What I've been up to

Oh my gosh, it's been nearly a month since I've written! I've been busy settling in and enjoying Portland, but of course that means I've been putting off blogging for far too long.

Our drive up to Portland was exhausting but went really well, in that everything made it up in 1 piece and we didn't have any significant Penske-truck-pulling-a-trailer mishaps, but Dr. Hubby swears that he will never drive a moving truck again!


Our apartment is wonderful and nearly done- once I hang up our pictures and figure out where to store the colony of computer related cords living in the corner of our front room I'll post a bunch of pictures. :) I love it because we actually managed to avoid cramming every inch of it with furniture. Having a bit of space makes it feel very peaceful. That being said, we still feel like we have too much stuff and took another car load of things to goodwill once we got here. I also love our location- Munjoy Hill feels a lot like the Marigny in New Orleans and we are close to the water, a gorgeous park, tons of restaurants, a coffee shop, and a gourmet/healthy food market.

Portland is amazing. Living here right now really does feel like being on vacation. My "office" is a sunroom that had a great view of Casco Bay and I walk my dogs in the Eastern Promenade (a big park leading down to the bay) every day. I've taken them down to the beach a few times but they are horrified by the fact that the water moves! They really love being in the park though and when it's not crowded we take them off their leashes and let them run back and forth between us. Bernie, lazy creature that he is, kind of gamely trots along until he gets too tired, but Hereaux SPRINTS with this big doggie grin on his face. He is in doggie heaven here!

Eastern Promenade after a rain

The happiest I've ever seen my dogs

I've found a lot of things I love about Portland already- The weather, of course, is perfect. I've also joined a yoga studio that I really love, I run a weekly 5K race (and have plans to run many more races), I've gone to to Farmer's Market and tried every strange veggie I found (fiddleheads! kohlrabi! salad greens with edible flowers! garlic scapes!), I've done a First Friday Art Walk, I watched the 4th of July Fireworks over the Prom from my porch, I've eaten at a lot of great restaurants, and I've cooked some pretty good meals here as well. And of course, the only pictures I've taken have been of dogs and food. :)

Fiddleheads! (and grilled chicken)

Periwinkles- aka snails! I basically pulled these out of a tide pool and boiled them- they were tasted like clams!

Speaking of clams- this guy was the size of my palm. Divine paired with fresh bread from the Standard Baking Co.

I also really like how environmentally friendly Portland is. Gone are the days of having to drive to find a place to recycle (and only being able to recycle newspapers). We have free curbside recycling and we definitely generate more recycling than actual trash because they take everything. It's awesome. Less awesome is having to pay $1 per special trash bag to get rid of our trash, but in all honesty, I appreciate the incentive to not just throw away stuff. Because we are total cheapos, we've also started a compost bin (despite the fact that I have a black thumb and kill every plant I try to grow) and I have been saving a bag of veggie scraps in the freezer for stock. I actually made my first veggie stock on Monday and plan to make chicken stock from the bones of last night's roast chicken tomorrow.

Working at home is going pretty well- I've been able to meet or exceed all of my deadlines so far and I really enjoy wearing yoga pants all the time, eating omelets whenever I want to, and painting my nails unprofessional colors. :) It can feel a little isolating but I'm making a point to actually leave the house every day (and walking the dogs doesn't count) which helps me feel more connected to the outside world.

In the next few weeks I'm looking forward to camping in Acadia National Park (Dr. Hubby talked me into getting us new tent and me a sleeping bag), running more races, going to the Farmer's Market more regularly (I've missed the past 2 weeks), doing a walking tour of the Hidden Gardens of Munjoy Hill, and taking a trip back to New Orleans for work (I need my boudin fix!). I'll also be going to D.C. soon to visit friends, and will be celebrating my 30th birthday in NYC with my inlaws since my brother-in-law is turning 3o three days after I do!

There are a lot of things I want to do but don't have concrete plans for too- trail running, getting out on the water (be it in a kayak, paddle board or real boat, I'm not picky!), skiing and snowshoeing this winter, and making friends and workout buddies.

Overall, I miss my family and friends but am incredibly thrilled to finally living in Portland. I still walk around and think to myself- I can't believe I actually live here. :) So far, the adventure is going well!

Birthday Boy

This weekend, I helped my darling fiance celebrate his last birthday as an unmarried man! On Friday night, we enjoyed happy hour drinks and $0.75 sliders at the American Sector, then hung out with our friends Steph and Brandon at our house.
On Saturday, we attended Hogs for a Cause and ate lots of Barbecue while helping to support pediatric brain cancer research. I had pulled pork macaroni, boudin balls, brisket sliders, and a salted fudge brownie. Stephanie and Brandon gave him a confederate flag belt buckle/beer opener for his birthday. I'm sure the people in Maine will love it. :P

What a beautiful day for a BBQ!

That night, we went to the LPO and saw Sir James Galway. Sir James Galway was awesome- incredibly talented, very Irish, and really quite adorable. I told my darling fiance that I want to take him home and keep him in a shoe box under my bed. (For the record, I also feel this way about Danny Devito.)

Wearing the Derby hat I gave him for Valentine's Day and sporting a seriously cute beard

Sunday was my darling fiance's 31st birthday. Of course, I chose to celebrate this momentous occasion with lots of food. In the morning, I made him eggs with black truffle butter, and for dinner I bought a pheasant from Rare Cuts for him to cook on the grill. The pheasant turned out really well- I butterflied it, rubbed it with honey and olive oil, and then he weighed it down on the grill with several cast iron skillets and cooked it for 30 minutes, turning it every 10 minutes (then every 5 minutes for the last 10, so it would be even). I served it with a side salad and mashed celery root with cranberry wensleydale cheese.
Dessert was a double peanut butter iced cake with chocolate ganache. It was a hit. :)
Hopefully, we'll have at least as much fun next year for my darling fiance's first birhtday as a married man! :)

Birthday Recap Part III: Portland

Thank you, dear readers, for hanging in there while I took my sweet time writing up this recap. I've spent the weekend prepping the house for my darling fiance's return (because of course, I didn't get around to any of the cleaning I'd planned to do while he was gone. I seem to have spent all my extra time watching episodes of Community on Hulu. Oops!)
Anyway, he's back now (so happy!) and has reminded me that I need to finish my recap, so here it is!
On Tuesday, my darling fiance had to work during the morning, so I woke up early and walked from his dorm in the West End of Portland down to the Old Port District and enjoyed a chocolate croissant and a cafe au lait in a little coffee shop called Morning in Paris. Once the shops in Old Port opened up, I did a little shopping and enjoyed a green veggie juice from the California Juice Bar. (It really hit the spot after the previous night's bacon fries!) I quickly discovered that Portland has a Lululemon!!! I'm so jealous since we don't have one in New Orleans! I have a few pairs of pants and a top from Lululemon that my darling fiance has given me, but I've actually never been to one myself. I immediately hit the sales rack and picked up an adorable running skirt. It looks a lot like the one I linked, but is a lighter shade of blue and has grey trim on the back. It's really cute and I've worn it comfortably on two long runs. I love it! I also picked up a purple headband. Happy Birthday to me!

My darling fiance got done with his work obligations and met me for lunch. We went to J's Oyster house and split a seafood plate (it had two raw oysters and two huge raw scallops, along with some crab meat, steamed shrimp, and steamed lobster claws) and a bucket of steamed clams. It was delicious.

Scallops are yummy!

Afterward, we walked around for a while and he bought me a birthday present- a Butter by Nadia dress. It's an infinity style dress which means that it has long bands on the top that can be wrapped a ton of different ways. Mine is dark purple, incredibly flattering, and wonderfully comfortable. I love it! After that, we walked back to the dorms so that I could take a nap. Once I was rested, we walked all the way to the other side of Portland to see the East End, Munjoy Hill, and the Portland Observatory.

Wearing my dress and enjoying the sunset at the East End

The View from East End
Portland Observatory

We ended our night with panini's and more french fries at Duckfat. I've eaten at Duckfat both times I've visted Portland and it is one of my favorite places. This time, I got the special panini with roast pork, sauerkraut, spicy mustard and cheese- along with duckfat fries with garlic aoli for dipping. So good!

A "Yaycation" indeed!

Finally, we walked back home and enjoyed some wine we'd picked up at the Cellardoor winery on Sunday. I also figured out that I'd walked a total of 9 miles that day!

I had an amazing birthday trip and I'm really glad I got a chance to visit Maine again. It's definitely one of my favorite places to vacation! Of course, I'd love to go back because there is still so much I haven't done!

What's your ideal birthday? Where do you like to spend your vacations?

Birthday Recap Part II: Camden

Sorry for the long delay! Work has been insane this week! I've basically been wrapped up in a 3 day meeting and I'm pretty wiped out.
However, I don't want to wait too long before writing about my birthday trip.
On Saturday (Aug. 14), I flew to Portland, Me to see my darling fiance (who has been doing an away rotation up there) and to celebrate my birthday by enjoying temperatures under 90 degrees! I got in at 10:30 pm, but wasn't too tired to stop by a really nice pub called Novare Res. The next morning, we had amazing toast for breakfast at a coffee house called Arabica, then picked up lobster rolls to go from the Portland Lobster Company.

This toast was amazing

We ate them on the way to Camden, where we stayed at the Hartstone Inn.

Our room at the Harstone

Prior to arriving at the Inn, we stopped at the Cellardoor Winery to enjoy a food and wine pairing. We really enjoyed the wine and were excited to try BBQ bear (!!) prepared by a local cookbook author (I feel bad but I can't remember her name). I was surprised to find that bear tasted like a cross between venison and lamb and was much lighter than I thought it would be.

Enjoying the view outside the winery

Of course, I saved room for dinner, and happily, we were able to eat at Hartsone after all! (We had been on the waiting list.) We had lobster tortellini, salad with peaches and a peach/orange dressing, blueberry sorbet, lamb medallions with asparagus and an artichoke, feta, and pine nut tart, and a mudslide souffle with Bailey's Irish Cream Sauce. YUM!!

29 never tasted so good!

The next day was rainy and a little chilly, so we couldn't go on a schooner tour like we'd planned. However, we had a really nice time walking around Camden, Rockport, and Rockland, just sightseeing and enjoying the ports.

Beautiful Camden Harbor

We saw the famous Galloway Cows in Camden and visited the Puffin Museum in Rockland.

Look! Cows!After that we drove back to Portland and went to Nosh for dinner, where we thoroughly enjoyed eating bacon crusted french fries dipped in chipotle mayonnaise.

Pretending that salads totally make up for bacon-fries

We ended the night with wine and chocolate cake with salted caramel icing at The Bar of Chocolate. It was wonderful!

So stay tuned for the exciting conclusion to my birthday recap, in which I spend the day shopping in Portland and eat lots and lots of food. :)

Birthday Recap Part I: Karaoke

This weekend has been very nice. I haven't really done much at all since I've been recuperating from a cold. I'm feeling 100% better, but I still don't have any energy in the evenings. Last night I went to dinner with my house guests, then went home and was in bed by 10, while they went out and painted the town.
I got up bright and early and met Grace for a run- which was a lot of fun. I don't normally have company on my long runs, but I found that the 8 miles really flew by this time. So thanks for the company, Grace! After that I went to the Farmer's Market, took a 2 hour nap (I'm such a granny), spent some time with my house guests on the levee, and got groceries. Now I'm just relaxing and looking forward to another quiet night in.
Tomorrow I'm going to Gulfport to visit my parents. I've requested BBQ chicken for lunch specifically so I will have an excuse to make another batch of cilantro lime slaw. I actually made some for dinner tonight as well and had it with sauteed shrimp, salsa, and corn tortillas. Drool.
I know I've promised y'all a post about my birthday trip, and I think the best thing to do is to split my post into a few parts. First, I have to blog about Karaoke.
Last Friday, 7 of my girlfriends met me at Little Tokyo Uptown, where I had reserved a small Karaoke room. My friend Steph had the genius idea to bring costumes, so we shut the door, closed all the blinds, and spent the next 3 hours making absolute fools of ourselves. It was wonderful. We sang at the top of our lungs, danced around, jumped on the couches, and totally let loose. It reminded me of nothing so much as going to slumber parties when I was 14. It was excellent girly fun and I totally want to do it again. My one caveat is this: no matter how tempted you are, it is inadvisable to head-bang during Bohemian Rhapsody. My neck hurt for the next two days!
Of course we took a lot of really funny pictures and I can't resist sharing a few!

Why yes, that is a chicken hat.

It's not a birthday party until at least one of your friends ends up looking like a Muppet.
Party on,Garth. Party on, Wayne.
Have you ever done Karaoke? If so, what's your favorite song? I like to sing Jose Cuervo by Shelly West. :)

And stay tuned for Part II of my birthday recap!

Foodie-ness

Just an quick update since I have reservations for my dinners on Sun. and Mon. night- Paolina's Way is an all organic pizza place with it's own farm (!!!) in Camden and Five Fifty-Five in Portland is supposed to be excellent. I'm also hoping to check out the Cellar Door Winery in Camden. Of course, researching all these places made me so hungry I had to eat lunch early! Drool!!

Birthday Week

This is my last week as a 28 year old woman. I'll miss 28 for a lot of reasons. 28 was a good age for me- I got engaged (which was definitely the highlight), I drove around in the first car I've ever purchased, I ran my first half marathon, I adopted a new cat, I kept the job I love, I traveled to new places, I maintained my healthy habits, and I spent lots of time with my wonderful family and friends.
Of course, I have a lot to look forward to! A coworker of mine who happens to share my birthday likes to celebrate her entire birthday week rather than just the day. In all honesty, thus far I've been celebrating my week by working on a giant spreadsheet at work and exercising after work, but there are good times coming soon! On Friday, I will be having an early birthday get together with all of my girlfriends and plan to celebrate with as much grace and dignity as one possibly can while singing Karaoke in a Japanese restaurant (i.e. not much). Then on Saturday I am flying to Maine!!!
I really really love Maine and am thrilled to spend some time in Portland and Camden. I'm really looking forward to a stay at the Hartstone Inn (which is supposed to be foodie paradise), to sailing on a schooner (weather permitting), and to just wandering around Camden and Portland. I can't wait to relax and get away from the hot weather down here for at least a little while.

The Big 3-0 (not for me, silly!)

So the exciting stuff coming up is that my darling fiance is turning 30 this coming weekend and since his med school kindly timed spring break to coincide with his birthday- we are going to take a trip! We'll be going to Estes Park, Co! While we are there, we plan to ride horses, ski at a nearby mountain, snowshoe, and (courtesy of his parents, who sent us a gift card) get massages! I am really looking forward to the trip!
Of course, prior to leaving for our trip, we plan to celebrate his birthday with our friends by getting BBQ at Squeal on Friday.

Wonderful Birthday

I have certainly been a negligent blogger this week- given that my birthday was Sat. and I haven't blogged in nearly a week. Oops!
I was planning to download some pictures of everything, but I keep putting it off- so I will go ahead and write the entry then hopefully put some pictures up soon. (Edited to add- here's a picture of my birthday breakfast! I'll spare you the ones of me with both presents and terrible bed hair!) I've just been lazy this week!
My birthday weekend was awesome.
Friday night, my dear boyfriend and I met our friends Jon and Sarah at Dos Jefes Cigar Bar. Besides having lots of cigars, Dos Jefes features tasty drinks, live music on the weekends, and a very nice patio. We sat outside and I drank Prosecco, which I love. At midnight, everyone sang "Happy Birthday" to me. :)
I woke up several times Saturday morning, starting at about 6:30 but kept making myself go back to sleep since I went to bed a 2 am. I finally got out of bed around 9:30. I'd noticed on Friday that there were two presents in the fridge, so I was eager to find out what they were. The first present was a bottle of Prosecco and 3 fresh white peaches. My dear boyfriend proceeded to puree a peach and make bellini's with it! The second present in the fridge was a delicious chocolate cake from Sucre. Best. Breakfast. Ever.
Of course, I had even more presents to open from my dear boyfriend and from his and my family members- because I am such a lucky girl!
My parents gave me lots of books and some beautiful navy blue woven placemats for my table.
My aunt sent me a really pretty copper wind chime that is shaped like a butterfly for my porch.
My dear boyfriend's brother (and his girlfriend) sent me a beautiful Le Creuset Petit Pear Casserole Dish.
My dear boyfriend's parents gave me a watermeter cover necklace (the watermeter cover is my favorite New Orleans symbol) and the Patagonia trench coat I blogged about last month!
My dear boyfriend also gave me two lovely bottles of Pinot Noir from Hopper's, my favorite Wine Shop (I'm currently enjoying the Frederic Magnien Pinot Noir- it's very tasty!), a pair of Lululemon yoga pants, and a Garmin Forerunner 305!
Like I said, I am a lucky, lucky girl. :)
After breakfast, I went to lunch at Little Tokyo with my girlfriends- Sarah, Steph, Ashley and Anne. We then went to the mall. I got some fairly mundane necessities- a bra, a polo shirt, and soap- but I also got a very cute top by Charlotte Ronson and a wide brown belt to wear over it at JC Penney's of all places. The I heart Ronson colaboration she's doing with Penney's is super cute and *very* affordable.
After shopping, I went home and got all dressed up to go out to dinner. My dear boyfriend and I went to Gautreau's and it was delicious! I had the gnocci with jumbo lump crab appetizer, the strawberry and spinach salad, the crisp duck breast, and the Creme Sophia. It was so good- especially the gnocci and the Creme Sophia.
After dinner we met up with Sarah, Jon, Steph, Ashley, and Anne at The Columns for drinks. Bedtime was again around 2am.
On Sunday, it was time to actually get organized. I tidied the house, bought groceries, and went to visit my friend Bonnie who is moving to California this week. She gave me lots of fresh rosemary, basil, eggplants, and jalapeno peppers from her garden. (Thus far this week I've made pesto, dried the rosemary, baked the eggplants, and used some of the jalapeno in cornbread.) It was nice to see Bonnie and her hubby Gabe before they move because I am really going to miss them!
All in all my birthday weekend was spent having fun with the people I care about and that made it really wonderful! It was a great way to start out my 28th year.

Best Thursday Ever

I just got a box of 12 gorgeous chocolate covered strawberries from my dear boyfriend's dear parents. It's a great early birthday present and a wonderful surprise at work! I ate two immediately. So good!!!

Cinco

When I had tamales and "taco salad" last night, the fact that today is Cinco de Mayo somehow totally escaped me. Two of my dear friends are celebrating birthdays today, so I'm actually going out for Mexican food today as well! And to top it off, I used the leftover salad toppings to make myself a big pot of brown rice and black beans to eat for lunch all week. I guess I'll be celebrating Cinco de Mayo all week!
My "taco salad," by the way, was excellent. I ended up just adding tomato, avocado, green onions, diced green chilies, and salsa to baby spinach. It had everything I like about taco salad, but was actually quite healthy.
Prior to dinner last night, I lifted weights for the first time in quite a while. I enjoyed the workout and it didn't feel that difficult at the time, but today I feel like I've been hit by a truck. I am also starving. (I've been sneaking bites of chocolate peanut butter to supplement my afternoon snack- a banana with more of the aforementioned peanut butter.) I guess that means it was an effective workout!
In other news, our neighborhood mamma cat (who I call Domino) has given birth to her third litter of kittens since we've moved into our apartment. We discussed the issue with our next door neighbors/feral cat co-feeders and they are going to see if they can get the humane society to come spay Domino and have her kittens adopted. I hope that good homes will be found for the baby kitties because they are tiny and adorable.

The Great Cake Debacle

I ordered a birthday cake for my dear boyfriend (who's birthday was yesterday), from Sucre, which is a lovely shop on Magazine that has gelato, chocolates, pastries, coffee, and wine. They also do specialty cakes. The cake I ordered was a hazelnut cake with salted caramel filling and shiny chocolate icing, decorated with chocolate shavings. I wanted it to look like a particular cake that they regularly carry (that has a different filling inside). However, when I picked the cake up, it was iced with a salted caramel butter cream, then decorated with a few sparse chocolate shavings. It wasn't pretty. In fact it looked uncannily like the cake had a full head of hair.

When I opened the box to look at the cake, the clerk who was helping me immediately realized that this was not the cake I'd ordered and went to get the lady in charge of the cakes. She was really nice, took pictures of the ugly cake so that she could chew out the people who made it, added a lot more chocolate shavings to my cake so that from the outside is looked like a chocolate cake and actually gave me an additional cake that was really pretty.

I am going to a garden party tonight, and so I figured that the new cake would be a perfect hostess gift. It is a chocolate cake with almonds on the sides and chocolate truffles on top. The icing is beautiful, shiny dark chocolate.

I drove home very carefully, but when I checked on the cakes, two of the truffles (which must have been top heavy) had fallen over and messed up the chocolate icing. I was convinced that the cake's beauty was ruined and that my dear boyfriend and I were stuck with two ugly cakes!

When he got home, I told him the whole story and he was appreciative but baffled. He wouldn't have known that the original cake was wrong in the first place. I pointed out to him that the point of getting a fancy cake is not just having it taste great- it also should look professionally made. He did convince me that the pretty cake is still pretty and a good hostess present despite the marred icing- it is a very small area. We then had some of the hazelnut cake and it was delicious!

The rest of his birthday was really fun. We went for a light dinner at Cochon's sWine bar which was really good (highlights were pimento cheese sliders, a duck pastrami sandwich with bechamel sauce, and a good selection of tasty meats, cheeses and rillettes) , then went to see the Marie Antoinette ballet. Afterwards we had a night cap at another wine bar and our friends got the piano player to play happy birthday.