Buddha Bellies

New Year Lunch

2012-01-27T10:11:00.000-08:00

After a great Vietnamese dinner on Tet's New Year Day Evening, we decided to follow it up with a nice lunch the following day at Ping Restaurant in Portland's Old Town. It was a particularly rainy day and a nice bowl of spicy noodles was what we were craving. From the outside with it's frosty windows and dark frame it almost looked like Ping was closed, but once we stepped inside the warm wood and smells from the open kitchen made us so glad they weren't.

We were on the search for some noodles and ordered a dry noodle dish and a brothy noodle dish. The kuaytiaw khua kai (wide rice noodles stir-fried in rendered pork fat with chicken, cuttlefish, duck egg and green onions, served on chopped lettuce, a bangkok chinatown speciality) was charry, smokey, light and refreshing. A really nice noodle lunch choice.

We decided on the brothy laksa nonya (cocnonut curry rice noodle soup with tofu, chicken, prawns, cockles, boiled egg, house made fish cake, bean sprouts, laksa leaf, shredded cucumber and house made sambal belacan. melaka/singapore version of the famous malaysian noodle dish). In a previous post we lamented about how Portland doesn't have great Thai food and it definitely doesn't have very diverse asian food outside of your typical Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese and Indian. It was nice to see a Malaysian dish represented on Portland's dining scene. Ping's version was very satisfying with chewy round rice noodles we typically see in Vietnamese's Bun Bo Hue.

Ping was definitely worth the trip downtown for its cozy warming atmosphere and food. The prices were a bit high for what you get. Are duck eggs really that much different and worth a few bucks more? Packaged Thai raman brand Mama gussed up with their own fancy broth was hard to selected for $9. We are undecided, but we will be back to try their other dishes such as the Burmese salad and other SE Asian favorite so hard to find in Portland.

Ping 102 NW 4th Avenue Portland, Oregon 97209 503.229.7464 www.pingpdx.com

New Year Dinner

2012-01-25T18:49:00.000-08:00

We decided our first meal together in the New Year should be Vietnamese food. So we headed downtown for a nice celebratory dinner with friends at Luc Lac Kitchen.

New kid on the block Luc Lac Kitchen actually got its start as a late night Pho restaurant downtown. They expanded the space, updated the decor and added a sleek bar. After taking a quick look at the menu, we realized Anne had worked with the chef at another Vietnamese restaurant Green Papaya before the change of ownership and then eventual closure. So we knew exactly which items we would be trying.

After a confusing minute trying to figure out the system for ordering/seating, we placed a massive order of food at the counter, got our table number and grabbed a table in the back by the kitchen. First to arrive was our cocktails.

Unfortunately due the confusing counter ordering system we doubled ordered a couple of appetizers, which arrived at our table at no particular order including after our entrees. But that was ok by us because everything was terrific.

We initially ordered what we thought was way too many appetizers, but we ended eating it all. Including the papaya salad, grilled chicken skewers (2x), salad rolls (2x), coconut prawns and mussels in tamarind broth. It was all delicious.

For our entrees we ordered a Banh Mi Nem Nuong or Vietnamese Sausage baguette sandwich with a zesty side salad. Everything about this sandwich was likeable - savory, comforting, crunchy, tart and spicy. An around great sandwich.

We also ordered the house signature dish, the Bo Luc Lac (beef tenderloin seared with Hennessey, butter, garlic and lots of black pepper), it wasn't as tender as Green Papaya's version with filet mignon instead of tenderloin, but the flavor was spot on. Served with a lightly vinegar salad, tomato rice and peppery lime dipping sauce.

We thoroughly enjoyed the food and atmosphere of Luc Lac Kitchen. It was definitely a great meal to start the new year with.

Luc Lac Kitchen 835 SW 2nd Portland, Oregon 503/222-0047

Happy Year of the Dragon

2012-01-23T08:36:00.000-08:00

A quick pic of Mom's Banh Tet for this year's New Year celebrations! Happy New Year Everyone!

New Year Clean-Up

2012-01-19T07:37:00.000-08:00

Right now families across Vietnam and China are preparing their homes for the upcoming Lunar New Year celebrations. Traditionally this is the time to clean and organize your home, setting the tone for the upcoming year. With this year's Lunar New Year being so close to Western New Year we thought it was a great opportunity to clean up the piles of everything that have accumulated since our wedding 6 months ago! We dedicate a whole weekend to a thorough clean-up and re-organization. First up was our utility closet with miscellanous items left from the wedding, a banker's box full of paper and stuff just shoved in any available space on the bookshelves waiting to topple over. We wish we had thought of taking a picture before, but it was pretty embarrassing, we couldn't even see the floor. With some help from clear bins, boxes and plastic tubs everything now has its place.

The wooden and paper boxes were all from Ikea. The plastic bins are from our local supermarket Fred Meyers and the small plastic tubs were from terrific Japanese dollar store Daiso. We couldn't believe all the places where we had paper stored all over the house, now it's all in one place and easy to get to.

While packing for our short visit to Seattle it became clear how badly we let things pile up. We finally gathered, purged and put our toiletries in one place, tossing out old out-dated items.

Next we tackled the coat closet. We added another shelf above to accommodate new wedding gifts that needed storage space. Being able to see all our coats, jackets, hats, scarves, gloves, bags and sunglasses without digging through items in the wrong place is a dream.

Party favors from the wedding, birthday cards, bills, check stubs, missing buttons, hardware for the windows, gift wrapping ribbons, mementos and trinkets; these items could be found in any room in our house, but we are slowly digging our way out and setting ourselves up to keep the pile-up from happening again.

Happy New Year Everyone.

May the Year of Dragon find us ahead of the curve and not under piles of stuff.

Seattle Weekend Wrap-Up

2012-01-17T07:32:00.000-08:00

Those of you who know us, know we love happy hours. That wonderful hour (or two) where cocktails and food are served at reduced prices. So it's no surprise we treated ourselves to a happy hour at cozy local bar Frank's in Seattle's Revenna neighborhood. What makes Frank's so great? It's a local neighborhood oyster house and champagne parlor. Wait...what? Yes, oysters and champagne at happy hour prices! Sorry the dim cozy lighting wasn't suitable for photos of the 3 different varieties of beautifully iced oysters or Frank's fantastic cheddar biscuits with shaved ham, gruyere and apple butter.

We had some time to kill before heading downtown for some late night grub, so we occupied our time with some indoor doggie fetch. Her name is Saffy and eventually she did manage to squeeze her square shaped body underneath the record console to get her ball and then couldn't figure out how to get out. Silly. Adorable. Frenchie.

We stayed close to the Ravenna neighborhood at the art deco inspired Hotel Deca. Centrally located close to University Way (strangely known as "The Ave") and I-5, we loved the industrial art deco facade and decor of the hotel.

After checking into the hotel we headed down to the Ave to get some thai food. After painfully deciding not to eat our thai noodles in the wonderfully smelling restaurant we headed back to the hotel, eventually succumbing to all the yummy looking restaurants. We decided some soup would be good power boost and stopped off for some udon noodles. U:Don (get it udon in the U-district?) is a cafeteria style udon noodle restaurant with a pay by the piece tempura bar. Yum. It was a nice warm pick-me-up.

Later that night we cruised down to Tacoma to the Museum of Glass. What a beautiful museum! We were there at night and didn't get a chance to see the museum's outdoor pieces in its full glory.

But we did manage to see all the galleries and the Hot Shop domed workspace, which was fascinating. We watched in theater-style seating as a group of people work on huge glass flowers. The surprising part, how quiet and zen it was. The artists moved seamlessly without saying a word to each other, working in unison. Very tranquil.

We weren't allow to photograph the main exhibit, but we did snap a few photos of the children and art series where glass artist replicated a grade schooler's drawing into glass. Those were hilarious! Kids have crazy imaginations.

There were numerous large glass pieces and an exhibit dedicated to large glass sculptures, but the large glass panels were the most impressive in our opinion.

We enjoyed a lovely dinner and high tailed it back to Seattle for a sweet late night martini and some dessert at Dilettante Mocha Cafe. The chocolate maker is known for delicious chocolate truffle martinis. Between us we tried the Mint Kiss (Effemere Truffle Sauce and a generous portion of Vodka), Mocha Martini (Ephemere Truffle Sauce, Coffee Liquer and generous portion of Vodka) and a Sea Salt Carmel Martini (Ephemere Truffle Sauce, fresh Cream Caramel Sauce, Vodka & Caramel Bailey's with a Salted Coco Rim). We also shared a Mocha Silk cake (flourless, all chocolate gateau fortified with espresso) and a chocolate moussee. We went to bed that night happy and a bit buzzed.

The next morning we trekked across Lake Washington to enjoy some dumplings, but found ourselves unmotivated for the drive home afterwards, so we stopped off for some donuts and coffee at Seattle's famous Top Pot Hand-Forged Doughnuts. We got their famous maple bar, bavarian cream and shots of espresso for the road.

We had such a great time in Seattle, we're already thinking which Seattle neighborhoods are up next for a food tour!

The Triple S

2012-01-15T08:22:00.000-08:00

The first time we were made aware of this little dumpling character was in Singapore. The second time, we sought him out in Sydney, Australia, so it should be no surprise that we found him in another "S" City - Seattle! Ok, technically it was Bellevue, but technically it was also Seattle! So our Triple S tour of Din Tai Fung's Dumpling House was complete, that is until we can get to back to Seoul and Shanghai again!

On our last morning in Seattle we gathered up 8 adventureous diners and braved Hwy 520's floating bridge and new picture tolls to head to one of only 2 Din Tai Fung restaurants in the USA. Man O' Man was it worth it!

We were ready and willing for a long wait, but was told our wait would only be 5-10 minutes because we were a large group. This time having a large party was already paying off. We purposely chose 8 particular people giving us a chance to taste way more food. Unlike dim sum's roving carts, orders are placed on a order sheet (kind of like some sushi bars) and staggered by the staff. First up was the fantastic hot and sour soup - a large bowl for the whole group.

Din Tai Fung's hot and sour soup is amoung the best we've had and even though some of the group had never had it, everyone agreed it was delicious, so much so we placed a medium order to-go for later. Once the large soup was finished, the bamboo steam trays came at us in a steady flow - nice work Din Tai Fung!

We ordered one of each dumpling available, except for veggie & chicken. There were shrimp & pork dumplings, green vegetable & pork dumpling, fish dumplings, shrimp & pork shui mai, shrimp & pork "beggers' purse" dumplings and pork and shrimp wontons in a oily chili sauce. The hit of the day was the "beggers purse" dumplings with a small shrimp on top and steam pork at the base and the uniquely delicious fish dumplings (we have yet to find these at any other dumpling or dim sum restaurant).

One new item we did try was the delicious pork glutinous rice, the terrific texture and crispy pork with salty sticky rice was a perfect combo. Soy soaked sticky rice and porky goodness. This one was so good, and since it was cut into thirds, 2 more orders were placed immediately.

We also ordered two noodles dishes, both vegetarian in order to savor the flavor of the noodles and sauce. The square handcut noodles were addictive. Chewy, not filling and packed full of flavor - slurplicious! The other noodle dish was the Shanghai noodles. A completely different noodle, more like a rice cake cut into slivers, also delicious.

We ordered three vegetable dishes - bok choy, broccoli and green beans. Each simply steamed and tossed in a light garlic oil. Simple & surprisingly delicious.

So, what's for dessert? Well sweet dumplings and buns of course. To satisfy our sweet tooth we ordered taro dumplings and buns. Typically we order sweet red bean buns, but the taro was even better. Sweet creamy purplish hue inbetween steamed white dough was terrific. But the star that stole the show was the gigantic bowl of shaved ice the 10 of us perfectly portioned and shared. There's shaved ice, mochi balls, sweet red beans, mango jelly, creamy sweet taro, a hint of sweet lychee syrup, sweeten condensed milk and a mango pudding. After satisfyingly stuffining ourselves this light, sweet, palate cleansing dessert was the perfect finish.

Our epic food tour of Seattle couldn't have ended on a better note! We cruised on down to Portland happily filled and ready for another food tour soon!

Din Tai Fung Dumpling House 700 Bellevue Way NE #280 Bellevue, Washington 425.698.1095

To Market We Go

2012-01-13T08:55:00.000-08:00

Seattle's Famous Pike Place Market is not high on our list of places to go. However since it was almost a year since we have visited our sister city to the north and with a limited amount of time we had to strategically map out our day, which revolved around eating of course, therefor a trip to the market was a must. We started with yummy Caffe D'Arte macchiatos up the street from the market.

We couldn't come to Seattle or Pike's Place Market without stopping by the pioneer of Seattle coffee.

We were heading into Pike Place Market for one reason and one reason only. Market Grill.

As mentioned earlier we had a limited amount of time during our visit and we weren't about to waste a precious meal opportunity with silly breakfast foods, we wanted fresh fish sandwiches.

Market Grill's simple stall mirrored their terrificly simple fresh seafood sandwiches. We split a cod and a halibut sandwich. Both were pounded thin sprinkled with seasoning, grilled and served simply with lettuce. Simple, allowing the mild taste of the flaky fish be subtle and fresh. In our opinion a pretty good meal to start the day with.

Market Grill 1509 Pike Place #3 Seattle, Washington 206.682.2654

Thai Tom

2012-01-12T08:01:00.000-08:00

If you live in Portland, Oregon you probably know the city has very few good Thai Restaurants. Portland is the puppy mill of Thai Food cranking out the worse, most watered down versions of Thai food. So when we heard the best Thai food in Seattle can be found at a small hole-in-the-wall right around the corner from our hotel, we not only made note, but bee-lined immediately after check-in. We were told if a tiny little Thai man is cooking and blaring heavy Thai metal music we are in good hands.

Unfortunately Thai Tom wasn't cooking, instead we arrived early in the evening and found the atmosphere mellow, playing Thai reggae and with some seats available at the bar. We already had eaten 2 lunches not too long ago and would soon have a big dinner so we placed a to-go order for two noodle dishes. In fact we didn't eat our food until we were back in Portland a couple of days later. Seriously, Portland has crappy Thai food, we were willing to do what it takes!

So, was the food good? 2 days and a plate of pad thai noodles later (which we rarely order) we finally were eating delicious Thai food. Tart, tangy, sweet, spicy, sour! YES! Too bad it's 2 and half hours away, but hey "High Five On The I-5" is what we'll be yelling as we cruise up to our new favorite Thai Restaurant stateside and next time we'll make sure to sit front and center to check out this tiny Thai restaurant in action!

Thai Tom 4543 University Way NE Seattle, Washington 206.548.9548

I Think I'm Turning Japonessa

2012-01-11T08:27:00.000-08:00

Japonessa Sushi Cocina in Seattle, Washington is one of the cool kids. A hip urban Japanese fusion restaurant in the heart of downtown that looks like it was outfitted by the Z Gallerie and has one of the best late night happy hours in town. Directly after arriving on the Cascade Starlight Train from Portland we bolted for the late night hot spot and it not only started off our food-tastic tour of Seattle, but was one of the most memorable meals we had in our too short visit to the Emerald City!

We started off with yummy takoyaki. The bonito flakes didn't "dance" like we've seen on other takoyaki we've had, but the light, not-doughy-at-all octopus balls were a hit and good start.

We ordered 2 sushi rolls and ikura with a quail egg. Being a sushi cocina the Barcelona Sunset Roll (top roll pictured below) was the standout of the sushi rolls - spicy yellowtail, avocado, cucumber, topped with yellowtail, tobiko and habanero allioli.

We also ordered the caliente ginger chicken and the garlic short ribs. We like to keep all our meal proteins well balanced. We were hoping the caliente ginger chicken would be like karage, but was a spicy sauce slathered chicken served with taro chips, but the short ribs were exactly what we were hoping - tangy little rib bites.

The highlight of the night was the Ankimo - monkfish liver! Pate of the sea! Deliciously creamy, individual bites of the sea! Delicious!

This was just the beginning of our epic Seattle Food Tour and it was off to a stellar start!

Hell Of A Decade

2012-01-09T08:58:00.000-08:00

With our wedding this last summer we completely forgot Fall 2011 was our 10th year together - a decade! The milestone passed without us even acknowledging the occassion. We decided to check back and found that we did spend the day together and actually took some photos of the beautiful autumn day! It was a hell of a decade and we look forward to the next decade and the next and the next and the next and the next and the next....

Champagne Brunch

2012-01-05T07:23:00.000-08:00

When news that the London Grill was ending their Sunday Champagne Brunch after 60 years we knew it would be an epic way to start the holiday celebrating (and eating)! We gathered up the troops and crossed our fingers for a reservation on one of the last Sundays the brunch would be served. And it did not disappoint.

When we arrived we were told it would be 10 minutes before our table was ready, which was fine since the stately Benson Hotel was all dressed up for the holidays, including an impressive gingerbread town set up in the lobby.

We started our brunch with some champagne (ppsssttt...it was the good stuff too). We were adviced to try our champagne with some berries from the fresh fruit table, which were so gorgeous I ended up starting off with a whole plate of just fruit. We couldn't resist the gorgeous plump berries, a rare sight in December!

Being the children of casino & buffet connaisseurs we knew to leave the breakfast pastries alone, especially after walking pass the dessert island to our table - (yes, an island in the middle of the restuarant just for desserts).

We started with the "Smorgasbord" table consisting of gravlax with all the fixings, smoked and cold shellfish, a punchbowl of cocktail shrimp, cedar smoked salmon, dungeous crab legs and even sushi!

Once our appetites were opened up we headed for the true stars of brunch and by that we mean what's in the hot chafing dishes, such as eggs benedict, lemon ricotta blintzes, bacon and sausages.

Next was the omelette and waffle stations.

Since brunches usually straddle the idea of breakfast and lunch, the London Grills' brunch is all meals including dinner, which would explain the roasted oysters, steamed clams, perfect little lamb chops, pork tenderloin medallions, chicken spanakopita and of course a roast carving station.

From the plate above, yes there was a fantastic cheese platter with the most delicate and mouthwatering havarti cheese, as well as a terrific salad selection with crab salad, antipasta, pasta and green salads.

Finally after so much savory we were ready to dive into the dessert island. This thing was fantastic with over 10 different cakes, chocolate mousse, lemon and fruit tarts, eclairs, creme brulee, cream puffs, cheesecakes, key lime and coconut cream pies.

As we looked around and realize we were one of the last groups of people to leave the London Gril's brunch we realized sadly we could have made this an annual event, but instead it was a last hurrah! The London Grill's champagne brunch wasn't the biggest or most expensive brunches, but the quality of each item definitely made it a worthwhile meal!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-03T13:52:00.001-08:00

We had plans to post this on New Years Eve, but the day and then the whole weekend got away from us, so it's a bit late, but nonetheless sweet.

Three years ago, on New Years Eve, seconds after the clock struck midnight, Mike proposed. Two and half years later we were married! 2011 was a year we hurled ourselves at at full speed! The year went by fast and furious and we didn't even travel anywhere. In 2012 we are looking forward to "settling" into our new lives and new last names! Hope everyone's New Years was great and here's to a 2012 full of love, joy, happy surprises and new adventures!

Natural Celebratory Dinner

2011-12-26T07:56:00.000-08:00

One dark December night we walked up to a neighborhood restaurant to celebrate belated and soon-to-be birthdays. With the overindulgent holidays upon us we were looking forward to an all vegetarian dinner at vegetarian/vegan restaurant Natural Selection. We were not disappointed, in fact we were so impressed that we plan to visit the restaurant each season to get our fill of expertly and innovatively prepared seasonal vegetables.

Natural Selection Chef Aaron Woo built his restaurant around "vegetables, fruit and grains served in a warm European-style setting, the menu combines both rustic and modern cooking techniques while highlighting the favors of France, Italy and Spain."

The restaurant was festive, cozy and did have the warm European feel expressed on the website.

We easily settled into Natural Selection's cozy dining room, ready to dig into the prix fix seasonal menu.

Natural Selection makes it easy with only 2 prix fix menus to choose from. Items can be ordered a la carte as well. We ordered a couple great cocktails and the 2 prix fix dinners in order to sample everything. Shortly after placing an order an amuse bouche of red pepper draped polenta bite arrived.

Soon our first course arrived. A delicious sweet hubbard squash soup and roasted maitake mushrooms. The soup was your basic creamy squash soup, but punched up a notch with the addition of cubed chunky squash to add some texture to the soup. The maitake mushrooms were smokey, silky smooth and crunchy all at the same time; paired with creamy potatoes, the dish was the ultimate in earthy flavors.

The next course was the salad course with a golden beet & endive salad and a brussel sprout & sunchoke salad. The beet salad was sweet from the beets and sliced figs, tart and bitter from the apples and endive greens. Crisp and bright. The brussel sprouts were shredded thin and matched the earthy flavors of the sunchokes. The grapefruit added a tart cold flavor to liven up the dish.

The main entrees were a ceppo pasta with arugula (with pumpkin, apple, and brussel sprouts) and a lentil & potato stew (with delicata squash, romanesca, peppers and almonds. The pumpkin blended beautifully with the ceppo pasta, apple and brussel sprouts, a total standout. The beautifully presented lentil stew was very unstew like and completely delicious. The stew was served in and around a small cored delicata squash that was cooked perfectly and easy to cut into.

The final and fourth course was the dessert course consisting of a fruit crumble and spiced pumpkin cake. Like the other 3 courses, the desserts were fantastic. Perfectly portioned and not too sweet, a great way to end our delicious vegetarian/vegan celebratory dinner.

Natural Selection is definitely worthy of a celebratory dinner. Slow paced and laid-back our dinner service matched the deliberate nature of Natural Selection's food. We thoroughly enjoyed the timed meal perfect for a cozy celebration with friends. We entertained ourselved inbetween each meal with palate cleaners and watching the small open kitchen casually pump out each plate.

Even the bar area was tiny and efficient, doubling as the wait and credit card station.

We really enjoyed everything about Natural Selection and can't wait to head back in the early spring to find out what they do with young asparagus and spring greens.

Spending Holiday Time Together

2011-12-23T07:43:00.000-08:00

We finished all our holiday shopping and to dos early this year. We even decorated the house more than usual and found ourselves with plenty of time to just sit and enjoy the holidays with our friends before the big heavy family Christmas weekend.

The weather has been very cold and damp so we decided to keep our bicycles locked up on the weekends and walk to all our festive gatherings. We knew walking meant we could have extra cookies and holiday drinks, what we didn't realize was how much we would enjoy these long strolls together. It has been the best part of the holidays this year, so we thought we'd share some of what we saw on our walks. Happy Holidays Everyone!

Settling Into The Holidays

2011-12-21T13:26:00.000-08:00

Christmas is this Sunday! Eeeeekkkkk! All our gifts were wrapped and mailed last week! And the last thing we had to do was finish our cards! Since the sun was out we walked down to an espresso shop to knock them out. Something about being forced to send holiday cheer through the mail gives us the worse case of brain freeze!

So 2 macchiatos and a mango chutney panini later we had written out our cheer - signed, stamped and soon to be delivered. After we walked up the street to drop the cards off at the late pick-up post box, we felt almost giddy knowing we had a whole week to enjoy holiday cheer in the form of cookies, holiday cocktails, festive candlelights and spending the dark evenings soaking up the best of the holidays with everything on our "to do list" crossed off! Happy Holidays Everyone!

Solstice Week

2011-12-20T11:45:00.001-08:00

Happy Solistice Week Everyone! It's been a long hard 6 weeks since day lights savings and we're almost to the end! Hang in there and enjoy the darkness!

The Most Powerful Images of 2011

2011-12-12T19:22:00.000-08:00

We are very visual people. Which would explaining having a blog. As the year is ending the 2011's list of top this or that are appearing everywhere and we wanted to share with you BuzzFeed's Most Powerful Images of 2011.

The image above is from the Occupy Portland Protest.

Makes us think about what images we'll capture and be captured in 2012.

Astoria, Oregon Wedding Weekend

2011-11-26T11:56:00.000-08:00

We headed out of town for a very special wedding in Astoria, Oregon. All these years if we needed a little beach/Pacific Ocean fix we'd head south not north to where the mighty Columbia River dumps into the Pacific Ocean. We were pleasantly surprised at how quaint, hip and interesting Astoria, Oregon was.

We arrived and checked into the cute Commodore Hotel before heading down the street to the pier to take in the sunset over the Columbia River bay dotted with large freight ships.

After a lovely rehearsal dinner we headed out to lounge at one of the many divey bars in the main town area. We were surprised at how young the residence of Astoria are - what do you all do in this town and in the winter no less. Maybe hang out at the VooDoo Lounge?

The day of the wedding we started with a fantastic espresso from the 14th Street Coffee Shop conveniently connected to the hotel lobby.

We needed to make sure we had plenty of food in our system so we walked up one Astoria's steep streets to Blue Scorcher Bakery for some breakfast, another great local business tucked conveniently in the main part of town. We got a terrific breakfast burrito and watched them frost the wedding cake.

They also had one of the best magazine selections we have ever seen in a bakery/cafe.

As we walked back to the hotel to get ready for the big day, the City of Astoria was up and roaring in celebration of Veteran's Day.

The wedding was short and sweet; the reception was fun meeting friends and family we had only heard stories of and reconnecting with friends we've known, but not seen in years. Before ending the night at the VooDoo Lounge with a personalized tour of the theater connected to the bar.

Halloween Birthday

2011-11-08T08:15:00.000-08:00

It doesn't get much better than having your birthday on Halloween. And that's exactly when Mike's birthday is - Halloween. Lucky devil!

This year with Halloween on a Monday, the celebrating was all weekend long. Starting Saturday with celebratory raman noodles, shinkansen drink specials (shot of Japanese vodka, shot of sake, and a shot of Kirin beer; done one right after the other), Japanese beers and the biggest cream puffs we have ever eaten. We then partied down and danced the night away to all our favorite Talking Heads songs.

Sunday was family dinner with requested birthday meal of Nem Nuong Ninh Hoa and a pie.

On Halloween we celebrated in a cemetery discovering the historical figures of Portland and their Untimely Departures. Then off for stiff mixed drinks at a favorite bar before ending the night with cognac toasts. A great Birthday/Halloween weekend! So much so we're including our travel video "Tuk Tuk Ride to Nowhere in Bangkok, Thailand" to keep the party going.

God's Eye View

2011-11-05T19:26:00.000-07:00

Since we met while working at a movie theater and to continue on our theme of movies here is a incredible montage of movie scenes all shot from "God's Eye View" synced beautifully to Yeah Yeah Yeah's "Down Boy". How many movies do you recognize?

This Is The Take Over

2011-11-03T16:15:00.000-07:00

The last movie we saw in a theater was back in April, before that we're not sure. We used to go to movies all the time, but lately we can't even find the time to watch the DVDs we get from the library. That is until we came across this little gem just sitting on the shelves. We kept renewing and renewing this movie until finally we plopped it into the DVD player and was blown away by what was coming out of our tv. All the old school rockers & dub songs we have on heavy rotation in our house was playing in this movie.

The movie is about a Roots Rock Reggae drummer named Horsemouth who decides to set up his own business selling Jamaican records via his motorcycle when a band of theives steals his cycle and Horsemouth decides that justice must prevail. This movie is seriously stylish!

Thankfully there are subtitles because that Jamaican patois was heavy! For those of you who love Roots, Rock, or Dub (ode to Portlandia's Mayor played by Kyle Mclaughlin) or for those of you who just love Jamaica this movie is a must see! REMOVE YA!

Signs of Fall

2011-10-30T19:01:00.000-07:00

Looks likes fall has officially arrived in Portland. Not sure how we feel about its return yet.

Bachelorette/Bachelor Blow Out

2011-10-28T07:31:00.000-07:00

This last weekend we celebrated our friends' final moments of non-marital status with a full day of celebrating. In typical fashion the bride was showered with a nice calming day at a hot spring spa complete with soaks, wraps and a massage. It was nice to get out of town, see the beautiful scenery of the Columbia River Gorge and the Resort was rustic and grand.

A few hours of pampering later we headed back into Portland and enjoyed a great southern feast at the Delta Cafe. We had plans to meet up with the boys for a Zombie Rock Show downtown , but had an hour to kill so a little kareoke was in order.

We finished off a pot of coffee and headed downtown in the warm fall night. We arrived in old town, decided the cover cost for the show wasn't worth it and ended up at a cozy bar enjoying more cocktails and gross bachelor/bachelorette themed shots, before heading over to the adult arcade Ground Kontrol for beers and old school arcade games and pinball. The evening ended with sidewalk photoshoots and more fried foods. With a groom/bride/group of friends like this, the wedding is going to be crazy fun!

Autumn Colors

2011-10-26T17:34:00.001-07:00

The deciduous tree leaves aren't the only ones giving us glorious autumn color right now.

Taken from the window of my office building.

Harvesting and Preserving Our 2011 Garden

2011-10-24T07:23:00.000-07:00

One of the quincessential Pacific Northwest things to do is have a small garden and spend the summer months growing your own food. This year with our mid-summer wedding we decided we'll still have a vegetable garden, but select vegetables we could harvest at once in the later part of summer. For example we decided to plant an Heirloom Goliath Tomato verses a prolific constant ripening cherry tomato. This beauty grew large over the months of July but only started to bare large green tomatoes in mid-August into late September.

As the green fruits grew and grew and grew, but didn't turn red we started to think we'd have 100lbs of green tomatoes to deal with, but with a couple hot September weekends our tomatoes started to turn red and our plan to can and preserve for use in the winter was back on track.

Our decision to attempt canning our tomatoes was solidified with this bad boy. A pressure cooker/canner purchased with some wedding money.

Sure we could have easily purchased a simplier water bath canning pot, but this 23-Quart Pot is also a pressure cooker. We could easily make a pot of beans for a huge group of people in less than an hour or cook a whole chicken in under 40 minutes! We also heard it's the safest way to can tomatoes which was our main objective. We started by sorting our fantastic harvest of tomatoes by size and whether they had an blemishes.

We were really surprised by how beautifully round and picture perfect the Goliath variety was. The largest firmest tomatoes were saved, later sliced and dehydrated into little round disc that we reconstitute in broth or water for our spanish rice, soup and flavoring bases for just about anything.

All other tomatoes were then prepped to be skinned and prepared for stewing or tomato sauce.

We quickly dunked the tomatoes in a pot of boiling water. After 40 seconds most the skins would visibly split and we would scoop them out and immediately dunk them in a bowl of cold iced water. 5 seconds later the skins easily peel off. Half the tomatoes were cut into quarters for stewing and the other half were roughly chopped for tomato sauce.

We cooked the tomato sauce down for two hours and immediately poured the sauce into the canning jars.

The pressure canner had weights and gauges and initially seemed very scientific and dangerous, with the boiling pressurized air/water situation, so we didn't document watching the pressure build and maintaining the heat so the pressure remains within a certain zone for safe canning.

We can tell you the tomato sauce was alot sweeter than we imagined, the stewed tomatoes had a smokey kick due to some roasted jalapenos we added and we were able to capture a little bit of summer with ingredients grown in our own backyard or within biking distance. We think even our cat Cleo approved.

He's Done It Again

2011-10-19T14:45:00.000-07:00

We were invited to a tapas themed special birthday celebration and we brought this tuna tapa bites. Yes, they were as good as they looked.

Honey We're Home!

2011-10-12T12:07:00.000-07:00

Although we live in a quaint older part of the city we do dream of living in an open industrial space like this one found in Chicago. The subway tiled kitchen wall, the railed barn doors, the open space, concrete floors, full glassed kitchen pantry wall and an elevator that opens right into your living room. This is a space we'd be happy to call home!

Tribute to Tributes

2011-10-07T06:12:00.000-07:00

On a rainy Sunday afternoon we braved the NW shopping crowds in search of some new kitchen appliances and furniture. To reward ourselves we decided to get some fries from one of our favorite spots in town, Tribute's. We've been going to Tribute's for their Philly Cheesestakes and Hot Pastrami sandwiches for ten years now. They have great thick crust pizzas too.

We were hit with two sad pieces of information upon ordering. One: the deep-fryer was not working, so we weren't going to be rewarded with the crispiest fries. Two: Tribute's had recently lost their lease and will be closing on October 9, 2011! We were told a new location is in the works and they will be back. Let's hope so! The Hot Pastrami we got was fantastic! Come back soon!

Summer Staycation, Part II

2011-10-04T19:14:00.000-07:00

A prime example of summer in Portland is having late night dinners. We made plans to meet up with friends for dinner on the south side of town and with plenty of sunshine before we decided to make a day of it and tour around town exploring. Portland was hit with a late summer heat wave and we wanted to be near the water, we had no idea we'd have a near deserted riverfront beach area to ourselves!

It may have something to do with the long bike ride back up.

Since we were being adventurous we decided to try a local taqueria in their new industrial location. We've been visiting Cha Cha Cha (Ole Ole) taquerias for ten years and we were skeptical of a possible "starbucking" of this family owned chain popping up in every hip neighborhood across Portland, explaining the two years we waited to try this one. We were pleasantly surprised that the prices weren't any different from their other less glamorous locations and decided to test the consistency of their menu by ordering our 'usual' - potato taquitos and a fish taco. The taquitos were a slam dunk and the fish taco was substantial and fresh, but missing the spicy mayo that usually tops the bland whitefish.

We needed to find a possible gift or at least a card so we detoured through a couple of neighborhoods full of new shops we have yet to check out.

Before we knew it, it was almost time for our dinner reservations. We left with plenty of time to bike to yet another constantly changing Portland neighborhood. As we biked in the warm summer night we passed the PICA building lit up with a summer art installation. It was a near perfect summer day.

Summer Staycation, Part I

2011-09-29T19:03:00.000-07:00

Spring started late and when summer started to show we were deep in wedding planning. With Portland's short summers, we were afraid we wouldn't get to enjoy much of it this year. We were completely wrong.

We like to stick close to home during the summer months, opting for vacations when the weather isn't so perfect. So on a random mid-weekday we decided to go be tourists in our own city, hopped on our bikes and headed downtown.

We had a couple things in mind, including a possible mid-afternoon cocktail at the top of this building, but we let the day unfold and ended up elsewhere.

Something we did plan on was to hit up two food carts we've been wanting to try. First was The Whole Bowl.

So healthy, so yummy. Wish we worked closer to one of their carts, it's exactly what a healthy lunch should be - filling and cheap. Everything was well executed from the texture to the beans and rice to the ripeness of the avocado. Only disappointment was the canned black olives. Another bonus was The Whole Bowl's cart concept - 1 item done well, an easy to decipher menu board and only 1 item served in only 2 sizes! Kudos to you Whole Bowl.

However, if we had known how filling it was, we might have taken it to go and gone a much unhealthier route and had a Hawaiin Loco Moco a couple of the other carts were selling. Hey, we're on a staycation, nothing healthy should be consumed!

One cart we did hit up that we wished was not only close to where we worked, but parked out front of our house was My Daddy's Sausage. Unlike the helpful, happy and well cared for Whole Bowl cart, this cart's menu was confusing, poorly displayed, had no prices listed and the girl was irritated we interrupted her game of Angry Birds to go fix us one of her Daddy's Laotian sausages. The minute she handed off the sausage we bolted for the riverfront and happily dug into this fantastic sausage.

The pork mixed with lemongrass, green onions and Laotian spices sausage was stellar. Topped with tangy green papaya, spicy mayo and a green chili salsa, it was delicious. We were now ready for a cooling cocktail and started walking back to where we locked our bikes when we spotted this beauty - Ono Shave Ice. Hawaiin Shaved Ice - Yes! Please!

We were looking for something refreshing and sweet and when we saw a father stop off for a simple snowconed shaped sweet for his daughter and when said daughter was handed a plastic flower boutique shaped cup with a mound of shaved ice covered in red syrup as big as her head, we were sold!

We ordered 1 Shaved Ice - Hawaiin Style with 3 flavors (Blue Hawaiin, Mango, and Guava). Hawaiin style includes topping the humungous pile of syruped shaved ice with adzuki beans, mochi bits, sweetened condensed milk and a scoop of ice cream. We opted for no ice cream, but everything else.

This thing was hard to share to say the least. We tried to alter 1 person holding and eating for 1 block and then the other person holding and eating for the next, but we soon just pulled off to the side and dug in.

Ono's shaved ice was so good we decided to forgo a trendy cocktail and instead met friends for happy hour at one of our favorite summer time patios at Bernie's Southern Bistro.

We enjoyed the summer sun and garden setting while sipping on Lynchburg Lemonades and Mojitos, snacking on cornmeal fried okra, deep fried pickles, buttermilk fried chicken salads and sweet potato fries. Ahhhh summertime.

Not yet in a food coma we decided to bike off our fried feast with a beer up the road at Prost, a German beer hall.

We contemplated getting something to eat at either the Mississippi Marketplace food cart pod connected to Prost or just order some German food from the bar, but we decided we wanted to continue snacking, so we hopped back on our bikes and headed for a late night of chips & salsa and some ping pong before heading home, not feeling full at all from a day of staycationing.

Guesthouse U-en

2011-09-27T14:01:00.000-07:00

As a lovely gift for rating all our wedding vendors we receieved a free linen photo ablum which we promptly decided to use for our travel photos. One problem was we needed to get our photos fully sorted before deciding on the final 100+ to be printed. The majority of our photos have been scrubbed and cleaned up but the ones from Japan were the last ones we needed to go through.

As we began sorting through the 400+ photos of just Osaka alone we came across photos of the Guesthouse U-en and realized that it was one of the most unique places we have stayed during our 4 months of traveling.

In fact all our accomodations in Japan were very unique and completely different, but the Guesthouse U-en was beyond our expectations and we're so glad we took a bunch of photos.

We arrive at the train station and with the help of a kind man, headed down an unassuming street, which initially looked more like an alleyway.

As we walked closer to the building our excitment grew when we realized which building was our guesthouse for the next 5 days.

The open garage door, concrete floors and initially nothing resembling a hotel lobby or guesthouse registration area made us think we were possibly in the wrong place. Was this the guesthouse or an autobody shop?

We made our way towards the back of the house pass a group of people lounging in the "cafe" to where the cashier/kitchen/reception area was.

From the internet description we knew the guesthouse had a cafe and print shop, but wasn't aware that these were separate businesses in the same building.

Upon check in we were given the passcode to the door for afterhours entry, a short tour of where the shared bathroom is (out front by the short little truck. A whole separate blog post could be used to describe this tiny and strange bathroom - wooden plank and plastic stool in a room tucked underneath the staircase. We had no idea how to take a shower this bathroom, but we managed). We were given a key that unlocked the padlock to our tatami room and told rooms are upstairs and ours was at the end of the hallway.

Once we stepped into our traditional tatami room we were beyond happy with our decision to stay at the Guesthouse U-en.

Our time in Japan was way too short and we're so glad we found the Guesthouse U-en, a serious gem of a find!

All our Osaka photos can be seen on our flickr site.

Little Big Burger

2011-09-23T08:57:00.000-07:00

The name says it all. The menu board and pricing also says it all.

You can pretty much get a burger anywhere in Portland, but for $3.75 and it not be fast food?! We were skeptical so we thought we'd split one, but soon realized Little Big Burger's burgers are slider-sized burgers, so we opted for two cheese burgers (blue cheese and cheddar).

The quality of the ingredients from the meat to the bun to the cheese really made these little suckers fantastic! Winner!

Another winner were the fries. Yes even though they were fancy truffle fries (the only kind listed on the menu) they were starchy, salty and crispy potato goodness. For $10.25 we were able to grab a low-key snack on an otherwise spendy dining options part of town!

http://littlebigburger.com/

Moon Festival

2011-09-20T20:05:00.000-07:00

This post is a bit late, but did you celebrate the Mid-Autumn Harvest Moon? Did you sip tea under the glorious full moon?

In Vietnam the Moon Festival is basically their version of Halloween. Kids light lanterns and parade through the village. In China the Moon Festival an opportunity for some matchmaking. And for both it means some yummy mooncakes with your tea under the full moon.

This year I did have the yummiest mochi mooncake I have ever eaten! It was only half a bite because the mooncakes were special gifts. This mooncake was a soft mochi skinned mooncake that was sublimely naturally sweet, starchy from coconut creamy yellow beans and a salty punch that came from what looked like salted rubbed chinese sausage. Yes, you heard it right - salt rubbed chinese sausages! The mooncake was amazing and if the last one wasn't a durian flavored mooncake I would have wrestled my dad for it. I have yet to find anyone who sells them in our neck of woods. If you know of anyone who sells mochi skinned mooncakes like the ones below, I'll buy you one!

Photos courtesy of Masak-Masak Blog

Memorable Meals: Sushi Birthday

2011-09-09T01:08:00.000-07:00

For three years Dad has hinted he wanted some homemade sushi and his hints grew louder and more frequent as his birthday neared. Even inlisting family members!

One of us said with ease "sure, no problem" and the other person said "uuggghhh, how many days of prep will this take?". Surprisingly with less than a few hours for shopping and prep we all were presented with a feast of homemade sushi.

We got everything ready "sushi-bar style".

Everyone got to make their own special rolls.

Then we feasted outside under a warm summer evening.

There was a sashimi plate, gunkanmaki, nigirizushi and even tempura!

We were even treated to oshizushi or press box sushi.

However, the best part was eating all those personalized and traditional rolls!

Sushi is a great summer meal and an even better birthday meal!

Mini-Anniversary

2011-08-30T19:45:00.000-07:00

A month ago today we were married.

The first month of marriage went by fast.

Which got us thinking.

What happened in the months between our March post and our recent wedding post?

Anne had a birthday.

Which meant dinner at any restaurant we want.

We decided on a neighborhood Chinese restaurant that made their own house spicy noodles.

There was some singing and dancing.

We had friends move across the country and now live in our lovely city.

We enjoyed a nice Easter brunch with family.

We tried to keep up with our bi-weekly produce delivery.

We attended Elizabeth Andoh's incredible Vegan and Vegetarian Cooking demonstration.

We spent a weekend learning how to make a kick-you-in-the-crotch-drop-you-to-your-knees-it's-so-good soup.

Cleo got fleas.

Which made her act really weird.

She spent all her time in the garden. Rarely coming inside, not even to eat.

Which meant she had many kitchen sink showers.

Dengue Fever played at our favorite live music venue Dante's.

We rode our bikes everywhere.

We had brunch with friends.

We went wine tasting.

We attended a friend's book launch party.

We added a new member to our family. His name is Roger.

And we witnessed the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

We did more than we thought.

Wedding Rehearsal Dinner

2011-08-26T12:33:00.000-07:00

Due to the traditional/non-traditional mix of our wedding, having a rehearsal was definitely necessary. More importantly we needed to make sure everyone was fed directly after. We wanted to include all our out-of-town guests, as well as all the kiddies who were not going to be at our adult-only wedding.

But what could we feed everyone for a reasonable price and keep it casual and mellow before our epic day?

Korean Tacos! That's what we could serve!

The boys at Koi Fusion Korean Taco Truck couldn't have been nicer to work with. It was a toss up between the bulgogi and short rib tacos for the top winners.

Our family and friends made it ridiculously easy to host the rehearsal dinner in our backyard by bringing a side dish or dip to share.

After filling our bellies with Korean tacos it was time for some light celebrating, nothing too crazy our wedding was the next day!

The few days leading up to our wedding were our favorites because we were able to relax with our family and friends, not stress too much and enjoy the summer nights.

We did run out beer and tried multiple times to make it to the liquor store without any luck, but it did help us find alternatives for our gluten free friends.

The summer night was perfect, the tacos were uniquely delicious and the memories of a perfect rehearsal dinner will be held forever.

A huge thank you to all our family and friends. We are so lucky to have you all in our lives and there to help us celebrate. Below is a time lapse we captured of our beautiful rehearsal dinner and guests.

Wedding Rehearsal Dinner Timelapse from Buddha Bellies on Vimeo.

Thanks to my sister Tri for use of her photos.

Wedding Hiatus

2011-08-11T10:15:00.001-07:00

Wow!

It's been so long since we last stopped by our beloved bloggie!

Apologies.

Spring turned into summer.

We were busy planning 3 big summer parties.

One of those parties was our Wedding!

To those who are planning a wedding - sympathies, it's a lot more work than you'll ever imagine.

It was for us at least.

The effort was worth it.

As evidenced in the time lapse we captured of our big day.

More to come.

Soon.

We promise.

Wedding Day Time Lapse from Buddha Bellies on Vimeo.

Spring In Our Step

2011-03-31T15:00:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posting lately. Our calendars have been packed full for two months straight! Who knew how much time and effort planning a wedding, hosting friends, helping friends move from out of state, continuing to work on Buddha Bellies, watching the cat age, getting our daily exercise in, balancing our meals and making time for family has really taken us away from our precious blog.

It's been an unusually cold spring, with lots of rainy and gray days. But that didn't stop us from doing a mini-photo shoot with fellow Portland blog Portlandize. Thanks Dave! It was nice meeting you and your lovely wife.

Six Degrees of Separation

2011-02-11T07:50:00.000-08:00

The weather the last two weeks has fluctuated between teasing us with thoughts of spring to reminders that it is still the middle of winter. As we continue to ride our bikes daily we have become obsessed not with rain, but with how cold it will be. The temperature may only change a few degrees, but those six to ten degrees makes the difference between frozen fingers and ringing ears. On the bright side we are on the up tick to more daylight, even if sunshine means it's going to be very cold. We've switched from listening to wind chimes to guide us to home in the dark to trying to spot bird's nests in the still bare trees.

This daily change in temperature has us dreaming of consistently warm weather and living some where that we can bike to the beach. Until then here's a video to warm up your February. Have a great weekend!

She rides from michele Lugaresi on Vimeo.

Happy New Year - Year of the Cat

2011-02-03T10:10:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year or Mung Nam Moi! The Vietnamese zodiac is slightly different than the Chinese Zodiac, so it is not Year of the Rabbit, but Year of the Cat!

Good Bye Year of the Tiger and Hello Year of the Cat.

Happy New Year. May the Cat bring you good luck in the coming year!

Photo courtesy of Sachiko Kuwabata

Macrobiotic Detox

2011-01-31T08:38:00.000-08:00

While doing some Christmas shopping at our favorite Japanese grocery store we thumbed through a booked titled "Mayumi's Kitchen Macrobiotic Cooking for Body and Soul". A quick peak through the book showed simple, easy and extremely healthy recipes and eating concepts. After borrowing the book from our local library we were lucky enough to receive a copy for Christmas and decided in the New Year we would try the 10-day macrobiotic detox as suggested as an introduction to macrobiotic eating.

Ok, we won't lie we were drawn to the simple Japanese inspired recipes first, but the idea of neutralizing our palates after the holiday glut of rich heavy foods also appealed to us. As we analyzed the items needed for the next 10 days we quickly realized the list of pantry items were already staples in our kitchen. Do you have hijiki or kombu or even a Japanese pickle press? We do! So delving right into the macrobiotic detox was easy, especially after receiving the bi-weekly Organics-To-You delivery.

A large part of a macrobiotic diet consists of eating whole grains, such as brown rice, lentils, Japanese pearl barley, amaranth, quinoa, and millet. We were very familiar with these grains from a previous year's stringent candidia diet. We utilized as much of our organic produce delivery as well as use up whatever we had in our pantry, so no maple syrup instead we used agave, we used filtered water instead of the suggested spring water and unsweetened dried currents and cherries rather than raisins.

So how was the 10 days of detoxing? One word - filling. Whole grains which consisted of nearly 50% of all the foods we ate is extremely filling. It was amazing how little was used as well. 1/4 of a cup would fill us to the brim. Each and every meal from the book was well thought out where portions would be used for the next meal so we didn't feel as if we were constantly cooking, which we were, hey healthy eating takes time.

There was a detoxing element in every meal, such as grains for healthy skin and millet for healthy stomach, spleen and pancreas function. Macrobiotic eating is also mostly vegan, which allowed our systems to rest and recoup from over digestion the last few weeks of the holiday season. But more than anything we were looking to expand our knowledge base and provide a retreat for our bodies. Japanese food traditionally tries to satiate all the taste buds, so the combination of foods never left us wanting anymore. No sweet to balance out the savory, no tart to balance out the bitter. It was soothing, delicious and gave us a great groundwork for healthier eating.

Now let's bring on the food porn!

Some mornings we would start off with a bowl of miso soup, to assist in getting your body ready to receive food and prepare to start providing energy; soft cooked grains for prolonged energy throughout the day and ward off need to snack; and steamed or fresh greens for vitamins, nutrients and minerals.

Since macrobiotic foods are whole foods your brain recognizes it immediately as food, from the minute your chewing creates saliva your brain is triggered - food and energy are coming, so your body recognizes it is being fed. We found ourselves full way before you were finished eating. Overeating did not ever occur. Processed foods or foods that are cooked way beyond their original states take longer for your body to recognize as food, therefor it is easy to overeat.

Breakfasts were simple and really delicious and for those who find it difficult to eat breakfast the small portions, variety of flavors and soothing warmth of the miso soup was an easy breakfast to have.

Mayumi's recommended detox switched up the meals constantly so we never had the same "type" of breakfast twice, switching between green, grain, soup to fresh veggies, nuts, and the rare piece of fruit. Fruit and spices were rarely eaten in the detox, which we found interesting. One morning we had steamed greens (bitter) an apple (sweet) and toasted pumpkin seeds (nutty, spicy and savory when dry toasted). This was so simple and so satisfying, a snack we we will always have around at our house.

One of our favorite breakfast, probably because it was familiar, comforting and warming during the cold winter months was the soft-cooked whole oats with rice milk and unsweetened currents, eaten with a side of toasted almonds to ward off cravings for something savory.

One item we did eat nearly every day was kombu. Kombu is seriously one of the world's superfoods and one of the best glutamate in the world. We are currently obsessed with learning about natural glutamate, the history of kombu and glutamate is fascinating. The sea salted seaweed is one of the best hydrators for the body and packs a huge amount of punch to each dish.

While whole grains were eaten during the day, dinner and evening time meals consisted mainly of vegetables and protein. Not once did we miss dessert or a sweet piece of fruit to balance out the meal, it was really interesting. We were very surprised by the lack of craving and absolutely no use of garlic in any of the meals. Dinners were hearty and light and mainly consisted of vegetables and soy proteins like seitan.

Another aspect of macrobiotic eating we were excited by was the many recipes and meals with salted and pressed vegetables. Our Japanese pickle press got a lot of use in those 10 days.

These are just a very small sampling of what we ate, we realized each meal consisted of 3 different items per meal, 3 meals a day (no snacking) for 10 days, that's roughly 90 different dishes we made. We can not stress enough how simple and delicious each of the dishes were. We also discovered many new items we absolutely fell in love with such as water sauteing, ume plum vinegar, mochi sheets, adzuki beans and pumpkin seeds.

The detox also consisted of many detoxing beverages. We'll be honest the first few days without our daily dose of espresso was difficult, but nothing a few ibuprophens couldn't help with. Espresso is very acidic and adds to the toxicitiy of your system, so when we drank more alkaline hot beverages in the mornings, which we made our moods and souls calm down quite a bit - we know pretty hippy dippy huh?

Having all the Japanese ingredients and being familiar with lotus stalks and tofu pockets also helped. What else helped? Having someone who knows how to make sushi helped squeezing out sunomono salads and pressed veggies as well as rolling the most perfect rice balls for lunch.

The 10-day macrobiotic detox was a great introduction to the concept of whole food eating and just added to our arsenal of what makes food good.

Mikestache

2011-01-28T07:32:00.000-08:00

Throughout the years I have grown accustomed to Mike's various facial hair. Let's consider it his personal form of self-expression. Sometimes it's minimal like a simple soul patch.

Sometimes he gets more creative such as with his pork bars phase.

Sometimes Mike is inspired by others, like his ode to John Waters and his recent dirty moustache coupled with long side bars or his dirty bars.

Usually it is just a full blown beard, which grows at an alarmingly fast rate. Sometimes I think he stashes $100 bills in his beard.

Throughout the years Mike has participated in friendly moustache or Maystache (usually occurring in the month of May) and Octobeard (occurring in October) competitions amoung coworkers. We've even joked about having Mike enter the World Beard and Moustache Championships held last year in Bend, Oregon. But those guys are serious competitors and it is more of a hobby for Mike.

While running errands on a sunny weekend we noticed a number of men running around with some seriously groomed moustaches. We didn't think much of it, as we live in Portland, Oregon so a group of perfectly waxed moustaches and beards isn't that strange.

That is until we noticed men with meticulously groomed moustaches and beards in stores, at the coffee house and just hanging out on the street corner. That's when we realized there must be a contest in town. The 2011 West Coast Beard & Mustache Championships was this last weekend. And the catch? It costs spectators only $10 and participants $20! Yes, double the cost if you want to participate. Now, you've got to be serious if you're gonna enter.

A Farewell To Remember

2011-01-19T19:43:00.000-08:00

Not long ago a dearly loved family member passed away. For the following 7 weeks (49 days) we honored her with weekly remembrances and temple offerings. On the 49th day we officially let her go onto her next journey and transitioned her mourning table to a remembrance table.

One of the uniquely buddhist traditions is to annually remember our loved ones with a meal consisting of foods they loved. This got us all thinking about what foods we would want to have at our remembrance meal.

However, during the mourning period only traditional vegan food is prepared and served, and if you have ever had a temple meal, the food can be delicious.

Traditional temple food is vegan and typically does not include onions or garlic. Mom managed to turn out several terrific dishes the monks and guests all enjoyed, starting with stir-fries.

Dad even chipped in a peppered tofu and seitan dish.

Mom decided to make our dear grandmother's own recipe kiem, a silky, starchy soup with sheets of tofu and yams.

A close family friend contributed the best vegetarian eggrolls we have ever had. Crunchy, savory and light, you betcha we wrote down the list of 8 ingredients!

To satisfy the sweet side a coconut and sweet bean sticky rice and a che dessert of sweet rice and black eyed peas cooked in coconut milk was served.

In combination these dishes perfectly complimented one another. The only taste missing was spicy, which honestly allowed the subtle and soothing elements of the meal to shine.

It was a very memorable meal and one cooked to help ease everyone on with life.

Pantone World

2011-01-15T14:31:00.000-08:00

It has been nothing but gray gray gray rainy weather so we thought we'd post this video of some colorful scenery! Dulux Paint please come and include Portland in your Let's Color Project. If it were up to us we'd paint every house in the neighborhood some ungodly bright color, it would sure break up all the gray!

Shigezo Izakaya

2011-01-10T11:19:00.000-08:00

After only a few minutes discussing food with us, you will quickly realize we have a true and deep fascination with one particular country's food - Japan's. As you delve deeper beyond sushi, raman, teriyaki, and yakisoba noodles a pattern of certain ingredients presents itself and the infinite ways to use such a limited number of ingredients in infinite dishes is insane to comprehend. We love love love it!

Our food gods finally answered our prayers for a proper Japanese Izakaya with the recent opening of Shigezo Izakaya in downtown Portland. An izakaya is a Japanese pub and you better believe we quickly memorized the Japanese kanji for izakaya while traveling through Japan. The minute we stepped up to the door we knew we were going to like this place.

When we were in Japan we ate almost daily at an izakaya and each one was memorable in aesthetic and food. Shigezo did not disappoint and kept our fond memories of cozy wood interiors, comforting food, beers, sake drinks and casual atmosphere in tact.

Recently we have become obsessed with getting a kotatsu table for the studio. Shigezo even had a cozy kotatsu room for those cold Portland winters.

So, how was Shigezo's food? The izakayas we know of typically have HUGE menus. Page after page of food. Shigezo - not so much, but their happy hour was well priced and had the typical izakaya food represented. And in typical izakaya style we ordered a few drinks, some food, ate it, chatted for a bit, ordered some more food and drinks and began the cycle all over again for several hours. It was leisurely and casual, the way all izakaya meals should be.

Here are only a few items we ordered. We were celebrating birthdays and there was a lot of plates and drinks tossed around so we put down the camera and joined in the celebrating!

Avocado Tuna Cocktail. Served in a cocktail glass on a bed of spun daikon radish. Delicious, the similar textures of the avocado and tuna are a match made in heaven! This dish tested our desire to only eat sustainable fish, which tuna is currently not. It is certain times of the year, but not during the winter months in Portland. Oh well, we can't always be saints and if this dish represented the devil - call us sinners!

Ebi Mayo, battered and fried shrimp in a spicy mayo. You can find this dish on most Chinese restaurants, but Shigezo's version is far superior, with light and crispy shrimp that had a nice bite to them. The key was the spicy mayo, which wasn't heavy and provided a nice tang. Ba & Me may even like these.

California Roll. The table actually ordered spicy tuna rolls and Alaskan rolls before trying the California roll. The true and usually not scrutinized aspect of sushi is the rice. A somewhat labor-intensive rice that will make or break your sushi and Shigezo's was really good. Rolls fillings were well balanced. Sushi rolls should have layers of flavors and most importantly layers of textures in your mouth (something other cuisines outside of Asia rarely take into consideration) and Shigezo's rolls had crunch, creamy, pungent and delicate flavors and tastes. Score!

House Okonomiyaki. We had to wait until the clock hit 5pm to order this dish, our most anticipated of the night. Off the dinner menu's hot appetizers, the okonomiyaki consisted of pork and squid (two items we usually don't put into okonomiyaki when we make it at home) and since this is an izakaya and not a okonomiyaki house there was only one to order and it was good. Much gooier than our crunchy version we still gave it a thumbs up!

Not pictures, but ordered and eaten was the tsukemono (pickled Japanese vegetables and bonito flakes)- very fishy compared to the tart and tangy versions we have had, subtle and delicious, but not for those just learning about Japanese food. Edemane, seaweed salad, kara age (fried chicken) several chicken wings, salmon carpaccio, and several happy hour menu sushi rolls.

Oh and then there were the happy hour beers and drink specials, which included 22oz steins of beer for $5. Shigezo has a fantastic selection of soju drinks too! Woohoo! But the drink we shall be recreating almost immediately was the Calpico Chu - a carbonated lime yogurt beverage that was so yummy - add some soju (Korean distilled sweet potato liquor that is similar to vodka) and as one birthday girl said "dangerous" but oh so yummy!

We shall be returning to try the ginormous raman bowls (seriously huge), curries, kushiyaki (skewers), proper kushiage (panko-fried skewers), robata (hibachi/grill items) and we barely touched on the sushi menu! Can you tell we're excited that Shigezo has finally arrived!

Shigezo Izakaya

910 SW Salmon

Open Monday - Thursday 11:30am - 11pm

Fridays 11:30am - 12midnight

Saturdays 2pm - 12midnight

Sundays 2pm - 11pm

503.688.5202

Looking Ahead

2011-01-07T07:40:00.000-08:00

Now that we have recapped how we rang out 2010 and rang in 2011. We're looking ahead! This is going to be a big year and we want to make sure we hit the ground sprinting!

C'mon - Let's Do This Thing!

More Yummy New Year

2011-01-06T13:22:00.000-08:00

We gave only one gift to each other this year and it was a Cuisinart Griddler Gourmet. Honestly the only reason we'd consider setting up a wedding registry is to put this somewhat frivolous kitchen gadget on the list.

While out on our NYE holiday walk around the neighborhood the day before, we slipped into our local grocery store and bought up some of our favorite sandwich fixings for a memorable New Years Day pressed panini sandwich.

After doing a test panini of peanut butter and banana we were ready to make a real sandwich. We have been dreaming of making our own pressed muffaletta sandwiches for awhile and here was our first one!

Seemed easy enough - assemble sandwich and press. And it really was that easy.

Later that evening we decided to try another sandwich we have been dreaming of creating at home - a traditional Cuban Sandwich. We managed to snag some of the carnitas from our NYE's tamalero, add a few pickles, some swiss cheese and a slice or two of Virginia ham, press and bam! A pretty darn good Cuban sandwich!

If this is what we're eating 24 hours into the New Year, here's to a gut busting 2011!

Yummy New Year

2011-01-05T12:17:00.000-08:00

2011's New Year's celebration was the complete opposite of our 2010 dancing in the rain to a latin marching band outside a makeshift rave tent. We decided to take it easy and ring in the new year doing something else we enjoy - eating food we made.

2011 New Year's Eve started with sunny-cold weather, which was the opposite of the deluge of rain we received last year shorting out the electrical equipment (hence dancing in the rain outside the tent in 2010!) We started with a nice walk through the neighborhood, allowing us to take in the holiday decorations without the holiday crowds.

It was a wonderful way to start the holiday weekend and new year just strolling through the quiet streets, while taking care of errands.

Since we didn't have plans to meet up with friends until after 10pm we took our time and our afternoon of walking errands turned into a 2-hour-post-holiday-get-your-body-moving-or-you-will-freeze-but-its-nice-I'm-freezing-with-you kind of afternoon. Plus we knew we tonight we will be stuffing ourselves with tamales!

Our good friends had invited us to a tradition they had wanted to re-visit for years and this year was going to be the year of the tamalero! We arrived as the first test batch was being pulled from the steamer. This was a holiday tamalero in the truest sense in that we brought over all our holiday leftovers to make tamales with.

We got the masa ready for our first batch of tamales made with our left over mashed potatoes, a bag of frozen peas and carrots and a special chili powder mix.

As soon as those were wrapped up and placed in the steamer we moved on to chicken mole, from our Christmas Chicken Mole dinner and Albert's perfected carnitas.

Once they were in the steamer we ready to toast and ring in the new year! We quickly lit fireworks, toasted and ran back inside to warm back up and wait anxiously for our tamales. Not a bad way to ring in the new year - going home with bags of tamales for the freezer, family and tasty new year day snack!

So, is it easy to make tamales? Goodness yes! The secret is to use some sort of lard or fat like bacon grease or straight up lard, you can totally feel the difference in the masa mix!

Holiday Traditions

2010-12-27T19:32:00.000-08:00

Holidays have their ups and downs and this year was no exception, but the long weekend with cold rainy weather kept us inside, well fed and comfortably cozy.

Over the years we have lost many of our holiday decorations and to make holiday decorating easy we simply put out more candlelight, but next year we'll invest in some evergreens (missed the smell) and maybe a wreath.

We don't have any holidays traditions we do each year other than eating. You could say our holiday tradition is to eat whatever we've been craving with wild abandon.

Although recently there has been one event that has repeated itself the last few years...possibly the beginning of a holiday tradition? Eggs Goldenrod for breakfast on Christmas morning.

This egg-based-gravy over toasted English muffins tradition has us thinking maybe there's something to this whole holiday tradition thing. We could easily imagine having chicken mole for Christmas Day Dinner every year like we did this year.

And end the holiday with an epic game of dominoes and beeritas.

We are much more into what we will be eating during the holidays over what gifts we may receive. Enjoying an overindulgent meal with loved ones, all the while knowing we don't have anywhere else to go for a while is what the holidays are to us. But we did get some cool stuff too. Like this cute little birdy bottle opener. It will make a great addition to our newly set up bar.

And this bad boy 10 inch copper tamagoyaki pan from Japan.

Maybe homemade tamagoyaki could be our next holiday tradition!

Happy Holidays!

2010-12-24T07:34:00.000-08:00

Since we're buddhist we don't celebrate much on Christmas Day, everything happens for us on Christmas Eve. And since we're somewhat Heathens we'll take any reason to celebrate! Hope everyone has a great Christmas Weekend!

Fall Rewind

2010-12-22T15:07:00.000-08:00

Whoa! What happened to the last 6 weeks? Life happens like that for us, we look down and blur, blur, blur. Like most Pacific Northwesterners our moods go downhill after daylight savings happens, which occurred while we were trying to catch some sleep in the Atlanta airport. Something about getting to work when its dark and leaving when its dark that makes people go crazy here.

That didn't seem to happen to us this year. We're really enjoying the dark cold winter weather, maybe it has something to do with the fact that we finally figured out how our radiant heated floors work making our house a balmy tropical oasis where you'll find us lounging around in t-shirts! Unheard of previous years!

We started the fall with a bang! Temperatures dropped slowly and gradually letting us wind down with the weather, taking in beautiful autumn walks through the park. Seriously we enjoyed this everyday for weeks!

Then the heavy rains came and all the leaves were gone, turning our neighborhood into large flood zones. Not due to the large amounts of rain, which we guess made national news, but due to the large amounts of leaves clogging up the gutters. It seemed like any typical late fall to us.

A way-over-hyped-mini-snow-storm, some more rain, more cold temperatures gave way to a few days of cold, but crisp, clean and gorgeous sunny days.

Just enough time to assess the garden, yard, and weather proofing. There's always something to do around here to "prepare" for the weather. But mostly our preparation this year has consisted of trying as many bowls of Japanese pork raman we can get our hands on!

That's our early fall in a nutshell. There was also much wedding planning, a smoked turkey, car bombs (the drink) and wet dark bike rides with the sounds of windchimes guiding us home.

Hope everyone is having a fantastic fall! Here's to winter! Winter Solstice was pretty fantastic too with the eclipse, which was clouded out here, but we could feel the gravitational pull! Yes, pulling us indoors to enjoy some couch time, wool socks, library movie marathons, wassail cocktails, and candle lit relaxing!

Back to Reality

2010-12-09T12:11:00.000-08:00

We are officially back from our time in Costa Rica. Did it go by too fast? Of course it did. We arrived home with a renewed sense of the world. How do you ask? Well, we realized there is a much better place to vacation than Mexico or Hawaii and that we really need to start exploring places south of the US border.

Yes, there will always be a dreaded layover, but if you have family to visit in any of the southern states it makes killing time in large international airports worth it. Plus we got the bonus of a mini-tour of Atlanta and a nice Thai food dinner.

Unfortunately the flights schedule was a bit off and we ended up overnighting it in the Atlanta airport for 9 hours. We tried to sleep away the time, which proved pretty difficult.

In the end it was totally worth it. We were able to see family and that's always a good excuse to fly indirectly home from a vacation.

Forest Patterns

2010-12-07T07:36:00.000-08:00

Hiking in a rain forest isn't about the views, but the plant life.

Once we were able to take our eyes off the slippery hiking path and look up, we realized how beautiful the forest patterns were.

Nature can be so beautiful and inspiring.

That's Why They Call It a Rain Forest

2010-12-05T21:36:00.000-08:00

Have you ever been hiking in the Pacific Northwest of the United States? Well, it's a lush, wet, green canopy full of moss and undergrowth. In other words, its beautiful. It really is, so we weren't too distracted by the Cloud/Rain Forest of Monteverde at first, until we realize things don't grow like this back home!

There certainly aren't palm trees as big as our dining room growing in the old growth forest just 30 minutes away from our house.

For a measly $14 we were able to hike through this pristine ecosystem that we had to ourselves due to the heavy rains of the wet season that seem to keep everyone away. We didn't care, it's a rain forest, you've got to expect some rain! Although due to the thick canopy, the rain was hardly noticeable - at first.

We decide to hike over to the observation bridge and out to the observation deck overlooking the Cloud Forest. A nice 2-hour hike that would give our lungs a nice dose of oxygen!

You could say the plant life is the star of the Cloud Forest, but we would argue the path the local government cut through to make the Cloud Forest accessible to its visitors was pretty impressive as well.

Unfortunately the open tiled path was a bit slippery and uneven that we spent a lot of time looking down, which provided us the opportunity to enjoy the lesser known inhabitants of the rain forest. This guys was actually pretty huge. Just crossing the walkway.

We had read about Monteverde's suspended walkways all along the rain forest and immediately thought of Vancouver, Canada's top tourist attraction, and extremely scary Capilano Suspension Bridge. Fortunately Monteverde's observation bridge is nothing like the the heart-stopping-swaying suspension Capilano Bridge, but a solid steel bridge high above the rain forest canopy.

The view was absolutely amazing. It was very Jurassic Park, as if any minute a huge ancient bird was going to burst through the thick clouds.

We continued along the beautifully green and lush hiking path to the observation deck.

When we reached it there wasn't much of view, other than the inside of a cloud.

Sure, we've seen plenty of the inside of a cloud, but for some reason it was really mesmerizing.

Plus the forest plant life was colorful and interesting.

As we started to make our way back to the main entrance, it began to rain and we were looking forward to having dinner at an interesting restaurant back in Santa Elena.

The Tree House Restaurant is a well known restaurant in the Monteverde area. Situated literally in the middle of a massive tree, the restaurant is hard to miss, on the main drag in Santa Elena, a small town you must pass through on the way to the Monteverde Forest.

The food was good, but the coffee and friendly staff is why you should stop. After a wet and exhilarating hike it was exactly the pitstop we needed before heading back on the crazy road down the volcano.

Forever

2010-12-03T09:21:00.000-08:00

Forever in our hearts

Costa Rican Hospitality

2010-12-02T22:50:00.001-08:00

After what seemed longer than humanly possible to endured road to Monteverde we caught sight of the first establishment and we quickly pulled over. Maybe it was the lush inviting vegetation in the parking lot, we're not sure, but it was a sight for sore eyes.

We walked into the Belcruz B&B probably looking worn down from the drive up and needing some reassurance we were in the right place and that it was worth the effort. Which is exactly what we got. The owners came out from behind the counter quickly offering directions to the bathrooms, pastry case, and would we like an espresso? Yes, yes, and yes!

We were quickly charmed by the owners, who probably see people like us daily, but didn't make us feel that way at all. We quickly ordered up espressos and was provided a nice map, which was then detailed with highlighted areas where the road turned bad and roadside markers indicating we were headed in the right direction.

We found the Costa Rican people to be one of the nicest people around. Friendly, curious, funny and overall just happy. Much like the people of Hawaii, they were an utter delight and we were quickly charmed by their kindness and openness. So much so that we visited the Belcruz on the way back to the main highway, for another espresso and some more of their charming hospitality.

On the Road to Monteverde

2010-11-27T11:06:00.000-08:00

We have never been so happy to see a sign indicating we were on the right track to Monteverde. We had read the road to Monteverde's Cloud Forest was a rough, steep climb up the volcano, cloud, rain forest, but we began to have our doubts once we turned off the main highway and hit the rockiest, bumpiest, wettest road we've ever been on.

We couldn't believe the road wasn't muddy at all, but by the looks of the lush area surrounding Monteverde, it gets a lot of rain.

We passed by small village areas and seriously couldn't believe people actually lived up here with a road like this, but when the locals would pass us on 4-wheel ATVs and street legal dirt bikes, we understood how they managed. We still had our doubts we were on the right road, until kind locals instructed us we needed to turn off by the church and head up. What? Head Up? More?

As we white-knuckled our way up the windy steep road, we were treated to amazing vistas with steep drop offs and hawks gliding in the distance.

Suddenly we realized we were in the heart of the Cloud Forest. It was beautiful!

An even bigger treat was when we spotted our first howler monkeys, just hanging in the trees.

It was hours before we saw any establishments or people, but it was worth the drive. In fact, we'd say the drive was definitely part of the whole experience.

Rocky Road to Monteverde from Buddha Bellies on Vimeo.

Where Life's a Beach

2010-11-24T07:19:00.000-08:00

When we thought about Costa Rican beaches we envisioned lush green jungles that trickled down onto a beautiful sandy beach. And well, we were about right.

We decided to dedicate a day to exploring the outer beaches of the area on a rare sunny day, but after some frustration with the rental car we ended up exploring only two local beaches close to our Playa Hermosa.

We trekked over the lush hills to the next coved beach areas Playa Coco and Playa Octocal. We had visited Playa Coco (Coco Beach) a few nights before to check out the disco scene, which is alive and kicking with locals, which was nice to see. We heard Playa Octocal was a white sand beach which meant cleaner water, a great swimming beach and snorkeling. We didn't get a chance to dip our toes in the water, again rental car issues - Boo for Budget! But we did manage to take a few pictures and see the lovely beach area we'll definitely be back to enjoy someday.

We'd go back and enjoy the calm waters and have lunch and shoot some pool at Father Roosters.

We took some photos, soaked up the beautiful scenery and then headed back to return to the Villas to return the rental car.

After returning the rental car we decided to head down to our local Playa Hermosa and soak up the sun and more importantly get in the water.

It was around 4pm and we knew from our week long stay that by 5:30pm it would be completely dark, but that didn't keep the locals from enjoying the beach until the sunset.

We've mentioned how terrifically modern Costa Rica is right? Well here's an example of that. All the beaches in Costa Rica are public, no beach area can be purchased and privatized including the secluded hillside beaches along the coves. If you can get to the beach by boat, you can enjoy it openly and freely. The government also says its a no-no to sell things on the beach so we were not bothered by anybody selling souveniors or trinkets. It was nice because we relaxed and really enjoyed our cute little Playa Hermosa.

Costa Rican Sunset from Buddha Bellies on Vimeo.

Grocery Check: Costa Rica

2010-11-23T10:53:00.000-08:00

Lara Dunston and Terence Carter have our ultimate dream jobs. They are travel writers who partnered with HomeAway Holiday-Rentals for a year where they are traipsing around the world trading hotel rooms for holiday rentals and writing about their temporary homes, living like locals and giving back to each destination they travel. The ultimate globe trekkers' blog - Grantourismo - 12 Months, 24 Destinations, Countless Experiences is a true inspiration for those who wish to "explore more enriching and authentic ways of traveling, and make travel more meaningful and more memorable".

We love their posts at each destination titled Price Check where they provide a comprehensive shopping list of typical items found at each of their destinations. It's a fascinating price index that provides an idea of what it costs to live like a local all over the world.

The items listed on the price check are similar at every destination in order to make a apples-to-apples comparison of what typical items such as water, coffee, milk and eggs cost. It really is fascinating to see what a bag of groceries would cost you from Barcelona to Buenos Aires. Just weeks before our trip a Costa Rica Shopping List was posted and provided us with a good idea what food would cost us if we decided to cook for ourselves, which we did every morning.

Costa Rica is very modern with every mercado, super mercado and super grande mercado listing out prices at check out in US Dollar and Costa Rican Colones. Change was always given in Colones. We found an incredible array of local goods and brought back many as gifts and by requests from those familiar with the local salsa and sauces. Here is a list of our favorites.

Beers - the local beers in Costa Rica mimic German style beers with light pilsners dominating the scene. Imperial seemed to be the beer of choice by the locals.

We actually preferred the darker richer, but still fairly light Bravaria beer.

Costa Rica had a dizzy array of hot sauces, but the one requested even by brand was Banquete's Salsa de Inglesa, a spicy thick worchester-like salsa that punched up our morning spuds. We brought back many bottles of this stuff which we think prompted TSA to do multiple searches of our bags leaving them wide open at baggage claim and even breaking a zipper and tag off what we thought were our invincible Kiplings! It was worth it though!

Another local item we absolutely loved was the creamy beans made in Costa Rica. We found out later what made them so delcious was the fact that they were fried not once, but twice! The boil-in-the-bag was convenient and efficient. Of course we snagged numerous bags for a quick meal back home.

Another bagged creation we loved was the local sour cream. Placed in a plastic bag with a screw-corner-top. Now why don't they do this with sour cream back home? This item we had to enjoy in Costa Rica, but will remain in our memories and hearts!

Did you know you can drink the tap water in Costa Rica? We told you it is a very modern country - Latin America Lite is what we liked to call it, more like Hawaii than Mexico, but we still bought bottled water, if for only one reason to say "I'll have some Cristal today."

Coffee is delicious in Costa Rica and there are many brands. With beans growing in the wild at Monteverde's Cloud and Rain Forest the country is ideal for growing top-notch coffee beans. We bought the Brit brand at the local grocery store but came across a small roaster while dining in Santa Elena at the base of Monteverde. We bought the coffee beans without trying it and as we were paying for our delicious dinner was offered up some and we marched back in the rain to pick up many more bags. Soon to be available online - Tree House Coffee Beans. Delicious!

There were many other items we purchased, but while we were in Costa Rica we bought fresh fruit, the yummiest avocados, plantains, the best tortillas, chocolate and of course some Cuban cigars!

Memorable Meals: Costa Rica

2010-11-21T07:15:00.000-08:00

Ok, we'll be the first to say it, Costa Rica what is up with all your restaurants selling pasta, pizza, and burgers? We're not saying those pastas and burgers weren't good. In fact the burgers are crazy good in Costa Rica, the beef in general. Pizza we never had, but it was on every menu! Yes, we understand Costa Rica's European historical ties, but we wanted some Costa Rican food!

So we high-tailed it to the next beach area Playa Coco for some "Typical" Food or Costa Rican food. Yes, they call their food "typical", oh but it is anything but!

It was breakfast time and we were on the lookout for a casado plate at a Costa Rica soda or traditional food restaurant. We could spot sodas all along the PanAmerican Highway - all outdoor with bar stools on the outside just like the picture above.

During the first part of the week we had alittle bit of difficulty finding any place that sold even just beans and rice. Even asing politely if they had rice and if they had beans and could they mix them together? To be honest if you aren't into carb loading all the time being a vegetarian in Costa Rica can be difficult. However, if you aren't a vegetarian you can enjoy the best fish there is. The ceviche can be found on most sodas and restaurants and they are fantastic as was this tangy, herby, sour, and acidic all white fish (we think it may have been sea bass) ceviche.

Served with plantain chips, the freshness of each ingredient made this dish and leisurely late-morning breakfast memorable!

After a bit of mime and broken Spanish we were presented with a vegetarian casado plate with fried plantains, cheese, the creamiest black beans, fresh salsa, and the yummiest sour cream.

At last we were able to find some Costa Rican food. The setting, cute little server, and food were beyond our expectations. Down to each perfectly set bite.

Birthday Snapshots

2010-11-19T07:41:00.000-08:00

Here is a photographic time-line of what Mike saw on his birthday this year.

He also had an hour and half long massage on the beach and the best steak of his life (...it brought a tear to his eye). Not bad for a birthday huh?

Toking on the Contraband

2010-11-18T00:30:00.000-08:00

From all our travels we have gathered quite a collection of cigars from around the world, but the one elusive cigar we had yet to experience was the famed cigars from Cuba. And even though our Villa had a strict no smoking policy in the rooms, we simply puffed on our Cuban contraband on the balcony each night.

We actually tried several cigars including the famed Cuban Cohibas and several Costa Rican cigars. We got our cigars from a very kind and helpful tobacconist who recommended us a few Cubans to taste, all which turned out to be extraordinary.

Did you know that you're never suppose to stub out a cigar? That you choose one by how long you have to enjoy it and what you are in the mood for. We were happy with the great selection in many price ranges available in Costa Rica. So many we couldn't decide which ones to smoke each night!

Villas Sol

2010-11-16T19:25:00.000-08:00

Due to the generosity of the Coston Clan we were privy to a week long vacation in beautiful Costa Rica. Strangely enough Costa Rica wasn't remotely on our travel radar. After spending a meager 7 days in the Central America country we are completely won over.

Thanks to resourcefulness and reliance on a thorough paper trail we were upgraded from a typical hotel room to a 2-bedroom villa at the picturesque Villas Sol at Playa Hermosa on the Nicoya Peninsula.

The villas had two balconies, walk in shower and a fully equipped kitchen, where we made a surprising number of meals in.

Each morning we would leisurely wake up with a cup of Costa Rican coffee, juice, tortillas, eggs and sometimes beans or potatoes. And if you could have this view while having breakfast wouldn't you take your time too?

Visiting Costa Rica at the tail end of the official rainy season meant a few days of clouds and rain, which made enjoying the hillside just outside our windows mesmerizing.

The proximity of the villas to the pacific coast beaches, the cozier international airport Liberia and the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve made staying on the Nicoya Peninsula ideal. We were within reach of other towns and the rain forest, our main reason for visiting. All this made for a very leisurely trip with plenty of time to sit and enjoy it all.

Batidos: Costa Rican Drink of Choice

2010-11-14T18:08:00.000-08:00

Some of us had one major goal while in Costa Rica - drink as many batidos as humanly possible.

These fresh fruit whipped-to-a-smoothie-like-consistency drinks were addictive. Especially with all the fresh tropical fruits available. We made it a mission to taste them all!

Similar to a Vietnamese Sinh To or fruit smoothies and nothing like a Mexican aqua fresca, batidos are traditionally mixed with just water or milk. And they were delicious.

We had a mango batido, papaya batido, a lemonada batido, a blackberry batido and a pineapple batido. Some were made with milk and some were made with just water/ice and all were delicious.

Batidos - found at every restaurant, soda, and cafe in Costa Rica!

La Nina

2010-11-10T20:43:00.000-08:00

As the weather is shifting quickly to winter, and the talk around town is all about La Nina, the counter part to El Nino, an ocean atmospheric weather phenomenon that is suppose to bring a wet rainy winter to the Pacific Northwest. So what did we do? Hopped on a plane and headed south!

Any guesses to where we went? More to come soon!

Real Estate Stalking: Sydney, Australia

2010-11-09T06:54:00.000-08:00

During our travels there were many cities we felt we could easily live in and Sydney, Australia is definitely one of those cities. We really liked the laid back beach vibe smack dab in the middle of a major urban city surrounded by water and tropical plants. Sydney is the type of city where you toss away the map and just walk through the neighborhoods.

We knew the cute boxy gingerbread townhouses that lined the streets of Paddington weren't as small as they appeared on the outside, but like the shop houses we loved in Malaysia and Singapore we wondered what these narrow homes looked like on the inside. What rooms were just off the iron balcony upstairs?

Won't someone let us in so we can see for ourselves?

Well, we're pretty resourceful and if you won't let us in, we'll find someone who will.

We warned you we were serious Real Estate Stalker right? If only to see what's inside these ornately narrow homes in posh Paddington.

We did manage to catch a few glimpses of what lays behind these seamless homes.

Up close these urban courtyards were even more than we imagined and got us thinking....

So, what if the Paddington Area is way over-priced. Sydney has many other great neighborhoods. Many that come with spectacular views.

Happy Halloween

2010-10-31T07:40:00.000-07:00

We're not sure what it is, but this year people are really into Halloween. Maybe it's just one of those years where we all just want to be scared or maybe be someone or something else for just one night.

Up until just a couple days ago the weather was sunny, crisp and above all else dry.

But then the first storms rolled in just in time for Halloween and the full moon, which couldn't be seen from all the rain and clouds. Now everything is dark, eerie and scary!

If we really wanted to scare people for this year for Halloween, we'd be Gluten. Everyone seems to be terrified of it!

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Extreme Haunted House

2010-10-29T07:35:00.000-07:00

It was a dark and stormy night. We didn't know what to expect as we raced down I-5 towards the Oregon School for the Deaf. As we approach the large brick institutional building we knew we weren't in for your typical haunted house. Why? Because you can scream all you want and no one will hear you. BOO!

Each Halloween the Oregon School for the Deaf puts on a haunted house as a fund raiser in the basement of one of their buildings. And each year people rave about it. This year it's been raised up a notch with the help of a television show Extreme Makeover and the new king of horror Rob Zombie.

We heard a limited number of VIP tickets were offered online so we bought some and couldn't believe the 1-hour-plus line out front and how we just walked right up, no line, no waiting! Was it spooktacular? Yes it was, although we should have gone on a less busy night. We were ushered in and out so fast we could see what was ahead and anticipated the surprises. But yes, it was pretty darn creepy!

ROCkTOBER

2010-10-26T19:55:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again - ROCkTOBER! In early fall into Halloween Portlanders are treated with an array of concerts and shows. As summer slows down the music scene ramps up!

Once upon a time the organizers of SxSW, the annual music festival in Austin, Texas collaborated with our local weekly newspaper Willamette Week to bring us NxNW. After years of misorganization, miscommunication and overall disaster for some of the artists Willamette Week pulled out and went on their own with MusicFest NW, a 4-day music festival strung out all over the city of Portland.

About a month before the festival was set to begin the line-up was unveiled and we began a preliminary list of the shows we would like to go to. We added up the costs of the individual shows and determined getting a wrist band would be cost-beneficial. However, time and more summer guests determined we were only free one night of the 4-day event.Panda Bear,Major Lazer,NoMeansNo and Shonen Knife would have to wait for another time. We did stand in line and saw Man Man perform at the Hawthorne Theater. The worse venue for an all ages show EVER.

The flat showroom, divided all-ages/21+ floor was a disaster for anyone under 6 feet tall. But it was Man Man! Xylophones, noisemakers, horns and the drummer placed in the front of the stage. The opening band Morning Teleportation - a local avant/folk band mezmorized us just in time for Man Man to take the stage. Another must-see band checked off our list!

A few weeks later we headed up to the Mt. Tabor Theater to see living reggae legend Richie Spice. We arrived as the first opening act came on so we headed down the hallway to the bar where the drinks were half the price!

The Mt. Tabor Theater was once a movie theater so it didn't seem off when the bar had a separate DJ spinning rockabilly in the adjacent bar. It also fit with the Tarantino Grindhouse style movie Hell Ride. The music matched perfectly with this gritty and violent movie, which we were kind of happy we didn't have to actually listen too.

We headed back to the main room to watch Richie's younger brother perform a short set then Richie hit the stage!

Richie Spice had a great backup band and terrific backup singers. Richie seemed a bit dazed. These Jamaican performers come to Portland and just can't handle the Pacific NW green, he was a bit sloppy and at times seemed like he was somewhere else, but he sounded great and the show was fantastic!

One of the most anticipated shows this season for us was the M.I.A. show at the Roseland Theater. A year ago M.I.A made her way through Portland supporting her album Kala and after hearing how she ruled the techno tent at the Coachella Music Festival, we were bummed when we missed her. This year we made sure to pony up for the $25 ticket + a $6 handling charge.

We arrived a little over an hour after the 9pm ticket call time to a PACKED venue and blaring stage and light show. It died down and we were happy thinking we made it just in time. We grabbed a couple of drinks and headed over to get a better view. What we saw was a bit shocking.

First, her "back-up dancers" looked like they were the younger siblings of some friends that she thought "sure, why don't you come along and be my backup dancers". Seriously terrible or maybe white kids from Britian can't dance no matter how much time they spend in the clubs.

Second, we were surprised by how sparse her stage was. But thrilled to see she decided to place all her money for the show into a huge sound system and light screen that turned her song Born Free into a bloody mess - it was awesome. If you want to see the video for the song, it may give you an idea of how she managed to capture the theme of the song and video in her performance.

M.I.A, Born Free from ROMAIN-GAVRAS on Vimeo.

Here's a shot of the loud speakers and subs on one side of the stage. The heavy bass sounds were perfect for being up in the balcony, since all you can usually hear upstairs is the bass.

Within a few songs M.I.A. had the whole place bouncin' like a Jamaican Dancehall with people bumping and grinding on the stage, including Miss Maya herself. Eventually she found her way to top of those banging speakers.

We had greatly anticipated this show and after 35 minutes it was over. O-V-E-R - Over! NO F%&KING WAY! Yes! Then an announcement was made that M.I.A would be DJing at the Crown Room for an additional $3 cover charge. We couldn't believe M.I.A. had pulled a Lady Sovereign! A few years back we had seen Lady Sovereign at the Wonder Ballroom play a short 40 minute set and then dared to say she was DJing at the bar downstairs for an additional $10 cover. We left pissed and highly disappointed at how short the show was. What songs she did play she reinvented which was cool, but she didn't even play one song off her first album! Musicians...so fickle.

Happy Belated Birthday

2010-10-23T07:26:00.000-07:00

October 2010 marked the 1,000 year anniversary of Hanoi as Vietnam's capital. A 1,000 years as the capital!! 1,000 years!!??? Are you are as in awe as we are? That's a long time!

For some perspective Christopher Columbus sailed the Atlantic Ocean looking for the New World a mere 518 years ago, that means Hanoi is twice as old as any major establishments in the US and Hanoi was not the original capital.

We were unaware of this millennium milestone, with little news, tourism PR or international focus on this birthday until we came across an article in The Economist blasting the government on its mishandling of such a monumental event. Vietnam is a communist country with strict governmental control over media and really messed up this one. The Economist article goes on to detail how poorly the government was in organizing and announcing events to mark the celebrations including a fireworks finale that left 4 technicians dead when a crate of fireworks exploded.

Looking deeper into the lack of governmental organization for the celebration showed how poorly the tourism boards are doing to attract foreigners to Vietnam. Very little special tourism packages could be found geared towards the celebrations and worse Vietnam Airlines did offer a promotion just weeks before the celebration, but only included flights out of Vietnam, but not into. Maybe the government is focusing more on the extensive flooding going on in Central Vietnam or maybe 1000 years isn't that old in these parts of the world.

The government estimates Vietnam receive 3.3 million tourist a year, but only manages 5% return rate compared to Thailand's 50%. To us that is heartbreaking considering Thailand was our least favorite country to visit. Direct flights from Asian hubs Tokyo and Kuala Lumpur have been canceled and now only a few carriers do semi-direct (1-layover) flights from the US West Coast. How sad is that? But to be fair Vietnam's tourism is very young compared to other SE Asian countries with it's borders only open to tourism in 1986 and only providing US citizens visas in 1994.

We love Vietnam and really enjoyed our time in the capital of Hanoi. So we would like to raise a glass and say "Happy Birthday Hanoi, may your future be bright with better infrastructure, more transparency and the positive attention you deserve."

Beautiful Fall Days

2010-10-22T07:39:00.000-07:00

The fall in Portland has started off so beautifully, except for one weekend which we spent in bed sick with a headcold, the weather has been sunny, clear and crisp. We're starting to see some fall color.

On an early Saturday morning we had originally planned to spend cleaning up the garden beds, we decided to keep the rake and shovel in the shed and instead take our bikes out for a long ride and enjoy the beautiful sunny fall day. Once on our bikes we just let the sunny weather, gorgeous fall colors and marked bicycle lanes take us where ever.

We passed people playing soccer in the parks, people raking up leaves and people enjoying breakfast outside. It was invigorating. We decided to do our own version of ConnectOregon and bike through any park we come across, which led us the Beverly Cleary Sculpture Garden at Grant Park in NE Portland.

Beverly Cleary is a dearly loved writer of children's books set in NE Portland neighborhoods. One of her books was recently made into a movie - Ramona and Beezus, who grew up on Klickitat Street. I grew up loving Beverly Cleary books and to see this small water fountain sculpture garden tribute was long overdue.

The small garden is by the playground area of Grant Park and has tribute tiles listing out all of Beverly Cleary's books and the years they were published. Good books are timeless with her most memorable books published in the 1950s! We were happy to spend such a lovely day with Henry Huggins, his dog Ribsy and Ramona!

Busy Season

2010-10-18T12:20:00.001-07:00

WOW, we've been super busy. Fall has started off with a glorious bang! The lazy days of summer are definitely gone with lots of garden clean-up, crisp bike rides and harvesting, harvesting, harvesting and more harvesting. Just not enough hours in a day. No time to just lounge around, that is until it gets dark and cold, but for now the days have been GLORIOUS! Starting with an amazing Autumnal Equinox!

Hope everyone is enjoying Fall as much as we are! Get outside in the amazing sunny weather, bundle up (it's cold out there) and take advantage of the dry weather!

Bob's Red Mill

2010-10-12T07:23:00.000-07:00

While traveling throughout Asia we would occassionally come across packaged items from brands and companies back home. Yes, there were multinational brands like Lays potato chips and Kraft products galore, but it was the local Pacific NW products that would surprise us the most. The most prominent products we recall seeing were Kettle Chips (mostly tortilla chips) and Bob's Red Mill flour products.

About 15 minutes south of Portland you can visit Bob's Red Mill retail store and cafe, where you will find their extensive line of over 400 products, as well as enjoy a nice breakfast or lunch in their charming red barn like mill.

So on the first rainy Fall day of the year we decided to make a trip out to the Whole Grain Retail store to stock up on some baking essentials at 20% off and enjoy a 50% discount on a breakfast entree thanks to our handy dandy Chinook Book coupons. The cute-as-can-be retail store/cafe was organized in several major areas. Cafe/kitchen/cashiers were at the back of the store where you can place your order for breakfast and lunch items, get a number and take a seat either on the ground floor off to the side of the packaged items, upstairs or on nice days, on their lovely patio area.

We placed our breakfast orders and went upstairs to get a full view of the store below.

While we were very impressed with incredible selection of goods offered in large bags, bulk, and pre-packaged, we weren't very impressed with the layout, they tried to cram way too much into the space. We were also impressed with the extent of their cafe menu. While there were no fancy cafe style breakfast items, instead focusing on traditional eggs and potatoes dishes, there were grits, biscuits, and a large variety of their famous baked items such as waffles and pancakes. The portions were great for the prices and the food was very tasty.

However when we got upstairs to find a table and wait for our grilled cheddar grits served with maple syrup (surprisingly delicious) we found nothing but dirty table after dirty table and when we asked to get a table wiped down, the staff seemed confused and we ended up finding a towel and wiping down the table ourselves. The same can be said for checking out at the retail store with confusion and cramped aisles making paying for our items a bit chaotic. Best to go on the weekdays when the store isn't packed with breakfast and store shoppers.

Bob's Red Mill is known for their traditional use of stone grinders to make their flours and baking products.

You can buy large wholesale size bags of all their products from garbonzo flours, rice flours, pastry flours, whole wheat flours, flours for bread machines and the list goes on and on. They also conveniently provide bins with airtight lids to store these large quantity bags. These ladies were consulting a list, something you definitely should have if you plan to shop here.

There was also an impressive area of bulk foods. We found one of the largest selection of dried beans we've seen in a while, including hard to find green french lentls and dried white beans. You can also find spices in bulk and normally extremely high priced thickeners like xanthum gum and guar gum which can run up to $10 a package in the store, available in bulk here!

There was also a bakery where you could buy fresh baked goods. It was hard not buy all the specialty breads made on premise.

There were also aisles and aisles of pre-packaged items such as scone mixes, pancake/waffle mixes and specialty cake mixes. Bob's Red Mill has an impressive list of gluten free, organic and hard to find products such as flaxseed flour or course millet flour all in one store. It is definitely worth the short 15 minute trek to visit this impressive and charming retail store for breakfast/lunch or to stock up on all your baking needs.

And if getting the ingredients to make bread aren't your thing, Dave's Killer Bread and NatureBake's stores are just across the street.

Bob's Red Mill Whole Grain Store 5000 SE International Way Milwaukie, Oregon (503)607-6455 6am-6pm Monday-Friday, 7am-5pm Saturdays, Closed Sundays

VegFest 2010

2010-10-04T07:48:00.000-07:00

This year Northwest Veg sure made it easy to stop by their annual Veg Fest by offering coupons for $1 off entrance fee of $5 on their website, in the local papers, at the entrace to the Convention Center and even at the registration table! And if you're wondering can a omnivore eat $4 worth of tofu, hemp products and raw chocolates? Hell Yes We Can!

I made plans to meet up with my vegan friends for the annual two day event infront of the ballroom entrance. I was a bit late because the weather couldn't decide to downpour, sprinkle or just rain. Normally even in downpours the short ride to the Convention Center isn't a big deal, but I had planned to bike further away to pick up concert tickets for later that weekend. We met up underneath the slightly scary and pointy swaying art installation in the rotunda.

Like any event at the Convention Center you find out which ballroom or conference room your particular event is held in and make your way up or down the convention levels and enter into a large square room with aisle after aisle of booths. Unlike any other event at the Convention Center participants are greeted with a free reuseable grocery bag from Whole Foods and table after table of free food! Plus people don't care if you take photos, no ideas here to steal.

Products made from hemp was big this year. It really is a miracle plant. You can eat it, drink it, wear it and I'm sure someone out there is trying to figure out how to build a house of hemp. We enjoyed spreads, breads and milk all made from hemp.

Another very visible vegetarian product was chocolate. Gourmet chocolate is becoming as ubiquitous as coffee and beer are in the Pacific NW. Inquiring about the organic cocoa ratios of a chocolate bar or drink is commonplace now and many of the chocolatiers were extremely creative pairing fruit and nuts in their chocolates.

I was very lucky to be with veteran VegFest goers, as I simply followed their lead and stuck out my hand as samples were passed back to me. Amazingly enough everything we tried, and we tried everything, was vegan as well as vegetarian.

Vegan Biscuits & Gravy from Blooming Lotus Cafe

There was even a kitchen supply company selling vegetable refresh bags, innovative kichen gadgets and the best wooden clothes hang dry rack I have ever seen, although a clothes drying rack of its size would be great, couldn't muster up the $60. It immediately did go on my housewares for upgrading wish list.

We did stop by the natural material clothing and accessories vendor selling vegetarian clothing, shoes and these fun bags made out of film strips. Although technically gelatin is used in processing film making traditional film photography not "veg friendly". Still, I thought these bags were fun.

There were even vegetarian dog food vendors. Only dog food, I can't imagine a cat anywhere who could survive without animal protein, it's just not natural. I grabbed a bag of the veggie dog treats to test on our family dogs, but honestly you can put peanut butter on an old shoe and our dogs would probably love it.

The two day weekend festival had more than just vendors and exhibitors, there were also speakers ranging from doctors and nutritionist speaking about health, disease and the importance of the food we consume to cooking demonstrations and even a guest speaker with a Ph.D in economics speaking about the impacts of global economics, international trade and climate change on household consumption in the US and around the world.

More than anything VegFest is about education. Educate yourself on health, meat alternatives and alternative ways of eating. I was standing behind one VegFest goer who commented that "there aren't very many overweight people here."

VegFest was totally delicious and yes, I definitely ate $4 worth of food. I got to try totally vegan cheeses that were delicious, a new line of vegan and gluten free pizzas from Tofurkey, coconut milk ice cream bars, several meat alternatives (most delicious and one just nasty) and more bean spreads than you can shake a stick at.

VegFest - Totally Vegetarian/Vegan, Totally Fun.