Tonight for supper I made pancakes: Whole wheat spiced banana blueberry pancakes. I really am not a recipe girl. I like to follow my heart (or more often my tummy) when I cook.

Don't be hatin' on my approximate measurements. Some people will tell you that baking is an exact science but in my experience there is plenty of wiggle room in any recipe.

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all purpose flour
1.5 teaspoons baking powder
.5 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoons nutmeg
1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
~1.5 cups h2o (I use water because I'm lactose intolerant, but milk is better) (the water measurement is the most subjective depending on how thick you like your batter-thicker, start with 1.5 cups, thinner add more water by 1/4 cup measures until you are happy with the consistency)
3 Tablespoons honey
1 egg
1/3 cup applesauce
1 banana
1 pint rinsed blueberries

In a mixing bowl combine honey, egg, applesauce, and banana. Mix until smooth add water. Put in dry ingredients, mix (if you are going with the thicker batter mix only until combined. Over mixing will result in too much gluten development making your pancakes tough. If you're going with a thinner batter there is probably enough liquid to stop the gluten development). Pour onto an electric griddle set at 350 (I love using a griddle because there lots of room so I can make more pancakes at one time, but fret not if you don't have one. A 10 or 12 inch skillet does the job just fine). Sprinkle the blueberries on top of the pancakes and flip them when little bubbles form uniformly on the surface. Once flipped let them cook one more minute. When making oodles of pancakes I like to keep them warm by stacking them on a plate in the microwave. Every time I open the microwave to add some more pancakes I put 5 seconds of cook time on the microwave so they stay piping hot.

Tonight we ate them spread with apricot preserves. That was super yummy, but the traditional maple syrup can't be beat.

Yesterday I went to Rochester to visit an ISU friend. I looked up directions to get there on mapquest and also used my GPS. Their directions conflicted, so I tried to follow the mapquest directions because I didn't want to go through downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul like my GPS wanted me to. On the way down I was able to successfully navigate my way, but the drive home wasn't as smooth. The whole drive home it was misting and raining, then instead of taking the exit for 494 West I took 494 East, uffda, then I had to exit and try again. I even got stuck in bumper to bumper traffic for a while. What fun. Anyway I made it home safely and had a splendid day with my friend in Rochester. We got to make lunch together, play Wii, watch a movie, and go on a walk around her neighborhood.

This morning I went to St. Phillip the Deacon Lutheran Church. It was pretty good. My plan was to go to both the 9:45 and 11 services (one is traditional and the other is contemporary) but today some of their musicians are away so all the services were the same. It was a mix of traditional and jazz. I have not seen Lutherans worship through jazz since I went to New Orleans for the National Youth Gathering in 2009. I couldn't stop smiling, it was so wonderful. The music was amazing and the choir director looks like Mark Twain. :)

Being that it is Holy Trinity Sunday the children's sermon was about God the Father, Jesus the son, and the Holy Spirit. While the woman was doing the sermon she was braiding her daughter's hair. She spoke about how even though God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit have different roles and appear in our lives differently they are woven together like a braid into the fabric of our one faith. I happened to have my hair in a braid today, so I felt like I was celebrating Holy Trinity Sunday. I would like to be in a Bible Study this summer, so I'm going to email one of the pastors and see how I can get involved there.

Summer reading update

4. Feasting on Asphalt, The River Run by Alton Brown(If you don't know or like Alton Brown, Food Network star, feel free to stop reading now)- It is Alton's account of his motorcycle journey from Louisiana, where the Mississippi empties into the Gulf of Mexico to Minnesota where the Mississippi starts. It is a fun book filled with many pictures and recipes. I must admit that I kinda skimmed this book, it is more of a coffee table book than a "sit down and read from cover to cover" kind of book. I watched the shows while it aired on Food Network, so I was pretty familiar with what was happening. I would rate this *** out of *****

5. Paper Towns by John Green-A group of high school seniors in Orlando seem to be having a fairly normal life, except for one, Margo. Margo pulls Q into some crazy shenanigans and then disappears. Q is in love with Margo and becomes obsessed with finding her. The beginning of this book is good. The middle is long and depressing and slow, Q can't find Margo. The end is fun, exciting, and heartbreaking as Q and his friends race across the country to find Margo. There is some pretty deep stuff in this book. I like the point that John Green makes about if you idolize a person you will ultimately be disappointed because they are just a human and can't fulfill all your dreams ( he of course states this more eloquently.) *** out of *****

This morning I found that there were two almost rotten bananas on the kitchen counter and immediately thought "banana bread!" I ended up making banana crumb muffins with toasted almonds, and oatmeal (you can find the recipe I based my muffins on by searching "banana crumb muffins" on allrecipes.com). Yum.

For supper I made black been burgers with onions, green peppers, tomatoes, and carrots inside them. The burgers were very pretty (as pretty as vegetables formed into a patty can be). I would equate them to the funfetti of burgers. :) We also ate some super yummy coleslaw, recipe adapted from Kraft's Food and Family magazine.

1 16 oz bag coleslaw mix
3/4 cup prepared Italian dressing
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup dry roasted sunflower seeds
1/2 cup toasted sliced almonds
2 large carrots peeled and shredded
1 green pepper chopped

Mix all ingredients and refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving.

Enough about food. On Tuesday my host mom took me on a tour of the quilt shops in the area. There are 4 within a 20 minute radius. I bought some fabulous fabric at each of them. One of them, Blue Bamboo, has an incredible selection of Batiks and Asian fabrics. All the fabric is fairly expensive, but it is sometimes just fun to walk around and gauk at the awesome prints and even better show quilts that decorate the walls of any good quilt shop.

We even set up an extra sewing machine and surger in the living room so I can sew and surge anytime I want! I've already made 2 pillow cases. My host parents spoil me to no end. I am so thankful for them.

My internship continues to be both a joy and a challenge. I feel more capable to do the tasks I've been assigned. No matter how much planning we do, sometimes things still come up and we have to do damage control. I'm a planner by nature, so it can be pretty stressful for me for me to have to think on my feet. I'm learning to be flexible and responsible for the choices I make. Sorry that update is so cryptic, we are pretty much sworn to secrecy. Just know that I am having tons of fun, learning lots about the food industry, and spending days on end in the most wonderful kitchens ever.

Quick and easy egg hot dish

It's a "hot dish" because I'm in Minnesota, for those of you outside of MN, it's a "casserole."

This is kind of a "choose your own adventure" recipe, use what you like and what you have in your fridge and pantry.

1 box of stuffing mix (anything but cornbread, I like low sodium chicken flavor)
6 eggs
2 cups of liquid (water, chicken broth, or milk)
1 small onion chopped ( I like to chop a bag of onions and freeze them so I have them handy.)
2 cups meat/veggies (Tonight I used 2 cups of frozen french cut green beans. My favorite combo is; 1/2 crumbled bacon, 1/2 cup red pepper, 1 cup spinach)
1 cup shredded cheese, separated

Mix all ingredients, excluding 1/2 cup of cheese. Pour into a greased 9x13 pan and bake on 375 F for 20 minutes. Sprinkle remaining 1/2 cup of cheese on top and bake 10 more minutes. Enjoy!

Summer reading so far

1. Sweet Love by Sarah Stohmeyer -A book I picked up thinking it would be a fun story about love and food. It turned out to be kind of a sad book. There is a lot about cancer, very dysfunctional families, rape, and murder. There was a lot of good descriptions of food, so that was nice, but I didn't like it that much. * out of *****

2. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green-A fabulous young adult book. A guy, who has dated 19 Katherines, graduates from a high school in Chicago and goes on adventure with his friend. They end up in a podunk southern town and have an interesting summer. There are footnotes and math equations. It is so much better than I'm making it sound. **** out of *****

3. Looking for Alaska by John Green- A high schooler goes to boarding school in Alabama by choice. He goes on many adventures with his new friends. These kids are very philosophical. They also love to drink, smoke, and have sex....I did not like that. Call me a prude but I felt this book was normalizing inapropriate teenage behavior. Other than that it was a really good, thought provoking book .*** out of *****

Back story to why I'm reading all of John Green's books: John and his brother Hank started something called Brotherhood 2.0 in 2007. They didn't communicate via text (emails, texting, letters) for a year so they made youtube videos back and forth to each other. They are really interesting and 4 years later they have a youtube channel called "Vlogbrothers." I love their videos so I decided to read John's books. Look them up on youtube...seriously.

Adventures in the Big City

My internship is going well. I am constantly busy; reading recipes, ordering ingredients, double checking my order, triple checking my order, putting away groceries, helping the testers (chopping, mixing, plating dishes), and washing dishes. I wash SO many dishes. The testers don't always have time to wash their dishes while they are moving from one recipe to the next (they have strict deadlines, it is completely understandable that the dishes stack up), so I am constantly trying to clean up after them. I get stressed out and can't think straight when there are crusty dishes sitting around.

The gals I get to work with are so much fun. We all love to cook and eat. I love it when we stand around a finished recipe and dissect it, talking about how the flavors and spices work together. The women who are in charge of the kitchens and the Pillsbury Bake-Off are wonderful. They are fountains of knowledge about all things Pillsbury. They are very understanding too when I do something wrong and reprimand me in the kindest way possible.

Yesterday my host mom and I went around Plymouth shopping. We went to a cute shop called Art 2 Heart where all their profits go to supporting local and worldwide missions and nonprofit organizations. I bought someting for John's birthday and a cool paper weight for myself that says "Be Compassionate." We also went to Cub Foods. It was nice to go to a Cub Foods because the one in Ames closed last year. I bought a beatifully fragrent cantelope and it is perfectly ripe and delicous.

Then we went to the library. OH MY WORD! This is the library of libraries. It is very eco friendly and there is moss or grass on the roof for insulation. The carpet has letters and numbers in it. There is a stain glass window that has famous quotes about books scatter through it. The rows of books are organized so well, it is very spacious. There is a designated area for kids and one for teens. I like that they have separate computer area for kids and adults. My host mom is friends with one of the librarians there so we got a tour of the room where the books are sorted by a machine that uses an array of conveyer belts and scanners. The books are scanned and they move down the belt and are sorted onto carts according to their call number. Then when a cart is full the librarians can just wheel them into the library and put them away! AMAZING!