Some Time Off: Eats and Reads of the Week

So my good friend Mac was taken to the hospital this week.  The trackpad wouldn't click, but I figured I should get it fixed before it's no longer under warranty, no?  So I had some time off.  And with that time off...

I'm finally getting back into books!  I figured I'd get some of my heavier reads under way during the summer, and this week I made some great headway.  I read Life of Pi which I absolutely loved - powerful, yet told with a lilting humor.  I just finished The Kite Runner hours ago, and I can't believe how fast I blew through it.  I'm not usually into historical fiction, but this was too good to pass up.

Quality hammock time right here

In between, I read one of my mother's Goodwill finds, French Women Don't Get Fat: The Secret of Eating for Pleasure.  While it mainly included a lot of common sense, it touted a great importance on simple meals with fresh ingredients.  When the food is high-quality, you won't need as much of it because you won't be psychologically hungry for something else.  It was very inspiring - this school year I'm going to have to make it a point to get my butt to the farmer's markets on the weekends!

It also inspired some simple eats for the week.  The book, when used as a guide for weight loss (not a goal of mine, I just like eating healthy and reading different opinions on how to make that happen), touts a cleanse involving leek soup.  While soup wouldn't be satisfying enough for me, this leek and goat cheese omelette certainly was!  I used two eggs, one leek, and a handful of blue cheese since we had some leftover.  Simple, fresh, and delicious.

Leek prep - this photo doesn't do the sunlight justice

Also apparently I can't flip an omelette to save my life

Leftover from this pizza that is!  I use a whole wheat version of this pizza dough, and topped it with my father's famous tomato sauce, fresh tomato slices from the garden, a fresh egg of mozzarella cheese, blue cheese, artichokes, parmesan, romano, and fresh oregano and basil from the garden.  So delicious!

This was devoured immediately

Also on sale at the grocery was cherries and blueberries, and being in the mood for French food I figured it was time to try my hand at clafoutis!  I halved this blueberry recipe but I substituted half of the blueberries for cherries and substituted whole wheat flour for white.  I even ground up pecans and used it as a topping, though I felt it almost made it more savory and next time I would use walnuts or almonds for a lighter taste.  Anyway, then I topped it with B&J's Vanilla Honey Caramel Greek Frozen Yogurt and dug in!

Look at those fresh berries!

Part cake, part custard, part love

That's all for this week.  I'd have posted more regularly but I just didn't have that much to say.  I'll try to keep up and also to be a bit more upbeat hehe.