Fried Tofu and Spicy Dipping Sauce. Brave has been wanting to make tofu and this recipe looked delicious. I didn’t deep fry it, but did light pan fry instead. Also, I doubled the white pepper (you know we love that spice!). This was an easy and yummy recipe to make, and I will make it again.

Steamed Tilapia with Ginger and Garlic. Of course, we throw in a whole lot of serranos in it too! We make two batches of steamed fish, one for the girls, and another for Ben and me. I highly recommend you make this!

Wonton Soup. I made this on the hottest day of the week, not sure what I was thinking, but we had no problem devouring it. I guess the heat doesn’t stop us from eating what something we love.

Week of 9/21 – 9/25
Monday: Leftovers
Tuesday: Turkey Meatloaf and Mashed Cauliflower
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Vietnamese Pork and Noodles
Friday: Ceviche

What have you been cooking lately?

This week’s learned, links, and thankfulness…

I’m thankful for the open and honest community of broken people we are part of. What we have in common is that Jesus made all of us whole. Also, thankful for all the different difficult (and not so difficult) circumstances that has shaped me to give me deeper understanding of grace. #liveoutgospel #liveoutgrace

Happy I was able to have dinner with my family this week! Life gets busy and we don’t see each other as often as we all would like.

Bummed about my Madewell coveralls. They finally came in, but they are way too big. It’s supposed to be a small, but it is definitely more a large. I guess I will have my Madewell gift certificates to hoard again until something else comes along.

Scored some vintage made in the U.S.A. Levi’s 501s at the thrift store this week… yippee! A $3 pair of vintage Levi’s is a really good find.

This jumpsuit is too cute, but I don’t like the cut-outs.

I just remembered I have cauliflower in the refrigerator to make this, but it’s been so busy that I never got to it. Darn! I have a feeling my cauliflower is bad now.

Math went well this week… praise the Lord and hallelujah! That’s the only subject that stresses me out in homeschooling. Are you surprised I’m not a math person?!

Now that Glow’s birthday is done, it’s my two little sisters’ birthdays coming up in October, then mine in November. Woot!

Ben roasted some butternut squash this week, and it seriously tasted like he marinated it in butter for days. It’s so deceptively delicious!

Have a good weekend friends! We plan to do plenty of relaxing; we are in need of a little sabbath.

The weekend is upon us and that means Ben and I will be treated to another (a lot) of episodes of Cutthroat Kitchen featuring Chef Dietitian, Chef Hello Kitty, and Chef Pi. Since we first got introduced to that show back in July, all of our family movie nights have alternated between watching Cutthroat Kitchen and Star Wars. The girls have taken it and really run with it. They wanted us to film their “episodes” one afternoon, and they really set the timer to 30 minutes to allow the chefs to “cook.” Ben was running out of space on his phone and was trying to get them to condense their episode, but they wouldn’t budge.

It’s pretty cute to see their chef space set-up, the pantry, their suitcase of money, and them get all crazy about the sabotages. In one episode, Glow ended up having to use gummy bears to make pancake syrup! HA!

We stayed home to celebrate her birthday, so she got the family tradition of breakfast in bed! She was saying she wanted to go to a hotel to celebrate her birthday, but the two weeks leading up to it she said she just wanted to stay home watch Star Wars and My Little Pony with a Yoda Party. I wasn’t sure how to interpret that Yoda idea, but I think she was delighted with the results. I love these quirky requests my kids have!

For breakfast, I made green tea french toasts (thank you nearby Asian bakery for carry green tea bread), and it turned out perfect to get in a bit of that Yoda-green. She chowed down on the giant stack of toasts all by herself! She doesn’t mess around when it comes to her birthday breakfast in bed.

Glow had this long list of things she wanted for her birthday (she dictated her list to True). It was basically a super long list of all things with “Yoda” in front of it. She wanted Yoda diapers, Yoda dress, Yoda flashlight, Yoda pajamas, and the list goes on. We had her pick her most favorite, and she said, “Yoda flashlight,” so we ended up ordering this talking one for her. Of course, she loved it (there is a no-talking one). I also made her a little Star Wars dress with fabric that she picked when we went to the fabric store. Her older sisters spent the days leading up to her birthday working hard in my office making her lots of Yoda presents. These kids take handmade gift giving to another level!

I’m glad wide legs and flares are back on the scene because I much prefer those over skinny jeans, and I never stopped wearing them anyway (proof here). Also, I”m loving all the high-waisted denim too, so these jeans that I scooped up from Zara (when it went on super sale) are so perfect. The fabric is really soft, so it’s wonderful for those hot days we’ve been having here (though we did get rain yesterday!). I don’t know the technical rules of fashion, and if those styles would be ideal on me since I’m so short, but whatever, I love them and will wear them anyway. Are you sticking to skinny jeans or are your legs ready for more breathing room?

on me: shirt, gap. jeans, zara (similar here). maguba clogs, c/o lotta from stockholm. bag, flea market.

Every time we go to Palm Springs, we never know where to eat. Leading up to the trip, I’ll spend hours looking through yelp, but never really come up with anything that sounds appealing to us. We call it our Palm Springs dilemma. We’ve learned that their food scene really doesn’t suit us. They have a lot of cool diner type places, but we don’t really like diner food. Cheeky’s, Norma’s, and King’s Highway just doesn’t do it for us. We have a short list of places we go to eat when we find ourselves in the desert. This past visit, we tried Bill’s Pizza, and ordered their buffalo pizza; the sauce was delicious, but the chicken a little dry.

We did however like Chi Chi at the Avalon. Their flash fried cauliflower and fried padron peppers on their menu is what wooed us to to go try them out. We also ordered their ceviche, charred octopus, and langostinos veracruzana. It was all delicious, but our favorites were the padron peppers and cauliflower. Next time, we might skip ordering from the main dish and just get more appetizer plates. The langostinas were our least favorite dish. Chi Chi did convince us enough at dinner to come back the next day for lunch, and this time we ordered a shrimp burger. That was super yummy and I will try to make our own version at home.

So if you find yourself in Palm Springs and aren’t really diner food people either, I recommend El Jefe at the Saguaro (for their ceviche), Chi Chi at the Avalon, or Native Food Cafe (Ben doesn’t like them as much as I do). Of course, always stop by Great Shakes to pick up some dessert!