kim, Author at Lovin' From the Oven

A little snippet from Paris: Part 2

May 24, 2011 by kim 7 Comments

Seriously. My favorite.

Crepe with nutella and bananas.

Went back to Chinatown to get some Vietnamese food..

Desserts galore.

Candy street vendor

Chocolate store

The yogurt aisle inside of Metroprix. a-mazing.

Club sandwich

My ridiculously expensive caesar salad. so not worth it.

Mint chocolate chip ice cream from a street vendor

The restaurants in Paris don’t have take out bags. If you don’t finish your food, it goes in the trash, not a doggie bag.
Most of the toilet paper that people have in their homes is colored, not white. Kinda makes it a little awkward when you’re trying to wipe clean.
If you have allergies, you may not want to go there in the spring. I don’t know what the heck is in the air over there, but I swear pollen is flying at your face left and right at all times in the day.
For Paris being all hyped up on the fashion, I really didn’t get a sense of it while I was there. Sure, all the amazing stores are to the left and right of you, but why weren’t the people dressed in them? Tokyo had way more fashion sense than Paris.
OPI nail polish is suuuuper expensive there. I’m talking 13 Euros (about 20 bucks). So if you want to buy nail polish, do it in the states!
You might want to avoid taking the metro at rush hour if you’re claustrophobic… or sensitive to B.O.
A lof of the public toilets have buttons on the floor that you step on to flush. Seriously brilliant. Why don’t we have that over here? Oh, speaking of bathrooms… each stall is literally a private room. Love that.
People sunbathe in parks there, so don’t be surprised to see a man in a speedo when there’s no water around.
Dryers don’t really exist there. They have washers, but they hang dry all of their clothes.
Hangover 2 is called “Very Bad Trip 2” there. True story.

Cake Batter Rice Crispy Treats

May 17, 2011 by kim 13 Comments

Let’s just say: Whoa mama.. I can always count on you guys for some drama (not all of you, mostly just the anonymous posters).

Let’s lighten the mood a bit, shall we? We all need that from so many people believing in killing off dogs at the first chance. Yeeeeesh. Let’s focus on the sprinkles, now… bright and happy thoughts.

I’ve always been a fan of rice crispy treats. My mom never really baked, so this is the closest she got to making dessert. Even so, these were probably made twice a year in my house when I was growing up. The moment I realized how simple the recipe was, I started making rice crispy treats on my own (maybe 7th grade?).

I saw the idea for cake batter rice crispy treats floating around on Tastespotting and Foodgawker. Could rice crispy treats really taste like cake batter? The idea was so simple.. just mix cake mix in! So I gave it a go. The first time I tried, the treats weren’t nearly as cake battery as I’d hoped for. So, I gave it another go with three times the amount of cake batter I put in the first time. Perfect!

Original recipe from Rice Krispies

3 tablespoons butter
1 10-ounce bag of mini marshmallows (4 cups mini marshmallows)
3/4 cup Funfetti cake mix
6 cups rice krispies cereal
6 heaping tablespoons of sprinkles

Completely melt butter in a large saucepan over low heat.
Add marshmallows and stir until completely melted.
Next, stir in the cake mix until dissolved.
Stir in the cereal until it is evenly coated with marshmallow. Sprinkle in half of the sprinkles and mix and continue stirring.
Press the mixture into a 9 x 13 baking dish and top with remaining sprinkles. Cut and enjoy!

Help our Dog, Bo, and a Giveaway

May 15, 2011 by kim 27 Comments

This past week has been a little hectic for me. My DB and I have been busy with work, trying to look for an apartment, finding furniture, and now, this…

First off, here’s a little background. My DB and I got a dog about a year and a half ago. He was rescued from the pound and was about 4-5 years old at the time. He’s an Anatolian shepherd mix (we think he has Sharpei in him because of his black tongue and loose skin) and was abused as a puppy. He’s very cautious around new men and is terrified of cables and abrupt, loud noises. His original owner named him “Bojo.” I kid you not. We shortened his name to just “Bo.”

My DB and I knew that we couldn’t take him with us to Berkeley, so we started looking at no-kill shelters for him weeks ago in case we couldn’t find someone to take him. Unfortunately, no shelter was willing to take him because of his age and because they were already backed up.

This past week, we noticed a growth on Bo’s hind leg. It didn’t seem to bother him; he walked fine and didn’t react when we touched it, but we kept an eye on it. When it didn’t go away after three days, we decided to take him into the vet. This was this past Thursday. The vet stuck a needle in it, expecting to draw pus, but it turned out to be blood. We left Bo overnight at the vet to have surgery that same day to have the growth removed.

This is Bo the first day back after surgery. He had the “cone of shame” on him but he could barely sleep with it and ran into everything, so we took it off. He’s not much of a biter/chewer, so it was fine. Seeing him in a little cast seriously breaks my heart. What was the bump? Well, it was worse than we imagined. It turns out that it was a malignant tumor and the doctor couldn’t completely remove all of it. He said they might have to remove a toe or his paw, depending on the lab results. Basically, Bo has cancer… we just don’t know what kind of cancer it is.

My heart seriously feels for him. He had such a terrible previous life and now this?! What did he ever do to deserve it? 🙁 Poor puppy.. He’s even quite young to have cancer.

My DB and I decided to have a biopsy for Bo, in order to find out exactly what’s wrong with him and what we could do to help. The problem is: our total bill is just over 600 dollars now for the surgery and biopsy… not to mention any additional surgery/care that we’ll need to pay for after we get the results back. We are definitely not in a position with that kind of money (especially with having to move out in three months), so I’m asking you guys for your help!

We couldn’t just leave Bo like that, every dog deserves a chance. So I created a paypal donate button especially for Bo’s vet bill pictured above. It’s a click through link that’ll let you donate any amount you wish through paypal. Any amount will help! If you’d like to donate through other means, please contact me at: kim@lovintheoven.com

Giveaway details: I wanted to be able to give something back to you guys for donating, so I’ll be giving away a SIGNED copy of George W. Bush’s Decision Points book. I know, it’s kind of random and totally not related to my blog, but I thought it would be a neat giveaway. Regardless of your political affiliation, it’s kind of fun to have a President’s signature. I’ll be entering anyone’s name who donates over $5 into a raffle and draw a winner at random. I’ll do the drawing on June 11th, 11:59 PM and let you guys know that Sunday.

You see, I work at the Reagan library and we were lucky enough to have him come give a lecture during his book tour a couple of months ago. I even worked the event so I got to sit in and listen to the speech:

Yes, that is an actual airplane at my work. It’s Reagan’s Air Force One, the one that flew Nixon’s last flight as President, and you totally get to walk through it. Kinda cool, huh?

There’s G.B. Jr.

Anyways, we really can’t thank you guys enough for taking the time to read our story, being so supportive, and just being there. After all, dogs really are.. a man’s best friend.

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