[Super Duper Fantastic] ISFP/INFP. 4w5. World Explorer. Super Hero. Rose-colored Glasses.

I am currently participating in a 60-day hydration challenge. The idea is to drink 60 ounces of water every day for 60 days, starting September 1st. I have never been very good at remembering to keep hydrated. In fact, it’s one of my 101 in 1001: 019 – Stay hydrated.

By participating in the challenge, I am hoping to make drinking enough water a habit. I drink a lot of tea at work, but I don’t think it was even close to the 60 ounces.

So far so good. I’ve been drinking enough water. Rather than absorbing it, however, the water passes right through me, and I am making way more trips to the restroom. Ugh.

When your friend’s mom asks us to help her with the consumption of the delicious fruits from the trees in her garden, how can you refuse? We sure didn’t, and last night, we transported these pluots [along with some pears] to the kitchen in cardboard boxes and paper bags.

Once in the kitchen, I went to work, sorting and washing all the fruit.

The ones pictured above were the ones that weren’t overly ripe and squashed to smithereens. If you didn’t know already, a pluot is a hybrid fruit – a cross of a plum and apricot with more plum-like tendencies. Its counterpart, the aprium, is more of an apricot. There are multiple colors because our friend’s mom’s tree grows three of the over 20 varieties of pluots.

For the overly ripe and NOT squashed pluots, I’m turning them into a pluot puree. They will be mixed with some bubbly for a pluot fizz, which I have so lovingly deemed “a Pellini,” similar to Bellini.

Before throwing them in for steaming, I slit an “x” on the bottom of each pluot.

I don’t have a steam rack set-up for any of the pots/pans just yet, so into the rice cooker they went! I used the steaming rack that came with the rice cooker instead.

The skins came off quite easily! I’m going to have to pit them tonight because by the time my fruit sorting operation was done, it was already past my bedtime. Once pitted, they’ll go into the food processor and one step closer to becoming pureed.

That’s a lot of pluots for two people, so we are inviting our friends over to help eat/drink them. I’m going to try making pluot ice cream or sorbet. I’m not sure what other recipes to try, but we need to finish these pluots before they go bad!

How is it possible to dedicate three separate posts to the same day? It’s the only way when you like to jam-pack your days the way I do! I’d rather not make my posts more than a few scrolls long.

In the evening, we took a walk through The Annex since the housewarming party was in the area. I made sure to try poutine the first chance that I got, which happened to be at The Acme Burger Company.

It’s French fries topped with fresh cheese curd, covered with brown gravy, the perfect late-night splurge. Definitely not part of an everyday diet, but it can be delicious, especially after a few drinks! After the housewarming party, we wandered around the neighborhood alleys to check out the art. The first thirty shots on my camera in Toronto must have been graffiti art.

At one point in the evening, we were standing in front of Lee’s Palace, a music venue that opened up in the mid-80s, talking to the owner about the mural out front. In 2009, due to the overload of pigeon compost and crap behind the front of the building, the building had to undergo some renovations, and the mural that originally went up in 1986 came down. After getting rid of the pigeon compost and crap, they were able to get the artist of the original mural, Runt aka Alex Currie, to come back and paint the venue’s new face.

Here are some articles I found regarding Lee’s Palace’s new face. Of course, this post would be incomplete without photos of the mural:

Totally random. Totally cool.

After wandering about the markets of Toronto on Saturday morning, Naly and I met up with a group for a food crawl in Little India. The crawl would visit five different spots in the area, but we would only tag along for four.

The first stop, Motimahal, was a very simple-looking eatery. We ordered vegetarian samosas to pad our stomachs for more food to come. I also ordered a mango lassi, which I drank rather quickly since the group was ready to head on to the next place, Udupi Palace. It was good, and I wish I had savored it.

At Udupi Palace, we all ordered dosas on the recommendation of the gal leading the food crawl. Tasty, but not anything I cannot find in the Bay Area. In fact, upon looking at the photo of the menu above, I now see their other locations, mostly in California. Update: There’s one in San Francisco, actually!

After filling up on dosas, we didn’t really have room in our bellies for the sugar cane at India Paan, but we still walked by the stand because it was on our way to the next stop, Bombay Chowpatty.

This was more of a snack joint and video store. I was pretty filled up from the samosa and dosa, so I just observed what was ordered by everyone else. Looked yummy. Here’s the Dahi Bhalla – lentil dumplings soaked in cool whipped yogurt with tamarind chutney topped with roasted cumin and cilantro:

I didn’t catch the name of this one though:

Naly and I left the group before the crawl actually ended to pick up some desserts for the housewarming party in the evening. She considered getting mangoes.

Ultimately, however, the Indian desserts at BJ International won.

Why P-pesto?! Because it’s got pistachios in it! It seemed like every recipe called for pine nuts, hazel nuts or walnuts, but I had no such nuts in the house. What I did find in the house were unsalted pistachio meats, so that is what I used instead.

The sun-dried tomatoes and shrimp were subsequently added when RV came home, but I DID make the pesto and pasta:

2 cups of fresh organic basil leaves, packed
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/3 cup unsalted pistachio meats
3 garlic cloves, peeled
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

The steps + stop to scrape down sides of food processor w/ a rubber spatula, as necessary.
1 – Combine basil and pistachio meats in a food processor, pulsing a few times.
2 – Add the garlic, pulse a few times more.
3 – Slowly add some of the olive oil, pulse a bit and add some more.
4 – Add the cheese, pulse until blended.
5 – Add salt and pepper to taste.

I am slowly going from “does not cook” to “sometimes dabbles in the kitchen and doesn’t poison everyone.”

I love running down to the farmers’ market on Saturday and picking up fresh organic berries! Here’s $19 in blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, and raspberries:

For the longest time, I would worry about berries. You have to eat ‘em pretty quickly, or they’ll spoil. I don’t know the $$ in berries I had to toss because I left them sitting in the fridge for a little too long and had to toss everything. :/

Well, I worry no longer. RV picked up the FoodSaver v2240 [the black version to match our kitchen] for the purpose of vacuum-sealing fish, and now we use it for packing away berries too. Since we can seal ‘em away, we can buy in bulk at the farmers’ market and have enough berries for two weeks. We defrost them by sticking them into the fridge the night before and have our smoothies in the morning!

It’s a fuzzy photo, but you get the idea! I actually took the time to sort through the berries, so the overripe ones would be eaten right away, while everything else is vacuum-sealed and thrown into the freezer in portioned pouches. It takes a little extra time, but it’s so worth not squishing the ripe berries and getting the juices all over the vacuum-sealing process!

Earlier last week, I attended an event at Azalea, a local boutique in San Francisco. Mission Minis was one of the sponsors, and I was so happy to finally get to try their mini cupcakes! I’d heard of them, but just never got the chance to visit their shop.

They were moist and delicious! Batch 19 was also a sponsor, and I definitely recommend the Peanut Butter Kiss [pictured above before I devoured it] as a pairing for their beer. At $1 a piece, I wouldn’t mind stopping by for a small treat!

In fact, I’m heading out to a birthday brunch this afternoon. Guess what I’m bringing? Two dozen mini cupcakes! The birthday girl loves cupcakes, and I found a great Plum District deal on it. I couldn’t pass it up, knowing how tasty those Mission Minis are.

@ The Haberdash [Magnolia Photo Booth Co.]

It seems that every time we have a dinner party, YouTube rears its lovely head for some entertainment. This time around, it’s the extended iTunes version of Bed Intruder song:

It’s catchy, and the lyrics are in the video if you don’t already have the song stuck in your head.

I foresee a karaoke performance of this song in the near future. Paging, Roger Niner Karaoke! Roger Niner always has the newest stuff, so I wouldn’t be surprised if the next time I am at an event where he’s a KJ, I MIGHT find that song!

I arrived in Toronto on a red-eye thanks to Virgin America’s new routes from SFO and LAX to YZZ. There were plenty of crying children and babies on board too, so if I caught any z’s at all, it was less than a wink of sleep. Needless to say, I was a little delirious upon landing and as a result, not as nervous about meeting Naly and Ben.

I was super lucky because her parents picked me up from the airport AND even lent me a car for the weekend! With Naly as my navigator, seeing the sights of Toronto on Saturday was a breeze.

We started off at the Kensington Market where I tried a butter tart.

There was this shop right across the street from where we were sitting that I had to ask Naly about:

As we walked through the area, what stood out most to me was the abundance of art.

I was absolutely fascinated and snapping away! We headed over to a different kind of market after that – St. Lawrence Market.

I love that most of the street signs in Toronto indicate what neighborhood you are in.

These folks were in line for the free corn. It went along the building and almost around a corner, so no, I was not in that line. Plus, corn on the cob and braces DO NOT get along.

These recap posts are photo-heavy, so I am splitting them into sections! Next up: Little India, Taste of the Danforth, and more graffiti art.

More Toronto photos: here! I’d love to add captions to them all when I have the time.