February 19, 2010

DOM + THROAT INFECTION = HOME SICK

It's day two of my homestay. Thursday morning I woke up and my throat was still hurting and my larynx (?) was closing up on me--or that "hole" at the back of your throat--so I figure that was good enough reason to call and sick and head to the doctor. She told me I had a throat infection (and kind of chastised me for not coming in sooner, doh!) and told me to stay home for the next two days. So I've been home, catching up on the Olympics; last night taking in the men's long program and am really happy for American Evan Lysacek taking home the gold medal. Evgeny Plushenko--even though I was a fan of his when I was younger--is now just a really huge douchebag. Who the hell gets up on the gold medal platform when you've not earned it--even if you are just being funny? This ain't the Ice-capades or Stars On Ice, you idiot! Plus on top of that, his comment regarding the quad and men's skating not being men's skating without the quad--ugh! I'm just about done with Plushenko. I'm glad that Evan Lysacek was able to take home the gold medal with a solid performance that did not include a quad jump--hopefully proving to Plushenko that a quad doesn't necessary guarantee you a gold medal.

Anyhoo, back to the food, here's a quick recap:
Feb. 16...Tuesday.
First breakfast was half a whole wheat bagel with PB and Crofter's Asia spread with a banana:Second breakfast was instant organic oatmeal with ground flaxseed, chia seeds, frozen peaches and strawberries that defrosted by the time I got to work. This is what my frozen fruit looks like:I usually use half for my oatmeal and then keep the rest for my lunch "dessert." Speaking of lunch, for lunch I had a mish mash of stuff:Leftover lamb chop, 6 butternut squash ravioli, 2 small pieces of boiled potato and 3 sweet potato balls. Totally random stuff that was leftover in my fridge but it tasted really, really good. I also packed myself some vanilla bean and dried cherry meringue cookies but only ate a couple before I had to get back to work:
Dinner was at Mevame restaurant for my parents' 37th wedding anniversary. We were celebrating a day early because their actual anniversary falls on Ash Wednesday. I've previously reviewed Mevame so I won't go into too much detail this time but I don't know whether it was because of my sore throat but everything was just a tad underwhelming. My family skipped out on appetizers this time (last time we got two and it was way too much food) and started off with our entrees which came with salads:Mine was drenched in salad dressing (which you can't really see here) but I couldn't finish it. It's a shame since I love this salad which features mesclun mix, spiralized beets and carrots, red onions, cucumbers and tomato wedges. My oldest brother and I ordered the same entree, the lamb chops:He got his with a side of fries while I got mine with a side of rice:My mom ordered the dark meat chicken skewers with fries:While my dad and other brother ordered the rainbow trout:One with vegetable and the other with mashed potatoes.

So this time around the lamb chops didn't seem as flavourful as the ones we had upon our first visit to Mevame. Maybe it's just because I had had lamb chops the day before and those were plenty flavourful or maybe my tastebuds were getting tired of lamb chops (I had had them for every meal prior excluding first and second breakfast), but these just didn't seem as tasty. The fries were spot-on and my mom's chicken looked delicious. I wish I could have tried a piece.

I was stuffed after 1/3 of my salad, one pita bread, two lamb chops, 1/4 of my rice and a good helping of my mom's fries so we all skipped out on dessert. Plus, the restaurant's dessert menu isn't terribly interesting knowing that I can make my own creme brulee at home in no time and at 1/3 of the cost. One thing that really irks me about Mevame is that they never refill your water; you always have to ask for it. Personally, I find refilling a person's water glass the easiest thing you can do to guarantee a good tip. If you refill my water glass without having to be asked to do so, it shows that you're being attentive. It guarantees a good tip from me. We had to ask our waitress for water twice. Not really cool considering that we showed up at 7:50 on a Tuesday night and by the time we were halfway through our meals the restaurant was hardly half full. There was clearly no excuse for her not to refill our glasses. That's just my one waiter/waitress pet peeve.

Anyway, my oldest bro and I split the bill so Happy Anniversary mom and dad!

===

Feb. 17th...Wednesday. Because I was feeling sick and because most of my food was almost an exact repeat of the day before, I decided to take the day off from food-photographing.

===

Feb. 18th...Thursday.
Home sick! Since my throat was hurting, I didn't really feel like eating anything. Before heading out to the doctor, my stomach wanted to eat a bowl of oatmeal but my throat didn't feel like it. I was the mediator and had a banana instead. Then upon arriving back at home after visiting the pharmacy, my dad helped me make some free-range chicken broth to which I added some rice noodles to fill me up:But even after a couple of bowls of that, just an hour later I was still hungry and dying for some real flavour, so I had a bowl of Frosted Flakes with organic 2% milk:Along with that I decided to try out my new tea: chamomile with lavender:Quatchi decided to chill out with me on the couch while we caught up on the Olympics and later on, I fell asleep:Here we are on the couch pre-nap time:The rest of the evening was spent watching the Olympics and eating the exact same thing for dinner that I had had for lunch with the added bonus of beef broth from some bones I found in the freezer. I also added some napa cabbage.

1 comment:

Diana said...

OMG look at your treats! You are out of control. :) Your cake pops are gorgeous and I'm sure everyone loved them. Hope you're recovered by now!