April 29, 2010

THREE FOR THREE




In the past seven months we've been broken up with via:

Voice Mail
Text Message
Email 

Ahhh, the beauty of technology. Zero accountability. At least we haven't gotten dumped by a Post-It! 

(And, we admit it, we've played this game as well.)

April 27, 2010

PIZZA PIE



Another kind of pie we're obsessed with is the pizza kind. We especially love putting "weird" things on pizza and calling it fabulous. Awhile back we were inspired by InStyle and Aida Mollenkamp ("Food Network's rising star," apparently) to have our very own pizza party with one of our favorite people and fellow blogger, Saltina.


(Saltina takes the most lovely, thoughtful photos. Check out: myphoneograpy. Really, you'll love them.)

And today, we're thrilled to do a co-post. Here for the recipes. There for more photos. Join us.

Note: We used one package of Trader Joe's whole wheat pizza dough, divided and made one of each of the pizzas below. Recipes are for two small pizzas each, so you might want to halve the ingredients. Although we believe that pizza is very forgiving and don't worry about measuring (maybe that's why we love it).

POTATO, ARGULA, PECORINO AND MOZZARELLA
2 cloves garlic, sliced thin
2 T grated pecorino cheese (we think Parmesan would work, too)
1/4 lb. mozzarella, sliced
1 small (about 1/4 lb.) cooked potato thinly sliced (we sliced, then cooked)
4 T olive oil
2 cups baby arugula

Preheat oven to 450. Drizzle 1 T olive oil over cookie sheet (or, you could use a pizza pan or pizza stone if you're feeling fancy). Prepare dough (to us that means rolling out as thin as possible, we don't worry about the shape, as long as it fits on the pan). Sprinkle garlic, pecorino, mozzarella and potato slices onto rolled out dough. Drizzle 1 T olive oil over pizza. Pierce dough with a fork several times. Bake 10 - 12 minutes or until crust is crispy. Remove and top with fresh arugula.



BLUE CHEESE AND ROASTED SQUASH
1/2 cup diced butternut squash*
1/4 cup diced onion
5 T olive oil
1 t salt
1/4 t ground pepper
2 T grated pecorino cheese
4 T crumbled blue cheese

In large bowl, toss squash and onion with 1 T olive oil, salt and pepper. Spread vegetables in a single layer on a baking sheet. Roast at 400 until tender (about 20 minutes, but depends on how small you dice 'em), set aside. Preheat oven and prep pan/dough as above. Sprinkle pecorino onto dough. Spoon the veggies evenly over dough. Sprinkle pizza with blue cheese and 1 T olive oil. Pierce dough with fork several times. Bake for 10 - 12 minutes or until crust is crispy.


*We diced up all the butternut squash and threw small batches into individual ziplock bags and froze them for future pizza parties. Easy!

If you're feeling extra fancy make the Orange & Lillet Cocktail that Aida recommended. 

Thanks to InStyle, October 2009 for recipes and inspiration.


April 22, 2010

COOCHIE COO













Once, we went on a date with a guy who, in an attempt to take it to the next level (we’re guessing), said “Hey, my dart matches your shoe.” (We were in a pub. Playing darts, naturally.) And then actually reached down with his dart and tickled our blue-sandal-clad foot.



We wish he'd just touched our leg or something.

April 20, 2010

FLAT

Moving to a new city is hard, especially if you’re single and know no one. We decided to join Match when we got to D.C. – the best way to shock us into a social life we thought. Our second date was with a guy who was a giant, goofy and floppy and strange.

Does he suffer from ADD, we wondered? Is he crazy? Unfortunately we downed three martinis as a coping mechanism, so when he went for the back rub, we didn't resist. Worse, we didn’t protest when he gave us a big, slobbery, goofy, floppy kiss.

Forgive us – extreme loneliness, tiredness and martini-ness made us weak.

And don’t you agree? Once we kiss someone, we feel almost obligated to go out with them again. 
In the time it took to get from date #1 to #2, we chatted on the phone a bit and learned the following:

- He was unemployed
- Living with his parents
- Usually stoned out of his mind on painkillers because of chronic back pain
- He was stoned out of his mind on our date
- Whenever he is constipated, his back pain acts up "real bad"
- He has urinary hesitancy (this means he can't pee in public. neat, huh?)

Clearly, when date #2 rolls around, we are not excited. We organize a squadron of new friends to come meet us at 8 (date starts at 7). We arrive on time – he’s not there. We order a mojito and nurse it. Get a text from him at 7:15: "HAVE YOU LEFT YET?" We call him back: "At the place. Been here for 15 minutes...you know, at the time we agreed to meet?" He is apologetic and says he'll get in the car right away.

45 minutes later we are wilting into our mojito. Nothing is more humiliating than being stood up by someone you're going on a pity date with. Areweright?? Friends show up and we bail. A half hour goes by and we have a voicemail from date:

"I was coming down Rock Creek Park when I hit a pothole and got a flat tire (cue sounds of cars whooshing by). Triple-A came and changed it and I'm on my way..."

We text: SRRY ABOUT UR CAR. WE’RE KINDA BENT OUTTA SHAPE FROM WAITING SO LONG FOR U, SO LETS CALL IT OFF. HOPE UR NITE GETS BETTER.

We turn our phone off. About an hour goes by, and when we turn it back on we are hit with  a barrage of angry text messages from him, along the lines of:

I CAN'T BELIEVE UR DOING THIS TO ME
I WAITED 2 WEEKS TO SEE YOU AND THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY ME
I THOUGHT YOU WERE COOL
etc.

We're shocked alright. We turn the phone off...and continue to have fun with the new friends.

April 16, 2010

THE END



A recent second date with a someone who wasn't doing it for us, got us thinking. How to exit gracefully? 


If you've been on one or two dates, can you just let the interaction fizzle out? What is the time frame that requires a conversation? 


And, other than the direct, "Dude, I'm just not into you," how do to you tell someone, "thanks but no thanks."


Our best line for (nicely) letting someone know we don't want to date:

Oh, honey, we're just not your girl. We would drive you out of your mind in short order because……(fill in the blank with whatever fault you think will drive them away) We wish you the best.

And leave it at that.

April 15, 2010

IT'S VAJAZZLING

(Warning: You might not want to read this one at work. Or, open in front of your mom. Just saying)


We're down with "maintenance" of our lady bits. And, we love trends. But, we're unsure of what to think about the latest venture into our bikini-business - vajazzling - which basically turns your crotch into hairless, shiny all-by-yourself party. 


12


Jennifer Love Hewitt has proclaimed her love for it, salons in New York and DC are doing it. Is our hood next? The jury is still out for us on this one. What about you?


PS Thanks to Twig, for always making sure we're in the know. XO

April 12, 2010

CUTIE PIE

Our mom makes the most amazing pies. Our grandmother made the most amazing pies. So do our aunts. Even our sister is making pretty damn good pies. So, obviously we're both spoiled and intimidated by the lady-pie-bakers in our family. Why would we ever even try? But we want to. We're drawn to pies (not just the eating of them, the process!).




We stumble upon this recipe (and lovely photography) via Sunday Suppers. We had a crush. So, on a blustery, dark winter evening on Orcas Island we decided to make a butternut squash gallet for our friends, figuring we would ease into this pie-making business. (A gallet is free-form and "rustic." Perfect for our first attempt at pie making.) Unfortunately, we found out it wasn't pomegranate season. So we modified with pears. We even did it like our grandmother would have, without an electric mixer. Just mucho elbow grease. It was delicious. We may be pie-bakers after all.




Next time we will try cranberries instead of pears. Unless we can find pomegranates at the market.

April 8, 2010

THE PERILS OF ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATION


We decide to try online dating. Just to get our feet wet, expand our circle. You know.

Email from guy: You seem interesting and cute. Here’s my number, we should get together sometime.

We read his profile. He seems OK. Not that great to warrant an immediate response - their are cooler people we're pursuing. Plus, we’re a little old-fashioned and would have preferred that he ask us for our phone number.

Email from same guy two days later: Why haven’t I heard from you?

What is wrong with people? We haven’t even met Guy (who's apparently crazy) yet and are already having drama. No thanks.

April 5, 2010

SWEATER VEST


Long-term relationship in your 20s = zero dating experience. Imagine our surprise when one day a guy we’d been introduced to in a semi-professional setting flirted with us. Over email. Several back-and-forths ensued before he asked us out for coffee. We accepted.

Met at a coffee shop one afternoon, just a quick break from work. He arrived wearing pleated Dockers, a navy blue sweater vest with a regular blue button up underneath and a royal blue T-shirt poking through. Now, lest you think we’re shallow – some guys can rock the sweater vest. Dads. J. Crew models and those arty-hipster guys. Our Sweater Vest was too dad-ish. And all those different blues...not sexy.

But, the date progressed. Conversation was fine but not memorable. After about a half hour we needed to get back to work and said so. Parting in front of the coffee shop Sweater Vest said “This was fun, we should do it again soon.” And we, not being very good at rejection in general, but certainly not on our first-date said “Talk soon.”

Ten minutes later and just back at work, our phone rings. Should we answer?

“Hi, it’s Sweater Vest.”

“Oh, hi.”

“I just wanted to say that I had a great time and we should do it again soon.”

(Didn’t we just have this conversation?)

“Uh, yeah. Sure. Talk to you later.”

“Bye.”

Ten minutes later – a new email. From Sweater Vest. “Hi, I’m sorry if I freaked you out when I called earlier. Didn’t mean to.  Had a good time though and we should do it again sometime.”

Wow. Don’t respond for awhile but, being the nice people we are, we decide that everyone makes an ass of themselves when dating and we don't want him to be sitting at his desk agonizing.

Email back – “No big deal. It was nice meeting you. Have a good night.”

A few days later, email from Sweater Vest: “Hi, how are you? Interested in getting together for a drink?”

No Sweater Vest, we are not. “Actually, we aren’t really interested in dating right now. Nice to meet you though. See you around.” (OK, we admit it, we need to work on our directness but…we don’t like to hurt people’s feelings.)

The response: “I just want to be friends. So, how about that drink?”

Friends? Yeah right. We don’t respond.

Two weeks later – another email from our favorite Sweater Vest. “Hi, haven’t heard from you in awhile. Did I do something wrong? Are you mad at me?”

This is too much. Sometimes it takes us more than two weeks to respond to people we like, people we have relationships with, people who aren’t complete disasters. We let him sweat this one out. 

April 2, 2010

MAKING OUR OWN LIVES

Being big believers in creating our own reality and tired of the ugly, gray winter weather, Supper Club went with a sunny island theme. We signed up for dessert and made this recipe for carmel corn with salted peanuts with macadamia nuts instead of peanuts (to be more island-y). The result, delicious!


And, it just occurred to us that we could have added coconut to push the tropics even more. Mmmmm...