Some Fun. in Cleveland

When Mr. Grumpy and I were just starting to get serious about each other (no, Mr. Grumpy – this did not happen last week), I got us tickets to go see The Decemberists at Cleveland's awesome Nautica Pavillion. For those of you who do not live in Cleveland, the Nautica Pavillion is an outdoor concert area in Cleveland that sits right along the river. It's a pretty cool place. Anyway – about an hour before the concert started, Mr. Grumpy backed out. He didn't want to go. I was beside myself. Obviously this meant he was DUMPING me and didn't like me, right? Plus, who was going to go to this concert with me now? Well, I wasn't used to his grumpiness quite yet, and about 15 minutes later Mr. Grumpy called back and said he would go with me (in his most cheeriest of grumpy voices… I could HEAR his eyes rolling on the other side of the line). 

Boy has Mr. Grumpy come a long way. Since then, we've been to a few other concerts in which SOMETIMES he even sings along!! One of his favorites (and one of mine, too), was seeing Fun. at the House of Blues last year. It was one of those shows you never forget. So, when I got my hands on the presale password for Fun. at Nautica Pavillion, you better believe I jumped on the computer to get tickets. Fun. had been touring for two years, and it was so obvious how far they'd come.

They had ALL the tricks – including bouncing glow orbs and confetti. They put on one of the best shows so even if you're not familiar with all their music, you should go just for the entertainment. You won't regret it. Here are some videos of the night.  

 

 

Definitely worth the $50 per ticket (note that their tickets last year only cost $20 a piece… ah what fame will do to you). And NO that wasn't me screaming "It's COMING TOWARD US." That was the drunky girl in front of me… 

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Weeknight Dinner: Buffalo Chicken Pizza (Oh yeah. I went there)

Ok people. Mr. G is out of town this week on a business trip MEANING that I literally have been itching all week to talk someone's ear off. It also means that I get to watch Say Yes to the Dress marathons without seeing one of these faces…

(Classic Mr. G Face)

Regardless, I was quickly reminded just what it was like to cook for one. So, I went to work and of course, came up with this recipe that saved my dinner tonight (I was going to just give up and hit the drive thru… yikes…). Feast your eyes, friends, on this just spicy enough to wake you up Buffalo Chicken Pizza. And I didn't even have to unbutton the top button on my jeans. Why? Because I made it LOW FAT*. You are welcome.

*Ok, as low fat as a buffalo chicken pizza can be… Stay with me here. 

Now, let's get cooking.

What You Need:

• 1/2 bag of whole wheat pizza dough, room temp is best! (I buy this fresh from the supermarket) – if you can't find this, just use the Pillsbury stuff. 
• One-half of a boneless chicken breast
• 1/3 cup Frank's Buffalo Hot Sauce (or just regular is cool too!), plus 1 tbsp
• 1 1/2 tbsp low fat bleu cheese dressing
• 1/2 tbsp Lite Ranch Dressing
• 1/4 cup low fat colby jack cheese, shredded
• 1/4 cup low fat mozzarella cheese, shredded
• 4 tbsp cup gorganzola cheese
• 1/4 cup red onion, diced
• 1 tsp celery salt
• 2 green onions, sliced

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 400. Poke holes in your chicken breast and place in a Ziploc bag. Then, pour in 1/3 cup of the buffalo sauce. Let that soak for 30 minutes. In the meantime, call your mom and tell her about your day and your awesome new Gel manicure that you got after work (Hello, Tiki Sunrise nails!). 

Ok, now that the chicken is all soaked and ready to go… Heat a pan on the stove over medium heat. Cook the chicken until barely done, about 5 minutes on each side. Let the chicken cool, then dice. Once it's diced, put it in a new Ziploc bag and pour in an extra tablespoon of buffalo sauce, toss and set aside.

Take the pizza dough and sprinkle it with flour to make it easy to work with. Work out the dough from a ball into a round, pizza-looking shaped piece. It should be rather thin – probably as thin as an envelope with a letter inside of it. Make sure you don't make any bubbles in the dough. Mr. G gets really grump-tastic when I make bubbles, so I was extra careful this time since he wasn't here to fix the bubble when the dough pops up in the oven. Once its thin and looking like a pizza, place it onto your pizza pan. Spread the bleu cheese dressing and ranch dressing on the pizza dough like you would normally with pizza sauce. Then, spread the cheese evenly over the dressing layer. Then, sprinkle the onions and celery salt around the pizza, and add the chicken. It should look like this (unless you put your toppings on the pizza in the shape of a smiley face. You can imagine how Mr. G feels about that). 

Bake on the bottom rack in the oven about 17-20 minutes, until the dough looks slightly brown around the edges. Take out of the oven, and let the pizza stand about 6 minutes. Then, add the green onions over the top. Cut and oh my goodness, ENJOY!!! You're going to love this. 

In other news… here are the other things I've been doing to keep busy while I'm a lonely apartment dweller this week:

1. Signed up with a personal trainer at Fitness Edge Cleveland. This is going to be great. I should start in a few weeks (since I'll be in LA next week for work) and will be doing 2-on-1 training with a buddy. I'm assuming that in a few weeks, you won't even be able to tell the difference between me and Gisele. I'll keep you updated.
2. I figured out how to make a panini without a panini maker. This was awesome. All you need is a cast-iron skillet with grill bumps (I don't know the proper term for that) and another pan of slightly smaller size. I put sun-dried tomatoes, low-fat mozzarella, basil, oregano, EVOO and diced, white onions on ciabatta bread. Placed it on the cast iron skillet and smooshed it with a pan on top. Cooked one side for 6 minutes, and the other for about the same, on medium heat. And voila! A panini. I was so "hangry" (my friend Robin's definition for that feeling when you're so hungry you get angry) I forgot to take a picture. So just use your imagination but have your imagination see a delicious sandwich.
3. I adopted a Tamagachi pet via my iPhone on an app called Bonzii. Do you guys remember Tamagachi's? Or GiGa Pets? It's like that but on your iPhone… His name is Bonjengles and he is really needy. So needy in fact he has died three times from starvation even though I kept feeding the thing steaks. I'll keep you updated… This is probably not going to stick.
4. I caught up on Jerseylicious and immediately needed an aspirin.
5. Nearly caught my neighbors' piano on fire. Listen. Don't get me wrong – I love musicians just as much as the next unrealistic girl. However, my neighbors had a piano that sat against our shared wall. It was really loud. And it was played too often. And the renditions of Ben Folds left much to the imagination. I expressed my hatred for the piano to my neighbors one evening (or should I say one early, early morning) upon my arrival home with said friend Robin after a too-successful girls night. Granted, they did ask me if I wanted a tour of their apartment, to which I said yes (duh). Now, instead of getting rid of the piano, they have started a band. Fully equipped with a bass guitar. And the bass guitar and the piano don't play the same songs. And somehow I thought the lead singer was just someone arguing loudly with their girlfriend but it turned out he (or she?) was trying to make music. You can imagine how happy I am about this… Especially because I told Mr. G about it and he laughed… and said it was funny… Mr. G. Thought something was funny. Ack.
6. I discovered I don't think I know what endive is supposed to taste like, but I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to have mushy black "goock" all over it. Mr. G told me I could probably eat it. And that if I ate more dirt (and apparently fungus growing on lettuce?) that I wouldn't catch the death of a flu when it goes around my office… 

I hope you are all finding a ray of sunshine in this rainy week! Stay tuned for a breakfast dessert recipe from Suzie Q (and her lesson learned from middle school students for the week).