BigTex and A World Famous Corn Dog

That's right everyone, I braved the crowds tonight to go to the state fair and experience Fletcher's Corny Dogs, who claims that they were one of the first who invented the corn dog, selling it at the Texas State Fair of 1942.

I am all about tradition, especially when it comes to fried items...

Here's BigTex giving everyone a warm welcome wearing this Dickies outfit.

Sorry about the bad pics, it was at night and I only carried my phone.

Here it is! So much deliciousness! The cornmeal batter is very sweet and cornbread like. It was by far the best corn dog I've had in my entire life. The dog itself wasn't anything special, it was all about the batter.

Then of course, in fair tradition, I had to get a funnel cake. Powdered sugar everywhere!

I capped the night off with some late-night froyo and now I need to hit the gym!

Easiest Potato Leek Soup Recipe and My Lipstick Army

First of all: I finally cooked the other day, surprise surprise!

I made a French classic,

Soupe Poireaux Pommes des Terre

This recipe was simple:

1) Chop potatoes into small pieces

2) Double wash Leeks, make sure you get all the mud off!

3) I sautéed my potato and leeks in olive oil and butter before putting in water to cover

4) Add salt and pepper to taste

5) Optional: mash up the potatoes for a creamier texture

No need for chicken stock or cream, just delicious on its own.

Secondly: I've been really into lipsticks, part of the process of growing up.

Here's a picture of my small(ish) army:

(L to R): Revlon Soft Nude, MAC Nude Rose, MAC Dressmaker^2, MAC Jazzed, MAC Vivaglam GAGA, MAC Victorian, MAC Utterly Frivolous, Revlon Strawberry Suede

(L to R): MAC Vivaglam GAGA, MAC Victorian, MAC Utterly Frivolous, Revlon Strawberry Suede, MAC Heartless (as previously featured), MAC Petals & Peacocks, and MAC Blooming Lovely

SO many MAC lipsticks as you can see, I'm hoping to broaden my brands but it's just so easy to buy a MAC lipstick and say, if I use up 6 MAC products I can get one back for free! Also, the names are pretty cool and I buy products just for the names and packaging.

Here are my top 5:

These are the ones I'd save if my apartment was on fire, along with my Urban Decay Naked Palette. If you have these 5, you don't need anything else in the whole wide world...

(this is so not true)

(L to R): Nude Rose, Utterly Frivolous, Strawberry Suede, Heartless, Petals & Peacocks

(T to B): MAC Utterly Frivolous, MAC Nude Rose, MAC Heartless, Revlon Strawberry Suede, & MAC Petals & Peacocks

5. Petals & Peacocks: very pretty cool-toned fuchsia color, I actually love wearing this blotted down and sort of like a stain on my lips. I bought this lipstick off of ebay way after the limited edition collection was over. I obsessed over this lipstick for 2 months straight and felt like a lucky duck when I finally bought it.

4. Strawberry Suede: the exact color of strawberries, it's a corally red, but more coral than red. I wore this a lot in the summer and will continue to do so in the fall. If I want a bright lipstick, I pull this one out, it makes me look tanned and healthy.

3. Heartless: my newest obsession. It's a classic red that makes me feel confident and self-conscious at the same time...but mostly confident. I like wearing this when I have an exam.

2. Nude Rose: this lipstick doesn't get much wear because I'm deathly afraid of breaking it even more. Since it is discontinued, I probably won't use it until I can get my hands on another one. It is my nude of choice and looks quite natural. I think this one has a cult following, so MAC you better repromote this.

1. Utterly Frivolous: Surprising that my top 2 lipsticks are discontinued and I found them for $10 at the CCO. This is such a wearable pinky coral. It's not quite bold and just adds that touch of color to your lips that makes them look utterly delectable!

Have a great weekend! I'll be back with more food!

~A

Blueberry muffins!

I think I have found a good blueberry muffin recipe! Finally! This muffin has a crunchy exterior and is soft on the inside. It's moist, not too dense and the tang of the blueberry is perfect in combination of the sweetness that is in the rest of the muffin. It was a stressful last couple of days, so baking always helps to relieve that - with the added bonus of being able to bring goodies for your friends. I find such joy in watching other people eat and enjoy my food.

hehe, some of the blueberries exploded - but they didn't bleed into the rest of the batter. I think it's really pretty :)

I have turbinado sugar right now as opposed to the regular granulated white stuff. So of course I had to take advantage of that and sprinkled a good amount on the tops of each muffin.

:) probably the most perfect looking muffin I've ever made. I over-filled the muffin liners so that they would have a large muffin top (best part of a muffin for sure!).

Here's the amazingly simple recipe!

-ingredients-

2 cups blueberries (fresh preferred, but can use frozen-do not thaw)

2 cups flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 stick unsalted butter (room temp)

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. prepare muffin pan with 12 cupcake liners.
2. Sift dry ingredients together: flour, baking powder, salt.
3. Beat butter and sugar in another bowl until light & fluffy.
4. Add eggs one at a time to the creamed butter & sugar. Add milk & vanilla extract.
5. Mix dry and wet ingredients together until incorporated. DO NOT OVERMIX BATTER.
6. Fold in blueberries, being careful not to squish any!
7. Pour into cupcake liners filling them right to the top. This batter is pretty thick so dont worry about it if there are spaces around inside the liner - the batter will rise and expand during the baking process.
8. Sprinkle the tops with turbinado sugar (don't be shy with this!). Bake for 25-30 minutes.

These only lasted about 2 days.. they are really THAT good.

-J

painting nails is the best procrastination tactic..

New nail polish makes me very happy. I was lucky enough to pick up this one from the Mac Store today -- it was the last one they had! Haha.. you don't know how happy that made me. Anyways, this is Bad Fairy from the Maleficent section of the new Venomous Villians Collection that came out on Thursday. They had 2 other ones as well: Formidable! (reddish violet with blue shimmers) and Mean & Green (green-purple-brownish.. many diff colors in this one). I was so tempted to get all 3 of these polishes, but Bad Fairy was definitely the prettiest on me. I usually don't even like glitter nail polish but this one is so pretty -- it changes color from orange to fuschia, depending on how the light hits your nail!! How cool is that! Also, it has a smooth feeling on your nail after it dries, no rough chunky feeling like some other glitter nail polishes are like. I LOVE IT.

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I haven't had sushi or any type of japanese food in quite a while, so I took the opportunity to go to Yokohama Sushi with one of my oldest friends who was back home this week. We used to go there a lot because we know the family that owns it, and just haven't been able to go back there together for a long time. I can't even remember the last time we went. Anyways, I am so glad we went -- we had an amazing meal and one of the sushi chefs was super cute! ;)

Beef Tataki.

We always have to get this when we go.. it is too delicious to pass up

Spider Roll, Volcano Roll, Spicy Tuna Roll.

These were off their half-price menu.

Grilled Hamachi Kama. (collarbone of yellowtail)

*drool* Apparently, Yellowtail is in season right now so this was one of their specials! SO GOOD.

And, lastly, this was a cool photo I snapped the other day outside on the porch of my friend's condo building. You could literally see the rain slowly making its way towards us. Can't wait for hurricane season to be over...

-J

How could you be so Heartless?

This morning I woke up with such a dilemma...
To go to the grocery store to pick up ingredients for my planned Curried Chicken Wrap (recipe forthcoming) or to go to the MAC Pro store to pick up a desperately needed red lipstick...



Which one did you think I chose?







Yes, I chose lipstick over food.

(Heartless from MAC + Disney Venomous Villains Collection)

And I rocked it with my studded faux leather jacket while eating super salty french onion soup from La Madeline...(super salty...eek)

And then picked up some Herbalism, I am a sucker for sweet sales assistants who compliments my purse...

I promise to make some food posts soon, Curried Chicken Wrap, Salmon & Leek Quiche, lots of soups are all in the works! Stayed tuned.

~A

it feels like it's been forever..

Time goes so slowly during school.. It's the 4th week of school, yet I feel like it's been months already. This week, tuna was on sale at the grocery store so I made tuna salad for sandwiches for lunch. My mayonnaise went bad so I didn't actually add any in here and it surprisingly still stuck together pretty well. So I guess this is your 'healthier' version for tuna salad sandwiches. Makes me wonder what everyone else likes putting in their tuna salad.

Tuna salad = 2 cans tuna (in water) drained + dijon mustard + celery + red onion + jalapeño + ground pepper

I got some nice sourdough french bread (which was also on sale) for the sandwiches and added sliced avocado and lettuce. Very satisfying lunch, I have to say. I also packed varying combinations (I like to change it up day to day) of grapes/babybel mini cheese/synder's honey mustard pretzel nibs along with the sandwich.

This week I also took full advantage of the $2 treat receipt deal (buy a drink in the morning, come back after 2 pm and get any iced grande drink for $2) at Starbuck's - I think it's ending in a week or so since it's not summer anymore.. but today I tried an iced grande pumpkin spiced latte. It is a must to get whipped cream on this drink and it probably tastes better hot, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Thursdays are my least favorite days of the week because I don't get a break for lunch at school, plus it was raining so hard from morning until now.. so I really needed a pick-me-up. Yay for delicious iced drinks!

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And here's a photo of my mom's orchids - so many of them are blooming right now! It really makes me smile being able to see flowers every day.

These just started opening - it's actually this really light green color on the outer petals but it showed up white on my camera for some reason.

All of our orchids :)

One of my mom's friends lives nearby and they brought us some papayas that they had grown themselves! I used to hate papayas but now I LOVE papayas. These were so delicious and cute! I just cut them in half, scooped out the seeds and went at it with a spoon. BEST way to eat papaya!

How beautiful is this papaya!

so cute :) tee-hee. a great reminder of how great (and yummy) things come in small packages! (You can see a larger papaya in the background that we got from the grocery store.)

Hope your Thursday went better than mine - the weekend is almost here!!

-J

Happy Mid-Autumn (Moon) Festival!

Time for mooncakes! My mom decided to make mooncakes from scratch for the first time ever this year. She woke up at 5 am this morning and started making them, so sadly I have no idea how she did it but I do know that she used the wheat flour that you can buy at Korean grocery stores. She also made her own green mung bean paste for the filling. basically you just take the beans, boil them until they are soft, drain the water and then puree it. And if it's still kind of watery you can strain it with a cheesecloth. I helped her make red azuki bean paste before - same process. I have to say, I am impressed with how well these came out. I hope this becomes an annual tradition in my house...

My favorite thing about these is how flaky the crust part is, and how many layers are in there. You can't get that from those store-bought mooncakes!

Good Job, Mom! haha :)

-J