We went to Denver, and I only had a camera phone

Bogdan had a conference in Denver this past week and I was lucky enough to join him. We're both huge Colorado fans, so it would have been very hard for me to skip a trip to Denver.

We arrived Wednesday and because the only thing Bogdan had to do was pick up his registration that day, we beelined it to the mountains! I had done a little pre-trip research to find a close hiking trail to Denver (our favorite hiking spot is in Estes Park, but that's about 80 miles from Denver) and found a few options. We turned on Mandy Tomtom (our GPS) and headed to the hills.

We had some trouble finding the parks I had researched, and ended up just following the road signs to a place called Three Sisters. This was no national park (or state park even) but it had a nice trailhead and a few trails. It was already about 4 p.m., so we decided to just hike.

The trail was covered in icy snow so it was a little slippery but when we got to the Three Sisters (a rock formation) and climbed on top of one of the sisters it was a fantastic (although windy!) view. It was a great start of our short trip to CO.

We spent the next couple of days at the Conference hotel (me working remotely and Bogdan doing his conference thing) and then on Friday night we got back in the car and started the drive to Estes. Our fabulous friend Erin and her family have a condo in Estes Park and it's been our base camp many times during the ridiculous amount of times that we've traveled to Estes Park. Erin opened their condo to us once again (thanks friend!!) so we had a place to stay in the mountains.

It was so nostalgic to be back in our little vacation wonderland. We arrived pretty late in the evening (especially since we were still on East Coast time and had been waking up at 5:30 every morning) so we didn't get to see the mountains and snow until morning. We woke up (early again!) and had breakfast at Kind Coffee. It's been almost 4 years since our last trip to Estes and we were amazed to see that not much had changed. Most of our favorite spots were still open *yay!* and Estes was still as cute as a button.

I wanted to do one more hike before our flight that evening, so we drove into Rocky Mountain National Park. Within a half mile, we saw a herd of elk feeding on the grass right next to the road. The winds were pretty ferocious and as we went higher and higher in the mountain the temperature dropped by 15-20 degrees. Snow piles lining the roads got taller and the wind swept and swirled the snow in the air and in front of the car. The weather was getting serious. We stopped at a trailhead for a really short hike to Alberta Falls and as we parked we saw people unloading their subarus with snowshoes, humongous winter jackets with hoods and hats, snow pants, snow gloves, cross country skis and hiking poles.

We looked at each other - Bogdan had a light spring jacket on with no scarf or hat and I was wearing a bigger jacket but no hood or hat either. As the wind rocked the car back and forth Bogdan told me he was challenging me to walk from the car to the trailhead map (probably 200 yards away). I said, easy! I got out the car and immediately was whipped in the face by wind and snow. I put my hands in front of my face and made it to the map. Immediately, I turned around and ran back to the car. It was a day for driving in RMNP, not for hiking.

So we drove and enjoyed the views and snow and wind and elk and mountains and everything else...from the comfort of our car.

Jan/Feb 2012: Cookbook Club Review

Jan/Feb 2012: Easy Chinese Recipes

Happy Leap Day everyone! I'm very excited to post this review of this installment of the Cookbook Club. Can you guess how I feel about this cookbook's recipe? Well, read on!

As I mentioned in the introduction post, I'm not the biggest fan of Chinese food and I'm quite picky about what I like. I was hoping this cookbook and the recipe we selected from it would end up on my list of Chinese food that I actually like. 

The Pan Fried Dumplings looked like they'd be a bit more work than most of the dinners I make, but it looked so delicious and worth the effort. My grocery store did not have dumpling wrappers, which meant that I'd have to make my own. Fortunately, the cookbook author includes a very easy recipe for homemade wrappers, but I knew that it would add significant time to my cooking. 

I got started early in the evening because the dough has to rest, and it was as easy as I expected. The most time consuming aspect was the actual rolling out of each wrapper, but even that went by quickly once I got used to the process.

As I looked down at my 20+ wrappers that had to be filled before fried, I thought I'd never start cooking! However, from beginning to end it took me about 10-15 minutes total of filling time. I ended up having a lot more filling and a lot less wrappers, so at the last minute I pulled together another half batch of the wrappers dough and was able to use all of the filling. 

I knew that we'd wait to eat the dumplings until they were all cooked, so I turned the oven to about 225 degrees and as I finished each batch in the pan, I put them on a baking sheet and put them in the oven. This worked out really well! When I finished the last batch, I had a ton of really warm dumplings waiting to be eaten.

Bogdan and I sat down with a plate full of dumplings and dug in. I was impressed with the crunch that each dumpling had and the tastiness of the filling inside. They were delicious! Bogdan loved them too.

This picture makes them look a little like chicken nuggets. :)

It would have probably been better to have a side dish or maybe to have had these as a snack, but luckily we filled up on the dumplings as our dinner and didn't need anything else. The only thing I was bummed about? My pictures did not come out nearly as well as the one on the recipe post. Oh well! They tasted good.

I can't wait to hear what you thought about the dumplings or the alternative recipes, Classic Shrimp Fried Rice or Sweet and Sour Pork.

Tell me in the comments and link to your blog post review on the linky link. 

Copy and paste the code below into your review blog post for a totally awesome Cookbook Club image.

<a href="http://stephandbogdan.blogspot.com"><img alt="Cookbook Club at Moving to Maryland" height="105" width="200" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sO1f7BBi1MA/Tl1oAWt9lQI/AAAAAAAAedI/CqnByj2UAKQ/s800/cookbookclubllogosm.jpg" /></a>

7 Quick Takes: Solving the world's pinning problem

1. Pin Problem: If you've spent any amount of time on Pinterest, you'll know that it is a site filled to the brim with superlatives. The best, the easiest, the fastest, the most delicious, etc. I'm all for being excited about things, but it's reaching a tipping point.

2. Pin Solution: Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks this way, so when my friend Becky wrote me about a new blog she and some friends started that reviews pins to see if those truly are the best cookies, I jumped right on board. We're just getting started at Pins Reviewed, but it's a great team of bloggers (my sis and cousin included!) and the concept is, well, the best. Right? Come see which pins we've tested and whether they've lived up to their superlatives.

3. Pin Test: In the spirit of the new blog, if you have a pin that you've been dying to test (but might have been scared to actually try it), let me know in the comments. I can get the Pins Reviewed team on it asap.

4. The curious bear: Bogdan loves Youtube. He could sit and watch videos all day, and last weekend he found an awesome bear video. You have to check it out.

Can I just say how happy/relieved I am that you can just say, "hey, what are you doing there" and a bear will run away like an embarrassed teenager.

5. Another Favorite App: Remember how I did my 7 quick apps a couple of months ago? Well I want to add one more to the list. This app is absolutely essential for anyone who ever has to put their phone on silent. Oh? That's you? Well then download Shush and watch your phone silencing life be changed forever. Anytime you put your ringer on silent, the shush app pops up and asks how long would you like me to be silent? You can choose in 15 minute increments up to 12 hours (or just say keep it off if you don't want to time it). So, voila! when that time has ended, your phone automatically goes back to the ringer. I use this every time I go to the library now. And church. And work. And during meetings. And. And. And.

6. Brat tree still a brat: If you've found yourself thinking, hey I wonder how that brat fig tree of Stephanie and Bogdan's is doing lately, well, I don't have good news. Once again she clings to life. Once again she is spending winter in our bedroom. She spent the whole summer outdoors on the patio, soaking up all the sunshine she could ever want and relishing in the warm weather, and now in defiance of winter, she has shed all her leaves and looks awful. Anyone local have a nice warm sunny draft free spot for a now-bare but could one day be not-so-bare ficus tree? She needs a new (and better) home.

7. Cookbook Club reminder: Look for my review of the cookbook club's recipe next week (on Wednesday, to be exact). I can't wait to see what everyone else thought about the Easy Chinese Recipes cookbook. Also! If you have a cookbook in mind that you'd like us to try, please please please leave a comment or email me. I'm looking for one for next month.

Check out all of the quick takes post here.

Getting Ready for Lent: Recipes for Fridays

First I want to say Happy Mardi Gras to everyone! I'm always surprised, when I'm outside of Louisiana, that people are still "celebrating" Mardi Gras. Case in point, I had a shrimp poboy for lunch served with a side of King Bread. (Don't worry, I corrected them that it is indeed called King cake).

Whether you're planning on partying hard today, are going to celebrate with a few drinks at home, or just enjoying this last day of ordinary time, I wanted to post a few recipes for the upcoming Lenten season. As you may (or may not) know, Catholics don't eat meat on Fridays during Lent or on Ash Wednesday. In Louisiana, this is no problem because we just have another excuse to eat the abundant and amazing seafood around us.

Living in Maryland (and many other locales), this is more difficult. I solve this problem by just making my own super tasty seafood dishes at home throughout Lent. Here are a few of my tried and true recipes.

Fish Recipes:
1. Cracker Fish: This is a no fail recipe with great crispy results. So yummy.

2. Poached Fish: I know that my review of this fish (which was for the cookbook club a couple of months back) was not the greatest, but it was a yummy fish dish that is worth sharing.

3. Parmesan-Crusted Tilapia - if you want a healthier dinner, try this oven baked fish recipe that is super tasty.

Shrimp Recipes:
1. Shrimp and Tasso Pasta - so I made the mistake of planning to make this during Lent last year and then I remembered that Tasso is meat. So if you make this, remember to omit it!

2. Shrimp Roban - My sister posted this recipe and review of our favorite dish from what used to be our favorite Mandeville restaurant, Semolinas. I made it last weekend and it was so delicious!! I never before made a recipe that required a full 1/4 CUP of garlic. Woah!

Crab and Others:
1. Gourmet Girl's crab cakes - If you're lucky enough to live in a place where lump crab meat doesn't break the bank, then you must try these crab cakes! So easy and so delicious. If lump crab meat is more expensive (like here in Maryland), I say plan a night where you will splurge, and feast on these babies. Yum!

2. One Hour Paella - I haven't made this recipe in years, but it's delicious! If you've never tried paella, it's worth making this recipe. The recipe calls for ham, but for a Friday in Lent, you could just omit it!

What are your go-to seafood or meatless recipes for Fridays in Lent? Tell me in the comments.

The Men, Men, Men, Men Decade: Reading the 90s

When the O'Meara family gathered together for holidays, it always felt like a very female event. I don't know why this is—in fact, I counted and there were 13 females to 15 males (this was before us grandchildren started marrying and reproducing). Regardless of the count, the female ruled. I guess we were just louder and more vocal than our male relatives (this could be due to the fact that the females were made up of more O'Mearas than the mostly "out law" males).

In an attempt to "man up" our gatherings, my godfather, Uncle Karl, would sometimes break into a chant/song that went like this, "Men, men, men, men. Men, men, men, men."

I say all this because I just finished reading the Pulitzer prize winners for the 1990s and that catchy chant of his is an accurate depiction of the decade.

Picture from Amazon.

The testosterone-filled 90s winners included some very male heavy works such as Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, Rabbit at Rest (yes, another Rabbit book), Independence Day (not about the movie), Martin Dressler, and American Pastoral. The Shipping News, although written by a woman, features a male main character. And I may be the only one who thinks this way, but even the super girly book The Hours also had an evident male presence throughout. Men, men, men, men...

Suffice it to say, at the conclusion of reading the 90s, this girl was ready for some O'Meara family gatherings circa 1990. Where my girls at?

To be fair, the 90s winners did include two very strong female winners— The Stone Diaries and A Thousand Acres. Unfortunate for me, I read those before I started the other books, which left me with very little female respite.

So what did I learn from reading the 90s?

Same thing I learned in preschool.

Boys are gross.

Picture from Amazon.

The Mambo Kings has to be the crudest book I've ever read. I was blushing and cringing through the almost non-stop sex-capades. Because I tend to be on the more prudish end of the spectrum, I read a few passages to Bogdan who said, "yep, that man is obsessed with sex." The thing is, the story that surround the crudeness was actually good, engaging, and even lyrical. To each its own.

Another great product of the 90s? Spoiler Alert: Rabbit Angstrom is dead.

Let me go back to my statement about The Hours. I've never seen the movie, so I had no preconceived notions about the story that examines the lives of Virginia Woolf and two other women affected by her life. Perhaps this is too simple of me, but a story such as that for a man to write is an ambitious undertaking. I found the characters a little flat, and not quite as female as I thought they should be.

Picture from Amazon.

I've mentioned before that I've never been crazy about short stories, but once again I find myself very mistaken. A Good Scent From a Strange Mountain is a collection of stories about Vietnamese immigrants living in New Orleans and South Louisiana. It was an interesting mix of descriptions of a place I know well and love, combined with stories of the Vietnamese that I never had heard before or even really thought about.

There you have it—the men, men, men, men decade of the Pulitzer prize winners. Now I must seek out the female decade—if there even is such a thing.

Another king cake in the snow

I said I'd make a king cake this past weekend, and I did. I used my sister's recipe and spent a good part of the day working on it. It started snowing while I was baking, which reminded me of the first time I made a king cake two years ago.

I kept thinking, as I was baking, that there was no way this would taste anything like Mandeville Bake Shop's king cake (hoping to save myself from disappointment when the king cake was finally finished).

Well, my friends, I am super excited to report that this king cake actually does taste like Mandeville Bake Shop's king cake and it is amazing. The last 2 king cakes I made tasted more like bread with cinnamon and icing. This tasted like a king cake. Lovely.

I'm posting the recipe with my notes in italics. This is a definite must try! Like my sister did, I made a half recipe, which yielded a more than decently sized king cake. Splitting an egg yolk in half is difficult, but not impossible.


Hoffman King Cake (Serves 10–12)

For the cake:
1 cup lukewarm milk, about 110°
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons dry yeast
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup melted butter
5 egg yolks, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon grated fresh lemon zest

For cinnamon sugar filling:
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup granulated sugar
4 tablespoons raw sugar (I used brown sugar b/c did not have raw)

For the icing:
2 cup powdered (confectioners) sugar

4 tablespoon milk

1 teaspoon vanilla
Purple, green, and gold decorative sugars
1 fève (fava bean) or plastic baby to hide in the cake after baking

1. For the cake, pour the warm milk into a large bowl. Whisk in the granulated sugar, yeast, and a heaping tablespoon of the flour, mixing until both the sugar and the yeast have dissolved. I used my stand mixer with the whisk attachment.

2. Once bubbles have developed on the surface of the milk and it begins to foam (this took about 10 or so minutes for me), whisk in the butter, eggs, vanilla, and lemon zest. Add the remaining flour and fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients with a large rubber spatula.

3. After the dough comes together, pulling away from the sides of the bowl, shape it into a large ball. (I had to add quite a bit more flour for it to pull away from the bowl - a little less than a cup, probably) Knead the dough on a floured surface until it is smooth and elastic, about 15 minutes.  I used the dough hook on my mixer, adding in flour as I saw necessary. This took about 5 minutes to get smooth and elastic.

4. Put the dough back into the bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and set aside in a draft-free place to let it proof, or rise, for 1 1/2 hours or until the dough has doubled in volume. I set it by my preheating oven.

5. Preheat the oven to 375°F. Once the dough has risen, punch it down. Roll the chilled dough into a 10 x 20 inch rectangle. Spread the filling on half of the long side of the dough. Fold the dough in half covering the filling. Pat dough down firmly so the dough will stick together. Cut dough into three long strips. Press the tops of the strips together and braid the strips. Press the ends together at the bottom. Gently stretch the braid so that it measures 20 inches again. Shape it into a circle/oval and press the edges together.  Gently lay the braided dough on a parchment lined or nonstick cookie sheet and let it rise until it doubles in size, about 30 minutes.  A few notes: one is I didn't half the cinnamon filling so a lot of this spilled out during the braiding and the two pieces of dough didn't really stick together. Could be because I didn't half it. Also, I had a semi-freak-out when it said braid the pieces. I was thinking, "how the heck do you braid? I haven't done that in years!"

6. Once it's doubled in size, place the cookie sheet in the oven and bake until the braid is golden brown, about 15 minutes. Remove the cake from the oven, place on a wire rack, and allow to cool for 30 minutes. Mine was done in about 12 minutes. My oven is fast.

7. For the icing, while the cake is cooling, whisk together the powdered sugar,  and milk in a bowl until the icing is smooth and very spreadable. If the icing is too thick, add a bit more milk; if it’s a touch too loose, add a little more powdered sugar. I added a few drops of lemon juice because I thought the icing was too sweet.

8. Once the cake has cooled, spread the icing over the top of the cake and sprinkle with purple, green, and gold decorative sugars while the icing is still wet. Tuck the fève or plastic baby into the underside of the cake and, using a spatula, slide the cake onto a platter. I strain the sugars (which I dye with food coloring before) onto the cake to make it look more king cake-like. My strainer started acting silly during purple and green.

—Adapted from John Besh recipe; sister's blog post

One last note, my sister and I were talking about how it's always difficult to store homemade king cakes because most people don't have oval cake platters or stands (and/or they are like me and have NO cake stands). I solved this problem! I put my king cake in a pyrex glass baking dish before icing and then covered it with foil for storage. Win!

7 Quick Takes: A surprising amount of HIMYM takes

1) Too long: It feels like it's been forever since I've done a quick takes post, so here goes!

2) King Cake: I'm planning on making a king cake this weekend. I've made them the past 2 years for Mardi Gras and, while I enjoyed the finished product, it was never anything amazing. My sister tried a new recipe and swears it's as good as our bakery back home's king cake. Trying it!

3) Huge squirrels: In my Toronto post, I mentioned briefly the overweight black squirrels that terrorize all garbage cans in Toronto. I wanted to share this picture of one who hit the jack pot. He was the instant envy of all of his friends.

4) Wha? Winter? I know everyone has been talking about this, but what is up with this winter? So freaking mild. I'm torn on this, actually. On the one hand it's nice that I can enjoy outside in a reasonably sized coat, but on the other, it just doesn't feel like winter, you know? I guess I just believe temps in the 60s and 50s have nothing to do with a mid-atlantic winter.

5)  Canada: We've been on quite the making fun of Canada bit for a while now. We started re-watching How I Met Your Mother on netflix instant and Barney Stinson is full of great Canadian digs. Just search for Barney Stinson Canada on youtube and you'll see what I mean. Some of our favorites: "why do we even let you be a country?" "You speak French there too? What a mess." "It must have been so hard growing up in Canada with America right there" and this one from Lily, "it's like their money and their army, no one takes it seriously."

6) Robin Scherbatsky: Speaking of HIMYM, I got all Robin Scherbatsky last weekend and tried my first cigar. I thought that I'd probably not like it too much, but I actually did enjoy it. More than Bogdan even. Surprising because I've never had a cigarette, so I'm definitely not a smoker. But a cigar? Mmm.

7) Jumped the shark? Furthering the HIMYM talk, am I the only one who thinks the show is just not working this season? It's forced. Nobody clicks anymore. It's just not funny. What is happening?!?! Especially now that we've been watching the old seasons and realizing just how funny the show is, it's really sad to see it floundering. Guess we'll be meeting Ted's wife soon. What do you think?

Find more quick takes posts here.