Do YOU know how to enjoy dumplings?

For the next few days, I’m playing babysitter to my 9-year-old cousin. After ballet class, a trip to the mall, lots of the Disney Channel, and a few games of spit, my aunt treated me to dinner at Din Tai Fung, a dumpling house in Arcadia on Monday night. I hadn’t realized that a dumpling house could be so popular, but my aunt was sighing with relief when we were able to find parking because of the weekday.

My Place Setting (with ginger/vinegar to the left)

When you enter, you come in facing a window looking into the kitchen. There I saw a circle of 5 men forming these dumplings one by one, all by hand! I stared at them for a good 10 minutes studying their techniques. (I’m sure I looked super creepy.) While looking through the menu, the child in me couldn’t help but giggle at the fact that the word “Juicy” prefixed many of the dumplings on the menu. Come on… Juicy Dumplings! JUICY DUMPLINGS. HOW JUICY CAN DUMPLINGS REALLY BE?!  HA. okay.. whatever… I thought it was funny.

More After the Hop!

hey, party people!

whoa whoa whoa, have I abandoned the wordpress world? might have seen like it, but I could never do such a thing! I know I was technically only supposed to be gone for “a few weeks,” but that quickly turned into a couple months. But all for good reason.

Since I left, a number of super cool things have been a-happenin’:

1. took my GRE!
2. got my scores back!
3. been interning for a sound studio!
4. worked on set for a commercial!
5. job hunting!
6. interviews! (some bad! some amazingly wonderful! and so many fingers crossed!)
7. I TURNED 23!
8. i made cakes!
9. i made cupcakes!
10. I MADE YUMMIES.

I promised myself that I would finally get crackin’ and get back to this precious little gem after my birthday, and here I am! I hope to work on my last set of photos soon, so I can be back to posting regularly (ahem, I mean start posting regularly!) asap! (maybe by tomorrow!)

this little pause from the wordpress has given me time to figure out what I want to do with it. I didn’t want to just half-ass it as I had been doing in the past, so I’m trying to really be proactive about it, and I have a few plans! lots of thinking and reflecting while laying in bed in the wee hours of the morning! I have a clearer idea, and I am really excited, so yay!

let’s goooo!

oy!

as i’ve said before, i seem to be full of excuses. and here i am, still full of them.

i’ve decided that i’m horrible with setting time frames with my blog. particularly when i’m a broke post-college grad studying for the GRE. i have made a few concoctions, but i simply haven’t had time to post about them, much less take photos of all of them. once i’m free from this ball-and-chain GRE in a few weeks, i’ll collect my baked goods and share them with the web. and I’ll try my best to not be so horrible with posting regularly!

but seriously, BRB. i’ll be living in my books for a bit. thanks for dealing with me, haha. ;D

jars? cakes? YES.

just bumped into this blog, and I am currently itching to try it out! maybe i’ll try it out this week?

just worried about all of the food coloring– would it affect the taste?

Chicken Shawarma and White Bean Salad

If you’re a good friend of mine, you probably have some idea that I am absolutely smitten with Mediterranean food (even though I can never spell “mediterranean” correctly.) If you mention Gyro, Chicken Shawarma, Pita, Falafel, Tzatziki, Tahini, and Hummus, and I am immediately ON BOARD. While at Berkeley, I was obsessed with this one Mediterranean place in Berkeley– seriously OBSESSED. There were times where I would head over for lunch for 3-4 days in a row! I even got my really good friend Angelo and my roommates addicted to it as well. and JP, being the wonderful Lebanese man he is, was just as in love as I was! It’s an overall good time when you’re sitting with amazing friends eating falafel and hummus! mmm!

summertime, and the livin’ is easy.

Lenguas de Gatos

Again, again, many apologies for being super lazy about posting for the past two weeks. In the flurry of family get-togethers that seem to happen every weekend, evening strolls downtown and bike rides down the bike path (first time I’ve done it!), I got caught up in the summer. On top of that, I also have the GREs coming in the fall, so I have been (truth: SHOULD BE) burying my nose in the books.