Stone Fruit Pie

Above is a sampling of the fruit I picked up at the Ferry Building on Saturday. In actuality I bought something like 12 billion pounds each of peaches, plums, apricots and nectarines. That's all I could fit into the colander above. The plums were flipping amazing...the skin was so dark, almost black with a super deep purple-y flesh that's amazingly sweet without being syrupy.

I wasn't sure how the pie would turn out, being a menagerie of assorted stone fruits. You can see from the picture how black the pie filling looks...that's all from those potent plums.

9 Hour Bolognese in 3 Hours

Courtesy of the crock pot...I flipping love the crock pot! Above you see the very first meal - ever - served on our wedding china. I am almost getting weepy about plates. The main dish of the evening was a bolognese served on polenta...I stole the idea from a meal we had at Nopa the week prior. They had a killer sauzerac on the menu....mmmmmm!

Toilet Paper Brides

Pic of Vy, Molly, Me and Hollis at my bridal shower hosted by the LVH and Hollis down in Sunnyvale. The ladies are quite the pros at these sorts of events so it is damned near impossible to not have a good time. Needless to say, it was a blast and it was very nice to get the women members of the family and various groups of friends all together for the afternoon. Thank you so very much.

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

Ta-Da! At Forrest's request, this week's "dessert of the week" is Pineapple Upside-Down Cake. I have been meaning to make this one ever since we had one for dessert at Roy's and recently we had seen an episode of "Good Eats" featuring this desert as well. Recipes for this cake are not abundant and it's genesis even more slim.

Although I found a good article here that states skillet style cakes were not new, but a recipe contest held by the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (later Dole) popularized this in 1925 after it was published in a book of pineapple recipe contest winners. So here goes week #3 and dessert #3.


Pre-flip, the cake looks like any other ordinary cake...unassuming in it's plain old cake pan


But oh my goodness, what gooey goodness lies here? What, my dear, were you hiding under there?

It looks like a picture out of an old Good Housekeeping magazine, and I half expect to see a jello mold next to it. I love the kitschy look of the pineapple rings with maraschino cherries in them. I didn't saute the rings like some recipes suggested so they were not totally soft, some thing to keep in mind. Next time I think I will add some crushed pineapple to the actual batter as well and soften the rings with a little pre-bake saute in the caramel.

The countdown begins...

Two weeks left until the big day. Craziness....Spent some time today writing out the place cards, working on the guestbook and will start to build the favors tomorrow. I think we've got all the little details worked out now as well - so nothing left to do except to get married...so very very excited!!!!

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Last weekend, I made a batch of Red Velvet cupcakes to serve as the dessert for our Father's Day Dinner. 20 cupcakes were made on Friday night and it was a struggle to keep enough cupcakes around the house for there to be two cupcakes per person at dinner.

Red velvet has an interesting history...interestingly unclear. Upon reading a few different recipes, I couldn't quite understand what the fuss was about...especially since red food coloring is not what makes a dessert memorable. Still, I needed to know more, especially since it is so well loved as evidenced by this article in the NY Times. Apparently the use of cocoa and acid (buttermilk and vinegar like the recipe calls for) used to cause a reaction that turned the batter a deep red color. Unfortunately, the processed cocoa we now use is too processed to react - thus we add food coloring.

Cupcake in the "cup a cake" traveling container...courtesy of Hiroko for my bridal shower. They are so flipping cute!! It makes me want to bake cupcakes all the time so I can pack them in my lunch every day :)

Oh my...what is this? A wonderful little package is inside, complete with cream cheese butter cream frosting. I now know how to make frosting - butter cream is literally, butter that has been creamed with sugar.

I promised Molly that I was able to apply frosting with a butter knife in an "un-janky manner" but the last remaining cupcake is not evidence of such, eh, what do you do. Maybe that's why this one is still left uneaten.

Cupcake Mecca

Recently Forrest shared with me this website www.cupcakeblog.com which belongs to his co-worker, Cheryl. I passed along to Molly and we are both in AWE of this woman's cupcake making prowess -she is an animal...practically a baking phenom, using wonderously interesting flavor combinations and making just plain beautiful cupcakes - OMG I can't wait to meet her!

Her cupcake pictures are so flippin cute too. Being the retard that I am , I have started a "one dessert per week" rule where I make one major dessert per week but have forgotten to take pictures of my shining conquests. The lemon meringue pie was rather nice and the red velvet cupcakes were adorable - I think there's one left in the fridge...better start taking pictures.

Good Bye Jensine

On Wednesday June 16th , Lazlo (pictured left) gave me a call to forward the news that our friend Jensine (pictured right) passed away. Jensine had been battling ovarian cancer for the last year and more recently has been having GI complications during her post cancer recovery. I'm not sure quite how I feel about this...I am sad and will miss Jensine, but I haven't seen her since just before she got sick so in some strange way, I can't believe she's dead. The picture above is a skeletal picture of my former friend. If it weren't for that bright smile, she's almost unrecognizable.

I have spent many years hanging out with Jensine & company at the Duke of Edinburgh down in Santa Clara...back when I used to live behind the Costentino's. I remember how all of us girls started "makeover mondays" out on the patio...spending hours painting our nails while confused English men stared at us...it must have been quite a sight at a pub. The only new year's eve party at Sushimania was spent with Jensine, Anthony and Vinny. There are many more stories I can share, but no need to - just a sad goodbye to Jensine and a pang of guilt wishing I had known sooner so I could have stopped by to give her a hug.

FINGERPADS!!!

Recently my skin decided to freak out and basically break out...into little tiny red bumps...all over my arms and legs. In addition to that, my arms decided to employ some ezcema spots in places that cannot be hidden easily.

Always a glutton, I decided that I would whole heartedly scratch them...of course to relieve the itchiness. Unfortunately that lead to some pain and general ugliness for my arms and legs.

After a week of this pain, and tired of having my hands swatted away by Forrest...I finally decided in my delirium to go to the doctor....who promptly gave me a steroid shot...that stuff works fast - but I was warned that I may experience the "inability to sleep, increased hunger and irritableness." Awesome - my own mini roid rage

OH MY GOD

I am so flipping depressed....I just went to Sushimania and it looks like the place has been sold :(
WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

they had one of those yellow paper signs on the door that indicate someone else has applied for a license at that location or change of ownership or something.... Inside the employees were the same, but no Hidei. I couldn't bring myself up to ask what had happened because I had no support crew with me and was afraid I would lose my shit. It's an end of an era....I have been going there for 8 years....I can't believe I have to find a new sushi place....I feel so abandoned.

Chester has graciously volunteered to go there with me next week to find out what's going on...

Some past sushimania highlights

No more running!

FOOEY! I quit!

Just kidding...I am actually only taking 2 weeks off running as my knee has decided to be a pain in, well, my leg - lol. It is unfortunate but if I sit down for too long, my right knee will cramp up and basically get "stuck." It is then painful to straighten it out and almost 'creaky' when I try to move/use it.

Some suggestions have been that I have Baker's cyst and will need to get my knee drained (gross) and others are that I have a soft tissue injury from over use (sounds less gross). Nonetheless, my decided mode of recovery has been to spend more time sitting on my bony ass (trying to gain some weight) and getting back to all those things I ignored during marathon training (my life).

Although if anyone has some insight into my knee pain that would be super-fabu

New family

Post Brunch pic...I think it is fairly obvious which parents and kids go together...

the path to marriage...

is an unpaved walkway down to the beach... A few weeks ago Forrest and I drove up to Sea Ranch to finalize some wedding details, meet all the vendors and have the much awaited meeting of the parents.... things went pleasantly well...

Coming home...

More Ice Cream please

Vermont is a very pleasant and pretty place but there isn't a whole lot to do there... During our visit we went to:

• New England Culinary Academy
• Lake Champlain
• Ben & Jerry's factory
• Maple Sugar Farm
• Montpelier (capital)
• Quechee (Simon Pierce HQ, and Quechee gorge)

I think that probably covered about 90% of the things you can possibly do in VT....

grow your own cows

fun little painted beans sold as "cow seeds" at the Ben & Jerry's factory.

fancy cakes

display case at the new england culinary academy

do you see what i see?

i can't believe someone was actually trying to sell this shit.

F's instead os S's

Apparently back in the day, they didn't use the letter "s" sometimes. If anyone can provide some insight into that, I would appreciate it...because it makes no sense to me...lol Maybe all the pilgrims had lisps?

Dinner at Union Oyster House

If you are ever in Boston, you MUST make it out to Union Oyster House...it is the oldest restaurant in the country. The food is standard New England fair with lots of assorted seafood served either boiled, broiled or fried. My suggestion is the Shore Dinner which is just a single serving clam bake.... The above pic has Hollis' mom and Lauren on the left and Sal, Hollis and me on the right...

More than halfway there...

Yes I may look like I am smiling, but inside I was really dying. Of course, given my luck the first marathon I run has to be in the worst weather in the history of the Boston Marathon...ugh. As if 3-5 inches of rain per day wasn't enough, temperatures were in the 30's and gale force winds..

But I did finish...about 30 minutes after my target time and cried afterwards...not tears of joy, but more like a temper tantrum.

cute sign made and shipped by Hiroko to Forrest so he can hold it out during the race

Poncho Forrest

he looks like one of those Russian stacking dolls, but it's really just a garbage bag with a hole cut out of it. In an effort to hold back all the rain, Forrest picked up some garbage bags and tried to make me additional raingear.

Marathon packet pickup

Inside of the Hynes convention center 2 days before race day. This is what a 25,000 person marathon's shopping mall looks like - madness. Good thin I am not claustrophobic

Mr. Owen

Look at how cute Caroline & Lee's little boy is.

Bon Voyage

It's here...I'm flying out tonight for Boston. Forecast calls for a "noreaster" storm and it already snowed yesterday. We'll see how monday goes....

Wish me luck

Lookie here!

Forrest and me looking at camera #2 at the beginning of our engagement party. Many many thanks to Chester, Craig and Adam for throwing such a wonderful shindig for us at Nihon on Folsom. The place is advertised as a whiskey bar and in all honesty has some mighty fine drinks....it is here that I discovered the Old Fashioned...mmmmmm

For more pics visit Chesternet

All hail the mighty corn

Yes, the green movement has made it's way to VMware. Recently, I received a notice to all employees stating that a "healthy snacks" initiative is being piloted in my building.

Double Up Boat Sushi

Kappa Maki anyone?
The LVH discovered that their local sushi boat place, SushiMaru, has some interesting end of evening practices of doubling up the plates on the sushi boats in order to clear out as much inventory as possible before they close. So in recent weeks, I have been able to convince Hiroko to join me as we decimate the doubled up sushi plates after a night of running with PacWest.

It's here....

I ordered Forrest an Aeron Chair as a wedding gift....and conveniently ordered one for myself too :) So now we can replicate our offices at home...ha! Yes, yes I know I am a dork but I embraced it a long time ago. I can't WAIT to sit in the new chairs!!!!

You have got to be kidding

2. They Realize Hunger Isn't An Emergency

Most of us who struggle with extra pounds tend to view hunger as a condition that needs to be cured—and fast, says Judith S. Beck, PhD, author of the new Beck Diet Solution. "If you fear hunger, you might routinely overeat to avoid it," she says. Thin people tolerate it because they know hunger pangs always come and go, buying them some time.

Copy Them: Pick a busy day to purposely delay lunch by an hour or two. Or try skipping an afternoon snack one day. You'll see that you can still function just fine. Then next time you feel those grumbles, you'll hold off before making a beeline for the fridge.

The above is from a MSN.com article called "8 Secrets of the Naturally Slim" and I say BULLSHIT! I think it is totally retarded how they say "thin people tolerate it" it being hunger. They are pretty much saying thin people don't mind being hungry...they are thin because they starve - HA! Can you imagine if I delayed lunch by an hour or so? Granted I have to eat every 20 minutes these days because of marathon training, but what about the hypoglycemic? should they just pass out? JEEZ.

Movie Review: 300

HOLY SHIT...if you haven't seen this yet, you sure as hell are missing out. This is 2 hours of pure Y chromosome, testosterone pumping yelling and fight scenes. All I want to do is flex my abs and yell "SPARTA!!!!!"

The first 20

Ran my first 20 miler over the weekend.

It wasn't easy and it took a long time....but it's done. Only to be repeated in 2 weeks..damn it! I'm tired and sore now, but maybe the 2 days of snowboarding had something to do with it....nah.

Dollars for Boston - PLEASE HELP

As most of you know, I have been training to run the Boston Marathon as part of the EMC Company team. As a VMware employee, I applied to and was selected via lottery to run this April 16^th. This has already been such a wonderful opportunity for me as a runner and I invite you to join me…

As part of the EMC Team, I am fundraising to support the Michael Carter Lisnow Respite Center in the single largest fund raising event the center has. This center provides care for children and adults with all levels of disabilities and is one of the official charities of the Boston Marathon. Our parent company EMC, has been the lead sponsor of the Respite Center's annual Marathon fundraiser since 1999.

I would like to ask for your assistance in helping raise the $2,500 contribution* to the Respite Center that I have been tasked with as an EMC team runner. Any amount is appreciated and is one step closer to the goal amount.

Checks:

1. Please make your checks payable to "The Respite Center"
2. Gimmie a heads up so I can pick them up to send to the center in one batch

Online:

1. Go to http://www.hopkintonrespite.com/html/donations.htm
2. Please enter my name "Betty Kang" into the "Payment For" dialog box

* Your donation is tax deductible as the Respite Center is a not for profit 50 (c)(3) organization. Tax Exempt #043237284

MUCHAS GRASSY-ASS

Wedding Planning...phase 1

As excited as I am about getting married...I'm not your typical bride. I am definitely particular and know exactly what I want....but funny enough what I want doesn't always remember the girlie stuff like buying a dress.

The dress search is now completed...after only 2 visits...I think it has more to do with my fear of dress shopping in general than anything else. I always have a hard time with dresses, because I primarily like plain, simple things to which my friends snore at. I think I did alright with the wedding dress...but we'll find out soon enough.

And we have a winner!

Check out the big winner in his age group - he beat the other guy by 5 seconds because he did a mad sprint towards the end of the run.

When it doesn't "hurt so good"

After a grueling 16 mile training run on Saturday, I decided to still compete in the Stanford Treeathlon on Sunday.

Super Fast Transition

There's Linh racing to the transition spot...where she apparently went from being 10th in her heat to 5th by magically materializing onto her bicycle with all her gear on.

Who's the douche bag in my shot?

that's me..."blueberry" in the background...behind the guy that's inadvertently posing for my photo. geez-louise....all this running has given me the body of a 10 year old boy - how depressing. Well, at least I'm skinny - LOL

Pragmatic Proposal

NEWS FLASH - Forrest and I are engaged.

I am so very excited and happy about this new development in our relationship - and also in a complete daze from all that is still left to come :)

Running, Running Everywhere...

and not a place to rest...

So in looking at some old posts, I cam across this.

My, my how things have changed...as I am now actively training for the Boston Marathon. Although my goal time of 4:30 isn't some tremendous feat, the fact I am am voluntarily running for that long is a feat in itself.

Funny, I wonder what's next :) Ironmans maybe?

Get Your Heart On...

Did you? I know I did...LOL. As a pre-valentine's day event, the LVH* hosted a dinner and cookie decorating with the ladies. Erin and Erin stopped by, I arrived later after a compulsory workout at the gym and Susi cruised by after a work dinner and is participating in the sleepover.

Cookie decorating sounds very stepford but it's a lot of fun when you have all of us erratic characters around trying to tell a story, strategically decorate cookies while balancing the wine glass.

COOKIE COOKIE

The cookie is merely a vehicle to present the M&M's

Memorable Superbowl Moment

And I mean besides the fact that the Colts won - HAHAHAHA

Quote from Eddie George during halftime or post-show with Boomer Esiason...
"You got to keep your eye on your luggage!"

Ventana Inn at Big Sur

View of Forrest from the resort parking lot. Spent the weekend at Ventana Inn at Big Sur for a little R&R. Forrest got me a massage at the spa for Christmas and I was more than happy to oblige :) as anyone can say, when it comes to spa treatments, I may have a problem saying "no." It rained all weekend like there was a hurricane off the coast of California so we didn't even get to see what the area really looked like nor did it seem safe enough to drive around on one lane highway 1. Thankfully, it all cleared up on Sunday and we got to see some gorgeous views of the CA coastline on our way home.

From the ass of a civet....Juan Valdez

"Relished coffees from around the world" my ass - HA! literally my ass. What you are seeing on the dessert menu at Cielo is Kopi Luwak and for those of you who do not know what it is, maybe that's for the best. At a whopping $40 per cup you have have a steaming cup of what appears to be ground up civet shit. Actually it's partially digested coffee beans excavated from civet poop....how not that appetizing.

Otherwise the rest of our meal there was pretty awesome. I got the "fresh catch of the day" and Forrest had the venison with herbed spatzle and chocolate infused sauce...muy interesante - highly recommended

Chef Chu's fortune cooke

"A bold and dashing adventure is in your future within the year"

Dude I am eating there more often!

All's fair in the tax game

I am sure most people out there will agree with me when I say that I feel as though my relationship with Uncle Sam is a bit one-sided. He takes and takes, and then when you think he's giving, he finds a way for someone else to take.

Case in point, my 2006 taxes. The gov already takes some ungodly amount out of my paycheck on a bi-monthly basis and when doing my taxes, it SEEMED like I was getting a decent return back from the fed. But, DOH! Somehow the trick was that I would owe a similar amount to the state - ARG