KC Irish Fest 2008

The Kansas City Irish Fest was this weekend and a group of us decided to go. This is the third year that I've gone to the Irish Fest, and it was a first for my new roommate. Here's a refresher on Irish Fest 2006 and Irish Fest 2007.
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It was fun for all, even for me since the whole festival expanded in size and there seemed to be a lot more vendors (food and other) and musical guests there.
Thankfully, we decided to go later in the evening this year, so it wasn't 100 degrees out and there was no need for me to jump in the fountains to cool off. The lack of heat, however, did not deter these kids from getting wet.
All of us purposefully did not eat dinner at home so that we could gorge on expensive-and-fatty-but-oh-so-delicious festival food. I was seeking out the Italian sausage stand, but I saw this sign for fried pickles and thought "Is that such a good idea?" No, I did not try one. The idea of a fried pickle does not perk my food palette. I was very close to getting a corn dog though.
I knew there was an Italian sausage stand!! 1/2 pound sausage on a bun for $6 -- waaaaayyyy better than the overpriced sausage dogs at professional baseball games.
See how big they are? Yeah, I was so hungry, I took a bite before I took a picture.

I got yelled at by the vendor for taking this picture of a bib with "spit happens" on it. =( mean old vendor.
For dessert, we had funnel cake, because you know, my new roommate never had funnel cake before and she has to try it at least once in her lifetime. I think I got her hooked. She also has a sweet tooth, like me, so I think we'll get along very well.
We were looking for green beer at the festival, but the only green liquid we saw was this fountain. No, we didn't drink it.
And below, pictures of Scottish bums. (get it?)

lazy cinnamon rolls

"What's lazy cinnamon rolls?" you ask? It's when you are too lazy to make it from scratch and decide to use pre-made dough from the Pillsbury doughboy. Or in this case, I just don't know how to make cinnamon rolls from scratch in the first place.
Ingredients for lazy cinnamon rolls -- One can of Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls with Icing.
Directions -- Read the back of the can!

Pop open the can, put the individual rolls on a cookie sheet like so, and stick it in a 400 degree oven for 8-10 minutes.

If you must, you can watch through the oven window to see the rolls progress in rising.
When the time is up, take out the rolls and frost with icing.
And voila! Yummy cinnamon rolls in about 15 minutes from start to finish.
Commence eating.

Texas Roadhouse

We had a Girls Night Out today, and to belatedly celebrate a couple of the girls' birthdays, and decided to have dinner at Texas Roadhouse in Blue Springs, Missouri. The coolest thing here was that they had buckets of peanuts everywhere, and you could just eat the peanuts and throw the shells on the floor.


I couldn't get over the fact that you could just litter the shells on the floor. I felt so guilty for "littering" but I kept doing it because I was allowed to. It was fun!

The dinner rolls were so yummmmyyyy....all buttery and warm, and it comes with a side of cinnamon butter spread. I, myself, had 2 1/2 dinner rolls with cinnamon butter, because you know three rolls would be too much for a lady to eat in one sitting.

2/3 of the group had a salad as one of her side choices (not me -- J and I are meatatarians). Everyone who had a salad said the ranch dressing was really good. From the looks of it, the salad looked pretty tasty.

More buckets of peanuts at our table, only they also gave us an extra bucket to put shells in if we wanted to.
And now for the dinner selection, starting off with my plate: Half Slab of Ribs with Mashed Potatoes and Steamed Veggies, which I am so proud of myself for eating 2/3 of the veggies because I hate califlower and broccoli.
Country Fried Chicken slathered in gravy sauce (with mashed potatoes and green beans, which are not shown here)

Half slab ribs with a baked potato loaded with cheese, sour cream and bacon bits.
Pulled BBQ pork sandwich with fried onion rings and a pickle.
Half slab ribs with mashed potato, no gravy.
1/3 slab ribs with steak fries.
Are you full from looking at the pictures yet? I'm still full from actually eating it, and dinner was almost four hours ago!

no more pizza meetings

For the last two years since I've been in law school, there is usually the prospect of free pizza to entice students to attend certain meetings/events/discussions being held by different organizations at the law school. The first year, it would nice to have free lunch every other day for almost every week during the first month at the law school. Then I got kinda sick of eating pizza every other day, and if the event/meeting/discussion was of no interest, I didn't bother going.

This year, I have noted that the meetings/events/discussions all proceed each announcement with "Come to this [name of event] and get free lunch," which is then immediately followed by "not pizza!" I guess other people are getting sick of pizza too.

I went to an APILSA meeting today (brownie points to anyone who figured out what APILSA stands for -- only those not in law school may apply). The board officers was very extravagent in today's food selection -- SUSHI.



No more pizza? I'm not complaining. Bring on the pizza substitutes!

special bday lunch (for CC)

I missed CC's birthday over the summer, so yesterday I took her out to lunch at the Tearoom at Andre's Confiserie Suisse. Andre's is known for the decadant chocolates, so we were expecting a great lunch too, which is just a prix fix meal that comes with beverage, entree and dessert. There is also a different menu everyday of the month (well, maybe they recycle the menus every month).

I would just like to add that whatever they put into the iced-tea, it was delicious. I think I drank like four glasses of iced tea, and I don't usually drink more than two glasses of any beverage, including water.
I chose the Bratwurst entree, which comes with a side salad topped with Andre's salad dressing (made in-house at Andre's and was extremely light but very tasty), and polenta. The bratwurst was a little plain (I was expecting more of a POW taste) but was pretty tasty when dipped in mustard. The polenta was pretty good too -- it was like mashed corn pie.
CC had the Chicken and Mushroom Vol au Vent -- translation: chicken and mushroom in puff pastry. I thought the serving was a bit on the small size, but I suppose the Swiss likes to eat in smaller portions, which is probably the correct amount a person should normally eat anyway. The meal also came with slices of tomatoes and a corn salad. All of which CC really enjoyed.
For dessert, we had a whole tray to choose from (I wish I had asked to take a picture of the tray). We chose the Dobash Slice (seven layers of vanilla cake and chocolate ganache) and some Summer Torte (not shown on website) that had some apricot and raspberry jam. Both desserts were delicious. I especially loved the chocolate ganache from the Dobash slice - it was so creamy and smooth. Since Andre's has a different selection of entrees for each day of the month, I suppose we'll just have to keep going back everyday in order to taste everything on the "menu." Too bad lunch wasn't $5 per person! (It was $14 per person.)

last (summer) supper

I've been flying back and forth from SF to KC to SF to KC for the last couple of weeks: first to KC to move things back into my apartment and attend first day of classes; then a short trip back to SF to attend a job fair. Now I'm back in KC, for good, or until the December break.

Anyway, during my quick stint in SF, The Boy took me out to Malabar in Sacramento as a last-summer-supper sorta deal. It was a meal that would mark the end of my last summer vacation ever and that I was eight months closer to graduation.

We started off with the Three Cheese Garlic Bread appetizer, which comes with marinara sauce on the side. The combination of the cheeses (mozzerella, provolone and asiago) was not too rich and it was delicious. I didn't taste much of the garlic and I thought the bread was not as crunch as garlic bread should be. However, we only had half the portion, so I took the leftover garlic bread home as a dinner snack and it was super crispy when I re-heated it in the toaster oven.

We each ordered a half sandwich and soup combo: Turkey Club sandwich with fries. The Boy chose chowder for his soup, and I chose chili.
The Turkey Club was packed full of turkey, bacon and avocados. YUMMY! I had to open my mouth extra wide just to ensure that every bite had all the ingredients in it. I think this might be the best turkey club sandwich I have ever eaten. The bacon was extra crispy and there was plenty of it but not so much that the taste of pork fat overpowered everything else. The avocado was nice and fresh too. My descriptions are so good that I wish I was eating that sandwich again right now.
So The Boy had chowder as his choice of soup. He thought it was clam chowder but upon my further taste inspection, it was just potato and bacon chowder, no presence of any kind of seafood. It was rich and creamy, and quite filling with all the potatoes in it.
I had the chili as my soup of choice. There was pulled pork meat in the chili which gave the chili a different texture that I can't decide whether it was a good thing or a bad thing. There wasn't a lot of spice to the chili, but it was a nice dip for my fries (chili fries!). I enjoy The Boy's chowder more than I did my chili. The turkey club sandwich still tops it all.

And now back to my regularly scheduled boring old pack-your-own-sandwich-for-lunch lunches.

no-bake chocolate cupcakes

I took a mini-vacation from school and flew back west to SF for a job fair. So, since I couldn't be in class today, I spent the day at The Boy's mother's house (to get away from the SF fog and be in some nice summer heat).

I haven't been making anything from my cupcake book lately because of this summer heat. It's way too hot to turn on the oven! But I wanted to surprise his mom with cupcakes so there was one recipe in the book that didn't require me to turn on the oven -- No-Bake Chocolate Cupcakes! Basically, it's just a chocolate flavored rice crispy treat. Super sweet but extra yummy!

Ingredients:

Six Snickers bars. I decided to use Snickers Almonds so I guess this is a no-bake chocolate almond cupcake.

4 tablespoons butter

3 1/2 cups rice krispies cereal

7 ounces milk or dark chocolate, melted.

No-baking instructions:

1. Line a 12-holed standard muffin pan with paper baking cups.

2. Chop up five of the candy bars coarsely.

3. Place chopped bars in medium pot with the butter; stir over low heat until smooth.

4. Add the rice krispies and stir until mixed.

5. Press mixture into baking cups.

6. Melt the chocolate over low heat.

7. Spread the melted chocolate over the cupcakes.

8. Cut the remaining candy bar into 12 slices.

9. Top each cupcake with a slice of candy bar. Refridgerate 30 minutes or until set.

10. Grab a glass of milk and enjoy!