SD Favorites

In San Diego, during the holidays, it's always nice to drive by the San Diego Temple and see the beautiful light displays there. Plus this is my favorite temple. And the most beautiful (my opinion, I know). It's where Mr X and I got married so I'm very partial to this temple. Here are some photos of it in all of it's holiday glory:

And on a completed different note - I've told you before that every time I'm in San Diego I HAVE to stop by the Blue Market Grill for fish tacos. Hands down the best fish tacos I have ever had. This particular trip was long enough that I was able to eat here several times. 

This trip I had the grilled Jumbo Shrimp taco (my favorite), the beer battered lobster taco (now my second favorite), and a grilled scallop taco (probably fourth favorite, after the halibut taco). These are SO GOOD people! My mouth is watering right now just thinking about them. And no, I'm not getting paid to say these things, unfortunately. Nor am I getting any free tacos. Also unfortunate.

Beer Battered Lobster Tacos.

Grilled Scallop Taco.

Grilled Jumbo Shrimp Taco.

Kicking Off December in San Diego

I was in San Diego for the first two weeks of December for work. It really made it feel like I skipped a large chunk of time for holiday preparation and festivities. During any time off from work I tried to squeeze in some festive fun. Mr X even made a whirlwind trip just for the weekend to see me. 

We happened to be in San Diego during the weekend of "December Nights". It's a holiday event that they do in Balboa Park every year for one weekend. Lots of vendors, holiday shops, free access to the museums, Christmas music, lights and performances. We showed up right when it opened because we didn't want to have to deal with parking problems or drive in traffic. Our plan worked.

 

The architecture of the buildings in Balboa Park is beautiful.

Behind that giant tree is an enormous pipe organ that was played later. In this photo a bunch of little kids are dressed up and singing Christmas songs & doing dances.

The Arboretum at Balboa Park.

The Old Globe Theater's Grinch Tree.

We checked out the Museum of Natural History. It was great fun!

Mr X's older brother came down from LA to visit us while we were in town. It was really nice to see him. He came to December Nights with us.

The food highlight of the evening was a food stand called "Sweiners". I suppose that's is a combination of Swiss and Weiners. Mr X and I have had something similar to this before in Vienna several years back. I remembered them being really yummy so we decided to see how these fared in comparison.

Basically they take a half of a mini baguette, punch a hole in it, fill that hole up with melted Swiss Raclette/Gruyere cheeses, stuff a roasted sausage in and then put a pump or two of mustard on the top. They are so, so delicious. I will admit that the ones we had in Vienna were better, but these certainly were not far behind.

A Very Happy Thanksgiving Indeed

This year Mr X and I unanimously decided to postpone the traditional Thanksgiving activities (spending all day preparing delicious food and then feasting) until Friday. That way we could spend the holiday snowboarding while everybody else was mingling with friends and family and feasting. This was in hopes that the slopes would be slightly less crowded than they will undoubtedly be the rest of the weekend.

I'm happy to report that our plan worked out great! Yay!

The other great part of this plan is that I still have to work Friday. Mr X doesn't. So Mr X will be doing the majority of the cooking. How nice! 

Last Friday the Boa dial on my old snowboard boots broke. The boots were so old that the repair people said they couldn't find a boa dial of the same model to replace them. So I upgraded and purchased these Ride boots. They have a double-Boa system - one to tighten the ankle area and one to tighten the foot area. It's nice.

We spent Thanksgiving morning at Winter Park. We normally really enjoy this place but there wasn't enough open yet so we went down everything they had open and then enjoyed a Thanksgiving lunch of burgers (normally we bring our lunches with us but since it was a holiday we decided to treat ourselves). This is the view of the mountain from our lunch spot. Those are our boards' noses.

Mr X is about to sit down and enjoy his lunch in the warm sunshine on a beautiful day.

After lunch we decided to change mountains for some more terrain. So we drove to Copper and spend the afternoon riding down everything Copper had open. It was great! Beautiful weather and gorgeous views!

This is just the view to and from the ski resorts from our house. I couldn't help but snap a few photos.

A Whirlwind Weekend

Mr X and I both had a 3-day weekend last weekend. It was jam-packed and flew by. Here's what we did:

We went snowboarding for the first time this season on Friday. It was great, I had been looking forward to it for months. In the photo above Mr X had gotten stuck in deep power and had to strap out. He then proceeded to sit on his board and ride it like a sled. He's not nearly as skilled at sledding as he is at snowboarding.

Saturday morning we packed the car up with empty coolers for a previously scheduled meat transfer with my parents in Vernal. It's about the halfway point from our place and theirs so that's where we decided to "meat" up. Ha ha. While there I received a violin lesson from my very talented and gracious mother. I'm terrible and she tolerated it and was sweet and encouraging. What a wonderful mother!

She recorded some music on her keyboard and then we played a duet. Mostly she played beautifully (because that's just how she rolls) and I struggled to hit the right notes at the right time. It was really nice to play with her and I had a great time.

We came home with a car full of pork and beef on Sunday and proceeded to pack our freezers completely full. We kept out some breakfast sausage and a steak for Monday's meals. Mr X declared, while sorting through all of the meat, that he couldn't decide what to keep out because he wanted to try some of everything already.

We did keep some head cheese out that my dad made and I started some dough for a rustic loaf of bread so we can have head cheese sandwiches. I'm really looking forward to that.

We even brought home some pig's feet. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them yet, but I'm sure that with a little help from the interweb and maybe Michael Symon's troves of pork recipes I'll find something great for them.

Once we put away all of the meat, unpacked and showered, we decided it was time for our first fire of the winter.

A Silly (But Satisfying) Acheivement

I keep meaning to compile all of my favorite recipes into one location rather than having scraps and photo copies and scribbled copies scattered about. When I originally started putting together my "cookbook" I quickly realized that I'd bitten off way more than I could chew. So I scaled back the idea and decided to tackle it one book at a time. So I started with a compilation of my favorite treat recipes. I finally finished it last week and had it printed - I think it took me 7 or 8 months. Yay!

The next step, in theory, is for me to do a "Volume I" each for Main Dishes, Side Dishes and Bread. Then I'll move on to Volume II for all of them. But it's quite possible that I may burn out long before then. We'll see. I hope not though.

The Weather Outside...

Is PERFECT!

My SIL just posted photos on her blog that were full of vibrant colors of fall - crisp leaves everywhere. I'm guessing that photo wasn't taken too long ago. When I saw what she has recently been seeing outside in her region of the country I was a bit surprised. I guess I figured it must feel like winter is solidly here to everybody right about now, but that's just silly of me. Regardless, I'm happy with what I'm seeing outside in my neck of the woods.

Beginners Again

On Saturday Mr X and I headed up to the mountains for a little adventure. The shoulder seasons here make us go a little stir crazy. 4 or 5 ski resorts are open here already, but as you can see from the photo below, there's a pathetic amount of snow in the mountains at the moment. Boo hoo! We've had light snow storms here and there, but nothing to get excited about much to my dismay. We were trying to patiently wait for more snow before we headed up because it gets boring really fast when there's only 1 or 2 runs open. Plus, everybody is trying to ride those 1 or 2 runs. This usually amounts to disappointment and frustration. It's like your starving and you're given one small spoonful of food to "tide you over".

However, we are chomping at the bit and ready to play in the snow. So we decided that rather than snowboard on the limited terrain, we'd try out skiing. It's been probably about 17 years since I've skied and I think its been 25 since Mr X has skied. We were terrible, just as we suspected. But we had a great time.

By the afternoon we were sick of the long lift lines so we decided to pack up our skis and go on a stroll around the area. It was a beautiful day and a nice long walk.

We'll try to hone our skiing skills again soon. I just wish some nice storms would come in soon.

Winner, Winner Salmon Dinner

Mr X recently attempted making smoked salmon using our Traeger. He used alder wood pellets and brined the salmon prior to the smoking. During the smoking process he glazed the salmon with some maple syrup. It was a success and I can't wait for him to do it again.

Happy Halloween!

Hardcore Fishing

Mr X didn't feel like he'd gotten the opportunity to fish as much this summer/fall as he had wanted to. So last Friday while I was working (he had the day off) he decided to head up to his favorite fishing spot one last time.

It takes about 45 minutes to hike there on a normal day. It took him longer on this day due to the fact that it was a winter wonderland up there. Despite the cold and snow Mr X trudged on - a very determined fisherman.

The path to our fishing spot.

The views along the path were pretty incredible. I'm so glad Mr X took the time to snap some photos for me.

This is the little stream that runs down from our fishing lake.

And here is the lake. The very frozen lake.

More frozen lake....(Mr X was walking along side of it to get to the mouth of the lake, where he loves to fish.)

Here is the mouth of the lake - and he was pleased to see that there was a tiny bit of unfrozen water in which he could fish.

 

So this is where Mr X fished. He said that sometimes his fly would get hooked on the edge of the ice and he couldn't get it off, so his solution was to dig for rocks and toss them at the edge of the ice until it broke off and then he'd reel in his line and detach the cumbersome chunk of ice.

Mr X told me that it was 18 degrees up there. Ouch! But he was determined to fish - I believe he said that he caught one fish the whole time. He tried for a while, until the cold cracked his fly rod during a back cast. Dejected, Mr X packed up and headed home. Poor Mr X. I felt so bad that his beloved fly rod was broken.