The Great American Breakfast Sandwich

I have a thing for breakfast. If I had countless hours in the day, what I wouldn't give for a leisurely meal on a veranda or at a French cafe. Despite being in a rush to beat the clock most mornings, I do make an effort to plop down at my desk and schedule a few minutes to enjoy my breakfast. Lately, my favorites have been homemade bread with a smear of almond butter and honey or oatmeal w/ cranberries and walnuts. Yum. Weekends allow for more extravagent concoctions like the sandwich above - a toasted panini with 2 fried eggs, turkey bacon, tomato and avocado. A sandwich like that makes me want to experiment a bit more - maybe I'll bake a batch of cheddar biscuits or some ginger pear muffins.

One of my favorite places for inspiration is the blog http://simplybreakfast.blogspot.com/. Sadly, the blogger just pulled the plug on her project but it's still chock full of inspiring recipes and lovely photos.

Now that the weekend is upon us, maybe I will break out the muffin tins.....

Marukai Market

Those of you living in the LA area are probably familiar with Marukai Market, an emporium of Japanese food, household and beauty items. For those of you on the East Coast, particularly NYC, it's like Pearl River Mart. Most of my NYC friends know that I'm a big fan of Pearl River so when I found out about Marukai I was thrilled.

They have a bunch of locations around Gardena and Torrance. And when you're done with shopping at Marukai, stop by Shin Sen Gumi on Western Ave @ 185th. It's a great Japanese BBQ restaurant that I went to with my office's Foodie Club.

While I will be making many more trips to Marukai in the near future, I already have a few favorite products. I rediscovered my favorite tea, Ganmaicha extra green. It's perfect for those of you who like the flavor of well-toasted brown rice and popped rice - it adds a slightly nutty flavor. Aside from that, I picked up some Crunky chocolate - YES, that's the name. It's a better version of Nestle Crunch. Lastly, I picked up some tasty rice crackers as shown above.

Coffee Talk

A while back I stopped drinking coffee. Some of you may consider this a sin or part of some bizarre personal challenge - maybe even a resolution of sorts. But no, it just sort of happened. I still enjoy a cup every now and again but lately I've been into tea. Fruit tea, green tea, white tea, chai tea what have you.

Anyway, I came across these photos I took this summer and became nostalgic. Maybe I will have a cuppa Joe tomorrow....Enjoy.

Some of my favorite pics from Vesuvio's in SF....

Half Moon Bay

Back in July, my boyfriend and I had the pleasure of vacationing in Half Moon Bay and San Francisco. Here are some of my favorite pictures.....more to come

Dreaming of Cupcakes

Despite having shot and eaten 19 cupcakes (ok, i didn't really eat all 19), I still crave them. So here's another shot to tantilize your tastebuds.....

It Was a Good Idea at the Time

So this past weekend I photographed some cupcakes for a co-worker's wife who owns a cupcake shop in Long Beach, CA. I know what you're thinking. Free cupcakes for life - or at least after the shoot. So I obliged. The shoot itself was a success and quite fun b/c I happen to be a huge fan of these delightful morsels. Perfectly sized - they're seemingly not large enough to make you feel like you've eaten a slab of cake yet leave you satisfied.

Well, this feeling of bliss quickly changed when I learned I had just agreed to take home 19 freshly-baked cupcakes in flavors like pumpkin spice, mint chocolate, lemon buttercream, and even Nutella! My boyfriend and I devised a 2-part plan to split the cupcakes in 4 pieces so that we could sample a few and not feel too terribly guilty....or sick. Part II involved us bringing the cupcakes to a bike race and "donating" them to worthy competitors.

Naturally we forgot to bring them the next morning. Safe to say, we polished off a few more and I photographed a couple as mementos of this cupcake invasion. I've included one of the pictures above. Enjoy!