Lindsay's Gallimaufry

25 things you may or may not know about me

Mona posted her list the other day and asked some people to do the same.  She didn’t ask me (I feel so betrayed!! :P) but I did it anyway.

1. I can’t decide between creme brulee and cherry pie as my favorite dessert.
2. I am one of the few women married to a geek who might actually out-geek her husband.  I love gadgets and gizmos at least as much as Tad does, and I was a programmer before him (I got him into it).
3. I am totally a night owl.  If I had my way I would stay up till at least 1am every night and not get up until about 8am or 9am.  But the rest of the world doesn’t work that way so I have to force myself in a mold that doesn’t fit.
4. I am really a homebody.  I could stay in my house for days and never get bored or have cabin fever.
5. Born a US citizen, I’ve never been to Canada or Mexico but I’ve been to France, the UK and Australia.
6. I am a Berry person, not a Citrus person.
7. I can’t stand super spicy food.  I like to savor my food, not be assaulted by it.
8. I can bend the top of my thumb back at an almost 90 degree angle to the rest of it.  I call it “Hitchhiker’s Thumb” and it totally freaks Tad out.
9. I never tasted a beer until I was 27.  It had always smelled and looked horrible to me, but that was probably because all I’d been exposed to before was yechy standard American beers.
10. I am a crafter at heart without the time to craft.  I have so many projects gathered on my todo list that I will never get through them all if I had 20 years of free time.  But I probably have almost all the supplies I need, just in case that free-time opportunity knocks!
11. I am compelled to arrange all the clothes in the closet by order of hue.  It bothers me otherwise, even for Tad’s side.
12. I scored a 5 (the best you can get) on the Advanced Placement Biology test as a senior in high school.  I always loved science and can still tell you things like how respiration works through a cell membrane and what a nephron is.
13. I have never had any other “real jobs” than as a programmer.  My first programming job was the summer of my junior year in high school writing a catalog database application in DBase IV.
14. I am addicted to boxes, containers and organizing supplies, yet I am still unorganized and have lots of clutter (and empty boxes!).  Luckly the lack of implemented organization does not apply to my digital life, where I am pretty anal about stuff.
15. I started a comic book with my best friend in high school.  She wrote the story, I edited it.  She sketched the characters, I drew the backgrounds and inked everything.  She took a copy of our first page to a conference where Neil Gaiman was speaking and asked him to sign my #1 Sandman.  When she gave him the page he said “Nice inking!”.  Those two words still mean a lot to me!
16. I really don’t like chocolate that much.  I wil pick a fruity “treat” over a chocolate one any day.
17. I am a font junkie.  I can lose hours browsing and downloading them if I don’t already have one for the project I’m working on.
18. I am allergic to cats so I don’t really like them that much.  They LOVE me (I think they know I’m allergic and do it for spite).
19. When I was a kid I won several contests for “top seller” for school fundraisers and girl-scout cookies (back when they let kids go door to door to sell stuff).   By junior high I completely lost all sales ability.
20. I played clarinet in band.  I miss the euphoria of making music sometimes.
21. During a particularly boring summer when I was too young to drive and too old to go to day camp, I watched “Back to the Future” twice a day and memorized the entire script.  I could recite it on a whim for years later.
22. I have two genetic oddities from my parents: a “double tooth” from my dad and a missing arch tendon in both feet from my mom.
23. I am a good cook, when I decide to cook, which isn’t as often as it should be.
24. I must do something creative on a regular basis or I am totally miserable.
25. I find small dogs dressed up in clothes/costumes very entertaining.

Lemon-Rum-Cream Chicken

I had all these beautiful lemons from the tree in my backyard and decided I needed to make something with them for dinner.

I found a few recipes for lemon cream chicken online but didn’t have all the ingredients so I made up something instead.  It turned out great (Tad and Avynn thought so too)!  It has a wonderful tangy lemon flavor in the thick creamy sauce.  And it’s relatively low-carb too.

Ingredients:

• Boneless, skinless chicken breasts (approx 2lbs).
• Butter (about 4-6 tblsp, your preference)
• 1 cup Heavy whipping cream
• 2/3 cup lemon juice without seeds but pulp is fine
• 1/2 cup Spiced Rum (I was out of wine… this worked well!)
• Salt
• Paprika

Instructions:

1. Mix salt and paprika in a small dish and use as a rub for both sides of the chicken.
2. Melt butter in a large skillet and cook chicken through.  For thick breasts it took about 20-30 minutes on medium-high heat.  Flip as necessary.
3. While chicken is cooking, mix cream, lemon juice and rum in a bowl.  Set aside.
4. When chicken is ready, remove from skillet and set aside.
5. Pour cream sauce in skillet and mix with the melted butter and chicken juices.
6. Turn heat to high and reduce the cream sauce.  Stir constantly to prevent it from scalding.  Takes about 5 minutes to condense to a glue-like consistency.
7. Pour sauce over chicken immediately and serve.

Ponzu Chicken

This recipe is almost cheating considering how easy it is but it’s so good and still falls under the category of low-carb so it’s worth posting.  Ponzu sauce has less than 1 carb per serving (check the label!) and chicken has no carbs so I’m going to be generous and say that this is 1 carb per serving.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 lbs of chicken breast halves (~ 4 large or 6 small)
• 1 bottle of Ponzu sauce

Instructions:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
2. Place chicken in a 12in rectangular baking dish in a single layer and cover with ponzu sauce.
3. Cover with aluminum foil.
4. Bake for 25-35 minutes (depending on thickness of chicken breasts).

Chicken in Sundried Tomato Cream Sauce

I modified this recipe from one in The Atkins Essentials a book that quick-starts you on Induction (the first phase of Atkins).  It is quite yummy and about 3-4 net carbs per serving.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 lbs of chicken breast halves (about 4 large or 6 small)
• 1/2 tblsp salt (optional if you are on a sodium restriction)
• 2 tblsp chili powder
• 2 tblsp paprika
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 3 tblsp butter
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 6 oil-packed sundried tomatoes cut into thin strips

Instructions:

1. In a small bowl mix salt, chili powder and paprika to make a dry rub.
2. Place olive oil and butter in a large skillet on medium high heat.
3. While the butter is melting rub the chicken breasts on both sides with the dry mixture.
4. Cook the chicken until cooked through (about 20-30 minutes depending on thickness) flipping every few minutes.
5. Remove chicken from skillet and place on a warm plate.  Turn heat to medium low.
6. Add chicken broth and sundried tomatoes to skillet.  Stir and cook until liquid is reduced by about half.
7. Add cream and stir until the sauce thickens, about 4-5 minutes.
8. Serve sauce over chicken.

Pork chops can also be prepared with the dry rub and olive oil/butter preparation.  It’s a great basic seasoning.

Low-carb Coffee Souffle

This is a recipe that I’ve come up with modified from a recipe that I found several years ago for a quick, easy eggy low-carb breakfast.  It will make a souffle-like dish that looks horrible but is quite tasty!  Estimating it to be about 4 net carbs.

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 1 tblsp vanilla extract
• 2 tblsp Sugar Free General Foods International Coffee (your preferred flavor - I like Suisse Mocha)
• 1 packet Splenda or your preferred artificial sweetner
• 2 large eggs

Instructions:

1. In a microwaveable cereal-sized bowl whisk cream, vanilla, coffee and sweetner until well blended.
2. Add eggs and whisk again until fully blended.
3. Microwave for 2 to 2.5 minutes.  If you are using a convection oven with a rack remove it because the souffle will rise and come out of the top of the bowl, sometimes up to 3 inches.
4. Remove from oven and let settle (it will shrink back into the bowl) and cool for a minute before eating.

Enjoy!

Trying out imified posting

I just added Tumblr to my imified widget collection. Giving it a test run to see how the posting process works! I’m fascinated with imified. I want to create my own widgets soon.

The French take Sunday seriously.

Nothing is open near the hotel where I’m staying as far as places to eat. Even Starbucks is closed and that amazes me. I had to get lunch from a vending machine in the Metro or pay my whole per diem to eat something from the hotel restaurant. All I’ve had to eat today is a breakfast bar, a pack of Madeleines, and a bottle of Orangina (met pulp!). I need protein badly! I can’t wait for dinner.

The apple tarts at the Louvre Cafe are very tasty.

I’d definitely suggest one if you need a snack while you’re there! Mmmmm. Tres Bon!

Even the pigeons speak a different language in France.

A pigeon roosted outside my hotel window for a good bit of the morning, “singing” as they do. It looked just like an American pigeon but sure didn’t sound the same!