I finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns last week. It's another fantastic book by Khaled Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner). A very beautiful, yet sad story...
Here's a discussion about the book w/ Khaled Hosseini:
Can't wait to see the movie (due out sometime next year). In the meantime, read the book!
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Peach custard pie
Friday night, Patty made a peach custard pie. She used a recipe for pear custard pie (that she made a few months ago - original posting here), but used peach in place of pear.
It turned out just as delicious as the pear custard pie!
The cool thing is that it is super easy to make (only about 10-15 mins of prep time).
Here's the recipe (from the book Everyday Food: Great Food Fast), with some slight modifications (in bold italics):
Ingredients:
It turned out just as delicious as the pear custard pie!
The cool thing is that it is super easy to make (only about 10-15 mins of prep time).
Here's the recipe (from the book Everyday Food: Great Food Fast), with some slight modifications (in bold italics):
Ingredients:
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted, plus more for pie dish
- 3 ripe but firm Comice or Barlett pears, leeped, halved, and cored (we used 1 pear/peach)
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1/3 cupe all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (used 3/4 teaspoon vanilla)
- 3 large eggs (used 2 eggs)
- 3/4 cup milk
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- Confectioners' sugar, for dusting (we didn't have any each time, so we skipped this)
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F; butter a 9-inch pie dish. Slice the pears 1/4 inch thick lengthwise. Arrange the slices, overlapping slightly, in the dish.
- In a blender, process the melted butter, granulated sugar, flour, vanilla, eggs, milk, and salt until smooth.
- Pour the batter over the pears (or peaches); bake until golden and firm to the touch, 40 to 45 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperatue, dusted with confectioners' sugar.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Berrygood
Berrygood is berrybad...
After dinner tonight, we went to try Berrygood. It's a new Korean style frozen yogurt store not too far from our house. I had read a really negative review about this place, but we still were open to trying it. How bad can frozen yogurt be???
We tried their "Premium" and "Green Tea" flavors with mochi topping. Both flavors were absolutely terrible. The flavors had a strange "off" taste and the texture was very watery and powdery, resulting in an even stranger aftertaste.
In the (Phoenix metro) area, we like Ice Tango the best, although they don't have a location near us yet (they are opening one very near to Berrygood). There is a place near us called iSwirl which is decent.
Places mentioned:
Berrygood (various locations)
15479 W. McDowell Rd.
Goodyear, AZ 85338
After dinner tonight, we went to try Berrygood. It's a new Korean style frozen yogurt store not too far from our house. I had read a really negative review about this place, but we still were open to trying it. How bad can frozen yogurt be???
We tried their "Premium" and "Green Tea" flavors with mochi topping. Both flavors were absolutely terrible. The flavors had a strange "off" taste and the texture was very watery and powdery, resulting in an even stranger aftertaste.
In the (Phoenix metro) area, we like Ice Tango the best, although they don't have a location near us yet (they are opening one very near to Berrygood). There is a place near us called iSwirl which is decent.
Places mentioned:
Berrygood (various locations)
15479 W. McDowell Rd.
Goodyear, AZ 85338
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Six Ways in Which the World is Different from the Way You Think It Is
Very interesting article (especially #1 and #2):
Six Ways in Which the World is Different from the Way You Think It Is (from Nicholas Vardy's - The Global Guru)
Six Ways in Which the World is Different from the Way You Think It Is (from Nicholas Vardy's - The Global Guru)
Taipei 101 damper in action
Found out about this one via maoxian.com...
Video taken of the giant damper ball in Taipei 101 during the recent Sichuan earthquake:
For those who have never seen it in person, this thing is massive - 728 tons, 18 ft. diameter.
This page has a good overview of the system (along w/ the same video):
deputydog - in action: a skyscraper's amazing 728-ton stabilising ball
Video taken of the giant damper ball in Taipei 101 during the recent Sichuan earthquake:
For those who have never seen it in person, this thing is massive - 728 tons, 18 ft. diameter.
This page has a good overview of the system (along w/ the same video):
deputydog - in action: a skyscraper's amazing 728-ton stabilising ball
Sunday, June 22, 2008
A Packed Weekend
We had the busiest weekend ever...lots of food involved so it was a good kind of "busy".
Friday night we had dinner at Pizza A Metro (my posting about the visit). Great stuff, highly recommended.
Saturday afternoon, I had my monthly volunteering event (for Washington Street Foundation). We went to see Valley Youth Theatre's production of Cinderella at the Herberger Theater. It was a pretty good show (much better than sitting/suffering through A Winnie the Pooh Christmas Tail a few months ago =)
After the volunteer event, I met up with Patty at a going away party for one of her co-workers. We only stayed for a little while before rushing off to meet my some of my co-workers for dinner.
This past weekend was the grand opening of The Dhaba. The owners of the restaurant are Thunderbird alumni, so we were there to show our support. The food was great (we all shared the food so I'm not really sure what we ordered). They had a few belly dancers on hand for the festivities. Here are a few pictures:
Sunday morning, we met up with some more T-Bird friends for dim sum at Great Wall. Great Wall has pretty reliable dim sum and it's the only decent place in the West Valley. We enjoyed a ton of food...
After lunch, we headed to Tempe to see My Fair Lady at ASU's Gammage Auditorium.
The show was good, though it a bit too long (a total running time of around 3 hours). I was kind of disappointed that the understudy (Dana Delisa) was performing the role of Eliza Doolittle. I had read a few great reviews of Lisa O'Hare's performance of Eliza. Doh! Delisa's performance seemed pretty average for me. That's what we get for seeing a Sunday matinee...oh well. I thought Tim Jerome (Arthur Doolittle) and Justin Bohon (Freddy Eynsford-Hill) gave fantastic performances. I do have to admit that both Patty and I did end up falling asleep during parts of the show...we must have been tired from eating too much for lunch! Overall, it was good, although it was a bit of a let down (on par w/ Rent). I thought it was going to be a fantastic show (like Phantom, Les Mis, Miss Saigon, and Oliver).
Time for some rest!!!
Places mentioned:
Pizza A Metro
2336 W. Thomas Rd.
Phoenix, AZ 85015
The Dhaba
1872 E Apache Blvd.
Tempe, AZ 85281
Great Wall
3446 W. Camelback Rd.
Phoenix, AZ 85017
Friday night we had dinner at Pizza A Metro (my posting about the visit). Great stuff, highly recommended.
Saturday afternoon, I had my monthly volunteering event (for Washington Street Foundation). We went to see Valley Youth Theatre's production of Cinderella at the Herberger Theater. It was a pretty good show (much better than sitting/suffering through A Winnie the Pooh Christmas Tail a few months ago =)
After the volunteer event, I met up with Patty at a going away party for one of her co-workers. We only stayed for a little while before rushing off to meet my some of my co-workers for dinner.
This past weekend was the grand opening of The Dhaba. The owners of the restaurant are Thunderbird alumni, so we were there to show our support. The food was great (we all shared the food so I'm not really sure what we ordered). They had a few belly dancers on hand for the festivities. Here are a few pictures:
Sunday morning, we met up with some more T-Bird friends for dim sum at Great Wall. Great Wall has pretty reliable dim sum and it's the only decent place in the West Valley. We enjoyed a ton of food...
After lunch, we headed to Tempe to see My Fair Lady at ASU's Gammage Auditorium.
The show was good, though it a bit too long (a total running time of around 3 hours). I was kind of disappointed that the understudy (Dana Delisa) was performing the role of Eliza Doolittle. I had read a few great reviews of Lisa O'Hare's performance of Eliza. Doh! Delisa's performance seemed pretty average for me. That's what we get for seeing a Sunday matinee...oh well. I thought Tim Jerome (Arthur Doolittle) and Justin Bohon (Freddy Eynsford-Hill) gave fantastic performances. I do have to admit that both Patty and I did end up falling asleep during parts of the show...we must have been tired from eating too much for lunch! Overall, it was good, although it was a bit of a let down (on par w/ Rent). I thought it was going to be a fantastic show (like Phantom, Les Mis, Miss Saigon, and Oliver).
Time for some rest!!!
Places mentioned:
Pizza A Metro
2336 W. Thomas Rd.
Phoenix, AZ 85015
The Dhaba
1872 E Apache Blvd.
Tempe, AZ 85281
Great Wall
3446 W. Camelback Rd.
Phoenix, AZ 85017
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Insanely HOT
The official (reported) high today was 115 degrees.
Here's a pic from my car display (taken @ ~4:30pm):
Do you see that??? 119 degrees!!! It was actually reading 120 right before I snapped the picture.
I spent the afternoon in downtown Phoenix (for my monthly volunteering event). Downtown Phoenix is pretty much one giant cement heat island. Actually, the whole valley is a massive heat island. It's just worse in downtown Phoenix. As I was walking to and from my car, I experienced the most intense heat I have ever experienced in my life (and I've already been through 10 summers here). It was seriously uncomfortable...like when you open the door of a hot oven and the heat hits your body. I really don't see how light rail is going to work in this city. The shade structures that they have built at the stops seem like they provide minimal coverage.
Terrible...it's only the second day of summer...
Here's a pic from my car display (taken @ ~4:30pm):
Do you see that??? 119 degrees!!! It was actually reading 120 right before I snapped the picture.
I spent the afternoon in downtown Phoenix (for my monthly volunteering event). Downtown Phoenix is pretty much one giant cement heat island. Actually, the whole valley is a massive heat island. It's just worse in downtown Phoenix. As I was walking to and from my car, I experienced the most intense heat I have ever experienced in my life (and I've already been through 10 summers here). It was seriously uncomfortable...like when you open the door of a hot oven and the heat hits your body. I really don't see how light rail is going to work in this city. The shade structures that they have built at the stops seem like they provide minimal coverage.
Terrible...it's only the second day of summer...
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