from Netflix. Apparently it was going to take longer than expected for our next ER disc to get here (Season 7: Disc 1, in case you were curious...making good progress on that goal!), so they sent the next available DVD in our queue, which was A Beautiful Mind. Well, Tom and I finally sat down and watched it the following Sunday evening. And can I just say...wow. It's so good. Heartbreaking at times but so, so good. This one might be a contender for a spot in the Top 5. Then last Friday we watched A Man for All Seasons, which was excellent as well. It reminded me of something I might've watched in a high school history class or something, but totally in a good way. That Thomas More was a pretty cool dude.

#1: 100 new recipes.
The weekend before last was another bad one, as far as what we ate. So we had another veggie night last week, and one of the things we had was a pot of stewed tomatoes (sorry no pictures...leftovers were gone too quickly!), courtesy of Paula Deen's Southern Cooking Bible.

#63: Go to 5 concerts.
Last weekend was a pretty crazy one. I got to go back to St. Louis on Saturday, this time to hear Ravi Zacharias, world-famous Christian apologist and one of my all-time favorite speakers. The next morning, I drove back to Louisville, and almost immediately after I got home, Tom and I jumped back in the car and drove to Indianapolis, where we saw...

SNOW PATROL!!! (Sorry the picture is so blurry, but that's definitely them.)

These guys are one of Tom's favorite bands, and they put on a GREAT show! The way we acquired these tickets was kinda funny. Shelli, one of the managers at my office, bought tickets to this show several months in advance, but back in December she hurt her knee pretty badly and ended up needing surgery. She's still got a long way to go in the recovery process, so she sold me her tickets. So I wish it had been under more pleasant circumstances, but the timing was actually kind of perfect for Tom and me, because Sunday was the 4-year anniversary of the day we started courting. Not a bad way to celebrate, I thought. :)

An Easter Update

#28: Watch every Best Picture Oscar winner from 1961-2013.
I watched Million Dollar Baby last weekend. For those who haven't seen it, I warn you: yes, this is a boxing movie, but Rocky it is not. If you only like movies with happy endings, this is not one for you. I went through several tissues in the second half. That being said, I thought it was great. Sad, yes, but very well-done. Way to go, Clint Eastwood! This weekend, I watched Amadeus. This was one of those movies that was available for instant streaming on Netflix but then went away at the beginning of the year. Well, it's back! This was also one of those movies about which I didn't really know very much, but I was very pleasantly surprised.

#1: 100 new recipes.
We went beyond Meatless Monday and didn't have meat in any of the dinners we ate at home this week! I tried another veggie burger, this time with sweet potato, and they held together much better than the last veggie burgers I tried. But that's probably because I didn't have any Magic Bullet-related complications to deal with this time. (I feel obligated to warn you, though: I followed this recipe extremely loosely. The person who posted it is vegan, and I am not. Vegans are cool with me, but her recipe had a lot of ingredients that I don't have and couldn't really justify buying, so I substituted almost all of the ingredients with things that were similar but not necessarily vegan; but the burgers were still fantastic.) I also made another pasta salad, this time with cheese tortelloni, basil, and lemon juice, yum.

Tom and I had a nice, quiet Easter brunch at home this year. For our "cocktail" we had a peach lemonade cooler (with green tea instead of vodka, hehe). I made some cheesy roasted tomatoes, revisited Paula Deen's breakfast casserole (tweaked a little so that I could make it in the Crock-Pot while we were at church), and for dessert?

A grapefruit pound cake! Clearly, this one turned out much better than the disaster of a pound cake I attempted on New Year's Day...

#82: Resist the urge to quote or reference The Golden Girls for a month.
Hey...! Today is Easter! That means Lent is over, which means that I have officially gone for over a month without quoting or referencing The Golden Girls! And you know, while I still think of lines or scenes from that show from time to time, it's definitely not as readily on my mind as it was a month ago. It feels good to be free of that...and isn't freedom ultimately what Easter is all about? :)

Thank You, Honey!

It's been way too long since my last post! Well, allow me to make up for some lost time...

#1: 100 new recipes.
One of my latest new recipes was a vegetarian chili that included sweet potatoes. It was a...mazing. I didn't miss the meat at all; there was so much flavor. And if there are any Cincinnatians reading this, you'll be pleased to know that this recipe also used cinnamon and unsweetened cocoa. You guys like putting that stuff in your chili, right? Weird...delicious, but weird. No offense, Cincy. You're OK by me.

You've probably seen those little tortilla pinwheels with various fillings? Well, I tried my hand at making them for a going-away party for one of our friends. The ones I made had seasoned wild rice, cream cheese, corned beef, and spinach; and they were really tasty! I'll have to make them again sometime, and maybe experiment with some different filling combinations.

After a weekend of good-tasting, not-so-good-for-you food, Tom wanted to have vegetables for dinner last week. So I made a squash casserole with sour cream and lots of Swiss cheese...oops. It was good, of course, but kinda defeated the purpose of having vegetables.

This week, my attempts at lighter weeknight dinners proved to be slightly more successful. We had things like baked tilapia and a Greek pasta salad that was terrific! It was loaded with vegetables, and not a drop of mayo in sight. And the best part is that I sort of came up with it myself! Pasta salad is pretty hard to mess up, but whatev.

On Friday, we had our friends James and Lyndie (and their sweet little girls, Sadie and Harper) over for dinner, and I made a tortilla casserole with black beans, sweet potatoes, and spinach. Oh my goodness...emphasis on the "good."

#51: Choose walking over driving 5 times.
After dinner on Friday, we all decided to go to the Pie Kitchen for dessert. It wasn't that far from our place, and the weather was fabulous, so we walked there! That was trip #5 for me, so consider this goal complete!

#38: Compliment or thank Tom for something specific every day for a month.

Tom's primary love language is "words of affirmation," but when it comes to verbalization, I'm all thumbs. Fortunately, this is an area in which God is growing me tremendously; I think I've gotten somewhat better at expressing my appreciation for him since we got married; and now, thanks to a little of what I like to call "Pinspiration," I've been able to step it up a little. I have a big pile of scrapbook paper and a sheet of letter stickers that will probably never be used for scrapbooking, so I put 'em together in a frame, and now I can express my gratitude with the help of a dry-erase marker. (I'm sure you noticed the crooked lettering. It's cutesy, right? Yeah...cutesy. I'm gonna go with that.) I've been keeping it up for a little over a month now, and I see no reason not to keep going!

Time with Friends

#24: See 5 new states.

New state #4 is...West Virginia! Our friends Scott and Amanda Whitaker moved to Morgantown, WV last summer, and we got to go visit them this weekend!

Our friend Jeff (far right) was also visiting Morgantown this weekend...we had a great time!

#1: 100 new recipes.

The first time I heard about zucchini bread, I thought it was the weirdest idea ever. Then I tried some at an arts and crafts festival in Charleston, and my mind was forever changed. It is delicious! It's actually a lot like banana bread, but not quite as sweet. Well, thanks to my Paula Deen Southern Cooking Bible (another great Christmas gift from Patrick), I can now make my own zucchini bread. And on Thursday night, that's just what I did.

Even better than I remembered! (I realize this photo makes it look more like meatloaf, but whatev.)

We tried a new recipe in WV on Saturday too: pizza with a crust made of...cauliflower! Yes, really! We were a little unsure as to how it would turn out, but I think it was pretty good, and it seemed to go over well with the small crowd that had gathered at the Whitakers' that night!

Progress on Two, Starting on One

#1: 100 new recipes.

This week I went beyond just ordering fish at restaurants and actually cooked it at home! I found an easy recipe for salmon chowder, and it required a lot of ingredients we already had at home, so I thought "why not?" And it was so, so good.

#36: Spell out our last name in photos.

Can you tell what this is? It's the line between two parallel parking spaces! I took this last weekend, while walking around Clemson (hence the orange) with Tom and Phil. Just two more letters to go!

#84: Read Systematic Theology.
I'm pretty sure most (if not all) people who graduate from Southern Seminary (my husband included) are required to take a systematic theology class, and this is the textbook. I recently decided that I was going to try harder to get a handle on what Tom is learning, and so this has become my new nighttime reading material. And you know, it's not as dry and boring as I thought it would be. I figured it would be full of good stuff, but I wasn't expecting it to be presented in such a non-textbooky way. :)

Hearty, From the Heart, Heart-Shaped

#45: Send a care package to Philip (hereafter affectionately referred to as Phil).
My brother Phil (I love how much I sound like Dorothy Zbornak when I say that...) is a sophomore at Clemson this year, and his birthday was a few weeks ago. This year's present was a box filled with school supplies, homemade cookies, and a gift card. Actually, Tom and I got to give this to him in person because my family met up in Clemson this past weekend for a double celebration, since Phil has the same birthday as my dad!

#1: 100 new recipes.
The cookies for Phil's care package were a sweet-and-salty combo...chocolate chip cookies with pretzel pieces! Sorry, no pictures, though. I finished them kinda late the night before we left, and I didn't have my memory card with me. Oh well.

Winter came to Louisville a little late this year, but it is finally here. The below-freezing temperatures had me craving a recipe that I've wanted to try for years but never had the chance (or all of the ingredients at one time): a nice, hearty beef stew.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love my slow cookers? (Yes, you read that correctly. I have two...one from my mom, and one from my mother-in-law. And yes, I have been known to use both simultaneously from time to time.) And, honestly, is there any better way to cook beef stew...? I threw everything in first thing in the morning; and it was perfectly done by dinnertime, plus it really hit the spot on a cold night.

We also had homemade deep dish pizza last week!

Look closely at that salami. This was our Valentine's Day dinner this year, so I broke out the heart-shaped cookie cutter. Then when we were getting ready to eat the finished product, I realized that last year's V-Day dinner was a LOT more elaborate than this. Then again, I didn't really have a job this time last year, so I had all day to cook said meal. What a difference steady employment makes...!

In other news, I have been trying slowly to get back into an exercise routine this week, working back up to my running endurance level from a few months ago...with food like this, I don't have much of a choice, do I?

Pioneer Women

#1: Try 100 new recipes.
The most recent recipe I tried was really special because it involved a recipe that's been in Tom's family for generations: his late grandmother's roll recipe. Tom's made them for holidays and other special occasions, but I've always been a little intimidated by them. Don't get me wrong; the recipe's not complicated...it just seems sacred, like a rite of passage. And I wasn't as nervous about the recipe itself as I was about what I wanted to do with it. See, I didn't want to make rolls. I wanted to make pretzels. What would Tom's Sasa (pronounced SAY-say) think of me, quite literally "twisting" a time-honored family recipe?! Then Tom told me that his mom has made all kinds of things with that recipe besides rolls...she's a roll recipe pioneer! So, after that I didn't feel so bad.

Clearly, my pretzel-twisting skills need a little work. Don't judge.

I made two different kinds: plain (salted) and cinnamon sugar. And boy, they were good. Tom and I tried them as soon as I took them out of the oven, and we couldn't stop plucking them off of the pan. Of course, they tasted more like rolls than like pretzels, but that's okay. We don't have the rolls nearly often enough, but that may change now that I feel more confident making the dough. Hmm, that would be good for our taste buds, but probably not so good for our waistlines...

Two New Recipes...And That's About It

#1: 100 new recipes.

I love chocolate chocolate chip cookies, and thanks to Pinterest, I've found a way to make them at home using a box of brownie mix as the base...genius! I made them for our friends' Super Bowl party yesterday, and they were a big hit! I can see myself making these for lots of occasions in the future...or, you know, for myself...

Meatless Monday has recently become an institution in our home. This week's MM dinner was black bean burgers, and they were delicious, though I ran into a bit of snafu along the way. (Is it just me, or has that been happening a lot lately...?) You may notice that it looks more like a pile of mush than a burger. I blame the Magic Bullet...details in the cooking blog.

And now, on a slightly less upbeat note...I can't make it to Charleston for the Bridge Run this year, but what's even sadder is that it makes no difference, because I wouldn't have been ready anyway. I have not stuck with the Couch-to-10K, or any running plan, for that matter. I know I have another chance to do the Bridge Run next year, but it's hard not to feel just the slightest bit defeated. When I first started this list last year, I really hit the ground running (no pun intended). But after looking over it again at the beginning of 2012, I realize that I've left a lot of things hanging, not just my training. More than 1/3 of my time is already up...I've gotta get a move on!

First and Last

#1: 100 new recipes.
I've finally found an easy, flexible breakfast casserole recipe, from who else but Paula Deen? Her recipe calls for a pound of sausage, but I think you could keep the base ingredients the same and easily substitute a pound of any other ingredient you wanted (bacon, veggies, some sort of meat/veggie combination, etc.). Did I mention it was easy? Well, it was also really yummy. Once again, I wish I'd taken a picture (I feel like I've been saying that a lot lately...sorry), but we took it over to our friends' house for dinner the other night and sort of...left it there! Oh well. There will definitely be a next time!

#28: Watch every Best Picture Oscar winner from 1961-2013.
The Last Emperor is the last remaining BP winner available for instant streaming on Netflix. (There were several others I hadn't seen yet, but they went away at the beginning of this year...boo.) I've been having to watch it in increments, but I like most of what I've seen so far!

In other Oscar news, this year's nominees were announced last week! Unlike last year, I haven't seen any of them yet, so I don't really have one that I'm rooting for. We'll see what happens!

#85: Jeff Street once a month.
And finally, we made our monthly trip to Jeff Street this past Saturday. Unfortunately, they already had way too many volunteers when we showed up, so our visit was a very short one. (Actually, that's not unfortunate at all, because it means that a lot of people want to help out there. I was also feeling a little under the weather that day, so I was honestly thankful for the chance to go home and rest. But I digress.) Since there wasn't much to say about this month's visit, I thought I'd take this opportunity to talk about something pretty awesome that's been happening over the last few months: Some of the Jeff Street residents have started coming to our church. In fact, one Sunday, the whole row in front of Tom and me was full of guys who are in the Fresh Start program. I don't think their showing up has anything to do with Tom or me, but it's just been so cool to know that God is using Crossing to play a part in their spiritual growth. It's also been nice to see some of these guys once a week, instead of just once a month. Exciting stuff!

Bad Food, Good Food

#4: Give up sweets for a month.
This goal is currently in progress. From this past Monday until Super Bowl Sunday (that's 4 weeks), nothing with added sugar or artificial sweetener will pass my lips. I honestly think this is going to be one of the most difficult goals to achieve because I am a bit of an addict when it comes to sweets. Really, it's a little sad how much I love them, but I know I need to...not love them so much. So wish me luck!

#1: 100 new recipes.
Pinterest has officially invaded the Duttweiler home. If you're not familiar with this website, let me warn you: it is addictive. I've gotten so many great ideas that I probably never would have found by just browsing the internet. My biggest "board" on Pinterest is for recipes, and it is full of ideas from people who are a lot more creative than I am...! I'm just thankful to be able to reap the benefits of said creativity, especially when it comes to incorporating more fruits and veggies into our diet. So far, I've tried three recipes that I found there: baked apple chips, roasted chickpeas, and "refried" (actually slow-cooked) beans. I also found an easy recipe for fried bananas using oil instead of butter. All of these were deeelicious and a lot more interesting than just eating any of those things straight-up. Can't wait to try more things like this!
The most recent new recipe is new even for me, because I made it up! It's a butternut squash soup, and the link on the Tracking page will take you straight my cooking blog. Shameless self-promotion at its finest...

Happy New Year!

At the end of one year, exactly 1/3 of the list is complete...that's 33 goals! Working through this list really helped to make 2011 a great year. Some goals have been easier than others, and most of the challenging ones still lie ahead.

#1: 100 new recipes.
We had New Year's Day dinner with our friends James and Lyndie, and Tom and I brought dessert: a banana-chocolate chip pound cake. (The recipe called for pecans, but I'm pretty sure someone in our group is allergic to them, so I used chocolate chips instead.) Sounds good, right? It really was, but I have to be honest: baking it was kind of a nightmare. For starters, there was too much batter for a bundt pan, even though that was the recommended pan for this recipe. Within five minutes of baking, batter started pouring out of the pan and all over the oven. The results were delicious, but my oven is a shambles. (For more details, check out my cooking blog.) It also took forever to finish baking; the recipe said 1 hour 20 minutes, but it actually took closer to 2 hours, so we were a little late for dinner. Regardless, the link is posted on the Tracking page. I sincerely hope you have less trouble than I did.

Much to Celebrate!

A LOT has happened in the last few weeks!

#58: Order fish 5 times.
So...I turned 25 two weeks ago! For my birthday dinner this year, I chose to go to Ramsi's, this great multicultural restaurant in the Highlands. And when I say multicultural...whoo, boy. It's the perfect place to go when you're with a group of people who all want different types of food. There was Italian, Greek, Moroccan, Indian, Chinese, Thai, Mexican...you name it! Personally, I was in the mood for Italian that night, and I ordered the Salmon Sonesta, which was salmon (duh) served over mashed potatoes, with a sun-dried tomato cream sauce (and Asian stir-fry vegetables on the side...random). So, so good! And it was fish dish #5, so consider this goal complete!

#63: Go to 5 concerts.
This is on the list because I looooove going to hear live music, but the last year or so has been pretty dry in the live music department. Well, we try to do something fun and musical every year at Christmastime. Last year we went to hear the Louisville Chorus, and they were fantastic. We're not exactly music critics or anything, but we were both in choirs all through college...speaking of which, the LC actually performed a piece that Tom and I did in college: Rachmaninoff's Ave Maria, which was always one of my favorite pieces that we did. We sang it in Russian, and the LC sang it in Latin. Just beautiful.

#14: Host a themed party.
Last Saturday was the Duttweilers' First Annual Christmas Extravaganza Party! (Tom shot down my original title.) We were talking maybe a month ago about how it would be nice to get together with all our friends here in Louisville before we all part ways for Christmas. Well, I honestly didn't think that idea would become a reality, but sure enough, there we were on Saturday afternoon, chatting with our friends, exchanging gifts White-Elephant style, and snacking on a whole lot of food...! (And wouldn't you know, I brought my camera to the party, but forgot to make sure the memory card was in it...doh.) I think a good time was had by all...and Tom and I are already coming up with ideas for next year!

#1: 100 new recipes.

Our party gave me a reason to try five new recipes! In Tom's family, it's not Christmas without buckeyes. This was the first year that he wasn't going to be with his family during "buckeye season," so I got the recipe from his mom and made a HUGE batch of them for the party! For the next treat, I found a P-Dub recipe for these little chocolate cookies, halfway dipped in white chocolate and crushed peppermints (we used candy canes). I made the cookies, and Tom took care of the dipping. Cute and delicious! Next came this cranberry chutney that we served over cream cheese, to spread on crackers. It was probably the easiest thing to make, but I think it was my favorite! And what's a Christmas party without Christmas cookies? I made them waaaaay too big, so we only ended up with 19 instead of 36 like the recipe said...but they sure were tasty! In keeping with the finger-food/bite-size theme, I got a recipe for tomato tarts from my Christmas with Paula Deen cookbook (found it online too though, so the link is posted!).

#28: Watch every Best Picture winner from 1961-2013.
I had Tom's laptop with me in the kitchen this week, mainly so we could listen to Christmas music while cooking. While I was dipping the buckeyes on Wednesday night, I thought I'd put on a movie instead. So I wandered over to Netflix to see what BPWs were available for instant viewing. Well, to my surprise and delight, one of them was Rocky! Not exactly a Christmas movie, but a great one nonetheless.

Didn't get a chance to send cards this year, but definitely next year! I recently started a Pinterest account, so I'm already getting some good ideas...! Merry Christmas, everyone!

More Reasons to Be Thankful

#70: Give my mother-in-law the day off from Thanksgiving cooking.
#1: 100 new recipes.
This list item originally said "prepare Thanksgiving dinner completely by myself"...but then I realized that one of my favorite things about Thanksgiving is spending the day in the kitchen with other people, so I changed it. We spent this Thanksgiving in Hawaii with Tom's family, and as an added incentive to do the cooking, Thanksgiving fell on Tom's mom's birthday this year! So Tom and I did the cooking, and his brother and sister did the dishes. We made all the typical Thanksgiving foods, but I found new ways to do mashed potatoes and green beans, thanks to Food Network (new recipes 49 and 50...halfway to finishing my #1)! The mashed potatoes were fantastic, and the green beans were...decent. I had to make some adjustments to the recipe, and I think I might have compromised the flavor a little. But all in all, everything turned out well, and it was a great day for my mom-in-law!

#83: Climb Diamond Head.
Woohoo, this is done! But now I get to tell the painful story of how this ended up on the list in the first place. The first time Tom and I went to visit his family in Hawaii, we did all of the must-do tourist things in about a week, and one of them was hiking Diamond Head. It started out smoothly enough, but eventually things got a little...well, challenging.

After at least 30 minutes of hiking, we had to climb this...and yes, it is as scary as it looks. I just barely made it to the top of the stairs...and when I did, things went horribly, horribly wrong. All of a sudden, I couldn't see, I couldn't breathe, I felt like I was going to throw up, and none of my muscles seemed to work. It was terrifying...and humiliating. That was as far as I got that day; all I could do was sit there sipping water at the top of the stairs, watching everyone else walk past me on their way to the summit. That memory has haunted me for nearly two years, and every time I think about it, it makes me angry, but in a good way because it makes me want to tackle that crater. Then this year, I had my chance; when Tom's parents asked us what we'd like to do during this visit, I asked to go back to Diamond Head.
There were a several things that made this hike a whole lot easier than the first one: 1) it wasn't as hot outside as it was the first time we went, 2) we were behind a group of high-school students who insisted on stopping every few minutes to take pictures, so we had lots of chances to catch our breath, 3) I could tell that the "training" I've been doing for the Bridge Run has helped increase my endurance, as opposed to before when I wasn't exercising at all, and finally...4) that nightmarish staircase no longer takes you to the top of the crater; there is now a detour that directs you to a staircase that's not as steep, and it's broken up so that you're not just continuously climbing for what feels like hours. Regardless of how much easier it was, I felt so accomplished afterward!!!