I woke up this morning not feeling well and decided to give myself the day to acclimate to winter and kick whatever little cold I had. It was a smart decision.
I went back to bed and when I woke up again I was already feeling better than I had earlier in the morning. I made myself hot cereal again for breakfast. This time I added in frozen blueberries, a slice of pear, pomegranate arils, maple, and cinnamon. The bowl was topped with almond butter and a crushed honey pecan. Mmmm. I might be sad when I’ve eaten the last of those!
I had a lazy morning / early afternoon and when I was finally hungry again decided to get in a good healthy dose of veggies. I wilted a couple of handfuls of spinach in the microwave then added in leftover roasted broccoli, acorn squash, and okra. I heated that all up with some boy sauce balsamic vinegar, 21 Seasoning Salute, and hot sauce. On the side was the last of the baked beans and pear.
I had to run out to pick up a few things including my first bag of chocolate chips since last December O:-) A few folks commented on Twitter that they were surprised but I just don’t bake too often or eat that much chocolate. Whoops!
Tonight was my annual Asian food, cookies, and Love Actually Chanukah celebration with Bethany. It’s our Jewish version of decorating the tree 
Last year we had quite the adventure as well and it’s a nice way for us to do all the things we enjoy – eat, bake, and watch a DVD that we wore thin while living in the sorority house and procrastinating finals.
We met for dinner at Thaiphoon where I ordered the Pad See Eew with beef. It was delicious as always and exactly what I was craving.
We had an interesting table of men next to us that were quite inappropriate. When Bethany coughed one guy patted her on the back, they offered us some of their meal, and then proceeded to be interesting interjecting themselves into our conversation and even accused us of not savoring our dinner! Good times.
We came back to my apartment and got started on our baking project: a gluten free version of Mama Pea’s Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Balls. I halved the recipe, used Pamela’s Baking Mix as my gluten free flour, and omitted the peanut butter chips.
While the heavenly dough chilled we light Chanukah candles.
Here they are before baking.
And after.
Oh.my.gosh. This are fantastic! I ate mine and couldn’t even form sentences while eating it. It was that good.
Bethany declared that these didn’t taste gluten free and I would agree. There’s nothing “gluten free special” about these. They are just outstanding.
I had to be reminded that 1 was probably enough and that 4 or 5 would be overboard for one night and I’d probably feel sick. I was willing to risk it but Bethany played the role of good adviser and friend.
I’m finally feeling back to normal and I’m pretty sure our Chanukah celebration and dough balls had a large hand in that!
What are you up to this weekend?
