So we may as well make beer bread

Mondays and Tuesdays make up our usual "weekend." It happens when you're in the tourism industry... But at any rate, we decided to devote this day off for adulting. Josh did lots of cleaning, and I worked on resumes for potential job postings (how's that for gender norms?).

Since days off seem so few and far between, I took the opportunity to do something I hadn't done in a long time: baking. When I lived in Indiana and was finishing up my degree, I had all the time in the world for baking. Usually it was just cookies, but I was a stress baker. I was also a fund-raising baker. And a bored baker. And a social baker for that matter. Come to think of it, I did a lot of baking... now that I'm working all the time, it's hard to decide to put apart the time for baking after work.

So now when I DO bake, I feel like I have to up my game. I opted to make beer bread this go round. I have made wheat bread and soda bread in the past, but this was a new adventure. I was excited to try it since I come from a long line of people who say, "just like Grandma used to buy" but my grandma had actually made beer bread before. It couldn't be *that* hard... I also had a PBR left over from Thanksgiving-- the favorite of Indie kids and elderly Midwesterners alike, and since it has a mild flavor, I figured it would be a great choice for a first attempt.

-3 1/2 cups of flour
-1 Tbs baking powder
-1 tsp salt
-3 Tbs sugar
-12 oz beer (any will do)
-1 beaten egg
-1/4 to 1/2 a stick of melted butter

Mix the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar in a large bowl (glass or metal will work best). Add the beer and egg, and mix well. Let the dough rest in the bowl. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Once the oven is heated up, scrape as much of the dough as you can into a greased loaf pan (I don't have a loaf pan, so I used a Dutch oven instead and floured the bottom. It didn't work as well getting the bread out, but it did give the bread a nice, rounded shape like old-fashioned breads. I think the next time, I'll just use a baking sheet covered in wax paper.). Bake for 50 minutes.

After that 50 minutes, remove the bread from the oven, and pour the melted butter over the top. Bake for an additional 5 to 10 minutes. Let the loaf cool on a wire rack.

This was one of the easiest things I have ever baked from scratch, and this will definitely become at least a bi-weekly tradition for us. 

Jerk Night

Dear Diary,
Remind me to find my camera because all good pseudo-lifestyle blog needs pictures of food...

Turns out, the more I compare notes about what the first year of marriage is like, the more I hear how normal it is to never see the person you're married to. Sure, that doesn't make it any easier, but it's nice to know we're not the only ones to play this game.

A few nights ago, I got off of work earlier than usual (4pm), and Josh did as well (which put him at 8pm). It was practically a no-brainer to decide to make a dinner that was out of the ordinary to celebrate him coming home before I was in bed. I opted for something semi-homemade that I hadn't made before. KABOBS!

I stopped by Publix, and I was lucky enough to find pre-made beef kabobs ready for cooking!(If you're planning on doing this yourself, of course, it was steak, green peppers, onions, and a tomato on either side of the skewer) The only issue was I had no idea if they had pre-seasoned the meat or anything, so I had to find some sort of bold spice mix. I proudly took my kabobs into the ethinic food aisle to figure out what kind of a dinner to make. Turns out, a Jamaican jerk sauce was on sale. As was Caribbean style 90 second rice. Done. The meal practically decided itself.

I didn't have a grill by any stretch of the imagination, so I used the grill side of our pizza stone, put it on the top rack of the oven, and left the broiler on high for 10 minutes. In that time, I was able to rub possibly too much jerk sauce all over the kabobs and let them sit for a while to soak up the flavors. After the 10 minutes, I put both kabobs onto the heated pizza stone and let them sit for 7 minutes on one side. I only flipped them a hundred and eighty degrees once to get grill marks on the other side and a more even cook, and I left them in the oven for another 7 minutes til the meat was 145 degrees all the way through. All in all, it made for a shockingly easy not-so-date night.

And grilled cheese for the journey...

So often in life, I find myself at a transition. Between jobs, between job satisfaction levels, between groups of interns, between crises, between goals, between homes... the list goes on, and it honestly will continue into my personal infinity.

Tonight, I find myself in transitions.

When you work in the tourism industry like I do, people do a lot of coming and going. And as soon as you really get to know someone, it feels like they're going somewhere else. I think of two interns this past semester in particular. You know that feeling you get when you can tell that someone is a kindred spirit? Both of them gave me that- and for very different reasons. Michelle has direct ties to my sense of happiness and how important it is to me that those around me are the happiest they can be. Heather has direct ties to my quiet sense of understanding. I will miss them both very much, but it helps knowing that they have more adventures ahead.

I'm also getting ready to visit my grandmother who is in the hospital. While yes, she is doing a lot better and will probably be back out soon, having a loved one be hospitalized IN ADDITION to being five states away tends to wear you down. Josh and I are going overnight to my hometown to see her. Hometown is a weird word for it, too, since any friends I had there have all gone, and I don't know what to do there besides visit a hospital. But I'm hoping that it will be a happier trip than expected. And maybe my trip to whatever sense of home there is there will help me remember why I like where I live and what I do now.

So here I am, on the couch with sounds of Josh making our adventure grilled cheeses before the journey. Every time we go somewhere by plane, he makes a grilled cheese with whatever fancy breads or cheeses we have lying around. Irish cheddar and Swiss tonight on ciabatta bread. I don't know where I would be without those grilled cheese sandwiches. The care he takes slicing the cheese and cutting the bread, making sure it's nicely toasted but not burnt, and how the cheese is gooey on the inside. It's just a sandwich, sure, but it always feels like his way of letting me know that even though we're going to be away from so many things I consider to be safe and home that there can be comfort and even joy in the adventure.

I got a fun compliment today!!

At my current job, I am only a supervisor probably once or twice a week. Honestly, it's one of my favorite things to do at work. I'm able to help my frontline coworkers resolve their day-to-day dilemmas, and I try to find ways to make everyone have a better day.

As I was walking back out from a break, I overheard one of the interns talking to our manager. "I think Elly's rubbing off on me. I've started giving everybody pep-talks!" I asked her what she meant. "Well, I've started noticing people and telling them when they're doing a good job." I guess I'm making more of an impact at work than I thought I was! Mini victories! If that's the way I'm rubbing off on somebody, I can feel proud of myself for what I do and how people view me.

And so it begins...

New Year's Eve came and went with hardly anything special happening. Josh worked all night, and I worked early. Even though it was our first married holiday season, I can't remember the last time things were this lonely.

Cassie and I decided to try blogging through the leap year cuz we can. Not necessarily anything fancy- just a thought for the day. It'll be a nice distraction at the very least while Josh is working nights. I'll be able to focus on myself and see how things are changing through the year.

So my daily adventure is overly New Year's-y. Normally, I don't do resolutions, so this year I'm trying something new for me.

I made a list of how I'm going to win 2016. I separated important parts of my life into five categories: Career, Personal, Financial, Relationship, and Friendships.

Career (A few ways to work towards a better job)
-Become a supervisor SOMEWHERE
-Do a job shadow at least every other month
-Pick 3 mentors (they have to have different leadership styles)
-Understand that I am a work in progress

Personal (How to be a happier, healthier me)
-Complete my name change by June
-Blog/journal once a week
-Exercise 3-5 days a week
-Read at least 30 minutes in the evenings
-Tidy up for 15 minutes every 2 days
-Meditate or spend some time inwardly focused every other day
-Practice my ukulele once a week at least
-Spend one night a week with immersive language practice
-Learn to nap
-Get a book style organizer
-Declutter once every 2 months at least

Financial (How to feel safer financially)
-Save $2000 more for the house fund
-Put 1/3 of my tax refund toward student loans and debt
-Give myself a $25 allowance per week
-Make a grocery list and stick to it

Relationship (How to take care of Josh and me)
-Have a nice sit-down dinner once a month (bonus points if it's homemade and we dress up)
-Write love notes
-Focus on encouragement and understanding
-More hugs and kisses!

 Friendships (How to take care of my friends)
-Encourage a friend once a week at least
-Have a monthly coffee date with somebody
-Do Bible study once a month at least
-Text someone who won't expect it at least once a month

The goal is to find things that I can actually accomplish and work towards over the course of the year. I want to feel stronger and braver this year. Welp, it's a start!

Sweet Dreams Are Made of Brie: Part 2 of a "What I Ate for Christmas" Series

Life gets busy this time of year. I watched a version of A Christmas Carol yesterday and couldn't help but laugh over the emphasis that Dickens put on not working on Christmas day. I shook my head and thought, "Nope. 8:15 to 5."

We are lucky enough, though, to live in an area where everyone seems to be away from their proper families. Somehow everyone ends up with a place to go at one of the "Heartwarming Orphan" holiday parties. Normally, Josh and I host one. This year, we were both a little too homesick to try distracting ourselves with hosting duties. Our friends Derek and Jess opened their apartment to us, and anyone else who needed to feel a sense of belonging. It was perfect.

I was asked to bring an appetizer, and with a 20 minute drive ahead of me, I wanted to make sure it was a fuss-free food. I made baked brie for the festivities. If the idea of baked brie intimidates you, don't let it. Think of it as oven-baked grilled cheese.

Ingredients:
-1 can of crescent roll dough
-1 or 2 Tbs of your favorite fruit preserves. I use apricot or blackberry (blackberry in this case).
-1 circle (that's a unit of measurement?) of brie cheese

Yep. That's all you need to make this. You may want to grease your baking sheet, but only a little.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Lay half of the crescent roll dough on your baking sheet or pan. Pinch together the rips and tears in the dough. Then place the brie on top of the dough.

Put your spoonful of preserves on top of the brie, and spread it around. Have fun with this step.

Fold the corners of the dough up towards the top of the brie. If you're like me and end up with extra dough, cover up any open spaces where the preserves may leak out. And of course, make crescent rolls out of the extra dough. Waste not, want not, and all that fun stuff. The crescent rolls will also help you gauge when the dough around the brie is ready. The crescents should look golden brown on top when you're finished.

Bake for 12 minutes, then check how the crescents look. If they're golden brown, your brie is ready. If not, wait another 2 minutes or so.

It looks like a super-charged dinner roll or biscuit. Considering it takes about 20 minutes total to make and only has three ingredients, it's a really simple appetizer. It's been a hit every time I've brought it to parties, so have fun with this one!

The finished product. It went really fast once we got to the party, too. It's a simple, vegetarian-friendly recipe that looks and tastes like a lot more effort than it really is. It's become something that my friends look forward to, and maybe it'll become a staple at your own festivities.

Let's Talk Turkey: Part 1 of a "What I Ate for Christmas" series

Christmas is only three short days away. Shopping is complete. Shipping is another story.

Josh and I are both working on Christmas, so hosting any sort of party-- let alone making a festive dinner would be a wash. We're going to a friend's house tomorrow, and we were asked to bring appetizers. On Christmas, there's a casserole contest at work, so that will be an adventure in and of itself. Knowing that there won't be much time for us to pause, reflect, celebrate quietly, or any of that homey stuff for the rest of the week, I decided to make our turkey today instead.

We were lucky and a little shocked that turkey hadn't been too difficult on Thanksgiving. Also around Thanksgiving, Publix supermarket had a sale on young turkey. 59 cents a pound? Unheard of. That was a LOT less than any other meat item-- and any other food item for that matter. So, like any thrifty girl with an extra day of holiday pay in her paycheck, I bought three turkeys! Haven't had to buy meat since.

Looks pretty tasty, right? It still has about an hour and fifteen minutes left to go before it's ready, but it smells DELICIOUS!

Ingredients:
-Turkey
-A stick of butter
-A roughly sliced red delicious apple
-Half of a roughly sliced large onion
-2 Tbs. ground cinnamon
-2 Tbs. herbs de provence OR 3 springs each of sage and thyme
-A cup of water

The turkey itself is about 10 lbs. First thing's first. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Cover the turkey skin with a stick of butter. You can certainly use less butter if you feel like it.

After cutting up the apple and onion, put the pieces in a microwave safe bowl. Then add the spices. Cover all of these lovely things with water. I know I said a cup, but really, just cover the contents so they are all submerged. Microwave for 5 minutes. Pour all of this (water included) into the turkey-- basically, instead of stuffing.

Put the turkey in the oven for 45 minutes (do this no matter the size of the turkey). After 45 minutes, put a thermometer in the turkey leg (make sure you don't touch the bone), and check the temperature. This will give you an idea how much time to leave the turkey in the oven. The end-game temperature is 160.

Lower the temperature to 350 degrees F. Expect to leave the turkey in the oven for about 2 hours. Make sure that the juices run clear and that the finished temperature is 160 degrees F as mentioned earlier. Put a tin foil tent over the turkey for 15 minutes to ensure that everything settles and cures properly. Enjoy!

On that note, we're going to watch A Christmas Story while turkey finishes cooking. Josh just said, "It smells like Christmas!" and you know something, it really does.