I’m deep in the depths of packing and move preparations but I couldn’t let Benji’s birthday pass without a post! I also have some recent eats for you so keep on reading.
BENJI’S FIRST BIRTHDAY!
Today is Benji’s first birthday! It’s also his five month anniversary of joining our little family! I adopted Benji on February 29, 2020 from Triad Golden Retriever Rescue. You can read his adoption story in this post.
After five months of life with Benji, I am amazed by how well he has integrated and adjusted. It wasn’t without challenges but overall I couldn’t ask for a better dog for our family. Working with Keen Dog Training and enrolling Benji in their immersion program was hugely helpful in that 1) I didn’t have experience with a dog who had nervous, anxious and timid tendencies and 2) I didn’t have the bandwidth to train a puppy the way that he deserved. It was an excellent investment and I’m awed every day by how well Benji continues to do post-training. I cannot recommend the team at Keen Dog enough. I can write a post just about the training immersion if you guys are interested.
Benji loves me. He’s super attached to me and it is so, so sweet. He is very affectionate and snuggly. He’s always close by. Benji also loves Zoey and they are rarely in different rooms. They play together and get along very well. Benji is great with Finn. If Benji is not right next to me it’s because he’s watching over Finn. I often find him upstairs outside of Finn’s door while he’s napping.
We love Benji and are so happy to be his FOREVER home! 🙂 Thanks to Deeana Kortney Photography for capturing these photos.
RECENT EATS
I’ve got 20 photos edited for recent eats so we’ll see how far I get before this post becomes a novel. I got myself back into somewhat of a cooking groove during the latter half of my mom’s time in Charlotte.
BREAKFAST
Carrot maple oat banana bread with scrambled eggs and fruit.
FAGE Total plain 5% with Purely Elizabeth original granola, bananas, strawberries, blueberries, dried cranberries and Wild Friends peanut butter.
Cottage cheese scrambled eggs and fruit.
LUNCH
It has been so hot and humid in Charlotte for the past couple of weeks. Smoothie bowls have been hitting the spot for lunch. This is frozen cherries, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, bananas, cauliflower rice, plain greek yogurt, peanut butter, a date and oat milk.
When I’m not eating smoothie bowls for lunch, I’m having tomato sandwiches! I got some great tomatoes at the farmers market last week (and peaches that are to die for). Y’all know I am a purist with my tomato sandwiches. Tomatoes, Duke’s mayo and sea salt on soft bread. I did get a little fancy this week and add basil from my basil plant.
DINNER
We always do Thai takeout when my mom is in town! We shared shrimp pad Thai and green coconut curry with chicken and veggies. This was from Aroy.
This was a clean out the freezer dinner that turned out unexpectedly delicious. I defrosted a piece of wild alaskan cod from Sitka Salmon Shares and cooked some frozen spanakopita that I bought at Whole Foods. I had a salad on the side. Both the fish and spanakopita were so yummy! I will definitely buy the spanakopita again!
Super simple dinner of rotisserie chicken, a baked sweet potato and brussels sprouts.
This dinner looks fancy but was ready in under 20 minutes. Pan-seared scallops with a simple pan sauce along with parmesan couscous and steamed green beans.
Gorgonzola gnocchi with Italian sausage, artichokes and mushrooms and a side salad.
I had a pound of ground beef and a pound of ground pork in my freezer that I needed to use. I had been craving Swedish meatballs for some reason so they were an excellent use for the meat I had on hand. I used this recipe for the meatballs and overall it was pretty good. My sauce could have used some improvement but the flavor of the meatballs was great. I served them over rice with steamed broccoli on the side. My mom doesn’t love roasted broccoli so I steamed it for her and it was a nice change of broccoli pace, haha. 🙂
This dinner was so good that I’ve made it twice in a week…once for my mom and once for Dorie. Shrimp tacos with cilantro lime crema and avocado along with a chopped salad kit and fresh corn. The tacos are super simple. I just sautéed shrimp with Dizzy Pig’s Peruvian-ish rub and served it on corn tortillas with the crema, avocado and chopped cilantro. The crema is what really pulls the taco together. It’s so good that I think I could just eat it by the spoonful. I mix together plain greek yogurt, mayo, lime zest, lime juice and sea salt.
The final dinner I made for my mom was bone-in pork chops from a local farmer friend (again, trying to clean out the freezer) along with sliced tomatoes and sautéed squash, sweet onions and eggplant.
DESSERT
My dessert game is always strong but it’s extra when my mom is in town! 🙂
We made a trip to Villani’s where my mom got the Italian cream cake and I got the lemon blueberry cheesecake.
Ice cream with chopped up baklava. If you’ve never tried baklava on your ice cream, it’s delicious! I learned this at our local Greek festival where they serve baklava sundae’s.
Finally, on my mom’s last night in town I made a peach and blueberry crisp with fresh fruit from the farmers market. I used this recipe from the ARCHIVES of my first food blog!
QUESTIONS
Which of my three desserts photos would you pick? Villani’s, the baklava sundae or the crisp?
What have you been eating for lunch lately? And have you been cooking any summery things for dinner?
What’s your favorite taco filling?
I’ve been doing lots of big salads in this hot, hot California heatwave. My favorite lately has been blackened salmon over a big caesar salad. Also made your veggie packed turkey meatloaf this week and it was a total hit! I used some sriracha BBQ sauce from TJs on top instead of the glaze and it was delicious!
Your tomato sandwiches always look so good! Have you ever tried a pimento cheese and tomato sandwich? It’s DELICIOUS! (Bonus points to cook it like a grilled cheese, but equally good as a “normal” sandwich.)
Happy birthday to Benji! Seems like ages ago that you got him as we were living in a different world in late Feb! I”m glad he has fit in so well!
For lunches, I have been living on leftovers. When I worked in the office, I would eat leftover 4 days/week and get lunch one day/week. But now I eat leftovers pretty much 5 days/week. But I also make a little side salad for myself when I get hungry around 9:30-10. One nice perk of working from home is that no one comments on when or what I eat. If I ate a salad at 10am in the office, I would get so many comments from coworkers!
Favorite taco filling is so hard! At home, it’s probably shrimp with sauteed peppers and onions. At an authentic Mexican place, it’s definitely carnitas! Yum!
I LOVE the baklava sundaes from the Greek festival! The first couple years I didn’t really see what the big deal was and just got the regular baklava from the dessert tent, but I finally tried a sundae and will never go back! I’m so sad they had to cancel this year but I know it’s for the best. Looking forward to next year!
Ooh, that baklava on ice cream looks soooo good! I love baklava.
I eat leftovers a lot for lunch, but I also make sweet potato burrito bowls a lot (rice, beans, roasted sweet potatoes, roasted red peppers and onions, avocado and tahini dressing). My other fave lunch is an open-faced sandwich with tomato, basil, mozzarella and avocado. So summery and a good way to use some of the basil in my herb garden!
Oh, and favorite taco filling is probably spicy black beans! I also make a really good honey-lime sweet potato black bean filling, it makes a good burrito bowl or taco filling!
I’d love to try the baklava over ice cream, yum! My fav lunch dish lately is broccoli slaw mixed with mashed avocado, lime, cilantro and jalapeño then topped with shredded chicken. Fav taco filling is grilled shrimp!
Happy Birthday Benji! You found an awesome family for your forever home 🙂
Congrats on the new house! So excited for all of you to have a place of your own to make memories for years to come.
It’s hard to choose a taco filling. My faves are asada, carnitas, and grilled fish. Lunches have been mainly leftovers with a few frozen meals, sandwiches, and salads mixed in. Dinner has been a lot of grilling as it doesn’t heat up the house!
The crisp. The crisp looks so good! We were doing whole 30 this last month, and I was digging the buffalo chicken in cauliflower and sweet potato bowl. Drizzle on that some Whole30 ranch dressing. My favorite taco topping is definitely sliced avocados!
Hi Jen:
About two months ago, you made a couple of posts on Black Lives Matter, your actions and reading, and how you wanted to “talk more” about these topics. I will be honest – as a POC reader, I haven’t seen a lot of that “talking more” here, it has feel basically business as usual past the same posts that every influencer and blogger made at that time about how they were reading and learning. I know you said you appreciated the accountability that others provided you when the protests began so this question comes from that place – what exactly have you been doing since those posts to use your platform and popularity for social justice? What are your plans we can hold you accountable for?
Denada
I would go for the italian cake!
Hi Jen – I submitted a comment asking for accountability for the work you have been doing on social justice issues a couple of days ago. You didn’t approve it which is disappointing and silencing. I’m a poc reader so am asking again – what have you been doing past the initial reading and learning on supporting people of colour that you were doing two months ago?
Hi Denada – I have been moving this week and haven’t had Internet service until now. I haven’t logged into the back-end of my blog in several days to check comments (this is also why I haven’t written a new post since this one last Friday!). All comments from new email addresses are held in moderation, it had nothing to do with the content of your comment. I’ll address the question in an upcoming post, and appreciate the accountability very much. Thank you Denada!
Your food always looks SO good! I’ve been in a meal rut lately. Just random protein and veg thrown together for lunch. We have been grilling as much as possible, eating local shrimp, burgers, grilled zucchini and squash. I need some good BBQ takeout from Lewis downtown. 🙂
Your baklava makes me miss my Baba’s baklava. It’s been forever since I’ve had it. That crisp looks so good. Fave taco filling? Gosh, depends on my mood. Lately, it’s been pan seared barramundi with a cilantro lime slaw.