ROC - Eating Day!!

Today was Reading Day! (Aka 'eating day') for my club's e-board. Last semester we started the tradition of turning the day before finals that's supposed to be for studying and instead make the night eating day! Last semester in a span of about 4 hours we went to Taco Bell, Very Berry Frozen Yogurt (where I work), and then ordered from Zonies (aka Calios) - Rounding out the night watching High School Musical. We're obviously the best e-board. 

This semester was very similar. Tonight, in that 4 hour span, we went to DogTown, Insomnia Cookies, and watched High School Musical 2 in the apartment movie theater. So. much. fun. We may not have eaten as much but we still had a blast and that's all that matters. 

DogTown is a Rochester restaurant that serves specialty hotdogs named after dog breeds. I ordered the Golden Retriever with loaded french fries. The Golden Retriever is a hot dog on a toasted bun in between a blanket of bacon covered in melted cheddar cheese. The Fries are covered in melted cheddar and DogTown sauce aka 'Cincinnati Chili'. Alright! It was really good. I probably should't have ordered the fries because with all the melted cheese and fast food I could feel my sodium levels rising. Worth it. This was actually the first tim I ordered a dog at DogTown. Usually I get a garbage plate or the fries but I've been meaning to try a dog and man was it worth it. Salty, but delicious!

Insomnia cookies is a chain of late night cookie joints so nothing insane but sure is convenient when you want a cookie at 2am. Not that I've gone that late but I've gotten a little closer before. Today I got my favorite chocolate mint cookie, white chocolate macadamia, and they didn't have my M&M cookies so I got a snickerdoodle but those things are incredible so I'm not even a little sad. 

All and all my last eating day was a success! Also, this blog as finally caught up with my life in real time! So from now on I won't have food posts every single day (darn!) but I will update whenever I go somewhere new to eat. Hopefully, here's to a good summer of a lot of new food!      

ROC - Festival Season!!

Summers in Rochester is the best time to be around because that means it's festival season! Every couple of weeks another festival rolls around bringing copious amounts of - you guessed it! - festival food! Now I know summer is swimsuit season and it does get pretty hot which makes my appetite go away a little because who wants to eat some much food when its hot and sweaty out. Eh. 

But this is the first festival of the year and my favorite - The lilac festival. I've been going to this festival almost every year since I can remember and growing up my mom's favorite snack to get us was the kettle cooked popcorn. These bags were huge and the salty/sweet combo of freshly made kettle corn in a giant kettle right in front of you was the best thing of the summer. However, starting in high school I started this deal of getting deep fried oreos with my friends instead. It stuck. 

So, of course this year I had to get it again - my first trip in. I happened to go with this guy who had never had them before so believe me - I was on a mission. He was a good sport about it too and even bought them for me (score!). 

It was at least 85 degrees, super sunny, and a little gross but it didn't matter. I still waited in line in the sun for 10ish minutes for these guys. And they were worth it. Soft and sweet on the inside and the great funnel cake kinda dough on the outside. Just one bite and you're covered in powdered sugar but it doesn't even matter because you're just warm and happy inside. One order is plenty to share for me, and I definitely make sure I don't get them every often because there's no way these things are good for you but that's okay too because sometimes you just need a bite of happiness.

I can eat healthy tomorrow.   

ROC - Poutine

For being a pretty small city, we have some really good food trucks around. Now that it's summer we'll have the food truck rodeo and for those of you who aren't familiar with it - it'll be a future post to come for sure. 

But one of my all time favorite food trucks in Rochester is the poutine truck. Poutine is a Canadian thing apparently - and thank Canada for that! I'm a potato addict as we know so this is the perfect meal for me. French fries covered in gravy and topped with cheese curds and some herbs on top. It makes my mouth water. 

I like the small size because it leaves room for me to try more trucks but sometimes I splurge and get a regular for the bacon order. Mmmmmm bacon! 

Poutine will never stop being amazing. And this truck will always hold a big place in my heart. 

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!