what i’m loving right now

(Or WAS, when I wrote this post.)

The below photo is of Trader Joe’s version, what they call “Speculoos Cookie Butter.” Not sure where the ‘speculoos’ comes from, but whatever.

Anyway, I’d been hearing a lot lately about Biscoff spread on Kath’s blog and Emily’s blog, and I’d seen it at Wegmans before, so I figured I’d pick up a jar next time I was there.

Well, when we swung into Ohio to stay with friends on the way home from Thanksgiving in Carmel, IN, Andrew and I met up with my dear friend, Susy, at Trader Joe’s and did some serious damage. One of the things she threw into my cart was this spread. (I didn’t even try to stop her.)

It tastes like crushed gingersnaps and is completely delightful mixed with cranberry sauce on a bowl of oatmeal. Very ‘fall.’

The only bad thing is that unlike peanut butter or almond butter, it doesn’t have any protein (less than 1 gram), so it’s not really a nutritional powerhouse or anything. It’s basically just dessert to spread on breakfast foods. Or any food, for that matter.

Like this morning, I spread a tablespoon on toast with the last of the Thanksgiving cranberry sauce (I’m almost embarrassed I’ve had it this long… They’re pretty acidic–how bad can they be?).

On a side note, doesn’t the above meal (toast, half an orange and egg whites with cheese) remind you of a ‘balanced breakfast?’ I never got those sugar-cereal commercials that touted their product as part of a ‘balanced breakfast’ when they’d pan and have a shot of a bowl with orange juice an a muffin. HA!

Anyway, if you think you’d like this kind of thing, be sure to pick up a jar of either TJ’s version or Biscoff at your local grocery store!

tiny sweet potato

This is what happens when I’m on my own for dinner:

Or leftovers.

Heaving dinner together this semester has been tough. I’m a firm believer in sitting down together regularly to meals, making that time quality time together. However, between Andrew’s twice weekly post-work engineering classes, his new workout schedule (hard to complain about, but still) and basketball, as well as my bi-monthly Bible study and Thursday evening class, we basically only sit down together on Fridays and Mondays, if we’re lucky. (I leave Sat and Sun out of the equation since our schedule is always up in the air but we’re generally together.) It’s been so frustrating for me to plan recipes and then have Andrew change things up at the last minute–I feel like I can’t win! I either plan and buy ingredients and then something comes up, or I don’t get anything and we’re stuck ordering pizza (JUST what I need) or going out to eat (which gets expensive).

You don’t know how much I’m looking forward to basketball, his professional classes and my night class to end!

Anyway, I made a brussels sprout salad the other night when the Layers were over for dinner. Basically, it was brussels sprout leaves, dried cranberries and blueberries, smoked almonds and manchego cheese. It was awesome, but separating the b.s. leaves was time-consuming–for leftovers, I steamed them like regular, then mixed them with the salad ingredients–yum!

I love sweet potatoes and am planning to make sweet potato fries with cranberry ketchup later this week, and when I found a bag of small organic ones at Wegmans, I knew I had to get it! Sweet potatoes are the best! It took 5 minutes to cook this one in the microwave and I sprinkled it with a mix of cumin, paprika and red pepper. It was just warm enough to wake up my taste buds. I did use about half a tablespoon of butter, too. Although olive oil would have worked in this flavor pairing, too.

These little orange babies are awesome; they’re perfect for lunches at home or at school. Of course, I’ll have to resist using too much sugar on the ones I sprinkle with cinnamon…

And lastly, half a pear and one serving of Cabot’s sharp cheddar for protein. Pears are fantastic right now! Although, this is the second time I’ve gotten a bag and they all ripen at the same time! We go from not eating them to eating them with every meal!

a list

1. Long time no type. Buried in schoolwork and life. Not necessarily in that order. Attempting to force myself to come up for air.

2. Chemistry is hard. Like, fail-out-of-class hard. (Not me, but you know what I mean.) I knew there was a good reason to fear it back at Penn State! Anyway, I’m doing alright, but a recent bombed quiz has shown me I need to devote more time to Chem and less to Anatomy.

3. In all my busy-ness today, I decided I needed to make bread. That’s so like me. Why? I had to “revive” my starter that’s in the fridge. And have I forgotten about the GAJILLION things of bread we brought home from our Thanksgiving trip? (No fewer than 1.5 loaves of rye bread, 10 bagels, 8 onion rolls, plus crackers.) Our house is carb central!

4. My Thanksgiving pumpkin pie was the ugliest thing ever (thanks to my impatience with store-bought crust), but tasted great. Get the recipe here.

5. Speaking of recipes–I just managed another blog post for the co-op. It’s about cranberries and I included the cranberry brisket Andrew loves so much. Read it here.

6. I am now “officially” a New Yorker; I took care of getting a new license and registering the car. License should be here in about a week! It’s kind of exciting, in a really anti-climactic sort of way. I think if we’d moved into a house we were excited about, everything would feel different. Instead, everything still feels very temporary. But, nonetheless, it’s still neat to see the Pilot with its new yellow and blue license plate.

7. We named our plants. Well, I named our plants. Andrew just went along with it good-naturedly. My dear friend, Emily, inspired me. She has such beautiful, healthy, vibrant house plants. I am so jealous. She and I recently traded some plant clippings and she mentioned one of them was named ‘Stella.’ Now, I’ve heard of people naming their plants before, but I just never have. I mean, mine don’t normally last that long…it was never a good idea to get attached. However, I do have one that has lasted FOUR years now! Andrew and I were in disbelief when we realized it. So, on the way home from our Thanksgiving holiday, I used my phone to look up names and their meanings (again, such a ‘me’ thing to do–we’re talking the significance of the names of HOUSE PLANTS) and we decided to call the big, four-year-old one “Gerard” which means ‘hardy.’ (We’ve been calling it ‘hardy’ since I hadn’t killed it yet, so we figured why not?). I have one other plant, an orchid Andrew bravely got me for Valentine’s Day this year. (I don’t know what he was thinking.) Anyway, it did alright for awhile, then the blooms fell off, then I panicked until I found out that was normal, and just when it was growing another stem and bloom, one of the movers bumped into it on our table and broke it off! I was heartbroken. I looked up ‘long-suffering’ and ended up with “Patience.” She’s been through a lot, that one, and just the other day I noticed a tiny bud getting ready to sprout from the moss–hurray! And now, I have Emily’s purple one to re-pot, who I have been calling “Stella 2.” Between the animals and now anthropomorphic plants, we have one full house!

8. I’m supposed to be working on psychology homework. Must hurry!

9. Hadrian has been down for the count all day today–GLORIOUS! I’ve been so productive. (In case you’re wondering, any time he returns from ‘puppy camp’ he sleeps 24/7 for about two days. Totally normal.)

10. We have 7 pints of ice cream in our freezer, plus the remnants of two Jeni’s that Emily and Dan brought us, plus a tiny bit of homemade Jeni’s vanilla. SEVEN unopened Graeter’s and Jeni’s pints. That’s like $45 in ice cream (hey, don’t judge my expensive taste in ice cream!). My brilliant plan: tiny scoops, both to make it last and keep it off my hips. I’ll let you know how it goes, but I’m not terribly optimistic…