The Bacon Explosion

The Bacon Explosion. It's all over the web now, but WOW, I WANT THAT. I can't even begin to imagine all the sorts of cardiovascular diseases and impending surgeries I'd probably get from that, but I'd really love to try it.

I feel like such a hypocrite. I spent two years doing community outreach, trying to get Filipinos-Americans with hypertension to really watch out what they eat. And as difficult as the field is, I am considering cardiology as a specialty. Yet I can't get away from bacon. It's just too good. Well, according to my most recent blood tests, I do have really good levels of HDL and low levels of LDL. I like to use this as my excuse as to why it's ok for me to eat lots of bacon.

Um, no.

New pair of Keds Champions WMNS

Don't get me wrong. I LOVE the cardiovascular system, and there's nothing that fascinates me more than the human heart. I could point out every little part of the external and internal heart as well as its vasculature. But I don't want to see it on my toes. I find it interesting that they show the posterior view of the heart, which isn't the correct anatomical position. Just seems kind of weird for an image that's not in Netter's or some other gross anatomy textbook. Those are some ugly shoes.

This was today's dinner: Penne with Haricot Verts, Bacon, and Red Chili Flakes (obviously salt, pepper, garlic, and olive oil too). Haricot verts really does sound much nicer than green beans.

Trip to Roseau

This morning, a few of my friends and I went to Roseau. Every Saturday morning, Ross provides free shuttle service from campus to the main "city" in Dominica, which is an hour away. We left at 8:30am, got there at 9:30, and had to leave at noon. It doesn't sound like much time for a place that's an hour away, but there's really not much else to do and see in Roseau besides the grocery stores, Saturday morning market, and KFC. There probably are more things to see that I just don't know about.

I should have taken pictures of the scene, but my hands were constantly occupied with groceries. Our first stop was Rituals Coffee House, which is basically a bootleg Starbucks, but I actually feel like it's an upgraded version. They have smoothies, more pastries, and a decent selection of hot and cold sandwiches. It's actually a pretty nice place. I got an apple fritter, which was twice as good as the apple fritters at Starbucks. We ended up going back there after all our groceries, so that's when I got an egg, cheese, and bacon bagel sandwich - yes!!! Definitely not as good as a New York one though, but it'll pass. I also got a pineapple-coconut smoothie which was delicious.

We also went to the grocery store, IGA. It's not bad for Dominica standards. They sell a lot of American products that are surprisingly not TOO marked up. Everything there was definitely cheaper than the little "grocery stores" around here. By the way, for you Filipinos, the grocery stores around campus are about the equivalent of a Filipino grocery store back in the States, except they sell very little refrigerated/frozen goods. So I bought a small tuna filet. I really wanted to get some ground beef but didn't see any. I also picked up some other random things, like Hunt's diced tomatoes for my amatriciana that I'll be making for Valentine's Day, white rice, Pringles, etc.

After that, we went to the Saturday morning market. Everything there is so cheap and really fresh. I got some small onions which are really dirty, so I hope they're ok. I haven't cut one open yet to see how they are. I'm kind of mad though because after I bought those, I saw a ton more stands that had much bigger and better-looking onions. Next time I go to the market, I have to buy more "exotic" things rather than bananas, onions, and haricot verts.

Anyways, I'm hoping to go back to Roseau at least one more time before the semester ends. I want to try to spend less on food and cook more at home. Another goal for the semester is to do at least one island thing. There actually are a lot of places to visit and things to do on this island. You just have to go out of your way to do it. Not to mention, it's kinda hard to find people to do fun things with around here. Hopefully, people will come through this semester.

Happy 25th Birthday, Gabe!

Every year, I get really excited for Gabe's birthday, possibly because I've basically treated him every year since I met him. When he turned 20, I got him a chocolate cake from Jubilee the night he threw a party at Water St, which was on the eve of his birthday. It wasn't even a birthday party. In fact, none of us even knew it was his birthday except for one person who convinced me that it was and that I should buy Gabe a cake. Turned out he was right. When Gabe turned 21, I took him to Sushi Park. I know, so lame and so cheapy cheapy of me, but I just wanted to be low key and figured I'd pay wherever we decided to eat this one night when we hung out a few days before his birthday. The following year, I finally stepped it up and took him to a quality dinner he deserved at Babbo. When he turned 23, we went to Po. 24, I dropped mad money for a gluttonous omakase meal at Sushi Yasuda.

Today, Gabe turns 25, and I'm sad I cannot be in NY to celebrate with him. However, in honor of his birthday, I decided to cook a nice dinner (by Dominica standards) for myself tonight. It's hard to get a lot of ingredients in my area here, so I had to work with what I've got. I meant to buy a couple of veggies at the Shacks today but didn't see any that I wanted to use to make pasta, so I decided to just deal with what I have at home.

I used fully cooked Tyson chicken - the type of chicken that typically comes in cans to make chicken salad, except I bought bagged ones - it's much lighter and more packable than cans. I also used a strip of fully cooked bacon (thank God for fully cooked bacon!), and packaged pesto mix that I just had to mix with water and olive oil over the stove. All these ingredients made a pretty good pasta meal even though no components were made from scratch.

Anyways, I'm happy I cooked a worthy dinner in honor of Gabe's birthday even though we could not spend the day together. The next celebration apart will be Valentine's Day, and I'm even sadder to not be able to spend that day together. In honor of that, I plan on making some amatriciana (the guanciale pasta) - so excited!

HAPPY 25TH BIRTHDAY, B!

One week down

Week 1 of Semester 2 is over. It was kind of a rough week. Lots of headaches. No motivation. And well, I tripped and fell on the stairs the other day. It was pretty embarrassing. I honestly don't even know how that happened.

I've just felt so lazy this week. I'm glad it was a light week in terms of classes, but I feel like I should be using my time to really master this week's work and possibly get ahead because I know it's going to be a really difficult semester. Instead, I've been watching a lot of tv (CNN in particular) and browsing Etsy.

I've taken a liking towards 1ofmykind jewelry. I really love the antique look in this designer's jewelry. I particularly like this necklace:


I LOVE amethyst even though my birthstone is ruby. Amethyst symbolizes healing, calming, and protective nature, which seems a bit appropriate for me. However, I'm not sure if I want a chain as short as 15" and pendant as big as 2". Anyways, I think it's a beautiful necklace...so is all of this designer's jewelry.

Attempt to look half decent on this island

Believe it or not, I dressed way worse than this 1st semester. My goal is to look a little bit more acceptable even though no one cares here haha.

Tshirt: Dirty Violet
Cardigan: BDG (Urban Outfitters)
Jeans: Habitual (bought at Estreet in Highland Park, IL)
Flip flops: Old Navy (but I actually wore black Reef ones outside)

Because I think we look good together:

Me:
Cardigan: BDG (Urban Outfitters)
Top: Rogan for Target
Jeans: J-Brand
Skinny belt: Urban Outfitters
Necklace: Forever 21

Gabe:
Shirt: Comme des Garcons - Play Collection
Jeans: 5EP

Gabe totally wears way more expensive clothes than I do. :P

Currently skipping class

I'm skipping my first 2 hours of neuro right now. Not good considering I'm the girl who ALWAYS goes to class and refuses to Mediasite. But I am exhausted. Thanks to snow on the east coast and midwest, there were tons of delayed flights. I missed my connecting flight from Miami to San Juan Saturday night, but thankfully there was one seat left on the 6.55am flight to San Juan the next morning. This was key. If I couldn't get on that flight, then I probably wouldn't even be in Dominica yet. However, I had to spend the night at the Miami airport. It didn't seem worth it to spend at least $100 when I had to be at the airport at 5am the next morning anyways. Ugh, never spending the night at the airport again. It was so uncomfortable and FREEZING at that airport. I essentially pulled an all nighter, as I could not fall asleep at all.

Thankfully, I still made it to Dominica, but it's been a rough start. An hour after I got back to my apt, the electricity went out and the generator did not come on until an hour later. The Internet barely worked in spite of the newly installed fiber optics. So I took a 2 hour nap. Woke up with a headache. Went back to sleep. Woke up at 7am. Still had a headache. Went to the kitchen and found a million ants in the sink because I forgot to wash my plate last night. And now I'm not in class because my headache is killing me...but I can't sleep because I already just slept for 11 hours. UGH. I just wanna be back home already.

Hopefully, I'll make it to my 11am class...

Slumdog Millionaire

I saw Slumdog Millionaire with my siblings the other day, and it was AMAZING. Totally my kind of movie. GO SEE IT.

The Violet Hour

Last Friday night, Gabe and I went on a date to The Violet Hour in Wicker Park. It's a modern day speakeasy with some crazy cocktails and little bites to eat. The only way you'd know where it is if you know the the building number because there's absolutely no sign outside, and it actually looks boarded up. It seems very exclusive, and they have some funny house rules...

"No cell phones. No reservations. No standing. No jager bombs, car bombs, or bombs of any kind. No Grey Goose. No Cosmopolitans. Proper attire required."

Because of those house rules, I was kind of worried about it being pretentious, but I was surprised at how NICE everyone was. The bouncer, a big black guy, was so nice and soft spoken, kindly asked for our ID's, and even asked us if we had ever been there before. Our waitress was really sweet too. I kind of wished we sat at the bar so we could watch the bartenders in action and maybe even talk to them about the cocktails, but it was relaxing to sit in the huge Alice in Wonderland-esque chairs too.

Pictured above is my Juliet&Romeo made with Beefeater gin, mint, cucumber, and rose water. It must have been the best cocktail I have ever drank in my life. It was so smooth, and all the ingredients blended together perfectly. Gabe's first drink was a Dolce Maria, which is a rum-based drink. While it was also quite smooth and easy to drink, I could tell it was very strong from the one sip I had. Definitely a man's drink. Another crazy thing about The Violet Hour is that they have a dozen different kinds of ICE. Yeah, I'm not sure how that works. But Gabe had a single big hunk of ice in his drink. It looked nice, but I wasn't sure how it was different from your average ice. My second drink was The Riviera, made with pineapple infused Beefeater gin, lemon, egg white, and campari. It was sweeter because of the campari, but I like how the egg white adds texture. Gabe's second drink was Gilded Cage, which was a vodka based drink.

I definitely want to go back to The Violet Hour again. It's a good thing we came when we did because there was a line down the block once we left. Thankfully, we only had to wait 5 minutes. I loved the drinks, the atmosphere, the interior decor, and the service. There was something attractive about the bartenders too in spite of their facial hair. The wore nice vests and shook those cocktails up with style. Just ask Gabe. He knows how much I enjoyed watching them shake and stir. Yum!

P.S. Had croquette-sized fried banana-peanut butter bites with wildflower honey and bacon. Only $5. You can probably imagine how much I loved them.

Kicking off 2009

2009 kicked off so much better than I ever could have asked for. It was spent with good fun, family, food, and Gabe's visit! I spent New Year's with the ones I love, and that was all that mattered. We had most of the Roy side of the family over at our house. I hadn't seen my little nieces and nephews since July. They grow bigger and bigger every time. I think I'm going to be sad once they're not so little and cute anymore. One of my nieces, Gabby, is even taller than my now, and she's only 10. Sad.

New Year's Day was pretty restful, but my family, Gabe, and I had dinner at Blackbird Restaurant. I went there for my 23rd birthday over the summer and never got a chance to review it on my food blog, so stay tuned for an update on that.

As negative as this may sound, I'm pretty sure 2009 won't be my favorite year. Aside from a couple of 2 week vacations, the entire year will be spent in Dominica, finishing up the basic sciences of medical school. I feel like I JUST started medical school, so I guess it's pretty exciting to think that I could be finished with basic sciences in a year, but it certainly won't be easy. This year will definitely test my patience and endurance, but I think I can make it out fine. I just need to pass all of my courses, and I'm good. :)