/ WHAT JEN DOES

We made it to Bryce // Day 2

3.11.2018

Today was a true combo of driving and hiking. The hike we did reminded me that yoga is not necessarily cardio. I obviously made it through and we were always going to be fine, but man I was winded for the first twenty minutes.

Despite waking up to some consistent rain, the day turned out to be really gorgeous. The moisture brightened up the red cliffs and made everything seem different from the day before. While you never wish for rain on a trip, it's cool to see how it changes things. All in, we crushed the day pretty good. Lots of driving. Some hiking. Decent eating - but breakfast was incredible.

Favorite moments? Talking about our favorite "Office" episodes on the drive. Trying "dill" potato chips for the first time. Playing with this random cat that came up to our cabin after dinner.

Farewell to Springdale
We let Jake be in charge of picking breakfast this morning. Since his sisters are really picking the rest of the itinerary, he needed to be in charge of something. Plus, he really loves breakfast. After a leisurely morning in the hotel room since it was pouring rain, we pulled ourselves together and headed to Deep Creek Coffee. It looked so cute - but the line was out the door and it wasn't a "fast coffee" place. So Jake pulled the trigger and we went across the street to Oscar's.

Oscar's = life. We sat on the patio outside under wonderful heaters. Kerrianne's coffee mug had a spot just for the thumb. The granola breakfast was incredible. Jake liked his french toast. Bacon was amazing. Plus, we played a quick game of corn hole before hoping back in the car for the day.

Zion
Before we left on the trip, I bought a super cheap, foldable lightweight backpack from Amazon. The one that I used in Peru was still in storage and we really needed something. As soon as we were about 5 minutes into the hike, all the layers started to come off and into the backpack. Backpack = win.

Kerrianne had found the "hidden canyon trail" as an alternative to the "angel's landing" hike that is so incredibly popular. Apparently hidden canyon is like the shorter, less crowded version. The hike really had three distinct portions:

(1) The first 25 minutes of the hike are constant steep switchbacks. During one of my breaks, I proclaimed that the stair master at the gym clearing does not equal cardio.
(2) Edge of the canyon walking // I don't know how else to describe this but essentially you are walking on the edge of the canyon and holding onto chains. Very narrow pathways.
(3) Canyon exploring // It wasn't super obvious that the trail had ended. Yes, there was a sign that said the trail had ended but it also said, if you keep going you need to do some "scrambling" so it felt like there was still more trail to do. End result? The trail never ends you could go on for forever. We only did about 15 minutes of this.

On our way out of the park, we made a quick stop at the "Court of the Patriarchs" since it would be so quick and was supposed to be a good vista. It was absolutely worth the 10 minutes pit stop.

Drove to Bryce
Accidentally, we kind of missed lunch today. After we finished the hike and started to drive to Bryce, we just never really saw anything that would be lunch. So we had some of our pre-packed snacks. We did make two pit stops on the 2+ hour drive:

(1) stopped in a random town that happened to have 4 rock stores next to each other. Jake discovered "dill" potato chips and we all loved them
(2) gas station for gas. Kerrianne also got coffee that I can only describe as "smells like you got it from a gas station"

We caught the first glimpses of the hoodoos when we entered Dixie National Forest. The landscape changed to dramatically the minute you officially left Zion. It was amazing to look off into the horizon and see these massive land formations that you just do not see anywhere else, never mind Boston. But the hoodoos, catch your eye immediately. So amazing.

Since we had skipped lunch and wanted an early dinner, we made a quick stop at Sunrise Point in the park for an initial view. Absolutely breathtaking. Plan is to come back tomorrow for a shorter hike that goes down into the park a bit more.

"Hotel" & Dinner
Fun fact about March in Bryce? Nothing is actually open. Even if it says it is open on Google, that's a lie. We booked our room for that night in the morning and decided to stay at "Bryce Canyon Log Cabins". The price couldn't be beat.

I'll admit when we pulled up I was like "where the F are we". It is literally just a bunch of cabins in the middle of a valley - but it grew on me. However everything is closed for winter, so we ended up driving 7 miles back to the Park for dinner at the Ruby's. Ruby's is connected to the Best Western Plus. Don't forget the plus. The meal was not amazing, but we all lived and had slightly fuller stomachs after. Plus, they let Jake and I order off the kids menu and gave Kerrianne and illegal salad.

Tomorrow? More Bryce and then driving to Capitol Reef!

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We made it to Zion // Day 1

3.10.2018

Yikes this was a long day. It started in Boston and ended in Utah. There is something so incredibly punishing and rewarding about a 6 AM flight - especially when you live in the burbs. Everyone was a trooper from start to finish. Our goal for the day was essentially to get to Zion and maybe do a hike.

A lot of the hotels that we had been looking at led us to believe that we were traveling during an off-peak season, but the park was still incredibly busy. So far we are in love with the natural beauty of this whole place.

Funniest parts of the day? (1) When Jake got caught at the Vegas airport playing slots underage. (2) Looking at pictures last night and realizing I made a super weird face because I had seen a chipmunk. Kerrianne laughed so hard she cried. (3) Kerrianne constantly on the hunt for "scat" and identifying where it came from.

Flight & Car
The flight was really as expected - except it smelled like farts nearly the entire time. Jake slept pretty much the entire time and I hammered away on the internet thanks to the free wifi. Wrote a few blog posts and looked at 5-panel interior doors.

The real win was our rental car. Hertz gave us a BRAND new Jeep Grand Cherokee with all the bells and whistles. The steering wheel is heated. Giant sun roof. Satellite radio... and it had 3 miles on it. So we named it Ruth - and everything we do with her is the first time. Like, I was the first one to ever eat Arby's chicken tenders in her. But seriously, she has a lot of buttons that I don't know what they do.

Zion
The park was just under 3 hours from Las Vegas. When we left Vegas, it was like "cool this seems like the desert".... and then the landscape changed. There is no way to take pictures of it. Our goal was really to just get a lay of the land and maybe do a hike - but save any "big hike" for the next day. So we pretty much did everything that you could do in a car - the rest you have to do by the park shuttle. On our way out of the park, we did see a group of mule deer in the valley. Kerrianne nearly leapt out of the sunroof gazing at them.

Checkerboard Mesa // furthest point we drove into the park. initially not super impressive, but when you actually read the sign about the history it's pretty neat. The name was given to it by one of the early park rangers.

The Tunnel // apparently this was dug in the 1920s - and is beyond impressive, but also very narrow. I also didn't know where the headlights were on the car so that was a fun, scary moment.

Canyon Overlook Trail // we absolutely lucked out and got a parking spot here. It was only about a mile long trail, but with lots of ups and downs, and narrow edges really took longer than expected. Would absolutely recommend this to other people.

Hotel & Dinner & Dessert
We are staying at the Majestic View Lodge in Springdale. Although Kerrianne had done a lot of the research for the trip, this was my pick. It was super affordable. The rooms are totally fine. But - it is pretty close to the main road. I'm not sure that I would recommend it during peak season.

The hotel did not get great reviews for food. I believe one TripAdvisor review specifically said to stay away. We ended up at "Bit & Spur" for Mexican. The chips and salsa absolutely hit the spot while leaving room for ice cream. One of the most entertaining parts of these trips is watching what Jake wants to do and finds fun - and turns out he's really into ice cream. We ended up grabbing some local flavors at Bumbleberry. I had Couger Tracks, Kerrianne had Emerald Pools, and Jake had Coyote Moon. And, they had us put a pin on their visitor map when they heard we were from Boston.

Tomorrow? Packing up and heading to Bryce!

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Utah Siblings Trip // Day 0

After the success of our Seattle Siblings Trip last year, we have elected to try the whole thing again - except in Utah.

There is something a bit wholesome about taking a family vacation to national parks. It’s just fun to explore the great outdoors and drive around for 5 days. And just like last time, we’ve filled our bags with preventative snacks. Nobody wants to get a case of the hangries.

We do have a rough plan for the trip. We’ll be flying into Vegas and out of Salt Lake City. In between those two destinations we are going to hit up enough national parks that it makes sense to buy a yearly pass. In hindsight, we should have actually done this last year.

Some rough expectations for the trip? Lots of natural beauty. Lots of leggings. Lots of driving. Outside of that, we’ll see how it goes.

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Eleanor: Year 5

3.05.2018

It is sometimes hard to believe that Eleanor and I have been roommates for so long.

I wrote a blog post about her after her first year and when she first showed up - and this feels long over due. As I write this, she’s sleeping on the pillow next to me. Not next to it, but on it. She likes it that way. Things Eleanor does not like?

cat trees // I’ve bought her two varieties but she will not go past the first level. She doesn’t like to be unsteady… so they are just too wobbly for her.
wind // Right now, we are living by the beach so it’s very windy at times. She hates the wind. When it’s too windy, she stays under the covers.
the roomba // I honestly would have thought this would have gotten better, but Eleanor also hates the roomba

So what does she love?

me // she follows me around the house and comes when I tell her we are going to bed.
men // specifically men who sit down so she can paw at them and try and sit in their lap
screened porches // the closest she’ll get to being outside. She’s a people/bird watcher. When we lived in the North End, she used to love to sit in the windows and look at the street.
laying in the sun // Her favorite place to nap is at the foot of my bed or on the sheep rug
my electric blanket // so this is seasonal of course, but Eleanor is immediately drawn to this. She normally sits next to me on the couch during tv time but if the blanket is out, she’ll make exceptions.
Ruby // Whenever my parents dog is over, she runs to see her and follows her around the house
select toys // for some reason she’s always loved these dumb cheap catnip carrots from Amazon. She also started to love these catnip sticks that I saw over Christmas.

But - the best part about Eleanor is that she tries to take care of me. Two years ago when I was really sick with a fever, she stayed close to me all night and left her paw on my arm. I know this sounds crazy but she only does that when she knows I’m not feeling well. She doesn’t speak English (yet) but she does her best.

Also, she didn’t murder me when I dressed her up for a “seasonal calendar” as a Christmas present to my mom.

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homemade veggie ramen

2.25.2018

The weather today screamed for soup - and so I made ramen. Saturday was a completely gorgeous day. I checked out two trails, had a turkey sandwich picnic, and cleaned out the garden. Home run of a day. But today I woke up to gross sleet hitting the windows followed by copious amounts of rain.

So a nice hot meal was just what the weather ordered. I ended up making ramen for a few reasons. One of which was it seemed like a good use for my leftover mushrooms, spinach and carrots. The second was my friend Meghan had made ramen recently and I could not get it out of my head. She totally knocked it out of the park.

A few takeaways on this recipe:

It is a phenomenal dumping ground for all the vegetables in your fridge or freezer. I could have made nearly this entire meal from my cabinets. All I needed was the actual ramen noodles.
There is a difference between "easy ramen" and "ramen". I went with easy and while it was delicious it was just not as salty as ramen normally is. You need miso.
I'm curious how this will be for leftovers. See this meal was for 2 people, but I am just 1. Let's see how that goes tomorrow night.
Super fast! I think I had this pulled together in less than 20 minutes.

Here's how it goes.

Heat the sesame oil in a large skillet over medium low heat. Add the garlic and ginger; stir fry for 2 minutes or until soft and fragrant. Add the broth and the water. Bring to a simmer; add the mushrooms and simmer for 5 minutes or until the mushrooms have softened and the broth is flavorful.
Add the instant noodles to the hot liquid and simmer for an additional 5 minutes or until the noodles have softened. Add the scallions and stir to combine.
Remove from heat, stir in the spinach and carrots
In a skillet, drizzle sesame oil and toss in some panko flakes. Saute until the panko flakes toast to a light brown.
Portion the ramen into bowls and top with crunchy panko crumbs and pea shoots.

Shopping List

sesame oil
3 teaspoons grated ginger
4 teaspoons grated garlic
2 cups chicken broth
2 cups water
handful of mushrooms

1 package instant ramen noodles only
1/2 cup chopped scallions or chives
2 cup chopped spinach
1 cup grated carrots

handful of pea shoots
crunchy golden panko flakes

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seared tilapia with parmesan prosciutto crumble

2.18.2018

I was headed to the grocery store this weekend rather casually and figured I should grab something for dinner. In an effort to prevent a lot of aisle wandering and salty snack purchases, I grabbed a sticky note to make a list. And in that minute I dreamed up this recipe for a seared fish with crumbled prosciutto. In that dream, I also added balsamic glaze but I held back in real life.

I'll admit that the fish was not the best that I've cooked. The Trader Joe's frozen fish filets are not super evenly cut so they didn't cook that well in the pan. Hindsight? I should have baked them.

But... the killer part? The prosciutto crumble. I will absolutely be using this again in the near future. It is so versatile and could be part of many recipes. Or maybe I'm just thinking of my mom's parmesan chicken. I could also see it as part of some tasty garlic toast.

Here's how it goes.

Set 3 pieces of prosciutto in a medium skillet. Remove from the heat when the prosciutto begins to crisp up. Add prosciutto to a food processor with mixture of parmesan and panko flakes. Probably like 1/3 cup each. Pulse to combine.
Set your skillet to a high heat with a bit of butter. Pat dry your fish with a paper towel and then press into a dish of flour and breadcrumbs (About a 50/50 ratio). Flip and press in both sides of the filet one or two more times.
Add the fish to the skillet and let cook for about 3-4 minutes on either side depending on thickness. This fillet was pretty varied in thickness so that was challenging. Remove when the fish flakes as you fork it. Need more information? Google how to cook white fish.
Put your parmesan prosciutto mixture in a skillet over medium heat. Drizzle with olive oil and let cook until it begins to toast. As it cooks, use a spatula to break up the pieces to help it cook evenly. Remove from the heat.
Plate your fish over the fava beans. Sprinkle heavily with the prosciutto crumble. Drizzle with olive oil and toss a few capers on the plate too. Enjoy!

Shopping List
white fish fillet
flour
panko flakes

prosciutto

bread crumbs

fava beans

capers

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lentil meatballs

2.12.2018

I will always be a meat lover - but I do enjoy the challenge of crafting good meals without any meat. And meatballs have always been one of my favorite meals. There is something so incredibly comforting about meatballs for dinner. They used to be one of my favorite "after work, when I lived in the city" dinners. I only add those caveats because for some reason I haven't made a big ole batch of meaty, salty meatballs since I moved to the burbs.

Last week I saw this recipe for lentil meatballs on Instagram. Jillian Harris was raving about how amazing they were and perhaps how you wouldn't even miss the meat. While I'm not sure that is totally true, if I was a vegetarian this would be a good substitute and a fresh take on leftover lentils. Also - lentils are crazy affordable so let's start using them in lots of places.

The meal comes together very quickly provided you already have the lentils made. I've never been great at cooking grains so just before I mentally prepared myself for cooking lentils, I googled whether I could make them in a rice cooker. Turns out you can - mostly. They weren't the best lentils of my life but for those of us that are especially challenged at grains.... it works just fine. Also, I'll absolutely be rolling all future meatballs in parmesan. It was super easy and cut back on the amount of cheese that I would actually put in a normal recipe.

Also here are some previous meatball recipes: escarole and meatball soup, sage and parmesan meatballs, scallion and ginger meatballs, tender ricotta meatballs, and the ole traditional meatballs.

Here's how it goes.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Heat a small skillet over medium heat. Once skillet is hot, add olive oil, shallot and garlic. Sauté for 2-3 minutes until slightly golden then remove from heat.
In a food processor, combine the egg, Italian seasonings, parsley, tomato paste, salt and pepper. Then add in the sauteed garlic and shallot as well as the parmesan cheese. You don't need to pulse until it's pureed just get these things combined.
Add your cooked lentils to the food processor and mix until combined. Again, not pureed but just combined. But honestly don't stress about it.
Remove the mixture to a bowl and then add in bread crumbs to get the mixture to the texture you need for rolling the balls. The mixture will be loose and very light but you should be able to get balls formed. I added about 2 tbsps of breadcrumbs but this will vary based on the moisture in your lentils, eggs, etc.
Roll tablespoon sized balls into shape and then coat in parmesan cheese. Arrange on a baking sheet.
Bake for 15-20 minutes until the balls have a gentle brown exterior. Remove meatballs from oven and let cool slightly - they will firm up the longer they are cooled.
Serve over some form of pasta with a marinara sauce.

Shopping List

olive oil

1 shallot, minced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 egg
1 1/2 cups cooked + cooled green lentils
1 1/2 Tbsp dried Italian seasonings (dried basil + oregano)
1/4 cup fresh Italian parsley
2 Tbsp tomato paste
6 Tbsp parmesan cheese (+ more)
salt & pepper

2 Tbsp bread crumbs

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moroccan turkey stew

2.01.2018

It feels like everything I've been making recently has chick peas. When I went to the grocery store this weekend, I bought four cans of chick peas. So I need to find a way to pull back on this and add in some other substitutes. But in the meantime, this moroccan turkey stew is delicious.

I found the recipe on the same website that I discovered the spaghetti squash primavera and tomato chick pea soup. While it isn't exactly low in sodium, it is delicious. I pulled it together in very short order after a pretty busy Sunday. The original recipe called for using a slow cooker which I wasn't interested in doing. If I was already going to brown the meat in skillet, I might as well just cook the whole thing in one pot and call it a day.

I'll admit I was a little apprehensive about the spices as I was adding them to the pot. I don't think I've ever used more than a pinch of paprika... never mind 2 teaspoons. But it is so tasty - so just toss caution to the wind and make this soup. Here's how it goes.

Heat olive oil in a large soup pot to medium-high heat. Add in the diced onion and garlic. Saute until onions melt down become more translucent. Then add in the carrots, celery, and pepper.
Cook for about 5 minutes or so.
Add in the ground turkey and break up the meat. Cook until you no longer see pink meat.
Add in diced tomatoes, chick peas, spices, broth and gently mix well.
Cover and simmer for about 30 minutes or so. The longer you let it simmer the more the flavors will develop.

Shopping List

olive oil

1 yellow onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
3 tbsp poblano pepper, minced
1 cup diced carrots
1 cup diced celery
1 lb package 93% lean ground turkey
28 oz can petite diced tomatoes
1 (15 oz) cans chick peas, drained
2 cups chicken broth
2 tsp turmeric
2 tsp paprika
1 tsp coriander
2 bay leaves
2 tsp coarse salt

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