garden. vertical.

I know. I'm rolling my eyes right now at the LACK OF BLOG POSTS...all I can say is #sorrynotsorry (you had to see that coming). Life's been busy and with Duke trying to take over the local beach, it gets a bit chaotic.

Last year's garden was so. very. sad. I'll be making up for it this year. The plants are moving on up...in a vertical garden, that is. Oh gawd...I'm not as funny as Nate says.

Plans for this year: Trying out this new freestanding vertical garden from Garden Up! along with the usual containers. The usual "just plant it to see if it grows" still stands - it has about a 70% success rate so far.

food. caramel brownies.

I've come to the conclusion that as long as I have an interest in baking or dessert making, I'll be feeding our family of two plus some. So I guess this is...your welcome, friends and co-workers. Unless the dessert sucks. I blame it on my 'novice baking skills'.

Brownies. Pretty sure this was a staple when I was going up. Even though it was of the packet in a box variety, it was still delicious and my sister and I needed a baseline to learn how to bake. (She's turned out to be a pro...have you tried her banana bread? I can't compete. I just use old banana for diy beauty treatments.) I love that you can have one recipe to start and make it your own by adding items you probably already have in your pantry. Last night, I went for salted caramel. It worked, kinda. See my notes below.

Sorry Nate, I'm pretty sure you are going to see a lot of brownies over the next few months.

food. chicken salad wraps.

I'm always looking for easy recipes I can prep for lunch so leftovers aren't on the menu all the time. Nate doesn't mind them but I can get to a place where I'm just over a dish...for example, the Chicken Satay Burgers. Don't get me wrong, this dish is really good but when it rotates every 12 days in the menu, it doesn't work for me. Sorry, Nate...you won't see this recipe back in the rotation until next summer.

Back to the Chicken Salad Wraps. This started out as something I was going to prep for lunch but after having a bit of a chaotic week, it was something easy for dinner and this was pushed to dinner instead of lunch. Easy and delish, you can add more crunch and/or flavours to this recipe (see my notes below). Enjoy!

food. russian tea cakes.

I love to bake. I'm not very good at it but hopefully that will get better as I have time to try more recipes.
One thing I've learned - measure, measure and measure again. These cakes were actually pretty good. The issue - always too many treats for the two of us. Have with a cup of tea or coffee and don't stop at one.

cellar door. rockford wines barossa.



Welcome to Rockford!
One of the many hobbies Nate and I have picked up since we've moved here is visiting cellar doors. Hobby, research for my job, research for visiting 'peeps, thirst - I guess you can really call it what you want. Some of you who have already visited know that Nate and I are starting to build a 'must visit' priority list.

At the top of that list is Rockford Wines in Barossa.
Let's get all the basic info out of the way:

food. prawn tacos.

I made these a lot last summer but forgot
Prawn Tacos
about the recipe until making our menu this week. Quick, easy, delicious - the salsa is even better the next day!

Note: Original recipe is Shrimp Tacos but we don't have shrimp in Australia and this isn't a salad. Spend the money to get some local prawns from your seafood guy.

Prawn Tacos from allrecipes.com, submitted by: abewasabe | Serving Size: 4
Ingredients

1 mango - peeled, seeded and diced
1 ripe avocado - peeled, seeded and diced
2 tomatoes - diced
1/4-1/2 cup chopped fresh coriander (cilantro)
1/4 red onion, diced
3 large cloves of garlic, minced
1/2 tsp of salt
2 tbls of lime juice
500 g (1 pound) of prawns
4 tortillas, warmed (or not - Nate goes cold turkey)

beauty. avocado face mask.

You know when you let that avocado go just one or two days past the edible stage? It happens to me often...which I'm sure Nate hates because avocados are expensive down here.

Now I have a fix for it! Inspired by my girl friend, Megan, time for a diy beauty treatment. She almost always has an avocado concoction for something so off I went and goggled 'avocado face mask'...

Here's an easy recipe I found on LaurenConrad.com:

food. homemade butter.

This just happened: homemade butter. Okay didn't just happen, I've been planning on making it since Friday.

Easy and hopefully delish. Recipe to come soon. I was going to add the recipe but thought it would be easier to just point you to the site I found it on. Their photos and steps are a lot better than mine would be.

Homemade Butter on diynetwork.com, submitted by Mick Telcamp.

boozy dessert. pear & riesling pops.

Not sure if boozy desserts is a topic that will stick but we can try it out.

It's hot here in Adelaide. What does hot weather mean in this kitchen? Less red wine and more white wine, obviously.

I recently came across Food & Wine's Pear & Riesling Pops. I gave it a whirl tonight. Recipe and results to come soon.

duke. cougs & dawgs.

No wonder Duke gives us blank stares sometimes...we confuse the shit out of him.
#GoCougs #GoDawgs
 





Don't mind this random code. I'm trying to claim my blog on Technorati.
VQDBQV2TAVJ5

organize. juice.

So much orange!
It's a bit wrong that I write this as Nate and I are opening our second bottle of wine for the night. Let's not think of it as wrong, more prepared.

Juicing...we love it (minus the cleaning of the machine). It's actually kind of hard for me to accept store bought juice now. The layer of sugar on your tongue after throwing down a glass of store bought juice is no bueno for this wanna be blogger.

Regardless of if your two bottles of wine in or not, if you plan to make juice in the morning...prep the night before.

Our routine for carrot, orange, ginger juice:
At night, set out two containers that includes...
4-6 cleaned, chopped carrots
2-3 quartered, peeled oranges
1 good size chunk of peeled ginger
Two glasses and your juicer

We put the containers in the fridge and in the morning, turn on juicer, juice and do a rinse of all your pieces for the juicer.

Have a juice recipe you love? Give us the recipe in the comments, we'll give it a try!

duke. pondering.

I took this photo yesterday. Duke tried to take himself for a walk this morning. I'm convinced he was pondering his escape in this photo...and his desperate need for a haircut.

found. awkward carrot.

Interesting little piece of carrot that was pulled out of garden at work.


food. garlic ginger marinade.

I tried putting this photo through Instagram but I don't think
any filter can make raw chicken on a grill look tasty.
End result was tasty, try the recipe.
Pretty tasty on chicken, Nate thinks this would be awesome on salmon...it's been added to our list of dinners to make.

Garlic Ginger Marinade by Food Network*
Ingredients:
  • 1 cup sliced red onion
  • 2 tbl minced garlic
  • 2 tbl minced ginger
  • 1/4 cup soy sauce
  • 1/4 cup orange juice
  • 1 tsp ground pepper
Directions:
Add all ingredients into a Ziploc bag, add your protein.
Let sit for at least an hour.
Grill and enjoy!

*Click here for the original recipe from Food Network.

date. movies.

Besides wine, the beach and Fringe...there are a ton of outdoor activities available in Adelaide. One of our favourite is Moonlight Cinemas at the Botanic Gardens that happens during summer. It's the perfect date night or family night to end your week with. Some of the perks of the Moonlight Cinemas: bring your own food, bring your own drinks (including alcohol), enjoy some fresh air and on occasion, you could see a shooting star.

Nate and I had an impromptu date night on Saturday - packed a picnic basket with chicken, quinoa salad, cheese, fruit, chocolates and wine and off we went to see Saving Mr. Banks. Friday was kind of a gray day (reminded both of us of Seattle) with rain on and off so we weren't sure if Saturday was going to be a repeat. Lucky for us, sunshine all around and the perfect night to head to the Botanic Gardens.

The movie itself was good, not the family film we thought it was going to be. This time around, we went for the experience of the Moonlight Cinema not because of the movie that was playing. If you're a fan of Mary Poppins, be sure you check out the movie. A fun side note: The author of Mary Poppins grew up in Australia!

If you have yet to check out Moonlight Cinemas, be sure you do before they are done for the season. There are still a lot of great movies to see.

If you don't have an outdoor cinema near you, create your own! Something my dad used to do for us as a kid. Project a movie on a white sheet or move a TV outside, make your own candy bar, have mini sandwiches to munch on and open your favourite bottle of wine.

If it's too cold right now to even fathom the idea of going outside, add it to your list to do as soon as warms up.

A couple helpful links:

Oh, and don't forget your blankets and bug spray.

food. feta sandwich spread.

Not sure how I came across this Food & Wine recipe but it looked easy enough for a lazy Saturday afternoon lunch (most likely on of the hundreds. The original recipe is for a whole sandwich, I'm focusing in on the spread for said sandwich. It looked too easy, which means the screw up factor could be pretty high for me. Fortunately, it turned out really well! I ended up making a second batch to have on hand for lunch this week.

Feta Sandwich Spread by Food & Wine*
Ingredients
  • 3 oz feta, crumbled
  • 2 tbl mayo (use more or less to your taste, the original recipe is 1/4 cup)
  • 2 minced chives

food. milo slice.

Milo - so Australian, right?! Too bad I'm not a huge fan of the drink itself. Nate, on
the other hand is...I discovered this recipe from The Organised Housewife. Easy & delicious - I even liked them!

I know, the photo doesn't look that great but The Organised Housewife has one that will make you WANT to make these.

Milo Slice bar by The Organised Housewife
Ingredients
  • 1/2 cup self raising flour
  • 1/2 cup plain flour
  • 1/2 cup Milo (I ended up using a bit more)
  • 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
  • 1 cup rolled oats (I categorised this as a 'healthy' snack after adding this)
  • 2/3 cup shredded coconut
  • 2/3 cup brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 125g (4.4oz) butter, melted

happy. 2014.

Wait..wasn't it just July? I won't be the first to say it - this year has flown by! I feel like it's been spinning, spinning, spinning and now it's gone. Completely good with these types of spins because so much happened in 2013 to have made it an awesome year.

Big THANK YOU to everyone who was able to come visit us this year! We've enjoyed having all of you as house guests, we hope you loved Adelaide as much as we do (or if not, we got you drunk enough to think you did).

Big CONGRATS to all our friends who have gotten engaged, married, and grew their families this year. Even though we're not there in person, we love that we can still connect over texts, Skype, FaceTime, Instagram, Facebook.

Again, 2013 was awesome but I know 2014 is ready to bring it. Stay tuned for more adventures, food, drinks and anything else that makes its way across the blog (hopefully. We all know this whole 'blogging on the go' thing is still trying to work it's way into our lives).

Happy New Year!