I've started a little online business. It's something I've been working on for the past couple week and finally I'm ready to go live. It's a little virtual bakeshop (with very real, non-virtual cakes) on Etsy.com.

Labels: Administrative, career, cooking, food, life decisions, Nerdiness, New York

Hey Chickadees...

Yes, I mean you. So I need a little help.

"A little help from US," You say. "After you've all but ignored us in favor of that *other* blog...humph. The nerve!"

I know, I know. But this could be BIG. And you might get something out of it too...

"Well...if there is something in it for US...whaddaya want?"

So you know that *other* blog... The food one?

"Ugh...yes. What about it?"

So I wrote this recipe, for a pretty incredible chocolate hazelnut torte. I mean, incredible! Simultaneously rich and airy, and completely flourless although nobody believes it when they try it. I mean...it's like PERFECT. Anyway, I wrote this recipe and posted about it, and next thing you know, someone nominated it for a prize!

A chocolatey prize. A trip, to a chocolate festival, in Napa...where I get to drink wine and taste chocolate and spend the entire day doing decadent chocalatey things...How great is that?!

"Pretty great, but what's it have to do with us?"

Well...you could come too. Maybe. Wouldn't that be nice?

"Hmmm...keep talking..."

Well this contest that I told you about. It's run by this website called Culinate, and for me to win, I first have to be voted into the top ten by my blog readers. (That's you). The cool thing is, just by entering and voting, you automatically get two chances to win TOO. See, they're not just sending a blogger. They're sendinga blogger AND a reader. And you can bring a date! So you and your date and me and my date and we all get to eat chocolate and drink wine and roam around Napa for three days and two nights on someone else's dime. Are you up for it?

"Maaaybe...what do I have to do?"

It's easy! You just click on this link and register. It takes two minutes. Then vote for my blog (Always Order Dessert). And that's it.

Then cross your fingers... If you want to help more, you can tell all your friend and their friends and your hairdresser and that cute guy across the hall that you've been trying get the courage to talk to. Him too. Tell him, and if you're lucky, maybe he can be your date.

Are you in?

"No promises...but why don't you give me that link again?"

OK, it's: http://www.culinate.com/chocolate/standings?blogURL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.alwaysorderdessert.com%2F Or just click on this:

Labels: Administrative, blogging, cooking

Those who know me will agree that this is long overdue. Those who don't, will soon understand why.

My new blog:

Always Order Dessert
Devoted to all things edible...

(Don't worry! I'm not shutting down sent from--Now you just get twice the Alejandra fun!)

Labels: blogging, cooking, food, Writing

During lunch today, I was thrilled to see a sign announcing that the very sexy chef Rocco Dispirito will be guest appearing in our office cafeteria tomorrow at noon.

Besides sexiness, Rocco is best known for his short-lived reality tv show, The Restaurant, in which he ran around experiencing creative differences with just about anyone who crossed his path (except for his Mama, Nicolina, who makes awesome meatballs). Rocco then moved to radio, where he hosted a pretty popular talk show for a year. His contract wasn't renewed, however, due to (you guessed it!) creative differences with the show's producers.

Say what you will about him, I think he's great. If you've ever eaten at Union Pacific, the Gramercy Park restaurant he helmed for several years (until he left over what I can only assume were creative differences), you'll appreciate his brilliant take on Italian-American cuisine. Also, I kinda have a soft-spot for feisty NY boys who love their Mamas...

Rocco, who has been bopping around making guest appearances on assorted food-related reality shows has recently landed a gig as the Bertolli whore spokesman. Sell-out, you say? Possibly, but the truth is that Bertolli makes good olive oil. And Rocco is hot. If he wants to hawk Bertolli pastas and oils, then that's fine with me.

My plan is to get him to sign a bottle of Bertolli olive oil for me... At the very least, I'm going to try and touch the hem of his Bertolli logo polo shirt.

I'll be sure to provide you all with a full report... (and maybe pictures!!)

Labels: Celeb Encounters, cooking, Meatballs

One of my favorite bloggers--and virtual friends--is Matt from Deglazed. This morning, I received a (shameless) e-mail from him letting me know that his blog has been nominated for a 2006 Best of Blogs award in the category of Best Food, Wine, and Cooking Blog.

Deglazed, if you haven't already checked it out, is a wonderful collection of stories about life in the kitchen for a new chef. Matt is incredibly clever and his posts always crack me up. He also makes sure to throw in several of his (awesome) recipes and the occasional gratuitous jab at Rachael Ray (that alone being reason enough to check it out).

Go vote and then check out his blog. Hmmm...or maybe that should be the other way around? It's up to you...

Oh, and for the record, he asked for a vote, but this plug was all me... ;)

Labels: blogging, cooking, friends

I came across this on Boing Boing and couldn't resist reposting it. His name is Mr. Blobby, and he's a blobfish or "fathead." I am completely amazed by the fact that this thing actually exists in nature (and not just in a Shop-Rite vending machine between the Koosh balls and the sour apple Jawbreakers.)

I also can't decide if I think it's absolutely disgusting or incredibly cute. Actually, I'm leaning towards cute... I showed this to Sara aka Fiorella earlier today and she wisely noted that: "the ocean is really not a place where we are supposed to be."

He kind of looks like this doll that my brother got for Christmas one year. It was called FROYD (For Reality of Your Dreams) and my brother and I used to fight over it, even though it didn't really do anything particularly exciting. It didn't do anything at all actually. (Besides make our dreams come true...)

Now that I think about it, this may explain my attraction to men with large noses (especially those that promise to make my dreams come true).

It also reminds me of the things I used to find in the back of my AP Biology textbook in high school. I would spend most of class ignoring my teacher and instead looking for creepy/interesting pictures that I would then cut out and paste on my binders.

Yeah...I was that girl.



UPDATE: I sent this link to my friend Jeremy who is busy studying for his law school finals and the following conversation ensued:

Jeremy: Creepy.
But possibly tasty...
Me: right?
Jeremy: but creepy
Me: like a giant scallop or something
mmmm...
Jeremy: Seared
Me: It'd be good seared. With a little garlic butter. And marinated asparagus.
Jeremy: freaks
Me: You and I? Yes.

Labels: cooking, Nature, toys

I find it impossible to say (type) that phrase without hearing Rod Stewart's raspy voice going on and on about the music played by the DJ on the radio-o. I blame my father for this--he's weirdly in love with Rod Stewart.

But I digress...

In order to properly mark my transition from DC web chick to NY writer girl, I've decided to throw one last little swank soiree at my place in the circle known as Dupont. The date is set for Thursday evening to accommodate a certain BFF who is jetting off to Argentina that weekend (ahem...Looney...) Yes, I realize it's a school night, but we're starting at seven so there should be plenty of time to feast and imbibe and still make it home in time to catch your 40 winks (should you be so inclined). Personally, I can go sans winks.

Pretty much the entire local cast and crew of sent from my dell desktop will be in attendance (with the notably sad exceptions of BFF Vanessa, who is a slave to her temp job, and friend for whom I've yet to decide on an appropriate pseudonym, who now lives on the opposite side of the globe). I'm also extending the invitation to all you blog girls and blog boys that I've met or corresponded with over the course of the past few months. I don't have all of your e-mail addresses, so either drop me a comment or click on the "e-mail me" link over there on your left, and I'll respond with my addy and the details.

Few things make this blogger happier than having a party to plan. I get to obsess over the menu and dream up hors d'ouevre ideas (I confess that I actually sketch these out sometimes...if I had a scanner I'd show you some of my canape sketches). I spend hours concocting the perfect playlist. I obsessively check my evite site to see if anyone new has responded. It's madness, but it's also a lot of fun. This will probably be the last party I'm hosting at my own place for a few months, so I'm really looking forward to it (although there is a rumor that I might be co-hosting [read: cooking for] a spooky halloween party in NY later this month). Also, it will probably be the last time that I get to see all my DC friends together for a while.

So that said, I have canapes to sketch.

Labels: cooking, friends, parties

The last time I felt like this I threw myself into my cooking. I woke up my roommates with thick slices of French toast covered in homemade fruit compotes and fresh muffins still warm from the oven. I skipped class to plan and shop for elaborate dinner parties. I organized the first of our swanky evenings—a classy wine, cheese, and tapas party that took three days of cooking and preparation, and completely redefined our meaning of the term college party. Looney and I were reminiscing about this party last night and he started laughing when I reminded him about it. "Oh yeah," he said. "That was a great party...I hadn't developed a taste for wine yest so spent the whole night drinking whiskey and cheese..."

Happy Homemaker became the default away message on my AIM profile while I spent hours buzzing around the kitchen experimenting with marinades and pie crusts. That was the year of my first Passover chicken, the one that was so tender at the bone that it practically disintegrated before we made it through the four questions. In the spring, armed with a French-English dictionary and a stack of cookbooks from the library, I set about on a month-long quest to bake the perfect Proustian Madeleine. My roommates would come home to tray after tray of fluffy lemon biscuits. "You're making me fat," one of them always used to say as she tried my latest experiment. Provisions Too, the gourmet market on the GW campus became a daily stop. I quickly worked my way through my meal points on ingredients like white truffle butter, porcini mushrooms, and saffron threads.

Looking back at it now, I realize that it was my way of regaining control over a situation that I found overwhelming. It wasn't about the food--I rarely even had a chance to eat the things I made--it was about the process. I’d had my heart broken for the first time and was disillusioned with my course of study. Inside I felt lonely and adrift, but all those feelings melted away once I stepped into the kitchen. Cast iron skillet in hand I could do anything. My power was limited only by my imagination (sort of a culinary Green Lantern). It was the perfect therapy for someone who refused it in its conventional forms. I made decisions in the kitchen: the Madeleines helped me realize that it was literature and not politics that I wanted to pursue, and I opted to take a semester off and attend culinary school in Italy instead of a traditional study abroad program. I set aside my textbooks and devoured food memoirs by Ruth Reichl and Jeffrey Steingarten noting the parallels—I wasn’t the only one who recognized how sadness has a way of dying in the kitchen.

I’ve started again. Only this time, in addition to cooking, I’ve started coding with abandon. I’ve literally spent hours hand-coding a new template for this blog to mark the new chapter in my life. I researched ways to circumvent the strict default templates of MySpace to create a great new profile. I’m also working on a personal page to highlight some of my writing and have been thinking about designs for BFF Vanessa who wants a page to showcase her artwork. Just like in the kitchen, I’m limited only by my imagination. Yes, some things require more technique than I am currently in possession of, but I refuse to let that stop me—I just find a way to teach myself.

I know that this is clearly a control thing. I’m sad and there is no real way for me to change that. I have to live it. If there were a code that would make me happy, I would write it. If there were I recipe, I would follow it. As it is, I have no power over the moments of doubt…the sharp pangs of sadness…the uncertainty of what’s to come. So I focus on what I can. I focus on the things that I can do. And hopefully, while I immerse myself in those things, the rest will work itself out.

Labels: cooking, life decisions, Nerdiness