Baked Mac & Cheese

As I had mentioned earlier, I made Alton Brown’s Macaroni and Cheese last night for dinner. This was my first real time actually making baked macaroni and cheese. It was quite eventful, in my opinion. I had a lot of pressure from Derek also because he typically doesn’t like mac and cheese (I know, who doesn’t LIKE macaroni and cheese!?). I was really hoping he would like this one, especially because it is Alton Brown’s recipe.

Anyway, it was delicious! It had a ton of flavor and the consistency was perfect. The did not have onions in my version though, that was the only ingredient I was missing. It still tasted great without it. I am going to eat some leftovers tonight, that is certain! Here is the recipe, if you are interested. Baked Macaroni and Cheese

We paired it with a Southern Tier ‘Cherry Saison’ which we have had for probably almost 6 months.

The beer was delicious. Not at all what I had expected. I thought it would be a lot sweeter than it was. It’s actually 8% alcohol and has a very strong bitter, hoppiness to it. It went well with our meal.

For dessert, I ate a yummy peanut butter ball! These things are amazing and I must have the recipe. They are made by a friend of Derek’s family and I look forward to them every Christmas.

I gotta run, I am working on making Roquefort Cheese Balls for the New Year’s Eve Party tonight!

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More Homemade PIZZA!

Today was a dreary, rainy day and I did not want to go outside at all! My plan was to go to the track over at Astoria Park to do some speed work, but! I did not want to run in the rain. I went out once to bring my friend Ryan over to the park to check out the scenery because he is planning on shooting the rest of his film there. After leaving I had no regrets for canceling my run. It was cold, rainy, and really windy and it was a good day to take off from running. I did more core work today, I actually just did it right now and it was nice and quick and simple. It may have not seemed like much, but my tummy is pretty sore already so I didn’t feel the need to go over board.

I did front and side planks, followed by some side to side ab work (as seen in this post). I also did side crunches with a weight and regular crunches.

Tomorrow WILL be my speed work day! I look forward to it actually, I quite enjoy the track since I can run without having to wait for dumb cars! It’s going to be cold tomorrow and I am dreading that, but I know once I get started I will warm up quickly.

I need to pick up a hat and gloves asap!

Yesterday I made a waffle PB&J. I had bought this package of “belgian” waffles about a week ago and we are out of  bread so I figured they would make a good sandwich.

It was good, you could tell the waffle had a lot of sugar in it though!

My food today wasn’t very exciting. I ate a cheese omelet for breakfast and I honestly can’t remember what I had for lunch or if I even at lunch! We are completely out of everything in the house, but I did realize that we have all of the ingredients to make a home made pizza. This was probably the first time I’ve ever made pizza dough from scratch. I used bread flour instead of white or wheat so the crust came out nice and thick.

The final product came out well, I did however take it out too early because it was still a little doughy. So after I took a couple bites of my piece I threw it all back in the oven for about 7 more minutes.

…and a Saranac Brown Ale

I ate three pieces of pizza and I was stuffed. Derek can have the rest : )

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The Heartland Brewery

Derek and I headed out on a double date with our friends Kelly and Cory to The Heartland Brewery. There are 5 or 6 locations around the city and I fell upon one the other day while doing something for work. We decided to hit up the one in Union Sq.

On a side note, I’ve decided to start giving restaurant reviews, with this being my first official one.

It’s a large place with plenty of seating up and down stairs. They also hold events quite frequently, which is a plus because in my opinion it is hard to find a great food and beer place to hold any kind of event. The menu is great, the only downside is that it’s a little pricey. Even the sandwiches were $10+ which is sort of a let down for me right now because I have no job so I had to make sure I didn’t get something super expensive. Otherwise I usually don’t mind spending a little bit of money on good food.

I decided on the Pulled Pork sandwich just like the rest of the table. Yes, we all got the same thing. Before the food though, I had to figure out my beer selection. I was very happy to see that they had a sampler available. There were 6 house beers and they also had 4 or 5 seasonal selections. Of course all the beer was brewed inside the premises. I went with the sampler that included the 6 house beers + 1 seasonal selection, in which I chose the Smiling Pumpkin Ale.

It was great to try 75 % of their beer all in one sitting. I honestly can’t wait to go back to try the rest of the seasonal beer.

The house beers are in order from the first one pictured here in the bottom left hand corner then around to the right and the Pumpkin Seasonal is in the middle. My favorite was probably the pumpkin, it had a strong flavor and wasn’t too sweet. After that I enjoyed the Indian River Light second best. I couldn’t believe how much flavor it had for being a light beer.

The pulled pork sandwich was excellent! The fries were good, they were labeled as spicy fries, but really they didn’t have much flavor in the spicy department. I finished the whole thing though. I especially liked that it came with a pickle.

Because it was a little pricey…

Rating: 4 out of 5

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6 Years and Counting

Okay I’m a little late posting this, but what else is new right? Derek and I have been dating for 6 years since this past Wednesday, the 23rd. I can’t believe it’s been so long, time really does fly. We had an amazing anniversary. On Wednesday we had our first paid job. We helped film a live webcast of a business conference that was based on electric transporation. It was pretty interesting, but a pretty long day overall. The conference was over around 230 and after that we packed up all the equipment and ended up going out for a drink with some of the ‘business’ people who put the conference on. We went to a place called The Algonquin, which is a hotel and they had a really nice bar inside. We both had Hemingways, which was a pretty girl drink, but they were damn good. It was the suggested drink of the afternoon. The woman in charge paid for every one’s drink!

We came home, got changed and did some research on where we should go out to eat. We couldn’t find anything that really sparked our interest. We were really hoping to find a place with good food and even better beer. We decided to just stay in the area and walk around until we fell upon a good place to go. We ended up walking for a lot longer than I had expected, well what seemed a lot longer because my feet were absolutely killing me. I wore shoes that were apparently too small for my feet.

Anyways, we finally decided on this place called Sanford’s.

It was a small place and pretty dark inside, but the menu looked fantastic. They did have a great beer selection, but unfortunately nothing was on tap. It was our anniversary though and we knew we had to go all out with everything we ordered.

First up, the appetizer; it was a special for the night: Mussels

And beer, OF COURSE!

The Oktoberfest was my first beer.

The Jenlain was Derek’s first, which was REALLY GOOD! I don’t know why I didn’t order one.

The mussels were good, definitely some of the best I’ve had, but nothing has yet to live up to the mussels from the Portsmouth Brewery. I was really impressed with this place, we will definitely be going back! The atmosphere was great and the service even better. The manager/owner came over to our table towards the end of the night and introduced himself to us. We had a good little chat and he said that he is a wine guy and his brother is the beer guy  (They also have a HUGE selection of wine). He gave us his card and when the waitress gave us our check she said  ‘The dessert is on Chris (the owners name), Welcome to Sanfords. We couldn’t believe he gave us free dessert. We were totally high rollers that night!

Here is the rest of our food!

This is what I ordered, a medium steak with cajun fries.

Derek got this mountain of pork that literally fell of the bone and was so delicious with garlic mashed potatoes. He always manages to order the most extravagant thing on the menu.

Derek and I both ordered this beer for our second round. It won the ‘Best Beer in the World’ award from Beer Advocate in 2008. GOOD!

A Belgian style waffle with pecans, bananas, and caramel. YUM! This is what we got for free.

We split this bottle for our dessert beverage. It was really good, but I was STUFFED by the time we left.

It was a great anniversary! I love Derek so much and we really are perfect for each other! 🙂

Oh yeah, we FINALLY have internet in our apartment so you can expect a lot more posts more frequently! I’m going out to the Heartland Brewery tonight in Union Sq. Be back later with a recap on that.

Edited to add:

Because there was absolutely no beer on tap:

Rating: 4 out of 5

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I’m Back

Okay I know I haven’t posted in like FOREVER, but I’m sorry I’ve been extremely busy and I don’t have internet in the new place yet! Once I get internet, I promise I will post at least once a day.

So, like I said I’ve been busy, but lets start from the top. The big move was quite successful. We arrived at our new apt at around 330 or 4 on Saturday evening. All of our friends were there to help  us unload, which was awesome! It was done in no time and I appreciate everyone’s help SO much! Our room was filled with boxes and we had a lot of work to do.

My dad and nephew, Cody stayed the night. We unpacked, drank beer and ate really good pizza.

We are yet to be unpacked 100%, but we are pretty damn close. There are only 3 boxes left in the bedroom, filled with ‘junky’ type stuff. Derek and I still had to go back to our old apartment to clean it out. We ran out of time on Friday because packing up the trailer literally took all day. We made it a one day trip and went back to Manchester this past Friday to wrap things up. We literally drove back, cleaned for 3 1/2 hours, then drove back home to NY. It was a long day, but I was glad to get it done and keep the weekend free to finish unpacking and cleaning.

I’ve been interning at my roommate Matt’s work for the past week. I started the first Monday I was here. It’s going well. I have learned a lot! I was basically just shoved out into Manhattan to find my way on my own. I feel very familiar with things now and I am not so scared of the subway anymore. I have to deliver things, pick things up and I’ve been doing some basic office work. I’m really itching to get a paid job though, or at least an internship that has something to do with Art. I would rather be working for free in an area that I want to be working in in the future.

I have someone to run with now and I’m so excited! I’ve already gone on three runs and I love it. Matt didn’t run much before, but he impressed me with his ability to run the 4 miles home from work in one shot. We ran home from work twice and then went for a 5 mile run yesterday. It’s nice that I will be able to keep up with my running here, I was slightly worried about it. I’ve also been eating really well, which surprises me because I figured I would be stressed out and eating anything and everything.

I get 10 bucks everyday for lunch and I’ve been trying new places every day. I work in Rockefellar so there are a lot of places just in the concourse on the bottom floor.

Here are some of my eats:

Roasted Eggplant Sandwich from ‘Wichcraft

Three Cheese Quesadilla and Orange flavored Green Tea from the Beach Street Eatery.

This past Saturday night we all went out the the Beer Garden and it was awesome, okay I may have expected something a little different, but I had a really good time. They definitely had good beer on tap and they served HUGE glasses of beer. The options were a half liter, a liter, or a pitcher. I had a half liter and a liter. I can’t remember what the first beer was that I had, but the second I believe was a local beer called Capt. Lawrence Freshchester (pictured).

Derek and I with our new roommate Matt.

Derek and I absolutely LOVE it here and we are already comfortable and feel like we are really living here now.

Coming Soon: Pictures of the apartment!

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A Going Away Weekend

I had such a great weekend! I went out on Friday night with some co-workers to Jillians, drank lots of beer and at lots of nachos and didn’t have to to pay for anything! The best part was just being able to hang out with my awesome friends from work. I will truly miss them.

Saturday was the big party day. Kerri and Scott threw us an AMAZING party at their condo! I had a great time and I think everyone there did also.  A lot of great people showed up and I can’t wait to hang out with them all again. By the end of the night it did get a little out of control, but seriously the party was a hit! The people there were awesome, the food was fantastic and the beer was even better! There were three different beers on tap, a dark amber ale and a cream ale that Scott brewed and Kerri’s first homebrew, a watermelon ale. Yum! They were all so good and I think we all drank 10 gallons of beer that night, haha. I know that is a short recap, but I just want to say THANK YOU  to my sister and Scott, the party was way better than I could’ve ever imagined, I love you guys and will miss you SO MUCH! I will now leave you with some of the best pictures of the night.

I still have two more going away gatherings to go to. One on Friday night with more co-workers and then a family one on Sunday. So busy!

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16 Days left…

Alright so I’ve FINALLY got some time to sit down and write a post! I have been so busy these past few weeks, but I’ve definitely been able to cross some major stuff off of my To Do list, which feels great.

I don’t even know where to begin. Surprisingly I’ve been able to keep up with my running during this craziness. I’m actually going to exceed my monthly goal of 75 miles this month. August is now the month I’ve put the most mileage into ever. I’m actually going to take a few days off from running. My body feels like it needs some rest from it, but I am hoping to get in a long run this Saturday morning, anywhere from 7-9 miles. I haven’t been running outside much though because it SO damn hot! I’ve been sticking to the treadmill mostly, otherwise I have to stop and walk a lot outside because of the heat and humidity.

I signed up for the Nike Human Race in New York City!!! I am SO excited for this race. It’s something I’ve heard so much about in the past and I am ecstatic that I will now be living in a city where it is held. It’s a huge 10K race that is held in 6 or 7 different cities across the country on the same day.  I haven’t been this excited for a race in a long time! I really can’t wait. It’s October 24th at 8am in Brooklyn at Prospect Park.

Had a yard sale last weekend and it went pretty well. We didn’t sell any of our big furniture stuff that we wanted to, but we are going to put it all on Craig’s List. We sold a lot of junk! and we made $165, so I’m pretty happy with that. My sister and my dad had some stuff in there too and they were nice enough to let us keep their profits! : ) Hopefully by the time all of our furniture sells we will have enough to cover the cost of the moving supplies.

Derek and I and Kerri and Scott went down to Salem, MA on Saturday night to go to this place called Gulu Gulu. It was awesome there! It was a cafe that served amazing beer, really good coffee, and yummy crepes! They had other things on the menu, but their signature food was definitely the crepes.

This was the banana walnut crepe with nutella, it was fabulous!

I also got an Ommegang Hennepin

and…I don’t remember what this is! It isn’t a Gulden Draak. It’s going to drive me crazy trying to figure out what this was!

We had 2 delicious cheese plates as appetizers…

and then played a game of scrabble

Kerri kicked our butt!

After that we headed to a sweet comic book shop and then hit up Salem beer works, where we shared a pitcher of Watermelon beer.

I had a lot of fun that night! It was pretty much out last night out all together before Derek and I head to NYC. I will miss them a lot and I hope they come and visit frequently!

I got my car inspected today and it passed without any problems, yay! It was quick and painless, except for the fact that it cost me $45!!!

My mom got some major surgery done yesterday, but it all went smoothly and she is doing well. She pretty much got her whole thigh bone replaced (femur?) because it was extremely thin and frail. I am going to visit her in the hospital tomorrow morning and hopefully she will be going home on Friday.

16 days til I move! Eek!

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Martha’s Exchange

These were from the other night, Saturday afternoon to be more exact.

This was the Tapas Trio Dip with Hummus, Smoked Salmon dip and Olive Tapenade, mmm it was delicious! My favorite was definitely the tapenade, it was so salty and good. I think I ate most of the vegetables and Derek ate most of the chips, ha!

I got two beers with my meal. This was the Biscuit City Pale Ale.

This was probably one of the BEST pale ales I’ve ever had. It was very crisp and refreshing and had a nice bitter after taste. I will definitely be back for another.

For my second beer,  I had the Lackey’s Brown Ale.

It was very dark in color, but really refreshing. This one didn’t stand out to me as much as the Pale Ale, but I definitely enjoyed it. I drank this with my meal, which was a plain old cheeseburger with a side of fruit

It was exactly what I wanted.

Derek got the fried haddock to make up for his last attempt with fried fish at The Shaskeen, which was a total let down. It sure was an upgrade, his meal came with a huge piece of fish and onion rings AND french fries!

Those onion rings were amazing! I find it hard to come by good onion rings, they have to be perfect or I don’t like them, ha!

Well back to today, I woke up pretty early, probably too early considering I only went for a short run this morning. I did make a delicious egg wrap for breakfast though and I COMPLETELY forgot to take a picture! It had two scrambled eggs, yellow peppers, and mushrooms all wrapped up inside a whole grain wrap with a little guacamole and garlic hummus. It was good and filling.

• Distance: 3.1
• Time: 28:45
• Pace: 9:16/mile

I was actually hoping to go a little faster, but I think the hot weather is what killed me and has been killing me for the past two weeks. I’m not complaining though! I would rather hot sunny weather any day.

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Will Run for Beer

I just got back from an 8 mile run, it was great! I left around 10am and it was only about 69° which I was very happy about. There was a nice breeze most of the time, but it was still pretty damn humid outside. It was a great run overall, a lot better than last weeks. It was a little slower this week, but a lot more enjoyable. I felt pretty strong the whole time and I even sprinted the last half  mile. It was nice to feel strong at the end of the run, instead of feeling like I wanted to die. Definitely worth the slower pace.

• Distance: 8 Miles
• Time: 79:54
• Pace: 9:59/mile
• Calories Burned: 750 (estimate)

Today is my Dad’s birthday! Derek and I are going over to my parents house for a family gathering. I bought my Dad the Shamwow! and a tub of pistachios (he loves them). There is kind of inside joke in my family where my dad always ends up with all of the ‘As Seen on TV’ products. I think he will like it anyhow. You’ll say WOW every time!

I went out on Friday night for one of my co-workers birthday. We went to Jillians and I was only going to stay for an hour or so, but I ended up having such a good time that I stayed the whole time. I got there around 4 and left around 10! I’m really going to miss all of the people I work with.

I had planned on a 3 mile run for Friday, but I thought it was worth the sacrifice of hanging out with good people instead. It turned into two rest days because I didn’t end up doing anything yesterday either. I drank sooo much beer from Friday to Saturday.

Yesterday, Derek and I did some errands and then went to Martha’s Exchange in Nashua. We got some really good food and beer there and then ended up going out to The Wild Rover in Manchester for even more beer and we met up with sister, Kerri and her husband Scott. I have some great photos to share, but I will have to upload them a little later because I am heading over to my parents house now, hope everyone is having a nice Sunday!

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Catching up on Food Pics

Here are some recent meals I’ve consumed. I take so many pictures of my food and never post them all in time. So now I’m catching up all in one post.

More beer from the awesome ‘Liquor Shop’ (located next to Trader Joes). Check out that Banana Bread beer that I bought. I like trying weird stuff, I hope it’s not too sweet!

Our huge shopping trip to Trader Joes! We got so many good things, I love it there.

A cheddar and goat cheese panini with spinach and mushrooms.

Blueberries, Granola, Peanut Butter Puffins and Greek Yogurt-brought this to work for lunch one day last week.

I made this last night for dinner and it was amazing! It may look a little weird, but it was just what I was craving. I’m definitely going to be adding this to my recipe collection. It’s scrambled eggs with sauteed onions, mushrooms, peppers and garlic with spinach and grated cheddar cheese on top of black beans and rice. Garnished with some SPICY salsa and really GOOD guacamole. It was a hearty meal, just what I needed!

Mmm, I could eat this every night.

Derek ate his dinner with a Brooklyn Brown Ale. I had mine with a  Hooker watermelon ale, which by the way tastes just like a jolly rancher, therefore was way too sweet for my taste. Before it even enters your mouth it is overwhelming! It also has a lot of fake additives in it, which is a huge turn off. It does not in any way live up to the amazingess of the Hell or High Watermelon Wheat beer, which I will be posting about on my beer page shortly.

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