HiHoRosie's Place

The holidays are upon us so it’s time to break out the good eats! We tend to have more nuts around during this time of year for either snacking or incorporating into various recipes. Recently, I had the chance to try some raw macadamia nuts and raw, shelled pistachios from Oh Nuts ! Oh yum! These are great to snack on all by themselves so it was becoming difficult setting some aside for something else delicious. Let’s start with the macadamias. Macs are full of fat – good mono-unsaturated fats – which translate in lots of energy. They also contain ample amounts potassium, calcium and protein. So while it’s probably not wise to eats these non-stop on a daily basis, consuming some now and again, is very good for you. Better for you than buttur n ol (say it like Paula Deen). My original plan with the macs was to make some raw vegan cookies. Mm, that failed (note to self: do not over-process nuts!). But…not all was lost, my friends. Instead, it became decadent, sweet nut butter. Swe...

Happy Wednesday kiddies! It's the last day of the month of August 2011. Wow. Where's the year going?! Sheesh. Seems like it just began and now it's nearly Labor Day, the unofficial last day of summer. Bummer. However, summer around here is not going without a fight I'm happy to report - it's my favorite season after all (autumn is a close second). Speaking of last day though, today is the last day to enter my giveaway for a jar of Tropical Traditions Skin Exfoliator . If you haven't entered, do it ! If you want bonus entries, get them in ! Ends at midnight. And speaking of giveaways, I'm thinking of doing a very special one that involves something homemade. Yeah, feeling crafty and want to share my craftiness. You game? I've got a couple of ideas in mind of what I'd like to do - anyway, it's a thought in process. Now speaking of homemade, I recently made some fruit rolls, as YS2 likes to call them. They're basically fruit roll ups or ...

I stalk many a blog. I’ve got my blog roll, but there are many others I visit that I don’t have listed or I’m subscribed to via email. Btw, to those who’ve added the email feature to their blogs, thanks! Love it! When there are recipes or ideas I want to keep, saving them in email is so much easier – plus I can keep up or catch up better this way than with google reader. IMO. Anyway…ramble ramble… One of those blogs I stalk is Sarah’s of My New Roots . I’ve caught myself on more than one occasion drooling over her various creations. Hmm…do I dare pass along a HiHoRosie Blog Fave badge to her even though she has no clue as to who I am or what the deal is about an HHR Blog Fave award anyway? Ah, sure, why not! It’s just a little token of appreciation or recognition to a blog I really enjoy. She, nor anyone else I’ve bestowed a badge to, is obligated to accept, display, or acknowledge this award in any way. I only share it right here with you. If she, or anyone else, happens to stu...

Hello guys! Hopefully, you all had a great Easter weekend. I know one person did (congrats!)! Can you believe it’s the last week of April?? Wow. You know what this means…it’s almost YS2’s second birthday! Next Tuesday. Sniff. My lil guy is becoming a BOY! Just prior to this past weekend, I started to get a cold. A slow-moving cold. It finally gained steam and presented itself on Sunday. Poo. I will say if you have to get a cold, this is the one to get (like we have a choice). It’s slow to take hold and the worst symptoms are lack of energy and nasal congestion/cough. No headaches, no grumpiness (not counting being annoyed), no sore throat, no feeling really bad. The end. I was still able to fix dinner (not raw, far from it except for salad). I really wanted what I had planned: vegan shepherd’s pie, salad with balsamic vinaigrette sprinkled with pistachios, and apple crisp for dessert. Um, hello! No pics. Nope, notta one! Lame huh? By the time it was all ready it was time to e...

Did the title get you to sing the MJ song? You're welcome. :) So I mentioned before that I did some dehydrating over the weekend. Awhile back I received an email from someone who was asking about dehydrating beets – how to get them crispy. Honestly, I’ve never tried beets before. I’m not a huge raw beet fan except in juices. Typically, I like my beets roasted. However, beets are so pretty and earthy and full of wonderful nutrients that I was willing to try my hand at this. You never know, taste buds change and I might end up loving them. I don't have many pics because it was late from when I first put them to when I got them out so here's one: For my experiment, I bought a bunch of organic beets (3 medium sized ones to this particular bunch) and one gigantic sweet potato (it was orange flesh – a yam? A sweet potato? I don’t know –can’t remember the variety). I found a basic recipe and how-to from Mommypotamus  and got my veggies cleaned up and ready to go. For the ...

...of mice and men often go astray - adapted from Robert Burns, To a Mouse , November 1785 Hola amigos (I should just say amigas since there are more girlies reading this than boys I’m sure…)! Hope you all had a fine weekend. Me? Well, you can guess based on the title and opening line things didn’t quite go as planned. Before I begin, I’d like to say to whoever is charge of making weekends a 2-day thing to please consider 5 days. That would be really nice. K, thanks. Saturday started out as planned: busy. To get me going, I made my usual smoothie with banana, spinach, peanut butter, cacao, and other tasty things. YS2 likes this too so we shared. To spare you the play-by-play, we ran our errands and did our things. We did stop at an Asian market that just opened a little closer to us. And we did our part to support them by sampling a few veggie eats (we ignored for the moment the possible bad things in it [animal products were avoided, however]) and picking up a cute miso bowl fo...

So I made kale chips again this weekend. And AGAIN they’ve been snarfed before being completely dry. Ah well. That just means they were tasty right? But seriously, I need help keeping my paws away. I just don’t have the patience to wait for such tasty things, I guess. What will I ever do when I make an ice cream cake or something?! It'd be silly to think there'd ever be pictures... recycled pic from last time My cheesy kale chips consists of taking a cup of cashews (soaked or unsoaked – I’m typically lazy or forgetful so I don’t soak most times), a third cup of nutritional yeast, juice from half a lemon, half of a sweet red bell pepper, one garlic clove, one teaspoon of Celtic sea salt, half to a whole teaspoon of pure maple syrup (or agave), and one to two tablespoons of (filtered/spring) water (optional). Then blend it all up till smooth and massage onto kale pieces. I dry at 115 in my dehydrator until well, I never get that far. Until crispy dry if you’ve got the will ...

Don’t you just love weekends? There never seems to be enough of them I think. Ha ha! We had a lovely weekend here. Saturday was GOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRGGGGEEEEEOUUUUUSSSSSSSSSSSS! Try that in a spelling bee. More like math – counting all those extra letters. One thing about the PacNW is when the sun is shining with few to no clouds, there’s nothing like it. We have so much green and then pair that with blue skies and water it’s simply amazing. It was in the mid 70’s (I don’t know actually – warm enough for flip flops and shorts) and a day to get out. And for one couple we spotted, to get married. Aww! They timed that perfectly because Sunday was cloudy, balmy and rainy. I missed out on seeing the beautiful bride – spotted her veiled head in the white Rolls but her bridesmaids were pretty in pink with a bright red flower in their pulled back ‘dos. May not sound pretty but trust me they were pretty. Anyway, we took a long stroll along the waterfront soaking in the sun. YS2 was having a ...

Ha ha! No, it isn’t! When I step outside it’s very fall (a soggy one too) but I'm still seeing spring . What do I mean? Well… Spring rolls, of course! Okay, I’m a dork. I love spring rolls though, with rice paper or collard greens. And I love that you can tailor them to whatever suits you. We start out with a yummy peanut sauce then layer on all sorts of veggies – typically broccoli, sweet bell pepper, zukes, carrots, cabbage, sweet onion and/or spring onions-ha! So whatever you've got and the more the bettah! Or however much you can get your wrap to hold. :) I’ll admit mine don’t always come out pretty. Meaning, I won’t be winning any food presentation awards. They’re lumpy and bumpy (sometimes ripped - see the hole in it? And that one's just minor) thanks to the many veggies I put in them, especially the broccoli. But you know what? I don’t care. They’re just awesomely delicious! That’s all that matters really, right? I thought about posting the peanut sauce reci...

Hey, friends! It’s been busy busy days lately. How about for you? I mean with the unofficial end of summer and just this and that it’s been crazy. But it’s all good. Unfortunately though, that means blogging suffers (as usual). But that's life, right? So, what’s in a name? The other day I was reading my bloggy friend’s post , Victoria of Mommy Is Green , about how she came up with her blog name. It’s fun to read about how people came up with their “stage names” for their blog, twitter, or whatever, so thought it would be a fun topic here. Not sure if most of you know how my name came about so let me tell you. Back when I was seriously contemplating a blog I thought, I need a name. I wanted something catchy and easy yet was “me.” I came up with some ideas, got some ideas from others but still I wasn’t sold on any of them. I thought of HiHoRosie but thought people would find it weird or something. But it’s the one I kept coming back to. I wanted to be sure that whatever name ...

Hey there! Thank you for all your sweet comments on my "brag" video - the one of YS2 talking and laughing. He is our pride and joy and truly a dream baby in so many ways so once in awhile I just have to show him off. Thanks for allowing me to do that. I try not to get carried away by doing it all the time here but you'll still see some pics of him and maybe the occasional video too. I just don't want to do it too much that you'll go ugh, not another one! ha ha! You wouldn't do that though, would you? :) Switching gears, I gotta gripe. I complained about this next topic on twitter recently so here's my question for you: have you ever won a giveaway in which you didn't receive your prize as promised (or expected)? It happened to me and I have to say it makes me a little crabby and disappointed. I supposedly "won" something four months ago from a blogger who's sponsor was an Etsy shop owner. The blogger failed to follow up on it (I em...