In no particular order...

Let the travel posts begin :) Three weeks of travel later, back in Philadelphia (in quite miserable rain) and lounging around until it is time to jet off to Prague. So far, the most captivating event of my morning is watching E! news, and uploading 200+ pictures to Facebook. Oh right and editting a bazillion pictures of food. Enough ranting about the freezing weather on the East coast and onto the actual food. 

Tom Yum soup with Udon noodles

Who knew sweet and sour in a soup could actually taste good? I've never ever enjoyed the sweet and sour combination found in Chinese take-out and various other Asian cuisines.  It just never seemed quite right - too much sour or too much sweet and nothing in between that was a resemblance of savory. Ah, but tom yum soup has proved me wrong. The secret? Lemongrass and Kaffir leaves which I managed to learn in my Thai cooking class (more on this one later!). Either way, this soup is not just sweet and sour but a wonderful   homogeneous blend of the two with wonderful ambrosial hints in every slurp. 

An eclectic twist of fried flat noodles, spicy chicken and basil leaves.

Snapshots of Travels

Left: Crab tostada over salad
Upper Right: Seafood mix, empanada over beans
Bottom Right: Sausage Sandwich from "The International Accordion Festival"

An impromptu stop at Crumbs after a NYC trip (for the first time!)
I've never been the biggest of cupcakes (give me an insomnia chocolate chip cookie any day) but these cupcakes just about live up to all of the hype

Shown: Coffee Toffee
We also got an insanely caloric cookie mania something or other to go but that got devoured later...

Some absurdly delicious bubble tea
Milk tea with Boba
Green tea smoothie with grass jelly (my favorite) 

One more exam and the semester will be officially over.

Recharge and Reboot

Thanksgiving inspired brunch specials at TapHouse.
French toast with a smattering of seasonal fruits and some fort of sweet gooey butter
Eggs Benedict over scrumptous stuffing

Ok I confess. I have indeed been one epic SLACKER this entire semester about blogging my eating adventures. Not that I haven't been eating or cooking but I've literally just been SLACKING about taking pictures and posting, but NO MORE (all these caps are clearly indicating how serious I am). Even though this is probably the worst time for me to finally update my blog with the dreaded corp val final in just a week and recruiting smushed in between - this blog has been looking too sad to be ignored much longer. You also know that I've been out of it for way too long because I did not realize blogger updated its interface and it makes posting so much better now (wow, good work Google).

The Rainbow after the Rain

Heirloom tomatoes + Basil + Mozzarella 

Sporadically rainy weather this week. I managed to dig these pictures out of my camera last week. I think I took these that night the big hurricane ravaged the East Coast not that we noticed since we were too busy munching away. Smitten Kitchen always has these beautiful shots of uber colorful vegetables so here's my rendition of that. 

I've always been obsessed with those  little pickled vegetables you get at Vietnamese restaurants. Awhile back, one of my foodie friends told me that you can make them yourself and it doesn't take 1039849384 days to marinate. A year later, I finally got around to making them myself :)

Au Revoir Canada, Hello Penn

One more day until I head back to Penn. I still refuse to believe that it is September already as I have been insulated in the bubble that is suburbia Pennsylvania for the past 2 weeks. Outside of reading, sleeping and eating - I haven't been doing too much else. Its also hard to do much else when you are waking up at 3:00pm everyday. ha. My justfication to my dad was that I was building up my sleep bank.

Water Chiller, Bread&Butter, Escargot.

Our final dinner in Montreal. It was about time that we had an authentic French meal. So authentic in fact that everything on the menu was in French with no English translation. We managed to fumble our way through the menu an settled on some delicious albeit safe options.

Chicken stuffed with bacon and brie cheese with fresh vegetables.There is of course a more official and French sounding name for this but I have no idea what it is.

Coq au vin (actually translates into rooster in wine...huh, how did that not dawn on me?

I was so so in the mood to order some froi gras but my dining companion was in mood to eat liver. Alas I missed out on my chance to redeem froi gras - the first time I had froi gras dish, I was 12 and thought I had ordered something akin to fried duck - imagine my dismay when the dish turned up to me mushy goo with a side of caramelized apples. Fortunately, my palette has developed somewhat since then.

[A rather large serving of] creme brulee which of course we finished.