why oh why must it end??

I'm sitting in my favorite chair with my favorite puppy sleeping in my lap. I'm not ready for this vacation to be over! We had such a fun Thanksgiving break, it's going to be a tad difficult pulling myself out of bed at 5:30 tomorrow morning... *Le Sigh*
Have you seen the movie "Blind Side"??? Well you need to go see it ASAP if you haven't. Tim McGraw, Sandra Bullock, and Kathy Bates are in it... It is a feel-good movie that is funny and quite entertaining. I give it 2 thumbs up!

Sunday Snuggle Time

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How to Share

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Black (bean) Friday

BEANS! Ross has been smoking outside all day...brisket, beer can chicken, AND baked beans on the smoker. The Huebel parents and brother Adam came over for dinner, which was a feast. The meat was tender, juicy, and moist. yum. the beans were a big hit. The dish was a combination of black beans, baked beans, and pinto beans with BBQ sauce, dijon mustard, brown sugar, chopped brisket, bell pepper, and JALEPENOS. They were rather spicy, but in a good way. For desert we had Dorie's Cranberry Lime Gallette. Fresh and dried cranberries, apple, walnuts, brown sugar, and lime juice?? Hello tart, hello sweet. Goodbye.

The Huebel's are upstairs right now playing Xbox with Ross and Adam. All I hear is laughing. Apparently they are new to Forza 3 (race car game). I love holidays :)

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Gobble Gobble

I love LOVE holidays. nothing is better than no work, good food, AND family time. Tuesday night Britany and I went to see the 2nd installment of the Twilight vampire movie, New Moon. While it is not going to win any awards, it was definitely entertaining. I've read the books, which are quite sappy and poorly written, so I thought the movie was about on par with my expectations. Ross's buddy Brandon also came over for dinner on Tues. The boys didn't want to go with Brit and I to see the movie though... they stayed home for a beer/xbox night instead.

On Thanksgiving I ran in the inaugural Clear Lake Turkey Day 10K. It was a beautiful day and a great way to start the holiday. I think a turkey trot might become a Huebel tradition. The family all convened on the Huebel parents house ~ 12:30 and the eating began!

Ross & Liz

Adam & Grannie

Grandad and the troublemakers :)

My contribution to the festivities was Dorie's All-in-One Holiday Bundt cake. It's a spiced pumpkin cake filled with apples, cranberries, and pecans topped with a maple syrup glaze. It was good, but I was not blown away. My expectations may have been too high...but I did have several people say they enjoyed it!!

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Last work day till MONDAY!

Just finished my coffee and the office is still empty. Hmm. On the bright side, today is my last work day this week! Ross & I went over to the Mack's house for dinner last night. Andrea made "Baked Spasagna", a cross between spaghetti and lasagna, based on a meal she'd had at Chedder's. I can't say I'd ever had it before, but it sure was good! I love these kind of dinner dates during the week because it's something to look forward to on an otherwise drab Monday... :)

I'm going to see the vampire movie, New Moon, with Britany tonight. Stay tuned for my review!!

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Friends make me :)

Natalie came in town this weekend (she's in Tyler TX till Aug) and we just had a grand'ole'time. We met up after lunch on Saturday and tooled around the Galleria for a bit. We are definitely complimentary shoppers. here's a tidbit of the dressing room conversation:

Liz: "what do you think of this shirt?"
Nat: "MMM, no. It looks funny."
Liz: "It makes me look like a scarecrow right?"
Nat: "It DOES! It really does. Let's go now"
Liz: "Ok"

We went over to Katrina's for a candle party (imagine pampered chef but for candles...). We had a nice time catching up with Katrina and the other girls. We bought some cute stuff too!

Katrina and I

Nat and I headed to Hugo's for dinner afterwards. Delish!!

Natalie's: Poblano Peppers stuffed with Chicken

Liz: Scallops over sweet corn bread and swiss chard

I forgot to get a picture with Natalie... but if she would hurry up and get back to Houston I can get one :)

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Friday Recap

It's been a great weekend so far. I figured I'd squeeze in a post before church :) Friday night Ross made dinner and I made dessert :)

Beer-Marinated Chicken and Grilled Veggies

Dorie's Chunky, Chewy Blondies

Now, I have a confession about these blondies. This is the 2nd time I made them, the first was a quasi disaster bc they we so undercooked. However, I really love cookie dough so I guess the outcome wasn't all that tragic, just not picture worthy. So I made a couple modifications for round 2 and they turned out lovely. It's a cookie bar made with chopped dark chocolate, walnuts, heath chips, and a little bit of butterscotch chips for good measure (my addition). Ross said, "BEST BLONDIE EVER!"

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And then there were 4.

Ross and I had a nice evening just hanging out and watching Top Chef of course.

TOP CHEF Spoiler Alert!!
It was the last competition in Vegas before the finale in Napa Valley and Eli got sent home. 4 chefs left! My advice to Eli: Never serve raw lamb to a panel of judges, especially when some of the judges are women. EWWAH.

We made dinner out of a BOX last night *GASP*. haha. We were suppossed to eat something else, but when you have to work late, it's dark outside, and you can't wait for meat to marinate, things happen. Low Sodium Zatarain's Red Beans and Rice with lean ground beef is pretty tasty under these conditions :)

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Tuesday with the Huebel's

What a long day at work. I'm not sure if it was the cooler weather or just a case of the midweek blues, but I never really woke up today. Steph came over for dinner... Robbie had to go out of town for work last minute, but we couldn't stop the party just bc of him now could we?? She brought over a little something something for Roma, from her pups, Haribo and Maple...

Hahahah. I love that the front of the card has a gray pup. Steph where did you find a gray marker? Impressive. Ross cooked up fish pontchatrain from our Brennan's cookbook. Gotta love some creole cooking. The flounder was great with the sauce and accompanied by grilled zucchini with a pesto sauce and pine nuts. MMMMM. The food was a nice way to wind down from a long day at the office.

For dessert, we had Dorie's Chocolate Gingerbread Cake. Once we got past some difficulties with the baking time, things were smooth sailing. It's a moist, chocolate buttermilk cake with chunks of chocolate and 3 kinds of ginger: ground, fresh, and candied. The consensus was that the ginger flavor overpowered the chocolate flavor. Next time I will cut down on the amount of ginger. (I happen to love ginger so thought it was perfect, but I agree it might be a little strong for the average eater). The cake kind of tastes like a giant gingerbread man. Feast.

Wednesday here I come.

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Gone Country

We didn't herd cattle, but we did do a lot of other things. Our weekend in a nutshell included S'mores, pitching tents, filling deer feeders with corn, target practice, avoiding cows, avoiding cow patties, squatting in the woods, hiking, tracking deer, sitting in the deer blind, falling asleep in the deer blind, and a campfire.Also, have you ever tried to take a nap in a tent with a Weimaraner? Probably not the best i dea if you want to sleep. Huebel slumber party!!

The new deer blinds.

The View

Momma's Boys.

The tents were inside the fence so the hogs wouldn't

surprise us at night. That's the old trailer we need

to get rid of.

Killer.

Target Practice.

Lap dog.

Dinner- steak and potatoes.

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Roma Update

UPDATE: The Vet doesn't think Roma has broken or fractured anything. She gave us some pain killers and we are to return if Roma is not back to herself by the end of the week. Good News!

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Injured Pup

We had a great weekend at the Ranch, but when we returned home last night Roma jumped out of the car and landed on her foot wrong. She has been limping around, careful not to put any pressure on her front paw. She won't eat, walk, or play which is NOT like our puppy girl at all. We are thinking something might be broken. Vet trip today... :(

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Heading West

The car is all packed up for our "Family Ranch Weekend" and we are heading west after work this evening! Ross was packing up all of Roma's stuff last night and she was so excited because she thought it was time to go hunting with Daddy. Not just yet missy. We will be staying with family friends in Kerrville tonight before heading to the Ranch tomorrow. The Huebel parents and Adam/Danielle will be meeting us out there. Gotta get a Friday night hunt in! Roma & I will be in the deer blind with Ross, helping him find the biggest buck of course... We will stay in a hotel Friday and then Saturday we will be camping out on the Ranch. Full-fledged camping. When I say camping, I'm not referring to the family camping we used to do where there was always a shower house, sinks, bathrooms, etc. No. I mean camping in a tent in the woods far, far from life as we know it. (well really only 30 minutes, but who's counting?) So wish us (me) luck!!! We'll be back on Sunday, hopefully with some venison :)

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Food or Pup?

I had a comment from my brother about the content of my blog:

Jeff: "Lizabeth your blog is all about food now"

Liz: "Well I like to eat... come on, we do it 3+ times a day"

Couldn't get better logic than that eh??! In an effort to provide "blog balance" I am returning to my OTHER favorite subject :)... these were taken at the dog park near our house.

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Quintuple Chocolate Brownies

Dorie's Quintuple Chocolate Brownies are A*M*A*Z*I*N*G!! The recipe includes 4 kinds of chocolate: unsweetened, bittersweet, milk, and white. I omitted the milk chocolate and used semisweet instead- for us, the darker the better! The big chocolate chunks and chopped walnut combination in the brownie are divine. The white chocolate is melted and poured over the top after the brownie has cooled. I didn't have heavy cream so the white chocolate was not the ultra thick consistency as the book describes, but it tasted great.  Some white chocolate chunks never hurt anyone right? Ross gave it 2 thumbs up and he isn't even a chocoholic. Here it is folks!

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Date Night: Houston's Best

My story will require a bit of background information:

1. Ross & I go out for "date night" about once a month, where we try a new restaurant that has been highly rated in Texas Monthly magazine.
2. From our restaurant experiences we have put together "Houston's Best Meal", which is our favorite appetizer, main course, and dessert from all the restaurants in Houston.

Alright, we're all up to speed now. So we had a date night planned for Friday night but Ross wouldn't tell me any details, which is highly unusual because most of the time I do the reservation, etc. All week I had been trying to guess because he told me he would tell me if I guessed it. I must have guessed 30+ places before giving up.

Last night Ross came home from work with a bouquet of flowers from a FLORIST not a GROCERY STORE!!!

We got dressed up and he took me to Goode Company Seafood and I immediately knew we had started our "Houston's Best" meal night!! The appetizer is called a Campechana. It's basically a salsa/pico parfait with lump crab meat that you scoop onto tortilla chips. Behold.

Crab Campechana.

Next, Ross took me to Ibiza downtown. Now, we haven't officially picked the best main course, but we did pick Ibiza for best risotto, so that's where we went. Sidenote: the head chef at Ibiza actually competed on Iron Chef of America and made this risotto! I had fresh Amberjack, grilled simply with lemon and sea salt, and risotto of course! Ross had beef tenderloin with a cheese sauce and bacon infused risotto. so good!

Amberjack.

Beef.

Now, for my favorite part of the whole meal, dessert of course. I have pretty high standards for desserts because I have an extreme sweet tooth, but Pappas Steakhouse wins. Hands down. Warm, gooey, pecan pie with a caramel topping and more candied pecans than you know what to do with. Tastebud bliss.

Pecan Pie with caramel ice cream.

I love pecan pie, but more importantly I LOVE THE ROSS!!

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The Battle Begins

First off,
CONGRATULATIONS TO NATALIE FOR PASSING THE TEXAS BAR EXAM!!!!! NOW I HAVE A LAWYER!!!!

Tonight I decided to take on Dorie's Caramel Crunch Bars. It's basically a chocolate chip cookie crust with chocolate and Heath bits on top. It might be better to describe with a picture...

It was really yum. I think Dorie's baking times may be slightly off because I had to add a good 10 minutes. Overall, it's a keeper. The cinnamon in the cookie crust is a really nice addition. I omitted the expresso because coffee flavor isn't Ross's favorite.

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From My Home to Yours!

My new cookbook arrived from Amazon today!! The book is "Baking: from my Home to Yours By Dorie Greenspan". She is supposed to be the Queen of baking. We'll see won't we. BE PREPARED... yummy things to come soon!

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Halloween Fun!

Houston weather was just GORGEOUS this weekend. Clear, sunny skies and temperatures in the 70's. We went to the Wings Over Houston Air Show on Saturday morning. The Blue Angels were featured, but my favorite plane is still the F-15... it steals the show every year. Ross & I also picked out our future airplane :)
On Saturday night we went to Clay & Andrea's Halloween party, just down the street. We had a good time handing out candy to all the trick-or-treaters and eating some yum food. I posted pictures HERE. there are some older pics that i've already posted on the blog. Check out page 2 to see our costumes! any guesses??!

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