Penne Arrabiatta

It is 4:17 in the morning and I am wide awake.

Maybe it's because I woke up around 1 PM; I don't know. (Actually, that sounds pretty plausible). But maybe it's because I go back to school in less than 2 weeks and I'll need to wake up at 7:30 in the morning for my job and I want to milk the last of my summer days. (Thankfully that only lasts a week; my morning classes this semester are at noon and 10:30 on alternating days).

Maybe it's both. Who knows.

I do know that I have random cravings for food when I'm up late...like tonight, I got back from my friend Alexa's around 12:30 and was craving arrabiatta sauce. I would've made it too, but we didn't have all the ingredients. I settled for disappointment instead.

But! I don't have to settle for that tomorrow. Because in a few hours, grocery stores will be opening and I can get the ingredients so I can have a nice bowl of pasta sauce soon after I wake up.

Penne Arrabiatta was my staple in Lebanon whenever we went to Italian restaurants. With extra sauce, please. I love regular pasta sauce, but when you add a spicy kick to it...man, that's the stuff. I was able to get by for the first few weeks when I got back because my mother had made an overabundant supply of my grandpa's pasta sauce and meatballs for my brother's grad party (which I missed). It's absolutely delicious and carries years of memories with it, but I started craving the spiciness of arrabiatta.

So, I searched for a recipe and found one. A great one. I didn't change anything from it, and won't, because it's perfect, so here's the recipe, from Una Mamma Italiana.

Few things are better than a bowl of pasta with homemade sauce....one of these things is a bowl of homemade pasta with homemade sauce.

Song of the Day-- Efter Livet by Tingvall Trio.
Recovery Link of the Day-- an ED tumblr in the style of #whatshouldwecallme. Accurately funny.

5:09ingly,
Carina

Good Old-Fashioned Comfort Food...Mac and Cheese Again!

Never look at delicious pictures of food at night.

Especially when you're already in bed and it's too late to cook anything.

I just made the mistake of looking at a picture of the pizza Mod and I had at Flatbread the other night and I'm pretty sure I drooled a little. And now I'm hungry and can't do anything about it because I'm in bed and already brushed my teeth. But I know I'll go hunting for pizza tomorrow. Maybe I'll even drive back up to Vermont. I mean, just look at this pizza.

Half Pepperoni and Peppers, half Punctuated Equilibrium (goat cheese, roasted sweet red peppers, mozzarella, red onions, and garlic). 

We devoured it quickly. Just look how happy we are!

She's wearing my dress.

Flatbread 4 lyfe.















It's so popular that you can't even make a reservation over the phone. On popular weekends, you have to go there at like 3pm to even think about being able to put your name down at 4pm when they start actually taking reservations. It's pretty frustrating for newcomers. They have this sign up in the restaurant:

Ignore the fact that they misspelled 'certain.'

Vermont aside, I haven't written a blog post in a while. I got back from Lebanon two weeks ago and I've just been SO busy. Oh wait, no I haven't. I've been doing nothing except seeing friends and hanging out with family. Which isn't a bad deal, if you ask me. But sometimes my days get boring and I end up watching That '70s Show for 3 hours. Which I guess isn't a bad deal either.

...Anyway.

I figured I should cook something new (I made Mexican quinoa again last week but I've already done a post on that). I was in Vermont this past weekend with my family, and our Vermont house just screams comfort food. So in between playing Rat-a-tat-cat and watching my 3-year old cousin Amin dance to dubstep, I found a recipe to make: Mac and Cheeze with a cashew-based sauce.

Now, I know I've done a mac and cheeze post before, with 3 different recipes, but I've now come to the conclusion that cheeze with a cashew base is just the best. Even my mama agrees, and she likes her real cheese. So the minute we got back from Vermont, I got to work. And oh, it was delicious. I got this recipe from Vegan Heartland. I haven't really checked out the blog that much; I just saw the pic of the mac and cheeze on Foodgawker. But now that I know how delicious the mac was, I'm definitely gonna check out more recipes!

I didn't make any adjustments to the recipe from Vegan Heartland, so here's a link to it. I'm too lazy to write it out myself: Baked Macaroni and Cashew Cheeze.

Don't worry, though. I have pictures.

Bread crumbs just make everything better.

The mac is already gone. 

I shouldn't be looking at these pictures. It's night again.

Even my brother loved it! According to my mom, he went downstairs this morning and said "Who made the pasta??? It was amazing!!!" When my mom told him that not only had I made it, but it was dairy-free, he proceeded to say "Well, it was a little dry." Whatever, he ate it at like 1 in the morning. It was perfectly creamy when I ate it.

Anyway, it's getting late, and I have to watch That '70s Show. Obviously. I made something else for dinner tonight, so a new recipe will be coming soon!

Song of the Day--View of Silence by Joe Hisaishi. Hisaishi is my favorite composer. I love watching videos of his live performances; he gets so into it. I'm learning this song on the piano right now! It's loads of fun to play, but challenging.
Recovery Link of the Day--I like this picture.

Love and Light,
Carina

The Lorax.

Food, Drinks, and the Beach: The Elements of Tyr

Oh hi! I figured it was time for another Lebanon update, so after waiting an hour for 16 pictures to upload (#lebanoninternet) I'm ready to write. Slash share pictures; I'm too lazy to write that much.

Sour/Tyr has been wonderfully relaxing. We've gone to the beach a few times, but we've mostly cooked up a storm and made lots of cocktails. I still need to work on my tan, though.

One of the first days I was here, Dany and I went to this café called Costa and decided to bring a little something with us to add to our drinks. Who says you can't get alcohol in Tyr?

Notice we're using a drug and alcohol prevention bottle.

It happens.

Yeah.

Another day, Amal (Dany's mom) made us mloukhieh! We spent so much time that morning peeling the freaking garlic and cutting cilantro. I never want to peel garlic again. But it was worth it, because the mloukhieh was absolutely delicious! Hopefully I can learn how to make it adequately.

Mloukhieh looks like a swamp, but I swear, it's delicious.

That night, I think we made falafel. And cocktails (obvi). May have been a different night, but whatever, it's summer. Days don't really matter. But I got to use a legitimate falafel-molding tool!

The other day we were so bored that we decided to make cocktails and then make a dessert. It wasn't great, but it looked good. Also most food tastes better after you've had a bit of alcohol, no?

We had maqloubeh too! I have to learn how to make it. It was delicious!

Suzan (Dany's cousin) made us pasta one night too. I pretended to help her cook :D

I took a bunch of pictures of the sunset too, but here are the ones I like best :)

On Saturday night, we crashed a wedding. My first time crashing a wedding, and my first time attending a Lebanese wedding. It was.....interesting, to say the least. I decided that the majority of the music belonged in Mulan.

Notice the sword used to cut the cake.

I even did dabke! It was fun. I failed at it, though. I'm good at walking in 5-inch heels, but not good enough to dance in them! We looked super classy though (we always do).

And lastly, a couple of beach pictures :)

You can clearly see how tan I am -______- I think I'm the only person who will have gone to Lebanon for nearly 7 weeks and come back still pale.

Anyway, I'm gonna watch Community now. I can't believe I'll be home in 2.5 weeks! I really can't believe I've been here for 4 weeks. I love it here, but I'm excited to go home too. But it'll be great to see my family--they get here on Saturday! (I do miss my arghile though--none here can compare to the one Grandpa passed down to me). But for now, I will enjoy the breeze coming through the door and watch an episode of Community before lunch.

Song of the Day-- Politik by Coldplay. I've been playing it a lot on the piano recently, and I even taught Dany the first part! So proud.
Recovery Quote of the Day-- "Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls. The most massive characters are seared with scars." -Khalil Gibran

Breezily,
Carina

Fattet Hummus in Paradise

I am in paradise.

It's late morning here in Tyr (Sour), and I'm doing the same thing I've done this whole week. Laying on lounge chairs with Dany smoking arghile and enjoying the scenery and breeze. It's been an incredible week, consisting of beaching it, drinking cocktails, eating good food, and enjoying time with Dany's family. I've even gotten a bit of a tan! Though I have a long way to go to reach Dany's skin tone (it'll never happen).

Anyway, the other night, after we got home from the beach, we decided we wanted to make fattet hummus. Every time Léa and I would go to a restaurant called Leila, I would order it and devour every bite. I discovered that the way they made it so good was that they made the chickpeas balila style before putting all together with the laban, pita, and pine nuts. Fatteh, if you don't know, is a traditional Lebanese dish consisting of laban (yogurt), toasted pita bread, toasted pine nuts, and then the main filling of your choice. It can be meat, chickpeas, eggplant, or all three if you so desire! It's quite delicious and it's one of my favorite foods. My dad's restaurant makes it whenever we have big parties, but they make it with the laban on the side. I've become accustomed to having fattet with lots of laban, and I think it's been helping my lactose intolerance. Anyway, it's such a great dish, and I'm here to share one of the many recipes with you!

Fattet Hummus
inspired by Taste of Beirut

Ingredients

• 2 cans chickpeas
• 2 c laban (yogurt)
• 8 T lemon juice
• 1/3 c olive oil
• 6 cloves garlic, mashed with some salt in a mortar
• 2 T tahini (sesame paste)
• pita bread, cut into small pieces and toasted or fried
• pine nuts, toasted or fried
• cumin
• salt
• hummus

Instructions

1. Empty the chickpeas and the water into a pot and heat until warm. Drain the chickpeas and put them into a serving bowl, but keep about a half a cup of the liquid for the dressing.
2. In a separate bowl, combine the chickpea liquid, lemon juice, olive oil, 1 clove mashed garlic, and some salt and cumin. Add 2 T of hummus and mix well.
3. Add 3 cloves of mashed garlic and some olive oil and salt to the chickpeas and mix well. Add dressing to chickpeas and mix.
4. For the laban: Add the other 2 cloves of mashed garlic, 2 T tahini, and about 3 T hummus. Mix well and set aside.
5. Layout (individual servings): Put some chickpeas in a bowl, followed by some pieces of toasted bread. Add as much laban as you like, and then top with toasted pine nuts. Sa7tein!

Anyway, now back to enjoying the breeze, watching Shoes and this gorgeous view. I took a picture for you all; you know you wish you were here.

Song of the Day-- Shoes. You saw it coming.

Recovery Quote of the Day-- "A Day in the Life"

Hungrily,

Carina

Hello from the Homeland!

Ahla w sahla! (that means 'welcome' in Arabic -___-)

Hello everyone! It's certainly been awhile. But I've been very busy. If you didn't know, I've been in Lebanon since the end of May, and will be here until mid-July. I just left Ain Aar in Mont Liban, where I was staying with my beautiful cousin Léa and her wonderful family. I'm now in Tyr in the South visiting my awesome friend Dany and his family. So far, everything has been amazing. And I've got the pictures to prove it.

The day after I arrived, jetlag hit and I woke up at 4AM. I saw the sunrise, which was beautiful, and then spent most of my time on the internet for the next 6 hours until Léa woke up. I managed to snap this picture though.

This is the view from their house in Ain Aar. It's breathtakingly gorgeous, as you can see.

After everyone else woke up, Léa and her mom and I went to Harissa to pray, as it was the last month of the Virgin Mary. We took the cable car up (and suffered a bit of vertigo) and I recalled having been there ten years ago! It was a very spiritual and emotional experience to pray there. So many people were at Harissa because it was the last day to pray.

That night, we went clubbing with Léa's brother and his friends that were visiting from Europe. It was an '80s night, and so many songs from Léa's and my 'Get Psyched' mix played. Needless to say....we got psyched.

The next night, we went barhopping and made friends with the bartender, who for some reason decided to put on a wig that resembled the hair of one of the guys from LMFAO. We also went barhopping the next night and saw Dany who was visiting from Tyr! Jesus I look white.

Free drinks are always welcome

Saturday we saw Dany again. We met at a beach resort called Lazy-B in Jiyeh, about 30 minutes away from Beirut. It was such a gorgeous day. We drank margaritas, tanned, and Léa and Dany even got me to jump into the sea!

My hat got blown off several times that day.

Loulou et Nounou 

Dandoun et Carroun

Hammock swinging

Needless to say, it was a wonderful day.

Another highlight of the trip: a cooking class Léa and my other cousin Dana and I took at Tawlet, a very cool Lebanese restaurant. Every day, there is a new chef that comes in to make their specialty. The menu is never exactly the same! They have a cooking class every Wednesday, and we and 6 others learned how to make tabbouleh, mtabbal betanjan (babaghanouj), and kibbet batata (potato kibbeh). The chef's name was Nada and she was really sweet. It was lots of fun and of course, the food was delicious. I wrote down the recipes too, so expect to see those up at some point!

Me, Léa, and Nada in front of the kibbet batata.

Okay now I really want some of that food. Right now, Frosties aren't really doing it for me. And still so long until lunch!

Léa left for Barcelona for the summer on Saturday night, so on Friday night, her friends and I went out barhopping in Gemmayzeh (Gaston and Bulldog, I think). I was exhausted though and fell asleep at the last pub we were at :p

Je t'aime petite cousine!

After she left, I headed down to Tyr to stay with Dany and his family, who have been so kind and generous during my stay! Dany and I cooked for his parents that night and made Baingan Bharta and Chole Palak (miss you, Ellen!).

Obviously we made margaritas, too.

I'm currently sitting outside on the porch in the garden smoking arghile and updating this blog, and will be watching Community in a bit (Léa and I became obsessed). The view is gorgeous and I'm super excited cause we're going to the beach this afternoon! Maybe then I'll get a bit of color -____-
Anyway, here's a picture of the sunset in Tyr that I took last night. Enjoy and more updates soon!

Song of the Day-- Trabak ya Lubnan by Tania Kassis. She's a great Lebanese singer, and this is one of my favorite songs by her.
Recovery Quote of the Day-- "Believe you can, and you will."

Smokingly,
Carina