Busy, Busy Busy!

I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while!  I have been so busy with work, other work, family stuff, and wedding stuff that I haven't had a spare moment to breathe!  I went cooking craaaaazy on Friday, but other than that, I haven't been cooking much.  In fact, John was sweet enough to surprise me with a wonderful dinner last night, AND he agreed to write a guest post about it!  Stay Tuned!

Friday.

On Friday I didn't have to be at work until 5, so I dedicated the day to cooking.  I started it off with an apple cinnamon smoothie.

I added in oats to give it more depth, and let me tell YOU, that was an awesome addition.  I didn't cook the oats or anything, just threw them in with the soy milk, flax seeds, apple butter, apple and cinnamon. 

Yeah, it is that good.  

After breakfast I got working on almond milk.  Normally when I make it, it is waaaay too grainy for me.  Some google-ing led to me believe that I needed to skin the almonds first, blanching them.  I had already been soaking the almonds and the skin was kind of wrinkly, so I figured, why bother putting them in boiling water when they are already wrinkly?  I just peeled them like that. 

THREE HOURS LATER:

Yeah, it took three hours.  AND I had red, sore thumbs for two days.  I should have just blanched them.  In any event, I blended them,

added water to the blender,

and strained it into creamy (slightly less gritty) almond milk.

 Was it worth it? No.  Not at all.  Was it delish?  YES!

While the almonds were soaking and I was peeling, I was also prepping dinner.  We had purchased a chicken on sale the other day, and I was ready to make it.  Normally I roast it in a roasting pan, and it is good, BUT Gayle at the Grocery Cart Challenge opened my eyes to using my much-loved slow cooker. 

I took out the gizzards, and added LOTS of lemon, some whole garlic pieces, and kosher salt, and parsley.

No water or anything!  I just cooks itself over the day and ends up like this:

Swimming in it's own juices!  It was so moist, and easier to cut since I wasn't concerned about scratching my non-stick roasting pan.  We just ate the legs and theighs, and I saved the breasts for another meal and the rest for chicken broth.  Added bonus?  I don't have to dirty a pan AND a slow cooker to make broth or mess with switching stuff from one to the other.  Once you make the chicken, the broth ingredients are already in there!

We also had roasted potatoes as a side. 

On Saturday we went to this restaurant called Oceanos to celebrate a birthday.  I had the MOST AMAZING salmon dish ever.  I tried to take a picture, but the lighting was so bad this is all I could get.

Just believe me when I say it was devine.

They also had lemon wraped in these cute little things that I had to take home and photograph.

AWWWwwwwWwww!

The last thing I need to share was a farmers market purchase... COLORFUL CAULIS!

How cool!

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