Tonight is the second night that T & I have eaten out at Farnachi, a mere four-month old restaurant in Uptown. It’s at the corner of I-75 and Knox and is definitely worth your time if you are ever hungry in the area. It is Italian cuisine with a Mediterranean/Middle Eastern flair (ie. the music and bench-style seating) and is somewhat smartly located adjacent to a Cigar Smoking Shop and a Mediterranean Grill. We’ve loved the signature “Farnachi” pizza with the addition of pepperoni. The thin crust crackles under a generous layer of yummy toppings. It’s one of the best pizza’s I’ve tried. Tonight we also perused into the appetizer list and chose the Feta Phyllo – a nicely presented and tasty dish. The prices are very reasonable ($14 for a medium pizza to feed two) and the atmosphere is perfect for a quick bite before the symphony, date night or for a small gathering of friends.

Christmas is a time for lights. The children’s sermon this morning was about just that. Jesus is the light of the world, and it is this time of year that we celebrate his birthday, shining light in places of dark. Just as He can enters our lives and makes us new.

Today we started/completed a few holiday activities. We bought some fresh cranberries last week to use around the house. We implemented one of the decorations for our wedding: filling glass vases with fresh fruit, and used the rest for stinging as garland. When we bought the Christmas tree, we also grabbed a fantastic bunch of live green garland. We used it on the brick ledge of the window with a string of white lights, on the buffet and on top of our EXPEDIT 4X4 shelf from IKEA, shown below.

Next, T worked on our homemade stockings. She is using a diamond-quilted, padded red for the sock and a traditional fuzzy white fabric for the top. They aren’t yet finished, but should look great and will soon have a nice new home below our window.

And last but not least, we made gingerbread cookes. Surprisingly, we had quite a hard time finding a gingerbread man cookie cutter. You would think that they’d be on the shelves of every store but alas, we ended up only finding one that was about four inches tall. Fortunately dough expands as it turns out and they look great. It’s amazing how such simple ingredients (cinnamon, ginger, cloves, brown sugar, etc) can make the house smell so much like Christmas.

After they came out of the oven, we tried our hand at icing the little guys. It was pretty dang hard. The icing distributed inconsistently and if you waited too long between uses, you got one gigantic blob. I will save you the horror shots of our first trials and just show the finals: a simple 3-button design for the men. At least they were tasty!

We recently came across these beauties at Lula B’s Antique/Trift Store on Greeville Ave. It’s a really fun place, fully of vintage furniture, household objects and well, a lot of over nick-nacks. A lot of the items seem to be from the 50-60s, an era we are very interested in, design-wise. So you can imagine our delight when we found these stacking plates designed by Massimo Vignelli. The original design is from 1964 and they are made of melamine. They won many awards and were once very popular as they were offered in many bright colors.

Hopefully our collection will expand in both size and color.

We had a few friends over the other night and they were nice enough to bring a fancy dessert. I first noticed the superb sticker over the simple brown box. And inside, four delicious cupcakes were nestled. Each hinting at their individual flavor and topped with a colorful candy. And of course they were tasty.

Yesterday T & I went to what has become one of our favorite places in town: the farmer’s market. Think of all the produce you could need, locally grown, very inexpensive and all under one roof (or two). It’s pretty much the best thing ever. Also, you pay in cash so there is no tax. We came home with 3 canvas totes full of goodies for just $12. And there’s research about how your body’s immune system becomes healthier and stronger if you eat local foods and produce. Plus, there is just something about it that is so different from going to the grocery store. It’s pedestrian friendly, safe, friendly, supports the community, and the food is oh-so tasty (you even get samples as you walk around). I’d greatly recommend anyone trying their local farmer’s market if they get a chance.

They even have a huge garden area packed full of vibrant and green choices for your garden. Too bad we have none.

Today was a pretty fantastic day. The Mrs. and I slept in and later went up to her new classroom to continute setting up. We both are still a bit giddy that she was offered a job and it is turning out to be a great blessing, indeed.

Afterwards we planned out our week’s menu and decided to try our hand at Asian food. One of our wedding gifts we registered for and received was a C&B Sushi cookbook, and it gets an A+ for all the images it provides. Who wants a cookbook where there are no pictures of what you are cooking? How do you know you succeeded? Anyway, we looked up Asian grocery stores and found one in the Chinatown district of Richardson, about 10 minutes north of downtown. It turned out to be a super-legitimate Asian food market and we definitely felt a little out of place. However, my European domination skills kicked in and we managed alright, that is, after asking for help a few time – especially on the ingredients I couldn’t even pronounce correctly. We had decided to make simple sushi rolls and miso soup and found everything we needed, plus some. There were so many interesting things to see. From the unique and colorful graphics, wide variety of options and very exotic / slightly disturbing produce options (dried jellyfish) or live seafood (turtles?? – we had to catch our jaw before it hit the floor) it was for sure a sight to see. All-in-all, it was really fun and we will return soon. However, the next time we won’t be so lost.

When we got back (after also making a trip to TomThumb) we began reading up on what to do. It really wasn’t too hard, and the results, as you can see below, were fairly awesome if I do say so myself. We started by steaming the shrimp, cooking the rice, preparing the water and “dashi” powder for the miso soup. For the sushi, you lay out the “nori” or seaweed on the rolling mat, then spread the sticky white rice in a thin layer over the nori. Then add a line of each ingredient, shrimp and avocado in our case, and use the mat to form the large sushi roll. Then with a very sharp and wet knife, slice the roll into the typical, sushi roll pieces, and violá, you can make it look like the pros.

In addition, we prepared a classic miso soup, contaning the dashi powder for flavoring (sort of a stock), then added some onions (we forgot the shitaki mushrooms), tofu, and scallions. Lastly, drop in a few tablespoons of “miso” which is a soybean paste (sort of looked like bean dip :D) and the soup began to take its true color and taste.

As T was less brave to try the wasabi, I took one fore the team and nearly passed out at its potent flavor. It was stronger than any wasabi I had previously tasted. I don’t remember putting that much on my sushi roll, but it felt like an intense numbing of my mouth and face – reacting very quickly and made me pause and turn red for a moment. Next time I used a wee less and was OK. What an intense garnish. I wonder how many people have experienced the mistake of taking one drop too much of wasabi on their first try.

T wrapped up our meal with some super wonton delights. She filled them with a tasty cream cheese, onion, shrimp and soy sause mixture, and deep fried them over a smal pan of sesame oil. Yum.

A great day ending with a great meal with my wife; a perfect day.