"People" is a hilarious word when you stop to think about it

Ehh, I haven't posted anything in more than a week. February has been a generally slow month for me. I would love to explain every mundane detail of my week to all of you, but instead I've chosen not to, mostly(partly[dramatic]) because photobucket takes forever to upload pictures, but partly(mostly) because I just don't feel like it some days. It's not like I'm busy, or like I'm out with friends or something, (I sit at my desk and watch hulu on the weekends), it's just that some days I just don't want to.

o

Yeah, this is kinda a boring and pointless post, but I promise I will have the new one up tonight about my weekend :D. Photobucket is just really making me angry because I have 57 photos to upload and it keeps taking forever so I just close the window out of frustration.

However I will rise above today, and deliver a great post tonight :)

o

o

Side note: Another thing that I do all the time, that makes absolutely no sense at all, is I usually end each post with "More Tomorrow" however I rarely actually post the very next day. I've been meaning to talk about this for a while, but I like it, so I'll continue to do it :)

More Later Tonight (Hopefully)

Frosting ^.^

Just so you all can know, I'm sitting in a smashed up plastic laundry basket as I type this. I got a snack from downstairs, and on the way back up I saw it sitting in the hallway to my room. Besides that......

I've actually been doing some stuff lately, even though the snow has once again impared me from having a life. OH! Plus I've been sick for the past three days but I'm feeling much better now.

So the other day Franiel and I purchased little "instant flan" packets from the grocery store. I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but I can't stand flan. I don't dislike it as much as I dislike creme brulee, but it's up there.

Right before we were about to make the instant flan, I guess something snapped in Franiel, because seconds later, he was on the phone with his aunt, asking for her flan recipe. We ended up making it from scratch, so that was nice.

I ate some of it, and it wasn't bad. I know I sound like a stubborn infant, but this flan was more tolerable, although I still don't want to eat it.

I guess this is "Caprese Part I" because I have another tomato and mozzerella item featured later. Before I made the flan, I went to Serpico's for lunch. This was when I started to feel sick, so instead of ordering soup, I got caprese sticks? I don't make much sense sometimes.

...or maybe that's all the time. I guess I started not feeling well on Thursday morning, after it snowed the second time. I went out playing in the snow the night before, so maybe that's it. I also guess it didn't help that the morning after I went out to shovel the driveway. /:

*CANDY PHOTOG*

Pt. 2

Somebodies been candy shopping at H-Mart haha.

I don't know what it is, but recently I've found that I really enjoy taking pictures. No this isn't one of those shocking career change moments, I just like it as a hobby.

A while back I was thinking to myself that I really need a creative outlet. Yeah, I draw, but that's not really an outlet as it's more a talent. I've also mentioned multiple times how much I want a real camera, not just an iPhone or a point and shoot. One of the first things I want to buy when I get a job is an SLR camera :D

Red Hearts Day

(Ignoring the obvious) Since today was Valentine's Day, I thought it would be fun for the children to bake red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. As usual, I ran into a few obstables, but in the end everything was okay.

Do not let these pictures decieve you, they appear bright, vibrant red and the frosting lush and shiny. Okay, the frosting actually looks that good, but the cupcakes are nowhere near as red in real life.

See the thing is, I planned to go to the grocery store yesterday, but I was sick so my mom went instead. I gave her the list of things for the cupcakes over the phone, and then I asked about the food coloring. I remembered that I still had some left over from my sister's cake. I thought it would be enough, but apparantly not. They turned like an "elmo red", almost orangish-pink.

I love the way the frosting looks in this one

So after I finished these, I went to lunch at Bertucci's, after trying to get a table for seven at Olive Garden only to have the man tell me theres a 2 hour wait. That's today's OHN moment.

"No. 82: OHN, I will not wait 2 HOURS to eat at Olive Garden"

Anyway, I called Bertucci's from the parking lot, and the man told me that there was no wait there. Then the traffic happened, as it seemed that ALL of the rejected OG customers rushed over the next italian sit-down restaurant. We did end up getting a table very quickly though.

Uh-oh. Here we go.

"No. 83: OHN, why is this giant chunk of onion just sitting in this salad"

Seriously though, I like onions in my salad, but come on. Who did this? Who put this giant peel of onion right in the middle of the bowl. The edges don't even look like it was cut, just torn off the onion and thrown in.

And no, those arent forks, they are giant serving tongs in size comparison to the onion. If you still don't believe me, just look how small the cherry tomato looks next to it. It's rediculous. No, wait, it's redonkulous.

I actually had a pretty nice thing to say about this picture, and how the oil on the bread catches the light, but now that I'm seeing it on the blog, I realize:

It looks like snot /:

I have forever ruined oil for all of you! Ahahaha!!

I must say, this plate confused me so much. The menu said "crunchy focaccia with cheese and a roasted tomato sauce and crumbled feta". I was confused because the "focaccia" they gave me resembled tortilla visually and texturally, and with the cheese it just seemed like a quesadilla. So let me revise that menu item.

"Quesadillas with Roasted Tomato Salsa"

And of course, I had caprese salad. Light lunch (:

Not too much text this post. More tomorrow sillies :D

Rosie Posie

So I have a cut on my smallest finger (I hate the word "pinky" in reference to the last finger. I find it repulsive and refuse to use it), and I don't know how it got there. Mystery cuts seem to be occurring often with me as of late, with this new one bringing the total up to three. I think it's been about a week since I posted the Smarties pictures up, and I figured I'd do something new.

I know I said I would stop apologizing for not posting for a short period of time, I just feel like I'm neglecting an infant in a dirty apartment while I go galivanting around the city.

Yeah, everywhere we go everyone knows us, even though I just started speaking to these people. As I go to Pitango and enjoy my mango and rhubarb gelato, my young child enjoys the scent of food down the hall, hoping he'll see a stray raisin on the floor tonight for dinner.

Ugh..... its too late; I've already lost my mind.

kj
I honestly can't use the "job hunt" excuse this time, so I'm gonna go with it snowed friday night until saturday evening. 3 ft of snow! I could barely lift the shovel with all of it on top. Ashley and I went out to shovel this morning, but it was futile. Eventually we flagged down someone driving down the street with a snow plow and he helped us out.

I've been eating a lot of junk food recently. Like an unusual amount of crap. Like this "Dublin Mudslide" Ben & Jerry's Pint I finished in about 10 minutes along with an entire bag of "Goldfish" pretzels, a pineapple fruit cup, and a blackberry Izze drink. Now I'm known around the house for...well....ending up in situations like this:

Person A: "Hey, I just bought that box of fruity pebbles yesterday. I even wrote my name on it. Where did it go?!" "Dominic!"

Person B: "He can't hear you, he's busy eating"

But I don't ever remember eating this much. People seem to think it's just "growing hunger", which brings me to another point. Sometimes I still forget that I'm a sixteen year old. A hah! You thought I was going to go off on another rant! Well I'm not! ANYWAY...

This week I didn't do too many interesting things. I baked a cake, with a frosting idea that I figured that I just had to try, being caused by my family being picky. Okay, so I love the lemon poppy seed combination (in muffins, cookies, etc.) so I figured, why not bake a lemon poppy seed cake. I know it's been done plenty of times in the past, but usually in a bundt pan and with flat icing, which I never understood. "Why can't I bake a cake and assemble it with a normal frosting using these flavors/ingredients?" Just as I was getting excited, my mother reminded me that probably no one in the house would eat a cake with poppy seeds in it. This is the problem I encounter nearly every time I make something: My Picky Family.

So what I decided to do was to put the poppy seeds in the frosting. But then I got another wonderful little message from my mother again. "Dominic, I thought you werent putting those in the cake." "Oh I wasn't, I'm putting them in the frosting *big smile*." "*-.- face*, Please don't put those in there." "Fine."

But I really wanted them incorporated some way into the cake, so I let them soak in the vanilla that I was going to use for the frosting to impart some kind of flavor.

Well, they didn't. Not noticably anyway. I guess the only way to impart poppy seed flavor into a cake (or anything for that matter) is to actually put them in. Someday I'll make lemon poppy seed cupcakes and my family can just avoid them if they don't want to eat them.

This would've made a really nice lemon cake if the frosting was lemon flavored...and a bit thicker. French buttercream was a bad choice for this one; heavy cake smashing down on already fragile icing. I think it was usually thin that day because of my absent minded-ness. The recipe called for 3 oz egg yolks, and instead of measuring egg yolks in a pyrex cup like I should have, I divided 3 oz by .67 oz, which is the weight of one egg yolk. It came out to about 4.4, so I just put 5 egg yolks in figuring I'd just add more butter. But I forgot the extra butter, and now that I think about it, I should've added more sugar syrup too.

So, to finish off the post, today I ventured out into the tundra and went to the grocery store. While I was there, I managed to get this great asiago bread. I haven't had it yet, but tomorrow morning I am so looking forward to the best egg and cheese sandwich ever. Lol more tomorrow (:

Smart Photography

Not a normal post today, since the (complicated) job hunt continues I haven't had much else to do. So simply enjoy an iPhone camera, a desk lamp, and a packet of Smarties :)

(This post was to emphasize the new focus on the photography of the blog, having already re-done the content [text] and the appearance [banner] for this year)

Cakel and Ligel

Dye all over my hands. Splatters on my glasses. A paper cut on the top of my thumb. Two cracked ribs and a broken foot. This is the result of yesterday's cake extravaganza (okay except the last two, I just thought the first three weren't quite dramatic enough).

hh

So I actually did something with my day yesterday, as it was my little sisters birthday! So I figured I had to bake her a cake, but what do I make for a picky seven year old? At first I thought a really pretty "princess cake" done with fondant and really nicely decorated. Then I remember the time I ate a piece of fondant in one of my baking classes. Sorry to all the bakeries (and fondant lovers) but excessive fondant tastes like poop. Yeah, I just said the word poop in a food blog.

hh

So instead I decided to do two cakes, the first one a plain vanilla cake with dark chocolate frosting. The second cake I chose to use the princess idea, but instead I used marzipan, because I actually like the taste of it. However, I had no idea whether or not she would like it, so that's why I decided to make two. More on that later.

I really don't know what's wrong with the picture on the left. Not that anything is wrong with it, it's just in real life the frosting looked a lot darker. Besides that, I think it looks great. I was talking to my mother about what kind of cake Madina would like, and she told me that she really enjoyed to lemon cake I earlier this month (never posted). So I basically just took the lemon zest and extract out of the recipe and added two teaspoons more vanilla.

I think it turned out well. I like practically anything made with buttermilk, but cake especially. I also really liked the color contrast between the light cake and the almost black frosting. (Do you like the new photo window thingy? I just thought I'd keep going with what I mentioned last post about keeping things interesting with the pictures.)

So here is the "princess cake" that I made, and let me say it took about 4 hours from start to finish. Why Dominic? Are you seriously that slow?? No people, I had to make the marzipan from scratch. And while that might not take that long to make marzipan, it did that me that long to make almond paste from whole almonds. First I had to blanch them and then make a sugar syrup with water, sugar, karo. I had to peel 11 oz. of whole almonds, rough cut them, then put them in a non-exsistent food processor.

So let me tell all of you what I did next. Last year, my mother broke my first blender, so I got a second one. Yesterday as I go to use it in place of a food processor, I find that the top no longer fits onto the bottom. So what I had to do was hold the top down with one hand, and press the pulse button with another. After I mixed the ground almonds with powdered sugar, I waited until the sugar syrup reached soft ball and then it hit me: I don't have three hands. So I had to go upstairs and ask my grandmother to come help me. She slowly poured in the syrup while I held and turned on the blender. Eventually, this made almond paste and that helped me make marzipan. Anyway, four hours later it was dyed, molded, rolled out, and put onto the cake. (It was the same recipe as the vanilla cake.)

Side note: So before the cake, singing, and presents, we ordered Pizza from Papa John's. While I was eating my favorite pizza (onion and green pepper on flatbread), I noticed there was a strange seasoning packet in the box instead of garlic sauce. I was kinda disappointed that the best part was missing out of the box, but I was curious to see what this "mystery packet" was. 5 minutes later, I discovered it was gross. It tasted like crunchy, peppery old bay, and it reminded me of when I was 11 and I poured tons of "Mrs. Dash" on my noodles.

Blahhhh, I just had to post something because I've been a little non-posty recently. I should have something else up tomorrow, so until then, enjoy the picture of pizza. More tomorrow ._.

Mrs. Bouffant and I Make Fresh Pasta

Starting with a photo?? And one that's out of chronological order with the rest of them?! *wags hand* Dominic you just keep getting more outrageous as the days go by! Ahhh....I'm losing my mind here. Without school, or any kind of work to keep me occupied, my brain has begun to atrophy. It's been over a month of leasure and I need to do something. I can't let the best part of my day be when someone brings home a different vegetable from the grocery store.

Besides realizing that I am slowly losing my mind, today Alex and I made pasta. This morning he said he wanted to do something with me, and so I asked him to look through a magazine and see what he wanted to make. He brought me a picture of pasta, so I ended up making papardelle with a red sauce. It sounds plain, but usually in this house the only sauce anyone eats is out of a jar, so it was nice to actually make a sauce from start to finish instead of heating or a bottle of prego.

I was going to do a white sauce, but then I remembered that yesterday, we bought some heirloom tomatoes from the store. My grandmother's friend mentioned to me a few months ago that at the farmers market downtown apparently they have some really nice green and red, and even purple and red tomatoes, so that's definitely something I'd like to go do as soon as it stops being ice cold outside. Anyway, above right is the beginning of the sauce which, I know, I should have used concasse(d?) tomatoes for, but it honestly slipped my mind.

So after I cooked the pasta, I added red wine to the sauce, let it reduce, and (the other reason why I made red sauce) I added the remaining stock leftover from the other day. I don't believe I posted it on here, but I made everyone risotto for dinner two days after I baked the apple pie. I didn't have any stock in the house, and Franiel was sick so he couldn't take me to the store, so I had to make it myself. I must say it turned out probably better than if I would've gotten it at Giant. Tangent Over: After it started to boil, I reduced it to a simmer then added the pasta. Everyone (that ate it) really seemed to enjoy it, probably because prego is just ground up tomatoes and onions and doesnt have stock or wine in it.

Someone should really give me a pat on the back or something for how consistent I've been with my posting recently. During the three week break I took from doing +discow+ I was actually thinking of announcing a hiatus while I explored the job market. Obviously that didn't quite work out, and as it seems this blog is the only thing revolving around food I have right now. So I'm sorry if I've been giving four crappy posts a week instead of one great one every few, but I need this so that I don't lose the desire to cook.

This was a very short post, but it's only because I'm leaving to go somewhere in a few minutes so I didn't have very long to type. I've also been working on new picture ideas (like the one above) to keep things interesting so it's not just square after square of mediocre food photography. So..... more tomorrow :)

GOLDEN RASPEBERRIES

Todayyy, I went to Au Bon Pain for lunch where I haven't been for a while, so I was kinda excited to go. (Sidenote- What is wrong with me?! Is my life so dry and unamusing that the most exciting part of my day is going somewhere to eat? I really need a life....) Anyway, I did enjoy the lunch for the most part, and I have a little bit of good news. As it turns out, it's perfectly legal for me to work in a bakery or pastry shop, and even though it wouldn'tve been my first choice, it's a step forward in me being able to get into a kitchen. I'm working at it, but I really think that I could work at this one kitchen if I really try. On to the food.

So this was my lunch today. A green chile soup, two bread sticks, a milk, and a chocolate muffin. Sounds plain, but it was actually even more plain than it sounds. I have individual (gripes?) with each item here, so I will further explain with each picture. But first, allow me to say the helpless elderly persons prayer to hope for flavorful food.

Dear lord, I thank you for this bland, indifferently prepared meal and beseech
you to ignite some spark of compassion in my cold hearted (insert current
caretaker/relative here), that (he/she) might show some shred of mercy to me,
(his/her) wretched captive, Amen.

Me, being the "overly cautious for stupid things and not cautious enough for important things" person I am, got milk to drink because I thought that the soup was going to be super spicy. Unfortunately, it barely left in tingle in my mouth, although that's not to say it wasn't still good. It's just the quaint little description they gave led me to believe it was going to be hot; it was just a bit of a let down.

This is the chocolate chip muffin I picked off the pastry shelf for lunch. This is a very sad picture of said muffin. And do we know why? Because said muffin was a very sad muffin. It was burned people. I want to say I knew this when I bought it, but I didn't know that it was completley burned. So the woman at the register was staring at me as I reached into the little box to pick one of the muffins up, so when I felt that it was harder than a rock, I couldn't put it back without the whole "you touched it you bought it" argument. So I knowingly bought a burned muffin, and sat down and pretended to be surprised when I bit into it. You aren't fooling anyone Dominic...not even yourself /: So in the end I decided to smash it up like a 4 year old and leave crumbs all over the seat.

The bread sticks were perfectly fine. Absolutely nothing wrong with the bread sticks. They tasted even better when I dipped them into the soup. (WOW! No complaints?!)

Aaaaand this brings us to our final (crappy) picture, a magical fruit that I didn't know existed until today. At the grocery store I found some golden raspberries. The first box I picked up had mold all over them, so I took these home. Sorry about the smooshed one in the corner, I was going for something that obviously didn't quite work out. I just wanted to make a small little note about all the pictures in this post actually; I was surprised that I took such bad pictures in Au Bon Pain today because usually the sun shines right through the window and makes for a great food picture, but I guess today because it was sorta cloudy. Getting a new camera is on my long long list of things to do right now besides getting some new eyeballs. Blurrggghhhh.....More tomorrow!

In the past I've said that obstacles only make things more interesting...

So today, I came across perhaps the biggest obstacle in my career I've had to deal with yet. I am certain there will be more, bigger ones, much more difficult, but I can't get to any of those until I find a way to fix this. More on that later. Recently, I've been doing a lot of job hunting (related) and I haven't really had a lot of time to just sit back and make food in my house. So when I had the opportunity to make popovers, lasagna, and blueberry muffins these past two days I had to post about it; after all, what's a twist without a main story to alter?

The popovers where a lot simpler than I recall to make; just mix milk, eggs, melted butter, and flour, add some salt, and pour into a greased muffin tin. Ashley and I were going through some of my old pictures from last year, and apparently exactly one year ago yesterday, I baked popovers in my bp150 class (according to the pictures date). Then I remembered that we didn't have anymore flour, and that no one ever wants to take me to the grocery store for anything. So I began to entice the hungry Ashley with stories of how they are almost like a muffin and and omelet combined, mostly to get her to walk with me up the street so I wouldn't be bored, but also so that she could try them. Long story short, we walked to the store and bought flour, milk, and blueberries (more on that later). Fast forward two hours and we have popovers!

*Said with excitement continued from last paragraph* These are not the popovers! These are lasagna noodles, which I needed to start on while they were in the oven because the recipes are at two different temperatures. I decided against putting anything else other than cheese in it for fear that no one in the house would eat it if I added spinach like I wanted to. I also didn't have any herbs to add to the ricotta mixture, so it was just plain. I actually did not take pictures of the lasagna after it had just come out of the oven, but I did take one while it was on the plate....the thing is....I had already taken a large chunk out of it. At +discow+ I have posted enough mildly disgusting photos, so we don't need one more :P

These are the popovers!!...they look wet /: Anyway, we added cheese to half of them (not these), all of which got eaten. They went quickly....like 5 minutes quickly lol. The good news is that they don't take long to make so maybe I'll do it again tomorrow.

This was my lunch today. After my job interview I went to the Starbucks at the bookstore on the Avenue, and I originally intended to only get a drink, but I found three extra dollars in my pocket (pathetic) so I bought a pretzel too! Instead of the feta/spinach pretzel, which seemed dry, I got the pizza stuffed pretzel because I figured the marinara sauce would keep it moist, which it did. That's when I got the phone call about my "problem".

So later on today Ashley and I started another baking session in which we made blueberry muffins for dessert. I reheated the lasagna I made yesterday (which was intended to be eaten today, just incase anyone was wondering) while we measured and mixed for the muffins. Let me say that muffin mix has to be my favorite kind of raw egg using, unbaked, batter between cakes, cookies, and brownies. Especially muffins made with buttermilk (not these lol), because they have that tart with the sweetness thing. Anyway, here they are.

Okay, so onto the part that I'm sure everyone has skipped down to see how dramatic Dominic is being today. My job interview that was supposed to happen tuesday ended up being re scheduled for today. After I sat down and showed him my portfolio, he asked me if I really wanted this job.

I was shocked when he said that I was over qualified for the job (especially since I had never worked in a restaurant before except Ireland). I told him that I still wanted to work there, just to get my foot in the door. During the job interview, my age came up (like I was sure it would), and the man said it absolutely did not make a difference to him or the restaurant. So we did the whole "oh wow, how did you do that" thing that usually happens when people find out my age, and then he said he'd be in contact and I left.

However, while I was eating my pretzel (I had to spit out a piece to answer the phone), he said that he had some unfortunate news. He said that he spoke to someone in the department of labor to make sure I could work there, and they basically told him that I can't. Not just at that place, but pretty much in every kitchen. They said that the slicer and the food processor and things like that were all considered machines, and that they were "too dangerous" for me to handle.

W...T....F...??!?!? I'm not a toddler, I'm not going to put my hand in a robot coupe and turn it on! I'm sure now everyone has their "I told you so Dominic" faces on, but don't write me off that quickly. I will find a way. I will get a job. I have gotten over things in the past and I can do it now. They told me I was too young to take the ACT, but I did. They told me I was too young to graduate high school when I did, but I did. They told me I couldn't afford to go to culinary school but. I. did. Things just wouldn't be interesting if I didn't have something else to deal with. So I will handle this, I don't know how, or what to do, but I will. Dominic will get a job in a kitchen.

Recycle Pie...?

I'm just going to say that the pie that I baked today wasn't exactly recycled (that'd be disgusting). I'm not quite sure what the word is for it, but there was a 3lb bag of apples in the second refrigerator in the rec room, and I knew no one would ever eat them. So I decided that since I'm not doing anything today, why not bake an apple pie?! I ran into a few problems along the way, but I like to think that obstacles only make things better. GET TO IT!

(Also, really sorry about the picture quality again. I'm trying to get this job, and if everything goes well, I'll have a lot more money. One of the first thing I plan to do is get a real camera so I don't have to take crazy pictures with my iPhone and put them up here :P)

So, these are the apples (why I feel the need to introduce them, I'll never know) and I must say, this picture makes them look very large. However, I will have you know that they were not. These had to be the smallest variety next to crab apples, probably not the best kind for baking a pie out of. The recipe didn't specify what kind of apple, and I had a few large granny smith apples in the fridge, but I didn't think sour apples would be so great in a pie. So I decided just to go ahead and peel, core, and slice 50 (<-dramatic) baby apples for this pie. Frankly, it was a hassle.

Let me tell you all how I had to fight the damn squirrels for my pie pan. I was looking for one of them, under the island in the cabinet where the rest of my bake ware is, and I couldn't find them. So I looked all over, only to be told that someone moved most of my things into a plastic bin in the shed. I hate going in the shed period, but more so in the winter because that's when the squirrels move in. I made sure to bang on the door to let them know I was there, but they still decided to continue their party on the roof. So, I walked over as they scurried away to the bin to get my pie pan, when one jumps inside. So I quickly got the pan, slammed the container shut, and walked out...and now in a week I get the pleasure of fishing a dead rodent out of the bin.

Skipping right through the crust, filling, and topping making, I bring you to a disgusting picture of an unbaked pie. The filling was a cooked one (do they have a recipe for non cooked apple filling?), so I spent a little time on that. Before I made the crust early this morning because I knew it had to retard for at least four hours.425°F and 35 minutes later...

THIS came out of the oven! I was very pleased with they way it came out, mostly because sometimes my oven in crazy and it burns things for no reason. This time I was prepared and reduced the temperature by about 15°F. That way, my pie wouldn't come out looking like a volcano. I would like to try the same recipe again, with a few changes that I've noted, one being less butter in the crumb topping. That with the caramelized sugar reminded me of palmier cookies, my nemesis.

Yeah, this has been a pretty lame post, but I honestly didn't do much else today, and I wanted to put something up because I'm not going to be posting tomorrow. I'm going to be away from my desktop and the little laptop frustrates me to use sometimes, especially typing large paragraphs. Anyway, I better get going, I have a bag to pack.

O.o Wednesday Brunch?

No. The answer to the question is no, I did not a fancy brunch this morning. I had half of a day old donut, some milk, and the last cashew out of the trail mix bag in the pantry. I had brunch at Roberto's on Sunday morning, and I (for some reason?) waited until now to post about it. Anyway, lets not dally and go straight into it.

When I first sat down with my first plate at the brunch buffet, I wondered to myself, "Why did I get cheese? This is going to be disgusting, just a wedge of cheese like this...". Strangely, it wasn't just a dull cheese like cheddar (not that there is anything wrong with cheddar, I just don't usually like eating large pieces of hard cheeses alone), but it was a very spicy and flavorful Pepper Jack. I tried it alone at first, and then with a piece of strawberry that I put on the plate, not thinking to eat it with the cheese. Well, it was just good. Also notice the slice of onion bread and pineapples slices.

This is a picture of juice. No, I will not be talking about the juice lol, but I would like to use this opportunity to talk about the service at Roberto's. I have to say that they have a really attentive staff here. The moment I got up to get another plate, someone was refolding my napkin, pushing in my chair, taking the old plate away, dusting the table for crumbs, and re-filling the juice and water glasses. Most places don't really have service, and I think that's a shame because these waiters probably get huge tips, and other restaurants could get the same amount of gratuity. Just thought I'd say that.

I really dislike pictures of eggs. Especially omelettes. Especially omelettes with cheese and tomatoes in them. I do, however, like the taste of them, very much. I know that its terrible manners to say mildly disgusting things while we're eating (or looking at pictures of) food, but I have been known to say worse at the table. This omelet looks like a giant sneeze. Yes that is foul, and yes the next time you eat an omelette, you will think about sneezes, but it will pass... or not....

I also noticed that the woman who usually carves the roast beef and makes the waffles hasn't been there the past two times I've gone....perhaps she got fired /: (speaking of which, I didn't get a waffle while I was there...now I want a waffle...)

*said in sarcastic tone* It just wouldn't be a review of Dominic's brunch if dessert wasn't half the meal. Anyway, this time they surprised me at the usually repeated dessert table by replacing all the old items with new ones. They had mini creme brulees (which I hate), mini flans (which I also hate), and they had mini key lime pies (which I like). You can also see here that I got some assorted candies and small cookies. I also got another one of the mystery "sacher cookies" which I have yet to find out why they share the same name as the cake (they taste absolutely nothing alike).

This was probably my favorite part of the meal; warm blueberry compote with crumb topping. It wasn't hot like fresh baked pie filling, but just right like the porridge in that story. (I think she should've gotten eaten. That's what she gets for breaking into a bears house... mhhmmmm... why am I even going off on this tangent?) There isn't really too much else to say here, other than I found more crumb topping in the bottom... so does that make it crust?

And for the final part of the meal, some chocolate covered strawberries. Again, not too much else to say here besides they were pretty good. I actually took a few more off the table on the way out, which Ashley glared at me for... speaking of which I re-did her blog. Now I only have one more banner/title card to do for someone, then I'm donneeee. She also changed the title of her blog, now its (clickable) The Look of Things. But that's about all for this post, btw I never explained why I didn't finish the Miami arc. The reason is that I got some sort of stomach sickness, and as soon as I was over it I got my tattoo on my wrist, which made me no longer able to type because it was right on top of my tendons. More tomorrow ;D