Good Food, Good Friends, & Well...

So I had another "Secret Dinner Event," this time it was at Dock 9 above Union Market, which just so happened to be across the street from our last dinner event. This event was smaller than most, Whit and I sat next to some cool females. I say they were cool because they watched The Walking Dead, albeit, they were a few seasons behind, but they loved the show. LOL! The drinks were also pretty darn good as well. They had Deep Eddy ruby red flavored vodka and mixed it with club soda and my word it was so delicious. I've never had Deep Eddy vodka before but I'll def be buying some and mixing it the way they did. The chef was from Alabama and his menu was a rendition of what he used to eat as a child, hence the popcorn and hen nuggets.


Menu for the Night.

First course: Cured Cobia with duck liver. I wasn't a fan of the duck liver, it had this lingering after taste, not to mention it was mushy. It's the brown blobs on the plate :/ Everything else was okay though.

Second Course: Jowl Cracklins. This was served with an arugula salad and creme fraiche for the dressing. IDK what the little beady things were on the salad, but it had the texture of caviar/roe, which I'm not a fan of. The cracklins were good though, I dumped them on my salad. The arugula needed something a bit sweeter though like a craisin.

Up close of the cracklins.

Third Course: Corn & Groundnut Puree. This was absolutely delicious. It had mushrooms and boiled peanuts in it. UGH! I just had a flashback, up until this point I was disappointed, but this soup def made up for the other 2 courses.

Fourth Course: Chicken & Dumplings. I made this extra large so you could see everything it came with. Fried hen nuggets, liver dumplings, veloute (the onion), and tomato jam. The hen nuggets were similar to Chic-fil-A's, so you  know they were glorious. By this point, I was actually stuffed. This would have been able to stand on it's on as an entree even without the tomato jam.

 

Fifth Course: Brown butter & sweet cornbread chiffon cake. This came with a bacon praline, popcorn anglaise, and blueberry icee type deal. The cake was a little dry, but all of the components together were good. There was also popcorn in the 1st dish.

The day after this event, my parents (dad & stepmom) came to visit, it was my dad's late birthday/Father's day weekend. We went to the district and did all the tourist site seeing things. I can only take but so much of my parents, so I was happy to see them go Sunday night, but I had a good time with them and my dad was like a big kid the whole time they were there. It was so bad I told my dad "YOU GOT BUS MONEY?!" because he was hollering about wanting to take the tour bus to all of the monuments, mind you by this point we had seen 75% of the monuments. SMH! I had an awesome time though; we went to Bon Chon when we got back, yum yum! Where a homeless in the restaurant was rambling to us, it was an awful experience, because I don't mind giving to homeless, but don't interrupt my family time asking us for money, when I just saw you order a beer. No SIR! Sunday, we went to church, then we went to get Thai food. I wanted them to try different foods and my dad was in food heaven. He loves food as much as me so it was funny to watch how happy he got over it. While everyone sat in the living room after eating, I got to work on my work week meal prepping.

 

 

I made an egg roll stuffed with pesto I made that I needed to finish up, shredded chicken, and mozzarella. I use water on the edges of the egg roll to fold them up.

 

I baked them and VOILA! They were so tasty with the drippings of...

My Zagana. LOL! I made lasagna, but with zucchini instead of pasta and fat free cottage cheese instead of ricotta. I forgot to take a pic before I started packing them in Tupperware, so I had to get a pic after the fact.

My stepmom brought these fresh herbs from her friend's garden for me.

 

So this past weekend I went to dinner with my friend, Kianna, at Casa Oaxaca in Adams Morgan, then we went to U Street for drinks. Casa Oaxaca we had a Gilt voucher for. Unlike other Mexican restaurants they didn't give us free salsa and chips. They gave us 4 small corn tortillas to share among our 2 servings of fajitas blank stare. Also when I asked for salsa, he brought me out a habanero hot sauce. They didn't even have salsa verde. It was just terrible. I had to add salt & pepper to my fajitas which is unlike me, I never have to touch the salt in restaurants. They also wanted to charge us $2 for 4 extra small tortillas. Clearly they're pretty tight on their inventory. What I will say is that I was impressed by their fajitas comings with squash and zucchini, I liked all the veggies. The next day Justyn and I went to the early service, so I slept most of the day after church. Here's a recap of the weekend.

 

Let me give you a little background on this pic. Kianna & I were at Newtown at this point and sitting next to us on our right were a group of masculine lesbians. Now one in particular kept staring and not your average stare, but a weird stare. Like she sat on the couch next to us and would act as if she's looking pass us, but would stare. Then she got up and stared right in our face. It was weird so much that it was flattering. Like she clearly didn't care about her creepish ways. LOL! So she asked us for gum, I gave her a piece and said "well since you got my gum, can you take our pic?" so like men who I'm not interested in I suddenly became a lesbian. So above we have a pic of me and my girlfriend because this is the only way this chic would leave us alone. LOL! She even hit us with the "so do yall want friends? Where are yall friends at?" -_- LOL! If you know me, you  know I'm not sensitive at all to homosexuality, hence why it didn't bother me. I do believe she was jealous of me and my "girlfriend" doe. At least we got a cute pic outta the moment. There was also some Ghanaians who were hitting on us, one wouldn't catch the hint and smushed his way right over onto our couch. deep sigh Then after one asked me of where to go out, I shared with him that I don't really know, but since we were on U Street he was in the perfect location. He then said his name and wanted to give me his number. Now listen, I'm not your "typical light skinned girl" I'm not rude when guys try to hit on me. I'll converse, but soon as they try to make their move, I let them know I'm in a rela, when they're persistent, I give em the blank stare. So this guy says "my name is Justin, how bout you take my number" My response "Oh! My boyfriend's name is Justyn. No thank you". I'm also not the kinda girl that's gonna take a drink from a guy who's trying to hit on me, so I don't lead em on at all. OH! The drinks were buy one, get one, including top shelf :) I also took Uber for the first time, it was a real cool experience, I can def see myself using it again especially since I don't do the whole driving under the influence thing.

Here are chicken drumettes with the Thai basil my stepmom brought me, onion, and a little BBQ sauce. I seasoned it as well.

Fruit jars for my work week.

Homemade biscuits that taste like they're from Popeye's. I would share the recipe with you, but I'm stingy.

 Baked peaches. I baked them just like I do my baked apples. I've shared my process on another blog of how I do the baked apples.

 I took a chance and decided not to put foil on the bottom of my Pyrex. Big mistake. LOL! I cooked these wings Sunday night, here it is Tuesday and I still have the pan soaking. I learned my lesson. These wings were so good, I hope the international grocery store has the Thai basil so I can use it again.

Some simple oven roasted asparagus. Sprayed with pam; seasoned with Black pepper, salt, and paprika. Sidebar: Why is aspargus so pricey?! I paid $3.49/pound for these. I'll just have to start getting it from BJ's when I want some.

 

 





I Don't Want my Identity (Name) Erased After Marriage.

WOMANIST

I get pretty peculiar/am a sticklar about the spelling of Justyn's name. I mean heck, I type it everywhere, so when my friends/family spell his name incorrectly, I'm quick, and I mean QUICK to correct the spelling. Heck! I may have done it to you "Justyn*". Not because I'm trying to be mean, but out of respect for him and also his mother, who took the time to name him. By that same token, when I'm introduced to someone and I either can't hear them speaking or they're name is culturally indicative of their background, I always ask for clarification, no matter how many times it takes for me to pronounce their name correctly. Nothing boils my blood more than people tuning out someone when they're name has too many syllables for their liking and their response is "can I call u B". Wait what? Also, when people introduce themselves by a shortened name, I always ask, "what is your real name?". One, it's culturally responsive to allow someone to be themselves, ethnicity and all, and two, a lot of times they're simply conforming to American standards, so I would like to give them the opportunity to be called by their birth name if they so choose.

IDK about this whole last name change business...
After I become a married woman, I don't know if I want to change my name. I can't say I've ever dreamed of being called Mrs. (His Last). I've loved my name since forever. I enjoy that my initials are beautifully written as TJJ and that people refer to me as TJ (I think it's a cute tomboy-ish thing). I also enjoy the fact that my name is common and "regular", I suppose American-White, so people don't know my race when they see my name. I was told after I was born, I went nameless for a few days until my dad could think of something to name me. The story goes, he found my name in a baby book and liked the meaning "appearance of God" and also liked that it was an ethnically neutral name. The shortened versions of our names actually rhyme, Cliff & Tiff, my mom always says that when I'm talking with her about my dad. I've been TJJ for 25 years so far, and I don't want to change who I am. My name is the very essence of my being, the root, the foundation, people give up so much in marriage (in return for other things, yes), but I don't want to give up my identity. My child, if I have one, will have his last name for sure, I would never deny him that, but I can't promise I'm willing to change my own. I'm not such a stickler that if people accidentally/made an assumption and called me Mrs. His Last, I would correct them, because that could be emasculating to him. But I definitely will punch whomever officiates my wedding if they say "now I present to you Mr. and Mrs. His First Name, His Last name". That just goes to show you how women and our identities disappear in marriage. I'm also not anyone's possession that needs a stamp of "Return to owner" written after my first and middle name. I'm not yours, we are we, we are separate beings who come together and I want to remember that I am an autonomous being.

I read once that the last name change signified...
The father giving away his daughter to a new man, thus making the wife the husband's possession. I have this perverse image of cattle being giving away. I can't say that when my father walks me down the aisle that he's giving me away because I make the decision about who I'm going to marry, not him. It's semi-radical to have thoughts such as this, but I can't make myself do something to appease my husband's pride if it causes me resentment. Maybe my views will change after X number of years of marriage, but as for now, this is what is.