ROC - Nostalgia

Graduation is approaching quickly. T-minus 12 days until we all leave this school and go our separate ways. These next few weeks are nostalgia central as we start doing things for the last time with people we wont see on a daily/weekly status. Life is getting heavy. 

Thursday was a good day. It was sunny, and beautiful out and things were good. I ran some errands around campus and ended up getting lunch with two of my friends here. We all are so busy but somehow managed to take a couple hours to spend together running around campus. We ended up getting lunch at one of the little side cafe kinda places in one of the newer academic buildings. Me and one of my friends were craving rice bowls and smoothies so it was a perfect decision. 

I got the florence which is a (white) rice bowl with pesto, tomatoes, spinach, roasted red peppers, cheese, and chicken. Beautiful. This was actually my first rice bowl but it was so good,  need to go get a few more before the school year is up. 

We sat on the roof of our building, enjoying the food, the sun, and each other. It's scary that things won't ever be like this again. That we won't ever be this geographically close to each other anymore. 

Here's to the stupid, good, dumb times. Let's never forget it. 

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Dessert weeks in class continue and Tuesday I made a Pineapple Upside Down Cake!! Of course this was the day that I was going to take my time getting to class because it was so beautiful out and It was just a happy feeling morning. And as I walk into the classroom 75% of the class is baking and I'm just derping around. So smooth. 

So I jumped right in, got my chef coat on, and looked at the sign up sheet for recipes. I'm so happy (and lucky) that no one picked the pineapple. Of course mine was one of two recipes that didn't require me to make a frosting (but now I still don't know how to make frosting so that the consistency comes out right..oops..).

Anyhow, I was super psyched about the cake. I still don't know why no one picked it because it turned out great and was super easy to make! melted 4 tablespoons of butter in the baking pan but putting it in the 350degree oven for a few minutes. Once the butter melted, I took the pan out of the oven, and took a can of those pineapple rings and put the pineapple on the bottom of the8x8  pan (about 5 rings fit). Then I put maraschino cherries in the center of each of the pineapple rings and put little canned mandarin oranges in the spaces between the rings to fill in the square. I packed 2/3 of a cup of (light) brown sugar on top of everything to make an even layer, so far so good!  

Next goes the single layer of yellow cake batter. I took 7/8 of a cup of sifted flour and then sifted in a teaspoon of baking powder and 1/4tsp of salt. Now the recipe said to resift but I was a rebel and didn't.. my cake might have lifted a little more if I had though... Anyways, next in the mixer I threw in 3 tablespoons of shortening and then slowly added in 1/2 cup of sugar so that it was incorporated well and started to cream together. I added one egg to the mixer and beat it for a minute or so, to make it light and fluffy. After that I added about a third of a cup of the flour mixture and I lightly folded it into the egg mixture with a wooden spoon. I was trying to make sure not to over mix it which I tend to do, which makes my cakes dense.. whoop! After the flour mixture I added in about half of my milk (half of a 1/3 of a cup). I folded it in to the mixture in about 8 strokes, then added another 1/3 of a cup of flour. I lightly folded it in again until ti was incorporated, added the rest of the milk, then threw in the last bit of the flour. The key that I was remembering was that my professor told us that lumps are okay. The cake is gonna bake out and smooth over so as long as it's relatively mixed it's going to be alright. Over mixing is a cake killer so don't do it! 

I baked it at 350 for about 40 minutes then took it out. I was a little afraid so I let it cook for 10 or so minutes and then had my teacher flip it over. It was a success! Maybe a little sweet but everyone that tried it said it tasted great so mission accomplished! 

ROC - Bar Pizza

I've been craving pizza like crazy lately but healthy Emily keeps fighting the urge to. Until this week! Monday class was a rough night so a few of my friends and I decided to go to the bar nearby and get a drink and some food. Because two and a half weeks left of undergrad means let's just do work and not eat all day. Classic college.

Well, we all got drinks and when it came time to order food, I recalled that one of my friends mentioned that the buffalo chicken pizza at this bar is really good. Of course this meant that I had to order it because it's a Monday night and we're at a bar drinking because class was just awful and being healthy doesn't matter so pizza. 

This pizza ended up being really good. It was a blue cheese topped pizza with crispy chicken pieces on top and a hint of buffalo sauce that was just the right amount. Solid. It totally hit my craving perfectly and I was super happy by the end of the night. Monday just redeemed itself. 

ROC - Tap and Mallet

For one of my roomie's 22nd birthdays we went to a place here in Rochester called Tap and Mallet. It's a super cute, kinda rustic feeling place. It's the second time I've been there and the first was great. They have amazing fish fry there. 

This time around I ordered the Shrimp Po Boy with a side of fries. I'm addicted to the french fries here. They're perfectly seasoned and a good cut. Yum!  

The po boy was not what I was expecting. It was pretty sizable but the bread was nothing special. Just your average french roll. The popcorn shrimp was also not expected but it was pretty good. 

Overall, the sandwich was alright. There was a sort of chili aioli that was great but I wouldn't order the sandwich again. The fries however, I would go back for. And the fish fry.. I would just order the fish fry again...   

Vermonster Time of the Year

That's right! It was that time of the year again! Annual new e-board/old e-board Vermonster night. Turns out most of new e-board is made up of old e-board minus me and PR because the two of us are leaving. So we obtained 1 new person for now and secretary will be secretary/treasurer for next year. This means theres 6 of us in both e-boards. But old PR got sick the night of the Vermonster so there was 5 of us to eat this thing. Challenge kind of accepted skeptically. 

5 people, 20 scoops of Ice Cream, 4 toppings, chocolate chip cookies, a brownie, hot fudge, and whipped cream like crazy. 

Let's just say.. we tried. And even though there was only 5 of us I think we did pretty well!  

We managed to avoid another chunky monkey fiasco and nixed it this year. We did have some debate over my strawberry cheesecake as well as the coffee and the mint chocolate chip but in the end it was all pretty good. I think if PR wasn't sick we actually might've been able to finish it this time around! 

This is as far as we got after about 45 minutes which I think is pretty good. Also, no pizza this year... but I think it was alright without it.