Messy and Cute, Clean and Cute

My (Chris) birthday was last week. We had a fun time but didn't take a lot of pictures of the actual birthday. Dawnell took me out to eat at a restaurant here in Mamaroneck which just opened up a couple of months ago. The name of the restaurant is Roasted Peppers.

We started with the table side guacamole. Dawnell appreciated that the texture of the fried plantains that were provided in addition to tortilla chips. The restaurant also provided a "pre-appetizer" of grilled bread with a roasted pepper hummus and a pepper infused olive oil. Much as I dislike hominy, I should probably mention that Dawnell dislikes peppers. But she ate up the hummus and loved the bread. For our main dishes I had a skirt steak with a side of black beans and rice and a side of avocado and tomatoes. The dish was delicious and well=seasoned. Dawnell got the lobster mac and cheese with shitake mushrooms. She was in heaven.

Overall, Roasted Peppers was a good choice. It's reasonably priced and high quality American cuisine with some Mexican flavor influences. We'd probably go there again, if only so that I could try the jalepeno brownie with coconut ice cream.

Ciaran got a cute new outfit and was smiling up a storm. He's like a picture voodoo genius though, because he always stops smiling when I take the picture. Maybe he gets hypnotized by the pre-flash on the camera. In any event, still really cute.

Beckett enjoyed my birthday cake quite a bit, which was the aptly named Chocobomb. It appears that a chocobomb blew up on Beckett's face.

Hominy, Kale, and Chorizo Soup

Dawnell went on a spending binge at the local grocery stores the past couple weeks, which should end up saving us money in the long run. She likes to claim that she is only a passable cook, but I'd put her up against Julie and/or Julia any day of the week.

This soup she made is so good that I took pictures of it. It is a Hominy, Kale, and Chorizo Soup. There is also some chicken, onion, and other yummy flavors. The spiciness of the chorizo really infused into the broth perfectly. I'm not even a fan of kale or hominy in general, but the textures of both were a perfect compliment to the proteins in this dish. A wonderfully hearty January meal.

Lots of Catching Up to Do

We've been out of commission since right after Christmas. We've had big computer problems and we still don't quite know what's wrong with the old one but we decided that as our last computer purchase was made about 85 years ago in computer years we should just go ahead and get a new one. Here is a quick run down of what's been going on.


Beckett has become an apiarist.




Ciaran made his first trip into the city for Chris' New Year's kids work party.



Ciaran has started solid foods.



And he likes them. Too bad he can only have cereal--his pediatrician doesn't want him to fill up on all those empty fruit and vegetable calories. He still needs to have lots of calories and fat to catch up so he gets yummy fortified cereals, but I still sneak him in some tastes of other things with the cereal.



Beckett finally got to make a real snowman--you know, the kind you make by actually rolling the snow and that is spherical instead of just a sad, piled up heap.


It worked so well we managed to make our whole family. Can you guess who's who?





We decimated our lawn's snow, but it was well worth it.

Beckett loves his snow Daddy. (Okay that picture was totally posed.)