Homemade Ramen Soup Recipe and Christmas Cheer

Hello Everyone!

How was everyone's Holiday?  We still have Christmas celebrations going on in our household and this morning we had another Christmas celebration with Meridyth's Mom, Sister, and Sister's husband and of course the new baby Caleb!  We had a wonderful morning and had a lot of fun drinking coffee, eating breakfast and opening presents.

We still have one more Christmas celebration to do with Mer's Father and his girlfriend Vicki.  Christmas this year is definitely being made to last at least another week but honestly I don't mind a bit!

Besides Christmas and getting in the holiday cheer I have had a horrible cold which has not only had me banished to the spare bedroom to sleep and cough/sneeze by myself but I have also been craving warm and salty soups.

I decided since I have some free time before school starts I would cook a little and maybe even be a little adventurous!

I have to say making a homemade Ramen soup especially when you are not feeling good is a perfect way to put you in a better mood and help that sore throat.  It is also so much healthier and less fattening than the packaged ramen.  I picked this recipe specifically because it called for angel hair pasta which I already had in my kitchen!

Here are my ingredients gathered on the counter ready to be transformed:

I found the recipe on Epicurious but changed it a bit to fit my ingredients.
Ingredients:
3 eggs hardboiled
1/2 box of angel hair pasta
3 large handfuls of kale
1 portobello mushroom (chopped) (I used a package and chopped them up finer)
1 clove garlic (chopped finely)
1 inch long piece of fresh ginger (peeled and chopped finely)
1/4 cup vegetable broth
2 splashes soy sauce (to taste)
chicken bouillon (not cubes, use either granules or paste)
salt and pepper to taste
sesame seeds

Instead of using fresh ginger I used ginger paste and I think it worked great.  I also didn't use sesame seeds but it probably would have added a little bit more flavor to the final soup.

I boiled my eggs while I was chopping the mushroom, garlic, and kale.

Directions:
In large pot, boil water for pasta. Break pasta in half and add to water. Cook according to box.
Pour out enough water to leave about 2 cups in pot with pasta. Do not drain. Return to medium heat.
(Note:  I dumped out too much water and then didn't have enough for soupy goodness, so I would keep more in that you think you need!)
Add chopped garlic and ginger. Add enough bouillon to season two cups of water and stir thoroughly. Add vegetable broth and soy sauce, continue stirring. (At this point I tasted the broth and almost died!  It tasted JUST LIKE RAMEN!)
Add chopped mushroom and kale. Allow to cook until both are tender.
Slice egg and add to ramen.
Season with salt and pepper, add sesame seeds and serve. ENJOY!

 

So the ramen was delicious but when I make it next time I will definitely leave more broth because my leftovers didn't have enough of the its goodness!

It was easy to make and I was extremely excited about the way it tasted.

Lots of Love,

Jess

Office Pot Luck, A horrible cold, and Blog Reassessing

Hello All!

These past few weeks I have been doing some major thinking about this blog, my Etsy shop LoveUPaperly and so many other things!  I am hoping that all of these things I have been thinking about will start showing up as changes in the New Year!

I think that is one of the reasons that I love the Holidays, Christmas, and New Years so much.  I always feel like it is a time to reassess and figure out if I think I am going in the right direction.

Besides that, I finally finished school this semester and I have a break until the end of January which is badly needed.

As for this weekend, I have had a horrible cold all week and it has only been getting worse so I am going to bunker down the next two days and try to get rid of these germs.  Last year I had just had surgery so Christmas was rather miserable for both Meridyth and myself so this year, cold or no cold, I am determined to try and feel well!

Friday we had an office potluck which was full of all different types of food.  I decided to go for a rustic Italian dish and made roasted cauliflower and broccoli with garlic and olive oil with tomatoes and of course pasta.  I topped the whole thing off with some mozzarella cheese!

I think it tasted pretty good!

Second, I took some pictures of the final product for my Parent's Chanukah present.  They were absolutely thrilled!  My Mom keeps calling to say that she keeps trying the pictures in different places all over her house.

I'm off to take some Theraflu.

Lots of Love,

Jess

Holiday cheer and a little crying

Happy Friday!!!! So, tomorrow officially kicks off the holiday and though my family is in Florida and Seattle we have tons of Mer's family here in Maryland and we have get togethers all weekend! I am super excited to see people and eat good food! Today was not a great day though. I am six weeks post surgery and for the past two days the pain has been pretty bad. There are also other stressful situations that I feel unable to handle. I usually deal with stress by going to the gym and pushing my body to it's limit, but since I can't do that...I cry. I cried at physical therapy today. I cried from pain, from feeling a lack of control, and for situations out of my control. However, as I am lying in bed surrounded by Mer and my kitties I pray that 2012 is a better year and I give thanks for the many, many, many learning experiences that happened in 2011. Though I am hoping for less learning experiences in 2012! I have photos to share with you but the will be coming soon. Maybe even tomorrow! Until then Merry Christmas Eve Eve and happy holidays! Love Jess

Macaroons (Macarons) and other Things

It's Wednesday!  It's Wednesday!

Happy second night of Chanukah to those of you who celebrate, Merry almost Christmas, and Happy Holiday's to everyone else!

I have been busy making presents today and will have pictures soon!  We are poor but it doesn't mean I can't make some heart felt things for the people I love!

I have also been rethinking me etsy shop.  Some questions I have been asking myself is:  What do I really like making?  What kind of images do I want to put out there in the world?  What can I see myself doing and making in a year, in five years, in ten?  What do I want to share with people and what do I want them to buy that they will want more of?

I like the name of my shop, love it actually, but I just feel like I need to figure out some core things about what kind of artist I want to be and what I enjoy making (when you enjoy it I feel like it shows through in the work, when it is painful to make or difficult I think you can feel that too).

Onto, the last part of the post.  As those of you who have been reading the blog know, I love images.  I like eye candy and pretty things, and beautiful images make me happy.

One of the images I love on all of the wedding blogs is this:

Image by Simply Photo

Macaroons!  They are so pretty and I love the colors and the shapes, and lately I have been seeing this eye candy all over the web.

La Mie Bakery, Des Moines, Iowa

Now, I have pinned some of these beauties on pinterest and can I admit a secret?  I have never eaten one before!  I don't even know what they are made of!

So if anyone else has this dirty little secret, this is what I found out in my searches on the web today.

First, I have been calling it a macaroon, most people seem too, but if you look on Wikipedia it is actually spelled Macaron.  What I found out is this treasure is a meringue based sweet made with egg white and almond flour.  The base of the word is from the Italian word maccherone meaning to crush or beat which is referring to the almond powder.

This sweet is considered primarily a french confection, but the Italians would beg to differ saying the french started making it when Catherine de Medici who married Henry II of France brought over her Italian cooks with her.

Traditional macarons were raspberry and chocolate, but now they come in a variety of flavors and combinations and the fillings can be jam, buttercream, or ganache.

The possibilities of flavors are endless!

I hope if you were uneducated like me about Macarons which Wikepedia said most North Americans consider it synonymous with Macaroons, but most Europeans differentiate, that you learned a little something!

Until tomorrow...I'm off to dream of beautiful pastries,

love,

Jess

Found on the blog Mumu, source unknown (if you took it, e-mail me!)

Blogs I love, Gift for Christmas, Wednesday Musings...

Hello Everyone!

Happy Wednesday!  I actually really love Wednesday's and I know not a lot of people do.  I feel like Wednesday is a day full of possibilities.  You can start to think about the weekend because you only have two days left of the work week!  You can congratulate yourself for working hard for three days and only having two days left to go, and I like to think on Wednesday that the week is still full of possibilities!  Not always easy, but since my neck surgery I have been trying to think of the glass as half full.

So that my lovelies is my Wednesday musing.  On to a christmas gift I bought Meridyth!  Meridyth and I are both artists.  I majored in black and white photography and fine art in college, and Meridyth minored in art and majored in Computer Science.  So, she needed/wanted a new pencil case because she loves to draw with graphite pencils.  I have been looking everywhere for a pencil tin with no luck.  I tried all the major chains and ebay and art stores.  Then I realized I didn't look at etsy!  So silly.  So I looked last night and found a man who sells handmade wooden pencil cases.  His name is Dallen Wright and his shop is Rexburbia.  Here is what I bought for Mer last night.  She was really excited!

Now onto some blogs that I follow pretty religiously.  One photographer whose blog I love reading is Katie Jane Photography.  I found her a few months ago because I love looking at elopement photography online.  Something about two people running away together and tying the knot just makes me swoon!  Well, she is a great photographer out of New York, and does a lot of elopements.  If you want some eye candy and people in love, I would definitely check her out. 

Another site that had me actually laughing out loud last night was The Knotty Bride.  I had never known this blog exsisted until last night and now that I do this is going to be a regular read!  She is sassy, and witty, and also talks about weddings!  Not for the meek of heart but I am a little bit in love.

Hope you enjoyed my musings for a Wednesday!  Until tomorrow...

love,

Jess