Keep Calm and Carry On: The Diary of Foodie and Gourmet

On our recent excursion to the city, Mom and I visited the Neue Galerie. This is a very small art museum that specializes in early 20th century German and Austrian art/design. It is very close to the Metropolitan Museum of art. 1048 5th Ave & 86th St, NYC Mom and I have been to this museum many many times, but on this occasion, we wanted to see the special Klimt exhibit that the Neue had put on. I'll be honest, until about 1.5 year ago, I didn't know much about Klimt and I did not know his art. I knew "The Kiss" of course, but that was it. That all changed my final semester at Bryn Mawr. In the spring of my senior year, I took a class called "The Last Days of the Habsburg: Vienna 1900 and the End of an Empire." To quote Bryn Mawr's website, " 360˚ Vienna is interdisciplinary in nature, and students will study works of art, architecture, design, literature, psychoanalysis, and pseudoscience. The seminar will feature critical discussio...

This past Friday, as a break from the dreaded calculus, Mom and I decided to indulge in another NYC adventure. Recently, this has been our new "thing." I come home after class on Thursday, relax, do a bit of hw, and then on Friday, we go into the city to do something fun and/or different! After hearing me rave about Restaurant Week, my mom turned to me Thursday night and said, "Hey! I want to do Restaurant Week too!" For that reason, the two of us started to peruse restaurants, looking for a nice place for lunch. I find that when my parents and I are in the city, we tend to just stick with the same restaurants, but we have recently been making an effort to branch out. Mom and I intended on also visiting the Neue Galerie on the Upper East Side, so we focused our search to restaurants in the that area. After about an hour or so, we settled on "Park Avenue Summer." Not only did the menu look delicious, but we were really impressed by the restaurant's ...

Despite my busy schedule, this past week, I treated myself to an amazing dinner at a trendy NYC restaurant. First, let me back track. I want to say that most major cities participate in this event, but to be honest, I have only experienced this in Philadelphia and New York City. Twice a year, these cities hold a major culinary event called "Restaurant Week." (Note: whereas in Philly this was only a week, it seems that in NYU, this Restaurant Week lasts 1 month and happens every season...) The idea is that a variety of restaurants allow diners to experience their restaurant for a discounted price.  It's a lot of fun for the diner because it gives you incentive to try different restaurants and it's great business for the restaurants because they get lots of exposure. Most restaurants do lunch and dinner. For a set price of roughly $25 lunch and $35 dinner (this is without tip/drinks), you get to enjoy a lovely three course meal. Not bad methinks! When I was in col...

My family loves loves loves Korean food! We love the heat, the dishes, the flavors...everything. The year after I graduated, so 2011~2012, we made it a family tradition to have Korean EVERY THURSDAY night. Thus, we dubbed this day of the week "Korean Thursday." While Korean cuisine encompasses a vast array of dishes, we are particularly fond of "Sundubu Jjigae."   Sundubu Jigae is a soft tofu stew that is served in a piping hot stone bowl. It's generally quite spicy, although you can adjust the heat level to your own liking, and can include almost anything! I tend to get my with seafood, beef, and kimchi. Yum! Also, traditionally, this dish is served with a raw egg that you mix into the stew. The stew is so hot, that the egg cooks while you are stirring it in!  a recent meal of sundubu jigae I am also a great fan of dolsot bibimbap, which is rice/veggies/meat (optional) served in a hot stone bowl. (Are you seeing a pattern here?) This is also a favo...

As I may have mentioned previously, I am currently studying calculus. This has been a most unpleasant experience. As a former history major and historian at heart, I knew that calculus would not be easy, but this is ridiculous. I'm not going to rant here, but let's just say, my instructor, a 2nd year PhD student, has no idea what he is doing. Unfortunately, I am paying dearly for his inexperience and inability to explain the matieral. (Trust me, this isn't just my opinion. Most of my class has admitted that my instructor is terrible.) Anyway, that's not the point. Since I've been spending all of my time studying, I haven't had much time to cook! How tragic! Living in Manhattan, it's really easy to order take out, but I try not to do that. I have two major reasons: trying to be economical and what little cooking I can do, is a great respite from all of those numbers. Even if it's as simple as chopping veggies for a salad for sauteeing something, that br...

My father is an avid amateur astronomer and this past weekend, he was away attending "Space Camp."This is not the space camp in Florida, but rather an astronomy retreat in upstate NY. It's rather exclusive and you must make reservations well in advance. Essentially, it's like camp, but all the attendees stay up all night stargazing. Everyone brings their telescopes and it's basically astronomy heaven. This is my dad's second year going and he love love loves it! To keep my mom company, I decided to come home, so we enjoyed a "girls weekend." Although I spent most of the weekend studying calculus, the evenings were very pleasant. Lots of delicious foods, cocktails, laughter, and Foyle's War. Despite the fact that my mother tells me that I need to diet (which is true), she made enough food to keep at family of 6 happy! Granted, although the food was abundant, it was all quite healthy. Not only did my mother empty out a lot of the fridge, her Ja...

Apple Quinoa Breakfast (makes about 6 servings) - 1 cup uncooked quinoa - cooking spray - 2 tbsp unsalted butter (or smart balance) - 2 medium apples, peeled and chopped - 2 cups water - ground cinnamon (to taste) - 3 tbsp brown sugar - 1/4 cup milk (the type is up to you) 1. Soak quinoa in a bowl of water for 5 minutes. Rinse and drain the quinoa.  2. Coat a large skillet with cooking spray. Heat up skillet under medium heat. When the skillet is warm, melt 1 tbsp butter until it bubbles. Saute the apples in the butter until soft and slightly browned. Set aside in a separate bowl. 3. Add quinoa and water into a saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Boil for 1 minute. Reduce heat to low, cover pan tightly and allow quinoa to simmer for 10 minutes. When quinoa is cooked, remove from heat and fluff with a fork. 4. Add remaining 1 tbsp butter, cinnamon, sugar, and milk. Stir to combine and fold in apples.  *Yields about 2/3 cup ...

After class and a rather lengthy tutoring session earlier in the week, I returned to my room in need of lunch. My mother is the queen of cleaning out the fridge and freezer, so I decided to make a lesson from her. I had defrosted some chicken thighs overnight thinking that I could do something with them. After some more rummaging, I discovered a bag of frozen "soyccatash"that I had bought at Trader Joe's a month ago. Basically it's a bag of frozen peppers, corn, and edamame. I also decided to use up my bag of frozen okra.  Ingredients: - 1 cup of chicken, chopped into bite size pieces - salt, to taste - ground pepper, to taste - garlic powder, to taste - onion powder, to taste - chili/cayenne pepper, to taste - 1 cup soyccatash (or other frozen veg) - 1 cup frozen okra - cooking spray - 1 tbsp soy sauce (or to taste) Gather your frozen veggies.  Cut the chicken into bite size pieces and season with spices. Spray a non-stick pan with c...

Ok, so I realize that my blog is mainly food oriented, but I thought that sometimes food-only can get a little old, and thus, I decided to mix things up a bit. Today, I mix food and history. Kind of... Before I decided that I wanted to go to med school and thus enrolled myself into a pre-med post baccalaureate program, I studied history. (The program I am currently in allows me to complete all of the pre-med school requirements.) As an undergraduate, I saw myself as am eminent historian --- the next A.J.P. Taylor or Max Hastings --- or something like that. Ever since I was little....elementary school perhaps?...I've loved history. It's always been my favorite subject (and incidentally) always been my best. In high school, when I learned about World War II in 10th grade European history, I was hooked. Since then, the Second World War has become quite a passion of mine. In college, I ended up specializing in modern European history/British history/WWII history, I received a r...

This week has been totally hellish, as I have been studying like a crazy woman for my calculus midterm. Since I was pressed for time, but still wanted to have nice meals, I resorted to a quick and delicious dinner: chicken breast and salad. I don't really have a recipe to share, with you alas,  I just still wanted to share! The chicken breast, I marinaded hours before with my mom's "shiso miso." Shiso is a very popular and prevalent green used in Japanese cooking. You may have some across it. It's sort of citrusy. Shiso is to Japanese cooking like basil is to Italian cooking. Does that make sense? So I slathered the chicken breast with the miso and let it sit in the fridge for several hours. I then let the chicken breast cook for 45 minutes in the oven at 350F. As for the salad. I love spinach, cooked and/or raw. My salad included raw spinach, red pepper, cucumber, and some avocado. My new favorite dressing is by Jo's. Its the ginger salad dressing. (Lik...

"Take some more tea," the March Hare said to Alice very earnestly. "I've had nothing yet," Alice replied in an offended tone, "so I can't take more." You mean you can't take less,"  said the Hatter. "It's very easy to take more than nothing." - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland I will be the first to admit that as wonderful, fun, and whimsical of a tale Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland is, that is one trippy story. I still love it, don't get me wrong, but man, when I read that story, I felt like I was on drugs or something. Still, my favorite part of the book, which is a favorite of a lot of people, has to be the tea party scene. I mean, it's so iconic and what's not the love? Tea, the Mad Hatter, the March Hare, the mouse, the pocket watch being dunked in the tea...I mean the whole tea party is wonderfully absurd!  Rather than just say, "today I visited blah blah blah" or "...

Today at my local grocery store, I discovered this: Dark Chocolate Dreams. Basically, it's dark chocolate peanut butter. AMAZING!!!! Why have I only discovered this now??? It's amazing and I am hooked. If you love peanut butter and dark chocolate, this is the delectable spread for you! 

Recently, I have been trying to eat healthy. Sometimes, I slip, but I'm human...I make mistakes. Still, I have been pretty good about starting my day off right. Since breakfast is the most important meal of the day and I have class from 9 am - 11:05 am, Monday-Thursday, I start my day with a fortifying breakfast of oatmeal, blueberries, and coffee and/or tea. I'll be the first to admit, I don't LOVE oatmeal. I tolerate it, but there is something sort of blah and boring about it to me. Despite this, I decided, "be good, be healthy, and give oatmeal a second chance." To make my breakfasts more enticing, I forced myself to get creative. Here are two oatmeal recipes that I really enjoy. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Savory Oatmeal (Spinach, Corn, and Egg Whites) Ingredients: - 3/4 cup Quaker Quick Cooking Oats  - 1.5 cup water - pinch of salt - 1/2 cup frozen corn - 2 cup spinach (you can add or subtract, depending on how...