Archive for July, 2006
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fun afternoon with rueda.
By Karen | Monday, July 31st, 2006 | No Comments »
When Kurt and I lived in Winnipeg and took salsa lessons, part of the advanced course was to learn a bit of rueda (wheel) salsa. Think of it as Latin square dancing: several couples form a circle and a caller is selected to shout out the different patterns to execute. It’s fast-paced and very exciting to be a part of. Unfortunately, rueda is not common on the salsa scene in Vancouver.
That being said, it was my privilege to be dragged into a couple of rueda dances at the Robson Sqaure dance on Sunday. It was the same set of kids from New West that had been taught by Peter (you may recall the video I took of them earlier). Not having done this for a few years, the first few minutes of the first song were very confusing. Obstacle #1: the calls are always in Spanish. Obstacle #2: the calls they were yelling out were mostly unfamiliar, like jumping in the air clapping and yelling, or squatting to the floor and slapping it with your hand. Obstacle #3: some of the leads didn’t know a few of the calls either!
Thank goodness for Spanish lessons! I eventually figured out the new moves and began to really enjoy the dance. For any of you salsaseros that haven’t tried rueda yet, you should totally try getting into the circle next Sunday.
Below is Peter’s rueda dance from a few weeks back:
balsamic strawberries with whipped mascarpone cheese.
By Karen | Sunday, July 30th, 2006 | No Comments »
Whenever I feel like trying a new dessert with ingredients that are in season, I tend to visit La Tartine Gourmande’s blog or epicurious.com for inspiration. It’s also a little easier to type in “strawberries” and “mascarpone” in their search boxes than to scour our cookbooks one by one.
Strawberries were on sale downstairs as I gathered ingredients for Kurt’s smokie and caesar salad dinner. Once again, impulse shopping hit! I remembered that La Tartine Gourmande had a great recipe involving mascarpone, so I grabbed a tub of that, too. Unfortunately, it also required coconut and yogurt, and someone was a little too lazy to go back to Nestor’s tonight.
Epicurious.com saved the day with this great recipe where you marinate the strawberries in a balsamic vinegar reduction and serve it with a whip of heavy cream and mascarpone. I was a little wary of the balsamic vinegar part of it but figured it was worth a shot.
After 10 minutes of prep, 30 minutes (during dinner) of chilling, and 5 minutes of presentation planning, this is how it came out:
The tang of the balsamic strawberries paired very nicely with the sweetness and richness of the mascarpone and whipped cream. This is definitely a dessert I’d serve for company…maybe for Jonny and Jane when they’re in town next weekend. We’ll see!
If you like, view the full Flickr photoset. We cooked up a storm this past week, so check out the other food-related photosets listed down the side of my Flickr homepage.
trying to contact me?
By Karen | Sunday, July 30th, 2006 | No Comments »
Some of you have mentioned that you have emailed me using the address “on my website”. I’m guessing you mean info@karenclement.ca or info@karenhamilton.ca. These forward to my real email (well, they should…) but your attempts may have been blocked by my spam filter. Please re-send to my real email, which i don’t like posting as a link online. Take my first name and my new surname, no spaces, and tack “@alumni.sfu.ca” to the end of it. Click send. And hopefully it’ll reach me this time!
more sunday afternoon salsa.
By Karen | Monday, July 17th, 2006 | No Comments »
Raf and I made it out to the free Sunday salsa at Robson Square this weekend, and this time I was armed with my trusty Canon S2. I’m in the middle of uploading the videos to youtube, so in the meantime, please enjoy the photos on Flickr. Below are some highlights.
Raf decides to be a goof:
- Peter and his students do an impromptu rueda
- Raf and Yvonne dance it up
- Vinod and Gia dance it up
- Laureano and partner dance it up
wednesday salsa folks.
By Karen | Thursday, July 13th, 2006 | No Comments »
Raf, Bruce, and I went to visiting LA instructor Josie Neglia’s salsa workshop, hosted by Urban Beat Dance Co. Some interesting combo patterns later, the usual salsa mixer started up, and this time I had my camera handy. Besides the video clip of my salsa dance with Vinod, we stuck to say-cheese shots with the guys that I normally hang out with on Wednesdays.
Click on each photo for commentary.
Jason:
a bunch of new photos.
By Karen | Tuesday, July 11th, 2006 | No Comments »
I’m too lazy to write full posts about each of these new photosets, so you’ll have to make do with this snapshot of new additions. Our official wedding photos from Curtis are now up, as well as the pics that Becky emailed. There are a few shots of Raf’s beagle Macie. The rest, of course, are dedicated to food.
Click on the image to go to the full list of my Flickr photosets.
evaluating Buy the Bunch.
By Karen | Thursday, July 6th, 2006 | No Comments »
Quincy’s wedding is coming up soon and they are looking for a florist, so here is an evaluation of our florist, Buy the Bunch, plus pics of our florist’s arrangements.
We loved the simplicity and elegance of the flowers by Buy the Bunch. We were also lucky the day my cousin and I visited Sam’s store on Main and 28th. He had a wedding that same afternoon, with bridesmaid and groomsmen’s flowers already set up in his fridge. I kid you not–the groomsmen’s flowers were exactly what I had in mind: a single cream rose with “manly” greens. The bouquet for the bridesmaid was elegant and in line with the Martha Stewart-y look we were searching for.
After a quick chat, we asked for 5 bridal bouquets, the 11 boutonnieres, and two orchid corsages for my grandmother and my mother-in-law. Sam threw in a bag each of fresh cream and burgundy rose petals, plus another corsage for my aunt, who happens to work with his wife (small world!). After booking the date, we didn’t have to do a thing until we paid in full, two weeks prior.
A week before the wedding, my bridesmaid fell ill and couldn’t make it. Sam was very understanding, and was flexible enough to transfer the cost of her bouquet into a gorgeous (really, just stunning!) cake topper for the wedding cake that my mother-in-law baked. He even called me on my cell phone to confirm the changes with me personally, just in case my mother-in-law’s request to him was unbeknownst to me.
My cousin picked up the flowers the morning of the wedding, and the flowers were ready to go and very sturdily packaged for easy transport. The four bouquets each came in a clear vase within its own white box, and came in handy during the reception to decorate the head table.
The flowers came nowhere near to wilting throughout the day. They were almost indestructible–if not for the catfight that was the bouquet toss, or for my brothers-in-law piggy-backing each other during the formal portraits, the roses would have had no chance of moving around in their arrangement. We were even able to use one of the bridesmaid bouquets on the following day, to make the brunch table festive during the gift opening party.
Yes, I’m gushing, but I firmly believe that Buy the Bunch was worth every penny!
Below are the thumbnails…click through for notes I drew onto the photos, and view the “large” or “original” photo to zoom in.
My bouquet–burgundy roses with white jasmine-like accent flowers and pearls (I was wearing pearls that day, but I don’t think Sam knew that):
The bridesmaids’ bouquet, a simple arrangement of cream roses with a silk and pearl wrap:
The transport vases came in handy to transform the bouquets the head table centrepieces:
The roses were still gorgeous the following day:
The bouttonieres, a cream rose with leaves and pearl accent:
My mother-in-law and grandmothers’ corsages, pink and cream orchids:
The absolutely fantastic cake topper:
My mother-in-law recycled her corsage to decorate the other tiers of the cake. What beautiful orchids!
What do you think?
recent home-cooked jaunts.
By Karen | Tuesday, July 4th, 2006 | No Comments »
In an effort to minimize cash flow incidents after the massive wedding and honeymoon expenditures, Kurt and I have been experimenting with our new kitchen gadgets. Here are some of our successes and not-quite-there-yet attempts.
Yummy and super-easy peas with shallots and prosciutto:
Homemade BBQ sauce with lots of rosemary-flavoured goodies:
Light-as-air chocolate meringues:
Peanut butter swirl brownies:
For the brownies, the peanut butter was so rich that it didn’t need all the salt and sugar that the recipe required. We probably could have taken it out of the oven a little sooner, to keep more moisture inside and prevent crumbling. It is supposed to be fudgy, after all–6 freakin’ ounces of dark chocolate!
celebrating bruce’s birthday at guu.
By Karen | Tuesday, July 4th, 2006 | No Comments »
Bruce would never tell you himself, but it was his birthday a few weeks ago, and to celebrate we went to Guu on Thurlow. All the lip-smacking food stuffs on Flickr. Non-food highlights below.
Gutter-minded menu? Or gutter-minded Bruce? Click the photo to decide.
My only successful attempt to capture flambé out of 50 shots:
celebrating june birthdays at reylar’s.
By Karen | Tuesday, July 4th, 2006 | No Comments »
Finally got around to editing the footage of my family’s live-band escapade at Reylar’s Filipino Restaurant. We had the whole place to ourselves in order to stuff ourselves and jam it up without the neighbours complaining. Below are the highlights. For the full photoset, visit the photo album on Flickr.
Video footage (larger view):
Tita Shirley hard at work:
Tito Edwin and Tita Tess being silly:
Mark and Shawn being too-cool-for-you:
The closest I got to the food with my camera:
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