Back home!

This morning I had drip coffee, you know what that means....

I'm back in America!! I already Americanized my nails

Much to my surprise, last minute I made the stand by flight & I got to spend a good 13 hours in the very back of a plane in between 2 men. FYI sitting between 2 men on a flight is the worse because they always take over BOTH of the armrests. The feminist in me fought for my armrest long & hard the whole flight. Besides the bad seat, since I was standby I couldn't order a special vegan meal, & not expecting to get on the flight, the only thing I had eaten was a bowl of warm muesli that morning.

The flight was a vegans worse nightmare: creamy fettucini, a roast beef roll for a snack, & eggs w/ grey sausage. Ick! I had to go non vegan a bit & had a small croissant, green salad, pretzels, chardonnay, & coffee. I was starving when I got off the flight! Thankfully as soon as my mom picked me up from LAX she brought me to a vegan restaurant that I have been meaning to try- Veggie Grill. This place was reminiscent of Native Foods (my all time favorite). I had the Santa Fe Crispy Chickin' w/ crispy chillin' chickin', lettuce, tomato, red onion, avocado, & southwestern spiced vegan mayo on a bed of kale w/ a side of chili.

My mom had the VG- Cheeseburger done El Dorado style w/ jalapenos, caramelized onions, & ketchup w/ a side salad w/ miso dressing. I thought it tasted yummy, but my mom still thinks Native Foods is way better.

Later I drove back to the airport & picked James up from his flight & we came home to a nice homemade meal. Knowing the both of us too well my mom made James a big pasta w/ chicken while I had brown rice topped w/ broccoli cooked in garlic & truffle oil. Truffle oil is sooo good!

This morning I had copious amounts of the coffee shown in the first pic & made breakfast for the family. Cooking for everyone else made me not so hungry, so I waited until the fam (along w/ James & Dru) & I went to go see Eclipse to have my first feed. My friend Dru, the person who originally got me into veganism, has recently converted back to her vegan ways so I brought us some healthy snacks to the movies. Chili & lime cashews, dried apricots, & pepitas.

For lunch I made myself a simple wrap w/ a whole wheat tortilla filled w/ shredded soy cheese, guacamole, tomatoes, & arugula. Doused in tapatio.

Tonight both sets of my grandparents came over for dinner & we drank peach sangria...

& I enjoyed an arugula salad w/, sugar plum tomatoes, & garlic croutons....

hummus, grapes,pita chips and a cold pasta salad....

Yum! It's nice to be home & w/ the family. Hoping for nice weather tomorrow so I can enjoy the beach. Cheers for now.

James' 21st Birthday!

Special K vanilla almond cereal w/ 1/2 sliced banana & soy milk. So good.

With a long black coffee from the Paddington Grind. Like my shoes? ; )

I grabbed a quick bite from the food court at the Westfield mall in Maroubra where we were busy buying some last minute things for James' birthday party. This yummy salad from Sumo Salad gave me the energy I needed to blow up all 150 balloons. Whew.

A hodge podge of sorts. Mixed greens w/ corn, tomato, carrots, chickpeas, avocado & pumpkin w/ balsamic vinaigrette, a bread roll, & a diet coke.

At James' party there was a ton of food. I only got a pic of some of the appetizers including brie & crackers, hummus, guacamole, quiche, & spanakopita. For dinner there were unpictured kebabs, sausages, & lots of salads.

For dessert there was the healthy option of a big fruit salad...

& James' amazing birthday cake that his aunty had made for him. This cake was insane! I love the surfer. It was made by Chris at Cake Occasions.

It was such an amazing night. James' sister & I made a slide show of photos and videos of James' throughout his life, and some of his friends and best mates (along with me) gave speeches.

A million drinking songs later this cute couple from the beginning of the night turned into....

girlfriend taking care of a very wasted boyfriend. Poor James was more trashed than he has ever been in his entire life. I guess that's what 21st birthday parties are for. Interesting fact: the dress I was wearing was James' moms from about 20 years ago.

After sleeping in super late at James' parents house, we made it back to Paddington where I grabbed a soy long black w/ honey from The Grind.

We lucked out & there were tons of leftovers from the party so lunch was as easy as warming up some roasted vegetables & adding the usual hummus & BBQ sauce.

Even though it was James' birthday I was spoiled & received a gift from friend and fellow blogger Winnecke. She works at a bakery, Sonoma, and after reading my blog and seeing how much I love grains she gifted me some of their muesli.

For dinner I had a bit of both the honey & breakfast spice and spelt maple & almond cooked w/ soy milk. I think I died and went to heaven this muesli was so delicious, it won't last long. Thanks Winnecke!

Tiger Mottle

Tiger Mottle, refers to the 'mottled' surface of a perfect espresso extraction. More importantly the term refers to my favorite place in Paddington for breakfast located at the 5-ways. Tiger Mottle is a restored terrace that has been converted into a restaurant that serves simple breakfast & lunch, and the best coffee I have found yet in Sydney.

Everything inside is a pristine white, save for the retro vinyl covers on the wall & a wooden moose head above the fireplace which is always roaring (even though it doesn't look like it in the pic, I swear it was!).

James took me here for breakfast this morning before we headed to the library. I started off w/ a soy latte w/ honey which was especially rich & creamy. You can tell by the design on top that they really take their coffee seriously here.

For my breakfast I had the mottle muesli- toasted maple, macadamia, & pecan muesli w/ soy milk, banana, & rhubarb. Rhubarb on top of granola (or muesli as they always call it here) is amazing! I am dying to try making granola sometime soon after recently reading about how to make it on this chica's blog.

For lunch I went to the salad bar again & had a mixed green salad w/ chickpeas, pumpkin, avocado, corn, pumpkin seeds, tomatoes & sun dried tomato basil dressing. No bread for me this time. I was happy to see two fellow foodies taking pics of their salad too. Taking pics of food by yourself can be soo awkward sometimes, I'm glad to know I'm not alone ; )

Second coffee of the day. CAFEEEINE. The coffee stand on the UNSW campus always makes their coffee lukewarm, more like room temperature to be honest. I begged them to do it extra hot this time, but I think they were a bit confused because they made it w/ extra foam. Hmmmm very curious. I also ate a banana but did not take a pic, it was waaay to big & phallic looking haha.

I'll be honest my day at the library was very discouraging. I took my first GRE practice test and I did not do well at all. From there on I started freaking out about grad school, and wondering if I'll get in anywhere... I'm not even positive where I want to go at this point, I still need to research more. I just wished the GRE was based off my knowledge of psychology not random words & math that I have not studied since high school. I do not understand the logic of standardized tests. Thank God I have 2 months left to study, hopefully it will be enough : /

My dinner was equally as uninspired as I was feeling about the GRE- leftover vegan fried rice James' mom the other night that I hadn't tried yet w/ some sweet chili sauce. I also had a few bites of James' pasta that he ate for dinner. Think I'm going to take a break from studying tomorrow in hopes that it will boost my morale.

Australia Bound

I have offically left sunny Cali to come down under to my home away from home,Sydney to visit my boyfriend : ) As my friends know I am completely obsessed w/ Australia, and this is my 4th time back over the past two years. Long distance is difficult but a great excuse to travel frequently.

Before heading to Sydney I had to indulge in a big burrito, because while Sydney may have lots of great international cuisine Mexican food is not their forte. My sisters and I when to la Sirena and I got a big veggie burritoSadly this burrito was a bit of a let down, partially this was my fault because I did not look at the menu. The only veggies were bell peppers and mushrooms, both of which i'm not a fan of. Plus there were no beans at all!! I quickly got a side of beans to add to it as well as tons of salsa, I took a couple of close up shots but they were a bit intense trust me you don't want to see them.

For the long flight to Australia I flew United. United really is not my first choice for flying internationally, but I'm trying to build up my miles w/ them. United is like the Best Western of flights to Sydney, they don't fuss around w/ any of the niceties. Quantas is like the Ritz Carlton, expensive but luxurious (they have great snack packs for the flight & serve tea and hot coco before you go to sleep). My favorite though is V Australia I would say it is the equivalent to the W hotel if I really want to keep this airline/hotel comparison going. When you walk onto the plane it feels like you are entering a club, they have funky lighting & good music, individual tv screens w/ tons of new movies & games, and great food.
I was impressed though w/ United's vegan in flight dinner that I requested before the flight online.
Couscous w/ chickpeas and grilled eggplant and onion, a side salad, pumpernickle bread, and raisins. I didn't manage to get a photo of breakfast, but it was pretty delicious too. I had cooked fruit w/ sometype of corn meal thingy, it sounds weird but I swear it was good.
I slept almost the entire flight, and attempted to watch a movie but they stopped it half way through because first class's screens weren't working : ( I don't really understand why this meant that they had to turn of the video in economy though... errr
14 hours later I landed in Sydney at 6 AM, and couldn't have been more happy to see James waiting there to pick me up, It has been 3 months since I last saw him.We were those obnoxious couples you see in airports- you know the kind, kissing & hugging and running into eachother's arms.
Later on for lunch we stopped by Charcoal Charlie's and I had 3 types of salad put together-Avocado vinaigrette, tabouli, and grilled vegetable.
Look at the size of this tomato!I'll be honest here Australian food is really far better than American food.Trust me the first time I visited I put on 15 lbs no joke & it was worth every single bite. This was mostly because I had chips (french fries) w/ every single meal , not because Australian food doesn't have healthy options because trust me they do. The general quality of their food is at a much higher standard than in America; everything is super fresh & you can really taste the difference in their produce as well as their eggs & dairy (I was not vegan the first time I visited). You really do pay for the quality though, everything is SUPER expensive and the portion sizes are a lot smaller.

For dinner we went to James' parents house & his mom was nice enough to make me a super yummy vegan meal.
Grilled tofu & veggiesYellow curry veggies
Grilled garlic eggplant
Least to say I was super stuffed after this meal. I left my camera at his parent's house so I was only able to capture a few pics of my next meals w/ James' Iphone. Sorry for the poor quality.
For lunch the following day we got some thai food & I had some spicy Tom Yum soup w/ Tofu & veggies.
That night we went to the Courthouse Hotel in Newtown to celebrate James' brother Damien's 23rd Bday. I had the coucous & spinach salad, which was far better than I expected considering it was pub food.
It was a really great night but towards 11:30 pm I was almost falling asleep on the table. My jetlag has not been that bad, but it was 6 AM for me at that time.

This morning I woke up and my voice is offically gone, I think it is because of the climate change. It has been pouring rain since I've arrived. James and I went to my favorite Cafe right across the street from us in Paddington; Micky's. James' brother is the barista here so he hooked us up w/ some coffee & juice...
Large soy latte for me. FYI in Australia there is no such thing as regular drip coffee, there is only espressso and there sizes are much smaller. The one time that I attempted to order an ice coffee I ended up with a vanilla ice cream milkshake w/ espresso on top.
James had the above juice made w/ fresh pineapple, apple, & oranges.
For brekkie I had the toasted muesli (granola) w/ strawberries, bananas, honey, and soy milk on top. The muesli was so good it had macademia nuts, raisins, and glazed orange rinds.
Now we're in the library studying it up. I know you're probably thinking I'm crazy for studying while I'm on vacay but I've already done the tourist thing & I really need to study for the GRE plus James has finals coming up. So long for now ; )