Food Network inspiration

I'd have to say that our latest obsession lately has been the Food Network. We've been watching a lot of Good Eats (Alton Brown), Good Deal (Dave Lieberman), and Everday Italian (Giada De Laurentiis)! I also like watching Bobby Flay's Throwdown because the people don't know what hit them and then they win and then it's happy (but there are no recipes from this show)!

Anyways, a lot of chefs on these shows love to use cast iron. The even heat is its key selling point but cast iron is heavy and a high quality one is pretty expensive. Nevertheless, we've recently acquired our fair share of cast iron cookware. One of our most recent acquisitions, our star piece, is the 7 qt Dutch oven.


In the last few days since we've got it, we've probably used it as many times as another recent piece, our 11" cast iron skillet. Throw in a grill pan, and our older 3 qt Creuset and you have lots of equipment to make excellent meals.

Speaking of which, JJ has been inspired to cook lots on weekends so we have quick meals over the weekdays. Here are a few of his tasty creations!

From Good Deal,
Potato, Tomato, Corn and Basil Salad:


Braised Hoisin Beer Short Ribs:


A second go at the braised beef short ribs, this time, minus the hoisin sauce but add in some orange:


Mexican Chicken Stew:


From Everyday Italian,
Fusilli with Sausage, Artichokes, and Sun-Dried Tomatoes:


We also have some Kalbi in the making!

Wilmette, IL

Tom invited JJ and his coworkers up to his home in Wilmette for an end of summer BBQ over the Labour Day weekend. We had never been up to Wilmette so a few of us got together early to check it out.


Wilmette's big attraction is the Baha'i Temple. There are only 7 of these temples in the world and apparently, this is one of the 7 Wonders of Illinois (one of the other wonders is Wrigley Field). This building is quite ornate and it's the first thing you see when you enter Wilmette on Sheridan Road.


Some detail of the building... notice that every column in this building has carved in it all the major religions in existence!



Before we went to Tom's, we stopped off at what Pat remembered as the best ice cream in Wilmette... I think.
Homer's!



Tom fed us well. He had a huge chunk of meat and one of the best grilled salmons I have ever had (too bad I didn't take a picture of the delicious salmon)!

San Soo Gab San

Finally, we found a Korean BBQ in Chicago! (Yes, it took a while.)
It's not close to get to but thanks to Kush who's been wanting to for a while, we finally made it out there. Excellent food! It's weird though, each type of meat, you order separately and it's like $20 a plate of a single type of meat!! I guess you're really supposed to eat this with a whole ton of people in order to try everything. They give you lots of those side dishes though (kimchi, anchovies, fish cakes, etc) which we love. We also ordered this goat casserole dish thing (also very big).
Highly recommended! FYI, it's at Western and Foster.

Lollapalooza 2007

Welcome to Lollapalooza 2007!!


The long awaited (because we scored $60 tickets MONTHS ago) was amazing! Over the 3 day outdoor fest, I managed to catch a whole ton of bands, well worth my $60. The sun was beating, the heat was rising, and all of this was enjoyed against the Chicago skyline.


I managed to take some pictures from my new phone (2MP camera!) so I apologize in advance for the grainy-ness. I'll spare you the ridiculously grainy ones I took during the night time.

The schedule was packed this year! Some people complained there wasn't a "real" headliner but I think they got some quality bands.


The first night, I caught some LCD Soundsystem and was completely blown away by Daft Punk and their giant pyramid. They were specks dressed in space suits complete with a helmet on this stage but at least they were elevated by this screensaver pyramid. Light show was amazing and I was impressed I knew most of their set! I don't have a good picture... but you had to be there to experience it!

Next day, I tried to go early but didn't get there til Tokyo Police Club was done their set. Oh well.


Silverchair was pretty good - hadn't seen them since Summersault 2000 in Barrie. Their sound has really changed and Daniel Johns is really strange.
JJ joined me for the Clap Your Hands set which was pretty solid.


Yeah Yeah Yeahs were really good live... Karen O also very strange...
Food at Lolla wasn't as expensive as I thought. They fed us well.
Finally time for the Saturday headliners... I opted for Muse and boy was I happy. That was probably the highlight of my weekend! We scored some good standing room early in the evening. I mean, there were TONS of people everywhere.


I loved Muse's set. My favourite live outdoor performance of the year!

Sunday was a chill day. I hung out with Myrm and her friends and we caught some Amy Winehouse and Iggy Pop at the north end of Grant Park.


Pearl Jam closed the fest with a really good performance. We weren't anywhere near the front due to the throngs of people so we set up camp near a little hill waaaay back from the stage with our melty ice cream. Near the end of the show, we moved up towards the stage and the front was still muddy from the rain the night before! Show ended with Ben Harper and Eddie Vedder doing a duet which was pretty cool.

Excellent summer weekend!

Travis at First Avenue in Minneapolis

That was Travis's entrance at their First Avenue show on July 22! They are probably one of the most energetic and just plain awesome live bands I have ever seen! They played many of my old favourites. JJ and I had an awesome time. Fran even did JJ's favourite Travis song unplugged! It was incredible... he got everyone to be quiet and the song was amazing that way! We were able to get pretty close so here are a few of my best pictures that night.

Fran's shirt says "Art. Music. Jaffa Cakes". I bought one :)

Andy on the banjo for Sing.

Picture of the whole band and Fran jumping off the drumset.

Bantering with the crowd before Flowers in the Window.


What a fantastic show and a great setlist!
Selfish Jean
Eyes Wide Open
Writing To Reach You
Love Will Come Through
As You Are
My Eyes
Big Chair
The Line Is Fine
Side
Driftwood
Good Feeling
Closer
Sing
Battleships
All I Wanna Do Is Rock
Turn

Encore:
20 (unplugged!)
Flowers In The Window
Sailing Away
Why Does It Always Rain on Me

A weekend in Minneapolis

JJ and I went to Minneapolis for the first time this past weekend. Jonathan and Katie were having their wedding there on a beautiful Saturday afternoon at Minnehaha Park. After a small ceremony, we wandered through the park and checked out the Minnehaha Falls (one of main attractions in Minneapolis).


Their wedding day ended with champagne at the backyard reception. Congrats Jonathan and Katie Hobbs!


On Sunday, we decided to tour the other attractions of Minneapolis. Our first stop was the Mall of America, complete with its own indoor amusement park.



We had to see what the fuss was all about... and the metro stop that took us downtown was there.

Downtown Minneapolis is pretty dead on Sunday. Not much is open so we spent most of it just wandering around: through downtown, along the Mississippi, and Mill Ruins Park.



The Guthrie building was kinda neat although I didn't really figure out what it was for. It did have this cool lookout towards the river.

Capping off our evening were dinner at Fogo de Chao (less expensive than the one in Chicago!) and, the reason why we stayed an extra day in Minneapolis, the Travis concert (see next blog post)!!!

Kevin restaurant

Our annual AIS fiscal year end dinner was at Kevin restaurant this year. Since we were allowed to bring our significant others, JJ was able to come along. AIS had bought out the place and so we had a set menu based on the pre-determined selections of the chef's offering from his regular menu.




For starters, I got the roasted sea scallop and they weren't kidding. You get ONE scallop and it was amazing!


JJ got the grilled asparagus as his appetizer and it looked really fresh and delicious.


I ended up with the halibut as my entree. It had an Asian flair to it and the ingredients was super fresh.


Though I didn't like lamb, I tried some of JJ's rack of lamb and I'd have to say it was excellent!


Apparently, the tuna entree is the dish to eat there but unfortunately, there wasn't enough tuna to go around for our entire group so chef Shikami made it up with an amazing tuna tartare hors d'oeuvres that I have no pictures of.

For dessert, JJ and I both had the phyllo bundle and it was quite unique.


I did wish that I had Maracaibo chocolate mousse once I tasted it! I normally don't like mousse because of how fluffy it is but this was the densest mousse I have ever had and it was definitely of utmost chocolate quality!