Jedd's Frozen Custard Patisserie Cafe

Earlier this week, I was waiting for the train when Lady Antebellum's Need You Now played on my ipod and I found myself blushing and staring at my shoes, as if those around me had super powers and could tell what I was listening to. But it's okay, because the Smiths came on next and I quickly reverted to light foot tapping and observing fellow commuters with lowered eyelids, knowing how much cooler I was than them. I mean, if it's on the (500) Days of Summer soundtrack, it's obviously hip, no?

So another reason I know that I'm cool, besides my taste in music, is because I frequent cool spots like Jedd's Frozen Custard patisserie cafe. The decor and vibe ooze awesomeness and I know I fit right in. Oh, and the frozen chocolate custard is so good! They're giving out free custards until August 1st (go on their website to print the coupon).

I can't change! I'm like a chameleon - always a lizard! / Food photoburst

Ever since we moved in last week, we've been frugal with our electricity and water usage. And it's not because we're environmental. Plain and simple, we're aiming for the lowest of the low possible bills! I think we're doing very well. 

But, it's made me hesitant about cooking and baking. The only thing we've used is the microwave (to nuke our veggie "sausage" patties below). Meals from May 24 at Kachi (mediocre).

Fancy desserts from my Shoe!

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera so this photoburst is very much incomplete. Tears. Just imagine delicious dim sum, pasta, sushi, Korean, pad thai...The beers were for moving day and since we didn't have a functioning fridge, we did it hotel-style.

The veggie patty was tasteless. Like eating bread between two slices of bread! And they were so puny...How embarrassing.

And the saddest of them all—our impromptu "breakfast" before the dogre headed off to work today. Tonight, me thinks I will actually heat up the stove top and cook up some pasta. For one. More tears. I wish I could have delicious chicken and chive dumplings at Cha Liu instead.

Bullet proof vests are like hugs!

Had dinner at Banjara (over by Christie Pitts) with friends last night and then shamelessly gobbled up my leftovers just before passing out on the sofa (seriously knocked out. drool everywhere). Guess what I learned? Indian food gives me crazy nightmares. I woke up in the middle of the night covered in sweat, took forever to fall back asleep, and startled yet again after another nightmare! Oh, and the dogre did little to comfort. Jerk. So new rule: no indian cuisine after nine o'clock. That face over there sums up how I felt.

We've been very busy creating box towers all over our home and visiting the dogre's parents' house to assist with the cleaning before they list next week. This is a snapshot of the attic at Prudhommes Antique Market but is very similar to how cluttered their house is. After twelve years, they've amassed many antiques, artwork, and more cups and plates than the five-storied antique shop holds!

We're off to see our lawyer now to empty out our whole bank account and then head uptown to help out some more. The weather in Toronto is super-duper lovely today, so I'm hoping to squeeze in some evening cycling!

i'm jealous of my tooth.

Mon friends, I can proudly write that I didn't soil myself on Friday. On Thursday night, I was filled with anticipation, wondering what it'd feel like to be drugged. The instruction package advised that the effects would hit me within moments of taking the valium so I nervously popped 10mg in after tucking myself into bed, while my seastar played "soothing" (crickets) soundclips from Youtube and refilled the humidifier. I fell asleep disappointed. At five, I got up to take 5mg and felt nothing. At ten, I took some other type of magical pills and groggily stumbled to my appointment! In the waiting room, I tried to describe to the dogre how my feet and bum were weighed by heavy sandbags and was quickly preoccupied with the realization that my husband had 2 sets of eyes. After that, my memory started to get hazy. 

I recall waving goodbye and flashes of the following: faces peering, requests to open my mouth, commands to open it wider, sipping on Gatorade and lifting my tongue to swallow more (crushed) pills. I also remember a snug blue blanket they mummified me in, and naughtily sneaking out an appendage from time to time, only to be gently reprimanded. It took six hours and even though I was heavily drugged, the procedure still felt long. I can't even remember the dogre collecting me, or the wheelchair ride home. I do know I puked clear green Gatorade in the elevator among strangers and then that's it. I blacked out until Saturday morning, waking in a fit of panic because I thought I was late for my appointment! I was in total disbelief when the dogre told me it was done.

So, that was a bizarre thirty-six hours of my life. Oh, I also randomly cried one tear, asked the dogre to slap my face, chatted about a Korean celebrity, passed out (seriously, like, head rolling backwards) mid-meals, accused him of being stingy with the food portions, commanded that the laptop be brought to me so that I could move the mouse cursor a half millimeter there, a quarter millimeter here, and spoke a whole new language of gibberish. I'm very happy that everything was documented on video because the clips really got me giggling. Also? My heart got all gooey warm, seeing how the dogre had taken such great care of me. He even missed a shift (the first ever! he's a very good employee). I know no one's keeping score but I'm fairly certain that my husband is better than yours! Then again, he did feed me expired KD and hotdog bits. And the pasta was whole wheat (let's gasp in unison).

Looking forward to the follow-up appointment tomorrow, as the tooth needs some serious polishing; the surface is uncomfortably jagged. They also need to readjust my nightguard and fix the bite. I really, really hope the infection didn't spread elsewhere but I have a nagging feeling that my toothache woes aren't over just yet. They never are! So, enough about me, how have you been?

You don't need to talk, you say? Would rather continue to hear my sweet, angelic voice, you say? Well, my cousin—we'll call her Jules since she handcrafts jewelry—and I went out to Vineland and Jordan for some serious antique shopping. I have a ton of photos to share but will show you my one and only purchase for now.

Neat, right? Got it at Vineland Antiques Etc.  Jules bought a few jewelry pieces and a very tasty jar of jalapeno jam preserves. The whole "downtown" strip in Jordan was just so lush and peaceful. We lunched at Zooma Zooma and then visited a few art galleries—Jules took genuine interest in each piece while I pretended to care.

The weekend was mostly spent with the dogre's family, helping his parents prepare for next week's garage sale. Also visited Teaopia at Don Mills and Lawrence with Shoe (clearly, this isn't her actual name! her dad used to call us Gum and Shoe because we were always together. although, I resent the fact that I was the gum...). Had the Dublin Cream (ceylon black tea, whole roasted coffee beans, and jasmine petals), which was very delicious, and took home a tin of Caramelissimo (ceylon black tea with bits of caramel, hazelnut brittle, and biscuit pieces). Oh, and before I forget again (I was still under the influence of the drugs into Sunday afternoon), thank you for the thoughtful butternut squash soup, Finn!

Since this post is (surprisingly) all about me and more specifically, my health ailments, you should know that my toe (recall When Panda Mugs Attack) is not healing well. And I still really hate homework (random but true). To stay positive, I've been dreaming of decorating (countdown: 12 days!) and indulging in some wanderlusting. My seastar is abandoning me with her man-dogress for an international teaching post in Korea, while another friend will be flying off to Sussex for her doctorate. Me? I'm just floating about in the Shanghai sky, courtesy of Garance Dore.
I'm also overly optimistic that we'll have the opportunity to visit them within the next couple of years. You know what? The combination of all those pills really took the edge off and resulted in a more pleasant, amicable, and sociable dogress. But don't worry, I'm back to my cranky self.

Lightning don't strike twice / Unless the topic is dentist and the dogress' oral health.

Ahh, pistachio gelato! An indication of summer to come. The weather's been unfriendly these past few days. Maybe it's a reflection of my miserable physical state. More on that later. Because I know you care. You do care, right? Good, so tonight it'll be a sandwich-style post: fluffy happy carbs around rotten, disgusting, despicable meat. So, let's begin.

Happy carbs—a beautiful wooden cake stand, as seen on ohjoy.blogs.com...

Happy carbs—we finally "cashed in" our large plastic bag full of coins at a nearby Canadian Tire. Sure, they took a nine percent cut, but we still skipped away with about fifty buckaroos!

Happy carbs—in all likelihood, we'll be sleeping in the new casa come May 29! Yep! The contractors didn't go on strike, home inspection is next week (so nervous and excited), money, paper work, and key(!) exchanges on the 28th, and move in by the 29th. We just need to book the elevator at our current building and hire movers. Feels surreal. I know I was all ambitious about re-painting our walls gray, putting up a chalkboard wall in the bedroom, and personalizing hardware pieces (switch plates, knobs, hooks, hangers, you name it!) but we'll likely delay all of that and just enjoy the bare skin and bones of our first home. Heehee. Looking forward to having the stipple ceiling removed and shopping around for a dining table, chairs, coffee table, office furniture (inspirational desk diy here), and lighting fixtures! Oh, and an electric stove heater, of course.

     {canadiantire.ca}

Happy carbs—a little ditty that the dogre is obsessed with. She'll be performing at some cafe on the west end, come May, and we're going to take a gander.

Happy carbs—a friend and I will soon be starting our very own Toronto picnic club! We'll take turns picking the park, date, and time, and attendees will bring their own blankets and food to share. It'll be an open invite to friends and friends of friends as well! Interested? 

Rotten meat—I've been dealing with persistent toothaches since January, after I got a filling in one of my top right molars. I went back before but my dentist attributed the pain to minor sensitivity exacerbated by my clenching+grinding. She merely shaved down the filling to fix my bite and refitted my nightguard (yes, I wear one. so does the dogre. we make a very sexy couple, you know). She was wrong. In fact, what I had thought were pesky allergy symptoms may actually be the consequences of nerve damage when the filling was put in. Why else would only the right side of my face (nose, eyes, head, ears) hurt? After today's visit, she's now 95% sure I've got an infection and sent me on my way with a prescription to penicillin and pain killers, requesting a followup in two days. They shuffled me around the whole visit, and unsurprisingly, totally changed the followup date and time without even consulting me. Oh, and now they've assigned me to the head dentist, who I find eerie and fake. And scary. I'll need the dogre to escort me again because I turn into a wide-eyed trembling doe (but cuter, of course) whenever I visit the dentist. Seriously, I have a phobia of dental offices and always leave nauseated and drowsy due to exhaustion, even if it's a ten minute consultation where they adjusted my nightguard! So anyhow, the dogre hates the place. He thinks they lack general courtesy and professionalism and calls it the fast food restaurant of dental clinics. I think he's right—they rushed me, all of them in a terrible hurry and showed a serious lack of patient care. I'm likely to change dentists, but after they resolve this issue because why should I pay elsewhere for their mistakes! They've yet to charge me for any followup visits I made since January because they know it's their misstep. And now, after a google search on the dangers of an untreated abscessed tooth, I'm freaking out over jaw bone and facial tissue damage, eyes, nose, ears, and brain infection! I'm wondering how worried I should be that my jaw feels weird, that my right nose and eye have been painfully dry and sore, and that I've been dealing with severe headaches! I'm the dogre is going to give the head dentist some serious drilling because I need to be assured that the infection hasn't dangerously spread elsewhere. On a related note, here's my word of the day for you: iatrogenic—a malady induced inadvertently by a physician or surgeon, or by a medical treatment or diagnostic procedures.

Happy carbs—mr. L alerted my seastar, who informed me, that we had missed our seastar anniversaire this year! So, we had a late celebration, doing what we do best; we ate. And then ate some more. We also nursed three cider beers each for five hours. My alcohol tolerance has become laughable.

Happy carbs—our home is super clean out of necessity and courtesy to the unit owners, who are struggling to rent this place out. Actually, we can call this one happy carbs/rotten meat because we've been inconvenienced with twenty six viewings thus far. 26! On one evening, they showed the place to six different individuals at six separate times. I don't think the manager has a good grasp of efficiency, as her ad sucked and she isn't even screening the inquirers. She's also getting the condo concierge to do her legwork, even though it isn't part of his job description and he doesn't receive monetary compensation! It's really annoying for us because it affects when we can cook, eat, and relax. But, times are tough and I suppose people are less inclined to spend x amount of money on a shoebox we've been calling home.

Happy carbs—these awesome titanium aviators by Ray-Ban.

Happy carbs—an adorable anchor necklace purchased at UO over the weekend. $20!

Happy carbs—food visuals! We ate at voglie ristorante & lounge,  just north of Church and Wellesley, for a friend's birthday dinner.

Clockwise: spaghettini al pomodoro with chicken, grilled new york strip, penne alla vodka, roasted chicken supreme. I'd return! Gawd, how I love spaghettini. It's my favourite! So thin and plentiful, and easily coated with sauce...Dreamy.

Some new recipes we tried last week...

Roasted maple chicken and sweet potatoes, turkey and bacon sandwich with avocado and pesto, toasted prosciutto, apple, and cheddar sandwich with honey mustard sauce, and chocolate chip oreo cookies. All recipes here, on my online recipe box. Looking forward to baking a lemon poppy seed loaf sometime this week.

Mama's Pizza had a special event and we got deliciously thin medium pepperoni pies for $4.99 each.

Really, are you even surprised to see pizza again? I forgot to eat dinner...Oops! How about another word before I leave: sesquipedalianism—given to using long words (I can think of a couple of people who intentionally and unnecessarily use long or fancy words...heh). Bye now!

Camel Toe & DT Bistro / A week(end) in food

Sunday night's dinner, in all its glory. Dogre, send a link of this post to your parents! (the dogre's mum often asks us what we eat and how we can possibly cook in such a small space and now we can show her that there's more to our diet than pizza—um, maybe you shouldn't send her the link to this post...just the photos). Dumpling soup, braised tofu, chilli dressing salad, and a little bit of meat on the side (find recipes on my online recipe box here), all haphazardly lovingly cooked by this dogress. Voila! 

We went on two dates this weekend. That's more than the last few weeks combined, me thinks! Firstly, we drove over to DT Bistro, our special spot for dessert and coffee (my favourite is the chocolate flourless cake but everything we've tried thus far has been good—mousse, tarts, cheesecakes...), for a light dinner.

Braised beef short ribs with mashed potatoes, house mixed green salad, passion fruit iced tea and mint orange iced tea. All delicious, especially the orange iced tea!

Secondly, we went on an impromptu date to the waters on Saturday afternoon—dogre style. Meaning: it was chilly and windy, he picked up sushi but forgot napkins and chopsticks, we ended up eating the food awkwardly in the car and took a brief walk before we had to flee because of all the insects. Plus, his eyes were caked with sand (Rocky's, not the dogre's...). All in all, it was fun. I love egg tarts!

Very different compared to the same trip we made last year, when we stopped over for some coffee and pastries at Pain Perdu, picked up deliciously fat burritos, and picnicked on a fallen tree. On that excursion, we had napkins and neither wind nor pesky insects were present. I even made a friend (only to be saddened when he injured a foot and his spirits fell...and other seagulls picked on him) and snapped photos of a family of swans (I almost wrote "sweens")! By the way, no Wrangler for us; used Kia Sportage instead. I find it endearing in an cute-ugly-dog way. The dogre vows to one day get a proper jeep though...

Oh, and he got me fresh flowers! What a beautiful lifestyle it would be to always have freshly cut flowers around the house. But how expensive! The dogre and I have agreed to my reasonable request for a monthly bouquet (that costs no more than $10).

What we don't want the dogre's mum to see: multiple pizza fests, mall food (calzones, greek, terriyaki), pasta, Korean, 7west carrot cake, fresh bagels, soup, DQ blizzards, and more tofu. Clearly, we're not very strict with recent goal towards better eating and health.

By the by, if you haven't tried the canned butternut squash soup by Wolfgang Puck, we can't be friends. I have high standards, you know. Bye.

And lastly, Jeudi and I walked over to Black Camel (the dogre has forever ruined the shop name for me by implanting 'camel toe' in its place...) and I got the roasted veggie sandwich again while she had the slow roasted beef brisket (five days to prepare! dry rubbed and marinated for three, slow cooked for half a day, and then left to "rest" for the remainder of the time). We were stuffed! Don't get the pulled pork though; it's very stringy and tough.

Metallic lucite.

I'm struggling with sleep again. I kid you not, for years I have been telling the dogre that I view his abilities to fall asleep immediately, anywhere, as the most enviable super power (well, maybe next to the power to conjure up food on whim, and puppies...and money). So, I've been going to bed later and later until I finally just didn't sleep at all. And let me tell you, my body is not feeling as fresh as it did when I pulled all-nighters in my highschool years. I feel like a zombie. The good that came out of a sleepless night was that I finished an assignment. It's ridiculous but I'm nearing the end of both courses again. Here's the shoe I used—I tickled my own fancy and added a floral pattern on it!

Since I was still up, I worked on the mother's day cards.Roughly traced and re-coloured a cute design I saw over at Rifle Paper Co. But never-you-mind that. Let's dive in to the pretty things we scored over the weekend!

The dogre and finn's friend held a launch party for her newly opened and fantastical shop, Tabula Rasa, of all things beautiful—old, new, and reworked. It was jam packed and us dogre household didn't fail to bring on the socially awkward. Actually, let's backtrack. Before we headed to the shop, we went to one of our happy places, DT Bistro, where I ran into a former coworker. So how awkward am I? Well, look:

  Tyler: What's up?!

     Me: Good.

Good! In any case, it was good running into him, which is rare for me to say, because I'm that person who will cross to the other side of the street and study my shoes rather than make banal chitchat and niceties with you. The dogre is going to harass me now—he was already huffy when he learned that he models. Back to the launch party, it was retardedly packed and all I wanted to do was thrift through the goods! I'd say a fair portion of the items are in a similar price range as Aritzia ($35 tees) while the rest is more attainable for the likes of me. Case in point, voila ici (I wonder if you're tired of this yet), my new twenty dollar purse!

Awesome. So many compartments. We also met the dogre's twin, in mannequin form.

What else, what else...We were suppose to watch How to Train Your Dragon but couldn't part with the fifteen buckaroos each per tickets. So, naturally, I went and spent ninety dollars at Pottery Barn. Very sensible, I am. Don't judge me! It's all part of sprucing the new casa up for when we resell it, you see...Cute LED lanterns, an antique bar tray, and a floral accent place mat for laptopping in bed (the dogre constantly scorned me for overheating it).

I'm envisioning a hearty mix of stripped wood, metal, and lucite pieces. For example, a lucite coffee table, yes please! Eh? You can do one better and offer me a trunk? Please and thank you.

More neat stuff (yes, neat) at Lonny, an online magazine.

The management company is showing our apartment to potential renters and it's such a nuisance. But the place has never looked so pristine. This afternoon, a guy came to check it out with four friends. And I have to say, I was sweaty. Not because they were hot, but because it was a gang of gays (is that offensive at all? hope not. I just love alliteration, as you're well aware) and after some exposure to stereotypical gay men (former coworkers) I've become sensitive to how "observant" they are. I was very nervous about how they felt of my decorating choices and meekly answered any and all questions they threw my way. I would have fed, bathed, and tucked them into bed if they so commanded it. I was in a room full of Anitas, really (inside joke. don't even).

Links, links links (easier than uploading images):

Cool personalized clear tray. Oh so nice.

And bags.

The most beautiful (and expensive) toaster I can only dream of having.

Half the price of this wonderful Burberry utility jacket here.

Hideousness over at j.crew (I can't believe such words came out of my mouth fingers) .

But this chambray shirt encourages me look the other way:

A sweet bracelet.

A cool but overpriced leather bike frame bag.

An illustrator mesh tool god.

A dream.

A great new (to me) inspiration blog.

Lollipops we will (yes, dogre, yes) soon order.

A collaboration of note design studio and abici results in enviable bikes:

And lastly, Rocky hangs with the likes of Seth Rogan, Paul Rudd, and leggy ladies.

Or not...

Watch me unfold.

Had a serious (and rare) cupcake craving so we skipped over to Dessert Lady in Yorkville. Got myself the very last red velvet cupcake (topped with cream cheese icing, of course), I did! Also, finally located the video that made me fall in love with Joe Purdy's song, Secret. What a lovely reception venue...Envy pouring out of my eyes and heart.

Please to enjoy the following:

What did you think? Enjoyed? you loved it!

Scrotation marks! / Zara photoburst. And then some.

I think my fashion style screams clean basics with the occasional whimsy/quirk. It's also been called a cross between granny and French style (according to my seastar and the dogre). Comfort is essential to me. Along with not standing out...Which is why I gravitate towards cardigans, loose tees, and skinny jeans in grays, blacks, whites, and navy blues. When I'm feeling playful, I'll bust out floral prints and pops of colour. I've never really cared what the current trend was, picking up pieces that I liked and disregarding the rest, combining things that maybe would lift eyebrows, but mostly be ignored as uninteresting! When I picked up my new pair of high waisted, pleated trousers, I hemmed and hawed, foreseeing all the intense teasing I'd receive from friends and family. But, they looked so classic and fitted my ill proportioned legs to hip ratio of a body. Yes, I'm wearing two different shoes up there! I try on new purchases with the old because if it doesn't match at least a handful of things in my closet, it goes back to the shop. I had almost given up on Zara, actually. Everything on the racks looked fantastic but 'twas a different story on me body. More from Zara (such amazing prices—like twelve buckaroos for the skirt and tee). Sco-ore for me!:

The dogre and I have big news. We're going vegan. No, that's a lie. We're going strictly organic. That's not true either...What we've actually decided on is a conscious effort to go as organic and local as possible. Hoping to minimize consumption of preservatives and place an emphasis on fresh ingredients. And most importantly, we're watching our portions. Sort of. Over the weekend and for the father-in-law's birthday celebrations, we checked out Glow Grill at Don Mills and Lawrence. I was hesitant since the restaurant focuses on health and well being but everything was super delicious! Not that any of the fish dishes were sampled by moi... But I hear they were good too. Yumm—one step forward for us!

And five steps back because we also gorged on endless Korean table cooking of jumuluk meat, ssamjang, and sangchew on Monday evening with my mum. At least we had just as much greens? As for tonight, 'twas taco night in our casa. So good! So fresh! I wish every Wednesday was taco night but alas, it's probably too high in salt for such a dream to come true.

Random food photoburst. Including When Panda Mugs Attack (no, but that is the very mug that cut my toesies! tui, tui.)

I like my grilled cheese sandwiches lightly coated in unsalted butter, sprinkled with onion and chili powder, and oozing with sharp cheddar cheese! And, of course, a squirt of ketchup on the side. Try it! I sound especially frivolous and self-important tonight. Oh well, this will come in handy when I become a super fancy personal fashion advisor/food artist-photographer/book cover designer/interior decorator. Eh? And you're still planning on getting me that Leica you promised? Please and thank you!

NOTE: the beautiful trousers were returned. I was too consumed with financial guilt. Should have returned the sunglasses too but forgot. And now I don't want to go back because seeing on the receipt that I had already made one return may raise eyebrows and I don't want to be "that person." Le sigh.