Bife Milanesa

So continuing on with the Birthday celebrations for my mom I made her favorite foods. All Brazilian of course. I made black beans, white rice, couve, sliced tomatoes with olive oil drizzled on top of them, and her favorite Bife Milanesa. Which is basically fried beef steak.

So this is what you'll need to make it:

4 Thin steaks
2 eggs
flour
breadcrumbs
oil for frying (I use vegetable oil, sometimes vegtable and olive oil mixed together)
pepper and salt

Take out the steaks and put them on your cutting board. Using a tenderizing mallet beat them senseless....ya I know that sentence made no sense at all, the steaks are dead I know, but I liked typing it.

Then take the steaks and sprinkle salt and pepper and coat them in the flour.

Take your two eggs, crack them open and beat them with a fork. Dip your steak into the egg mixture then coat it with the bread crumbs.

In a small frying pan, put in the oil and heat it up. When it's ready cook one steak at a time.
To test the readiness of the oil you can drop some breadcrumbs into it. If they float up it's ready to go : )

The steaks will cook really fast, seriously I'd say under 4 minutes, so don't take your eyes off them and turn it once. They'll look nice and golden brown.

Also a note on the breading. My mom is a personal fan of using american style breadcrumbs with italian seasoning. It is really tastey. My personal preference though is using panko. But that's up to you.

Here's the finished plate for my mom's birthday dinner : )

Instructional Youtube video to come soon! I took so many pictures while making this.
Also recipes to come with youtube videos:
1) Bife com cebola, beef with onion
2) Couve, sauteed collard greens, (pictured up top)

Birthday Cake!

So today is my mom's birthday. I decided to make her a cake : )

I used a Duncan Hines instant cake mix, I chose French Vanilla.
To top it I used heavy whipping cream and made obviously whipped cream ; )
In the middle of the two layers of cake is tapioca pudding.
I decorated it with strawberries which I cut to look like little flowers. All in all I think it's pretty cute.

To make the whipped cream all you need is:
2 pints of whipping cream
sugar and vanilla extract to taste
Using a mixer whip the cream into glorious submission adding vanilla and sugar gradually.
You can cheat and put the mixer on high that forms it pretty fast but I tried to do it slowly I think it takes longer to break down that way : )
I didn't over sweeten the whipped cream since I believe whipped cream should be a very light and airy treat not over powering

Obviously after decorating the cake it went straight into the fridge for safety : )
I also had way too much whipped cream left...and of course tons of strawberries so I mixed it all together until the concoction turned a light pink color. It's a nice tastey summer treat if you don't want to have that cake.

We had the cake today after it chilled in the fridge. I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out taste wise. It was light and you didn't get that over powering sugary taste you get with other cakes....I seriously feel like I didn't have cake, which is dangerous because then you could eat way more than you originally planned hehe.

I hope you try it yourself
I sure had fun making it

Here's a link to the youtube video for it :   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-17nenzCzI&feature=channel_video_title

Scary Cute...Not

Hi!

Ok here's my review of scary cute by Annie Obaachan. Well superficial review since I didn't really go in depth and crochet some of the patterns. So please just take this into consideration. I'm personally hoping my mind will change and I will actually come to like this book, i repeat HOPING.

 Well first I was hoping for better monsters. These supposedly cuddly scary but cute creatures are far from what I was hoping. I actually only like two of the patterns. The others look like the author got rather bored and had no actual inspiration to create a creature that resembled a monster. One example is called Special E.T. (photos to come in the future) looks like a deformed dog toy where it's head barely resembed the shape of E.T.'s...then again maybe that's why they called him "special." In my opinion if you want to learn how to make different crochet shapes this is an ok book for a beginner to look off from, but to actually purchase and say "hey look at this monster I made"...well to be polite that's a different story... although I do admit they would be rather child friendly so they won't get scared. Yet I'm still in pain over the fact I paid $20 for this. Once again I remain in hope that I might in time like this book.

But if you do like the funky shaped monsters seriously buy and give it a try. Annie Obaachan actually does give a good description on how to crochet and build these things.

So ya there's my superficial review/rant on the book Scary Cute by Annie Obaachan. I'll see if I can post some pictures from the book later...problem is I just can't seem to find my camera...major problem....

Grelly Bean

Hi!

*singing to self (using the song Lollipop)* Grelly Bean Grelly Bean oh Grelly Grelly Grelly Grelly Bean Grelly Bean buh dum dum dum

I'm proud to post my very first, ever original no copycatting amigurumi EVER! I present to you Grell Sutcliffe from the ever popular Anime and Manga Kuroshitsuji aka Black Butler



I'm very proud of him. I'm planning to make a better quality one to sell on etsy. He'll also have a pal. I'm going to make a kitty Sebastien, that's right a Sebastien Michaelis with cute little cat ears ^^

Once again your thoughts?

Kero

Hi AGAIN!

Here's a picture of one of my first amigurumi attempts. The pattern came from cutoutandkeep.net The creator's name is Saa-Chan here's the link:  http://www.cutoutandkeep.net/projects/kerochan_amigurumi

I actually created a Suppi-Chan pattern to match him..sadly I was an idiot and didn't completely write it down, my friend actually has the prototype I gave it to her for her birthday. But I'll try again ^^ Because I know I could have done better.



Let me know what you think!

Sick Tips

So yea I've been sick since saturday, March 19th...bleh. What felt like just a head cold turned out to be a sinus infection trying to turn itself into bronchitis. Sadly missed three days of work...I know it's strange to say sadly over missing work but I like my job so ya it was sad. I did pretty much nothing but hibernate and attempt to do some crochet, ya total fail on the crochet part. But I would like to give people some ideas on how to fix yourself up when you're sick.

One:

Breathe Right strips are awesome in helping you breathe at night when you're all clogged up with mucus.

Two:

Vapor Rub is a God send

Three:

Don't be stupid, rest and sleep as much as you can.

Four:

Drink lots of fluids, although juice and sodas are great and can help make your throat feel better, water is the best way to go. Try keeping like a gallon around you all day, but to keep germs from growing in the bottle I suggest pouring the water into a cup instead of drinking directly from the jug.

Five:

Take your multi-vitamin with an extra vitamin C tablet, gotta help yourself get strong again.

Six:

Chicken soup is cliche but oh so useful, not a chicken fan? Then how about some nice alphabet soup.

Seven:

You're sick but it's no excuse to be dirty. Keep taking your warm (..not scalding hot) showers, it can help lower your temperature and help kill the germs that are on you, hey you know they're there after you blew them all out of your nose or hacked them up, don't fool yourself they're there and you know it.

Eight:

Learn that generic tissues are the same as kleenex or puffs, might as well save a few cents while you're sick right? Although if you like those vicks tissues from puffs get them I've yet to find a generic with that.

Nine:

Try not to pass it on to the other members of the household...granted I always fail at this part, as my dad says "I know you love me but please don't share EVERYTHING"...ya sorry dad ^^;

Ten:

If you have a temperature higher than 100 degrees and are just miserable seriously don't wait it out go to the doctor. Reason is you'll find out what you have, second you'll find out how to treat it, and three it'll also help you catch serious problems quickly. You don't want what seems like the simple flu to turn out to be pneumonia, no one wants hospitalized!

Eleven:

If dealing with sick children it's always safer to get them to the doctor as soon as you can.

I hope this helps some people. I know a lot of people know what to do when they're sick but since I got sick I thought it'd be a good idea to try and share some things : )

Also a few extra tips would be if you have a sore throat I would suggest gargling with warm water and some salt. Warm water and some vinegar is pretty good too, in my family we tend to use red wine vinegar. It helps soothe your throat and kill some of the germs : )

Ok, hope to get a recipe out this week for everyone...does anyone read this thing??
Bye!

Granny Square!

Hi again!

I found a picture of my first granny square where I switched colors. I'm still terrible at it hehe. The pattern came from the crochet magazine: Interweaver Crochet, it was in the 2010 winter edition. I just loved this pattern I had to try it out. My mom is trying to convince me I should make a blanket out of it. I'm not sure yet but i is tempting, maybe after a little extra practice. And yes I know I'm in my pajamas but eh, I was comfy.



Ok so for this pattern it required a size I/9 (5.5mm) crochet hook, I used one that was a bit bigger. I'm afraid to post the pattern due to copyright but I'll see if I can do that in the future. So what do you think?