Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Another Change

Whenever I update my blog with a new background it always takes me AT LEAST 30 minutes to get the background and colors just right! My sister, Courtney, has a blog and I am always checking it to see updates to either her posts or her background. The other day I looked at her page and realized she had changed her background. Well, when I went to change mine I found a background template and got the colors to match with it. I loved it! I stayed up way too late to get everything right. Just before I started writing this post I checked Court's blog out again and realized I had changed my background to hers!! I can't believe I didn't even realize it, especially since I had looked at her blog that same day I changed mine. We sure do have good taste.  I decided to change mine again because I don't want ours to be the same! Surprisingly, it only took me about 10 minutes to be satisfied with it. I'd say it looks pretty nice! That's all. Have a super night! :)

Monday, May 9, 2011

A wonderful Dinner

Last night I faced my fear of cooking something a little unfamiliar and I just went for it! I cooked salmon with green beans, lemon peel, capers and olive oil in parchment paper. It was surprisingly super easy! The recipe is as follows (this makes enough for two people):
2 salmon fillets
1/2 lb. green beans washed and trimmed
2 teaspoons capers drained and rinsed
4 wide strips of lemon peel OR about 5-6 small pieces lemon peel
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

All you need to do is preheat the oven to 400 and lay out two pieces of parchment paper (about 16 inch pieces). Place the fish in the center of the parchment paper and then top it with the remainder of the ingredients, putting two strips lemon peel on each piece. You can fold the paper in any which way but I took the two sides and met them together at the top then folded them down to the fish. I tucked the sides underneath the fish and placed it on a cookie sheet. The fish I used was pretty thick, so I cooked it for 20 minutes and it was perfect! Greg bought some Israeli couscous with baby garbanzo beans, quinoa, and orzo to eat on the side. It was pretty good, but I recommend regular couscous; just my preference!


I cannot figure out how to rotate this picture! It is saved facing the right way, but will not paste on here correctly. Anywho, this is the fish before the oven.
Clearly this one won't paste correctly either. This is the cooked meal. D-lish!

Sunday, May 8, 2011

**April**

Wow! It is so much harder to keep up with this blog than I ever expected! Rather than doing 5 posts about things that went on last month, I figured I'd just include everything at once. The first week of April marked my Spring Break. I didn't go out of town or anything, but I actually had a really good time! Two of my good girlfriends, Lisa and Jessica, came over to my apartment one day to lounge at the pool. We made some delicious fruity cocktails and bronzed ourselves. In the middle of the week I met Greg and some of his coworkers for lunch at Fox Brother's BBQ. Oh my gosh! What a fattening amazing meal. Three of us all got the same thing: a brisket "burger" with pimento cheese, bacon, tomato, etc I highly recommend it! One evening while I was hanging out at Greg's he showed me this Almond Filling Sweet Bread mix his mom had given him for Christmas. I looked at the directions on the back of the box and realized that it was a full on baking process. I had never baked anything before (no, cookies that you cut off a roll and 'bake' in the oven don't count). Greg thought it would be a good idea for me to do it one day while he was at work, and I was up for a little challenge in the kitchen. The box came with four ingredients: the bread mix, the almond filling, the glaze, and the yeast packet. I open the box and pull out ingredients 1, 2, and 3. Where is ingredient 4? No yeast packet?! My first baking experience was off to a bad start. Well, I ended up waiting a whole day to get the yeast from the store because I had just come from the store and really didn't feel like going back. I got the yeast and crossed my fingers that the measurement was accurate. I made the dough, let it rise, rolled it out, filled it, and put it in the oven. Lisa had the joy of being at my place when it came out of the oven, and I must say it was actually pretty good! 

This is the finished product! Mmmmm
Let's see, what else happened in April? Greg and I went a Braves game the last weekend of my Spring Break and saw the Avett Brothers afterwards. It was so much fun! Oh yeah, the night before the Braves game we went to Rome for one of Greg's friend's wedding showers. It was on Berry's campus and it was a pretty perfect night. There was delicious food, refreshing drinks, and horseshoes. During Easter weekend I went to Columbus to meet Greg's parents. Unfortunately, I was feeling a little under the weather, but I just pushed that to the side and enjoyed my weekend. On Saturday, we went over to Christi's (Greg's sister) boyfriend's house and went out on Lake Harding in his boat. We had a blast!

Lake Harding
 Needless to say April was a very good month. May (this month) is going to be busy and very fun! Hopefully I will do a post sooner rather than later!