Welcome Molly

Last weekend, I got to meet the newest member of the family, Molly!

Kris, Si, Sophie, and Molly drove down from LA to visit. On Saturday, we all got together at Spike and Frog's house for Indian food and general festivities. Tons of cuteness everywhere I looked. At just 1 month old, Molly seemed so tiny! Holding her made me all nervous again, as if I hadn't just gone through the experience. How quickly the memories fade. She's got the most beautiful blue eyes, and whereas Sophie looks exactly like Kris, I think Molly looks exactly like Si.


The cousins were quite cute playing with each other. Here's Sophie posing with an unsuspecting Max (no idea why she likes to pose with her mouth wide open, but it was hilarious).

Bagels: Take 2

This week, I made bagels again, only this time using the standard size and boiling for only 30 sec each side. I should have baked them longer but I was super paranoid about them getting hard like last time, plus we were late for Molly's Welcome party (post to follow). Oh well, they still came out delicious. Much better this time around.

Next time (yes I'm still in pursuit of the "perfect" bagel), I will boil for 1 min each time as recommended and bake a little longer. Also, I'll be sure to use fresh yeast. I used some from a previously opened packet and didn't feel like my sponge poofed as much as last time.

Seriously though, these are great. Why would you ever buy bagels again?

Butter Ball

Bagels!

I've never had any interest in making bagels. It seemed like too much work. I thought, how could homemade ones possibly be better than bagels from a bona fide bagel shop?


Well, a couple of weeks ago, my coworker brought in some homemade bagel bites that were stuffed with chocolate. Sooo tasty. He convinced me it wasn't too much work and sent me the recipe. I was committed.

Last weekend, I made my first attempt. It ended up being a three day process, mostly due to my own poor planning. I would typically perform the next step late at night, only to realize later that the following step would take a few more hours to complete. That outta teach me to read the whole recipe carefully in advance. The bites/bagels (I made both) turned out to be delicously crisp and chewy on the outside but perhaps too airy and fluffy on the inside. It wasn't the texture you come to expect from a bagel.

This weekend, I decided to try again. This time, I used Peter Reinhart's bagel recipe which I found on Smitten Kitchen. Actually both recipes are quite similar. You start with a sponge of yeast, water, and bread flour. Then you proceed to make the dough. After vigorous kneading (you will save yourself sore arms with a KitchenAid) and rising, you make donut shapes and let them rise a little more. Then it's off to the fridge.


The next day, you boil the bagels for a couple minutes.


And then it's off to bake until golden (pic below is pre baking).


My second attempt was much better than the first. The insides of the bagel were much more substantial without sacrificing the crisp and chewy exterior. I did end up baking these too long due to some extenuating circumstances with an uncooperative baby, so they came out a bit too hard on the outside. Luckily, the inside was still soft and bready. Next time, I will make full sized bagels instead of the minis. There's no point making smaller portions if you end up inhaling five mini bagels. Not that I ended up eating five...er...Also, rather than baking the next day, I'd do everything in one go. Refrigerating overnight seemed to deflate the bagels slightly.

Next weekend shall be my third attempt at which point I hope to achieve the perfect bagel. Till next time!

A Whole Lot of Milk

Since giving birth over six months ago, I've amassed quite a lot of milk in the freezer. I stopped counting once I got past 300 oz but if I had to estimate, I'd say there was 500 oz in there. Generally, I've been giving Max freshly pumped milk rather than doing FIFO from the freezer. However since I'm still producing about an extra bottle a day, it quickly adds up.

This afternoon, I decided to do a quality check on the milk. I took the oldest bag (dated 11/24, coincidentally my birthday!) and defrosted it. Smelled suspect. Tasted (yes I took a sip) very suspect. I immediately grabbed a bag from end of Dec. No smell, but still tasted a little strange. I then grabbed a fresh bottle from the fridge and tasted for comparison. No strange taste at all. Now in full paranoia, I grabbed a bag from early Jan and a bag from late Feb. Neither smelled but the Jan bag still had a strange taste while the Feb bag didn't. After some googling, it sounds like most frozen milk will taste different. It's not actually bad unless it smells like sour milk. In that case, I would say the milk up until late Dec has gone bad but the milk after was fine. Nonetheless, I made the executive decision to DUMP IT ALL. Well, up until mid Jan at least. I mean if there's even any doubt, why risk it? Plus it plain tasted weird. I know I wouldn't want to drink that milk if I were a baby.

So I proceeded to clear out about 200 oz of milk. I didn't count but it sure filled up my sink so lets just say it's a lot. Here's how the freezer looked afterwards.



I wasn't particularly upset to be throwing it all away, probably because my milk supply is still going strong. It was strange looking at that volume of fluid and thinking "wow my body produced that". Then again it's not horribly surprising given the volume of waste a human body is capable of producing in a day.

I'm still aiming to continue breastfeeding until 9 months. I'm not going to lie, it's really tough finding time to pump at work and I still get random milk blisters/clogged ducts, but Max loves his milk and who am I to deny that chubby little burrito ;)?

Pho Real Pho

Last Sunday, Badge and I went to a coworker's house for some GSL and homemade pho.

What is GSL you ask?

Why, it's the Global Starcraft League, of course!

...

...

You heard me. Apparently, GSL is a big thing, especially in Korea where it's treated like a national sport. My coworker had recorded the finals and invited some of his gamer friends over to watch. I was intrigued, mostly because I very much enjoy watching other people play video games and have played warcraft before which is similar. The final decision came when he mentioned his mom would be making some homemade pho. Done and done.

As anticipated, the pho was DELICIOUS. The broth was super flavorful and the meat tender and tasty. Even Badge, who had only eaten pho once in his life (and did not enjoy it that time), thought it was good. After slurping up my noodles and soup, I felt guilty that I had not delivered on some tiramisu, and had instead opted out for chocolate chip cookies. I felt like my coworker (as proxy for his mom) deserved better. Next time.

The GSL was quite entertaining. We only stayed for a couple games before we had to leave to put baby to bed. The commentators were hilarious. They really acted like it was a sport. All in all, a fun Sunday evening.

Baby State of Affairs: 6 months

Last Wednesday, Max turned 6 months old! We took him to the doctor's and here are his stats:

Weight: 19.10 lbs (85%)
Height: 28 inches (93%)
Head: 17.25 inches (53%)

This has been a great month (minus the week and a half where Max got really sick). He's been sitting up more and more and rolling around like mad. He loves to do small scooting motions. It's super cute.

Around 5.5 months, we started him on some rice cereal. Just a tablespoon a day mixed with some breastmilk. About a week ago, I roasted and pureed up some butternut squash we got from the farmers market, and he seemed to really enjoy the taste of that. Strangely, he stopped pooping last Tuesday which had us a bit concerned but after talking to the nurse today, he finally pooped an enormous diaper full (four and a half days later). And boy, has the consistency and SMELL changed after he started eating solid. No more are the mild manner poos of a exclusively breastfed baby. No sirree. I won't go into detail but let's just say both Badge and I were floored.

Just recently he seems to have gone down to 2 naps a day. At night he sleeps 10-11 hours, sometimes with a night feeding, sometimes not. Lately, he randomly cries until someone goes in and rocks him back to sleep. We think he's teething since he is drooling a LOT and chewing on anything in sight. At his appt, the ped thought he'd sprout teeth within the next 3 weeks or so.

Otherwise things are going very well. He's just about the cutest little thing ever. There are still stressful moments of course, but overall everything seems more manageable. Happy birthday baby burrito!

Peanut Sesame Noodles

Last week, I made peanut sesame noodles, a tried and true recipe from Monkey. It's so easy and so tasty. Great week night meal. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures, but I'll go ahead and post the recipe.

Peanut Sesame Noodles

thoroughly blend in blender:

2 cups natural unsalted smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup rice or white vinegar
1/4 cup light soy sauce
2 tsp dark soy sauce
2 tbs small pieces garlic
2-6 serrano or other fresh chili peppers, cut into pieces
3 tbs sugar
2 tsp salt

remove peanut butter mixture to a medium bowl. stir in:

1/2 cup toasted sesame oil
2 tbs chili oil

gradually stir until smooth:

1 cup freshly brewed black tea

good with sliced cucumber.