An average day of work

Not like most average work days.

What do I do?

This.....

As a few of you know I am a labor and delivery nurse.  I am truly proud of the difference I make in people's lives everyday.  It's stressful and scary, happy and sad, emotional and exhausting.  But I have never come home from a day of work and felt like I made no difference what so ever.

[Photo's are of my coworker and friend Heidi's twins who were delivered at our hospital on Tuesday.  We are so proud of you Heids! Ryan and Maren are beautiful. P.S. to you health care workers out there worried about HIPAA, I got her permission]

Happy Momma Heidi and her older son Colin who was trying to lick my face because that is what his doggie scout does

An average day of dining

I don't document my everyday meals because to me they don't seem like anything special.  I don't remember that what I eat isn't what most people eat everyday until my roommate tells me "everything you make is gourmet".  I often forget that many people don't love to cook as much as I do and many people don't find cooking as easy as I do.  I thought i'd document a usual day of food every once in a while to show people how I usually eat.

Here is what I made to take to work today...

Breakfast- 1 egg scrambled on fresh whole wheat bread with reduced fat cheddar cheese and turkey bacon

Lunch- left over ceviche and watermelon

Snacks- Reduced fat peanut butter and celery, chobani 2% pineapple yogurt

Dinner- Steak and mushrooms over spinach salad

Eddie Bean enjoying his breakfast

Ceviche

Ceviche is one of my all time favorite dishes, when done well that is.  Its so fresh and delicious and the variations are endless.  I've been milking my friend Horacio for his family's ceviche recipe.  They make the best ceviche I have ever had.  I ventured to make it today.  It turned out very tasty but not quite as good as when Horacio's family makes it.  None the less its an easy recipe that with some tweaking will turn out even better next time.

Ingredients:
3 lbs corvina fish (I used tilapia as corvina was not readily available at my grocery store)
20 lemons
1 1/2 medium sized white onions (or 1 large)
1 tsp cumin
3/4 cup finely chopped cilantro
Salt and pepper
Jalapeno pepper

1. Juice all of the lemons into a large bowl.

2. Dice the fish into small pieces (I diced mine into cubes about a 1/2 inch thick but I think next time I will go smaller).

3. Toss the fish into the lemon juice, cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and marinate overnight.

4. Dice the onion into small pieces and toss with the fish the next morning.

5.  Add in cumin, finely chopped cilantro, salt, pepper and jalapeno to taste.

6. Serve in martini glasses for a little flair.

tips:
A. For spicier ceviche chop the seeds of the jalapeno with the pepper, for more mild core the jalapeno.
B. Zest some of your lemons before you juice them and save the zest in a jar in the refrigerator for other   recipes.
C. To get more juice out of your lemons pop them in the microwave for ten second then roll them on the counter under your palm with gentle pressure before cutting them open.

Zamora & Slater Engagement Party

My dear friend Horacio Zamora just got engaged and nobody knows how to throw a party like the Zamoras.  On saturday a good portion of my friends trekked out to King George, Virginia and partied all day river side with Horacio's family and his bride to be Jaqlyn.

The scenery was absolutely gorgeous, especially as the sun began to set.  The food was delicious, as it always is at these parties, and the drinks were perfectly refreshing.

The bar set up

Steaks on the grill in preparation for dinner

Tasty light vodka soda

The table setting

Some of the boys

The lovely ladies

Sunset

Pink sky

Pat

Ronnie

Marisa, the soon to be groom, and myself

I took over DJing later in the evening

Beautiful girls

My darling Michelle of Thatssomichelle.blogspot.com

Of course I would be dancing the night away

Vegas baby Vegas

I spent Saturday of last week to Tuesday afternoon in Vegas with some fabulous girlfriends.  I've been to Vegas once before but I think this trip might have been even better than the last.  We hit Moon, Tao, Vanity and Marquee, not to mention Rehab (the Sunday pool party at Hard Rock Hotel).  Here's a couple pics from the weekend.  Hopefully there will be more to come when all the girls put up their pictures.

Dinner at Nobu with some beautiful ladies

The usual look I wear on my face

Ready to go out on night #1.  My dress is Bar III.  Ladies what were you wearing?

Waste Not, Want Not challenge

So I didn't completely follow the challenge rules last week.  Night shift sometimes has a bad effect on me and I ended up ordering food with some of the girls at work Thursday night.  None the less I did succeed in more or less clearing out my refrigerator and a portion of my cabinet.  While its obviously something you can't do all the time (since you would run out of food) the challenge has given me inspiration to use what I have in new ways and not continue to buy and buy for no reason.

Berry Filo Pastries

I promised for my Waste Not, Want Not challenge I would use those strawberries that were going bad for something and this is what I came up with.  This one is dedicated to my friend Melena from work who called me "a little Martha Stewart" and has no idea how flattering that comment actually was to me :)  I didn't have enough strawberries to make pastries for work friends so I used the strawberries to make something for myself and used some frozen blueberries I found in the back of my freezer to make more.

Ingredients (found in my fridge and freezer of course, nothing purchased):
2 cups Fresh or frozen berries
1 tsp orange zest
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup sugar
1 roll of fill dough (thawed)
1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 tbsp melted butter

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. If you chose strawberries, chop into quarters

3. Place all ingredients, except for the powdered sugar and butter, in a pan over medium heat

4. Stir occasionally and heat berries for about 7-8 minutes until sugar has drawn liquid out of berries and turned into a syrupy texture
5. Unwrap filo dough onto a sheet of parchment paper and cover with a damp paper towel
6. Remove damp towel and cut filo dough into squares and then across the middle of the square into triangles
7. Take one triangle at a time (while others are covered with damp towel), split filo sheets in half and put two spoonfuls over berries onto one half

8. Flip other half of filo sheets on top of berries and use kitchen brush to glaze top of pastry with melted butter

9.  Repeat with all the pastry triangles
10. bake for 10-15 minutes or until top of pastries are golden brown

11.  Sprinkle top of pastries with powdered sugar

Hint: When working with filo dough do not take it out of the wrapper until all your other ingredients are ready as it dries out quickly.  Work fast and make sure to place your damp towel back over the sheets you aren't using while working.