Pinterest: Green Onion Project to the test

I will admit it, I'm a pinner. I enjoy Pinterest as much as the next person. 

Pinterest, if you don't already know, is not all about pinning and making pretty boards to look at. It also has to do with creating and doing. 

So I took one of the pinners' DIY when I saw that she grew her own green onions from your cut/used green onions. Her pin said after you do this, you'll never have to buy your own green onions again.

Was she right? Let's take it to the test.

Day 1:

Day 2: 

Day 3: 

So you can see the immediate growth. It's slow but very visible. 

Let's skip to Day #8.

Day 9:

Day 12:

Day 17: 

And 2 weeks later:

So yes, it does grow fairly fast. 

But is it edible? The texture of my green onion is very light and hallow and so I used it only to sprinkle it on  my dishes. It did not give me enough to use it the way I would if I had a 3 bunches of them.

Unfortunately, unlike the pinner, I will still need to buy green onions from the store as mine do not grow as fast (if I use a lot) and even if I had time to wait for it to grow, they still would not be thick or big enough for my culinary uses.

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This was a fun and interesting project and I would love to get deeper into nuturing an herb garden if I had a backyard of my own some day. 

Happy Hump Day! -Miss Eve

 Miss Eve gets to try a new thing today.

Another bright and sunny day is another day Miss Eve goes out to explore the world.

It's scary and lonely out there when it's just yourself. 

What to do?

Where to go?

Who will you meet?

Well... where best to start then where you are. And look at the poster closest to me. It says: "Drink it All..." So I guess to Miss Eve, that means have a sip of my lovely fresh water in my sippy cup!

"Well that was delicious!" -Miss Eve

Happy Hump Day! Hope that got a smile out of your work day! 

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Always remember to take a break and refuel so you can be a better and more productive Y-O-U!

Thanks for visiting today!

Food Review: Jules Bistro

French food in Toronto and my first time having french food! 

Shocker!?!?... I know right, me too!

Today's food review takes us south of Chinatown to Richmond/Spadina area. Jules Bistro is the name.

Outside has a very small and limiting patio area, but it's the interior area..... that'll get you excited -at least for those detail-oriented-type people. =0)

It's french all around. You walk in and you can feel the atmosphere, the staff, the colors just bringing you into a french culture world @ Jules Bistro. I loved every second of it.

Even the wait staff felt... can I say... authentic?! ;p 

After thoroughly admiring the restaurants' atmosphere and decorum, us hungry gals, dove right into the menu to see what tasty foods will be delighting our hungry stomaches.

They had a good size menu to choose from. And not only that, they had a pretty big "specials" list that night. After viewing everything, I opted for some meat.... Steak sandwich. I was kinda curious as to how the french do steak. If you don't know me, I'm a big lover of steaks. I like the rare to the rare of rares. And since it's in sandwich form, I knew I'd be enjoying my stead between 2 very good french breads!

And for Monsieur Boeufs' ($12.95) close up:

Okay, I know it looks like I'm bragging about everything about this restaurant, but honestly, the sandwich was GOOD! SO GOOD! SO VERY GOOD! The veggies with the sauce with the steak and the bread together was a marriage for success. 

My friends' mains were also VERY tasty:

Grilled Salmon

The salmon wasn't overcooked and the meat was fresh and delicious.

Chicken in a very creamy sauce

The chicken was very tender and the cream sauce was just enough creaminess.

One thing that was less exciting were the portions. It can be especially seen with both my friends' main entrees. They stacked on the french fries, but the chicken entree looked very petite. One of them also made a comment that the fries looked like the same size as McDs'. hehe

Also with my sandwich, I had a side of French Onion Soup. The soup was very clean and healthy tasting. It looked very simple. The taste of it was not what I had expected and wish there was more cheese in it. I found a small clump of melted cheese at the very bottom of my soup bowl. The soup was probably my least favorite thing about the whole experience.

But overall, my first french restaurant experience was not bad at all. The atmosphere and the space having filled up completely was a very nice feeling. The staff was extremely smiley and very nice. 

Price: $$$

Customer service: 4.5/5

Food: 4/5

Atmosphere: 5/5

Location: 5/5 (close to my workplace)

Overall, I rate it 4/5

Meric Jules Bistro for a great night of food and fun with my friends! I will definitely come again!

TIFF 2012: Giveaways & Contests coming soon

TIFF 2012 

September 6-16, 2012

Toronto, Canada

Will you be there with the Stars?

Films to screen: 

Looper (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis), God Loves Caviar, Imogene (Kristen Wigg), The Paperboy (Zac Efron, John Cusack), Argo (Ben Affleck), Writers (Kristen Bell, Greg Kinnear), Motorway (Johnnie To).... just to name a few.

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WANT TO WIN FREE TICKETS TO TIFF 2012? 

Come back to check out theccgirls' contest & giveaways!

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For more info, go to www.tiff.net

Food Review: Oh Geul Boh Geul (North York)

Just uptown on Yonge Street, in a small yellow/red coloured restaurant and squished between a row of other mom & pops' restaurants, is a great Korean restaurant called Oh Geul Boh Geul.

From my recollection, this is rare to have so many choices of side dishes. The other Korean restaurants I go to give, at most, 5 side dishes. This was a delight!

Too hungry to think, I forgot to take photos of the interior. But I'll describe it to you. It was small, very very small. But, they have a lot of seating. They even had private and spacious booth seats that looked as though they could fill 6, at most.

Onto our main dishes.

The popular, Tofu Stew with red bean rice

Spicy Seafood Noodle Soup

Ja Jang Myun (noodles) 

White Fish Stew

Each dish was blazing hot with tasty spices and great mouth full in every bite. They really pack it in. I love how they don't cheap out on the seafood like some other Korean restaurants I've been to. 

The service is okay, similar to all other Asian restaurants (quick and efficient). The place is small but it was very busy. We went on a Monday night and the place was already half packed when we were seated. And after 15 minutes, they had a line up. 

I liked this place very much and would definitely go again with friends. *Thanks Uncle Tony for taking us here! Great choice!

This place is good simply for great food. The ambiance is less than great, but the food and its size helps to overlook it. I think you would enjoy it if you like Korean food. 

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Overall, I rate it 3.8/5

Post London Olympics 2012

This summer Olympics I am happy to say I really got into the spirit.

With that said, I wasn't the only one.
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Cannot wait till Rio 2016!

Food Review: Cafe Moroc

Cafe Moroc is an exotic eatery in Toronto.

If you're open minded about eating in a room filled with lavish fabrics hanging delicately up and down, left and right, then come check this place out.

Unfortunately, I didn't experience the dinner "party", but had their lunch special during Summerlicious. 

From the entrance, the exotic feel encapsulates you with their foliage on either side of the doors. 

Then as you move pass the front "cafe-ish" area, you walk into an Moroccan dream: Dark, drapery and delicate.

The feel of the place was very new and exciting. From the beginning, it already made my experience here very fun and exciting. 

The Food Experience:

Appetizers to start we enjoyed a Moroccan Maftoul & Harira

Maftoul is a hand rolled "morrocan cigars", crispy pastry stuffed with spicy beef, cashews and raisins and topped with Chipotle aioli. This was a VERY tasty appetizers. Nothing seemed too spicy until the aioli touches your tongue. But without aioli, the dish would not be the same. I love that it was 2, because it was a taste explosion in your mouth.

Harira is a hearty tomato based broth, with chickpeas, kidney beans, lentils and a blend of Morrocan spices. This soup was tasteful matched with the Maftoul experience. The different ingredients each had a solo performance in your mouth but at the same time, bringing them all together to work well as one tasty soup.

The Entree: Mango Salmon

With salmon, I always hesitate to order because I am very picky about how cooked I would like it to be. I know that I can't get it just a tad under cooked (food regulations etc), but in the end, it's really a leap of faith when I decide to order salmon. This time around, I was satisfied. With the combination of the flavourful rice and veggies, the mango salmon was delicious. The salmon was nice and flaky and not at all dry. 

Spiced Cinnamon, Caramel and Apple Cheesecake (photo above). For me, cheesecake is a great dessert. But in saying that, it's also best made by North Americans. I'm sorry, it's just how I feel. This cheesecake was too light, too cheesy/creamy in a bad way and too soft. That's not how a cheesecake should be made. All in all, I did not like it.

The other dessert we had was more authentic, as its described in their menu, "Morrocan Treats". It was basically Meringue. And after you take a big or medium bite out of it, it became very sticky and chewy in your mouth. It was... okay, but definitely not something I would order again. 

This being my first time to this restaurant, but also having it on my radar for quite some time (it always being included in Summerlicious), the hype of it was rather half good half okay. The space and atmosphere captured a very enticing dinner atmosphere for dates or intimate dinners with close friends, and the first 2 dishes were good... but.. I'm all about desserts and they just didn't make any good punches with either desserts. 

Overall, I will have to rate it 3.1/5

Food Review: The Blake House

The house-looking restaurant found on Jarvis between Wellesley and College called The Blake House is a mysterious one that you might pass by and be curious about.

My friend and I took the opportunity to take that curiosity and go during Summerlicious 2012. 

Although that day was a high of 30 degrees, the double spaced patio was calling our names. With maximum coverage, we sat down to order.

For our appetizers, my friend ordered a Cool Roasted Ontario Tomato Soup and I got the Baked Spicy Shrimp cakes with jalapeno aioli.

Unfortunately, both of appetizers were not to our liking AT ALL. The soup tasted like it came out of a can. The texture was very watery and my shrimp cakes were way too spicy for my liking.  The spiciness took center stage in my mouth before anything else making it very hard to enjoy.

Next up, our entrees:

I couldn't resist, my favorite food: The Blake Burger.

And my friends' Capri Spaghettini with Roma tomatoes, torn basil, and shaved grana podano with a white wine sauce.

My burger was not too bad. I was satisfied. The burger was cooked to a tender texture, but my fries were a bit over fried. The Capri Spaghettini was rather bland with a bit too much roma tomatoes packed inside (see photo above).

If you know me, I usually choose Summerlicious/Winterlicious restaurants based on their desserts. I'm glad we did.

An order of Chocolate brownie with roasted marshmallow topping and caramel crumble (photo above) and a Cherry Sundae (photo below).

The chocolate brownie was a great and sweet end to a mediocre meal. The roasted marshmallow added a very unique and sweet touch to the brownie. The Cherry Sundae was only okay. The cherries had a very sour taste and was extremely mushy. It did not go too well with the french vanilla ice cream was good.

Overall, I was not pleasantly surprised by the food at The Blake House.

The waitress, however was very kind and pleasant -especially since mid-way we had to move indoors after a bee attack.

I rate this restaurant a 2/5.