twin cities brekkies suggestion #1: victor's 1959 cafe.

Breakfast is a thing for me. Like, a real big thing. I could go on and on again about how much I love mornings but I'll save you the chatter.

You guys, the Twin Cities is loaded with wonderful brekkies places. So here's my first suggestion (of many).

Victor's 1959 Cafe
3756 Grand Ave S, Minneapolis

Here's an unfortunate photo just to prove that it exists and that I go there:

Why you should go.

• It's Cuban!
• Breakfast happy hour: Mon-Fri, 8:00am-10:30am
• Wall graffiti to entertain you while you wait for...
• Uhmuhgahd delicious foods. Do you want plantains and yucca and mango things and beans and mole for breakfast? Why did I have to ask?
• Guava jam
• Good coffee
• Lovely servers
• So reasonably priced!

But can I be a vegetarian and still have options?

• Uh, duh. Beans. Plantains. Yucca. I said it all before.

grain-free peanut butter dog treats.

I had a crippling realization while making dog treats today.

1. I don't have a dog.

2. Earlier in the week I made "chocolate chip cookies" using basically the same ingredients as these dog treats. The only difference was that there was chocolate instead of parsley in mine. 

Guys, I just wanted to see what the making desserts with beans craze was all about. I'm so embarrassed.  And I like how weird they are. Like, I really do.

Don't talk to me anymore. I might be a dog. Hold up, though. If I am a dog does that mean I don't have to do my own laundry anymore?

Grain-Free Peanut Butter Dog Treats

Adapted from Food52

These pup cookies are made with garbanzo bean flour in case your little nugget is grain-sensitive! There's so crazy simple and there's a bonus parsley add-in for breath-freshening. Buy me a dog right now.

Makes about three dozen, depending on the size of your cutter.

1/2 cup natural peanut butter

1 cup water

2 Tbs canola oil

3 cups garbanzo bean flour (or half whole wheat, half all-purpose)

2 Tbs dried parsley (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.

In a medium bowl, whisk together peanut butter, water, and oil. In another bowl combine flour and parsley. Add peanut butter mixture to dry ingredients and mix to combine. 

Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to about 1/4" thick. Cut shapes out of dough (I used a two inch biscuit cutter). Transfer to prepared cookie sheets, leaving about a 1/4" between treats (they don't spread a lot). If desired, score treats with a fork to prevent puffing. 

Bake for 18 minutes, or until golden brown. Probably don't feed your dog treats straight from the oven.

ten commercials to make the rain go away.

This one goes out to all my late 80s, early 90s babes. From a not so long ago time when zany must have been the only buzzword to target children through advertisements.

Cereal will be featured on a separate post. Don't make me share its glory.

1. Nickelodeon Magazine. PLEASE.

2. Mr. Bucket should probably see a doctor. 

3. Wishing you all a Polly day and that the ink in your ink pads weren't all dried up like mine. It's hard being the youngest.

4. I'm offended by how insincere this seems now.

5. Another group of people that may want to make an appointment with a specialist. I'm spooked.

6. The only thing that matters in this Bagel Bites commercial the the kid at 00:05. It's the only thing that matters because mom didn't buy me them. What? Eating pizza "anytime" is not "healthy"?

7. This comes with a supplemental Buzzfeed article about Guess Who celebrity dopplegangers. 

8. "Looks like another scorcher" is something I said a lot as a child.

9. A cloud of m&m minis reeking havoc inside a museum was something we all dreamt about. No? Just me? 

10. The Talk Back Dear Diary that is nothing like a diary but more of a bullying tool. "No boys, no way!" 

You think I'm done? Just for today.

No, mom, this isn't what I do with all of my free time!

It's what I do with some of my free time.

love your tree.

I'm convinced nothing else matters. I want this plastered everywhere on everything on everyone.

"look at that tree. now, look at that tree. do you like that tree? do you hate that tree cause it doesn't look like that tree? do you say that tree isn't pretty because it doesn't look like that tree? we're all trees. i'm a tree, you're a tree. you've got to love your body. you've got to love your tree."

11:40pm real talk by yours truly.

Also, California shells.

banana, carrot, zucchini bread.

It might be raining for the first time ever. Well, that's just what it feels like when you live in a place of eternal winter. At first the sound of raindrops was confusing to me, unfamiliar. But then it was so so welcome. Spring is finally here!

I bet you didn't know it's mandatory to bake on rainy days. I bet you really didn't know it's mandatory to bake a quick bread on rainy days.

Banana, carrot, zucchini bread is literally everything you've ever wanted. It's like all the good flavors of breads came over for a play date and had so much fun. It's like you couldn't decide which one you wanted to make so you just decided to make all of them. It's like everyone's married and they're on their honeymoon and the weather is perfect and no one gets sunburned and there's a lot of singing.

Maybe you should just make it.

Banana, Carrot, Zucchini Bread
slightly adapted from Rose's Heavenly Cakes (as in there's supposed to be walnuts but I didn't have any)

2 cups plus 2 Tbsp all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup quick cooking oats
1 very ripe banana, mashed
1/2 cup oil
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1/3 cup water
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup shredded carrot
2/3 cup shredded zucchini

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare a 8x5in loaf pan.

In a medium sized bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and oats.

In a large bowl beat together mashed banana, oil, sugars, and eggs. Add water and beat til foamy. Beat in vanilla. Mix in carrot and zucchini.

Slowly add flour mixture to wet ingredients and combine, being careful not to over mix. Bake for one hour or until a toothpick, inserted, comes out clean. 

pistachio shortbread.

I'm not that mad at me for not doing any sort of blogging for the past...let's say for the past two months.

Am I in the midst of a second wind? We'll see.

Winter is long in these parts, but that's nothing a heavy dosage of vitamin D, one sixty degree day, dogs, friends, and oatmeal can't fix.

       

Sometimes I get real gift-y so I made some cookies to send to the family back in Illinois. My dad doesn't like chocolate which is an anomaly to nearly anyone. First I was all, "winter citrus shortbread duh." But then my ego was all, "everyone makes citrus things in the winter." And so I chose pistachios.

I've got this real fuzzy memory of my second grade teacher forcing us to eat pistachio pudding on St. Patrick's Day which made me hate pistachios forever. Imitation pistachio flavor is extremely disappointing. Pistachio.

These, however, are not disappointing. Being careful not to over pulse butter with the rest of the ingredients will result in a perfectly sanding dough that comes together with some help from your fingers. Think moon sand. Moon sand cookies that will melt in your mouth.

I would imagine you could make these will all kind of nuts. Candied pecans. That would be great. 

Head over to Leite's Culinaria for the recipe from the More From Macrina. Macrina? Obvi these cookies are going to be delicious.