Amy's Ice Cream + Green Chile Mac

There are many things I love about my work trips to Austin, but these are two edible delights I look forward to on every trip. The first is Amy's Ice Cream, a local shop in South Congress that they also happen to have at the airport. The all natural goodness comes with hot fudge sauce that is to die for. Last month they had Girl Scout cookie Thin Mints to mix in. OMG.

The second thing I love to eat in Austin is the green chile mac and cheese at the Roaring Fork. It's the restaurant in the hotel that I usually stay at, so I was not expecting much. Most of the stuff on the menu is pretty meat-heavy but I tried this with a salad and it was the shiz. Creamy, crispy bread crumbed, slightly spicy, amazing mac and cheese. I get it nearly every trip now, it's so good.

Crockpot Dog Food

Sometime last year one of our dogs was having joint issues and our vet recommended we start making their food in a crock pot. I originally balked at the idea, thinking it would be expensive and time consuming. Turns out it is pretty relaxing and the dogs LOVE it. Plus Toady lost 11 lbs. after eating it! We mix it with a little dry food twice a day. It also sort of got me thinking about how much crap is in the food that I eat and how I should be eating more whole foods and less processed junk. I mean it seems pretty simple, right?

Here is the original recipe from Sun Dog Cat Moon Vet on Johns Island.

Palm Beach

I was cleaning photos off of my cell phone and decided to post some of the ones that I want to remember. This was from a work trip to Del Ray Beach last summer. I had some time to kill before taking the car back to the airport, so I drove out to West Palm Beach. The water was ridiculously pretty, and on the way back to town I found some great shopping at City Place (and some great Thai food). I love getting paid to travel!

Huevos Rancheros

I didn't eat Mexican much until my husband introduced me to it years ago. Now I LOVE it. Huevos Rancheros has become a standard for us, but this time I mixed it up with pinto beans and additional veggies. Mmm-mmm good!

Butternut Squash Ravioli

I decided to be adventurous and make a big meal from scratch. First thing was caramelizing about half of a red onion. Used this easy guide on All Recipes and they turned out very tasty.

The next step was to make the actual raviolis, once the dough was rolled out. I just cut little squares with a knife and mixed up some butternut squash, ricotta, mozzarella and salt/pepper to use as the filling.

Next I made a sage pesto. I think I'd add more sage next time, but I basically mixed up fresh sage, olive oil, walnuts, and parmesan in a food processor for the sauce.

The finished dinner--butternut squash ravioli with sage pesto, caramelized onions, goat cheese and arugula!

And since there was a lot of dough left, I decided to make some spaghetti noodles to freeze for later :).

Roasted Root Veggies

One of my professors made a comment about roasting up some root veggies and it sounded like a great idea. It seems so simple and yet I've never quite gotten the results I wanted. So I looked up a basic recipe and they turned out soooo good. I added rosemary and thyme to mine and used coarse sea salt. Delish!

I started with this Food Network recipe and tweaked it just a bit.

Ingredients
1 large sweet potato, peeled
1 cup of mixed baby potatoes (fingerlings, purple, etc.)
2 medium beets, scrubbed and tops trimmed
1 large carrot, peeled
1 large parsnip, peeled
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Rosemary and thyme

Directions
Place a large baking sheet in the oven and preheat to 425 degrees F.

Cut all the vegetables into 1 1/2-inch pieces. Toss all the vegetables with garlic, olive oil and salt in large bowl. Season generously with pepper, rosemary, and thyme.

Carefully remove the heated baking sheets from the oven, brush or drizzle with olive oil. Divide the vegetables evenly, spreading them out to assure they don't steam while roasting. Roast the vegetables until tender and golden brown, stirring occasionally, about 45 minutes to 1 hour.

And here is the final product, yum!

The Harlem Shake

I can't resist a good Internet trend, so today at practice our kids did the "Harlem Shake." A few other variations that I enjoy are the Super Mario version and the UGA Swim Team version. Even when things are stressful, little silly things like this can make it all okay :).