Sylvia's Scenario

I'm experimenting with instagram and I came up with this collage of all our little critters. Aren't they cute?  I have fun chasing them around and trying to get them to be still for a photo.  Our weather has been so wonderful the past few days, you just want to be outside. (chasing critters…) I'm hoping the cold weather is over but I'm sure this is only a tease since it's not even March yet. I'll be posting more collages as I get the hang of this!

Raspberry Sweetie Pies, these are our Valentine's Day dessert tonight.  We are having our dessert from Whole Foods tonight with leftovers from all our dinners this week…isn't that romantic?  No cooking for me but we're still eating good food and we're going to do our favorite thing that only happens every two years…watch the Olympics!  I LOVED last night with the 3 slopestyle skiers winning 1-2-3 medals, only the third time in history.  And all three have such great stories which makes this so inspirational.   Joss Christensen   won gold and was skiing with a photo of his dad in his pocket who just passed away in August (makes me want to cry).  Gus Kenworthy   won silver and is trying to rescue stray dogs in Sochi and working to bring some home with him, just like I would be doing…apparently, like so many countries, they don't spay or neuter animals in Russia so there is an overpopulation of strays.   Nick Goepper   won bronze and is just a super cute 1

Yesterday, I was craving  Chinese food   so when I went to the grocery store, I bought some mushrooms for it but then I didn't use them.  So, today I decided to make my favorite dish with mushrooms - beef stroganoff.  I love this dish and I've made it so many different ways.  I decided to keep this one because it is pretty easy and doesn't use heavy cream or other high calorie ingredients, so common in beef stroganoff.  This beef stroganoff is a good, easy any-night dinner you can have during the week without a lot of fuss.  Serves 4 1-10.5 oz. can beef broth 2 Tbsp. flour 1 tsp. dry mustard 2 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce 1 pound uncooked trimmed beef tenderloin, trimmed of all visible fat and cut into 2-1/2 inch strips 1/2 tsp. salt 1/4 tsp. pepper, freshly ground 2 tsp. oil 4 cloves garlic, minced 1 yellow onion, thinly sliced 10 ounce fresh mushrooms 1/4 cup sour cream 4 cups cooked egg noodles, hot 1.  With a whisk, stir 1 cup of the broth, flour, mu

I was craving more dumplings from Din Tai Fung   (Nick got me hooked) but I'm 500 miles away from the closest one so instead I decided to try to make something along those lines for dinner tonight and this turned out really yummy. I bought some baby bok choy to go along with it just like we had at Din Tai Fung. Serves 4 1 pound chicken thighs 1 cup soy sauce 1/2 cup sugar 1 cup water 1 tsp onion powder 3 cloves garlic, minced 1 tsp ground ginger 1 Tbsp lemon juice 1 tsp red pepper flakes 3 tsp. corn starch steamed baby bok choy cooked brown rice sesame seeds 1. Cut chicken into bite-sized pieces and spread out in a single layer in a baking pan. 2.  In a medium saucepan over high heat, whisk together the soy sauce, sugar, water, onion powder, garlic, and ground ginger. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer 5 minutes. 3.  Remove mixture from heat and whisk in lemon juice and red pepper flakes. 4.  Pour mixture over chicken. 5.  Cover pan with foil

While we were in Seattle for Super Bowl weekend we ate at Nick's favorite Chinese restaurant in Toyko called Din Tai Fung.  He was thrilled when he saw that one had recently opened in our old neighborhood. They are known for their dumplings and Nick even has a punch card in Japan for this restaurant. (They don't do punch cards in the U.S.) They have a team of cooks preparing the dumplings and you can watch them through a window into the kitchen. This restaurant doesn't take reservations so we had to wait two hours.  We had plenty of time to watch them entertain us with their dumpling making. We didn't actually stay there the whole time to wait for our table since the restaurant is located at University Village where there is a lot to see and do. We wandered into the Village to kill time and check out the shops…like the Team Store full of Seahawk gear. How does this cap look? Nick was feeling right at home and I was t