Fat Tuesday

Easter has already come and gone...oh well! Forever catching up on here. That is life.

Fat Tuesday is the Tuesday before Lent, the Catholic season of deprivation leading up to Easter. The idea is that you indulge on this one day, before abstaining for the next forty. While Tony and I are seriously lapsed Catholics, we appreciate any excuse to indulge, and we certainly did this year. Tony worked from home and we went to lunch at Pinthouse Pizza for a couple of pints while the kids were in school.

Nachos smothered in queso and avocado, oh my goodness.

Margherita pizza...really unnecessary after that giant plate of nachos! I'd like to say we took most of it home as leftovers, but that was not the case.

Finally, that evening I fried up some beignets using a mix that I bought awhile back in New Orleans. They did not turn out nearly as fluffy as the ones I remember from Cafe du Monde, but once I covered them in powdered sugar there were no complaints. Monster even had one.

I may not have fasted for the next forty days, but I did eat considerably lighter in the days following our wonderful gluttony. No more beignets until next year. (Sorry, Monster.)

Thanksgiving 2015

Feels weird writing a Thanksgiving post after Christmas, but that's life. Thanksgiving dinners are always rather brown, aren't they? We actually had two Thanksgiving feasts this year and they were both heavy on the brown tones. Even the green beans take on a brownish hue when incorporated into the ubiquitous green bean casserole. Thanksgiving alchemy at work.

First we celebrated a few days early with my parents. My mom did all the cooking and would not accept anyone else lifting a finger! For me there was sweet potatoes, corn, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, stuffing, and rolls.

Nice family photo.

Take two.

Then it was off to Oklahoma for Thanksgiving #2 with my mother-in-law. I had my usual car meal, a hummus falafel wrap from Tom's Tabooley.

More brown in the form of corn, mashed potatoes, broccoli rice casserole, rolls, and sweet potatoes.

Schrodinger's Thanksgiving leftovers...is it margarine, or mashed potatoes? WHO CAN KNOW FOR SURE?

And other brown meals followed. Golden Corral? Golden mac n cheese, yes, but also heavy on the brown.

Another brown/gold combination, nachos at Iguana in OKC. Thankfully, our sangria swirls were not brown!

The first part of our visit, the weather was fantastic, so we were able to meet up with my friend Sunshine and her kids. We let them run wild on the OU campus while reminiscing about our college days there.

A storm blew in on Thanksgiving Day, and the cars got covered in ice. Such a novelty for my Texas kiddos.

Scraping (and eating) the ice. Observing nature while also testing and strengthening their immune systems. Win-win.

Hope you had a lot to be thankful for this year. I know I did.

Superhero Nachos

Our library had a superhero cape-making session today. Olivia and Jackson were happy to decorate their own personal capes.

Pow!

Jackson did not care to model with his cape. Instead he shimmied up a tree. The cape would've just encumbered him really.

What do superheroes love? Nachos! For the queso, I used the Mild Cheesy Dip from Plant-Powered Families. So good! It's nut-free, but still super creamy and rich like a cashew-based queso. I mixed it with a few spoonfuls of salsa to give it a Mexican flavor. To make mine extra-hot I added some chopped banana pepper and serrano pepper from my garden.

For dessert, frozen blueberries. 

Dallas, Part 2

Day 1 of our Dallas weekend was spent playing at Legoland and chowing at Spiral Diner. Recap here. On Day 2, we headed to the Dallas World Aquarium.

It's called an aquarium, but it's really half tropical rainforest, half aquarium. We made our way through the rainforest first.

I couldn't believe this stork was real, until it moved. It was the biggest bird I've ever seen!

The official name of this tree is the Monkey Don't Climb Tree. For obvious reasons. Ouch.

Loud, squawking, constantly fighting flamingos! Not the most peaceful birds. But pretty.

Look at this frog's expression. We have all been there.

I literally squealed when we came to this sign.

I had never been this close to a sloth before. There were actually two, but one was asleep. This one was wide awake, however, posing for pictures and, later, placidly eating his shoots and leaves.

Next we observed the aquatic tanks. Jackson and Olivia were delighted by the otters, who would repeatedly swim right up to the glass like they were playing hide and seek.

I'd never seen a polka dot stingray before. Such a cool pattern! I love stingrays.

Undersea creatures are pretty amazing.

Such variety.

Jackson was really interested in the anemones and starfish. Because SpongeBob.

These sea spiders will haunt my dreams.

To get that image out of your brain, check out what we saw next.

A little back story. Tony is obsessed with manatees. His love of manatees is perhaps equal to my love of sloths. He calls them his brothers of the sea. So when we first passed by this tank, he was a little crushed to find that the manatee was sleeping with its entire body turned away from us. But when we passed through again towards the end of our visit, the manatee had perked up and was swimming adorably around in its tank, which it shared with various fish and turtle friends.

Eating its salad. Total herbivores, they eat 150 lbs. of greens a day!

The manatee had a toy stick that it carried around. At one point it dropped the stick, and the stick floated up to the surface. The manatee swam vigorously until it reached the stick and grasped it again. It was almost like a dog playing fetch! I wonder why it is so attached to the stick. 

At this point we'd seen pretty much everything and the kids were reaching their limits of appropriate museum behavior, so we broke for lunch.

Out of all the dining options in Dallas, we chose...Spiral Diner again! 

Party sampler to start, with chips, guac, queso and salsa.

Orange spice iced tea, so good.

I was going to get the blue plate special Zucchini Po'Boy, but they were out of French bread. I didn't want to eat a po'boy on plain sliced bread, so I went with the Nachos Supremo. These nachos were dressed to the nines with cashew queso, quinoa, corn, olives, scallions, guac, sour cream, jalapenos and cilantro. Every bite made me so happy.

Tony had the Spiral Burger on a traditional meaty patty, with all the fixins, and a side of potato salad. The kids had the same things as the day before (spaghetti and grilled cheese).

Goodbye for now, Dallas. It was fun!

Recent Eats

Happy November! Here are some meals that didn't make it into my October posts.

PPK Breakfast Nachos! With roasted potatoes, tofu scramble, and cashew cheezy sauce, these are hearty and awesome. I substituted lentils for the black beans. We had them for dinner, shh, don't tell anyone.

Veggie hot dogs topped with red onion, pickles, and mustard. Baked potato on the side. I didn't have any sour cream for the potato, but I made do with Earth Balance, salt, and lots of black pepper.

Oh She Glows' 15 Minute Creamy Avocado Pasta. Jackson and Olivia love this one.

Sushi bowl from More Quick-Fix Vegan. This is so delicious and easy, I may never roll sushi again! All the flavors of sushi -- rice, tofu, red peppers, avocado, bits of nori -- tossed into a bowl and topped with soy sauce, wasabi and pickled ginger. I also sprinkled it with wasabi sesame seeds. 

Pajama storytime. I love watching Tony be a daddy.