More January time to ski!

HPIM2829
Originally uploaded by matthewsunessa

Many local schools and businesses closed today. They anticipated a wintry mix with possibly 4-8" new snow starting this morning. This made for nearly clear roads and many snowy sidewalks as everyone stayed home...well everyone except Sunny.

Both Terry and Matthew worked remotely today, but I couldn't teach a group training class from my living room, so I skied down Mass Ave to the gym. I was easy-going about my pace and got there in about 15 minutes. Naturally, no one showed up for the group training, so I did a little computer work for next month's classes/groups and then skied home. This time in the sleet! Yucky, but slippery and still good conditions for skiing.

On both the "aller et retour" I enjoyed the ski wear given to me by Matthew's Mom, Judy, who somehow knew that the blue-greens would match my skis and my eyes! Is she psychic or what?

Taking on the Ben and Jerry's "Vermonster"

Friday night, one of our friends ran an "ice cream crawl" for his birthday. We started at a specialty dessert restaurant called Finale in Harvard Square, moved on to local chain J.P. Lick's, and finished with the massive Ben & Jerry's "Vermonster," a mega-sundae that you need lots of help to consume. (This also spreads the obligation around a little, given the dish's amazing $35 cost!)

We got five different flavors in the big plastic tub, more than a dozen scoops of ice cream, and heaped on five toppings above and beyond the automatic hot fudge, nuts, and whipped cream. Our best topping choice was bananas (tastes great with vanilla or chocolate) and our worst was gummy bears, which freeze up and become crunchy gum, a poor texture match for the ice cream.

The picture shows me contributing my stomach to the task. It took about 40 minutes to reach the final step, a cup of syrupy soup. Fortunately, the birthday boy knocked it back without a second thought, saving us the less-than-appetizing task. The store keeper took our picture for the wall of those who'd consumed the whole thing, which always took a handful of folks, and sometimes several. (One amusing photo does show a team that failed, sad faces on display.)

Tales from the Bread Machine: Hearty Flaxseed

Matthew turned out this loaf last night between two pleasurable tasks. First, this Christmas yielded a new Nintendo DS cartridge called "Personal Trainer: Cooking." It guides you through a large number of recipes from a dozen cuisines. Last night, he made blueberry / cranberry / raisin coulis, which the program classified as a German dessert. (Sunny thinks of it more as a topping.) We then re-watched the documentary "Bigger, Stronger, Faster," a highly recommended and wide-ranging examination of the social impact of performance-enhancing drugs. Totally worth the two hours of your time.

Anyway, this bread resembles a flaxseed loaf we did in the past, but allows for raisins as a mid-point addition. (Bread machines with "fruit & nut" cycle allow you to mix in more stuff just before baking.) I kept waiting for it to beep and alert me to the "add stuff now" moment. Turns out you put the fruit in a side compartment and it does the work automatically. Oh well, next time.

We used the FRUIT & NUT setting with MEDIUM crust.

Look: Bubbly top that looks a little underdone, but inside definitely baked
Cut: Crispy crust, dense interior
Taste: Not as flavorful as expected, probably from lack of raisins (the recipe says to adds cinnamon when you leave out fruit, which we did accidentally)

Brrr...live from Boston, it's New Year's Eve!

HPIM2679.JPG
Originally uploaded by matthewsunessa

We met up, went out, and then promptly went back in. Inside is where the warmth and love was on the last night of 2008. The ice sculptures and howling winds were only made better by the warm, free T ride back to Cambridge.

Once there, Patti made hot chocolate (Gharadelli's with Hood whipped cream, yum!) and Matthew made a few good/evil cocktails. We played boggle (woohoo?) and then watched Dick Clark and Ryan Seacrest do the "Live from New York's Times Square" thing on the TV. Boo hoo to NBC because Mr. Clark is so old now and Mr. Seacrest seems to be already washed up, too.

At least we had champagne to drink, which I popped and poured just seconds before the Final Countdown (and check out Freezepop's cover of the pop masterpiece). Anyway, Cheers!