Poco-Cocoa – Page 116 – Things & Stuff

Weekend Warriors

Justin and I spent our Saturday traveling all over Austin to do some food research for the book. We ended up visiting 10 places in one day.

We started out with just one rule: we could only take one bite of each dish, so that we didn’t get full too early in the game. Yeah, that didn’t work. One bite?! Of a hot and tasty migas taco? Of a fresh piece of sake nigiri? Of a cool coconut snow cone?

It was a lot of food! We didn’t eat it all, or even half of it, but it was still a looooong day of eating. We took our little Zumi camera and my Canon Rebel along for the ride, and I put together this video of our day. It’s a good 7 minutes long, so I understand if you don’t have time/desire to watch it. 🙂

For those who do watch it, lemme know what you think!

Happy Monday, everybody!

Weekend Warriors from Crystal Esquivel on Vimeo.

August 30, 2010

Austin, Edibles, Videos
A Bajillion Photos

So as we’ve been trying out new restaurants, I’ve been taking photos. Lots of photos. Some with my fancy-pants DSLR, some with my iPhone. I finally took the time to upload a huge batch of them last night, and I added them to my flickr page. I’m not going to blog about all of them (maybe a few), but if you want to see what we’ve been eating lately, you can see them on flickr.

I did notice one recurring theme in all these photos, which I have dubbed Justin in the Corner. Apparently I like to photograph Justin framed in the corner of the photo, with the restaurant background behind him.

At Nau’s Enfield Drug…

At Rockin’ Tomato…

At The County Line…

At Asia Cafe…

At Musashino…

At Chez Nous…

Thanks, babylove, for letting me take and post your photos, and for making every meal a bajillion times better with your presence.

August 27, 2010

Austin, Edibles, Fun stuff, Photography
Barista Training!

Everyone, thanks so much for your comments on my last post. The ball of light idea really seems to help out… and now I just have to work on remembering it more throughout the day.

So a few weeks back, I trekked out to Cuvee Coffee Roasting Company for their barista training. It was so much fun! We got to tour the place, then learned all about how coffee beans are processed, then learned how to pull espresso, then learned how to make milk-based drinks. So now when I get coffee anywhere, I’m watching their methods and scoping out their machines and appreciating their latte art.

Here are a bajillion photos from that day. 🙂

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One of their growers painted these bags for them with the Cuvee logo! They’re so pretty.

More coffee bag art:

Evidence of the morning’s tastings:

The ginormous coffee roaster:

Basic steps for making an espresso drink, as demonstrated by my classmate:

1. Grind the beans

2. Tamp them down

3. Brew

4. Steam the milk

5. Pour the milk into the espresso

If you’re cool, your drinks might look like this:

If you’re me, your drinks might look like this:

So yeah, I need a lot more practice with latte art. 🙂

Still, it was so much fun, and it really helped me understand and appreciate coffee more.

August 26, 2010

Austin, Edibles
Seven Things
Hi, internets! How has life been? Mine has been busy, but then again, isn’t everyone’s life busy? Lately I’ve had a lot of internal turmoil to deal with… too much emotion, too much negativity. So I’m trying to tell my self this throughout the day:

I am a ball of light. I am my own radiant energy, my own source of happiness and peace. I do not rely on anyone else’s light to make me happy. I want to be positive, I want to be happy, I want to be bright. All negativity that’s directed at me will be deflected away by my ball of light – it will not be absorbed. And when other people encounter my ball of light, it will undoubtedly shine on them and only do good.

I don’t know why this ball of light thing seems to make sense to me… basically, I want to be happy, and not bogged down by my own negativity and that of others. I feel that if I just work on my own inner light, it will radiate out and positively affect others, while still being a constant source of energy and happiness for me. I can’t rely on others to make me happy, and I can’t try to make them happy… I can just feed my ball of light, and shine through my life in that way. Does this make any sense at all?

In theory, it works. Yesterday I was able to maintain my focus on that ball of light until about mid-afternoon, and then I lost it. I once again became annoyed, frustrated, grumpy. But today is a new day, and my ball of light is in my hands.

So my far-away friend Wei-Wei tagged me for a little meme, in which I share seven random things about myself. Here we go:

Seven Things
1. I treat myself every weekday morning to a tall soy no whip mocha from Starbucks. I used to feel bad about buying my coffee from a chain shop, and about spending the money. But my friend Lindsay helped me realize that it’s something I like, something I look forward to, and so it’s OKAY. My barista knows my name and my order. 🙂
2. I have a girl crush on Giovanna Battaglia. She makes me want to wear Prada and smoke.
3. I am addicted to Pinterest. When I actually have time to read blogs, I pin and pin and pin.
4. I’ve always wanted to dye crazy colors in my hair. So I added pink and blue strips. But meh. I’m dying it back to dark brown. (At least I tried, right?)
5. I have a new-found adoration for bi bim bap and banchan thanks to my friend Sandra. And I learned how to say “thank you” in Korean. (Kamsahamnida!)
6. I seriously need some new clothes, but shopping just doesn’t sound fun, which is very weird for me. I don’t even feel like going shoe shopping. Maybe if it wasn’t 106 degrees outside, I’d feel like trying on fall clothes.
7. I maybe think I need 10 hours of sleep a night. Probably.
Hope you’re all having a great week!
August 25, 2010

Random Thoughts
Little Deli & Pizzeria

Seriously? Why have we never been here before? Little Deli & Pizzeria, a hidden gem in an old funky shopping center in the Crestview neighborhood.

It’s teeny tiny.

There are only four tables inside. And they use huge vegetable cans as pizza stands.

The cheese steak rocks.

The pizza is awesome, hand-tossed with lots of oregano in the sauce.

We love Little Deli!

August 19, 2010

Austin, Edibles

Weekend Warriors

A Bajillion Photos

Barista Training!

Seven Things

Little Deli & Pizzeria