Adventures in Omelet Making

Tyson and I ventured out this morning to the Madison Farmer's Market...lots and lots of stands of delicious locally-produced food (particularly cheese...these crazy Wisconsinites), flowers, plants, and other things. Tyson and I specifically went to buy ingredients for fresh, homemade omelets! (I actually went because I wanted coffee and flowers, but he can think I went for the omelets...)

Confession: I have never made an omelet before.

Neither has Tyson. (Yeah, big surprise there.)

Well, let's see how this works...

Attempt #1: Not bad, but half of the "egg pancake" ripped when I tried to flip it. Some emergency cheese melting over the top was necessary to glue the whole thing back together.

At least Tyson thinks it tastes good! (And it did.)

Attempt #2 (note the smallest stove ever)...

...Tyson, in all his manliness, decided that he needed to figure out how to flip an omelet after my first "failed" attempt. Instead, he ended up folding the egg pancake over on itself three or four times, fusing the whole thing together in one egg-y lump. Rescue attempt for this batch? No longer an omelet, but scrambled eggs. And darn it, that was supposed to be MY omelet, too...

Attempt #3: A perfect flip! By none other than yours truly. Perfectly browned and delicious.

Conclusion: Omelets: 1, Shannon: 1, Tyson: -1.

A Week in the Life: Friday

3:45 am: Home again!

4:02 am: GOOD NIGHT!

11:12 am: Morning stop for Caribou. Bring on the caffeine!

11:17 am: Hello again, COD.

1:09 pm-1:30 pm: Photos of our presentation for the critique. Check out those rockin' boards and picturesque model. Yup, this is exactly what I have been staying up for all week 'til the wee hours...

4:59 pm: And my roommates wonder why I am never at home. Note: Crystal made me promise not to post this picture on Facebook. Did I violate any of those terms here? I think not.

6:33 pm-7:42 pm: Dress rehearsal for the dance recital that is (eep!) tomorrow! Too many cute (and crazy!) little kids in one place. These are just some of my favorite shots, but I took a ton more!

And now...TO B-E-D!!!

A Week in the Life: Thursday

3:39 am: Working on the boards for our project in studio. You can see my friend and groupmate Kraemer in the background. We've been buddies since freshman year here at ISU (eep-that's 5 years ago!) and took the same studio together this semester and happened to be placed into the same group for our project.

4:27 am (duh, silly): Arrive home! Yay!

9:18 am: One last, longing look at my bed before heading back to studio 5 hours after I left it.

11:46 am: The start of a rendering.

11:46 am: Breaktime. Dark chocolate M & M's Premium break time, that is.

2:15 pm: Heading back to studio after art history class, some good ol' Caribou Coffee in hand. My body has ingested more caffeine within the past few days than in the last few months combined...

2:19 pm: Rendering, middle stage.

2:36 pm: Realize that except for the handful of delicious M & M's I had earlier, I have not eaten all day. Yogurt covered pretzels to the rescue!

5:03 pm: Dash home to grab my glasses and my car. Take another longing look at my bed. I am pretty sure there is a Shannon-sized spot in there...

7:08 pm: Finished rendering. Yay!

At 1:48 am I am still here...no new pictures...this Thursday wasn't too exciting...but at least it involved chocolate and Caribou!

McCafe part II

So quite ironically, I was able to go to a McDonalds that is part McCafe the very day after I made my last blog post.  

I am sad to say that I was slightly disappointed.  The interior atmosphere I can somewhat excuse, as the McDonald's was not quite large enough to contain an entire "McCafe" addition, but served as little more than an extension to their menu in little Carroll, Iowa.  Something I cannot excuse is the fact that everything was automatic.  I stood, waiting at 8:45 am for a delicious vanilla latte to jumpstart my day, and was quite surprised when all of a sudden it appeared, after seeing no one touch the espresso machine.  I didn't even know the machine was on and working yet apparently it had been able to spit out my latte.  But there was none of the experience that makes it what it is: no grinding beans, no careful pouring of the steamed milk and mixing with the espresso...the only human touch was to put the lid securely on the cup.  I can pay 50 cents at a vending machine for that experience!

I would say that the taste was a step up from the gas station cappuccino machines that I mocked with my last post, but definitely a step down from my beloved Caribou, or even Starbucks.  I suppose you get what you pay for.  It wasn't entirely bad, but definitely could have been better.  The latte made up in sweetness what it lacked in strong, espresso taste, but that could possibly be remedied by not adding a syrup flavor to it.  

While I am not too enthused about the coffeehouse-style drinks that the McCafe has to offer, I am still enticed by their cold coffee drinks, and even their plain old cup of coffee.  Maybe my expectations were set too high by their cold coffee drinks.  At any rate, I will not be making special trips to McDonald's for coffee anytime soon (only potentially for an iced vanilla latte) but will just be happy that if I go to McDonald's for breakfast, I can have some decent coffee to go along with it.

McCafe v. Fashion Week

http://www.stylelist.com/blog/2009/02/11/fashion-week-has-an-official-coffee-its-mccafe/#comments

See above link.

A year ago, I probably would have thought the same thing as the author of the blog post above.  McDonald's + coffee?  Not just coffee, but espresso and lattes and mochas?  I would have assumed that it tastes like the "cappuccino" you get out of the gas station machines.  You know the kind, it's basically sweetened, syrup-y water infused with a drop of "coffee-flavor" substance.

However...

While I have not had any of the hot coffee drinks from McDonald's, I have had their cold ones.  They make a mean iced coffee or (my personal favorite) iced vanilla latte.  Being a slightly picky coffee addict, I was pleasantly surprised at how delicious these drinks were.  And all for a dollar or two cheaper than the big coffee chains (ahem, Starbucks).  I have had their regular black coffee, too, and it is also pretty yummy.  And I read on the McCafe website that they don't charge you for a syrup shot!  I realize it is only 60 cents (at Caribou anyway), but when I get coffee everyday, that adds up to $4.20 every week, or $218.40 each year.

I have no reason to believe that their new hot coffeehouse drinks will be any less scrumptious.  Let's face it, McDonald's is an advertising and research-oriented powerhouse.  They tend to set the trends for the fast-food industry, and other chains are now trying to get their own coffee lines up and running.  Mickey D's is already a step ahead of them, and I am sure that they have done their homework before releasing such a radical hit to the market.

And have you seen the new McDonald's, particularly the "McCafe" portion of them?  They're...nice.  Rich woods and warm tile...no more hard, cold, plastic booths.  Instead of wanting to leave as soon as I sit down so I don't catch some unkown disease from the starkly neutral plastic seat, I actually wouldn't mind staying for longer than 10 minutes.  They even have contemporary lighting: drop down pendant lights and cove lighting that gives off a nice ambiance. (McDonalds?  Ambiance?  Crazy, huh?)  Though evidence of the traditional ketchup red and mustard yellow that characterizes the McDonald's logo can still be seen, it is in a much more tasteful way.  Deeper reds and warmer yellows that warm up the space, instead of causing it to look like a preschool classroom.

I understand that McDonald's (even McCafe) being the official ANYTHING at fashion week seems a bit...low class.  But this is another evidence of McDonald's genius.  Get the celebrities, the fashion-forward celebrities, drinking their coffee, and oh, what a marketing scheme.  They don't have to do anything but give away free coffee, and the media will do the rest.  It's freaking FASHION WEEK, images of celebrities with a McCafe cup in the hand will be plastered all over the place.

I think it's brilliant, delicious, and that Ms. Wintour is in for a little shock.

CHECK THIS OUT!!!

I am probably more excited about this than I should be...

http://www.mccafesnowflakes.com/