Pinterest Tuesday #2

Puns + Animals = Perfection



Campfire Cones



Layering rough pieces with classic gems for a dynamic look.

Garbanzo Bean Salad

Garbanzo Bean Salad

3-4 Servings

Ingredients

1 can of garbanzo beans (drained)

1 diced tomato

1/3 finely diced onion

1 minced garlic clove

3 sprigs of parsley

1 slice of lime

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil

2 ts vinegar

salt and pepper to taste

1. Prepare all of the ingredients as listed above.

2. Pour all of the ingredients, aside from the beans, into a medium container that closes up tight.  You will be shaking this so you want to make sure that it won't leak out. Close the container and shake it until completely mixed.

3. Add the garbanzo beans and shake until the ingredients are evenly coated onto the beans.

4. Serve at room temperature or cold.  It will keep in the fridge for several days. I had it with a warm sandwich and a mug of masala chai tea and a good old Lord of the Rings movie.

Masala chai tea is my own "precious."

Banana Ice Cream

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream!

One ingredient banana ice cream to be exact.  That's right! One ingredient, and it's, you guessed it, bananas! 

Well mine was four ingredients including the toppings but other than that, yeah, it's one.  This is great for vegans (without the honey and waffle bowl of course) and those who are diary-free, I know I would've loved this when I was vegan a few years back. 

Banana Ice Cream

1 Serving

Ingredients: 

1 banana

2 tbs crushed peanuts (about 9 peanuts) (optional)

3 ts honey (optional)

1 waffle cone or bowl (optional)

1. Freeze the whole banana for three hours or until frozen.  You may peel and chop it before you freeze the banana in order to make it freeze faster.  It's best to use a ripened banana but I just couldn't wait any longer to try this out!

The Frozen Banana

2. Place the peanuts in a plastic baggies and crush them with anything.  I used a mallet that's meant for spices.

3. Chop banana into slices and peel the skin off if you did not do this before before.  My slices were pretty thick but you can make yours as big or small as you'd like.

4. Place in a food processor or blender until smooth.  I prefer the processor since I didn't have to keep mixing the bananas so that the blades could reach the others.  With the food processor it only took me about two minutes to completely mix it.

That's all banana, nothing else, I promise!

5. Take the ice cream out and serve immediately.  You can put whatever toppings on it that you like.  I chose to put it in a waffle bowl with honey and crushed peanuts, it made the flavor of the sweet bananas really pop out. 

6. Enjoy the sweet, healthy snack!

The Fourth of July

The last few nights have been full of thunderstorms, my neighbors' fireworks, and Air Force jets practicing in the little windows of good weather possible.  These are all signs that the Fourth of July is coming up soon; I know it's a month away but I just get so excited for holidays like this!

My dog, John, curling up and trying his best to sleep.  He's actually shaking in fear as he hates the loud noises. March and July aren't his favorite months to say the least.

Even with my baby being so miserable I can't help but love the Fourth of July.  It's wonderful to have the family around for good food and a ton of oohs and ahs at the end of night.  Last year a bush was set on fire during the show and everyone forgot about the booms up above until it quickly burnt out. 

Although I can't promise that your local neighborhood will set ablaze I can promise you a beautiful Fourth of July with a few of these simple tricks.

Snacks

Drinks

Outfits

For the more laid back girl.

Untitled #8 by mia-nguyen featuring a straw hat

Dress, $48
Keds shoes, £35
Prada plastic sunglasses, $287
Hat Attack straw hat, £88

And for that "you can never be overdressed" girl.

Untitled #9 by mia-nguyen featuring platform heels

AX Paris belted dress, £22
Steve Madden platform heels, $100
Retro handbag, €130
Banana Republic indigo jewelry, $35


So what are you guys doing for the Fourth of July?

Recipes: Strawberry Lime Popsicles

I love fruit and I love limes (I sometimes eat them alone, they're so good).  So I decided that a hot day needed a cool treat and this was it.  The sweet, overripe strawberries acted perfectly with the limeade to make a great pick me upper.

Now I'm a little bit late on this one, by about 3 days, so just ignore the date tags on the pictures. 

(With pomegranate juice)

Strawberry Lime Popsicles

Makes 3 cups of popsicle, 2-3 servings

Ingredients:

1 cup cubed strawberries

3 tbs lime or lemon juice (about 1 and a half of limes)

2 cups water

5 tbs sugar

3 tbs pomegranate juice (optional)

Make limeade with the lime juice, water, and sugar.  Mix in other ingredients.  Pour into popsicle mold or, as I did, pour it into old canning glass jars.  Place popsicle stick into the mix or use apple corers like I did.  Freeze for 4 hours or until frozen solid.  Enjoy!

You can add any other type of juice you may have lying around.  I ended up adding a small dash of POM Wonderful to the smaller of my two popsicles and that one tasted even better than the other.

Hint:  To remove the popsicles from their molds easily run the covered part under warm water until they slip out.

Hint: Don't sweat the measurements of the ingredients.  Taste the popsicle juice as you go so that you don't end up with one that's too sour of too sweet for your taste.  

Without pomegranate juice.

It was so good that my little brother and I finished them before I could take any photos!

Enjoying them along with some good old Mumford & Sons.

Gorgeous Eye

If only I had the guts to do it!

Smokey Eye

Nostalgic

I spent half of my life in Vietnam and am half-Vietnamese so when I was checking the weather for tomorrow and saw that it was in my favorite weather conditions nostalgia really hit me.  I love the rain in Vietnam.  The smell of petrichor brings back memories of riding on my uncle's motorbike in countless floods that everyone takes so casually.  I remember watching pigeons gathered by the puddles after the rain while eating street side pho with my grandmother and aunt and how cool it always felt during the rains. Vietnam is in my blood, of course I'd think 90 degrees was cool.  

P.S. This was supposed to be published last night but I must have saved it as a draft instead of publishing it.