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Entries Tagged as 'sushi'

Friday nights are my favorite

July 12th, 2009 · 6 Comments · Asian, Boston, restaurant reviews, sushi

So I know it’s already Sunday, but the last couple of days have been so good I just can’t not blog about them. So yes, I’m going back in time a bit… let’s pretend it’s Friday night, shall we? It’s better than Sunday night anyway.

Friday nights are my absolute favorite. I had to work this weekend, but I still wanted to pretend I was going to have a full weekend of fun ahead of me. We also happened to have a gorgeous day here in Boston, which has not been the case for the most part of this “summer.” Every nice day we end up having just makes everything better! That, combined with my new decision to live a little more and stop calorie counting and sugar and flour restriction + the fact that it was a Friday night made for a wonderful night out!

Around 7 pm Adam picked me up from work and we decided to find a spot for dinner. Neither one of us had a craving for anything specific, until I mentioned sushi. The second that word came out of my mouth, there was no turning back. I haven’t had sushi in ages (white rice, sugar in the rice, soy sauce = non CLC compliant) and I needed it NOW Haru happened to be just around the corner of where we were, and it’s definitely one of our favorite sushi restaurants in Boston. Definitely a little pricey but the atmosphere (clean + modern) + quality of fish + creativity of dishes make it a worthy splurge once in a while. I was SO excited for my meal, I could hardly contain myself

I started with a glass of Smoking Lagoon Cabernet Savignon. It was the cheapest cab by the glass but I still enjoyed it. I’m pretty sure I paid more for that glass than the whole bottle was worth, but I also enjoyed it with amazing sushi and that’s something I can’t recreate at home!

While sipping on my vino, I browsed through the menu. Everything sounded good! It was hard to decide what to get, but the second Adam pointed out the Strawberry Fin special roll, I knew it was a winner! I always get one “special roll” and then get a few other basics. This time I ordered 2 salmon sushi + 1 shrimp sushi, and at the last moment decided to also get the tuna tataki with avocado. I haven’t had good tuna tataki in forever, and was really excited to try Haru’s version when I saw it on the menu. So here’s the loot…

The sushi was so fresh! I think you can tell how buttery the fish is from these pics…

And the Strawberry Fin (crunchy spicy yellowtail, jalapeno peppers and mango, topped with scallops, wasabi tobiko and fresh strawberries) was probably the coolest (and best) maki roll I’ve ever had. Well, I guess I also really love the hawaii maki at Fin’s. We’ll call it a draw. The flavors were so complex! I loved the spiciness of the jalapenos, mixed with the sweet mango and strawberries. I dipped every bite in the strawberry sauce it came with (no need for soy sauce here!). SO good!

Aren’t these guys so cute? The tuna tataki (seared tuna with avocado salad and spicy soy vinaigrette) was also excellent! I didn’t eat all the avocado, but the tuna was definitely gone by the end of the night

The meal was superb! I was so happy with my selections, and was very satisfied. So I said no to dessert. Wow, that’s a first! In my attempt to be more mindful of how I feel and not eating things on “auto-pilot” this was a great decision. Of course my sweet tooth kicked in later, but we’ll get there in a bit

We decided to have another drink at one of the bars in the area, and stumbled upon a newly renovated Champions in the Marriot Hotel at Copley. Champions is a sports bar and used to be a bit divey, but literally 3 days ago the place was reopened with a brand new super stylish decor. We were pretty impressed, especially since we’ll be living like 2 minutes away from it in less than 2 months! I would love to become a “regular” at this swanky bar My drink of choice was the Estancia Cabernet Savignon. The bartender gave me a really generous pour (this picture was taken after I drank probably half of it!). I liked this wine a lot!

We chatted while drinking for a while and then decided to head home to watch some Entourage dvds. But not before stopping by the Fenway Berryline. Tart frozen yogurt, you are the best guilt free dessert ever!

They had 3 flavors: original, banana and blueberry. All were amazing so I got a small of all 3 + mochi (regular and strawberry) + fresh mango.

This picture isn’t great – I waited to come home to snap this photo so the yogurt melted a bit, but it tasted so good. The mochi was a bit of an indulgence. They were soft and yummy but of course are still candy. I’ll stick to fruit and nuts next time for a beter-for-me dessert. If you haven’t tried tart yogurt yet, you must go out and get some asap (Inna, I’m talking to you! ).

And this ends my Friday night recap. What’s your favorite night of the week? Do you have a Friday night routine? Do you prefer to stay at home and relax after a long work week or go out and party your heart out?

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I love Fridays

May 2nd, 2009 · 7 Comments · Boston, restaurant reviews, snacks, sushi

I love Fridays! Ok, more specifically I love Friday nights. They are just so freeing. You know the whole weekend is ahead of you, and you can do anything. Awesome! Btw, if you are confused, I am aware that it’s Saturday already but I’ve been crazy busy again so I’m a little bit behind on posting – I hope you’re out and about enjoying your weekend and you didn’t even notice that this post is late (ha, of course now I told you… oh well).

So Friday night was really fun (I’ve decided that I want to go out more often on Fridays – just makes the night extra celebratory), but let’s start from the beginning…

I woke up dreaming about this yogurt combo inspired by Lauren’s breakfast earlier in the week. We were still out of fresh fruit, so frozen (warmed up) berries sounded amazing. I didn’t know how dependent I’ve become on fresh produce and I really miss it when we’re out (or even running low). I guess that’s not a bad thing

So back to breakfast… in this bowl: 1 plain chobani, about 1 cup of frozen (microwaved for 1 minute) berries, 2 graham crackers and vanilla cinnamon amazing almonds (from the package I got from Meghann).

amazing crumb yogurt

I was afraid the berries would be sour so that’s why I went with the candied almonds addition. I was happy to find out that the berries instead were incredibly sweet – the whole bowl (seriously!) tasted like amazing dessert. Creamy yogurt, sweet berries, buttery graham crackers and crunchy almonds. I will definitely try to recreate this when my sweet tooth kicks in at night. This is much healthier but incredibly satisfying. What more could a girl want? Oh wait, maybe she would want some chocolate pecan banana bread? Oh yeah, that’s it (Recipe + progress pics for the banana bread to come)

slice of chocolate pecan banana bread

[yogurt + banana bread + coffee = 482 calories]

Mid afternoon, I had this fabulous snack:

kashi crackers and dates stuffed with light laughing cow cheese

[181 calories]

I pre-stuffed both the dates and the crackers, but the crackers got slightly soft on me before I ate them. The whole combo was really great, but I’d recommend consuming the cheese stuffed cracker “sandwiches” right away.

Lunch was a 2-parter. I started with a whole bunch of random leftovers – somehow they worked really well. I made a salad with spinach, grape tomatoes, snow peas with 1T Annie’s woodstock dressing (I always drizzle the dressing on after taking a picture). On the other side we have bulgar with creamy mushrooms (just tiny bit of shrooms left from a few nights ago). Woodstock dressing has sun dried tomatoes and tahini as a base. The sabra sundried tomato hummus (which has both ingredients as well) went really great with it and tied the 2 sides of the plate perfectly. I kind of mixed it into both the bulgar and the salad. Yum!

bulgar with creamy mushrooms + salad

[285 calories]

Then I went to a grocery store to pick up a few fruits. It’s finally May, which means a new budget. Yay! It started raining right before I was about to leave my work to get the fruit, but I didn’t care. I swear just the idea of a fresh juicy apple made my mouth water. A little rain never hurt anyone

fuji apple

It was so sweet – like someone injected it with sugar. Could/would they do that? Hmm.

100 calorie pack of almonds

[apple+almonds=185 calories]

The lack of real protein at lunch really caught up with me mid-afternoon. I was really snacky. I started with 1/2 of this bar:

PURE chocolate brownie bar

love the chunks of nuts!

[1/2 bar = 100 calories]

It was delicious (I’ll be more descriptive when I eat the other half), but I realized that what I really wanted was this piece of heaven…

best things ever!

[170 calories]

Mmm, yeah – best ice cream ever! These things are a little small, but really that’s the perfect amount to satisfy an ice cream craving. For 170 calories, you get creamy coconut ice “cream” topped with real chocolate and almonds bits. Did I mention how much I love these?

And then a few hours later it was time to let the weekend begin (by the way, this is also where the calorie counting stopped)! We met up with our friends for a beer first at the new Irish pub, the Lansdowne. The bar is only 1 week old and had almost like a new car smell. Kind of funny. I ordered my usual – Magners hard cider. Hey at least this time I was drinking an Irish cider in an Irish pub I drank almost this whole pint – gave the rest of the 21oz bottle to Adam and also some of the cider I didn’t finish. We had more drinking to do at dinner

Magners

I also had a few of the cheese fries the guys ordered for the table. Not healthy but so delicious. I had maybe 7 of them?

cheese fries

And then we went to Fin’s for dinner. I got a really strong sushi craving mid-day and I knew I absolutely HAD TO have some tonight. Fin’s is walking distance from our place and it is fabulous, so it was an easy craving to fix. I started with a house salad (no onions) – lettuce, tomato, cucumber, carrots (really just for garnish) and house-made dressing. The salad was like the standard little salads you get in your bento box, but was probably 4 times the size. I ate nearly every bite. Yum!

Fin's house salad

Oh of course I had some vino Maybe 1.5-2 glasses. I was trying to be good in preparation for the race on Sunday.

my first glass of riesling

And the main course – sushi. It was better than I remembered. Absolutely amazing!!! The presentation was so cute too – I got the flower because I ordered the hawaii maki. Adorable!

hawaii make + 2 sake and 2 hamachi nigiri

The salmon was melt-in-your mouth fresh. I had to give a bite to Adam, it was so delicious!

mmm salmon nigiri

Hawaii maki: spicy tuna, avocado, mango wrapped in rice paper

closeup of hawaii maki

What a great combo! Spicy tuna + sweet mango + creamy avocado. The rice paper was also a really fun change from the seeweed wrappers. Much less chewy – just added to the creamy feel of the whole thing. Perfecto!

Ha, I just realized that last time I went to Fin’s I ordered almost the exact same thing. That stuff must have looked good to me twice Btw, Adam ordered the cowboy maki (which had steak, asparagus, shiitake mushrooms and red onion). I didn’t taste it because of the onions, but he could not stop talking about how amazing this was. He said this maki was cravable. That’s a good sign that we’ll probably be back at Fin’s soon.

And finally – when we got home I wanted dessert. Banana slice #2 of the day… with some peanut butter slathered on top this time. I blame the wine.

banana bread slice topped with peanut butter

We then cuddled on the coach and watched the Biggie movie. It was really good. We love Biggie! What a perfect night.

How is your weekend going?

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Act, don’t react

March 7th, 2009 · 12 Comments · breakfast, oats, snacks, sushi

Ok, so I’m stealing yogi tea messages again to use as my titles. They’re just so motivational sometimes, I can’t help myself

yogi tea message

I’m happy to report that I finally got some sleep last night – almost 10 hours, actually. It felt SO good to wake up this morning, actually well rested. Yay! Another reason to be super happy today: we had 60* weather in Boston!! I know many of you understand how awesome that is. My husband and I definitely took advantage of it and walked for over 5 miles. It was beautiful. Too bad it’s going to get colder before it gets warmer for real. Ok ok, enough talk, let’s get to food!

BEST MEAL OF THE DAY

I had some super delicious foods today so picking my favorite meal today was a tough call. This one wins just because of it’s complexity. It took nearly 3 hours to make! I spotted this recipe for the root veggie pie with rosemary biscuit topping on Andrea’s blog a little while ago and couldn’t wait to make it (although honestly she’d make cat food look amazing with those photography skills)! The long prep/cooking time she warned us all about definitely meant it had to be a weekend night meal, and a weekend night meal when I had a lot of patience at that. Given that I hardly cooked in the last 2 weeks, I figured I was up for the challenge today. This meal did take a lot of patience but we were reworded with a delicious meal at the end, so it was all good Here are some progress photos for you (scroll over for descriptions)…

filling ingredients (I omitted onions and celery and subsituted skim milk for soy milk)

veggies all peeled and chopped - that took nearly 30 minutes... I'm slow!

beef broth into the pan...

veggies joining in

butter melting (I used smart balance 50:50 butter)

added garlic + rosemary --> this smelled amazing!

adding and stirring in flour

now the beef broth

sauce ready with milk and red wine

veggies go back in

and into the baking dish until bubbling (took less than 40 minutes in my oven)

biscuit dry ingredients

adding butter

butter all mixed in until mixture looks like bread crumbs

adding buttermilk

biscuit dough is ready

* Making the biscuit dough didn’t take very long so I put the bowl into the fridge until the veggies were ready to be topped off*

blobs of biscuit dough on top of veggies

all ready - took another 39 minutes in my oven

Mmm, biscuits :)

my portion - 1/8 of the dish

This was very intense! Quite delicious but very intense. I actually had to force it down a little bit, and I didn’t think it was very much food (volume wise). It could have something to do with the fact that it was nearly 10 pm by the time we were eating it and I just worked out. Maybe… I’ll let you know if I want to eat all of the leftovers tomorrow. Ha! That may be the real test. Oh, I should mention the hubs went back for seconds on this. Always a good sign!

OTHER DELICIOUS EATS

stove top oats: 1/3c rolled oats, 1/2 banana, 2 dates, golden raisins, skim milk + choc chips and BB as toppings

3 ak mak crackers with 1T sabra hummus + grapes

seeweed salad at Sushi Express

eel/sweet egg maki, tuna nigiri, yellowtail nigiri

some strawberries from this bowl

Clif Mojo honey roasted peanut bar

Total calories for the day: ~1510

WORKOUT

Well, as mentioned above I went on a 5+ mile walk with my husband to take advantage of the beautiful weather we had in Boston today. Everything took a lot longer today so I had to work out while the veggies were in the oven. Good thing I had Jillian to guide me through a quick (but sweaty) workout. Today was my first day of trying Jillian’s 30-day Shred dvd. I used 4 lb weights for everything except for 6 lb weights for the flys set. I thought I could do a lot more on the bit with the bicep curls (forget if it was the second or the 3rd set). I need to invest in some heavier weights for that. The one move that nearly killed me with the 4lb weights was the side lunge + raise. Ouch! I considered switching to 2 pounders but stuck it out. I think it’s better to challenge myself and hopefully by the 10th day, I’ll do this move with no problems Workout stats…

Duration: 0:26
Calories burnt: 186 (45% fat)
Ave HR: 133; Max HR: 206

Don’t forget to switch your clocks 1 hour forward (if you are in the US). I’m going to miss this hour tonight

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Sushi goodness

January 15th, 2009 · 13 Comments · Uncategorized, snacks, sushi, yogurt

I had such a fun night last night! Sushi+drinks+fun friend = happy Elina! My friend Katie and I went to Fin’s in Kenmore Square in Boston. I went to Fin’s a few months ago and after reading my post about it, Katie really wanted to check it out. I love sushi but don’t have it nearly as often as I’d like, so of course we made a sushi date. Fin’s is BYOB so we stopped by the Wine Gallery first and picked up a bottle of Pinot Grigio to share Here is my first glass (I had about 1/2 bottle):

wine

After chatting for a bit, we finally ordered some food. I feel like I haven’t had a salad in forever so I started with a Field Green salad (no onions or scallions)… I think it was just mixed greens, tomatoes, red and green peppers and carrots. It was much bigger than I was expected and I ate almost every bite. The dressing on it was perfectly light and the veggies were nice and fresh. I love salads!

fin's salad

Then came the sushi. I wanted to try something fun + a few basics, so I went with the Hawaii Maki (spicy tuna, avocado, mango wrapped in rice paper) + 2 salmon nigiri and 2 unagi nigiri. Here is my plate:

fins sushi plate

It was SO good! I’ve never seen maki wrapped in rice paper instead of seaweed. Pretty cool! The spicy tuna was spicier than I expected (but I love spicy!) so I was chugging water like it was going out of style The nigiri was especially fresh (like melt-in-your-mouth fresh!). Seriously I could eat sushi everyday! Perfect food day for Elina: yogurt parfait for breakfast, salad from b.good for lunch and sushi for dinner. Oh yeah, don’t forget lots of chocolate and baked goods in between!

I also tried one of Katie’s spicy scallop rolls. She said they are her favorite but these weren’t the best. They were a little overcooked, I think… slightly tougher than you’d want them. Still yummy though

spicy scallop maki piece