A Puesto Fiesto - Our First Cinco de Mayo in San Diego

I've been so bad about writing lately. The extra bad thing is that I actually have a ton of topics! I've just been really lazy so sorry about that. However, I'm bringing back the World Cup Eating Challenge for the Women's World Cup!!! You can check out some of my favorite posts from last year while you wait for that or you keep reading to see how we spent our Cinco de Mayo!

A few months ago, our friends invited us out to Taco Tuesday at a place called Puesto. They are pretty well known in these parts for having gourmet tacos and their Taco Tuesday prices are amazing for a higher end taco. So when we started seeing fliers around for their Cinco de Mayo / Taco Tuesday party, we were really excited.


With that said, our first stop was obviously the taco booth. The line was long but it was all worth it because it wrapped around to where the chef was preparing the tacos, and I got to spy on how they were made. Some of the Puesto tacos have a grilled melty cheese wrapped around the meat. I was so excited to see how this was made. As readers of this blog know, I love playing around in my kitchen at home and I'm really excited to try to make these myself now that I've seen how it's done.

If you're curious too - they melt a little handful of cheese on the grill and put the meat into that. Then they scrap it up and roll the crispy cheese around the meat. I'm sure it's the kind of thing that looks easier than it is but it's so delicious, I won't mind eating my failure.

Seriously, look at those. The top are carnitas tacos and the bottom are chicken rolled in that amazing crispy cheesey goodness. And yes, all four of those were for me. I probably could have eaten another four as well. They're that good.

Puesto is located in a little pavilion near Seaport Village called "The Headquarters." I never got that name but it turns out it used to be the SDPD's headquarters so while we enjoyed our tacos and beer, we also got to take lots of silly jail pictures.

I think the important take away here is that Dan is just ridiculously taller than I am. 

We also found out one of our favorite San Diego spots, Donut Bar, was going to have a booth. They made special churro donut waffle sandwiches with horchata ice cream filling. Obviously Dan got one. I snuck a bit and it was delicious. I know they were making them on weekends in May. Hopefully, they keep it up all summer so everyone can have a chance to try them!

I probably need to make a post about Donut Bar in general. It's the famous San Diego donut shop that luckily is only a couple of blocks away from our apartment. We are known to stop by a little too frequently.

All in all, we had an amazing Cinco de Mayo Taco Tuesday. In general, San Diegans seemed pretty well behaved and the only person we saw making an ass of himself was this guy:

Recipe: Paleo Sriracha Crab Canapes

I'm a sucker for seafood. I always love to buy crab meat and lobster at the grocery store and then I get home and I'm at a loss for what to make with it. When I recently bought a crab of can meat, I started thinking about a nice little paleo appetizer. I've always thought cucumbers slices made a great alternative to a crostini or filo shell for these kinds of things so I went to work. I figured it would all tie together with a little spice so I whipped up some sriracha mayo to go with it.

This is literally the easiest thing I've ever made and was perfect as a little appetizer for some friends I had over so I'm really excited to share it!

So this recipe has 4 ingredients. The hardest part of it is making the ingredients if you are trying to do strict paleo. Otherwise you just need crab, cucumber, mayo, and sriracha. I decided to make the mayo but I used pre-made sriracha since I have some awesome gluten-free stuff. The only paleo downside to mine is a little bit of sugar but I use sriracha so infrequently that it's never made sense to make my own.

For the mayo, I used the Nom Nom Paleo recipe. This recipe had always alluded me in the past. I could never hand beat the mixture hard enough myself and didn't have an immersion blender. I tried using my Ninja once but the power just broke it and I ended up with an egg vinaigrette. This time I decided to use a hand mixer on the lowest setting and it came out PERFECT. I think this is a more common tool than an immersion blender so I really recommend it.

Next was to the add the sriracha. Nom Nom Paleo has a recipe for that too! If you don't feel like making it though, Organicville is amazing gluten free Sriracha.  For the spicy mayo, you just combine 6 tablespoons of the mayo and 2 tablespoons of Sriracha.

From here on out, it's all super simple. I use about 2/3 of my Sriracha mayo mixture on a can of claw crab meat. The amount of mayo you use is really personal preference. Too little and there won't be that kick, too much and it will be super overdressed. I was aiming for the lighter side at first but it didn't really have enough Sriracha goodness so I added another tablespoon and that was perfect.

I used a mandolin to slice the cucumber slices. You ideal want a little under 1/4 inch thick slices. Too thin and they are kind of papery and won't hold up the crab. Too thick and it will be too much cucumber for crab. I super recommend using a mandolin (and definitely buying one if you don't have one). That's the best way to guarantee perfect slices and it's such a useful cutting tool.

Then all you have to do is plate your canapes. I spoonful on each cucumber is perfect. I served these with a couple of bottles of light acidic white wine and it was awesome. I definitely recommend these as a light appetizer for a summer BBQ.

Paleo Sriracha Crab Canapes

Ingredients:

- Can of crab meat (lump or claw are fine)

- 6 tablespoons paleo mayo

- 2 tablespoon Sriracha (homemade or bought)

- One large English cucumber

1. Mix paleo mayo and gluten free Sriracha to make Sriracha mayo.

2. Mix about 6 tablespoons of Sriracha mayo with crab meat. You can use more or less depending on how much of the Sriracha flavor you want.

3. Thinly slice an English cucumber to about 1/4 inch thick using a Mandolin.

4. Spoon the Sriracha crab onto the canapes.

5. Arrange on a pretty plate and make all of your friends happy by sharing them!

Bonus tips: if you are a Sriracha fiend, an extra drop of Sriracha on each one might pack the extra punch you love also. 

Wine pairing tips: A crisp white wine would go great with this. We enjoyed it with the Bonny Doon Pinot Gris/ Chardonnay which is light and acidic and went perfect with it. Try to avoid an oakey Chardonnay if that's your wine of choice. If you do add the extra Sriracha though, you'll want some sweetness to cut the spice. An off-dry Riesling would be a nice pick.

A Review of a Glass and a Wine: Goverre and Two Shepherds Rosé

Many moons ago, a friend sent over a Kickstarter that she thought would pique my interest. It was for a ceramic wine glass with a seal-able top so that you could fill it with wine, throw it in your purse, and bring a glass with you wherever you went. They also had little silicon sleeves that came in fun colors. Obviously, I Kickstarted for 4 of them in blue and gold.

The first go around didn't get funded and I was so sad because I've successfully backed projects that were terrible and this was truly a great idea. I was so happy when the creators tried again and made their goal. A couple of weeks ago my beautiful glasses came in the mail and I was so excited to try them out.

When I saw the Kickstarter all those months ago, my first thought was that these would be perfect for bringing wine to the pool or beach - places where glass is usually forbidden and you don't want to be bringing a big bottle of wine. So I figured that taking advantage of a beautiful San Diego Sunday and bringing a new bottle of rosé to the pool would be a great way for me to try my new wine glasses and my new wine. 

Goverre Wine Glasses

Goverre Pros

• The glasses are absolutely beautiful. I love my two colors and the design is very chic. It's nice when a functional product looks good also.
• The glasses ended up being bigger than I expected. If the end goal here really is to transport as much wine as possible outside of the bottle, you can realistically put half a bottle in each glass. Trust me, I tried this. Me and two glasses were enough to bring my bottle of rosé to the pool.
• They maintain temperature really well. Since I had brought two glasses, one was laying in the sun with me while the other stayed in my bag in the shade. When I was ready for the second glass, I was pleasantly surprised to find it still slightly chilled. This was after about 1-2 hour outside on a very hot day. Granted, if you were in the sun, it would warm up so this is about care as well but it's still nice that there's some insulation in these glasses.
• Since the goal here is to be able to throw a wine glass in your purse and go play, I wanted to make sure it wouldn't spill. I decided the best way to do this was the Blizzard test. So I held a glass upside down and was happy to report no leaks! 

Goverre Cons

• The lids are extremely difficult to get on and off. The creators sent an email to this regard with some tips on how to loosen them up so it wasn't completely unexpected. It was a little frustrating though to not be able to get the lid anywhere close to on for my blue cups without feeling like I was going to break it from pushing down so hard.
• Even though one cup passed the Blizzard test, the one I didn't test leaked all over my bag. As you can imagine, pink wine isn't ideal for getting all over ones things. It's definitely frustrating that the lids are too tight on some glasses and not tight enough on others.

Summary

These are a really cool idea, and they are super cute. I think there were some issues with the implimintation of them. I'm happy that the makers of the product got ahead of that and emailed out as the glasses were going out, but it's still crappy that there was an issue. All in all, I'd recommend these glasses... after a few more product runs to make sure all the kinks are out. 

Two Shepherds 2014 Grenache Gris Rosé

This wine is one of the newest releases from my good friend, William Allen. I was so anxious to try this wine. In the past, I used to help William at events and get a first look at his new wines but from the other end of the state, I haven't been able to do that. So, of course, I made sure to stock up when wine club orders were due. 

The wine was exactly what I was hoping for on a sunny pool day. It was so light and refreshing it almost felt like drinking cranberry juice. As I mentioned above, I was in the sun so despite chilling the wine beforehand, it did warm up while I was drinking. This didn't take away from the wine at all and it was just as enjoyable chilled as it was at more of a room temperature. 

This wine was definitely another great showing by William and I'm excited to enjoy some of his crisp whites at the pool sometime soon as well.

On a side note though, San Diego weather is not cooperating today and it's really hard to write this post about swimming and sunshine and heat while it's overcast and gloomy outside. San Diego - get with it!!! This is not what we've come to expect from you!

12 Things That Happen When You Move from Northern California to Southern California

It's funny how different two ends of one state can be. Even thought I grew up in Southern California, the ten years in NorCal really made me forget some of the perks and downsides of the SoCal lifestyle. It started dawning on me though, that these differences would make an awesome list!!!

1. You will have bathing suits and towels hanging everywhere

This is actually what started this list. I was trying to hang up my bath towel and I noticed every hook in the bathroom had different bikini pieces hanging from it and the guest bathroom had Dan's swimwear hanging. I was like "this is new." I realized that we've been going to the pool so much that some bathing suit is usually wet and hanging out to dry.

2. Sandals are usually acceptable footwear and more comfortable than you remember

I've always owned lots of sandals but it was never nice enough to walk around in flip flops in SF. I always wore boots or athletic shoes and maybe a dress sandal or heel for something nice. For St. Patrick's Day, I was looking for some shoes to match my spring dress and decided to wear my Rainbows. It felt so weird wearing something so casual and bare to go out but they looked perfect with my outfit and were comfortable. People here are so casual that flip flops are a great option for going out. This goes for shorts too.

3. Tan lines

Dan and I take the dog for walks a lot and generally try to get outside when we can. I usually wear a tank top and sports bra... and I started noticing how awful my tan lines were. I've been trying to go to the pool a bit more to even them out. We went on a big hike the day after though and the tan lines got worse than ever. The only thing worse than the tan lines though? Dan's are darker and stand out more... because he's more tan than I am. My white boyfriend from Ohio is tanner than Brazilian me... how?

4. Nice days in SF are cold days for San Diego

When we first moved here, the days were about 60-65 degrees. It was January so this wasn't anything crazy and was actually kind of like a day in SF. We needed light jackets but it definitely wasn't freezing by any means. Everyone we met told us how sorry they were about the bad weather. The next week it was 80 every day. Generally, its low 70s here but it really does make the 60 degree days feel cold.

5. Public Transit stops being a form of transportation

That's not to say that San Diego doesn't have public transit. There's a train, there are buses, there's light rail. They all look pretty clean too. We just live in a spot where the places that we'd want to transit to (because we are drinking so we wouldn't drive), we can walk to or if it's too far to walk, it's a ten minute drive. It seems like more of a hassle than a convenience and driving is so easy.

6. But it takes less time to drive short distances

I remember our first day here when we made the ceremonial new apartment trip to Target. I looked up the distance and it said "10 miles." In San Francisco, this is forever away. It was a stressful day so I sighed and just didn't want to go even though we badly needed household items... then I looked again and realized it was 10 minutes to go 10 miles. Now that we've been here a few months, it's our little joke - everything (in Central SD at least) is 10 minutes away. It also means (to my brother's disdain) that we are very late to any place further than 10 minutes away.

7. You miss out on Beta ideas from tech companies

A lot of services I subscribe to actually email based on where you live. It's pretty hard to change email lists so I'm constantly getting emails about special deals or promotions or new products for Uber or Lyft or other companies that are only for San Francisco residents. Moving from the center of innovation to a smaller big city definitely means missing out on new breakthroughs until they go a little more mainstream.... although we do seem to be the test market for fitness and nerdy events which is cool.

8. Hipsters are traded in for Beach Bros

I feel like every city has their crowd of people that are extra annoying to deal with. In SF, it's the hipsters who loudly talk about how picky they are about their coffee or how outrageous it was they got a ticket for running a red light on their bike. In SD, they are beach bros. When I'm at the pool, I can hear them from a mile away. They are the ones who ruin the pool for everyone else by doing that kind of destructive behavior that makes the apartment crew check in every 5 minutes and tighten the rules - things like trashing the pool area or blasting terrible music.

9. You accidentally bring your jacket with you on warm nights

I feel like the unspoken rule of living in San Francisco is that no matter how nice the weather is, you always bring a light jacket. Always. In San Diego, if it's a nice day, you are really going to regret bringing a light jacket. You are going to be stuck carrying that thing or maybe forgetting it in a bar. It will just make things terrible for you. Leave the jacket at home. I mean - it's April summer - the weather is perfect!

10. You find plastic bags really confusing. 

In the Bay Area, plastic bags were banned years ago. More recently, stores started charging for any bag in order to encourage people to bring their own. Dan and I were entrenched into this habit so it's always weird to us when people just start bagging our things at the store while we are standing there trying to hand them one of our re-useable bags. It's even weirder to me when I'm just getting 1 or 2 items that I can easily carry or put in my purse, and they instantly bag it. I'm so used to bags not being a thing that it's hard to understand how much they are used here.

There are alsosome stores we've been to where they'll put one item in a bag and then grab a new bag for the next thing and I have to tell them they can put everything in one bag. I'm just really hoping that San Diego outlaws plastic bags soon as well so I can go back to a world I understand.

11. You start shopping at places like Walmart and Target all the time

I couldn't even tell you where Walmart was in the Bay Area. I know I went once in college but I can't remember where it was for the life of me. In San Diego though, since driving is so easy, big box stores are everywhere and we take advantage of it. I recently went to Walmart for the second time in years. You get used to hating them for all the bad press you hear but it is really nice to find everything you need in one place for good prices.

12. .... And you really do need some new stuff

I thought we were set moving in with a boogey board and some beach towels. That's not nearly enough to really have a beach day. We needed chairs and an umbrella and a cooler. We  actually need to stay stocked up on sun screen.

And We Are Back in Business

Well, that was a crazy couple of months. Guys - moving is hard. Let me just repeat that. Moving is really really hard. I kind of thought we would just throw all our stuff in a U-haul, drive down to San Diego, and be unpacked and get settled in a week - immediately having tons of free time for blog posts and cosplay and kitchen experiments. In reality - I think there's STILL a box or two hanging around and we've been here almost 4 months! I'll probably unpack it in November and then we'll decide to change apartments or something.

To add to the madness, a month in I decided that I absolutely could not continue to function without "just going to look at some puppies." We came home with the first one that seemed like she could be a good medium sized puppy that would fit our active lifestyle. Oops.

Aside from just unpacking and getting used to a baby animal in the house, moving is so much more than that. When you get to a new place, especially one as awesome as San Diego, you want to explore. We go out more at night. We've been making friends. We sign up for a lot of events. We are doing a lot. It's always so nice here. My free time isn't spent in front of a computer, it's going on walks, or swimming, or getting some sun at the pool. Finally though, I realized I missed by blog and there are a couple of clouds outside (which is probably as close as we are going to get to good blog writing weather) so it's time to fill you guys in.

One thing that I've loved about this blog is the way it's evolved. It started as My One New Thing a Week - a way for me to get out and explore SF because I wanted to move to San Diego. Ironically, after that I decided I wanted to stay in SF longer - but hey! looks like we made it to San Diego eventually after all. From there, it just became a way to document all kinds of adventures and personal journeys, and then I just wanted to step out of talking about my personal life for a while because I was hurt and a little broken and it was easier to talk about exciting new movies and my favorite books and go into another world. When I came back again, this blog became about all of those things and more. It's a place for my adventures, nerdy interests, recipes, craft ideas - everything.


So I figured all of those branches of what this blog was and is - they are all part of where I want to take it. I want to share with you my recipes and cooking adventures (and trust me, I think all the time about trying to do another cooking challenge), I want to share event and restaurant reviews, and I want this to be a great way for friends near and far to get a good pulse and what's going on with Nikki and Dan in San Diego Ville.

Anyways - we are back! I spent a strenuous afternoon at the pool taking lots of notes on blog posts for you guys so I need to get busy writing and sharing all of our adventures with you!

San Diego So Far

I've been terrible about writing. I know this. I've had excuses but I also know that when you want to write, they don't matter. I also feel like when you want to write, you're a flurry of emotion and the words write themselves. I almost wrote a very personal post... it was the day I met Harley. The day we reserved the dog that we would pick up the next day and would change my life.

There are so many words to follow that last sentence.... what changed about getting a dog? What did I realize would change? Why am I finally writing it now? Why do I need to write out these questions that I know I need to answer?

My original post, the one written on the eve of getting a dog, was written out of fear. It wasn't the first time I'd rushed a dog into a relationship. Dogs are a lot of responsibility, and responsibility has a way of trying things. Those fears dissipated into reality and the reality was having a supportive partner that despite his reason, wanted the same little puppy that I wanted and quickly stepped into the role of amazing dog father.

Harley, our beautiful puppy, has a way of being frustrating and willful but being so smiley and loving and occasionally obedient that you can't really be mad at her. Even when you correct her or put her on time out, she looks at you with such love that you know she isn't holding it against you for training her.

Best Friends!!

You're probably starting to realize that this post isn't about how our move has gone. It's all about how much we love our puppy. I told you that writing comes from emotion. Love is one of them... but so is fear.Today we have to leave our baby. Maybe she's not a real baby but I've hear the painful yelps from when I've left her sight... and I can't imagine a weekend away from her.

When my puppy can't see me, she cries and yells and chases after any other short brunette.... she is going to spend a weekend with a stranger... that I hope she will trust enough. I still worry though. Not in the sitter - she seems amazing. I just feel that there is something behind my puppy's strong and unrelenting attachment.... I just don't want her to feel that we left her forever.

I didn't think my heart would open again so much after Rocco died, but it has and more. As fun as that first month was in San Diego, I knew I needed more. Adopting a puppy was big step, and probably one that kept us more from doing new things than naught. However, having a little puppy to walk and explore with and train... that's opened so much of a world for me.... and I'm going to miss it.... even for a couple of days.

But enough of my moping... let's talk about the fun stuff. Dan and I have noticed we get the same handful of questions about Harley all the time so I thought I'd just address those here...

What Kind of Dog is She?

We really don't know. The rescue place didn't either and told us to send pictures when she's full grown so they could see how she ended up. Her papers say Terrier/Cocker Spaniel. She clearly has zero Spaniel in her though. The only useful information we got was that her mom looked like a Jack Russell Terrier. Based on her face and soft fur, I think her dad might have been some kind of German Shepherd/ Golden Retreiver mix. That makes us think she'll be a medium to large size dog (35-45 lbs) and has a lot of growing ahead of her.

So Much Judgement

How Does She Get Along With the Cat?

...ha. The first day, she was terrified of the cat but that quickly passed. Now she thinks the cat is some weird other puppy and constantly tries to play with her like she would another dog. Sometimes I think Callie likes it... for about 3 seconds and then she starts trying to bat away the dog. Or maybe that's Callie trying to play back. I'm still holding out hope that they will be best friends once Harley works out some of the puppiness.

Is It Hard Having a Dog in an Apartment?

Yes and no. We live at the end of the hallway on the 11th floor so when puppy needs to go out, we have a ways to go before actually getting her out a door and we don't always make it. The apartment itself is great. Aside from a love of my shoes, Harley isn't very destructive so we haven't had much worry about her destroying our things. It's really easy to keep her in whichever room we are in so we can always have eyes on the puppy. She generally really loves being in the apartment too. There have been several walk attempts where she's just pulled us to go back inside. It's nice that she loves her home.

Harley... like Davidson?

No, she's named after Harley Quinn from Batman. Ironically, she perks up whenever a motorcycle or fast car drives by so I think she would disagree with us. Kids - they always do what they want despite their parents intentions.

How Is She So Stinking Cute?

I have no idea. She's painfully cute sometimes. I think she knows it too and uses her cuteness to get away with being naughty. This morning on our walk, she kept sitting or laying down when other dogs were approaching (instead of, you know, walking on our walk) and the other owners said "Wow, she's so well behaved!" moments before Harley would pop up and pounce on their dog. This girl definitely uses her cute to her advantage.

Learning How to do Burpees

That's basically how life with puppy is now. It's nice having a pet that we can go on long walks and hikes with. We take her with us to any pet friendly establishments. A few days ago, she helped us buy shoes. I really love how dog friendly San Diego is. We'd heard that a lot of stores downtown were ok with dogs, but it's still weird taking her into a store and having the associates freak out about how cute she is and wanting to pet her instead of telling us we can't have her inside. Most restaurants give her a bowl of water or a treat and other diners murmur about how cute she is when she's getting into trouble. We love our little foof ball and we are going to miss her this weekend.

2015 New Years Resolutions

One of my favorite serial posts for this blog (and probably the only ones I actually do when I'm supposed to) is my annual resolution post and this is going to be a really special one. I'm not going to lie, I totally punted on last year. I didn't feel really committed to any of my resolutions and the only one I followed was the "Run a 5k" one. Heck, I ran 2 10ks. I killed that goal.

However, once the year got started, my boyfriend and I tossed around the idea of moving to San Diego. We agreed that we would stay in SF for a year, but no longer. Suddenly the really important resolution was just to be present, enjoy the city we live in, and spend time with our friends - but at the end of the day, commit to this move.

In the sense of completing that, I think we did a great job. Obviously there were still times when the comfort of wine on the couch was more appealing than going out, but now that we are on the peak of moving, I feel really good about it. I could sit here for another 10 years thinking of everything I haven't done in the Bay Area but when I look back at my time here, I think I did a good job of taking advantage of the many activities, events, and unique places up here. So I don't really look at this past year as a Resolution fail, but really that shortly into the year, I found a better resolution and nailed it.

But enough about the past - let's get to the future!

Visit at Least Two New Countries - And I know which ones too. I've never been to America's hat or tie and that's just inexcusable. As a future San Diego resident, visiting Mexico should be easy. I'm also signed up for a half marathon in Vancouver which should take care of Canada and my next resolution...

Run a Half Marathon - I know I can walk a half marathon. Heck, I'm pretty sure I could run half of one. I'll be really happy if I can run a whole one. I have 8 months to prepare in a city where weather is not an issue. I can do this.

Fall in Love... With San Diego - I'm not worried about this one at all. Everything I've seen has made me really confident that this will be the easiest item on my list. I do know though, without a big friend base there, it will be really important for Dan and I to push ourselves to explore instead of taking the easy route (although I do plan on exploring our apartments pool area pretty often...).

Find a Community in San Diego - Or more than one... whatever :) I was so lucky to find a great community in UC Berkeley and live so close to my Alma Mater that I was able to really grow that community into a group of really amazing friends. They are no doubt the hardest thing about leaving. They will never be replaced, but I think San Diego will really feel like home when Dan and I can find something like that.

Finish a Big Creative Project - My new 15 foot commute is going to save me many hours a week and I'm excited to take more time for my creative endeavors. I have a couple costumes I want to make and some other top secret things I'm hoping to do. All of them are long term things - like months - so it's a big deal to finish one... or more!!!

Open Up Our Hearts - Losing Rocco was definitely the hardest part of this year. It hasn't been that long and I know it will still be many months that my eyes tear up at the thought of my Love Bug. As much as Callie tries, she's really just not an affectionate pet and Dan and I are very much missing that. When the time is right, we want to give another Cuddle Bug a good home and lots of love.

The Trifecta - Last but not least is definitely the most ambitious on my list. "What could be more impressive than a half marathon and establishing a new community in a new city?"  you ask. The Trifecta is a half marathon.... 10 k.... and 5k... all with obstacles... completed within a year. 2015 seems like a good year for this. I don't know what my future holds but I'm in the best shape I've ever been in and I imagine in a few years I might not be able to dedicate that much time to running through mud and rope climbing. No time like the present!