70′s and 80′s boy band. um, no. image credit here

I’m talking about menudo, the food! There are two types of menudo – the Mexican soup version, made with beef stomach and eaten with tortillas; and the Filipino stew version, usually made with pork or beef. Today, we’re going to talk about the Filipino version, of course! Because I’m Filipino and that’s that.

I grew up eating menudo with steamed rice, made by my parents. I think my husband has only eaten it once. It’s got a somewhat sweet, but tomato-y taste and it’s very good. My husband though I’d be making the beef stomach version and to assure him I wasn’t, I told him it has a similar taste to afritada, which I’ve made before, which he likes. I decided to go ahead and make menudo, to freeze and eat later. (Freeze/batch cooking post will come soon!)

Are you adventurous enough to try this?

Chickpea & Chicken Filipino Menudo (adapted from Ang Sarap – tagalog for “how tasty!”)

Ingredients

• 1 large chicken breast, cut into small chunks
• 1 15 oz can of chickpeas, drained
• 1 cup carrots, diced (I used the petite carrots that come in a bag; easier to cut since they were already small and peeled)
• 1 & 1/2 cups potato, peeled and diced
• 1/2 cup frozen green peas
• 2 cups fat free, low-sodium chicken broth
• 1/2 cup frozen chopped onion
• 2 tsp minced garlic
• 4 tbsp tomato paste
• 2 tbsp white vinegar
• 2 tsp low-sodium soy sauce
• 1 tbsp white sugar
• 2 dried bay leaves
• 1 tbsp canola oil

1. Heat oil in a large, deep pan. Sautee garlic and onions, til the onions are soft and translucent.

2. Add chicken and chickpeas. Cook until the chicken is done and slightly browned.

3. Add broth, carrots, potatoes, tomato paste, vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and bay leaves. Stir well (making sure tomato paste is incorporated) and bring to a boil. Lower heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.

4. Add frozen peas and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

5. When simmer time is done, season to taste with salt and pepper. Remove from heat and serve with rice.

(I portioned this out – froze two batches, enough for 2 dinners for my husband and I.)

As I’ve mentioned before, I work 40 hours a week at a large university in town. Lately, I’ve been working 40+ hours because of the nature of the semester. The spring semester IS slower than the fall, but it’s still busy. I work specifically for a large music college in the university and we’re in the midst of audition season – high school seniors who have to audition with their primary instrument to gain entrance into the college. It’s a very demanding time for all my co-workers. We actually just got done with the first one today and this upcoming week, we’ll have another one. Thankfully our last audition day is not until end of February. Whew!

Anyways, the combination of long and busy hours at work AND being in my 3rd trimester is very tiring. I have no energy or willingness to cook at night. I just want to crash on the couch and veg out. But we must eat and eat healthy/cheaply if we can. Thanks to my friend Melanie (who is due a week before me, with twins!) who gave me the brilliant idea and encouragement to cook meals ahead of time, I’ve done this. In fact, I’ve done this for about the last month and a half or so. (Preggo brain here – I can’t really remember.) Freezer/batch cooking, plus our homegroup helping us out by providing a few meals has really been amazing.

So how does one do freezer/batch cooking? Well, you will find a TON of resources out there on the internet. I just got some ideas from Melanie (like, making soup and pizza) and came up with my own ideas, too, based on what we like to eat, how much time I had and what our budget was like. Some things I kept in mind:

1. We don’t eat casseroles so those were out of the meal plan (though casseroles are great to freeze).

2. I need to cook as much vegetarian stuff as I could – cheaper and healthier. Or at least, use mainly vegetables and add a meat as a filler.

3. I have a normal size freezer. Space is limited.

4. What are dishes that we like?

5. What are dishes that are easy to freeze?

6. How often should I do this?

After doing this for a while now, it turns out that shopping once a week is better for me than shopping for the whole month. And more specifically, cooking on the weekend is better than cooking during the work week. Because of some meals I already had in the freezer, I haven’t necessarily cooked EVERY Saturday or Sunday. I think, looking back, I’ve cooked every other week, and I’ve just rotated meals that I already had in stock and ones that I just froze. I used to write down our weekly meal plan, based on our “inventory” but now I’ve started inputting everything on Google’s calendar option. It’s easier for me to move things around, if I decide we’ll eat one dish one particular night rather than another night, etc.

With audition season in full-swing, I knew I had to plan well. So, I made several meals last Saturday, knowing that I wouldn’t have the energy to cook this weekend.

Here’s what my freezer looked like seven days ago:

The 1st shelf is sort of random, with some bags of frozen vegetables (mainly chopped spinach, chopped onions and chopped green bell pepper from Kroger), 3 bags of eggroll wrappers (I can only find them at Central Market or at Asian grocery stores, so I buy a bunch at a time and keep them frozen until later use), 2 pouches of fish, some frozen fruit and a couple of lunch servings for me.

The 2nd shelf contains mostly the frozen meals I’ve made. 1 batch/bag means 1 night’s dinner for BOTH my husband and I. Last week’s “inventory” had:

• 2 bags of fried, whole fish (from my dad) – we can eat this with rice, eggrolls and salad
• 3 bags of Filipino eggrolls (lumpia) that I made; there are 8 eggrolls per bag, which I fry up and we eat with rice and lettuce (or with fish, like I wrote above)
• 1 batch of taco soup (leftover from a homegroup friend’s contribution)
• 4 cheese quesadillas (made with our sandwich maker), to go with the taco soup
• 2 batches of vegetarian chili (post coming soon)
• 3 batches of hoppin’ john
• 2 batches of red bean paella
• 2 batches of menudo (post coming soon)
• 2 batches of shish taouk (post coming soon)
• 2 batches of middle-eastern rice (post coming soon)

Some other stuff I’ve made and froze have been zuppa toscana and 2 pizzas (using Jiffy’s pizza dough and toppings I had in the fridge, like turkey pepperoni, mushrooms, cheese and spinach).

That’s a lot of dinners, right?! (Three days of the week, my husband and I are able to ride to work together – same work hours – and therefore, we eat lunch at a vegan cafeteria on campus. The meal plan we use there is cheap, approx. $3.50 per meal, per person. The other two days, I work different hours from my husband, so I pack my lunch and eat at my office; he eats at home.)

So as to not overwhelm my husband with just soup for like, three days in a row, I try to have a rotation of the meals. Variety is a good thing! My husband is great – he eats whatever I make (granted, as long as it’s not a casserole or meatloaf, ha!) and is not the stereotypical male who only wants meat and potatoes. He’s actually very healthy and was the person who helped me to change my eating habits (I used to eat a lot of junk). He’s all for eating healthy, cheaply and ethnically (if that makes sense) – he loves Filipino food. I am blessed!

Anyways, cooking ahead of time has been a lifesaver, like I mentioned earlier. The night before, I’ll take a bag out of the freezer and will put it in the fridge to thaw all day next day. Then, once I get home from work, I’ll take the bag out of fridge if it is still a bit frozen, and let it thaw on the countertop. I’ll either pour the contents of the bag in a bowl and microwave it, or I’ll heat it up in a pan on the stove. The only thing I’ll have to actually cook is shish taouk, as it’s just chicken pieces in a marinade – I’ll just bake it in the oven. The rice to accompany it is already cooked.

Last Saturday was my latest cooking day. My husband helped me make the shish taouk marinades while I cut up fresh chicken (bought 5 lbs of it from Sam’s) and put into bags. That same afternoon, I made menudo, middle eastern rice and orange chicken (for our dinner that night). I was able to rest on Sunday instead of worrying about meals for the coming week. I won’t have to cook for another 2 weeks, I think (especially since this upcoming weekend is another audition day – no time! no energy!).

Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions. I’m still new at this and I know that I have room for improvement in my system of cooking. I honestly don’t know how much I can keep doing this as the weeks progress and as my belly grows. But for now, freezer/batch cooking is so helpful. I can’t imagine NOT doing this!

Oh, Panda Express, how I love you.

I first ate at a Panda Express nearly 8-9 years ago, when I worked at a Christian bookstore inside a mall. My lunch breaks were spent sitting at the mall cafeteria, eating loads of rice and orange chicken. You see, the orange chicken at Panda Express is UH-MA-ZING. Up until recently, the closest Panda Express from us was about 25 minutes away. This was a good thing, as I couldn’t justify driving that far just to get orange chicken. But now, our town opened its first Panda Express. Sigh. That orange chicken (along with their string bean chicken and firecracker shrimp) is within my reach. This is not a good thing. Not only is the food good but cheap! I must exercise self-control.

(Side note – after having been to China and eating the food there, my love of Asian food grew. I don’t consider Panda Express and Pei Wei to be real Asian food, but just pseudo-Asian. It can’t be helped when you’ve had real Asian food as well as local Asian restaurants in your own town. But I still have a soft spot for P. E. and P.W.)

Anyways, we try to limit our eating out, to save money. So I figured, while I needed to satisfy my craving of orange chicken, I should search online to see if I could find a recipe that was close to Panda Express’s version. I was lucky! I found a recipe that I think is pretty close to the orange chicken at P. E. Maybe better (that’s what a lot of the reviewers said). After making the orange chicken myself, I was convinced of its goodness. And I think it’s decently healthy, because I didn’t deep-fry the meat and I added spinach at the end for some nutrition. My husband, who is a fan of P. E.’s orange chicken, loved what I made and he agreed with me that this dish will be put on the rotation.

You gotta try it! I tell you, it is delicious.

PS – this is the only picture I have. When you’re cooking something like this, you have to be pretty fast to add the ingredients. No time to take pictures! And here’s a tip: make sure you have all your ingredients already set out, ready to be put in the pan. Mise en place will serve you well here, as a stir-fry dish doesn’t leave you much time to scramble to get an ingredient from your pantry.

Orange Chicken (slightly adapted from Food.com)

Ingredients

• 3 large uncooked chicken breasts, cut into 1 inch bite size pieces (or smaller, larger, whichever you want)
• canola oil (for frying), maybe 2-3 tbsp
• 1 tbsp gingerroot, minced
• 1 tsp garlic, minced
• 1/2 tsp red chili pepper flakes
• 1 tbsp rice vinegar
• water (to taste, if you think the sauce ends up being too vinegar-y for your liking)

ORANGE SAUCE (doubled from original recipe)

• 3 tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
• 3 tbsp water
• 10 tbsp white sugar
• 10 tbsp white vinegar
• zest of 2 oranges

1. Mix all the orange sauce ingredients in a bowl, stirring well to dissolve the sugar. Set aside.

2. Heat a small amount of oil (1-2 tbsp) in a large pan. Panfrying, cook and slightly brown the chicken pieces in the hot oil. Remove from pan when cooked and set aside chicken.

3. Add about 1 tbsp of oil in the same pan, use high heat and add ginger & garlic. Sautee for about 10 seconds. Add chili flakes and stir quickly. Add the rice vinegar, stir for 3 seconds, then add the orange sauce. Heat until boiling, then bring the heat to low so the sauce can simmer.

4. Add the chicken to the sauce, stir well to combine. Simmer for 10-15 minutes to get the sauce to thicken up. (Or, you can make a little cornstarch & water paste, but I didn’t do this since I had no cornstarch in the pantry.) Season to taste with salt and cayenne pepper.

5. Remove from heat, and add as much spinach leaves as you want. (Like my “healthy” addition? Why not?). Serve with brown rice. Enjoy!

image credit here

Now, I’ve done my fair share of traveling but I don’t usually eat at places that make lists like these. But alas, I HAVE eaten at Quinn’s Pub (I have family that live in the Capitol Hill neighborhood, so we just walked there). No, I didn’t have the burger (sad, sad, sad) but I did try several things that I never would have eaten before, had my sister-in-law not chosen it for us.

• wild boar sloppy joe
• bone marrow with crackers
• truffle fries
• rabbit ragout
• fried frog legs

Interesting list, huh? Last time I was in Seattle was December 2010, a fun-filled 10 days with my family up there. We weren’t able to make it to Quinn’s but we did make the obligatory (to me, at least) stop at my favorite Seattle restaurant, Elysian Brewery (their burgers are AMAZING).

Anyways, check out the slide show. For a pregnant woman, my mouth was drooling by the time I read the headline of “America’s Best Comfort Food.”

Season 1 of BBC’s Sherlock (my husband got me the DVD series!). I’ve probably mentioned here once or twice that I’m a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes. We own almost the Grenada Television’s DVD series from the 80s, a hardback copy of the canon and now this. (Sorry, folks. While the Robert Downey Jr. versions of Sherlock Holmes are good, it’s just too Hollywood-y for me. I’m a Sherlock snob, what can I say?)

image credit here

My new water bottle, from the Container Store. It’s 32 oz, BPA-free and it doesn’t leak! Mine is the blue one and my husband’s is the black one. His and hers water bottles.

image credit here

Dairy Queen mini-blizzards and fries. I know, I know. These things are not healthy but once in a while is NOT bad! You gotta enjoy a treat every now and then. And this is a treat for me! (My husband thinks mini-blizzards are too small; he likes the next size up.) The mini-blizzard is the one in the right-hand side of the picture, the smallest of the bunch. Oh, and their fries! When you get it freshly made, they are oh so good.

image credit here

Parking farther so I can enjoy a nice, brisk walk to my office building. This is definitely good for me, as my 5:30 am exercise routine is no more (I am not sleeping well at night anymore, so getting up that early for exercise? No way! I’ll take as much sleep as I can get now). On a given day, I’ll get to walk approx. 1.5 miles, from the parking lot to the building and back, and from the office to the one of the university cafeterias on campus. Which leads me to this . . .

The spring-like weather. While I love winter and would rather it be cold right now (you know, January, winter, that kind of thing), I am thankful for spring-like temperatures. It makes my walks more enjoyable.

image from wunderground.com

Costa Rican Tarrazu coffee from World Market. For part of my husband’s Christmas gift, I got him this special coffee from World Market. It’s actually one of our favorite blends. And while I AM pregnant, it’s okay for me to drink a small cup of coffee ever so often.

image credit here

Paul Baloche’s “Glorious” album. One of my husband’s Christmas presents to me. It is such a great worship album!

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Ina May Gaskin’s Guide to Childbirth. A great book to encourage me and help me prepare for labor and delivery. A must-read for women who are pregnant! Thankfully I found a used copy of it at our local used bookstore.

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And, one last thing – William Wilberforce: The Life of the Great Anti-Slavery Campaigner. I’ve had this book for several years now but have yet to get through it. I WILL finish it in 2012! Slowly but surely reading it.

image credit here

What are YOU liking/enjoying lately?

Ha! Breakfast, indeed. Nesting kicked into high gear immediately and I set out to make peanut butter cookies. Why peanut butter cookies, you ask? The other day, when my husband and I were eating lunch together at the cafeteria, we had some no-bake oatmeal chocolate peanut butter cookies. You know which one I’m talking about. That got us talking about other cookies we enjoy and he mentioned his love for peanut butter cookies, especially his mom’s recipe. I decided then that I would make my loving husband these cookies!

Alas, I really do try my best to have our household eat as healthy as possible, with indulgences every now and then.

CONFESSION: we stopped at Dairy Queen last night, on the way home form work, bought us some blizzards and a small order of fries. Ate that, and then snacked on pretzels, chips and salsa. Hubby drank a beer to wash it all down. We never ate dinner. We ate like college students. We are definitely not health freaks around here. Sometimes you just have to let loose!

Back to being healthy, ahem. I didn’t have my mother-in-law’s recipe, so I decided to just go online to find a healthier version of peanut butter cookies. Thanks to this wonderful website, I was successful! My slightly modified version is below. These cookies are so good! Not overpoweringly sweet, but sweet enough. And that peanut buttery goodness? Oh my. I hope you enjoy this!

Healthier Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies (adapted from Daily Unadventures in Cooking)

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 1/2 cup regular, extra crunchy peanut butter
• 1/8 cup agave nectar
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup old-fashioned oats, uncooked
• 2 cups quick oats, uncooked
• 1 1/4 cup unbleached white flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. In a large bowl, beat oil and peanut butter with a wooden spoon. Add the eggs, mix well and then add agave nectar, brown sugar and vanilla, mixing some more.

2. Using the same bowl, add all the oats. Stir until oats are almost coated. Add flour, baking powder and baking soda and mix, until almost incorporated. Don’t overmix.

3. Form 1 inch balls of dough and place on a cookie sheet (I lined mine with foil). Press the doug balls slightly and bake for 10-12 minutes.

I’m not sure how many cookies I made total because as I made them, my husband and I ate them. Sigh. That’s what happens when you have freshly baked cookies! They’re just so good straight out of the oven.

Oh, and cookies aren’t the only things we ate for breakfast. I had some leftover quinoa in the fridge so I warmed it up with some milk, added chopped apples and walnut pieces to it and season it to taste with cinnamon and honey. It was really good. A pretty decent breakfast in my book, I think! My husband was a fan of it all so I am pleased.

Onward and upward on to this beautiful day! We did our morning devotions, some chores around the house and now, I’ll be getting ready for a trip to Sam’s with my friend Kathryn. I don’t have too much to buy yet but I’m excited to save some money while buying some bulk items. Hurrah! Ahh, the things adults get excited over.

Have a wonderful weekend

image credit here

The other night, I was taking inventory of the food we had in the fridge and freezer. I’ve done pretty well (if I do say so myself) in cooking meals ahead of time, on the weekends, and freezing them. Working all day, 40+ hours a week at times, and being 27 weeks pregnant tires a woman out! But with my frozen meals, I just have to take out a tupperware or freezer bag, let it defrost in the fridge all day and voila, dinner is ready to be heated. I had most of our meals for the week already cooked and frozen so I just need to make one more meal and snacks for the next 5 days. I made quite a few versions of fudge babies (posted the other day) and made a batch of chocolate quinoa bars (found a recipe from this blog). I wondered what else I should make and I thought, why not make some hard boiled eggs? Quick snack to go with an apple or some crackers. I’m easy to please! And since I would be making hard boiled eggs, why not make egg salad? Ahhh, pregnancy. Ever since I thought of making egg salad (mmmm, egg salad sandwich), that’s all I’ve been thinking about! Darn craving!

As the norm for me, I searched online for a good recipe. Found one on allrecipes.com (one of my favorite food websites) and gave it a try. Verdict? It was really good, for a very simple recipe! I’ll be making this one again, as my go-to base recipe for egg salad. Husband’s verdict? He won’t touch the stuff, I’m afraid. He is NOT a fan of egg salad or chicken salad or tuna salad (what’s wrong with him?!). I don’t think I can ever convert the guy. Anyways, check out the recipe here – I didn’t change anything about it except for omitting the green onions and only making 1 serving of this. I made it tonight, tried a bit of it on a piece of end toast and it was so good! I have some left for a small sandwich tomorrow. Yum!

Okay, so it’s not the prettiest picture. But it’s so good!

Oh, two cooking tips I just learned.

#1 – I finally found the perfect way to make hard boiled eggs! Thank you, Elise at Simply Recipes. Finally a method of cooking eggs that works for me. I’ve tried other methods (like my father-in-law’s way and a whole host of other ones) but I’ve never produced perfect hard boiled eggs. I won’t blame the methods. Let’s chalk it up to user error. But in my search for an egg salad recipe, I found Elise’s way of cooking hard boiled eggs. It takes a while but it’s definitely worth it.

#2 – if you DO stick an unlit (of course, people) matchstick in between your teeth while chopping/slicing onions, your eyes will NOT water. I first heard of this trick from the movie “The Help”. Every time I chop onions, it’s such an ordeal (eyes watering, eyes burning!) so I thought I’d try it. It worked! I looked pretty silly but as long as my eyes weren’t burning from the onions, I’m okay with that.

Have a good rest of the week!

So what are fudge babies? Let me back up.

I have a sweet tooth and can eat almost any kind of dessert out there but for our health (as well as the health of our baby), it’s best not to indulge. Once in a while is okay, but not everyday. Plus, having just taken my 1-hour glucose test to see if I have gestation diabetes (praise God I don’t! I passed the test!), I want to be more conscious of what I eat. I’m already pretty conscious about my diet but the holidays were difficult. So much good food! I did well during the first trimester but as the holidays neared, my will turned into putty. And today marks the day of the third trimester for me – so why not use this time to turn over a new leaf? Now, I’m not going to promise you I won’t eat sweets but I figured, let’s come up with an alternative.

I’ve already started venturing out in this arena – making black bean brownies. I can still satisfy my sweet tooth but have some nutrition in there. Well, the other day in a random search for recipes online, I found this recipe for Fudge Babies. Thank you, Chocolate Covered Katie! You are amazing for having a blog just for healthy desserts. My world is complete. (You should check out her blog. You won’t regret it. She’s got a ton of healthy dessert recipes!!)

What are Fudge Babies? Why, they are wonderful little balls of chocolate goodness. And the best thing about them is, the sweetness comes from the vanilla & raisins (the original recipe called for dates, which are better than raisins but I didn’t have any dates in the house. Gotta go with what you have!). Here’s my take on it:

Fudge Babies (very slightly adapted from Chocolate Covered Katie)

• 1 cup walnuts & almonds (whatever ratio you want to do)
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 2-3 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tsp vanilla

1. Put walnuts and almonds in a food processor and grind them into small pieces. Add the raisins and grind again, for several seconds or so, taking care not to grind finely. (I noticed that the raisins didn’t really get ground into pieces, since they’re small to begin with.)

2. Put raisin and nut mixture into a bowl and add vanilla, stirring well.

3. Add cocoa powder. Mix well again.

4. Using your hands, portion out the mixture and make them into small balls.

5. Enjoy! I promise you, these are good. Very good.

After tasting one of these babies (ha!), I decided to make another batch, but with oats (walnuts and almonds can be so expensive at times!). Let’s just say that while the oat fudge balls are good, they were harder to make. I’ll go ahead and put the recipe on here (based on this other recipe I found online). I’m going to make this again but will NOT grind the oats (they’re already small enough) and will use more raisins to begin with. The recipe below will outline a simpler, non-ground way. If anyone out there in internet-land has some great raw protein dessert recipes like the Fudge Babies or these oat fudge balls, please share! I’d love to have more in my arsenal.

Oat Fudge Balls

• 1 cup old-fashioned, uncooked oats
• 1/2 raisins (I probably ended up using a total of 3/4 cup raisins)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder
• 1-2 tbsp honey (or more, if you need to make the mixture stick together more)

1. Mix all ingredients well.

2. Using your hands, portion out mixture and roll into small balls. If the mixture is too dry, add a bit more honey. It took me probably about a minute (much too long in my book) to roll one of these up.

3. Enjoy! (I did enjoy eating a few of these, AFTER I got over my mistakes and frustration in rolling the mixture up into balls. I will just try again to make this recipe better and easier.)

Warning: 3rd trimester picture up ahead! I got my hubby to take the first two pictures of me. And yes, for those who saw me yesterday, I AM wearing the same tshirt FROM yesterday.

PS – most of my travel pictures were taken with a film camera, before I ever owned a digital one, so I don’t have many pictures to post. I’ll have to scan them in so you can see them at a later post!

A: Age you went on your first international trip: if my memory serves me well (preggo brain here, apologies in advance), I believe I first ventured outside of the U.S. and headed over the Texas border to Piedras Negras, Mexico. I was fifteen years old and part of a very large youth group that served for a week at an orphanage as our mission trip. It was not a luxurious trip at all (but mission trips are not intended to be that way) – we camped out in tents and sleeping bags on the grounds of the orphanage. I didn’t know anyone but a small handful of people but I still had a blast serving the children there. Side note: I have been outside of the U.S. before – I was born in the Philippines and then moved to Texas at age 8 but I count my trip to Piedras Negras as my first venture outside of the country.

B: Best (foreign) beer you’ve had and where: Sad to say that I have never drank beer  each time I’ve been abroad. But my favorite foreign beer is anything Belgian. A lambec, to be exact. Best stuff ever, just too darn expensive.

C: Cuisine (favorite): this is tricky because I love food and so many different kinds of cuisine. I have to be loyal to my home country (Philippines) and my parents’ cooking – Filipino food is just fantastic. Next up? Middle Eastern and Italian food (though I’ve not been to these places). Finally, Chinese food – which I’ve tasted when I spent two weeks in south China about 9 years ago. And then again, Indian food is amazing, too.

in Mumbai, with some dear people

D: Destinations, favorite, least favorite and why: my favorite place in the world is Ireland. I’ve gotten to go to this beautiful country three times, living there for 5 weeks on my last trip in 2002 (with a group called Wonder Voyage – check them out!). The Lord did some amazing things in my life and I got to experience some fantastic adventures, like served the local church in Athenry, made wonderful friends, drank tea with lovely Irish folk who invited me into their home, hiking up the Slieve League, took a dip in the icy pool of Mahon Falls, walked a trail by the Cliffs of Moher, slept in a youth hostel in Inis Oírr (one of the Aran Islands), ate the best smoked fish chowder of my life and attended the 25th annual Galway Arts Festival, among other things. I left a part of my heart in Ireland and one day, I will be back! Least favorite? I’m not a hot weather beach person. It’s no fun for me to sit under the blazing sun, or to walk on hot sand, or to swim in the ocean. No thank you.

E: Event you experienced that made you say “wow”: when I went to China, I was part of a missions group. In my particular group, there were four of us girls with our two team leaders. Us foreigners were invited to sing at this people group festival. I remember being in front of thousands of people in this “small” town, singing a capella, freezing our buns off and having the time of our lives. At that same festival, we danced and mingled with different people. A Chinese girl, about ten years old or so, took a fascination to my fleece Old Navy light blue scarf. Without speaking each other’s language, we exchanged scarves. Today, I still have her hand-knight brown and white scarf and she has mine.

F: Favorite mode of transportation: the train! Last time my husband and I took a trip to Seattle was December 2010, to visit some of his family for ten days. Since our family there lives within walking distance to downtown, we just hopped on the train from the airport into the city, met our family at the train station under Nordstrom’s and we all walked to their place. Taking the train allowed me to see the neighboring towns and glimpses of beautiful scenery that the Pacific Northwest has to offer.

G: Greatest feeling while traveling: definitely seeing God’s creation – the different cultures I’ve experienced, the people I’ve met, the beautiful natural sites I’ve seen. To be in awe of what he created. I’ve gotten to stand near the edge of the Cliffs of Moher and on top of a small mountain in the Bale Mountain National Park in Ethiopa. I’ve gotten to ride a train in Mumbai, India and be in the throng of hundreds of women on their way to work or their homes. I’ve gotten to eat authentic cuisine, lovingly made by our hosts. I’ve hiked up trails in Canada. It can’t get much better than that.

Emerald Lake Lodge, not too far from Banff, where we spent our honeymoon in 2006

H: Hottest place you’ve traveled to: Texas. In July. Boo.

I: Incredible service you’ve experienced and where: eating brunch at the beautiful JW Marriott in Mumbai. Best. Buffet. Brunch. Ever. (And I’ve been to a lot of buffets, if you know me well.) Food was amazing and the service matched it.

J: Journey that took the longest: not sure. I bet my longest journey was when my family and I moved from the Philippines to Texas. I remember flying from Manila to Narita, Japan to Detroit, Michigan to DFW, Texas. But then again, my trip to Ethiopia consisted of flying from DFW to Chicago, Chicago to Egypt, Egypt to Addis Ababa.

K: Keepsake from your travels: pencils (from places I’ve been to and places my friends have been to; I’ve got maybe 200 or so?) and coins. Now, my husband and I collect coffee mugs from places we visit.

L: Let-down sight, why and where: actually, I don’t remember visiting a bad place.

M: Moment where you fell in love with travel: during my second trip to Ireland, in 2001. I hated to leave the country. I actually cried on the plane, before it took off to go to the U.S.

N: Nicest hotel you’ve stayed in: it’s a toss-up between Emerald Lake Lodge in Field, British Columbia (for our honeymoon) and the Hilton in downtown Fort Worth, where we stayed overnight for our 2nd year anniversary.

O: Obsession–what are you obsessed with taking pictures of while traveling?: Graffiti and street art/decor. This obsession just started several years ago.

New York City, 2007

Seattle, 2008

Chinatown, San Francisco, 2011

P: Passport stamps, how many and from where? I am not sure but I’ve been to Canada (once), India (2x), Ireland (3x), Ethiopia (once) and China (once).

Q: Quirkiest attraction you’ve visited and where: bad memory here, sorry. I’ve seen quite a few quirky things in Seattle and San Francisco.

R: Recommended sight, event or experience: west Ireland, particularly Galway and the surrounding towns; British Columbia, Canada; the Pacific Northwest.

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S: Splurge; something you have no problem forking over money for while traveling: food!

T: Touristy thing you’ve done: I have a love/hate relationship with touristy things. On one hand, it’s good because you get to see famous landmarks, etc. On the other hand, it doesn’t seem as authentic. Like, the first time I went to Seattle with my husband to visit family, we did the obligatory trip to the Public Market. But then on other trips there, my sister-in-law just pointed us to one direction and off we went to explore the Capitol Hill streets and surrounding neighborhoods. We really enjoy just walking off the beaten path, because we’ve found a lot of neat stores (like cool thrift shops), restaurants and sites that way. Plus each time we’ve been to Seattle, we go to places our family goes to, so it’s authentic. The grocery stores they shop at, the restaurants they eat at, the parks they play at, that kind of thing. Plus we get to avoid the tourist (i.e. numerous) crowds.

U: Unforgettable travel memory: sitting in a pub in Inis Oírr, listening to master musicians play Celtic music. Oh! And dancing like a fool – some of my friends and I volunteered to be taught Irish dancing at this hotel in Galway. We happily obliged, laughed hysterically, learned some dance steps and sweated buckets. And I can’t forget this – sharing a $24 crab at a restaurant on Fisherman’s Wharf with my husband, as part of our 5-year wedding anniversary.

V: Visas, how many and for where?  Four, if I remember correctly – for India, China, Ethiopia and Ireland.

W: Wine, best glass of wine while traveling and where? Not too big of a wine person but I remember drinking an amazing Belgian beer several years ago while in Seattle. It was so good! Must get a bottle of this . . . for AFTER the baby is born!

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X: eXcellent view and from where?: the Slieve League, Carrick, Ireland.

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Y: Years spent traveling?: since 1997, I think. So that will be fourteen years? I hate math.

Z: Zealous sports fans and where?: Texas. Football. Enough said.