Musical musings for February

I hope you didn't think I had forgotten about this month's musical musings. I definitely had not, I just almost ran out of time to squeeze it in on here. I am honestly not sure when or if anything other than country music will appear in my purchased folder, but I am completely okay with this. I managed to buy quite a few songs this month, both new and old artists as well as Lady Antebellum's complete album. This was all courtesy of a gift card I got from some friends for my birthday. I will really be listening to a lot of Lady Antebellum's music in the next week and a half, as I get ready to go their concert on March 10th. Speaking of concerts, my housemate/fellow country music lover and I managed to score tickets for the much-coveted Luke Bryan concert in May. I have seriously never had a concert be so hard to purchase tickets for. The successful purchase really has to be credited to another friend who managed to get two tickets side by side by selecting one ticket in two different browsers. Yes this is the lengths I will go to sometimes and just shows what awesome friends I have. So without any further ado, the music now in my iTunes library is:

1. Golden (complete album) - Lady Antebellum
2. Ain't Worth the Whiskey - Cole Swindell
3. Lookin' For That Girl - Tim McGraw
4. This Is How We Roll (feat. Luke Bryan) - Florida Georgia Line
5. Grew up in a Country Song - Jordan McIntosh
6. We Are Tonight - Billy Currington
7. Up All Night - Jon Pardi
8. Carolina - Parmalee
9. Jumped Right In - Dallas Smith
10. Southern Girl - Tim McGraw
11. The Blues Have Blown Away (feat. Connie Britton & Lennon & Maisy) - Nashville Cast
12. Don't Put Dirt On My Grave Just Yet (feat. Hayden Panettiere) - Nashville Cast
13. You'll Think Of Me - Keith Urban

February's musical musings can be found on these albums (images courtesy of iTunes)

Curling

I am not sure if anyone got struck down with a case of Olympic fever recently, but I personally managed to watch some of the action. Although, I honestly wish I had watched more because I think it is awesome to see what some people are capable of achieving, plus I get incredibly patriotic. In the aftermath of the Olympics, I coincidently was able to try my hand at curling via a Groupon offer with a bunch of friends, who like me were all newbies. After a quick 101 from an instructor at the Richmond Curling Club, we were split into two teams and pretty much left to do our own thing. What followed was an entertaining hour and a half as we all tried our hand at being the skip, the sweeper and the curler. My efforts were questionable, but I managed to contribute a point to the winning team's final score. It was a really fun afternoon spent in great company even if I did come away with a bit of a bruised knee probably due to my ill-formed technique. Two hours over in the blink of an eye and with them a winter sport tried whilst snow fell outside, one I definitely will do again.

Cake and cookies come together

During my time in Vancouver, I've been lucky enough to have some great people become a part of my life. One such person has allowed me to not only become a friend, but also a part of her family. We celebrated her baby shower last Sunday and I was honoured to be able to assist in the preparation. This of course meant some baking amongst other things. I was charged with making mini cupcakes so I decided on a funfetti cupcake using the recipe found here, topped with a mini sugar cookie courtesy of this recipe. I baked the cupcakes using vanilla yoghurt and regular milk where choice was necessary. I managed to make fifty-one mini cupcakes using just a single recipe batch and found I needed to bake them for 11 - 12 minutes. For the frosting, I did my usual experimentation in combining icing sugar, butter, vanilla essence, milk and pink colouring to tint for a buttercream variety. For the sugar cookies, I did not add any almond extract, but otherwise followed the recipe as written. I did however make the mistake of adding pink colouring to tint at the end instead of before the dry ingredients. This is why the cookies turned out more tie dyed than actual pink, but cute teddies and feet nonetheless.

I was also responsible for this guy (courtesy of a recipe provided to me) sans the eyes and his ducky friends, which were all done by the guest of honour's best friend and amazing chief baby shower organiser:

What I am most proud of was the candy bar that I got to source and create. Who would have thought that pink candy wouldn't be so accessible, but I had a lot of fun scouring the stores for it and doing a few visits to Party City. I cannot take credit for the tablecloth, white owl, the main candy bar sign or the cookies you can spy. However, the rest was all me with a sprinkling of assistance in set-up from the guest of honour's two adorable nieces.

It was such a lovely shower that took a well-led army to create and pack up, but it was definitely worth every minute of it. We all cannot wait to meet this baby girl!

Online shopping

A few weeks ago, I feel like I had an online shopping bender, well by my standards anyway because I really don't do it as much as I could. It was just a regular weeknight and I was doing some of my usual Internet browsing while watching something on TV. Before I knew it I had gotten it into my head that I needed to purchase a few of my favourite things from some of my favourite stores. Although to be fair, I was out of Jurlique rose hand cream, my absolute favourite as mentioned here. It was out of stock when I last ducked into Sephora so I ordered it from their website instead. This is really the only purchase I can justify as I really didn't need more new bras from BrasnThings, my absolute favourite store for this, which happens to be Australian with reasonable shipping costs, fast delivery and great sales. Lastly, I hopped over to American Eagle so I could peruse and hopefully utilise a 25% off code in combination with a gift card I had gotten at Christmas time. I bought a cute top and two pairs of printed leggings, which is something I had been wanting for a while, but could not find any I really liked. I have to say the American Eagle purchases were the ones I was most worried about as I wasn't sure of the fit or if the legging material would be what I was looking for. However, with each package arrival this past week it felt like it was still my birthday and I am happy to report that everything I ordered was just as awesome as it looked online especially the leggings. This just goes to show you that shopping in your pjs in front of the TV can be fun and rewarding, but maybe not for your bank balance.  

Birthday moments

As the snow falls outside and makes no attempt to stick, I can happily reflect that I think life is pretty good at the moment. Even the fact that I have been thirty one now for almost two weeks doesn't phase me too much because I would like to think being another year older isn't a bad thing. Instead, it just makes me re-assess my priorities and realise what is most important to me right now and in the coming months. I had a great birthday and for the occasion itself, I spent it with amazing friends having a delicious steak dinner, seeing a show and enjoying a quick hotel stay. We saw West Side Story, which was a great performance for a show that doesn't leave you feeling all warm and fuzzy at the end of it. It even snowed during the few minutes it took to walk from the theatre to the hotel. I have to say this was very cool as my birthday is during the summertime back home in Australia so snow is definitely not a factor. I also got showered with birthday love at work, the Friday before, in the form of a very cool ice-cream cake featuring an edible photo of Jake Owen. My work desk looked like birthday had thrown up on it. Plus, all the cards and presents I received in the mail made me feel very loved knowing that I was being thought of by loved ones so far away. So another year older and hopefully somewhat wiser, but definitely with a lot of fun had along the way.

Pecan pie

Baking a pie from scratch has been on my to do list for quite some time now and a Super Bowl viewing party this past weekend seemed like the perfect opportunity to try to whip one up. I decided to go with pecan pie, not knowing if I was being really ambitious or overly cautious with my choice. I definitely wanted to make the piecrust from scratch as well as the filling. With these two things in mind, I searched online for a recipe to use. I ended up picking a recipe for the crust and another one for the filling. I actually found the filling recipe first and liked the simplicity of it, which is why I didn't use the other one in its entirety. I followed the crust recipe to the letter using my food processor for part of the process as suggested. I definitely feel like I can improve with a few of the steps especially rolling out the dough and putting it in the pie tin. The filling was pretty straightforward and I baked it in the slightly cooled crust for approximately forty minutes at 350 degrees.

I was pretty nervous about the finished product because it didn't quite look how I expected, especially as the pecans seemed to have sunk to the bottom of the pie. The success of this baking attempt was really going to boil down to the taste, which obviously couldn't happen until the first slice was cut. Thankfully, it tasted delicious and was a big hit with the crowd. 

To top it all off, the Seahawks played a great game and went on to take the championship, which made me pretty happy as their neighbour up north. 

Baking and party supplies

Tomorrow is Super Bowl Sunday and I will definitely be watching along with the masses. For this big sporting event I plan on whipping up a batch of s'mores cookies, first made here. However, I also have a new recipe I hope to successfully bake later tonight so stayed tuned for the post about that one within the next few days. Although, I haven't been baking the past few weeks, this hasn't stopped me from perusing the baking aisles and supply stores. The last few days have seen me pick up some new supplies to add to my array of existing ones. At this rate I either need to bake more or stop buying. I think I will take the former, of course. Below are the latest additions from Homesense and Ming Wo, some with a purpose and others just because I could:

Whilst we are on the topic of supplies, I discovered the most amazing party supply store in North Vancouver called Party City. It pretty much has everything you could possibly want or need when it comes to having a party. I could have spent hours in there and almost feel like I did. It was full of a variety of themes, colours and costumes. It makes me want to have or attend a party just so I have an excuse to go back.

I believe they have locations all over Canada and the United States so check them out - you won't be disappointed. I guess I better sign off because cookies and that other thing won't bake themselves.

Dine Out Vancouver 2014

For a few weeks around the end of January each year the Dine Out Vancouver Festival is held. This means you get to dig into a reasonably priced, yet delicious three-course menu at one of many participating restaurants. The meal (sans drinks, tax and tip) will set you back $18, $28 or $38 depending on where you dine. Last year was the first time I ate at a restaurant during this time and I really enjoyed it. Therefore, I was really looking forward to trying at least one new restaurant this year. We ended up doing two 'Dine Outs' with one toward the beginning of the festival and the other one last night. The first one was an $18 menu at Maria's Taverna, a Greek restaurant. I was really excited to try this restaurant as my dad is from Greece so it always feels really nostalgic for me to go to a Greek restaurant. For the appetizer, I had Avegolemono; a light chicken egg lemon soup with orzo pasta. This is a soup that my mum has made many times so I was really intrigued to try it in a restaurant. I wasn't disappointed at all by it. For the entree, I had chicken souvlaki, which was served with rice, roast potatoes and some Greek salad. The meal was finished off with the perfect portion size of baklava; nuts and honey wrapped in a filo pastry. I have to say that the appetizer was definitely my favourite dish of the meal. I look forward to dining at this restaurant again.

Last night we dined out at Hub Restaurant with a $28 menu. For the appetizer, I had a Caesar salad, which was so yummy that I forgot to take a photo of it. Next up for the entree, was a prime rib dinner complete with mashed potato, vegetables (I tried a brussel sprout for the first time and survived) and a Yorkshire pudding. 

Dessert was a sharing dish consisting of a freshly baked chocolate chip cake-like cookie and vanilla gelato. By the time we got to dessert I was definitely glad to be sharing it.

I'm looking forward to what 2015's festival will include, but until then I will continue to try new restaurants whilst occasionally returning to old favourites.