Anyway, back to the adventures! I’m going to break this down in order of my favorite things about Oregon, rather than a daily log, because that’s easier. And yes, be prepared for a lot of Voodoo Doughtnuts! And be warned, this will be a photo-intensive post, so if your computer loads pictures slowly… just warning you!

First things first: day 1 of our trip, we went to Cannon Beach. Unfortunately, the first day we arrived was the only day it was sunny, and hence this one and only picture I got of the beach (and me). The next morning, we ate breakfast and left early amid the dreary rain. However, I thought Cannon Beach was absolutely beautiful! Next time, more pictures for sure. Also, more Mo’s eating. So much more eating at Mo’s…

Cannon Beach!

One of the coolest things Dad and I did was take a jet boat ride on the Willamette River. I say it was cool because a) jet boat, duh! and b) we learned some interesting info, but I have to say, I wouldn’t do it again. It was one of those jet boat rides that intends to get you wet, and half the time the guide went so fast that I had to close my eyes because my contacts were blowing out! Boo!

Boat ride!

Dad is psyched to be on a jet boat, clearly.

That’s probably the most excited face my Dad had on this whole trip. He’s not a ‘smile for the camera’ guy!

Waterfall!

On our trip, we saw the beautiful Willamette Falls, which was stunning.

And of course, any trip to Portland would not be complete without a trip to the farmer’s market! Unfortunately, Dad and I weren’t in town for the famous Saturday Farmer’s Market, but on Wednesday, we did stumble upon this smaller market downtown.

Farmer’s Market!

A view from the outskirts of the market… once we were up in it, I was too overwhelmed by everything to get any decent pictures!

You can be sure I bought some fresh strawberries and ate them all in one sitting!! Dad and I, of course, being the sweet-fiends that we are, also got a bunch of pastries… but yet again, no pictures… because we inhaled them :-/

And what would a trip to Portland be without lots and lots of eating?! (Answer: not a trip at all!!) Every single day (for breakfast and lunch) we ate at the food carts. Dinner was typically leftovers from lunch, or we weren’t hungry, otherwise we would have eaten dinner at the food carts too. No, probably not the healthiest meals, but damn were they good. My favorites off the top of my head?: DC Vegetarian (I got their tempeh BLT); the Whole Bowl (I ate there twice!); and La Jarochita (those breakfast burritos were NOT KIDDING AROUND. Huge!!). Honestly, I wish I had eaten at DC Vegetarian twice, but Dad insisted we move around the city to find more food cart pods (except, you’ll notice, when he found a food cart he loved…), so alas!

But here, the one semi-blurry picture I got of the Bambino bowl from the Whole Bowl:

I don’t even remember exactly what is in here but let’s take a stab: cilantro, avocados, black olives, black and red beans, brown rice, salsa, and something called Tali Sauce. I have no idea what Tali Sauce is, but let me just say: it makes the bowl. I mean, otherwise this bowl is something I could even whip up… but with the addition of this not-spicy-yet-not-sweet sauce, the bowl is perfect. Heaven! You’ll also notice I left off the cheese and sour cream, thereby making this bowl vegan… aww yeah! Eating healthy while traveling FTW!

By the way, the bowl looks small… believe me, it’s not. I was full off that bad boy for hours! However, it is possible to eat it in one sitting so, if you live there or maybe have access to a fridge, you could get the bigger bowl and have leftovers. That’s what I would do!

And finally… what you came to this post to read about… VOODOO DOUGHNUTS!!! We ate here twice, which was the most I could convince Dad to do, and I’m pretty sure the second time we ate there was only because it was Friday (our last day) and we had nothing to do, and because Dad is a sweet fiend like me.

My first Voodoo loot:

Yes, ALL VEGAN!

From the top, clock-wise, the ODB (I’m not going to spell that out for you, but you can find it here!), the Diablos Rex, and the infamous Voodoo Doll itself! And yes, the Voodoo Doll had red filling inside of it (like blood). The best part about all of these donuts? They were all on the ‘vegan’ shelf, meaning they were made with no eggs and no dairy! Woohoo! Also, for those curious… they taste exactly like ‘real’ doughnuts. I could not tell the difference and, believe me, I’m kind of something like a ‘real’ doughnut connoisseur.

Eat me…

And, as mentioned on Yelp, go early!! The first day we went at 6 AM (the downtown location is open 24 hours) and there was no line… Friday we went at 8 AM, line practically out the door! People literally get boxes and boxes of these doughnuts, so really… go early or go really late!

And one our last day in Portland, Dad decided to be adventurous…

ODB for an ODB.

and he tried the ODB plus the Triple Chocolate Penetration (picture not shown, because we ate it immediately…) He proclaimed the doughnuts from Voodoo “good”, which is about the highest praise about anything that you could expect from my Dad, so I took it as a good sign.

That’s it for today! Look for more pictures and Part Two tomorrow (or the next day, you never know with me)… until then, stay cool!

Enter: book clubs! Combine reading + new friends + talking about books + refreshments and me, and what do you get? A very happy Melissa indeed! I’m part of this ‘New to Phoenix’ ladies-only Meetup group (by the way, if you haven’t checked out meetup.com and you’re looking to meet people/do stuff, I highly suggest you check it out!), and they just started a new monthly book club event. Hooray!

The location of this book club was pretty far from where I live, but it was in a super familiar part of town (basically, the side of town where I grew up), so I was acquainted with the location and knew exactly how to get there. I think if I hadn’t been familiar with the area, I would have passed on this event and waited for the next book club meet up, but I lucked out.

We read Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen (summary here), and I thought the book was really good. I’m not really into reading fiction books on my own, and I highly doubt I would have ever chosen to read this book if it hadn’t been “required.” However, I’m really glad I read it because it was a cute and short book, the kind you can’t really put down.

(source)

So, did I make any friends? I definitely can say I made one friend for sure (she happens to live across the street from me, so we may carpool for future meet ups!) but I’m unsure as to whether or not we would get along. She’s my age, but she’s very, very opinionated and I feel like I might tire of that rather quickly… there were two other ladies I hit it off with (one who is in her early 30s and the other is more late 30s), but didn’t get to talk to a lot, so we’ll see. I wasn’t brave enough to get their phone numbers or exchange emails, but hopefully at the next book club event, we’ll get to talk more.

As for the Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead Reboot, I’m still sitting on a 5-lb. loss. The boyfriend and I have dropped strength training from our workout routine and have just been doing cardio, so we’ll see if that pumps up the weight loss any faster. I’m personally okay with just doing cardio for now, because I had kinda fallen off the whole ‘Run to 5k’ challenge, and now I’m back on it

And as for my upcoming trip? Guess where I’m going?!

Portland, Oregon! Woohoo!! This is kind of like my graduation present/trip from my parents, although I’m just going with my Dad. We’ll be there for 5 days, and I’m super excited. It’s the perfect place for a vegetarian ‘hippie’ like myself! I’ll be sure to share photos with you all when I return!

That said… do you have any suggestions for places/restaurants/food carts to visit in Portland? I have a list of places I’d like to go, but if anyone wants to share their suggestions, I’m all ears!

(source)

It follows a man named Joe Cross, who is “100 pounds overweight, loaded up on steroids and suffering from a debilitating autoimmune disease.” Continued from the movie website, “Joe Cross is at the end of his rope and the end of his hope. In the mirror he saw a 310lb man whose gut was bigger than a beach ball and a path laid out before him that wouldn’t end well— with one foot already in the grave, the other wasn’t far behind. FAT, SICK & NEARLY DEAD is an inspiring film that chronicles Joe’s personal mission to regain his health.

“With doctors and conventional medicines unable to help long- term, Joe turns to the only option left, the body’s ability to heal itself. He trades in the junk food and hits the road with juicer and generator in tow, vowing only to drink fresh fruit and vegetable juice for the next 60 days. Across 3,000 miles Joe has one goal in mind: To get off his pills and achieve a balanced lifestyle.

“While talking to more than 500 Americans about food, health and longevity, it’s at a truck stop in Arizona where Joe meets a truck driver who suffers from the same rare condition. Phil Staples is morbidly obese weighing in at 429 lbs; a cheeseburger away from a heart-attack. As Joe is recovering his health, Phil begins his own epic journey to get well.

“What emerges is nothing short of amazing – an inspiring tale of healing and human connection.
Part road trip, part self-help manifesto, FAT, SICK & NEARLY DEAD defies the traditional documentary format to present an unconventional and uplifting story of two men from different worlds who each realize that the only person who can save them is themselves.”

(source)

My boyfriend and I watched this movie about a year ago now and, long after I went back to grad school in Denver, he decided to give the whole “juicing thing” a shot. Guess what happened to him? He lost 20 lbs. over a summer and, after adding exercise to the mix, has lost an additional ten pounds.

Think about it like this: Our puppy, Molly weighs 35 lbs. That’s approximately as much weight as Blake has lost over about a year (not really trying that hard after he was done strictly juicing.) So basically, before the juice reboot, he was carrying around a medium sized dog ALL THE TIME.

Chunky monkey.

Why I am telling you all this? Well, because he and I are doing this program right now! This is my first time doing it, so I thought I’d share with you my journey as a newbie to the whole “juicing thing.”

First things first– we are getting enough nutrients from this program. We are following the FS&ND ‘Classic Reboot‘ program, which combines juicing and eating whole vegetables together. It’s a 15 day plan, although we may stretch it out longer. It’s 5 days of juicing and eating whole foods, followed by 5 days of just juicing, concluding with 5 days of juicing and eating whole foods again.

After you’re done with the program, the website has guidelines (which, if you’re a vegan or vegetarian, you probably follow pretty well anyway) to keep yourself on track. Anyway, just to be sure, I’m monitoring my energy levels and continuing to take a B-vitamin supplement, as I have always done because, as a vegetarian, it is recommended.

So, what has our program looked like so far? Well, here’s what juicing looks like:

Fruit! Frozen fruit added to smoothies? Tastes like a pina colada…

Our juicer.

We juice mostly hard veggies in here– think: carrots, cucumbers (is that a fruit?), celery, green apples (definitely a fruit)… pretty much anything that’s really hard or crunchy goes in that. And yes, that’s my sweet dragon cup (made for children– don’t judge!)

A medley!

This is an all-fruit juice smoothie we made, but I will frequently include kale and spinach in my smoothies. Not pictured? The ground flaxseed I add to every smoothie for additional healthy benefits!

The finished product.

Our fruit smoothies will very in color– any where from this randomly brown-ish color, to bright green, to dark purple. Pretty cool!

And now, the thing you care about the most: Blake and I have been doing this for about a week so far, although sometimes we ‘fall off the wagon’ (see: Memorial Day at my parents). For the past 7 days, Blake has lost 5 lbs and I have lost 3 lbs.

I’ll be keeping track for you guys over the next month– we’ll be doing the 15 day strict reboot first, and then playing around with juicing for one or 2 meals a day throughout the rest of June. I’ll let you know how it goes!

In an effort to clean out the pantry and the refrigerator, I decided to mix my two favorite things together for a healthy and very filling meal: Trader Joe’s Soy Chorizo and Amy’s Black Bean soup.

(source)

PLUS

Amy’s Black Bean Soup

EQUALS

Yum!

Now I have to be honest… cooking soy chorizo is kinda gross. You have to cut off the casing and, especially if you’re a klutz like me, the actual soy chorizo stuff falls apart in your hands, leaving your hands/the counter/the floor/the cats covered in red coloring. Definitely unappetizing…

Cooking soy chorizo

I eventually got it into a pan along with a tablespoon of coconut oil, fried it up, and added half of this batch to half a can of Amy’s Black Bean Soup. You can use more soup or more soy chorizo if you like, but I find soy chorizo to be really spicy… plus I wanted leftovers for the next day

On further thought, you really could make this legitimately ‘Sandra Lee’ approved and add some fresh spinach or herbs to this dish. Make it your own! I promise, it is super delicious, very filling, and incredibly easy to make. The only ‘mess’ was the pan and the cutting board I used to cut off the soy chorizo casing. Super facil! (Super easy!)

On to awesome topic number two… today I went to Hula Hoop Cardio! A local fitness studio offers $5 drop in classes. The classes they offer include Zumba, Hip Hop Cardio, ‘Butts and Guts’ (haven’t been to that yet!), Zumba Toning, and now, Hula Hoop Cardio!

(source)

I had heard of hula hooping as a form of cardio, and several years back, I bought a couple of hula hoops. The roommates and I used them pretty frequently at first, but eventually the two other roommates got bored and stopped. I continued to hula hoop around the house intermittently, but when I moved away for grad school, the hula hoops got packed away. Needless to say, I didn’t think I’d really get back into hooping…

Enter: this class. When I saw in an email from the studio that they would be offering it this month, I got so excited. Let’s be honest, I also read this article in Shape magazine a while back about Marisa Tomei hula hooping, and I thought, ‘damn, I wish I were Marisa Tomei! She’s so cool! I should get a hula hoop.’ (No joke, this is in part why I bought a hula hoop all those years ago…) But back to fitness…

Why is hula hooping a good exercise?

• Other than being fun (thus upping the likelihood that you’ll stick to it, obviously a huge factor in exercise and weight loss), hula hooping doesn’t require any fancy coordination, nor does it require pricy equipment. If you can move your hips, you can hula hoop. (source)
• Hula hooping burns as many calories as step aerobics, boot camps, or brisk walking. (source)
• If you use a weighted hoop, not only will hula hooping be easier, but you will also burn more calories than using a store-bought hula hoop (that said, I used a regular plastic hula hoop and still got a killer work out). (source)

After today’s class, I am more determined to (one day) purchase a weighted hula hoop– they only had one, and a lady grabbed it before I did. She also was the best hooper in the whole class, and now that I know that weighted hoops are easier… well then…

I had a ton of fun and right now, my quads are sore– we did squats and lunges (yes, while hooping!) in addition to some dancing and walking around. I wasn’t the best hooper, but I was pretty darn good! The most important thing is that I am excited to go to class again next week (and I burned 400 calories.) Win win!

Have you ever tried hula hooping, either for fun or in a class setting? Would you be interested in hula hooping, or do you think it’s just a fad? (Definitely a possibility!)

First, the gatos. It’s been warming up a lot here in Phoenix (that’s an understatement) and, since we’re trying to save money and it’s been dry outside, we’ve been using the swamp cooler (AKA evap cooler) a lot. As you may or may not know, swamp coolers work the best when you have a door or window open, so that the hot air in the house gets pushed out by the cool swamp cooler air.

Well, let’s just say that not all of our windows have screens (I know, I know, that’s one of the first things we’ll be fixing this summer!). And Blake, unlike me, thinks that ALL THE WINDOWS must be open to have a truly cool house, so he goes around and opens windows even though I tell him a) no screens b) flies will get in the house and c) we have crazy kitties.

I’m sure you see what’s coming next, right? Oh yes… the Curious Case of the Escaping Kitties time! Unbeknownst to me, Blake had opened the window in his office fairly wide, although not wide enough for a kitty to get through (so we thought.) By some stroke of luck, I had left my phone in Blake’s office and went to retrieve it when I saw our fat kitty, Izzy, sitting on the bench, looking shady.

POC: Partner in Crime

This wasn’t typical behavior for Izzy– she’s usually our ‘sweet’ kitty, the kitty that comes when called, that purrs and meows and loves to be petted and around people… but yesterday, her squirrelly-looking face made me look twice– and who did I spy sitting RIGHT OUTSIDE the window, on the ledge? MADISON!

“One day I shall be free…”

Knowing that she would run away if I made any sudden moves, I called Blake and told him calmly that Maddy was outside. He understood immediately, and went outside and gently called Maddy’s name, all while slowly moving to grab her. Luckily she took his ‘nice Daddy’ bait and came willingly (like I said, she’s not our ‘sweet’ kitty).

Our cats don’t speak English (we’re working on it) but I could tell for the rest of the night, Maddy was annoyed at being caught. Her one shot at freedom, cruelly taken away because Izzy can’t keep her poker face (nor could she get her fat butt through the small window opening). Oh well, the bright is that we caught her and she’s safe, and now Blake is beginning to understand that windows without screens should NOT be open. Training the boyfriend is a slow-going process…

And now, Molly! Nothing exciting to report about her– she’s still our crazy puppy. We took her to the dog park at 6:30 AM yesterday (yes, on a Saturday!) because, again, it’s crazy hot outside by 8 AM. She had a great time, although she did get beat up a little by a giant 11 month old Great Dane (11 mos. and it weighed 155 lbs…. what?!)

She also has her own precious way of coping with the heat:

Best of both worlds.

My Dad got her this great bed (he spoils his grand-puppy) and she absolutely loves it… but when it gets too hot in the house, she compromises by doing something like this. I don’t know how she finds it comfy, but someone she’ll sleep like that for an hour to two… go figure!

Hope you all are enjoying this lazy Sunday!

Speaking of sweets… I drove down to Tucson to spend the weekend with my parents, and on Mother’s Day, Dad and I took Mom out to breakfast and made her pay! Just kidding… not really… Dad paid for himself and Mom paid for me and her. We’re precious, aren’t we? (Don’t worry, Mom, I promise to make it up to you once I start getting a paycheck!) Anyway– I had waffles. That’s pretty much the best part of the story. Also, Mom got flowers, a card, and delicious See’s candy from Dad and me, which I’m sure she loved as well

Dad didn’t really do the best job of holding the phone still to take a photo, so this is the best we’ve got. Yay! And clearly, we dress fancy…

Anyway, on to the stuff you were promised!

No, not Molly!

Good try to distract me, but I’m not here to talk about the dog (even though she’s the best puppy everrrrrrr!)

Instead, Avocado Pesto Pasta , recipe from Chloe Coscarelli! We actually ended up halving the Coscarelli recipe and mixing it with Simply Organic’s Sweet Basil Pesto sauce mix. We also made one tiny change in the Coscarelli recipe, which you can see below…

Ingredients

• 1 lb. dried linguini (we used the pasta we had in the house– angel hair. Whatevs, it’s pasta (Italian-foodies, please don’t beat me!)
• 1 bunch basil leaves
• 1/2 cup pine nuts (okay, so check it: pine nuts are crazy expensive. I read online that you can actually substitute raw plain cashews for pine nuts, so that’s what we did! Same amount.)
• 2 ripe avocados, pitted and pealed
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1/2 olive oil (we used coconut oil, because we’re out of olive oil and we heard it’s just as good of oil as olive)
• Salt to taste
• Black pepper to taste
• 1/4 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes (once again, we have a million tomatoes left over from the Market, so I chopped up 2 whole tomatoes and threw them in)

Directions (hint: it’s so easy!)

1. In a large pot, bring water to boil. Cook pasta according to package directions.
2. While pasta cooks, in a food processor, blend basil, cashews or pine nuts, avocados, lemon juice, garlic, and oil. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Drain pasta. In a large serving bowl, toss pesto with pasta and garnish with basil and tomatoes. (This is also the point where I quickly brought the Simply Organic mix to a boil, stirred it, and threw it in with the Avocado Pesto.)

Pesto in the processor.

So my photo skillz (and phone) aren’t the best, so this looks gross, but I promise you, it tastes amazing! Also, since I have a tiny food processor, I had halved the ingredients… if you have a regular-sized food processor, you can blend up more pesto at once!

Yummm!

The finished product! I have to say, speaking as unbiased as possible, I liked Chloe Coscarelli’s Pesto recipe much more than just the packaged Simply Organic pesto, but that’s probably because a) the CC recipe was creamier and b) the CC recipe was fresh. I think if you substitute cashews for pine nuts, you could make this pesto really affordable… so do it!

I had first heard of 100% Pure on the awesome blog vegansaurus. 100% Pure is a vegan-friendly skin/body care and make up company that neither tests on animals, nor uses animal products (there are a few products by 100% Pure that use honey, but they are clearly stated and have a ‘vegetarian’ label vs. a ‘vegan’ label, so you’ll know the difference.) Most of the ingredients 100% Pure uses are fruit and essential oils, none of those nasty, bad-for-you chemicals that typical make up and beauty companies make.

Anyway, with vegansaurus’ happy review, I decided to dip my feet in and try the Red Wine Reseveratrol Mask/Scrub. As a friend told me, “you could put on the mask and drink red wine at the same time!” (I have to admit, that suggestion was the main reason I decided to try this mask over the others.)

Don’t worry, it didn’t arrive looking this way… all a quarter empty and everything. For the sake of fully trying out this product, I’ve been using it for about the past 2-3 weeks.

One of the things that impressed me about the company 100% Pure is that, like Sephora, they included free samples along with my purchase… I got a small tube of children’s toothpaste (Tom’s Strawberry), which has now become my go-to traveling toothpaste, and sample sizes of 100% Pure’s body lotion, which I haven’t tried yet, but look like this!:

As you can tell, each lotion is labeled. You can see how the ‘Honey Almond’ body cream is labeled ’100% vegetarian’, because it contains honey, while the others are labeled ’100% vegan’ because they contain no animal ingredients. Handy!

Free stuff aside, I have to say I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how well the mask/scrub works. One thing that bothers me is that there are no directions on the back of the bottle for how much or how long you’re supposed to use the product… so I use about a dime sized amount 3 times a week. I typically use it as a scrub more than a mask– I use it in the shower while my pores are all open from the hot water, and then gently buff it off in a circular motion with my hand after leaving it on for about 30 seconds-a minute.

It’s made my face really, really soft. Also, at first I notice my breakouts went away in a snap, but now that it’s been a couple weeks, my breakouts have returned and I’ve had to incorporate my Neutrogena Acne wash again. That said, the Red Wine Reseveratrol Mask/Scrub is not designed to deal with oily skin. Instead, it’s more about age prevention and keeping skin ‘youthful’ looking.

For the softness of my face factor: 5/5 carrots! (That’s the best!) Also, it’s made my skin look more glowing and just feel better in general, so 5/5 carrots for that. Lack of directions disappointed me… 1/5 carrots.

Unfortunately for me/you/the company, they are in the process of moving production facilities, so a lot of their products are ‘out of stock’ and won’t be back in stock until June… I wanted to try the starter pack with the tinted moisturizer, mascara, and under-eye serum, but that’s out of stock until June, which is just a little too long for me. I’m disappointed that 100% Pure (to my knowledge) didn’t make a stockpile of stuff before moving production facilities. For those reasons, I’m unsure if I’ll purchase from 100% Pure in the near future. I’ve heard good things about Juice Beauty, so I’ll probably be checking them out next!

Disclaimer: I was not given this product free of charge to review, nor was I even asked to review this product. For all I know, 100% Pure doesn’t know me, and I don’t know anyone who works for 100% Pure. All views are my own and are not sponsored by anyone else. I bought this product wishing to try out organic and/or vegan beauty products for my own life, not attempting to sell it to anyone else. If you think I’m lying, look at this beautiful face! You’ll forget about everything!

Just one small problem… Blake hates eggplants, for pretty much no reason. He says they “look gross.” Awesome… so obviously eggplant parmesan was off the list, as was pretty much anything with the words ‘eggplant’ in the title.

Enter… eggplant mixed IN pre-made sauce! Woohoo! And so my Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Shells with Eggplant Sauce was born. The Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Shells part comes from this recipe, and the Eggplant Sauce (however gross it may seem to you), comes from me.

Without further ado…

Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Shells with Eggplant Sauce

Ingredients

Eggplant Sauce

• 1 eggplant (skinned, ‘salted’ (salt the eggplant, let it sit for an hour to get all the bitter juices out, wash it, pat dry), and roughly chopped)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon onion or garlic powder (or both)
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• 3 cups pasta sauce of your choosing (I used regular Marinara)

Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Shells

• 2 1/2 cups ricotta cheese
• 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese (the recipe calls for fresh, but I used the canned stuff and it seemed fine)
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Approximately half a bag of fresh baby spinach (I used what we had left)
• Jumbo pasta shells

Directions

1. In a large pot, bring salt and water to a boil. Add pasta shells and cook until done, set aside.
2. In a medium sized non-stick pot, add olive oil, eggplant, onion/garlic powder, and salt and black pepper. Cook until eggplant has started to brown. When finished, set aside.
3. While pasta and eggplant are cooking, start making the ricotta mixture. Basically, put all ingredients (except for the pasta shells) in a large bowl, mix well with your hands. It should look something like the picture below, but maybe with more spinach in your case.
4. After the eggplant is done, transfer eggplant mixture into a high powered blender (I use a Blendtec, but you could also use a food processor), add pasta sauce, and blend until well mixed.
5. On a 9×13 baking dish, lightly greased, layer half of the eggplant sauce on the bottom.
6. After pasta shells are cooled, stuff them one at a time with the Spinach and Ricotta mixture. Place each shell onto the baking dish.
7. When finished stuffing each shell, cover with the remaining eggplant sauce.
8. Cover with foil, cook at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

And you’re done! Yay! When I surprised Blake with this for dinner, I didn’t mention the eggplant sauce, until he asked what kind of sauce I used… and surprisingly, he said he liked it! He said he couldn’t even tell there was eggplant in it at all. Success! And maybe a good idea for you, if you have some veggies that need to be eaten and a family member that refuses to eat them

Harsh, Izzy.

But you’re in luck! For this post, at least, my pictures a) sucked and b) a professional photographer took photos, so I can share those with you! Hooray! (I’m also in luck– I have a charge cord in my car, and I ordered a new charger on Amazon, which saved me $10 vs. buying it at the Apple store. Woo!)

On to the good news– (back story) as you may or may not know, since I moved back to Phoenix, I’ve been on a quest to make new friends who like to go out and do stuff. I moved away from Phoenix after high school, and I’ve been gone for about six years. Since then, I’ve either fallen out of touch with my old high school friends, or they moved away, or they got married and had kids and now we have nothing to talk about (I love their kids but there is only so much ‘talking about babies’ that I can handle…). Suffice to say, I’m looking for friends who are in my situation– recent grads or working professionals who like to go out to brunch, randomly go out to movies, hit up a mani/pedi spot, grab a coffee and just talk gossip. If they have boyfriends who get along with Blake, all the better, but single friends are awesome too because I love living vicariously through them

Anyway, I’ve been doing a lot to meet up and make more solid friendships. One of the coolest things? Going to Yelp Phoenix’s Ultimate ‘pleY’ date (pronounced ‘play’, Yelp backwards!)

By the way, all of these photos are from Melon Fish Photo, the company that took the photos for the Yelp event. I did not take these photos, and full credit goes to Yelp and Melon Fish!

In case you don’t know what Yelp is (shame on you), it’s like Angie’s List (I assume), but free. People like you and me review anything and everything– restaurants, apartment complexes, doctors, hairdressers, clubs, bars, landmarks, museums… and that’s just a list of stuff I’ve reviewed. It’s very legit– users who sign up just to write a hateful review are ‘filtered’– only people who consistently leave solid reviews show up. Eventually, if you write a couple solid reviews (AKA you don’t just write ‘I hate this place, it was lame’ or “omg this place was so cool!!”), people will “thumbs up” your reviews as either Useful, Funny, or Cool.

And, if people really like your reviews, they nominate you to become a ‘Yelp Elite’… which is what I am That means I wrote enough Useful/Funny/Cool reviews and I participated a modest amount on the forums (basically just answering other people’s questions– for example, if someone said, what are some cool things to do in Phoenix?, I’d write in and tell them about downtown Phoenix, hiking, etc.) for someone to nominate me.

Long story short, it wasn’t exactly the fact that I’m an ‘Elite’ on Yelp that got me (and Blake) into this event, but it certainly helped.

And boy, was it fun! Thursday night is a random night to have an event, but it worked out. The play date was hosted by the Phoenix Children’s Museum, and it was a way for the Museum to raise money for events. The Yelp event raised over $5000, which is pretty darn good!

Outside of the Children's Museum

A Children’s Museum without the children? Sign me up!

Waiting outside to get in

While we waited to sign in, a bunch of food trucks lined up outside with those Kind health bars, coffee, donuts, and (I think) hot dogs… free for us to eat outside! Yum!

They also had these really nifty performers/people on stilts walking around outside… the guy on the right juggled these glow in the dark pins, as did this guy in stilts…

We tore this map up! Treasure hunt!

Once we got inside, we got our pictures taken (still have to find those…) and were given this map. Three floors of alcohol, food, and entertainment??? I’d died and gone to heaven!

Food!

Okay, so not the healthiest food I ate all night, but omg, these brownie/fudge bites were scrumptious! I know we have this company’s card here somewhere, but I’m pretty sure they’re called JJ’s Fudge. They even had a chipotle fudge bite we could have tried, but we were too chicken

Drinks!

One of the many alcoholic places we visited… Cruz Tequila! Hands down, some of the best tequila I’ve had and I’m not just saying that because it was free (although that probably helped…) We got two free shots and a margarita, which unfortunately meant the whole night went by a whole lot quicker and blurrier for me… It was also the most popular booth at the event, as you can see above!

Entertainment!

This jungle gym (three stories of it!) was by far my favorite thing about the museum. I am terrified of heights, but the thrill of being on this jungle gym (plus being safely enclosed, plus, you know, the alcohol) overrode my fears. Blake and I (and about 10-15 other people at any given time) ran up, down, around, slid down things, climbed up, and just generally laughed and crashed our way around this jungle gym. I was actually glad I’m only 5’2, because Blake was practically hunched over the entire time, whereas I just kinda ducked but basically walked around unimpeded… like a child!

There was also a ton of other stuff to see and do– a “bread toss” where you threw a loaf of bread through different sized holes– if you got the bread through the smallest hole, you won a long loaf of bread (not the tossed bread, that’d be gross.) Blake won that, so that was cool! I also got a free shirt, plus we got coupons for free tacos at Rubio’s, free pizza, and free massages. And did I mention all the stuff at the booths was free? Aw, yeah.

Blake and I got to talk to a couple people, but the event was so packed it was actually pretty hard to ‘make’ friends. I’m looking forward to the smaller events Yelp throws to see if I can better get to know people.

All in all, a very successful Yelp event! Happy May Day, everyone!

Why did I attempt to make up my own recipe? One, I’ve always wanted to be one of those people who “experiments” in the kitchen. I’m envious of those who can see what’s on hand in the kitchen and make a delicious meal from it (my boyfriend is one of those people, which is great for using up old food, but he always shows me up! ) Two, since our Market on the Move trip, we’ve had a ton of tomatoes to use and I wanted to see if I could use the majority of them instead of freezing them.

What makes this southwest? The addition of some spicy ingredients… And, of course, because it was made here in the hot, wonderful, dry Southwest!

So without further ado, here is my monster creation!

Slow cooker Southwest Black Bean Chili

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 medium sized yellow onion
• 2 medium sized yellow bell peppers, seeded and chopped (you could probably use whatever bell peppers you have on hand– yellow is what we had!)
• 2 minced garlic cloves
• 2 tablespoons chili powder
• 28 ounces (ish) crushed tomatoes (I pureed about 28 ounces of all the tomatoes we had in a blender, but I know you can buy canned crushed tomatoes, and I believe they come in that size)
• 2 cans black beans (I used Eden Organic Black Beans)
• 1 cup water (you don’t need this if you use more tomatoes, like I did)
• 2 jalapenos (more if you want it hotter!) – seeded or not, it’s your call. I seeded one and kept the seeds in the other- spicy!
• salt
• black pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onion, bell peppers, garlic, and cook until softened (about 5 minutes). Stir in the chili powder and cook about 30 seconds to a minute longer.
2. Transfer onion mixture into a 4-6 qt. slow cooker (ours is a 4 qt., I believe). Make sure that you don’t fill it past 3/4s full, otherwise it could bubble over.
3. Add the tomatoes, beans, water, and jalapenos. Only add the water if you want it to be more soup-like, otherwise leave it out for a thicker, chili-like recipe.
4. Season with salt and pepper, cover, and cook on Low for 6 to 8 hours.

Want to make it chunkier? You can add some store-bought or homemade soy chorizo, like I did the next day for lunch, or you can cook up some plain couscous or quinoa and throw that in there to soak up some of the more ‘soup-like’ aspects of the chili.

Again, the great thing about slow cooker recipes is that you do all the work in the morning (or the night before, if you’re pressed for time in the mornings), throw it in the slow cooker for the hours you’ll be at work (most slow cooker recipes are 8 hours or so), and then you have dinner waiting for you when you get home!

I really want to investigate using the slow cooker for breakfast foods, and I also heard a rumor that slow cookers can make bread… say what? Stay tuned, I’ll keep you posted!