Lemon Orzo Pasta Salad

Lemon is so refreshing. I love this salad and I really should make it more than I do. This is the perfect salad to use up your fresh summer produce such as tomatoes or cucumbers. I did not add tomatoes in this but you totally could. It is relatively easy to make and this made an entire giant container for lunches all week. I love all the fresh herbs.

In case you are wondering per Wiki:
Orzo (Italian pronunciation: [ˈɔrdzo], Italian for "barley", from Latin hordeum^[1]), also risoni ([riˈzoːni], "big rice"), is a form of short-cut pasta, shaped like a large grain of rice.

What you need~

Fresh Herbs.

1 package of orzo pasta (I used whole grain)
1 large bunch of basil (diced)
1 cup of parsley (diced)
1/2 cup chopped cucumbers
1/2 cup diced roasted red peppers
1/2 cup artichoke hearts (diced)
1/4 cup mozzarella (I diced up some mozzarella balls I had)
3 stalks of green onion (diced)
1 kohlrabi (diced)
2 lemons
1 cup of olive oil
Nature's seasoning (to taste)











Start by boiling water and cooking the orzo pasta to directions on package. Let rest or pour cold water over pasta to cool. While this is boiling prepare all the veggies and place in a large bowl. Time to make the dressing before tossing it all together. Zest your lemons into a bowl and juice them. Slowly add the olive oil to this mix as well as the Nature Seasoning to taste. If you feel like it is too thick add some water to it. Place pasta in the bowl with the veggies and herbs. Toss lightly. Then slowly mix in the dressing. I would recommend chilling before serving. It is light and refreshing.

I really love all the fresh produce this time of the seasoning. Use it up in creative ways you never know what delicious things you can make.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily

Travel Adventures:Bairds Creek, Anapehee Brewery, Ignight Market

Wanderlust. Ryan and I constantly have it. We are wandering here and there and almost always on the go. This past weekend was no different. Waking up we thought we wanted to go hiking and the adventure ensued after that. I like not planning out my days if I can manage it. I used to be a huge planner planning out my entire weekend weeks in advance. Ryan has been a really positive influence in this regard and he has really shown me the joy of being a wanderer. Here are some pictures of our fun Saturday adventure.

Baird's Creek

 
 



 What is wrong with me I have never been here. It is like a little slice of heaven nestled on the east side of Green Bay. The start of the hike sort of sucked due to bugs but after about 15 minutes or so in they dissipated a bit. This park is really beautiful we hiked around for about two hours.

Things I love about this park:
The old growth trees are amazing.
The creek is winding and gets fat and muddy at points or clear and thin at some places.
The butterflies.
The different elevations to climb on.











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Annapehee Brewery

Another place I should have been to earlier in life. Getting here is a bit of a drive but it was beautiful day for that. Making it into town we stumbled in a kite festival and roamed that for a bit before moving onto the brewery. They were supposed to have a yummy skaliwags food truck but we made due when they did not show up by eating a flatbread pizza from the brewery. This place is tiny FYI so plan on sitting outside. They have a nice patio and had music to listen to. The actual beer mosaic red paired well with the BBQ chicken pizza.

Chilling on the patio.

Mosaic red-- hints of pineapple.

Listen to the music, soaking up some sun and beer.

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Von Stiehl Winery

I did not include this in the title but this place was right next to the brewery how do we not stop in!? Well we did and it was fantastic. Free tasting and we bought two bottles the dry red and the pinot noir. THAT is right I bought red wine and I loved it.

 

Tasting list they have a lot of options.

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Ignight Market

I mean besides the delicious tacos this place had other great vendors. HELLO cheese curds and local beers. I simply loved the hot air balloons. I stared at them for hours even getting a tad to close at one point.

 



This was a fun wander and I hope to do it again real soon.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily

Eggplant Parmesan

Yummy! Nothing like some good old comfort food. This is a healthier version that I made with the Thai eggplant I picked up at the farmer's market. Easy to make it turned out really good and took like maybe 15 minutes to throw together. Who does not love healthy, easy and tasty?

What you need~
Eggplant (I used about about a cup and a half sliced)
Panko bread crumbs
Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup Mozzarella cheese
2 cups of spaghetti sauce
Olive oil
Dried basil
Dried oregano
Mrs. Dash

Start by cleaning and then slicing your eggplant thin. I used my mandolin to do this. Spray a cookie sheet with olive oil. Place the slices on the pan making sure to space them evenly. Spray them with more olive oil. Top with parmesan cheese, bread crumbs and seasonings. Broil on high for five minutes.



I used left over pasta sauce I had in the fridge to layer into the dish. You will need about 2 cups of sauce for this recipe. Layer some of the sauce in the bottom of a baking dish. Layer some of your eggplant pieces into an even layer. Sprinkle some of the mozzarella cheese. Repeat steps until all sauce and eggplant is used. Top with more mozzarella cheese and bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes. Broil for another 5 minutes and serve.

I left out measurements for some items because  you need to add them to your taste. This was good I will make it again. Must better for you than the deep fried version.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily

Travel Adventures: Broadway Farmer's Market

I love random adventures. I wanted to get some produce for the house so instead of going to the grocery store we went to the farmer's market. We decided to go and get things we have never had before or cooked before. It was a fun experience. The layout this year was much more spread out which made it easier to walk around. We shared a gelato and some kettle corn. Ryan also got a beer from the beer tent (Hinterland's Oktoberfest). I would highly recommend before the season is done that you stop at the market if you live in Green Bay. If not this market the downtown market on Saturdays is really awesome too.

Thai Eggplant

Kohlrabi

Kohlrabi and yellow cauliflower

$5 flowers

$5 flowers so pretty

Cinnamon peach gelato

Yellow cauliflower

I did some research and will be roasting, slicing and eating all these yummy things this weekend. Super excited.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily

Travel Adventures: High Cliff State Park- Camping

What an awesome weekend friends. My heart was happy and so was my belly!

One of my besties (Katelyn shout out) turns 30 this week and to celebrate we got 3 camping sites at High Cliff State Park to celebrate. This place was really easy to check into and they let you check in and stay till 3PM each day. This was really awesome as we did not feel rushed checking out on Sunday. Some of the fun high lights of our weekend are detailed below.

Breakfast sandwich

Food:
We have a problem and always pack way too much food. I love hot dogs over the fire and totally did that both Friday and Saturday night for dinner. I love Maplewood Meats classic hot dogs with the bacon/onion ketchup I bought. Simple but ohhh so tasty. We also had ranch pretzels with beer dip, fruit, puppy chow for tasty snacks. Saturday included a delicious breakfast of bacon and eggs. Lunch was a spread of awesome sandwiches, veggies and fruit. By the time dinner rolled around and we then ate cake I was stuffed. As Katelyn said we can only drink to fill in the spaces around the food. Sunday was the best breakfast sandwiches over the fire. Yum!



The Trash Panda Todd:
Todd became one with our site early on Friday night. The first person to spot him was my friend Liz. She stated: "Oh the marshmallows fell off the table." Then a couple seconds later they disappeared under the trailer and we saw a giant furry raccoon butt running away. Another friend Brandon was heartbroken that he lost his marshmallows although later he came across Todd eating them on a path. No worries no one let him (Brandon) eat the raccoon marshmallows.  Todd tried to come back later that night but we ran him off. Saturday he got in the garbage. WHOOPS.

Katelyn and her awesome cup!
Picture Courtesy of Maggie Andersen.

The Best BIRTHDAY gift ever (Dave Grohl cup):
Anyone that knows me knows I have an addiction to the Foo Fighters and specifically Dave the lead singer. I am not the only one and when Maggie/Marshal got Katelyn a wine glass with Dave on the front it was perfection. Now we all need this cup ASAP because it is the best thing ever.

I started this fire all by myself.

Fire:
I often forget how much I enjoy sitting by the fire. We went through a lot of wood and ended up cooking all our food over the fire. I loved every minute of it though. Nothing like relaxing by the fire to warm your bones up.

Hiking group.
Picture Courtesy of Maggie Andersen.
 

The wild flowers.
Picture Courtesy of Maggie Andersen.

Hiking:
High Cliff State Park is known for it's beautiful views and well cleared paths. We went for about an hour and half hike as a huge group. It was fun and everyone got some much needed exercise in between eating a ton of food. One of my favorite parts of the hike is when we walked through a parking lot and turned the corner into a wildflower garden. We saw butterflies and really pretty flowers.







Hanging with my friends:
You know who you all are and I love you all as unique individuals. I think that this weekend would have been a dud if it was not for each and every one of you making me laugh every single moment. Special shout out to Katelyn I hope you had the best birthday celebration!

All the best things. :)

Left shark in his natural state.
Picture Courtesy of Maggie Andersen.

Last comment: Shark head.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily

Ancestry DNA Results!

Finally! I wanted to do this for years and Ryan and I decided for birthday gifts this year to each other we would each get our DNA tested. I will tell you whatever you think you know about your history or ethnicity you are most likely WRONG. Every person I know that has done this testing has had some sort of a surprise in their results. I figured breaking each percentage down would be the easiest thing to do.

Here is my overall break down. I need to explain it in detail or you will get totally confused. In general I am European. 99% to be exact. Let's go over the break down starting with Europe West.

This makes up a huge chunk of my DNA. I know from family history on my Grandma (Mom's) side she was a Becks and they were from Belgium. My father's last name Fonder is also of French/Belgian heritage so it makes sense that 59% of me is from this region.

 I have no idea. I talked to my mom about this and we are both at a loss. One of my friends mentioned that with these countries being "neutral" or "safe" countries it makes sense that my ancestors might have moved here due to war or famine. Otherwise this 17% is totally new to me. I need to research it more.

Another fun surprise. I mean I never knew about this either. I have Irish friends and I have been jealous of them and their fun St. Patrick's day holiday. I guess I need to get in on the fun now. This also explains all my freckles I have. That is a common trait from this ethnicity.










How exciting. I knew I was Italian as my dad tells me this all the time. I did not think it was such a large chunk of my DNA though. I know that ancestry links Italy/Greece together but from my family history that I can tell I am actually Italian. Time to go back to Italy and learn to make pasta!

I think for me my whole life I always related to Polish as being part of my identity. Which really it is not a large part of who I actually am. If anything I am a Polish Jew. I know that my Grandfather (Mom's side) states he is Polish so that is where I get that from in my mind. Another interesting result.

I wanted to jump up and down when I saw this result. I love Britain. I am addicted to British TV and drive a British MINI. (Well technically owned by BMW the MINI brand was originally a British car). I just love this! I will continue drinking my tea in happiness.

At this point as I was looking at my results I started to feel a bit like a giant European mutt if you will. My ancestors traveled a lot. They must have been rather nomadic or lived in large cities to have this amount of diversity. I mean I have always wanted to go to Spain I even speak a  tad of Spanish. So this was cool to see that I have a tiny part of me that is Spanish. Must explain my love of dance.






I mean here is more of the Polish my Grandpa (Mom's side) always talks about. So at most I am 2% Polish and that is pushing it in all likely hood. Some really interesting stuff.

The next two are less than 1% but are REALLY surprising and cool. I know that growing up I always thought I was Polish and Belgium. The fact that I have some ancestry in the Middle East is super cool. Explains why I love spicy food.

Another fun surprise. When I told my dad about these he was laughing. Who knew right? I will say that I wish that this part of the world was more safe so I could travel here.














All the results were a bit overwhelming if I am honest. Looking at it all as a big picture I hate to say it but I may have to just tell people I am European. Going into all the percentages would most likely put people into a nap state OR I guess I can tell them I am American.

I would highly recommend you do this test if you can afford it. Currently they have their DNA packages on sale if you want to do it. It was super easy to do. You get the package in the mail. Fill the tube with saliva and mail it back in. In a couple weeks your results should be in. I think they tell you up to 4-6 weeks. Mine came in quicker. I sent my package in at the same time as Ryan but mine is done and his is not yet. I cannot wait to see his results. Rumor is that he is a large percentage Polish. We will see.

Until next time~
XoXo Emily