Balzer Designs

The Weekend Five: Chinatown

This weekend I'm sharing five photos from one of my favorite places in NYC to visit: Chinatown.  

No matter the weather, the streets are always bustling with people and activity of all kinds.  I love exploring the different little shops and trying to figure out what the foreign-to-me fruit and vegetables are.  There's lots of good eating in Chinatown too!  My favorite place for Dim Sum is Jing Fong.  I highly recommend their sticky rice and har gow!  It's definitely worth the subway ride.  There can be a very long wait on weekends, but you can generally walk right in during the week!

Thanks for stopping by!

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P.S. I'm heading out of town to film Scrapbook Soup TV.  I'll be posting lots of daily pics to instagram and will try to post at least once a day to Facebook with updates of the projects and guests and all the goings-ons.  I've got plenty of posts scheduled to fill up this blog next week, but e-mail responses will be even slower than usual.  :)

Food Art

I've been reading the Another Lunch blog for a few months now.  The blogger shares photos and how-tos on the adorable bento box lunches she packs for her kids.  Here's an example:

So cute!  I love those little animal sandwiches.  There are actually a ton of bento-focused websites.

Like Bentology:

And Bento School Lunches:

And CuteOBento (which is entirely in Japanese):

And Bonenhase:

A google search will bring up about a million more!  The food art ranges from cute to jaw droppingly amazing.  

But people packing lunches aren't the only ones having fun with their food.  Via the blog Colossal, I stumbled onto two very cool food artists.

Mike Breach "paints" on coffee before serving it to you.  

You can watch a really good short video and see the original post here.

And artist Hong Yi recently created a 30-day long food art project with some fabulous creations.

You can see many more (and larger) photos in the original post here.

Are you a food artist?  Do you long to be?  I'm still on the "getting things to taste good" part of cooking.  Some day I hope to graduate to "tastes good & looks good."  Something to aspire to!  :)

Thanks for stopping by!

The Weekend Five: Red Rooster Harlem

On Valentine's Day I went out for a fancy lunch with two of my girlfriends.  We went to Red Rooster Harlem, where chef Marcus Samuelson was actually walking around shaking hands and getting enthusiastic hugs.  Here's a peek at our lunch:

We had a very good meal and some excellent girl bonding time.  Hope you're having a great weekend!

Thanks for stopping by!

The Weekend Five: Healthy Cooking

I've been on a cooking spree lately.  I'm trying to eat more healthily and that means less takeout and more cooking.  Here are a few things I've made recently (all photos taken with my iPhone):

Toasted English muffin, low-fat goat cheese, hot pepper jelly.  A delicious snack!

Zucchini Tots.  I found the recipe here.

Oven Baked Fries.  They look and taste pretty darn close to the real thing!  I adapted this recipe.  Instead of the 5 tbsp of oil, I sprayed the pan with Pam and then mixed the raw potatoes with 1 tbsp of oil.  I also added 2 tbsp of parmesan cheese, sprinkled over the fries before they went into the oven.  Even my husband was a fan. 

A hearty weekend breakfast: chicken (I like to poach mine in chicken broth), scrambled eggs (1/4 cup of egg whites and 1 egg) with salsa, and a summer tomato.  Yum!

Zucchini Boats.  Very loosely based on this recipe.

Cooking is becoming an increasingly important part of my life.  I am starting to get obsessed with healthy recipes and making the plate look "pretty."  It's an art all of its own, and not one I'm even close to mastering!  I'm enjoying learning about a whole area of creative living.  There's so much to be explored!

Hope you're having a great weekend!  Thanks for stopping by!

Fun Food Projects for Fourth of July

Happy Fourth of July to those here in the U.S.A.  And Happy Wednesday to everyone else!  I've gathered up a collection of fun Fourth of July food projects.  My Mom keeps trying to convince me that cooking is a form of craft and she might be winning!

Patriotic Strawberries

I'm not a huge fan of white chocolate, but I think this is just a super cool super easy idea.  From the Best Bites blog and she has step-by-step instructions for you.

Berry Patriotic Cupcakes

The fruit on top almost makes me think I can call this a healthy cupcake!  Almost.  You can find all the nutritional information and the instructions on the Kitchen Daily blog.  Although I have to tell you that the instructions are a little big hilarious.  One of the ingredients is "12 cupcakes."  So the instructions are pretty much only for assembling the cupcakes, which is the crafty part anyways!

Watermelon and Feta Flag

I am actually a huge fan of watermelon and feta cheese together.  But I know that not everyone is, so you could replace the feta with apple cubes (skin off, obviously) or banana chunks.  You can find the instructions and lots of process pics on the Wenderly Design blog.

Independence Punch

One of my all time favorite drinks comes from a little restaurant near me that I love, called Vynl.  They have a watermelon lemonade which is yummy, but also just looks so cool.  The watermelon juice and the lemonade don't mix.  So when the drink arrives it looks so pretty, almost like a sunset.  This Independence Punch has the same cool effect.  On the Big Bear's Wife blog, Angie tells you how this punch works and why the liquids stay separate.  Super cool!

Crispy Cheese Stars

Not strictly patriotic, but really, how much red, white, and blue food can you eat?  I found the recipe on the Disney Family Fun blog and it looks staggeringly easy.  Now to unearth the cookie cutters....

Red, White and Blueberry Trifle

I adore trifle.  My Mom makes one with bananas and strawberries and pignoli cookies that makes me weak in the knees.  The trifle pictured above is from the Skinnytaste blog and is therefore relatively low in calories.  Visit the blog for a great tip on putting this trifle together in a snap!

Would you like to see some cooking/baking included on this blog, along with the usual artistic adventures?  Let me know!

Thanks for stopping by!