Family Veg Night

It was another night out for our family. Richard and I convinced my parents to try a new restaurant: Veggie Grill. Enjoy the pictures and feast with your eyes :)



Take a Spin-ach: Spinach salad with ginger papaya dressing



Bali Bliss- Tempeh burger and steamed Kale



Sante Fe Crispy Chickin' (My meal!! and I'm convinced it's the best)- crispy chickin breast with avocado and south west salsa.




Sweetheart fries with chipotle ranch (we all fought over these)



Don't be a chicken- grilled chickin breast sandwich.



As you might be able to tell, we all weigh 900 lbs now! It was worth it. (hehe) If you're ever near the UCI campus in California, try the Veggie Grill. These pictures are proof of great food.

Teddy

Freeze Dried Rambutan

I just bought a new product and I want to share my excitement with you!

Freeze dried Rambutan.

A while back I did an informational post on this fruit. (Rambutan info) I haven't even opened the package yet but I wanted to give you a heads up as to what's coming.





I hope you're as amused as I am!


Teddy

Thai Bro's Restaurant

Very often I crave Thai food late at night. The problem with that is that most Thai places are closed by 10PM. Thus, Richard and I began a search for a Thai eatery with late hours.
After some intense "googling" we found Thai Bro's Restaurant in Laguna Beach, CA.
I was extremely skeptical about this place (come on, the word BRO in your name??) but it's open till 1Am on the weekends or later.
We had to give it a shot. Upon arrival I was pleased to see they had a vegetarian section of the menu and they even asked whether we eat eggs or not. They also offered to change most any item on their menu to suit our veggie diet.

Here are our choices:

Richard had Pad Woodsen

I choose the Drunken Noodles which usually come with beef but they added tofu instead.

Thai Bro's will definitely more than satisfy my late night Thai need. Although I did not find my dish to be spicy, it was flavorful and I gobbled up every bite (just to clarify, most people would have found it to be spicy enough; I have a higher than average tolerance and I'm sure they'll adjust to your taste).
Richard's dish was just as good as mine and I found that both of us were sneaking bites from each other's plates.

Overall, I was impressed and am overjoyed to have a new late night hideaway.

Teddy

P.S. Unfortunately I was unable to find a restaurant website; I only found it on a listing of Thai eateries in OC, CA

Strawberry Banana Shake

My family had a fiesta yesterday. John added homemade strawberry banana shakes to the menu and zapped one up for me as soon as I arrived. The sweet, fruit filed treat was a great way to kick off spring. I wanted to gulp it all down but I kept it together and quietly sipped :)





After all of the food we headed out to play some tennis. Unfortunately it was beginning to get dark. Tennis is the dark is quite adventurous though.

They weekend is coming to an end again. Hope you've made the most of it.


Teddy

PS The classes I'll be taking are for HR. I'm getting my certification and I already have a degree in management.

Thai Sticky Rice

Have you ever had sticky rice before? I've tried making my own version of this. It was pleasing but not the same.
I've been searching around online and it looks like the only difference between my version and what I've seen is sugar. I choose to not use any but here are the basic ingredients for this simple sweet dish:
Thai Sticky Rice (Long Grain Sweet Rice) 2 Cups
Sugar 1/2 Cup
Salt 1 teaspoon
Coconut milk 1 cup

Dose anyone else enjoy this Asian treat?

Teddy

Mushroom turnovers

I can't even remember having turnovers before the last year or two. I didn't even like mushrooms for the longest time. Now, I can't imagine life without the glory of FUNGUS :)
The yams almost out-shined the turnovers. They were sweet enough to be a dessert and it's just sinfully good to have dessert for dinner.


I'm starting school again soon. I may start to struggle with juggling everything. It's exhilarating to return to a learning enviornment. Wish me luck!

Teddy

Thai Curry Noodles

There is a secret obsession of large, flat, rice noodles within this blogger. Mix these noodles with a Thai curry sauce and I'm as happy as a RUFUS ;)

It's been a great Sunday. I visited with my grandpa, uncle, cousin, mom and Richard and ate some curry.

I'm thinking that this is turning into a curry blog! I've been eating it so often that is almost is. Perhaps that's not a bad thing. The world could always use a little more curry love. :)

Teddy

Greens on St Patty's Day

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

We went out last night to an Irish pub. We sang, had a few drinks and watched some bag pipers play! It seemed like such a festive night that I don't feel a need to do it all again tonight ;)


My mini "green" celebration today consisted of a mixed greens salad with green bell peppers (I stopped by Trader Joe's and picked it up there).


I hope everyone has a safe and fun St. Patty's!

Teddy

Family Veg Night

Family night was at my place this week. It was a simple take out week. We ordered Macaroni Grill to-go. Pasta is a rare meal here. I prefer asian cuisine (most likely because I'm addicted to spicy food in a terrible way)




When I have pasta I prefer the thinner Capellini or Angel haired noodle. I ordered Angel hair pasta with pesto, fresh tomatoes and artichoke hearts. Most restaurants give too much food for me but I enjoy leftovers for lunch.


Now that we're stuffed onto the main event; my parents met Rufus.





Hamsters are nocturnal and he wasn't in a rush to wake up while they were over. I managed to get him to pop out for a second though.





After dinner was over and we were getting ready for bed is when Rufus really awoke. Great news! My parents brought Rufus a present: a ball for him to exercise in! He gave it a spin when they left and had a grand time bumping into all sorts of new objects.

The evening was full of food and fun as per usual :)

Teddy

Welcome Rufus

He's in there running

Sunday Richard and I adopted a hamster. We named him Rufus. He is a Teddy Bear hamster (aka a Syrian hamster).

He's a QUICK one and he's still very timid around humans. We need to ease him into being held by us.

Rufus' favorite thing to do so far is run on his lil' wheel. He really gets that thing going too. On Sunday night he ran for 3 hours!

It's been hard to snap a good picture so far but once Rufus get's to know us, I'm sure he'll pose wonderfully. Until then, these less than stellar photos give you an idea of our little guy.

Teddy

Saturday Breakfast

Another Saturday and another trip to Mother's Market. My breakfast: vegan pancakes. There was a mix up in the kitchen and they brought me buttermilk pancakes. By the time my real pancakes came out I was too hungry to take pictures. :) Just pretend these are vegan okay? hehe





Richard had Ranch-style Chilaquiles. I want to ask if they can make this vegan for me. I tried the veggies in it and they were GREAT; mushrooms, bell pepper, onion, zucchini and tomatoes.

Have a great weekend

Teddy

Vindaloo Curry

I am a curry-loving fool. Lucky for me, so is Richard.
This said, I always have a some sort of curry past at home. Above is a mixture of vindaloo curry paste, chickpeas, fried tofu, onion, garlic and thai basil. Adding the basil was a last minute decision and I don't know if I'll do it again. Thai basil tastes out of place here. By no means did it
ruin the dish; it merely lessened it's awesome-ness.

I need to spend some quality time perfecting my curry skills. Hey, I'm young! I'll get it soon :)


Teddy

Update!

The restaurant with the larger than life burrito is called Los Primos Cantina.

Los Primos Cantina 488 E 17th St , Costa Mesa 92627 949-650-1486

I just found a GREAT blog with a review of the restaurant.
http://www.burritoblog.com/

If you scroll down to the State California Los Primos is list and he's got a GREAT picture of one of their burritos.

I'm telling you, try the veggie monster and see if you're up for the challenge (I think it was only about 6 bucks!)

Teddy

Coworkers Last day

Why do all momentous occasions (happy or sad) require cupcakes?
Well, you know, I'm not sure but I sure do like it. Last week one of my great friends at work said peace out.
While we were all unhappy about it, we weren't too unhappy to enjoy some good food.





Her favorite color is purple. I attempted purple frosting. If you held the cupcake you could tell they were purple.





They are mini cupcakes. I find that for work functions, they're the best because I make one batch and it's enough to feed an army!
It's off to work for me now. Good luck in surviving MONDAY!

Teddy

PS I'm not sure of the name of the Big Burrito location. I'll ask Richard tonight and let everyone know.

5 pound burrito

While studying for school one night, Richard happened upon a little Mexican restaurant near our home. Well this little shop serves HUGE vegetarian burritos!

They're large enough that he can't finish one on his own. This from a guy who eats his whole meal and finishes half of mine! I had to try it. Thus we shared one (of course!).





Inside is black beans, guacamole, white rice, fresh salsa, cheese and sour cream.
The burrito was still a LARGE meal, even when cut in half.

My computer is still out of commission but Richard is letting me hop on his. TGIF!!


Teddy

No Internet

I don't have working internet at home right now. Hopefully I'll get that fixed tonight.


Until then...

Have a fun, food filled, day!


Teddy