The Shout

Sometimes my camera has a mind of its own, and throws a blurry picture my way.

It's Christmas!

More proof that the holiday season is always a tasty time of year (not to mention over commercialized). Have a happy Christmas, Hanukah, Festivus, and New Year!

Christmas Tree, XL

If there was ever a contest for the most intense Christmas Tree set-up, I think this triple decker tree would probably have to win....can you imagine putting lights on that thing every year?

Art Museum Part 2

Just a little playing with color and light...and I thought modern art couldn't be functional.

Chez Jacques

You're all probably sick about my writing about food, but I've come to realize that not only do I love food, but I love all varieties and kinds of food--I can wax eloquent on fine dining and fast food alike. Today, I'm handing out kudos to Chez Jacques in Milwaukee's Fifth Ward. It probably looks to you like it's just a ham and cheese melt, but is in fact a superbly executed croque monsieur (so make that a French ham and cheese melt, naturellement) and salad served with the world's most delicious dijon mustard vinaigrette. They also have some fantastic crepes in a variety of flavors, including a tasty chicken curry crepe (not traditionally French, but still delicious). I'll definitely be coming back here again.

Art Museum

I went to the Art Museum last week to check out the Andy Warhol exhibit (which they wouldn't let me take pictures of it, so it doesn't get its own post) and while I was there went to visit my favorite piece of art in the regular collection. It looks unassuming, just an open suitcase on the floor, until...

You walk up to the suitcase and look in. This isn't the best picture of it, but in the suitcase is a sewer grate, and under the sewer grate is a stream with plants, rocks, and running water. If you're really interrogative in nature, you can walk around the back of the suitcase and see two pairs of feet...

It looks like a dad holding a little kid up over the water as it runs by. I think I love this because it's three things in one, isn't what it seems on the surface and isn't the sort of modern, abstract art that I could do myself at home with rocks or finger paints. Thumbs up for the suitcase.

A Little Baking

Just a good old-fashioned Pierski Christmas cookie baking assembly line at Grandma's...you know, like back in the day before child labor laws made Grandma give you an occasional break from all your hard work.

(If my grandmother is reading...I'm just kidding. And I love you. Do I still get a Christmas present?)

That Time of Year

Lots of accidents this time of year, clearly. Roads are slippery, and that sleigh just doesn't brake like it used to.

We Put the Kitsch in Christmas

My Grandma Marge is a big fan of her 1960s Christmas decorations: big, multicolor lights and home-made Christmas tree ornaments. My cousin Cassandra mugged for the camera as Grandma gave us decorating instructions...and I wanted to give you a close-up of her ornaments, because I'm pretty sure she and her mom (my grandma Alma) made a lot of them by hand. They just don't sell ornaments like this at Target, now do they?

Honeypie

Honeypie, a new(er) restaurant in Bay View, is home to all sorts of delicious home cooking and midwestern-ish comfort food. I've been meaning to go there for awhile, and finally got there this week. I ordered some white bean chili, to keep it warm and simple, which was delicious. I was with a friend, who pointed out a dish called the Davenport on the menu: it promised a "mound of turkey," mashed potatoes, cheesy sauce, assorted veggie toppings, and a some bread. He sort of scoffed at the menu's boasting, but he shut up real quick: it was indeed a real mound of turkey and mashed potato deliciousness. I would have to say, I'd recommend Honeypie to anyone who's as hungry as a horse. Or hungrier.

Grandma's Cookies

My great-grandmother Alma passed away this past week. She was a whopping 96 years old, and just decided one day not to wake up for us. I decided to blog about her because she was something of a family matriarch (she shared that title with my other great-grandmother, who is herself an impressive 95 years) and because it's the Christmas season. Grandma Alma's parents owned a German bakery when she was growing up, and every Christmas she still brings over plates of homemade cookies, just like she used to make in the bakery. These cookies are a family favorite, and no one makes them like Grandma did.

The recipe is a simple sugar cookie one, and the taste is not unusual as far as cookies go. The real secret to their deliciousness is that Grandma hand decorated each one with chocolate chips, colored sugars, sprinkles, nuts, powdered sugar, sno-caps, and hershey kisses in the shapes of candy canes, stars, christmas trees and ornaments. At her funeral, one of my younger cousins was crying because he was afraid he wouldn't get to have any more of these...not exactly grief for the loss of Grandma, but I'm sure she would still be pleased to know that she, and her cookies, will be missed. I'm hoping the recipe won't get lost, so I'm putting it here for myself, and for any of you, if you're interested.

A Holiday How-To: So the Oven Broke on Turkey Day...

Well, it's Thanksgiving...which means family, food, and football on TV. Just before the holiday could kick off, however, Mama D's oven broke down. Not to be deterred (and having a turkey large enough to feed a small army), she figured out how to grill out bird on the gas grill, cook the stuffing in a crock pot, and still have dinner on the table by mid-afternoon. Here she is checking out the turkey's progress.

Update, 12:05 pm: Mama D says the turkey takes 4 hours on the grill, and is turning out so brown and lovely that she may grill the turkey every year from now on. You heard it here first, friends: necessity is indeed the mother of delicious invention.

Where have you been?

My cat was waiting for me when I got home to Mama D and Chris' house for Thanksgiving...this is her doing her "I'm so cute and adorable when I stick my paw out, why don't you pet me?" look.

Spanish Lessons

Tested out my fledgling knowledge of Spanish on the windshield while stuck in traffic between Chicago and Milwaukee because of a crazy semi-truck accident. Apparently, I quiero the windshield. Maybe I'd better study up some more.

Embarrassing Birthday Trip

Some parents like to really embarrass their children when birthday time rolls around. And some people really enjoy helping their friends' parents plan that really embarrassing birthday experience. This past week, that's exactly what happened when the mom of my friend Chris enlisted our help to plan a spectacularly embarrassing birthday dinner for Chris and his younger brother Joe at Organ Piper Pizza in West Allis, otherwise known as the Music Palace of Metro Milwaukee.

Joe, on the left, and my friend Chris on the right, look plenty embarrassed. And although the pizza is pretty solid, the real attraction is the old-school organ, which is attached to several rooms of organ pipes as well as other sound making devices attached to the ceiling and walls, like sirens and train whistles. An ancient old man named Ralph plays old standards, show tunes, and songs from movies. Below, old Ralph unfurls the American flag for a rousing rendition of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame."

Best part of the evening was when my friend Ben joked that the place-with its families with small children target audience and loud, cheesy music-made it a great place to take a girl on a first date if you didn't really like her. Classic stuff.

Baking Again

A little almond pound cake with vanilla drizzle...by far the most easy dessert I have in my repetoire because I can cheat and use box mix or store frosting for the drizzle if I want. No one needs to know, and it comes out delicious either way.

Hard at Work

Some of my favorite things- my roommate Brian in the kitchen where he works and a basket of french fries...kind of awesome.

Dinner and Dessert

I know, I know, another food post. Maybe you'll forgive me once you see how delicious this all is. On Saturday night, I had the most amazing chicken florentine with pesto sauce while in the midst of a baking session.

On the menu for dessert - apple pie. I tried a new recipe of my own, which I think turned out quite well (I combined a recipe I got from Mama D with another I pulled from Epicurious.com, adding a little extra sugar and small amounts of brown sugar, nutmeg, and vanilla into the usual apple pie filling). I'm proud of the few things I can cook or bake well, so I felt like sharing the pictures of the results with all of you.

The Explorer

This bike, seemingly permanently parked outside of Sven's Cafe in Bay View, looks ready to do some serious exploring. I generally go to Sven's for the French Vanilla Chai, but if some quality exploring time was on the menu, I wouldn't be one to say no.

Amazon Recommends...

Amazon.com is usually spot on with its recommendation system for everything from books to cds to Christmas gifts for your relatives...it has lots of fancy algorithms to figure out what you'll want to buy. So imagine my surprise when Amazon recommended, based on my history of checking out indie rock and hip hop, that I download a song by Weird Al. Suddenly, the internet is trying to tell me it thinks I'm weird.

Indian Summer Day

The weather was something fantastic today - in Wisconsin we usually miss out on any extended period of weather in the 60s...but today was a sunny, wonderful exception.

Ducks took a last celebratory turn around the Veteran's Park lagoon.

The last joggers and kite-flyers were out in full force.

The last yellowing leaves clung onto their trees with the last breath of autumn.

Another Delicious Post

I went to Transfer Pizzeria in Milwaukee for the first time last night, and enjoyed the general atmosphere (they have local art displayed on the walls, and live jazz on Tuesday nights) as well as some decidedly delicious food. If you go, I would highly recommend the bruschetta as well as the Pollo Fungi pizza, which had an unusual name (do you usually think of Fungi as delicious?) but was a dreamy combination of a perfectly hand tossed crust, chicken, mushrooms, onions, and sauce.

On a side note, I realize that I love to blog and talk about food. A lot. So to help myself out, and you all as well, I added food to the list of things I talk about alot on the blog's home page. If you click on it, all of my food related posts should now pop up. I've blogged about food so much that there's actually more than one page of pictures-just hit "older posts" when you get to the bottom. Looking at all that culinary goodness made me so hungry, I had to go eat something.

Halloween - The Morning After

This is my front porch. This is also the wig that my roommate Brian wore out last night for Halloween. Somewhere on the walk up to the front door from the sidewalk, the wig escaped, and has been relaxing on our front steps ever since.

Halloween - Obligatory Zombie Post

My roommate Jill has a good friend named Megan...who happens to be a zombie. She is, in fact, the best zombie bride I've ever seen. In my effort to celebrate Halloween, I felt like I should also celebrate Megan's clear desire to eat brains, or whatever human flesh she can get her cold, undead hands on. While her husband, Craig, looks pretty pleased with the prospect of getting eaten alive, Jill (below, dressed as the USO) still can't believe Megan finds her appetizing.

A Glitch in the Matrix

The two black cats at my friend Amelia's house...almost the same, but not quite. I like how one of the cats' names is Gotti, and Amelia describes him as a "pimp" and says that he does whatever he wants around the house.

Through the Looking Glass

Fall is happening outside of my Dad's living room...the trees are so yellow that when the sun shines into the room the whole place is filled with a warm golden yellow glow. I took a picture of it so that when it's snowy and about 20 degrees below zero outside, I will remember how much I actually like living in a frozen tundra...when it's not so frozen.

In Grandma's Basement

I belong to a family of music lovers, and my Grandma Marge (who still puts on tight fitting jeans and goes out dancing) is no exception. She has a Jukebox in her basement that plays old 45's, and insists on the occasional impromptu dance party...call her a dancing queen, just don't call her old.

Another Typical Family Photo

I love it when my relatives do this: ask us to take a picture and then all look in different directions. This is from yesterday's celebration of my cousin Stephanie's baptism. (She's the baby in the white christening get-up.)

Belated

My belated birthday cake from my Grandma Marge was epic: it looked like a Swiss Cake Roll, and had ice cream in the middle. Nothing says Happy Birthday like Chocolate-chip-ice-cream-birthday-cake. Cheers to that!

Night Lights

I'm a big fan of the effort to light up Milwaukee at night...including the lights on the underside of the Marquette Interchange, the recent lighting of the Art Museum for the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, and especially the color-changing lights at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. My friends and I were taking a stroll past it last night (that's my out-of-focus friend Omar on the bridge).

More autumn-ness

Some general autumn leaves action happening over at the Charles Allis Art Museum on Prospect Ave.

Fall is here

It's a little over-saturated, but you get the idea: fall is in full-swing. I snapped this shot of a lady carrying home her groceries under some autumn colored Maple trees over on West Howard Ave.

Silence on the air waves

I thought maybe I should post a little note letting you all know that I've been neglecting the blog lately because I've had a weird flu-like bug since Saturday. So in my quest to sleep, lounge in pajamas on my couch and eat saltine crackers, I haven't had much time to be out taking pictures. I'll be back later this week.

Until then, here are some other photoblogs that I dig because they focus on daily photos from other cities:

New York Daily Photos

San Francisco Daily Photos

Chicago Daily Photos

Seattle Daily Photos

See you all soon!

The Family Chef

Mama D is one hell of a cook - while I was at home visiting her and the family this weekend she whipped up a lobster bisque, steak, carrots, and baked potatoes for dinner. She's a pro, and is single-handedly the reason that I cannot cook very well (I'm learning...I only fill the kitchen with smoke about once every two weeks now...quite the accomplishment). Above, she stirs the bisque, and below, stirs up some simmering carrots.

Kansas City Beef

I went to visit Mama D in Kansas City over the weekend. Knowing my obsession for cheeseburgers, she made a smart choice and took me to lunch at J Alexander's, a local restaurant that has delicious well-done fare as well as one of the best burgers in town. Other than wanting to slather ketchup all over it (perhaps a second obsession), I enjoyed it thoroughly. You can see below just how much I enjoyed it...just call me a member of the clean plate club.

Pumpkins- the after shot

The after shots - I had attempted a Jack Skellington face, with mixed results but better than I usually do. I have one extra pumpkin (in case I massacred mr. skellington) which I might carve as well.