Tag Archives: dinner

Nighthawk Breakfast Bar (or A Late Night Breakfast/Dinner)

Posted on May 3, 2016 | Comments Off

I’m always looking for fun things to check out around LA. It fits in nicely with one of my 2016 goals to go do more fun stuff with my friends. So when I saw an article from the LA Times about a new restaurant that is only open late at night and serves breakfast style foods, I knew I had to check it out! I posted about it online and asked my friends who wanted to check it out. We managed to get a group of 5 of us and were able to go this past week!

The Nighthawk Breakfast Bar is only open Wednesdays through Saturdays from 8pm-2am. I’m not usually a late night person and we heard that it can get really crowded, so my group went on Thursday night and we made an 8pm reservation. The Nighthawk is out in Hollywood, so my Disneyland buddy June and I carpooled together. My friend Rayshell met us there at 8, and my friend Amanda and her friend had to work until 8 so they met us there at 9.

When June, Rayshell, and I got there the very first thing we did was check out the menu and the amazing drinks that they have available!

Nighthawk

In all the reviews we had read online, people were raving about the Spiked Cereal Milk. While they sounded awesome, I decided to get one of the Julius drinks (I got the OG).

(by the way, sorry that so many photos are the best quality. I took them in a dark space without a flash so others weren’t bothered)

It was pretty amazing! It tasted so much like an orange creamsicle and there wasn’t too much alcohol in it so I didn’t feel that buzzed. Rayshell got one of their boozy floats (and I got to try it and thought it was awesome) and June was the one who got the Cereal Milk!

Cereal Milk

It was a lot of milk, but we all got to taste it and it was really delicious! I just wished that they had some sort of Cereal Milk sampler (maybe shots of each type?) so you could try them all and not have as much milk because it’s a pretty filling drink.

We also got some food to start with (and Rayshell couldn’t stay too late either). The first thing that caught our attention when we were checking out the menu online before we were there were the Benedict Fries. They sounded amazing and we all knew that we would have to get them.

Benedict Fries

And we totally made the right choice on those! The egg on top was perfect and runny and the hollandaise sauce on the fries was really good! I think we all loved them and the only regret we had was that with only 3 of us splitting them they were so filling so we didn’t get too much more food!

When we had the Benedict Fries, Rayshell also ordered the Purple Haze Potato Hash.

Duck Hash

She let June and I try some of it (since I knew I would be writing this post I felt like I needed to try as much as possible). It was a little bit spicy for me, but not so bad that I didn’t enjoy it. The duck was really delicious and it was a great match for the Benedict Fries we also had.

Sadly, after we ate those Rayshell had to leave (she had an early work day). But June and I hung around for Amanda and her friend to get there and we tried to prepare ourselves to order more food (we really wanted more, but we were so full!).

Amanda and her friend got the Benedict Fries too (June and I didn’t have any of theirs) and the Chicken and Biscuits.

Chicken and Biscuits

I got to try the Chicken and Biscuits and I think that the next time I go to Nighthawk I will have to get those! I’m not usually a fried chicken person (or gravy person), but this was really good and not greasy like I thought it might be.

And since June and I wanted to try one more thing, we went for more of a dessert option and got the Drunken French Toast.

French Toast

The french toast was the perfect end to the meal. It was really sweet and light and everyone at the table enjoyed eating it!

What shocked me the most about going to the Nighthawk Breakfast Bar was that everything was really delicious and that I had really no complaints about the food at all. I was telling June in the car on the way home that if something wasn’t as good as the rest then maybe we could have ordered more things to try (we really wanted to get the Tower of Bacon but had no room in our stomachs). But since everything was really top-notch, we basically cleaned the plates of everything that we got. But we also know that a return trip to the Nighthawk Breakfast Bar is in order so we can try out more things (and maybe by then they will have some sort of Cereal Milk sampler too!).

If you are going to go to Nighthawk, I do recommend making reservations. It wasn’t super crowded when we got there at 8pm, but it filled up quickly and if you go really late I can imagine that there would be a wait for a table. Also, nice it is a late night restaurant, you can probably find free meter parking nearby! We found a free meter (it was free after 8pm) right across from the restaurant so we were pretty happy about that! I really do recommend everything that we ate and I would guess that everything else on the menu is just as good as what we tried. This is a really fun place to check out with a pretty chill atmosphere (especially chill since it is in Hollywood and many places there are a bit touristy).

If you get to go to Nighthawk, I’d love to know what you had and what you loved! I think my friends and I will be able to make it back there in a month or so, and I know we want to know what things are must-haves for next time!

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged dinner, drinks, food, friends, Hollywood, Los Angeles

A Goodbye Dinner (or My Friend Is Becoming A Georgia Peach)

Posted on March 25, 2016 | Comments Off

While I love celebrating all of my friends‘ accomplishments, sometimes those accomplishments are a bit sad too. My friend Brandi announced recently that she and her family are moving to Atlanta and she had her goodbye dinner the other day. I’m happy for the new adventure that she’s going on, but I’m sad that a friend is moving away.

Brandi and I have been friends for a while. I actually can’t remember exactly how we met. I think it might have been through The Actors’ Network but we’ve known each other so long that I can’t be sure. Ever since we met, she’s been an amazing friend to me. She’s the one who started our Girls Night Out group and because of that I met so many of my other friends. She’s helped out with the Inside Acting 200th episode celebration by making custom cookies for us, and then she inspired so many of us with her amazing story when she was interviewed on the podcast. She has accomplished so many things in her career and I only hope that I can have similar successes to her some day.

With Brandi

Brandi’s move is going to be a really good thing for her. She’s got family near there and there are so many opportunities for actors there. I’ve already told her that I’m expecting that it’s just a matter of time now before she is cast on “The Walking Dead”. While I wish that she was staying in LA, I know that her move to Atlanta is the best thing for her and her family. Plus, I know she’ll be making trips to LA every so often (and this gives me an excuse to go to Atlanta for the first time)!

Brandi’s dinner was technically also a Girls Night Out gathering, but since Brandi wanted to invite some of her guy friends too we made it co-ed. It was the same night as the rock opera screening, so I was a bit late arriving to the dinner but that was ok. As soon as the screening was done, I got into my car and drove over. I was only about an hour late, but because there was horrible traffic everyone was late too.

The dinner was held at Kitchen 24. Originally I was totally going to stay there for dinner and hang out with Brandi and everyone else as much as possible. But because I got there late and was exhausted that evening, I was only able to be there for about an hour an a half. All the food there looked amazing, but it was a bit late for me to eat and I knew that I needed to be out of there by a certain time. I wish I could have ordered something because when everyone else started to get food, it smelled so yummy. So I guess I’ll have to go out there another time to try it out.

Since I wasn’t eating while I was there, I spent my time chatting with my friends. Some of them I haven’t seen in a long time, but since we are friends on Facebook it always seems like I know what they’ve been up to. It actually shocked some of us when we realized it had been over a year since we had seen each other! So even though we were virtually caught up, it was nice to catch up for real. And we all started planning our next Girls Night Out since it has been almost 2 years since our last real one. So we are working on scheduling the next one (and making sure that we FaceTime Brandi in so she can be a part of it) and hopefully we get a good turnout for it.

Before I knew it, I had to head back home. I’ll see Brandi one more time for sure before she moves because I am giving her some of my old suitcases to use for moving. So it wasn’t a big goodbye when I said goodbye, but it was still sad. I know with Facebook, twitter, Instagram, and other technologies that it won’t be that hard to stay in touch when she moves; but it won’t be the same. And I think having to say goodbye was also a lesson to the rest of us that we have been slacking on seeing each other in person and we need to remedy that now.

But for now, it’s bon voyage to Brandi and the amazing adventure she’s going on. I have no doubts that this move is going to benefit her career so much and before we know it she’ll be back in LA again accepting an amazing award or something!

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Posted in Celebrations, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff

Tagged acting, dinner, friends, girls night out, moving

Grownup Dinner (or Seeing A Gym Friend Outside Of The Gym)

Posted on March 17, 2016 | 1 comment

Even though several of my plans over the weekend had ended up not happening, the one thing that didn’t get rescheduled was my dinner on Monday evening. I had dinner plans to hang out with my friend Dani.

Dani and I pretty much see each other every week at Orangetheory, but it’s not that often that we see each other outside of workouts. We see each other for our Pantages shows (although she didn’t come with me to “The Illusionists”) and we also sometimes hang out like at her birthday party or at the Disney musical show. But usually our hangouts are at the gym and we catch up on life before class starts.

So when Dani asked me if I wanted to get dinner with her on Monday night, I was super excited to get to hang out with her! She suggested a restaurant in downtown Culver City and it worked perfectly for me. Downtown Culver City is only a few blocks from my house. And since the clocks changed it was still pretty light out when I was leaving for dinner at 7pm. So I took advantage of the late sunlight and walked to dinner.

Walking In Culver City

I don’t walk to restaurants in downtown Culver City too often because I don’t walk home at night alone. But Dani said she could drive me home after dinner, so I was able to walk there (and get in a bunch of steps for the day).

We met for dinner at Akasha. I had been there before, but I hadn’t been there in a long time so I was excited to go again. When we got there, we went to the hostess stand to get a table and found out that since we didn’t make a reservation it was going to be over an hour wait! I couldn’t believe it because it was a Monday and so many tables in the restaurant were empty. But since we didn’t want to wait that long we found seats at the bar to eat there (the entire menu is available at the bar so that’s good).

As soon as we got our seats at the bar, the first order of business was ordering drinks. I don’t drink that often (I can’t because of taking Vyvanse), but I can have a couple of drinks a month if I want to. I haven’t had a drink in a while, so I figured that getting a glass of prosecco would be nice (I ended up only being able to drink about half of the glass). Dani and I kept joking that this was a grownup dinner since we were in normal clothes and not gross and sweaty after a workout. It was a nice change of things.

The conversation was pretty awesome. Dani has a really cool trip coming up so she was telling me all about it and I was sharing with her how nice it was to have a lazy weekend the past weekend (sadly, I didn’t have too much to share since I hadn’t really done much lately). There was also a guy also sitting at the bar who looked really familiar to Dani so we spent a little bit of time trying to figure out if he was on a tv show or something.

As far as dinner goes, I’m still trying to eat healthy so I ordered a bit differently than I probably would have in the past. I got a salad and a small plate (I think it might technically have been an appetizer but it was the perfect size for me). That isn’t that different from what I would get most of the time, but the salad was me testing out a food I don’t like: kale.

I know that kale is super hip right now and everyone seems to be eating it, but I don’t. When I was a kid, my family had a pet lizard who ate kale. Back then it wasn’t something that most people ate (I’m guessing it was super cheap because of that) and I only saw kale as lizard food. I really believed that until a few years ago nobody ate kale. But once it became super popular I tried it and didn’t really like it.

I have a rule that if there is a food that I claim to hate that I have to try it at least twice a year. I do make my best effort to try the foods I don’t like that often but I know that it doesn’t always happen. The only food that I have decided I don’t have to try again is pineapple. I tried it the last time in Hawaii and I still hated it. Even though I love my Dole Whips, I hate pineapple. So I don’t try that again anymore. But since kale has still been on my hated food list, when I saw it on the menu as a kale caesar salad, I figured I’d try it.

Kale Salad

Honestly, I think the reason I liked it was because of the dressing and not the kale. But I still ate most of it and did enjoy it! So now I know that if kale is prepared with other flavors I love, I might like it. Good for me to know!

My dinner was the small plate of potato gnocchi with mushrooms. It was pretty small (especially compared to Dani’s dinner with was a giant plate of awesome food), but it was tasty and just enough food for me.

Dinner

We were hoping to go on a quick shopping adventure after dinner, but since there was a line to get out of the parking structure we ended up skipping it. But I know that the shopping adventure will be happening in the near future.

It does feel like a bit of a luxury to go out for dinner with a friend like this. Normally going out for dinner is Chipotle or Lyfe Kitchen (ironically I had a dinner with a friend at Lyfe Kitchen the next day). There’s nothing wrong with those places, but they are not nearly as nice as a sit down dinner where you have to spend more than $20 to eat. It’s not something that I can do that often, but it’s not unreasonable to do as a treat. It does feel really grownup to do that since most of the times I go out for a nice dinner I’m with my family. It’s just not something I get to do with a friend normally.

But after splurging on going out to dinner with Dani, I realize that treating myself like that every once in a while is totally worth it. Yet another thing to work on planning into my schedule to make my life the best it can be.

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged dinner, food, friends

Cooking Routine (or Adding Flavor)

Posted on March 11, 2016 | Comments Off

I’m working really hard at cooking more at home. With my challenge for this month being no delivery food, I must have better options in my house to eat so I don’t fail at the challenge.

I think what I really struggled with in the past was the sheer number of options for foods to make. I have dozens of cookbooks (I recently gave some away so I think it might just be under 2 dozen cookbooks now) and all of them have lots of recipes that seem super delicious and I know I could probably make them. I’m a good cook and I can follow a recipe, so I don’t worry too much about not being able to make something (although I do worry about something not tasting good if I make it).

I think the other problem with a majority of the recipes in the cookbooks are the number of ingredients that a recipe requires. Maybe if I had a huge kitchen I’d keep a ton of ingredients on hand to be able to make anything with very little grocery shopping required, but that’s not my situation. My kitchen is a small but functional and I don’t have much storage or counter space. So I have to keep things limited that I store. So many of the recipes seem like I would have to fill an entire grocery cart with the ingredients just for that meal. That’s expensive, that’s a lot of stuff to store, and chances are most of it would spoil before I used it up.

So a lot of the things I’ve been making in the past have been pretty plain. I do a lot of the same veggie bowls that I made a year ago on the cleanse I did. Even though the meatloaf I make is a bit fancier, it’s still not a ton of ingredients and it’s really easy to put together. I keep lots of things that are easy to make (like turkey burgers and veggies) in my freezer so it’s not too difficult to put together a basic dinner. And I’m glad that this is a habit that I’m still sticking with.

But I’m still looking to bring more variety into my cooking because even though basic foods can be healthy, they can be boring. And I know that if I get bored with something I won’t keep eating it (that’s why I stopped making veggie bowls for so long). So I’m working on easy ways to add variety to the flavor of my foods but don’t require too much effort or shopping.

This past week I had a couple of different meals that worked out really well. Toward the beginning of the week, I made a turkey burger for dinner (which to me is perfect just plain on its own). But I knew I’d want a good side dish to go with it. I had picked up some broccoli because I figured I’d make broccoli at some point, so I figured this was as good of a time as any. I steamed the florets in the microwave and then put those into a bowl to cool a bit. Then I browned some butter in the microwave (it’s a bit messy, but the flavor is totally worth it) and after that was done added some fresh lemon juice to it. My mom does this to broccoli all the time and it’s one of my favorites. And it made a delicious and nice looking dinner that night.

Turkey Burger

Next time I’ll make more of it because I ate so much of it and I need to do some adjustments to the flavor of the sauce (I needed more lemon), but it was really good and reminded me how good healthy food is.

Then on Wednesday night after my workout I knew I needed to cook dinner. I used to hate cooking dinner on workout nights, but I’m starting to be ok with it. In the past, I might microwave a dinner or get delivery after a workout because I was tired. But honestly it’s not that much harder for me to cook (I know, everyone has been telling me this for years but I didn’t believe it) and as long as I have things in my kitchen that are easy enough to put together I can get it done really quickly.

One thing that I’m a bit obsessed with right now are smashed potatoes. I use baby potatoes and cook them for a few minutes in the microwave. Then I smash them down with a paper towel and bake them until they are super crispy. I usually use my oven to bake them in, but on Wednesday I wasn’t using my oven for anything else. So I tried making them in my toaster oven. And to add some flavoring to them, I tried this new seasoning grinder I got at Trader Joes.

Garlic Salt

While the potatoes were baking, I cooked up some chicken sausages and thankfully I timed things out pretty well because the potatoes were done pretty soon after the chicken was. While I’ve made these potatoes a lot lately, adding this new garlic salt seasoning really made a huge difference and made them so good! I’m thinking maybe I’ll try this seasoning on some chicken next week.

While I’m super happy that I’m still keeping up with cooking at home and that I’m taking more chances and finding more things I enjoy making, I’m still worried that this is a phase and I will go back to my old ways. Maybe being cautiously optimistic is better than feeling overly confident that I’ve changed and will never go back to how I was before. I really want to keep making steps toward a healthier (and cheaper) life and I know that cooking is a huge part of that. Hopefully I’m able to keep this up.

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff, Health

Tagged cooking, dinner, food, health issues, meal planning, meals

A Dinner Hangout (or Seeing My Sister-In-Law in LA)

Posted on March 2, 2016 | Comments Off

Even though my schedule the past week was crazy (I haven’t even covered the craziness of my past weekend), I still tried to have fun when I could. So when my sister-in-law Krystle sent me a text saying that she was going to me in LA on Friday, I knew I had to hang out with her! Since she and my brother moved to Santa Barbara, she and I haven’t really hung out in LA too much. She’s come over to my house for a quick visit, but it’s usually just a stop on their drive back from San Diego.

While I couldn’t hang out with Krystle and Ross while they were exploring LA (I was working then), I was able to join Krystle for dinner after she dropped my brother off at a friend’s house and before she and a friend went to a concert.

Since she was dropping my brother off in Brentwood, it worked out really well for me. I was working out at Orangetheory at 4pm, so we made plans to get dinner around 5:30/6. As soon as my workout was done, I showered and changed there (they have really nice shower facilities but I usually go home to shower after class). We were meeting for dinner at a burger place across the street from Orangetheory. But because Orangetheory is valet parking (we get 90 minutes for free), I moved my car across the street to cheaper parking.

I had never been to Barneys Hamburgers before, but I usually don’t hang out in Brentwood. I just go there for my workout and then go home. But this place seemed really cute and the menu seemed awesome when I looked online, so I was excited to check it out.

Krystle and her friend had gotten a table before I arrived, but they only beat me by a few minutes. Of course, she and I tried to catch up right away. But since they had a concert to go to, we knew we needed to order food first so they could leave on time.

I was a bit overwhelmed by the menu at first, and I didn’t want to eat anything too crazy since I had just worked out. But then I realized that it was ok to splurge a bit and found a couple of burgers that looked pretty awesome to me. I figured I’d have to go back another time soon to try another burger, so I chose one that looked good but not too crazy. It had cheese, bacon, and BBQ sauce on it. It wasn’t the healthiest thing on the menu, but it was far from the worst. We also ordered truffle fries for the table (even though Krystle doesn’t like truffle fries, her friend and I do so I’m grateful that she let us get something to share even if it isn’t her favorite).

Post Workout Burger

The burger was really great! I don’t eat burgers like most people do. I tend to take the top off of it and then cut into it with a fork and knife. It’s a weird habit that I’ve had for a while, but it works for me and it keeps me from getting hamburger from falling out of the bun and onto my clothes.

While we were eating, Krystle was telling me about some upcoming trips that she and my brother are taking and how her wedding planning business is going. I’ll be seeing her in Santa Barbara next month when I’m there for Rayshell’s wedding, so we also talked about what we want to do while I’m there (my parents are going to be in Santa Barbara then too so it will be lots of family time).

We also got to talk a bit about the next trip that she and I take together. We though it would be a fun weekend in Las Vegas, but life got in the way and if we are going to do that it will have to wait until the fall or winter because we don’t want to be there in the heat of the summer. But this coming winter is when we also thought we’d go back to New York, so we have to decide which trip we want to take. Either one will be awesome and I’m super excited to get to spend more time with Krystle soon on an adventure.

We only got to hang out at dinner for about an hour before Krystle and her friend had to leave to get to the concert. Even though it was a fast hangout, it was seriously so much fun! I hope that Krystle can come down to LA every so often so she and I can do stuff here. There’s so much fun stuff in LA that she hasn’t done, so I’m hoping she can join me when I find out about a cool event.

After I said goodbye to Krystle and her friend, I headed home to get ready for my crazy weekend. But more on that in tomorrow’s post…

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Posted in Family, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged dinner, fun, hangout, Los Angeles, sister-in-law

Still Cooking (or It’s Almost A Habit)

Posted on February 19, 2016 | 1 comment

I’m scared to be too excited about this, but I’m happy to report that I’m still doing a lot of cooking at home. I’m not doing this because I have to for a specific reason (like a diet plan or limiting food options). I’m doing this because I want to.

Most of my cooking is still pretty basic. It’s not as much of a lazy thing, it’s more because I don’t want to have to buy a ton of ingredients or risk a recipe coming out badly. Turkey burgers and sautéed veggies are still a staple for me. It’s super easy and fast to put together and while it isn’t the most flavorful meal it keeps me full. And when I’m getting home late after a workout, I really don’t want to have to spend a long time putting together food.

But when I do have the time, I’m testing more and more recipes so I can have more things that are easy enough to put together and are very tasty. So many cookbooks seem to have dozens of ingredients (and things that I don’t always keep in my house), so I’ve been doing a lot of searching online for recipes that include a lot of what I already have (or something that I decided to pick up at the store that week).

This past weekend while doing my grocery shopping, I decided to pick up some ground beef. I honestly had no plan of what I would do with it, but I figured I could make meatballs or hamburgers or something. So I did some searching online for fun ground beef recipes and what came up most often was meatloaf. I’ve made meatloaf before and it didn’t come out so great because the outside was overcooked and the inside was undercooked. But then I started to do a search for meatloaf muffins and found enough basic recipes to put something together myself.

I made meatloaf (made pretty simply with a pound of ground beef and added a minced onion, diced a red pepper, added some ketchup (about 4 tbs), some Worcestershire sauce (about 1 tbs), a cup of bread crumbs, an egg, and some salt and pepper) and mixed it up pretty well. Then I took a disposable cupcake tin and divided the mixture into 6 portions. I baked it for about 30 minutes at 350 degrees (I waited until a meat thermometer got to 160 degrees in the middle of one of the muffins) and they looked pretty amazing. I also made smashed potatoes (I microwaved baby potatoes until they were soft, smushed them onto a baking sheet, and baked them with some garlic olive oil while the meatloaf baked) and my food looked pretty incredible.

More Home Cooking

Between the prep time, the baking time, and the time to let things cool down so I could serve myself; it was only about an hour from start to finish (and I was able to do all the dishes while the food was cooking). That’s not bad at all and the food tasted pretty great! The potatoes could have used a bit more olive oil on them (and maybe some actual garlic on them too) and the meatloaf had a bit too much Worcestershire in it, but overall I was pretty happy. And I know the next time I make the meatloaf I’ll add some more veggies in the mix because you couldn’t tell they were in there at all. Maybe I’ll add some mushrooms, carrots, and zucchini since I usually have those in my fridge anyway. And the recipe is pretty easy to double, so I can always make even more and freeze them so I have easy microwave meals on days I’m too tired to cook (instead of having limited time to eat leftovers in the fridge).

I’m seriously proud of myself for cooking when there isn’t a specify reason I have to. This is the start of making cooking more of a habit for me. And I know that this habit has started and stopped for me a couple of times in the past, but this time things are different. I’m not trying to be trendy (by following a specific plan or tying to bulk cook). Those trendy cooking things work for so many people but I guess it doesn’t help me. I just need to cook when I feel like it, allow myself to have easy meals on nights that I don’t, and to have enough variety to not get sick of what I’ve made and want to go and order delivery food instead.

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Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged cooking, dinner, food, health issues, recipe

Honey Dijon Chicken (or An Easy Sheet Pan Dinner)

Posted on February 10, 2016 | 1 comment

I’ve been seriously slacking on cooking lately. I was doing so great doing bulk cooking and then cooking less often last year. But this year cooking just wasn’t something I felt like doing. I haven’t just been eating freezer meals or delivery, but my cooking was limited to making turkey burgers or something really easy to throw together. And I knew that I needed to get myself back into the cooking game because while I don’t know if I want to cook every night, I do want to eat more home cooked meals.

So the other day I was browsing through Buzzfeed (it’s something I do between customers at one day job after I’m done doing the other day job), and I saw a recipe that looked good to me. So I decided to test it out, and I’m actually super happy with how it tasted! It wasn’t perfect, but the chicken was super juicy and the flavorings were really awesome. So here it is!

Honey Dijon Chicken With Potatoes and Carrots

Honey Dijon Chicken

What you need:

1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 2 breasts)
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
3 medium red bliss potatoes (about ½ lb), roughly chopped
2 medium carrots (about ½ lb), peeled and roughly chopped
1 Tbsp. canola oil, divided
1 Tbsp. chopped fresh rosemary, thyme, or sage leaves, divided
1 tsp honey
1 tsp Dijon mustard

And here’s what to do:

Remove the chicken breasts from the fridge, dry them with paper towels, and season them with salt and pepper.
Preheat the oven to 425°F.
Place the potatoes and carrots on a large sheet pan and toss them with ½ tablespoon canola oil, ½ tablespoon chopped herbs, a pinch of salt, and some freshly ground pepper.
In a large mixing bowl, stir together the remaining canola oil, the honey, mustard, the remaining chopped herbs, a big pinch of kosher salt, and some freshly ground pepper. Dry the chicken breasts again with paper towels. Add the chicken breasts to the bowl and toss everything together to coat. Place the chicken on the sheet pan with the vegetables, spreading everything out.

Before the oven

Roast in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through with no pink in the middle. A thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the breast should read 165°F.
Let everything rest at room temperature for 5 to 10 minutes, then serve.

Cooked meal

I used more chicken than the recipe asked for (I couldn’t find just 1 lb of chicken breasts at the store), so I decided to do more carrots and potatoes than it asked for as well. And the carrots at my store weren’t looking so great, so I used baby carrots instead. If I was doing this over, I’d cut the baby carrots in half (they were very crisp) and I’d cut the potatoes a bit smaller too. But nothing was tasting raw or not cooked, so I was happy. The only other modification I might do in the future is to change the herbs in it or add garlic since I love garlic so much.

I turned my cooking into 3 servings. I had the first serving on Monday night when I cooked it and then put the other 2 servings into storage containers in my fridge. I know that sometimes leftovers don’t heat up that nicely, but I ate this again yesterday for lunch and it was still just as good as the night before (and I was shocked that the chicken was still juicy and not dry at all).

The fact that this came out so nicely the first time I made it really made me feel great and made me remember how much pride I feel when I cook something from scratch. It’s not easy to do all the time, but I really do want to make more of an effort in the future. And now that I’m feeling more confident in my cooking abilities again, I think I’ll be ok with trying new recipes again (I’m always nervous that I’ll spend a ton of money on ingredients and then the food gets ruined or tastes bad).

I highly recommend this recipe (thanks again Buzzfeed!). It’s a nice meal to make for yourself, but it also looks impressive if you are making it for other people as well. This is definitely going to be saved in my collection of favorite recipes!

1 Comment

Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged cooking, dinner, food, recipe

A Night Out With Some Awesome Women (or Being Ok Being Awkward)

Posted on January 13, 2016 | Comments Off

The other night, a friend of mine invited me to join her at a meeting of women writers. I asked her if it was ok for me to go even though I wasn’t a writer, and she said that the group was ok with it. This group had met before, but not all members had met before so it wouldn’t be like I walked into an established meeting.

My friend and I were the first ones at the bar we were meeting everyone at (after getting a perfect almost free parking space right in front!) and soon after we arrived more people showed up. We got a table for the group and started ordering food and drinks.

In the beginning, I was just listening to what everyone else was saying. They were updating each other on their lives and jobs and I didn’t want to interrupt. It was really cool to hear what all these awesome writers have been doing and not just listening to what other actors are doing (those conversations can be very repetitive and weird for me at times).

But soon after that, more women showed up for the group and our table got pretty full. There were maybe 8 or 9 of us and the bar was a bit loud. I really wanted to hear what everyone was saying and participate in the conversation, but it just got very difficult to hear. I listened to what the people immediately next to me were saying, but I was still not really a part of the group.

My friend (who was sitting next to me) noticed that I was being really quiet and not adding to the conversation and she interpreted it as me being bored. I explained that it wasn’t that I was bored but it was awkward in the group because I really didn’t know everyone and it was tough to be a part of the conversation. I wanted to be a part of things, but I had to be ok with the circumstances and be ok with being an outsider for the night.

It wasn’t the group’s fault at all. The table we had was pretty big, there were a decent number of people, and it was pretty loud. Even our waitress had trouble hearing us from time to time. So it wasn’t the best place to be when I tried to get to know a bunch of new people.

My friend and I left a bit on the earlier side because we had another place we wanted to stop by before it got too late, so we started to say our goodbyes to everyone. And I talked to everyone more while saying goodbye than I had all night. I was talking to people individually while we were standing next to each other. So the noise and number of people didn’t affect the conversation. And everyone in the group was so awesome and I wished that it had been easier to be a part of the group the entire evening. But it just wasn’t meant to be that night.

I’m sure that I will get to see everyone again in the future. Hopefully I’ll be invited to another group meeting and maybe it will be somewhere that is a bit quieter so I can feel like I’m part of everything. But even though I pretty much sat quietly in my chair during the meeting, it felt awesome getting out and getting to meet new people. I’ve been in my own bubble with my set group of friends for a while and I know I need to expand my friend circles. Meeting people who are awesome is always a good thing in my mind. And I learned from those brief conversations that everyone in that group was pretty awesome.

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Posted in Acting, Food

Tagged acting, dinner, friends, meeting

Broadway Sings Disney (or A Fun Adventure With An Awesome Friend)

Posted on January 12, 2016 | Comments Off

When I set my 2016 goals and said that I wanted to have more fun with my friends, I had no clue that I would start of the new year with a really awesome friend hangout. But that’s exactly what happened.

My friend Dani asked me if I wanted to join her for this random show that she found discount tickets for online. She didn’t tell me too much about the show, but I said yes right away! I figured that no matter what it was, it could be super awesome and the best idea ever or super weird and would still be a fun story to share. She sent me more information about it and it was Broadway Sings Disney at Rockwell Table and Stage. Even after learning more about the event, there wasn’t much information about it online. I knew it would be singers singing Disney songs and that there was dinner at the venue, but that’s pretty much all Dani and I knew before getting to the show. But we both went into the show very excited to see who would be performing and what the show would be like.

Once we arrived, we got seated at a table right next to the stage. It was pretty funny because I had looked at the seating chart online ahead of time and said that it would be really awesome if we sat right next to the stage. But I assumed that since we had discounted tickets we’d have bad seats. We were pleasantly surprised to see that it wasn’t the case and loved being right next to the action (even though sometimes we were only seeing the profile or back of a performer).

Broadway Sings Disney

We were given menus and a song list of what would be sung that night and got some food ordered right away. We wanted to make sure that once the show started, we weren’t trying to flag down our waiter or trying to eat and watch the show at the same time.

Since there was a 2 item minimum for the show, Dani and I split 2 appetizers and we each got an entree. We split some truffle fries and veggies with dip and we each got a steak salad for dinner.

Food Dinner

The food was really good, but the venue was pretty dark so it was a bit weird to eat. When I was eating my steak salad, I never knew if I had a piece of steak or lettuce on my fork until I ate it. It made the meal a bit of a mystery. Everything had the same blue tint to it due to the lighting and nothing really looked anything other than blue. While that made it odd to eat, it didn’t affect the taste and I was glad that a venue that has a food or drink minimum didn’t have bad food.

The show was really fun! All the singers were really good and almost everyone sounded like they could have come out of a Disney cartoon or movie. I pretty much knew every song (the benefits of being a big Disney person!) and I enjoyed every performance that each singer did. Some performers kept things very simple and some performers made it seem like a scene out of a musical. But the thing they all shared was being so enthusiastic about getting to perform, and I loved that!

The show wasn’t very long, but that was a good thing because I had to be up early the next morning. There are 2 more Broadway Sings Disney shows, and each show is with different performers. I’m hoping that I can maybe make it out to one more, but if I can’t this time I’m hoping to make it the next time they do the series.

I’m so grateful that Dani invited me to come to this show with her. I doubt I would have discovered it on my own. I had never heard of this venue before this show and I already know that I want to go see some of the other shows they have coming up there. This was a great way to start of my 2016 adventures with my friends and I can’t wait to see what the next adventure will be!

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged adventure, Broadway, dinner, Disney, friends, musical

Last Happy Hour Of 2015 (or A Speedy Catch Up)

Posted on December 23, 2015 | 2 comments

My friend Rayshell and I have been trying to do monthly happy hours, but our schedules lately have been so busy and conflicting. We wanted to make sure we got in one more happy hour before the end of the year, and we both happened to have Monday evening free! So we scheduled a happy hour hangout immediately before either of us ended up booking something else we had to do on Monday!

We met on her side of town (which sadly took me forever to drive to due to rush hour, holiday traffic, and the rain), but all that driving stress was gone when I got there. We met at El Torito Grill (we go there a lot) and while I was a little bit late, Rayshell didn’t seem to care too much since I drove to her side of town.

I had brought her holiday card with me to happy hour (it saved me a stamp) and Rayshell gave me a bottle of wine! I was totally not expecting a holiday gift, so that was a pleasant surprise!

As soon as we ordered our food, I got to hear all about the trip that Rayshell and her fiancée just went on! It sounded like she had an awesome time and it made me start thinking that I should plan another trip soon. We also discussed her wedding and the upcoming bridal shower and bachelorette party. She’s got so much about her wedding already figured out and under control, so I know that it’s going to be an amazing party! There’s only a few more months before her wedding, so I’m getting really excited for all the festivities and to be celebrating Rayshell and Paul (her fiancée).

When Rayshell asked me about what was going on in my life, I had some things I could tell her about Thanksgiving and work. But I really didn’t have a ton of fun updates to talk about. I really wished that there was more going on in my life right now, but my days are pretty full and I’m not focusing on the fun things as much. I’m working on fixing that and I’m thinking that next year will be filled with more fun adventures.

We didn’t stay at happy hour too late. It was raining and while the patio we were eating on had space heaters, it’s was pretty cold. And I had told a friend of mine that I could get them at LAX and take them home after they returned from a trip.

I’m so glad that even though Rayshell and I didn’t manage to do happy hour every month, we did do a pretty decent number of them this year. Both of us are busy with our lives and since we live on opposite sides of town (a big deal in LA), we don’t always get to see each other unless we make the effort. I know that we will continue our happy hour tradition next year as well (the next happy hour will be on my side of town) and I’m looking forward to having more exciting things than work to update Rayshell on!

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Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged dinner, friends, hangout, happy hour

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