Homemade Big Mac

I actually love McDonald's. Although I do agree that their food tastes mass-produced and has a weird aftertaste, I love their Big Mac and their regular hamburgers. Since we moved, the nearest McDonald's is about a 15-minute drive away, which is further than we're willing to go for, well, unhealthy food. Still, for the past few days, I've been craaaaaving a Big Mac. So we made some ourselves. Tadaaaa!

 

First, we made the sauce. We didn't have onion powder and the yellow stuff on the right was the closest thing to sweet pickle relish we could find.

 

Still, once mixed, it tasted like the Big Mac sauce to us. Only healthier. As healthy as 1 cup + 4 tbsp of mayonnaise can be.

Klaas chopped up some iceberg lettuce...

 

... and put some onions in the blender. They were mushy and looked more like rice, but whatever! 

Then, we MADE our own patties. Which turned out to be no big deal. I always thought it would be a complicated process, but no. All you have to do is make a ball, a bit larger than a golf ball, and then flatten it out.

We made Big Mac buns by slicing two buns in half. The bottom of one bun was then cut in half again. The top half makes the middle part of the first bun. Confused? You shouldn't be. We thought this tutorial was very helpful. We followed the recipe each step of the way.

Then we cooked the patties, put sauce, onions and lettuce on the bottom of the bun, added a pattie topped with some cheese, put the middle part of the bun on that, added another layer of sauce, onions and lettuce and then topped that with the second pattie, some pickles and the top of the bun.

A close-up of all that glorious goodness.

When we were out shopping for Big Mac sauce ingredients, we decided to go all out and have a somewhat fancy dessert as well. Two scoops of vanilla ice cream sprinkled with chocolate drops and some chocolate mousse topped with white chocolate sprinkles did the trick. Of course we used our golden spoons to dig in.

Our dogs were happy too...

All that was left, was this sad little cherry tomato. ^^

 

I love cooking up burgers. It's so much fun and provides you with an instant summer feeling.

Lazy weekends are the best

I've had the laziest weekend ever. This was the first Friday night in 4 weeks that I've been home from work. I've had an info session for our fourth, fifth and sixth year students Friday last week and then parent-teacher meetings on the two Fridays before that. So anyway, last Friday I had the luxury of going home at 4:30pm and not coming back later in the evening. I totally embraced it and did absolutely nothing that night.

Before going home I bought some chocolate Easter eggs from Broederlijk Delen, which is a Belgian NGO that provides development aid. I had three euros to spare, so I contributed. I think God would be pleased with me.

Friday marked the start of the new Astrid In Wonderland season. It's (one of) my (many) guilty pleasure(s), but I don't care. I'm not even embarrassed to admit that I love Astrid and her pimped out, chromed out Kill Bill mobile aka the pussywagon. This show is sooo sooo funny I could watch it all day.

I went to a pet store with my mom on Saturday and got a new scratching post. They look content, no? However, we haven't moved the old one out yet, so of course they're still sleeping on that one. Who would want to chillax in a brand-new home when they've got a raggedy one?

 

Some other things I did this weekend: visited my grandma (it'd been a while), baked peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, had dinner at my parents', corrected tons of group works and tests and took a hot bath while reading Forever in Blue: The Fourth Summer of the Sisterhood.

 

Two more weeks until spring break. Can't wait.

Random is my middle name.

Here are some random pictures from the past week around the house:

The first strawberries of the year. They were good, but we could taste that it's actually still too soon for strawberries. Our taste buds didn't explode.

 Dyeing my hair. I am soooo sexy.

Speaking of sexy, how about this? Habba habba. 

O'Malley is ALWAYS inside. I think the only time he ever ventures outside is when he has to do his ermmm cat business.

It's the little things in life

Today was such a relaxed day. I watched Medium with our dogs and cats, got dressed at 12:30, watched some more Medium, did some laundry and met up with Klaas at the supermarket to buy everything we needed to make burritos and cookies.

 

It seems that Juul is having his cake and eating it, too... ˄ and ˅

 

I like my men in the kitchen. Love goes through the belly, you know.

(I love dutchisms like that.)

Rice and red pepper. Yum!

Ooohh aaahh, look at all those colors!

 

I didn't take pictures of the finished product, but I already blogged about our burritos here.

 

Tomorrow is cookie time! I'm not sure if I'll be trying out something new, though. We'll see!

Bits and pieces

1. I love our pets. They're my babies.

 

We spread out a blanket for Flo to lie down on. She, of course, finds pillows far more comfortable.

 

2. Seeing as I don't have to work this week, I was able to go to the market yesterday. I picked up some delicious spareribs (seriously, they had so much meat on them!) and called it a two month anniversary feast.

3. A few days ago, I pinned a picture on Pinterest that seemed really cool. I had been wanting to try it out ever since, so I finally "made" it last night. It's some sort of natural air freshener and although it's a tad too subtle for my taste, I really like it. All you need is a lemon, a few sprigs of rosemary and 2 tbsp of vanilla extract (I only used one). Put it all in some water and let it simmer, baby!

4. I took a bath while watching Medium this morning. Klaas does this all the time, but it was a first for me. The sad thing was that I was already at the last episode of the disk when I got in the tub. I might do this more often.

 

5. Klaas made his casserole again. It's potatoes, cabbage, minced meat and Béchamel sauce and it's the perfect comfort food. It's so good that I like to eat it at all times, even when I don't need comforting.

 

Two date nights

Klaas and I went on a triple and a half date last night! We had dinner with Sofie and Arnaud, Joke and Gary, and Tabitha. Tabitha and I are Sofie's maids of honor, so I was glad to finally get to know her a bit better. She seems crazy enough to suit me and my ways, so I'm sure we'll get along splendidly. :) We had so much fun last night - maybe a little too much. Which is why I have no decent pictures to post here!

Friday night, Klaas and I went to see Django Unchained. We both really loved it. It reminded me a lot of Inglourious Basterds, even though they're about two totally different subjects. Driving home after the movie, I felt kind of blue. I wish I were a bounty hunter. Life must be so cool! Anyway, our life is pretty great now too, so I'll be just fine.

This is one of our current favorites. It's a scrambled egg with turmeric, ham cubes, whatever veggies we have on hand (usually cucumber and cherry tomatoes) and toast. Soooo good and so easy.

Power's out

So, we woke up yesterday because we noticed that our alarm clocks weren't working anymore. Apparently the rain combined with the thaw of the snow had caused our basement to get pretty damp which caused a malfunction in the water pump's pressure controller, so it kept constantly pumping up water. This in turn short circuited the electricity so we were out of water AND out of electricity. Klaas took the day off from work and started fixing the problem. Although the pump is a goner, he did manage to get the electricity working again.

Before

 

 

After

 

 

"Is that all?" you might say. It doesn't look all that different or complicated to me, but let me tell you, I wouldn't even know how to figure out what exactly the problem is. Let alone be able to fix it. I feel so lucky to be married to this wonderful man who not only picks up the slack when I'm too busy to do some household chores, but who is also amazingly skilled when it comes to dealing with problems like these.

 

Being out of water and electricity, we had a very unhealthy, yet utterly romantic dinner.

 

 

Great. Now I'm hungry again.

Bad habits: part 2

Although I haven't allowed myself that Last Donut yet, it seems that I am already just replacing one bad habit with another. On Tuesday, I got to the train station and went to get a sandwich. I glanced over at the donuts, thinking "I am not buying a donut. I am strong." and proceeded to the register. Then I noticed some chocolate croissants on the cash desk and thought: "Oh, yum!"

Yes, I am STILL reading American Psycho.

This was the only splurge of the week, though, so it's all good.

Klaas and I tried out a new recipe today.

Well, that picture didn't turn out well.

I totally stole it from Joke, who got it from here. It's paprika chicken stroganoff and I really liked it. Klaas didn't think it was particularly good, but he didn't hate it either. I guess that doesn't matter, because there are plenty of recipes we've tried out that he really liked but that didn't hit the spot for me.

In closing:

I like to consort with other redheads. Makes me feel like I belong.

I need more recipes! Please share some of your favorites with me!

Bad habits

Mmmm, sweaty donut.

One of the only things I love about going to work is getting to read my book on the train. Sometimes I have to go get a sandwich in a store at the train station and, unfortunately, there are donuts right next to the sandwiches. So I almost always end up buying a donut as well. Then I walk to the platform, sit down with my book and eat my donut. Even if I've only just had breakfast or if it's almost time to have lunch. This has got to stop. I'll allow myself one last donut, though.

On dogs and birthday dinners

Just how cozy do Flo and Juul look?

 

 

Our cat is such a snob. She's pretty and she knows it. She won't use the kitty door, oh no, the door actually has to be opened for her.

It was Gary's (the South African from here) birthday yesterday and we were invited to celebrate with him and Joke. It was so much fun and I'm so glad we went, because it really helped me forget for a while some issues I've been dealing with. We had dinner at a sparerib restaurant in Ghent and it was sooo good. The restaurant was really pretty too, cool setting.

Ohh, pretty pretty.

 

Everyone

The girls

The birthday boy man.

  

How hot is my husband? Did I hear you say 'very'?

 

Joke made Gary a mustache cake. It sounds wrong to say it, but it was goo-hood.

 

Look how happy that cake made him!

 

I think I'll go have another piece of that cake now.