Kauai- Part 1- What We Ate

Every morning we ate a papaya (sometimes 2) with lime and apple bananas.

Lau lau is my favorite Hawaiian dish. Usually consists of fish or pork wrapped in taro leaves and steamed. Sadly I usually have a hard time finding this and when I do it is in short supply. I should move there and sell lau lau out of a truck.

Banana Joe's. My guilty pleasure. But not so guilty really.

They have what they call "frosties".

The only two ingredients in this magical treat are frozen pineapple and frozen banana.

Blend the two together and out comes a delicious, creamy, all natural delicacy.

I think we came here 4 or 5 times. I hear I can make this exact same thing in my blendtec blender. I must try.

We found amazing chocolate haupia pie at a bakery Hanalei.

This place was a new find for me. Pat's Taqueria. A taco truck parked in the parking lot by the Hanalei pier. It was out of this world. We tried the carne asada and fish tacos and both were excellent. Full of flavor and spice. Pat Grenz, who once cooked at Bar Acuda, opened this joint because he wanted to run a place that serves the food he loves....and for that I love him.

...and there were gold fish. Parmesan gold fish to be exact. A girl should never go kayaking without them.

Want to eat this stuff too? You should:

Lau lau- Pono Market
Banana Joe's
Haupia Pie- Village Snack and Bakery
Pat's Taqueria

Nicole & Tony-Engagements

Yesterday while I was editing these, I started watching "Biggest Loser" on Hulu. I'm not sure if it was the show, or the fact that these photos are of my favorite place or how adorable and in love these two are....OR that I'm female and sometimes get hormonal..but I cried on and off the whole time. Serious. I would see someone on Biggest Loser climb a mountain and then simultaneously open up an image of Tony kissing Nicole's forehead in a taro field, and it was really too much. I was overcome with positive endorphins.

I wish I could just post every image I took at this photo shoot, so you could see how fun and awesome and beautiful the day and this couple were.

I am leaving my calendar indefinitely open for Hanalei engagement shoots or wedding shoots, or any type of shoot! Just watch out for tears while I edit.

Instant Oatmeal

In celebration of it being Monday, I wanted to share with you my favorite discovery....instant oatmeal on airplanes!

It doesn't matter if I just ate a huge meal, I step onto an airplane and am hungry. Sometimes I get fancy and make food and bring it, but other times I fall prey to airport food or WORSE airplane food. Then it came to me. Instant oatmeal. Healthy, filling, add water and presto! Now I keep a couple bags in every carry on (and a plastic spoon, or you will be sipping it). My instant oatmeal of choice is the organic kind from Costco.

Bon appetite.

Hanalei Valley

Back from Kauai. Pretty much the best week ever. Oh, and did I mention I had a couple fly over from Oahu for a photo shoot? Icing on the haupia pie. We shot their engagements in Hanalei, which is probably my favorite place in the world. You heard me. World.

I am kind of out of sorts from the fake night of airplane sleep, but once refreshed I plan on tackling all sorts of things to edit so I can share some great images from these past few weeks.

Mahalo.

Portland

Some reasons why we really like Portland:

-bikes
-bridges
-streetcar
-aerial tram
-old architecture
-new architecture
-sustainable fish and amazing organic foods
-river
-trees
-haylie and ross are super cool and easy to photograph
-and the rental cars are not off site at the airport! major bonus.

Besaws

While in Portland we ate at this great restaurant, Besaws, in the Nob Hill neighborhood.

Basically it was lunch time, but we had to order breakfast. I could really eat breakfast items for every meal. I ordered a salmon scramble and Grant ordered some hamburger, cholesterol laden egg thing that was super good. Oh, I almost forgot! We ordered mac n' cheese too....only a half order, but still...

We were very happy, especially since our server use to be a sailor. I like to think of him as a pirate though.

After belly's full we took a walk around the neighborhood. Big trees, colored leaves, warm sunshine. Good job Portland.