Magic Tape Results

Last week I mentioned this Magic Tape that I got put on my leg at PT.

4 days later it got taken off....here are the before and after pics...what do you think?

Magic? or not so magic?

Before:

After:Looks like the spot where the actual tape was stuck sucked out the bruising.
so wierd!

Restaurant Review- Mokka

I headed to Mokka last weekend with 5 friends (so there were 6 of us total) for brunch. Sadly I am not always a huge brunch fan. If it's breakfast time, I want something small like cereal or oatmeal... otherwise..I just want lunch. A large part of that is my extreme distaste for scrambled eggs and sweets for breakfast. PRetty much the best brunch choices are omlettes or other dishes that include scrambled eggs (breakfast burritos, etc) or waffles, french toast, donuts, etc (tooo sweet). So I was pretty excited to see things on the menu that made you feel like you were getting the best of both worlds!

I had a quesadilla with a friend egg on top. It was filled with lots of cheese and bacon and still had sour cream and salsa for dipping... very yummy!
Rob got a Goetta grilled cheese with waffle fries.. He absolutely loved it and the waffle fries, that I stole from any plate I could, were also crispy and flavorful.

I will say the wait was ridiculous. We waited a solid 30+ minutes for our food... I didnt really mind, because we were there to hang out with eachother and not in any hurry...but some people in our party who were a little hungrier than me, might disagree. Also, after reading a couple of other reviews on Mokka, it doesnt look like the long wait was a one time thing.

Overall I liked the creative menu and the fact that it was nonsmoking even though it was in ky...so I would recommend...unless you are in a hurry..

Restaurant Review- Shaan Indian

A little part of me felt like I was cheating on my beloved Dusmesh, but when I read good things about the new Indian restaurant right down the street from my house on a fellow food blogger's blog, Rob decided we had to try it. He made a quick phone call to make an exciting discovery that it's a BYOB (it is! yay!) and we had dinner plans figured out...

First we made a quick stop to Oakley Wines, which is walking distance (but unfortunately not crutching distance) from our house to do a $5 wine tasting. Last night was 3 whites, 3 reds and a port...along with apps (cheese from Findlay, fresh olive tapenade and other yummy bites)- we chose a bottle of red from the tasting that was on sale and headed over to Shaan for dinner.

The man who seated us, who I assume is the owner but I have no idea was funny and nice and seemed to know almost everyone that came in the door.

We started off our meal with an appetizer of Paneer Papadi Chat (A tangy sweet blend of paneer potatoes, papadies and a touch of yogurt with black indian salt served chilled)- whoops! forgot to get a pic...but this app was huge!

And a glass of the bottle of wine we picked up from Oakley Wines...

I was not a huge fan of this appetizer. We usually order this at Dusmesh and I like it better... But I did like the raw onion and homemade cheese in it...but it was just alittle dry for my taste.. I also wanted to save as much room as I could for the main course, Lamb Saag & Garlic Naan:

The lamb was tender and delicious and the sauce wasnt overly cream based. The naan was soft and garlicy and pretty much perfect.

The service was great, the atmosphere was fine, the food was delicious and it's a byo... we will most definitely be back.

Miracle Tape?

Yesterday was my first post-op visit to the dr. He was happy with how much swelling was left and explained more thoroughly what exactly he did during my surgery (since I was completely out of it after the surgery) so that was nice. A nurse also took out the stitches (which were in there TIGHT... ouch!)
It has been 1 painstaking week on crutches with 5 left to go...

But check out this bruising that has been a recent development in the past couple of days...

My physical therapist, Jason wrapped on some supposed magic tape that is supposed to make the bruising going away, so my leg currently looks like this:


We'll see if it actually does anything!

Restaurant Review- The Rookwood

The Rookwood has been many things in its life. Obviously a place that produced amazing, historic pottery at one point...but more recently a chain of restaurants including Rookwood Pottery, Porkopolis...and currently, "The Rookwood."

The building is cool...you can eat in an old kiln and just see the history throughout the building. Also the view from the parking lot is to die for... When I lived in Mt Adams I would walk Maggie to the parking lot and just sit on the wall staring over the edge at the view...very peaceful place...

But onto the food...

We went for lunch the other day...

Nancy and I each got a cup of soup and split a grilled cheese sandwich

Butternut squash soup

French Onion Soup

Do you LOVE the little teacups these soups come in? Because I certainly do...so pretty!

This is the grilled cheese with white cheddar, fontina and gruyere...love all the cheeses, but for me, a little bready... I have had the apple & brie sandwich before (pressed with brie, sliced apple, dijon, red onion marmalade)- and liked that better.. a little less dry....but both are very yum!



The fries are good, but make sure you ask for a side of the fry sauce to make them even better! yumyumyumyum..

Kathie had a burger with their house chips and loves anywhere where they will make your burger medium rare...which annoyingly a lot of places refuse to do...


This was the Erkenbrecher Burger- smoked bacon, grilled onions, cheddar cheese, fry sauce

Here are some more pics of the restaurant courtesy my photog nancy :)

Surgery Info

A lot of people have been asking me about my surgery and what happened, so I figured I'd write a quick blog about it. Basically I was missing a lot of cartilage in my knee (for all of you who actually know anything about knees... I had level 3 OCD which is apparantly the worst kind)

I was casted from the top of my thigh to my ankle for 3 months in 7th grade and then had a surgery in 8th grade along with all the physical therapy that went with it. Eventually, being an 8th grader, I kind of just acted like it was better so the drs, pt and crutches would stop... but it never actually felt better...and in the last 2-3 years it just kept feeling worse and worse and worse.... so after some more pt, x-rays and MRIs, we decided on another surgery...this time a cartilage transplant....

I had a MosaicPlasty, which is basically:

A cartilage transfer procedure uses healthy cartilage from a normal area of the knee, and moves it to a damaged area of the knee. The two types of cartilage transfer procedures are called:
Mosaicplasty. A mosaicplasty moves round 'plugs' of cartilage and underlying bone to damaged areas. The plugs are each a few millimeters in diameter, and when multiple plugs are moved into a damaged area the result is a mosaic appearance--the multiple small plugs of cartilage look like mosaic tiles.

More info here

I will spare you the immediately following surgery bloody civil war wound looking pictures and show you the cleaned up version of the post-op. Pretty swollen and gruesome, but I'm thrilled he was able to do it with only 5 small cuts instead of the enormous 12+ inch incision he was planning on making vertically down my leg..

It's been one week down on crutches (no weight bearing at all) and at least 5 weeks to go. My first post-op doctor's appt is tomorrow so we'll see how everything looks!

I have the best friends ever and appreciate the visits, flowers, cards, emails, etc that have made this past week much more bearable...

Scallops on Creamy Leeks

On my quest to do all of my favorite things in one weekend while I could still walk, we made a Friday night stop at our local Whole Foods for 5 after 5.

While walking around the store sipping our wine and snacking on our apps, I noticed a display of amazing scallops that were on sale! Remembering a food blog I had recently read..I decided it was time for my first attempt at scallops... and I'd say quite a successful first attempt!!

The leeks in this dish turned out sooo good and the thing that made them creamy was just regular milk (not cream!) , In this case it was skim milk and these leeks were the perfect consistency. The scallops were cooked perfectly and the scallop/wine sauce along with the creamy leeks were fabulous. yum yum yum. Rob declared that he isnt even sure why we ever bother eating out... what a nice boy :)

Here are some pics!

Sauteed scallops sprinkled with parsley, lemon zest and fresh lemon juice....

on a bed of creamy leeks!

Want the recipe?

Find it here: http://sproutedkitchen.com/?p=1197

Roast Beef Sandwiches

Inspired by the delicious sandwiches we had at Wicked-Wich last week, I was on a hunt to find more delicious rare roast beef like the kind we had there. Seperately, on my last weekend as a walker for a while, I wanted to spend time doing some of my favorite things... one of which included a beautiful springtime day trip to Findlay Market.

We picked up farm fresh veggies, listened to some street music and split some dojo gelato:

Pomegranate and Chocolate Gelato: Perfect Summertime snack

Then we made a stop at Krause's for some rare roast beef, a couple of slices of horseradish cheddar and some fresh baked bread to make a little backyard lunch.... mmmmmmm

Findlay Market is Ohio's oldest continuously operated public market and one of Cincinnati's most cherished institutions.. Go there. Duh.

Black Bean & Millet Burgers

There has a new book that has been sweeping the food blog nation in the past couple of weeks and of course I immediately want any kind of new and trendy cookbook...but thought I should try out a few internet recipes before committing to the whole book....



Clean Food: A Seasonal Guide to Eating Close to the Source with More Than 200 Recipes for a Healthy and Sustainable You
by: Terry Walters

Millet Black Bean Patties with Corn. Before we talk about how DELICIOUS these are..let's talk about how cheap they are. At whole foods last week a pound of millet was 99cents from the bulk bin...all we needed was a cup (about half of that pound.) Add a can of black beans, an onion and some frozen corn along with some spices I already had...and this is the cheapest meal ever that can be refrigerated and re-heated for healthy dinner for days... which comes in handy when you are tied to the couch for a while...

But not only are they cheap, they are really delicious! Packed with flavor and have a great soft texture. Instead of frying them in grapeseed oil per the directions, we threw them on the outdoor bbq and had a delicious meal outside!

Everything was already cooked up before grilling, so we just threw them on the grill to get a little crisp on both sides.. Rob and I both loved them!

I had them with a little spicy salsa on top:

and Rob enjoyed them on bread as an open faced sandwich..

Want the recipe?

Get it Here: http://www.nomeatathlete.com/clean-food/

Restaurant Review- Wicked Wich

Last week on Nancy's suggestion, we visited Wicked-Wich to check out the newest sandwich shop on Sycamore where New York Deli used to be. The meats in the deli case were covered with all kinds of delicious spices and sliced to order. I was excited to see rare roast beef on the menu as were Kathie and Nancy as we all enjoyed it in some way or another...

Nancy and I got the pick two that included a smaller sandwich of the day (the broomstick) and a soup or salad.

I got the broomstick with a turkey bean vegetable soup...

Nancy got the broomstick with the tomato garlic soup (this soup was SO yummmy)

Kathie got a full roast beef sandwich on marble rye with a side of chips..

The roast beef was tender and soup was tasty but the restaurant was Cooooold. Also Nancy and I ordered the exact same thing but it came on different bread and with different toppings, I'm sure once they work out all the kinks,this place will be around for a while.. hopefully!! It's so nice to have a delicious and close option.. Once I get back to walking I'm excited to go back and try some of their other delicious looking meats...

Afterwards we sat in the PG gardens for a while and watched some birds taking a bath... gotta love spring!

My life for a little while

I have so many blog updates to do!

Hopefully between laying around, watching movies and falling asleep randomly from pain killers... I will be able to get this thing up to date!!

First I have to wait for Rob to come home and either help me down the stairs or bring me my camera....but for now...here is a snapshot of my life for a while...

Lazy Ravioli Dinner

I don't really think this is blog-worthy (at all) but it was pretty tasty so I'm posting it anyway...

Last night Rob and I ran some errands right after work as I am trying to take full advantage of my last couple of days on two (mostly) functioning legs...

sidenote: I am having Surgery bright and early on Monday morning... and will be pretty much totally out of commission for 10-14 days followed by a total of 6 weeks on crutches...

anywhoo....we ran said errands and didnt get home until about 8pm so I wanted to whip up something fast and easy....enter Trader Joes's Gorgonzola stuffed Ravioli...

Tender, fresh, cheesy and delicious we might need to get some more of these to have while I am in couch exile and need a dinner that takes less than 10 minutes to prepare...

Last Night's Dinner- Greek Tofu?

I am having lots of fun experimenting with tofu now that I am not totally confused by it.

Last night we had this greek tofu quinoa salad with olives, cucumber, tomatoes, onion & feta and it was pretty tasty! Next time it needs more liquid....it had lemon juice and a little balsamic...and the flavors were good...but just a little dry for my taste... but look how pretty!

A few random pics

Let me just tell you I am HIGHLY annoyed that I didnt get any shots of my ENTIRE family over for Easter Sunday. We had over 35 people over in our new house and the most gorgeous day you could have ever asked for. At one point I looked out and saw kids playing basketball, adults playing cornhole, two people tossing a football and people sitting around the multiple seating areas I had set up :) Rob was a whiz on the grill, grilling up burgers and dawgs for everyone and we had enough sides and desserts to feed a small army....and yet no pictures... except this one of the pretty veggie tray I whipped up before people even showed up. Grrrrr.

And here is a shot of Rob giving our lawn its first trim with our shiny new mower that we bought last week. Maggie just followed the mower around not being sure if she should bark at it or run away...

Rob's parents send us some pretty tulips that were the perfect Easter decor.

Hope everyone had as great of an Easter as we did! And here's hoping to more of this dreamy wonderful weather!!