Strawberry Muffins

For the past couple of weekends, I've been craving muffins. Specifically blueberry, but really any muffins would do. I made a trip to the grocery store on Wednesday with the intention of buying blueberries (for the muffins) and instead stumbled across a whole shelf of discounted strawberries!

One awesome thing about strawberries on their last legs: they cook into amazingness. One of my absolute favorite things to bake is Smitten Kitchen's Strawberry Summer Cake - a pound cake-like base with strawberries sunk into the top. While the cake bakes, the strawberries literally melt into a jam-like consistency on top that is so awesome, I can't keep the cake in the house. Last-legs strawberries melt the best because they're already almost squishy.

When I saw the strawberries, I decided I'd try making blueberry muffins with strawberries instead of blueberries. This ended up being a fantastic idea. The strawberries melted inside the muffins, so instead of biting into crunchy fruit pieces, I bit into the muffins and it was like someone had injected them with little bits of jam. I made a dozen on Saturday, and I have another batch in the oven as I type.

Feature!

Happy Friday, everyone! My friend Kirsten from Eat The Queen came over last night to do a feature on my fridge - go check it out!

Then have an awesome weekend.

Miso Fried Rice

My brothers and I love to go to Benihana for special occasions. One of my favorite parts of a Benihana meal is the fried rice - I always hope that I get served last so I get some of that awesome crispy bottom that's been sizzling on the hibachi extra long. Sometimes I get cravings for really salty, crispy fried rice, but this is the first time I've ever actually tried to make it. I think it's a success!

This is an approximation of the flavor of the fried rice at Benihana, with miso paste instead of what I've always thought was garlic butter (now I'm thinking it may be miso!). In addition, I was short a few ingredients for Benihana's special orange sauce, so I decided to go a totally different direction with a fried egg and sriracha garnish. Yum!

Eggs Poached in Spicy Tomato Sauce

I love eggs. They're so versatile, healthy, an inexpensive - even if you buy the organic ones! (I definitely recommend organic eggs, there really is a difference in the flavor of the yolk!)

Anyway, I've been craving this dish all day. It's similar to shakshuka, because it's a touch spicy, and you poach the eggs in a tomato sauce, but I didn't have any feta or jalapenos (who keeps that sort of thing on hand???) so I mocked up my own version. It was so perfect - a touch spicy, and a little bit sweet because of some carrot puree, and once I cut the egg into the sauce, it took on an almost cheesy and creamy quality. Eggs poached in tomato sauce may seem strange, but I think it would make the most wonderful comfort food in the middle of the winter.

Oatmeal Galore!

One of my favorite breakfasts is oatmeal - especially in the morning during the week, and even more in the winter. It's cheap, it's healthy, and it's quick - no more than 5 or 6 minutes to prepare, toppings included. The photo above is maple syrup (the real stuff!), brown sugar, and walnuts, but there are a million different combinations I like to make. Check out below for my oatmeal base and some other suggestions for toppings...

Super-Easy Roasted Vegetables

As the title states, these delicious roasted veggies are super easy to make perfectly. I could never figure out how to roast veggies properly. They never cooked right, and there was always a very burnt element combined with a very undercooked element, combined with too much or too little salt. However, Jim did these as a part of the Valentine's dinner he surprised me by cooking, and I couldn't stop eating them. Seriously. He ran to the bathroom while they were cooling and I kept sneaking crispy bits of brussel sprouts out of the dish. Is there a better vegetable than perfectly roasted crispy brussel sprouts? I don't think so.

Spicy Veggie Dumpling Soup for One

I recently bought (on a whim) a bag of veggie dumplings from Jungle Jim's. These are one of my FAVORITE frozen purchases ever. I don't generally buy a ton of frozen food, but these swayed me because they're so simple: the ingredients are kimchi (spicy cabbage), sliced radish, onion, ginger, soy, and wheat flour. Real food! I've been snacking on them a lot, and last night I decided I wanted to try my hand at a broth-based soup. I threw it together without a real recipe, and I was pretty pleased.

Ingredients

Serves 1 for a meal, 2 for a side

1/4 cup matchstick carrots

1/4 cup matchstick zucchini

1/4 cup roughly cut onion

1/2 clove onion, minced

1 cup chicken broth (I used homemade broth, but if you're buying it definitely get low sodium)

1 cup water

6 frozen veggie dumplings

salt to taste

splash of soy sauce

red chili paste to taste

Directions

1) Put broth and water into a medium-sized cooking pot. Add onion and garlic, and bring to a rolling boil. Cook for approximately 5 minutes.

2) Add carrot and soy sauce, boil for another 5 minutes. 

3) Turn heat down to a simmer, add zucchini and dumplings. Cook until dumplings are done (follow your packaging)

4) Serve in a bowl, and garnish with your desired amount of red chili paste.

There are a couple things I would do differently if I made this soup again: 

1) I'd add some sesame oil or miso for a little more depth. This was pretty one dimensional, even with the added layer of the chili paste.

2) I'd slice up a little ginger, and maybe add in some mushrooms for some extra earthiness.

I think this would also be really good with udon noodles instead of dumplings, and you can always add whatever vegetables you have lying around. Yum!

Best Chocolate Chip Cookies Ever (SERIOUSLY I'M NOT EVEN KIDDING)

In honor of Valentine's day, and because I just baked these for my boyfriend, I give you cookies. You might think I'm lying, but these really are the best chocolate chip cookies I have EVER made. They're in the top 3 chocolate chip cookies I've ever eaten. Maybe top 2, but we'll say top 3 just to be generous.

They're huge and soft - gooey if you pull them out at the early end of the baking time, soft and brownie-like if you leave them in for the whole 17 minutes.

I haven't even tried another chocolate chip cookie recipe since I found this. Let's get into the details...

Monday Night: Box Wine

Each Monday night, I'm going to highlight something that might help bring a little more pleasantness to your week. This week it's BOX WINE!

*as a disclaimer, I know nothing about wine, except what I like and don't like. 

Chunky Tomato & Pea Sauce

I know this looks a lot like the salsa from yesterday's post, but I promise it's not! Like canned black beans, I also buy LOTS of canned tomatoes - especially in the winter, when tomatoes aren't in season and the ones in the store are a little suspect. The thing I like about canned tomatoes is that they're versatile, you can buy lots of different textures, and best of all: they're CHEAP! At some point, I'll do a post on the pros and cons of different types of canned tomatoes, but for now let's focus on this chunky sauce.

I actually made this a few nights ago with some spaghetti and the end of a triangle of parmesan, but last night it was perfect for a pre-bed snack with a generous hunk of toasted semi-stale baguette...

Black Bean & Veggie Sautee for One

I've developed a recent love for black beans. I've been eating lots of them, like two cans in the past week. I put them on salads, in tortillas, with rice, with chicken, and with veggies. Here is one of my absolute favorite ways to have them - sauteed with veggies, and served with dollops of plain yogurt, hot salsa, and avocado. Mush it all together and put it on a chip! Jump through for the "recipe" (if you can call it that...)

Sorry for the Break!

Hey Guys,

I'm so sorry I've been out of touch! I'm presenting my thesis a month from today (well, either April 20 or 22) and the final draft is due in to my department a week or so before the presentation, so I've been working around the clock to get that finished! I'm 99% sure my draft will be done by tomorrow evening (I've got one more section to finish up) and then I'll start on the editing, which I hope won't be too bad!

Anyway, not much has been going on - I've been growing my hair back, and I absolutely LOVE having it short. I'm going to let it keep growing until I get back home, but I might see if I can get a trim over Easter to get rid of the dull ends.  I've been experimenting with headbands & gel, and I gave myself a fauxhawk the other day that my friends loved.

I've got a couple pieces of really great news - I haven't found a full time job yet, but I'm interning at the website Girlfriendology (I'm not writing as often as I'd like, but that will definitely change as soon as my paper's finished).  You guys should all check it out & join the community (if you're a girl!) I'm also writing a piece on dating after chemo for the website The Frisky, which I found through CNN and sent in a proposal. I didn't really expect to hear anything back, but they responded within a few hours. Now I'm trying to figure out all of the contract stuff - I think I'm going to have to give my dad a call for some help with the tax form!

Finally, I had my scans this past Monday and everything came back clean! My mom and I had a little bit of an adventure (NOT a good one) when they misread my forms and didn't do my neck CT (which is the most important part!) Debbie got me another CT for 8:30 on Wednesday morning, and when we got back to the hospital, the new computer system at Children's had deleted my appointment.  We ended up having to wait an hour and a half before I could get in, and we were not happy. When everything finally got started, it went really fast.

Last of all, I keep getting bronchitis. I've had it TWICE this semester already, and it just won't go away! I have to see the ENT when I get back to Cincinnati so they can do something like scrape my sinuses (which sounds really unpleasant...) I'm on my second round of antibiotics, so hopefully that will clear everything up.

Lots of Love,
Lauren

New Hair!

Check out my new hair!!!

Curlyish...

Hey Guys,

My hair's been growing pretty fast! The cowlick on the right side is kind of making my hair grow in an Elvis 'do, but I guess it makes things a little interesting!

it's also starting to just get long enough to curl a tiny tiny bit - I can't wait til it gets long enough to really start curling! It's still pretty thing, but I'm still crossing my fingers that it'll thicken up eventually... I think right now it kind of looks like little down feathers...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Uh Oh...

Hey Guys,

I ended up back in the ER on Tuesday morning... My cough had been gone for a few weeks, but it started up a little bit again on Sunday. By Tuesday I had a sore throat and a fever, and since I was 4 hours away from Dr. Adams and the clinic, Lisa told me to head on over to the urgent care near my apartment. I had a little bit of a breakdown in the waiting room, and I was crying while I was checking in and getting my BP done, so my pulse was SUPER high. They were all really nice to me, though, and immediately brought me back to my own room since I'm still "immunocompromised." I had come prepared with a bunch of magazines, so I was pretty comfortable in my room.

The doctor (well, med student/intern guy) came back pretty fast - and he was SO cute. Definitely the cutest doctor I've ever had, and definitely Grey's Anatomy/ER worthy. I was wishing I'd fixed myself up a little for the trip (dumb, I know!) and it made me feel a little better!

I ended up being there for about 3-4 hours, so it was such a bad visit. I had a chest x-ray and bloodwork done, plus an H1N1 test and a strep test. It turns out I have bronchitis that had gotten pretty bad pretty fast, so I got send home with a Z-pack of antibiotics and some more codeine for my cough.

I spent the rest of Tuesday and all of Wednesday in bed, and drove home Thursday morning, which is where I am until early Monday (I have a French class on Monday and can't afford to miss another class, it's SO HARD!)

My hair's coming in pretty well, and I'll post some more pictures soon! We're going to a Gala for my old high school drama department tonight (Brian's singing and some of my friends will be there) so I'll definitely have pictures!

Lots of Love,
Lauren

I Think I Scare the Freshmen...

Hey Guys,

I was talking to my mom on the phone the other day, and I was telling her something that I've noticed since I've been back. I think I scare the freshmen in the conservatory. Not in an "AHHH!!!" terrified kind of way, but more like a "WTF is going on with that girl?" kind of way. I mean, I've got this super, super short haircut, triple-pierced ears, and I'm generally either wearing a big faux-fur coat my mom gave me for Christmas or a black wool trench coat and some kind of crazy hat. Also, usually I'm wearing giant earrings that are down to my shoulders. AND I wasn't around last semester. AND people still get excited every time they see me - professors, kids, accompanists - people are constantly shrieking & hugging me when I walk down the hall (which, by the way, is kind of nice haha). So, basically, I think I'm really freaking the freshmen out. Oh, well...

Anyway, I've been cooking LOTS of really good food for myself - I'm trying not to eat/buy anything processed... as much fresh, organic food as I can get, and I'm trying to make a lot of it myself at home instead of eating as often as I used to, and lots and lots of fruit and iced green tea. I want to try to make sure I've gotten ALL of the chemicals out of my body before I let myself eat too much junk again!

Also, I've been noticing that some of my arm hairs are doing weird things... like... getting really long & curly?!?!? I'm guessing those are the ones that clung to life during my treatments so they're all weird. I'm glad they're blonde & hoping they'll fall out and be normal, because if they keep growing like this it'll be really bizarre. My leg skin seems to be reacting weirdly to having hair again - I've been having to exfoliate my legs A LOT because the hair on my legs keeps growing in just under the top layer of skin, not so much like an ingrown hair, just like it can't quite make it through that last teeny bit. It's really annoying.

Check out my hair! Haha, the back is kind of growing into some weird swoop in the back. I bet it always grew like that but I just could never tell. I also kind of have a little bit of a cowlick on the front right side. Not sure if that was always there, either, but it's popping the front of my hair up in a funny way. I guess this means no bangs for me (not that I'm really disappointed by that). It looks thicker in these pictures than it really it, it's still pretty thin, maybe a little bit thicker, but you can definitely still see my scalp somewhat. Not as thin as I thought it would be, but still not particularly thick. And fuzzy. As fuzzy as 1/2" long hair can be... I kind of like it this short, but I definitely want it to get long enough to see what kind of a curl it has! I'm considering getting a trim over Spring Break in March, but we'll see how much it grows before I make an appointment!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

More Hair, More Hair!

Hey Guys,

It's my third week of school and I'm starting to feel a little better. I went home this past weekend and hung out with some of my friends from my internship last summer - it was REALLY good to see them, I've been missing them a lot while I'm at school. It's been awhile since I've updated, so I wanted to post up some pictures of my hair, which has been growing really well! It's almost long enough to style some way, and it's messy when I wake up in the morning. It's finally gotten thick enough that it looks like a buzz cut (although it's still thinner than it used to be) and it's really soft & kind of fuzzy. I stopped using the Nioxin and started using Herbal Essences shampoo & conditioner for chemically-treated hair (haha) at the recommendation of my mom, who used it when my little brother was growing his hair back from chemo. I think I'm going to make an appointment for Spring Break (about 1.5 months away) to get the gross ends cut off, and maybe it'll even be long enough to get it trimmed up into a style. 

I put up that last picture because Katie & I were trying on my large collection of stretchy headbands since she might be borrowing a diamondy one for her recital. I've decided my hair's still too short for headbands & that this one makes me look like one of those baby girls whose parents put headbands on their bald heads to show that they're girls. Haha...

Also, a belated thanks to my friend Gretchen, who has an amazing pixie cut, for recommending some good short-hair products for whenever I'll need them!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Cropped Hair Inspiration

Hey Guys,

Here's  a quick hair/scar update - my hair's getting significantly longer and somewhat thicker. Once it finally starts thickening up a lot, I think I'm going to keep it pretty short. I'm really liking how fast I can shower and the fact that I can wear cute hats and big earrings without worrying about messing up my hair or covering up my earrings...

Look how much my scar has faded - you can just barely see it now. The necklace that I wear every day usually falls just over it anyway (I moved it to get a better view)

Finally, I wanted to share this photo with you, courtesy of Garance Doré's street fashion website. I love the haircut!

I have sunglasses & a dress similar to that ( the back isn't so low cut) - too bad I don't live near a beach...

Lots of Love,

Lauren

Whoops...

Hey Guys,

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been having LOTS of anxiety since I got back to school. I can't describe it exactly, but mostly I just feel unsettled a lot of the time, and I feel like I don't belong. I miss my friends in Cincinnati a lot, and I'm hoping to come home next weekend to see everyone.

Yesterday, I had my first appointment with my new counselor at the BW health center, and he's a really nice guy - I think it will help a lot to have someone to talk to, and I hope that the anxiety calms down soon, because it's really frustrating!

I also found a Young Adult support group about 25 minutes away from campus, but I misread the calendar - the meeting was last week, not this week! I had been so excited all week to go to the meeting and get to know some people, but I totally showed up at the wrong time. Hopefully I'll get it right in February!

Classes are going well, the only thing I'm slightly worried about is my piano class - everyone in my class is really talented, and I can barely remember some of the stuff we're studying. Plus, a lot of the class is based on improv, which I'm not very good at at all (mostly because it's hard for me to figure out what notes are in each chord very quickly) but hopefully I'll get better as the semester moves on.

Lots of Love,
Lauren

First Day of School

Hey Guys,

Today was my first day back at BW. I've been having a LOT of anxiety about moving out of my parents' house and back to my apartment in Cleveland (even if it is only four hours away & temporary). I keep having this irrational fear that I'm not going to be able to handle going to class and living on my own, even though I've done it for four years!! I had a little bit of crying on Saturday and Sunday, and a little bit this afternoon. All in all, though, the day went pretty well. I don't have class until noon on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and not until 10 on Tuesday and Thursday. It's nice to know that I don't have to wake up early every day. One more semester of sleeping in until I (hopefully) find a job.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with my advisor to go over the bit of work I've done on my thesis and to make a plan so I can get the rest of it finished as efficiently as possible. I'm hoping that I've got enough work done on it, but if not, I'm only taking 12 credits this semester, so I'll have plenty of time to work on it. I'm also taking my first (and only) night class - it's a class I've been wanting to take, but it only meets once a week so it's 2.5 hours long!!! Tonight my professor went a half hour over, so I didn't get out til 9:30 - I hope this doesn't happen every week!!

I'm off to bed now, but I hope everyone who's starting school is having a good back-to-class!

Lots of Love,

Lauren

ps check out the hair - it's getting a little thicker!!