Bubble tea. . . the tea you can chew!

My coworkers and I have been spending a ridiculous amount of money on bubble tea at the independent zen tea shop across the street. While we love the place and like to support the owners I wondered how difficult it could be to make my own bubbles. I did a little research and a few days later a brick of tapioca bubbles landed on my doorstep.



Tapioca bubbles are basically tapioca starch and caramel coloring pressed together in fragile little powdery pellets. I cooked about 2 cups of them in water (with plenty of room to swim, just like pasta), and then turn the heat off and let them sit covered for a half hour. At the same I prepared a sugar syrup with white and brown sugar. when thebubbles are cooked they need to be drained and rinsed. Some of the bubbles dissolve so when they're done they're sitting in a gelatinous black mass. Once they're coated with the sugar syrup they look like this:



If you go to a bubble tea stand or a tea shop you can get all kinds of flavorings and mix-ins and sweeteners added to many different tea bases. Personally, I like regular old black tea with no flavorings and maybe a little milk. The tapioca bubbles in their syrup are fairly sweet, so I usually don't add extra sweetener. Here's the green tea with vanilla soymilk (and bubbles) that I made for myself:



The bubbles stay firm, so you need a special wide straw to suck them up. Sometimes they get stuck:



Bringing them to work, they looked like a science experiment:

The mulch that escaped

I took this a few Sundays ago in Raymond Park, Cambridge MA. I noticed the mulch spiral on my way home on Friday and meant to take a photo early Saturday morning before the park was mobbed with kids. But I forgot, and then it rained and poured. So I was surprised and happy to see that my mulch spiral didn't totally wash away.

New England Spring Flower Show

A couple of Fridays ago I took the day off of work to go to the New England Spring Flower Show hosted by the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. I was curious because I'd never been to one. I was also in need of a little injection of spring. This year's theme was "Rhapsody in Green", as in environmentally green as well as obvious green.

Many of the displays were difficult to photograph because they were so large and it was kind of dark in the place - my photographs wouldn't have done them justice. Here are some small scale photos:
giant palm



Patterns on the floor



Pretty garden furniture



Entries from the young Mass Horticulturalists. Flower Power!



Aloe plicatilis, or Fan Aloe. This had a funny little shoot growing up out of the middle but I accidentally chopped it off in the photos.



Oops! I can't find where I wrote down the name of this one. I'd name it the Medusa cactus.



One of the entries in the arrangements section



Lots of orchids. This one is a Doritaenopsis "Chain Xen Pearl" Moth Orchid



Here's a Paphiopedilum Hybrid Ladyslipper



This is a Phalaenopsis "Join Angel" Moth Orchid



And last, a Zygopetalum "River Murray"



The Blue Hills Reservation in Milton had a booth with all kinds of information as well as critters! This is an Eastern Screech Owl that they rescued. Very cute little guy.

In preparation for my own garden, I bought more California poppy seeds and some nasturtium seeds for my porch window boxes. Fun stuff!

Secret Ingredient Brownies

I can count the number of times I've made brownies from a box on one hand. My Mom has an excellent brownie recipe, so I usually use that. However, my Weight Watchers leader mentioned an alternate recipe this week that and I was so intrigued that I tried it that night.

Buy a box of brownie mix and a can of black beans. Rinse the beans, put them back into the can, and fill up the can with fresh water. Puree the beans until no visible bean skins remain. Add the bean puree to the brownie mix in lieu of the regularly suggested fat and cholesterol laden eggs and oil. THEY'RE REALLY GOOD! The texture is a little different - obviously they're not oily and they're extremely dense and fudgy. While they're not as good as traditional brownies, my coworkers agreed that you'd never know they were made with beans and that the chocolateyness makes up for the bean factor. Mostly they just taste like brownie mix.

A Belated Valentine to My Media Boyfriends

Ah, unattainable love.

Ira Glass was my first - I refer to him as "My Radio Boyfriend". That voice...that wit...those glasses...those sideburns...that salt and pepper hair...be still my beating heart! I try to see him whenever he comes to town, alas it's only every couple years or so. (Disclaimer: Mr Glass, I'm not a stalker - I just think you're handsome)



And then there's Mo Rocca. I'd been listening to him for a while on NPR's "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me", but hadn't actually seen a photo of him until quite recently. He's also a commentator on CBS's Sunday Morning show which is a nice way to begin a lazy Sunday morning. Darn it, he's a looker too!


My latest guilty pleasure is the new Dr. Who. I never watched it growing up because it looked scary and stupid, but the new version is fun. Sometimes I just like an evening full of monsters and CGI, and I never get tired of watching that blue phone booth spiral through the galaxies. Christopher Eccleston is superb as the first Dr., but he's not really my type, though we both have ears that stick out. At the end of the first season he's regenerated into the slightly spastic David Tennant who has great hair, a nice brown and blue pinstripe suit and (not often enough) glasses. Yay!

HMMMM! I see a trend. Do you?

"Unsettlingly Real-Looking Felted Bacon Scarf"

From Etsy seller chrischunski:



Overheard last night on my walk home: "Blah blah blah I couldn't believe she said that, that really fried my cheese blah blah blah". WHAT???

February 5th: Super Duper Tuesday, Fat Tuesday & Shrove Tuesday

Zowie, busy day! I voted, I did nothing to celebrate Mardi Gras, and in a nod to my Canadian heritage I made pancakes for dinner for Shrove Tuesday, aka Pancake Day. If I observed Lent, I would join my neighbors by eating pancakes because they're typically made with rich, decadent ingredients like eggs, flour, milk & butter. I'm not sure where maple syrup fits into the scheme of things. My pancakes weren't even all that decadent - I used whole wheat flour, egg whites & fried them in canola oil spray. Plus I ate them dry sans syrup - it was dinner after all.

Well, um, my current regimen of saving money (damn you Boden with your sassy spring fun skirts!), eating healthfully, working lots of extra hours, digging into my NetFlix queue, and actually making it to the gym regularly after a hiatus with consequences does not make for exciting blog posts. Wow, nope! I'm not even going to try.

Pretty photos from a vacation in September coming soon.

Photo: Kitties at Knossos, Greece. Yeah, this has nothing to do with anything but it's cute and one of my relatives had some sad kitty news.

Snow Day YES!!!

I have a snow day, la la la! First ever in the history of my institution - I had to check three sources because I didn't believe it. I'm extra happy that none of us have to go because I probably would have been the only one to show up anyway because I'm the only one who lives in town and doesn't have kids. Clearly the current President of my school (unlike her predecessor) actually gives a shit about our safety and well-being. And speaking of poor leaders, tonight I'm going to hear Madeleine Albright give a talk about her book Memo to the President Elect: How We Can Restore America's Reputation and Leadership.

I Love a Mexican Fiesta as Much as Anyone but. .

When I found my apartment on Craigslist I was instantly attracted to the orange walls in the kitchen, not to mention the fact that it had a pantry, two porches and a china cabinet. It was exactly what I wanted in the neighborhood I wanted at a price that we could afford. The apartment was great, although it needed to be repainted. I painted the two front rooms before we moved in, thinking that I'd get to the bedrooms eventually (I painted them this summer) but that I'd never repaint the kitchen because orange walls are really fun and awesome.

I changed my mind. While the orange was novel and sunny and bright for a while it began to grate on my aesthetic sensibilities. Not only was it like Mexican fiesta all the time (helped by the Mexican oilcloth) but the transition from the soft green middle room to the school-bus yellow kitchen really irked me. Plus I needed a change. Other things in the house (and in my life) had been recently rearranged and it felt like appropriate timing. So in a weekend I went from Velveeta to Benjamin Moore Vanilla Ice cream. Although it comes across as a little bland on film I'm happy with my mini kitchen makeover- the kitchen feels larger, airier and calmer. And with my tablecloth selection and colorful dishes I have no lack of color. Now I'm thinking about repainting the front living room this summer because the white I chose is too close to the color of the white trim. Stay tuned, ha ha!

Before:



After (yes, strangely crooked):

Human Tetris