Chef Pan

My new favorite food recipe website after we had to cook again for our House Church group last Friday is Recipezaar, mostly because the printouts are so snazzy looking. We used it last week for our "breakfast for dinner" to make a chorizo scramble and some cinnamon french toast.

For tonight, I decided to go all out with the shrimp that we bought for the first time to make some honey-walnut prawns. I figured it was a decent recipe since it had 16 reviews and was rated 5 stars and it came out great:

While the dish was tasty, it took me freaking two hours to make, most of it spent prepping/cleaning the shrimp and preparing the walnuts. I really should have actually read the reviews, many of which suggested alternatives to spending an hour on the nuts. With candied walnuts and pre-peeled shrimp, I might be able to churn it out in 10 minutes like the restaurants!

Whee, one year!

Wow, the first year of marriage flew by rather quickly. Having our anniversary be the last day in June is great since it gives me the entire month to remember not to forget about it! It's been a blast getting our own place in downtown Dallas, setting it up with a bunch of furniture, and living together after doing the long distance thing for two years. I think I've managed to mostly keep in Ruth's good graces and made some progress in developing my latent culinary talents. We even took the plunge and added some parental responsibility to the mix by adding a dog to the household :)

After spending our one year dating anniversary at Gary Danko (which may not have been the best move to set low standards from which to build up), we visited one of the acclaimed restaurants of the DFW area, Abacus. We stuffed ourselves silly, particularly enjoying the lobster shooters and sushi roll appetizers so we could hardly finish the main course. We'll definitely have to come back during Restaurant Week in August. Good thing they just posted the restaurant list today so I had something to link to :)

Happy anniversary, silly wifey!

Vegas!!

We headed to Sin City at the end of June to join other folks from my high school for a 10 year reunion, along with celebrating the end of Ruth's 3rd year of med school and a quick getaway before our one year wedding anniversary. Tickets to Vegas are ridiculously expensive on the weekends, but we were fortunate that Ruth's dad had some extra Southwest vouchers that we used. It was the first time I had ever flown the airline and I was somewhat dreading it since we had to make a quick stop each way, but I was pleasantly surprised and impressed with their efficient turnaround, although it did mean we had to fly the wrong way for about an hour towards San Antonio first. It's no wonder that Southwest is doing fairly well in an industry that has fallen on hard times.

We decided to rent a car for some added flexibility and given the high price of gas, we of course opted for... a white Prius! It was nice to cruise around in a familiar vehicle and we spent the initial night watching our first Cirque du Soleil show, <<O>>. It was pretty spectacular as a bunch of different acts performed over a water-filled stage. At first I thought there was some cryptic storyline that I wasn't artistically knowledgeable enough to follow, but now I'm pretty sure it was just a bunch of different acts strewn together. In any event, it was pretty cool.

It was Ruth's first time in Vegas, so we drove down the Strip for her to check out the various resorts and casinos. It was oppressively hot, so we pretty much actually only ventured into the nearby Bellagio and Caesars. We couldn't pass up the photo op at Caesar's, but it looks pretty ridiculous.

Saturday evening was the main organized event, but we met up with some friends earlier in the day for the Bellagio brunch. It was decent, but I must have had unrealistic expectations because I left unsatisfied. We even stopped by the Wynn's brunch buffet on Sunday before we left for the airport and it was about the same.

Finally at the main event, we had a little over 50 attendees, which wasn't too bad for a class of 180 that graduated in Singapore. It was a little embarrassing that there was at least one time I introduced myself to someone thinking they were a guest, but had in fact been in our graduating class. Then again, I was slightly consoled that Jordan made the same mistake :) Although I had seen a lot of folks at our wedding last year, it was nice to catch up with some that I hadn't seen for a couple years and others since high school. I guess everyone is still pretty much the same at a 10 yr reunion (like I'm still taking undergrad classes), but I'm sure another 10 years will do the trick.

I managed to chow down on a few double doubles for an In N Out fix, but unfortunately didn't have any extra time to find a card room to play some poker. Ruth was also sad that she missed out some of the other opportunities in Vegas so perhaps we'll have to make a return trip...

I'm getting behind on the blogging so will have to post about anniversary in a few days...

Hawaii

I'm getting bored of watching the Lakers get killed so I figured I should catch up on posting since returning from my trip to Hawaii last week. The first part of the trip was spent in Oahu where the main event was the Changina wedding. The flowers courtesy of Fujikami Florist were amazing, of course, and covered the hotel ballroom in an endless array of purple and pink. I think I spent most of the first few days continuously being fed by wedding-related events, which was sweet. Congrats to the newlyweds!

In between partaking in wedding-related activities, we found time to laze around at the beach, which was one of the main goals for our time in Oahu.

The other goal in Oahu was to eat Japanese curry multiple times at Curry House. I managed to have two normal, delicious meals there before Jeremy, Rob, and I agreed to partake in a simulated curry challenge to mostly Chang's pleasure. Since it was no longer officially available, we ordered three curry dishes each which included 400g of rice (the regular portion is 300g). After starting out a couple bites behind on the first plate, I managed to pull even with Jer by the end of the second plate as Rob faded. It was a close finish, but I managed to eek out a victory by the narrowest of margins by the time the third plate was done. I felt ridiculously gross afterwards and Chang recorded the whole thing, so I'm sure it will be on YouTube soon.

We spent the last couple of days in Kauai, which had beautiful areas that were nice and secluded, perfect for honeymooners or, in our case, four dudes. We spent more time lazing around the beach the first day before Ravi convinced us to go on a ridiculously unsatisfying hike highlighted by a freaking dry waterfall for our 13 mile efforts. I didn't pack any athletic shoes, but was pretty impressed with how well my $15 Court Classic tennis shoes from Costco in Kauai held up through the hike. We spent our last day there relaxing on a golf course. It's quite sad how messed up my golf game is, but it was fun enough that I might try dig up my clubs and hit the range a few times in an attempt to salvage my game.

Unfortunately, Ruth was stuck in Dallas on her surgery rotation and wasn't able to make the trip, but I did my best to honor her request to gain weight during the trip by eating everything in sight. The curry binge didn't hurt either. :)

Happy Birthday, Wifey

Ruth's been on her surgery rotation for the past two weeks, which entails being on call every 3rd night at UTSW. Amidst the tiresome routine, we've been celebrating her birthday in bits and pieces over the last few days. Her real birthday was on Friday, but she was on call Thursday night, so I gave her a gift on Thursday morning. On her post-call birthday, it was our turn to host and provide dinner for our church small group. It was the first time that I've had to cook for a dozen people and it thankfully went off alright, although I accidentally burned a pot that still requires scrubbing. One of our guests brought a birthday cake, so we sang and devoured it, unfortunately before we took a picture. We were going to go out to celebrate over dinner last night (Saturday), but Ruth was too tired after a day of shopping, studying, and playing mario kart, so we ended up staying in. Dinner out has been postponed to tomorrow (Monday) since she's on call again tonight :( But at least it will have taken 5 days to get through an entire birthday celebration :)