My New Vintage Kitchen Table from the 60's!

I've been living in my apartment since May with no table. That's right NO TABLE. It's been a pain in my ass. I have to sit eating on my bed or on the floor at the coffee table (which is actually my grandfathers old cedar chest).

Earlier this summer my friend moved into this awesome bungalow in North Riverside (a suburb of Chicago). It is beautiful. I love everything about it. Hopefully one day I can have a place like theirs! Anyway... She offered to give me her old pink and gray 60's table that the previous owner left in the basement. Of course I jumped at the chance as I love everything vintage. The only problem was getting it to my apartment. For months we tried to plan and coordinate, but nothing ever worked out. Then Sunday morning I got a call at 8 am, "I have my parents van, want me to go pick up that table for you?" UM DUH!!

And now my little studio is complete. The best part is that it has an adorable Pink and Gray table! YAY

I'm seriously in love!! Every time I look over at my table I smile.

Deliciously Easy Roasted Vegetable Recipe

As I mentioned before, I love vegetables. One my favorite girlfriends gave me this amazing roasted veggie recipe. YOU HAVE TO TRY IT!

You can choose any vegetables you like. I usually eat...

1 Red Pepper

1 Yellow Pepper

1 Purple Onion

1 Large Zucchini or 2 Small Zucchinis

3 Large Potatoes or 6 Small Potatoes

(feel free to add Asparagus, Tomatoes, Mushrooms, Brussels Sprouts, or even Turkey Sausage)

Cut up veggies and put into glass pyrex. Drizzle with olive oil, a splash of vinegar, salt, pepper, a sprinkle of sugar. Roast in the oven for 45 minutes at 425 F. When you remove from the oven sprinkle with herbs of your choice. I would recommend rosemary, thyme, and red pepper flakes.

YUM

How to Make Cold Vegetable Pizza - Perfect, Easy Veggie Appetizer Recipe for Parties!

Vegetables are the best! I actually prefer them to fruit, which is probably why I love my mom's Vegetable Pizza Recipe. It tastes fresh, creamy, and cool. 

This recipe is extremely easy to make, but does take some prep time. When you make it, I would recommend placing each veggie within each square, as opposed to just throwing the vegetables all over the pizza. It just gives a nicer presentation. 

YUM!

Vegetable Pizza Recipe

What you'll need...

2 Cans (8 oz each) Crescent Dinner Roll Cans

1 Package (8 oz) Cream Cheese, Softened

1/2 Cup Sour Cream

Dried Dill

1/2 Cup Broccoli

1/2 Cup Cauliflower

1/3 Cup Cucumber  

1/2 Cup Chopped Tomatoes

1/3 Cup Green, Red, and/or Yellow Peppers

1/4 Cup of Chives

(Obviously you can switch up to the veggies, depending on what you like. You could add anything! Carrots, Olives, etc.)

Start by heating your oven to 375 F. Open the crescent rolls, unroll, and press into the bottom of an ungreased 15x10 pan. Bake for 13-15 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove from oven and let cool. Now get to chopping those veggies and place to the side. Next mix cream cheese and sour cream. Spread this mixture over the cooled crust. Now (in my opinion) it's important to cut your pieces. I recommend 4 rows by 8 columns. Then sprinkle generously with dill. Lastly, add your veggies. I usually start with 1 type (i.e. broccoli) and put a piece on each square, then move onto the next vegetable. This gives it a nice neat and clean look (as seen above). 

Unfortunately this doesn't store very well, because the crust gets soggy, so it's best served immediately. 

Hope you love it as much as me!!

-Xtina

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My Favorite Veggie Pickling Recipe - You Can Even Pickle Peaches!

When my girlfriend ask me if I wanted to try pickling with her I jumped at the chance. Who doesn't love pickles? So we hopped in the car, headed to Whole Foods, and wandered around the produce section asking ourselves what we should pickle. 

While discussing our pickling we met a very interesting man who told us that he pickled all the time. He suggested we try beets, brussel sprouts, and peaches... Yes peaches.

The recipe we had was very simple. The most time consuming part was cutting all the veggies. The great thing about it is that you can pickle just about anything!

This recipe takes about 40 minutes to prep and is best if you let it refrigerate over night. 

Makes about 2 quarts 

FOR THE BRINE:

10 Cloves Garlic, Peeled

2 Cups White Vinegar

6 Tsp Kosher Salt

Several Sprigs of Fresh Dill

1 Tsp Celery Seed

1 Tsp Coriander Seed

1 Tsp Mustard Seed

1/2 Tsp Black Peppercorns

1/2 Tsp Pink Peppercorns (if you have them)

FOR THE VEGGIES: 

Anything you like! Here we did...

Cauliflower

Asparagus

Pickle Cucumbers

Carrots

Beets

Brussel Sprouts (forewarning - if you use them, cook them a little bit beforehand so that they are soft)

and a separate jar of Peaches

You can also add Red Hot Chiles or Jalapenos to make it spicy!

Veggies

Spices

In a medium saucepan bring 4 cups of water to a boil, reduce heat so water simmers and add garlic. Cook for 5 minutes. Add vinegar and salt, raise the heat and bring to a boil, stirring until salt dissolves. Remove from heat.

In 2 clear 1-quart jars, place a few sprigs of dill (we ended up tripling the recipe). Divide the seeds and peppercorns between the jars. Using tons, remove the garlic from the brine and place 5 cloves in each jar.

Mixing it all up

Pack the jars full of vegetables. You want each jar to be tightly stuffed.

YUM

Peaches and veggies, before we poured in the brine

Bring the brine back to a boil, pour it over the vegetables to cover completely, let cool, then cover and refrigerate. The pickles will taste good after a a couple hours, but will taste better after a couple of days. These will keep for about 3 months.

After pouring in the brine, the beets started turning the water bright PINK

Now we wait...

If you've never had pickled peaches, try it, they're surprisingly good!

I can't wait to dig in!

My Beautiful Wall Collage - How to Hang and Make the Perfect Arrangement

I've always wanted to do a wall collage. Pinterest and the design blogs I follow have been so inspiring, so when I moved to this new place I knew that I had to do one. Now making a wall collage is not as easy as you would think, especially when you have concrete walls! I sat down for hours moving, rearranging, and replacing my art, until it was just perfect and even then I still made more changes. Since this is such a complex piece I decided to think outside the box and include new and old pieces, pictures of my best friends, art from my travels around the world, flea market finds, and a piece of art my BFF made me.

The most important thing about making a wall collage, is that it doesn't have to be perfect. The colors don't have to match, it doesn't need to be symmetrical, and not everything has to be the same shape. Keep playing around with the overall shape of your art. Make sure that is has appropriate spacing between each piece, if some are too close or too far from each other it will look funny. As you can see everything is off centered, but the over all shape of the piece has the same amount of weight on each side. Doing this helps to make the piece more visually appealing. 

Once it was perfectly arranged, I took a picture of my art.

Many of my frames did not have hooks, so the next thing I had to do was go to the hardware store, purchase mini hook, and attach them to the backings. After that I traced each piece onto a piece of paper (notated where the hook was), cut them out, and then taped them on the wall according to my photo.

This was so I could make sure my art looked at good on the wall as it did on the floor. It was also very helpful to my handyman because he knew exactly where to hang each piece. 

This hung on my wall for about a month before I hung anything, just to make sure I was happy with it. Its not easy to make changes when you have concrete walls.

We started in the middle and worked our way out, while measuring to make sure that everything was perfectly centered in the middle of the wall and aligned with one another.

Once it was done I was THRILLED!

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE the way this looks! My apartment is one step closer to being perfect!

Here's a close up of the wall.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with a Maple Cream Cheese Filling Recipe

I love anything pumpkin. So I'm always excited to try new pumpkin recipes. When I came across this recipe I couldn't wait to cook a pumpkin and get started. Forewarning, these are HIGHLY addictive. They also take a while too cook and assemble, so be prepared. 

YUM

PUMPKIN WHOOPIE PIES WITH MAPLE CREAM CHEESE FILLILNG

Makes about 4 dozen assembled whoopie pies (will vary depending on size)

Ingredients For the Whoopie Pies:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup canola or vegetable oil
3 cups pumpkin
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions for Whoopie Pies:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger and nutmeg. Set aside.

Cut baking pumpkin in half. Fill a 13x9 glass pan with ½ inch of water and place pumpkin halves face down. Cook for 45 minutes. Once cooked, scoop out the meat of the pumpkin, should make about 3 cups.

In a separate bowl, whisk the granulated sugar, the dark brown sugar, and the oil together. Add the pumpkin puree and whisk to combine thoroughly. Add the eggs and vanilla and whisk until combined.  Gradually add the flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and whisk until completely combined.

Use a small cookie scoop or a large spoon to drop a rounded, heaping tablespoon of the dough onto the prepared baking sheets, about 1 inch apart. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, making sure that the cookies are just starting to crack on top and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cookie comes out clean. The cookies should be firm when touched. Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool completely on a cooling rack.

Ingredients For the Maple-Cream Cheese Filling:
3 cups powdered sugar
8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
4 ounces (½ cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions for Filling:

To make the filling, beat the butter on medium speed until smooth with no visible lumps, about 3 minutes. Add the cream cheese and beat until smooth and combined, about 2 minutes. Add the powdered sugar a little at a time, then add the maple syrup and vanilla and beat until smooth.

To assemble the whoopie pies: Turn half of the cooled cookies upside down. Pipe or spoon the filling (about a tablespoon) onto that half. Place another cookie, flat side down, on top of the filling. Press down slightly so that the filling spread to the edges of the cookie. Repeat until all the cookies are used. Put the whoopie pies in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to firm before serving.

Prepping the Pumpkin

Cooked Squash

Assembled Whoopie Pies

Love trying different Pumpkin Pie Recipes!

My Apartment Decor is Moving Along...

I really enjoy interior design. I know decorating my new apartment will take time, but I'm okay with that because I want it to be perfect. I decided that a chandelier in the dining area would really dress up the room and that I wanted to incorporate pieces from my family throughout the space. I love the color gray, feminine details, antiques, and being surrounded my photos of the ones I love. Here's the start of something amazing...

Dining Room Chandelier from Overstock

I had it set on a dimmer switch

I don't have a lot of kitchen storage, so I got this Ikea Expedite piece of craigslist. 

The chest and the mirror wrapped up in the blue tarp were my grandmothers (you can see the mirror hung below). The Gray and brown suit cases are from antique stores and the camel one is from my uncle. 

Here's the mirror hung up, along with my childhood dresser. I want to change the hardware eventually.
The lamps and coat sand are from Urban Outfitters.  

More soon to come!!