Hiking with Marmu

I had been itching to hike, even the weather's been a bit warm. It's been a while and I had a little time today so Marmu and I headed out to the Ernie Maxwell trail for 1 1/2 hrs.

The flowers were blooming, they were pretty. I didn't care for the bees buzzing around though. I thought to myself, if the kids were with me, they'd be freakin' out now!

"Twas a beautiful day and we had the trail all to ourselves.

Ben & Jerry's Cappucino Ice Cream Clone

Those Ben & Jerry's ice creams are really good but just too small for the price. So I've been looking at Ben & Jerry's clone recipes. Found one for Cappucino ice cream. I was surprised to see cinnamon as one of the ingredients (a whole tablespoon!) but decided to follow the recipe as-is. The cinnamon taste was pretty strong, kinda took away from the coffee flavor. But it's one of those that was good in it's own way. Sure, a little disappointing if you're looking for a COFFEE ice cream, but if you're just looking for GOOD ice cream, this one's a winner (unless you HATE cinnamon ^_^).

Mango Ice Cream

I like recipes that are simple to make but still have delicious results. Here's one: mango ice cream. 2 lg. mangoes, 1 c. cream, and 4-6 T. sugar (depending on how ripe your mangoes are), blend them all together in a blender and put in your ice cream maker. Mangoes sorbets are good too, but I only had 2 mangoes on hand, and I wanted the "creamy-ness". The only thing was that it was a little hard. So I zapped in the microwave a little bit. I've seen other similiar recipes that incorporated egg whites. That probably would of helped.

Ferns with My Folks

My parents came up yesterday for a little visit. Knowing it's fern time, we headed to Fuller Mill Creek to see if we'd get lucky.

And we did! Perfect timing, they were just starting to shoot out and there were no traces to other pickers before us.
That's my dad counting the rings on the tree... 150 yrs old!

We got Marmu to hop on to some boulders.

Abby got into the picking thing. So her and my mom did most of the work.

I think they liked Marmu. Can you tell? ^_^

Idyllwild Spring Challenge 2009

Headed out to Hurkey Creek for the Idyllwild Spring Challenge, a first bike race for me and a second one for Emi. She raced the 7-mile last year and wanted to try the 9.5-mile this year so we raced that together. It had been fun, going out riding with her to train, even those times when we got lost. I think it brought us closer.
Raceday...it was very windy, shirts flying around everywhere. So windy our new EZ-up even broke, and we had so many rocks on the shirts keeping them in place. But I was really glad it didn't rain, as was predicted. That would of been miserable.
At the start line. A sight I thought I'd never see.

Emi (on the left) coming in to finish.

Abby participated in the kids race.

Awards ceremony for the kids. They all got a cool wooden medal.

Mr. Brown Shugga

Emi took first place, although she's eleven she raced in the 15-18 year old category so she could do the longer course. There was one other 15-yr old girl racing against her but she had a meltdown and didn't finish. That really says a lot about how tough Emi is. Like her socks?

2nd place for me, only 2 minutes behind the winner, and on a singlespeed so I think I did pretty darn good. ^_^

Pretty cool trophies.

Spring Challenge Line-Up

This Saturday's the Idyllwild Spring Challenge, Emi and I will be racing and David'll run the shirt booth. It's an interesting role-reversal. So he'll hang out and drink some beers while we ride, possibly in the rain. I've been really busy and so we're using some of our old designs.

Bikeman. Womens in Heather Cinnamon, Mens in Military Green. I think this shirt will always be one in the mix.
Shoulder bag with the Pennyfarther design.

A new one, "Bike Nerd" this one's for the guys, baby blue ink on dk. chocolate shirt.

For the ladies...baby blue on navy blue shirt.



And the Penny's are back again. This time Heather Grey for the women, and Charcoal for the guys.

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In addition, we'll bring along shirts from the past booths. This one's a somewhat small race, I think the one in June at Big Bear will be the one we'll have a little more variety, maybe even pins and magnets?

Daring Bakers-April 2009- Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.
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I was pretty happy with making cheesecake this month. Usually it's a cake someone in the family chooses as their birthday cake, but it had been a while since I've made it. It's one of those cakes that is fairly simple to make, yet heavenly delicious. Cheesecake is like ice cream to me, simple is best so I decided to leave it plain. If it's good, leave it alone.
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Usually these baking challenges are enjoyed only by the family. This time there was company so I was able to share them with friends. This cheesecake tastes very similar to my go-to NY Cheesecake recipe, expect this one is baked in a waterbath so I couldn't use my springform pan. Oh, and this one had four times more heavy cream in it, so it was VERY CREEEEEAMY! Oh yeah, it was good! And it didn't last too long. ^_^
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Check out the recipe here.

Unexpected Turn of Events

Funny how there are these unexpected turns in life that brings you to a place you'd never expect you'd be. For me, it has been mtn. biking. About 12 years ago, I was in a mtn. bike accident, going downhill my bike slipped and I hit my head on a rock which cracked my helmet and left me unconscious. For nearly a decade after that, I didn't ride a bike except to ride to the bathroom and back at David's bike races. I was just terrified to ride a bike. And now, I'm in training to race my first bike race, the Idyllwild Spring Challenge. Racing is the last thing I thought I'd be doing. Being a newbie, I'll stick to a short course, 9.5 miles, but I'll be racing alongside Emi, who's raced the 7-mile course last year. We pre-rode the shorter course today, and we had a lot of fun. We just cruised and didn't worry about going fast. And to David's pleasure, I'll be rockin' a singlespeed. Now, how this did happen?

Creamy Pesto Chicken Pasta

Our families enjoys pasta. But it 99% of the times it's the same ol' spaghetti with marinara sauce. Don't get me wrong, we still enjoy it very much but I just wanted to try something different. Creamy sauces like alfredo are usually too rich and heavy. But this one came out pretty good. Found the recipe from Allrecipes.com, made a couple changes like adding more garlic and pesto, and throwing in some zucchini, but for the most part stuck to the recipe. It was flavorful and not heavy at all. A keeper recipe.

Dynamite (BANG!)

My dad used to be a sushi chef so he taught me how to make Dynamite, those rich mayonaise sauce topped seafood. I used some sliced octopus, salmon, kanikama (imitation crab) and mushrooms but anything you enjoy will work fine. Instead of making individual portions, I just made a big one in an 8x8 brownie pan.

The mayo sauce is quite simple, mainly minced or crushed garlic and mayonaise. Often times they put in masago (smelt roe) and since that isn't something most people have in their fridge, this one is optional. I just happen to have some in the freezer that needed to be used. Spread it over the top...

And bake. I used my toaster oven. This dish is very rich, almost too rich for me, so I don't cook this too often. This same sauce tastes great on green mussels, sliced boiled potatoes, or in mushroom caps. Adding cilantro to the mayo sauce gives it that "fresh" taste, and my dad even adds miso sometimes. This is a good base that has endless possibilities.