Re-creating Roma

I think most of us (by us I mean those poor, sad souls who are completely obsessed with food) have a meal in their head that was the best they ever ate. Mine was spinach gnocchi in gorgonzola cream sauce. I ate it in Rome, about 3 years ago, and have dreamed about it since. The gnocchi, so perfect and light. The gorgonzola cream sauce, so tasty and creamy. This meal was haunting my dreams--- I had to have it again.
So, Tuesday, after a particularly difficult day, I came home and decided that THAT was what I was going to eat for dinner. Lucky for me, I happened to have a professional chef coming to dinner, who helped make my dream a reality. We substituted Roquefort cheese for gorgonzola (because Roquefort is randomly a staple of Argentine cooking, and thus much much cheaper than gorgonzola).
Let me tell you, it came out AMAZING (picture above). it was soooooooooooooooo good!!! It was definitely rich, and not at all heart healthy, but 100% worth the calories. A bit of red wine made the meal perfect. Right now I have a bit of uncooked gnocchi dough left in my fridge and i feel like its screaming out to me "eat meeeeee!!!". We'll see how long I last...

ohhhh paula

So the other day I was indulging my food porn addiction and looking at one of my favorite sites for everything heart-attack inducing, www.thisiswhyyourefat.com. That was where I came upon this little gem: Paula Deen's deep-fried butter balls. Its literally little balls of butter that are frozen, and then battered and fried. You can see the recipe here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/paulas-fried-butter-balls-recipe/index.html
My friend Kevin has this theory that Paula Deen secretly (slash not so secretly) works for a butter conglomerate. I'm becoming more and more convinced that he's right. I mean I love that Paula takes liberties with those trans-fats. I also love how on those travel episodes, where she goes to places like France or Italy, she gets plastered on the local wine and then attempts to sloppily make out with the men who work in the markets as her big-bearded husband awkwardly looks on. I also loved that time where she randomly had Jimmy Carter on the show and called him Mista Jimmy every three seconds and flirted with him so much that he became visibly uncomfortable. Classic Paula.
But really Paula... deep-fried butter balls? I don't know if you've heard but America is suffering from an obesity epidemic. You just took your show from bubbly Southern to semi-homicidal. Shame, shame Paula. Shame, shame.

new beginnings...

So after a grueling winter that lasted almost a full 8 weeks (can you sense my sarcasm???)... spring is finally here! And with spring, comes new changes (and apparently a cliché blog post about how spring symbolizes a new beginning).
Well, to begin with, I have finally quit the rest of my institute classes and started my own business! I mean obviously its not a legal business as I'm not even in this country legally, but nevertheless I am finally my own boss. Its great because I get to work less and make more (win-win, right?). Well, theoretically. Now, if I want to spend my Tuesday mornings sitting in the park reading a book, I can do it. Well, theoretically. The thing about being your own boss is that your salary depends on... YOU. Last week I got offered a ton of editing jobs on the side, and as I'm still new to this whole being my own boss thing, I accepted everything. I ended up working like a crazy person all week, and spending the better part of Sunday working as well. So, I don't exactly have that whole working less part down pat yet, but I'm hoping I'll get there.
Sunday night I had another first--- I went to my first movie in Argentina! I know, its a bit hard to believe --- I've been living here for a year and almost 4 months now. Well, this is basically what happened; movies here are kinda pricey, and also really easy to download and watch for free online. Also, I wasn't making so much money before, so going to a movie meant that I was foregoing a night out with my friends (something that I was obviously not willing to do).
So the movie.... Hugo was super-boyfriend and indulged my "food porn" addiction by agreeing to go with me to see "Eat Pray Love". I loved it. Well, actually it was one of those movies where you don't really need to hear what they are saying, you just want to see the pretty places and amazing looking food. Later that night we were talking about all the food in the movie and I said, "You know that scene in Italy, where they place that BEAUTIFUL plate of pasta pomodoro in front of her with the fresh basil leaf as garnish? All I could think, the entire time she was shoveling it into her jabber, was how much better it would be if she cut up that fresh basil and ate that with it!" I know, I think I have some sort of sickness...