Spring is here!

The sunny weather today was a nice relief from the miserable rain we get on the West Coast.  It's even nicer that it happened on the weekend.  The sun is a friendly reminder of the fruits and vegetables we'll start to see in the supermarket and farmer's market in the coming months, making our heavy on the comfort and not so kind on the waist meals a little more healthier.

Sundays are usually lazy for me.  Found this ecard:




True dat (yes, I have not given up talking like this despite my age).

Spent most of the morning researching what I will be bringing to P's family's Easter dinner.  Polish people know how to do Easter dinner up so I'm looking forward to it.  I've decided on a Polish dessert and am researching on how I can change it up a wee bit to take it to the next level.

P decides to make breakfast in bed (which is actually lunch in bed because we lazed around and watched TV until mid-morning).  P has recently discovered an instant noodle soup called Mama instant noodles.  His favorite flavour is artificial pork...yikes!  Sounds mega disgusting, but judge lest ye be judged.  Who amongst us has not eaten instant noodles in our college days to save money or as a naughty treat?  So P makes me "Mama soup" which involves half the packet of flavour powder due to the high sodium, adding sliced mushrooms, and cracking an egg into the hot broth to cook.  We slurp instant noodles in bed while watching P's favorite show on repeat.

I go out to get a spot of sunshine and return home inspired by it.  Spring meals shed the starchiness and heaviness of winter meals and instead favour lightness and uber fruits and vegetables.  Asparagus was on special at the store and I picked some up.  Frozen fruit was also on special so although it's spring time, not every fruit has yet showed up.  I stocked up on frozen berry mixes and raspberries.

Spring is here! menu: 
Toasted Sesame Ginger Salmon with jasmine rice
Roasted asparagus and mini sweet peppers (just roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper)
Raspberry Breakfast Bars

(Italicized so it looks like I hand wrote the menu out adding that extra touch of class)

Got the recipe for the salmon from Bitchin' Kitchen and the raspberry bars from Smitten Kitchen, two excellent blogs full of recipes.  

Wanted to take a pic of the salmon, but as soon as I said the salmon was ready, P ran to the oven and started dishing himself the salmon, thus destroying its beauty.  P was mad hungry after doing homework all day. 

 P and I constantly disagree on proteins being sweet.  Filipinos are used to their meats being savoury and sweet, but P is not.  I knew going in that he was going to critique the use of honey and brown sugar, but I charged on.  The recipe calls for the glaze to be put on after the salmon has cooked, but I tripled the recipe for the glaze and brushed it on twice during the last few minutes of cooking to have a thick layer of glaze.  Be careful to keep an eye on it because the sugary glaze can burn quick.  Next time, I may add chili flakes, sriracha, or more cracked black pepper to the salmon to balance out the sweet.

The RBB (tired of typing out the whole thing) is as breakfasty as oatmeal cookies, but I would not turn my nose up if these came to me for breakfast, especially if it was breakfast in bed on a lazy Sunday.  The bright color of the berries woke up my eyeballs from duldrums of seeing only greyness all winter.  For frozen berries, they tasted so good and the lemon juice only enhanced the raspberry taste.
  

Honey Bear photo bombs the RBB's

You don't even want to know how messy my kitchen was after this.  Blah!  I pretended that the mess didn't exist and settled in with one of the bars in bed to watch The Walking Dead.  .

Only thing I don't like about lazy Sundays are they lead to Manic Mondays.  Sigh!