slow food day

today was absolutely gorgeous out! we awoke to the sun peeking in through the edges of our bedroom roller shades. i think it was the first day in a while where it's been clear and sunny out. and on top of that, temperatures rose and it was 30-40s out. it was delightful ...

while kevin had his pour-over stumptown coffee, i prepared pork shoulder (蹄膀) which would braise for the next eight hours, and pork rib soup (排骨汤), just like my mom used to. the lunar new year started on february 19th, and we didn't have a proper celebration this year, so i was planning out a mini-feast for tonight.

we ran a few errands in the morning, which consisted of the third trip to container store and adorama for the weekend, i think? ha. i love the bigso boxes of sweden designs so have been measuring and trying to pick up the right size boxes to organize some of the clutter on our bookshelves. unfortunately, the piano books which i want to organize are about 1/2" too long for the bigso file containers in the end. darn.

in the afternoon, we putzed around the apartment, unpacked a couple boxes, and i started preparing for dinner around 5 while glancing at the oscars red carpet in between. the dishes were ready to go by 6, so we skyped for a while with allyson and met baby dennis for the first time :D he is a beautiful, sweet boy, and was trying so hard to say "HI" at the tender age of six months. i think allyson thought we were skyping to share our own great news, but uhm, lol, we didn't have the news she was hoping for. LOL.

daisy arrived around 7 and kevin seated us in the prime positions at the dinner table to feast our eyes on the tv. daisy had seen a few of the nominated films, while kevin and i had seen none, so we were lucky to have her as our hollywood-oscars-celebrity-gossip guide throughout the evening. neil patrick harris was the host this year, and made a few memorable comments throughout the night.

my favorite: "she had to have a lot of balls to wear that dress" :p

it was a relaxing fun night, and it felt like we had front row seats at the dolby theatre! and i was totally stuffed.

menu

sauteed baby bok choy

luffa with enoki mushrooms (兹瓜)

egg with dried baby anchovies
braised pork shoulder (红烧蹄膀)
pork rib soup with kombu (海带排骨汤)
red bean soup with peanut and black sesame glutinous balls

snowpocalypse of 2015

we awoke to a very quiet city on tuesday morning. the streets and sidewalks were void of cars and pedestrians. all we heard was the low rumble of snow plows going down seventh ave and the comforting crackle from kevin's burr coffee bean grinder. our new houseplant was settling in nicely by the southwest window, basking in the morning light.

deblasio had implemented a car-train-bus-subway ban starting at 11pm last night, so we decided to walk to work. there was about 6-8 inches of snow on parts of the sidewalk, but for the most part, the streets and most major sidewalks had been cleaned overnight. the temperature was in the mid-30s, not too cold for a 25 minute walk, so i put on my ice breaker base layers, a fleece pullover, and a hard shell jacket and pants! armed with kevin's nikon and freshly brewed coffee in our top pot double-walled stainless steel mugs, we were ready to go!

the walk to work and back home were really nice! with so many people taking the day off or working from home, the streets were quiet and cars and public transportat did not re-enter the streets until 7:30am. maybe we should do the walk a bit more often, well, maybe just on workday holidays or days with terrible weather when it's less crowded out.

during the day, one of my close friends, monica, asked if it was okay to put me down as her older son's emergency contact at his high school. she'd asked us last year to be his emergency contact as well. it feels nice, like we are family. i am almost always at my desk or in the city reachable by my mobile, so of course i accepted.

we made a quick and easy dinner tonight. spicy sesame noodles with chicken, cucumbers, and pea shoots on the side. we've been working on a pot of chicken-pork soup with daikon and seaweed this week as well, good comfort food during these cold days and just like my mama makes it :)