Head out to Deep Cove and start off the day with a breakfast of donuts and coffee from Honey Doughnuts. The donuts there are, quite frankly, my favorite of all donuts. If I remember it right, the family even went there during the dead of winter just to have some donuts. That’s how much we love them. Everything is right with the world when your first bite on your birthday is on crunchy-on-the-outside, soft-inside, dense, mmm-inducing donut dipped in dark chocolate.

I turned a year older last weekend. I requested that instead of throwing and catering my own party again (yes, I was insane), I wanted to just relax and have a picnic by the park.

Of course, it’s not all eating as I made my family “work out” by kayaking for a couple of hours before the feast. I mean, it’s not intentional that these days half the time one ends up doing some sort of physical activity when you see me. That’s a good thing, right? At least I don’t get blamed anymore for all the calories from my cooking and baking.

Say OHMMMMM. YOOOHHHMM.

Yeah, you’ll have to work for it, but it will be worth it! :-)

It was a super gorgeous day to be out. There were a lot of people in the park, in good spirits.

Back in Manila, my birthday always falls on days of inclement weather…typhoons, heavy rains, gusts of winds and hey, no school or work because the typhoon warning is off the charts! It’s great that there are no classes back when I was studying, but heck, I couldn’t do anything during the day either! Here in Vancouver, my birthday is almost always sunshiney. LOVE!

We really had a super fun day in the sun, and I really think all birthdays should be spent like this. ;-)

It will be another beautiful summer (long) weekend here, so cheers to that! Hope you’re having a great weekend where you are, too!

Who doesn’t love tart? From savory to sweet, tarts are pretty little things that seem to make its way to everyone’s hearts. I, for one, have a lifelong love affair with tarts because I used to help my mom make personal size fruit tarts for the family, and for my grade school canteen that used to sell her stuff for dessert. It would always be a treat to finish one on the way to school on delivery days. She would set them with gelatin to make them all shiny and enticing, and to prevent the tops from getting watery in the humid tropical weather of Manila. The cream custard that holds the fruit up conjures up memories of childhood for me and my brother. We’ve been bugging our mom to make some of her fruit tarts, with no success. I even got her the small tart shells from Williams-Sonoma, but nope…she still hasn’t gotten around to them. Hah.

For now, all we could hang on to, is my humble tart with frangipane filling.

One evening a couple of weeks back, I was insane enough to arrange the blueberries right side up one by one. it was worth it for the photos, even if they weren’t perfectly aligned. Who wants perfection when you can have homemade? Or so, I tell myself!

And what is it about the scalloped edges of tarts that make me all warm and fuzzy inside?

Don’t get me wrong, I love eating fresh, sweet and local blueberries as is, but it’s always nice to have some good fruit go into something baked:

Making something out of Mother Earth’s bounty is one of the simplest joys the home kitchen can produce…especially summer fruits!

Hmm…and guess what? Something exciting is coming–we’re opening up an online shoppe of our favorite goodies soon! Tick-tock-tick-tock check out the countdown on the right block! More on this later. In the meantime, click that link and be signed up for some cool prizes! Thanks for your support!

  Get the recipe for this BLUEBERRY FRANGINPANE TART

I love oats. I grew up eating sweetened oatmeal topped with Nido powder milk. One of my earliest childhood memories in the kitchen was baking oatmeal cookies with my grandma. I eat it raw. I’ve also been known to eat it with asparagus. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that I went so far as making it congee-like and topped with my all-time favorite viand, the (Filipino) adobo.

That's not a pond of oil, it just looks like oil from this angle. Whoops.

I’ve turned into a heathen in the world of adobo because its appointed wife is a bowl of steamy white rice (or garlic fried rice). How could I defame such a cult-following of adobo lovers?

The reason, my friends, is that I’m dead serious about improving my health and losing weight. I packed on so much weight even I couldn’t believe it. This is what the 30′s does to you, I guess. I was joking that I got an early 32nd birthday gift. There is just no room for error in food choices and laziness (with regards to physical activities). To remedy that, I run almost every other day (depending on how my body is, if I’m too sore I don’t run) using a modified Couch-to-5K running program (it’s 12 weeks instead of 9), and have gone to Bikram yoga since the beginning of June. I run and do yoga on Sundays. So for all that hard work, I am more careful of what I eat. Since I got back from my carefree vacation, it’s been tough to think of what recipes to post here because you might think I am going nuts with the healthful turn of events. I mainly stick to eating fresh fruits, and just one meal with rice a day. Woe, my beloved rice!

So, anyway, back to oats. It’s like my almost-guilt-free ally in all of this. In the morning, I eat a steel-cut oats porridge, a little sugar, and skim milk powder (gotta have the powder there) for breakfast. Sometimes I would eat it with something savory, such as chicken adobo. [Again, my apologies to my Filipino roots.] It does curb my hunger pangs. Honestly, I can put almost anything in it. I prefer steel-cut oats because it doesn’t turn into complete mush and I still get those solid (rice-like) bits when it’s not overcooked.

The result after a month of proactively living healthy? I lost 10 pounds (!!!), I feel the best I’ve ever felt in a year. It didn’t come without a lot of ‘work’ though–it took 4 months for my metabolism to get back to into gear. Effortless metabolism doesn’t come free anymore in my thirties. Ouch.

So, uhm, how do you keep healthy fellow foodies, food bloggers, and food lovers? Any tips?

Living in a gorgeous city like Vancouver, there is no shortage of good views. When it comes to choosing a place to enjoy Sunday brunch, it really is just a matter of thinking where you’d like to go to or what you’d like to do afterward. I love Stanley Park, I love walking or taking a leisurely bicycle ride along the seawall, and with running in mind, I suggested that the whole family have brunch there. I can push my personal agenda and make family time around it sound like fun. Haha. I’m kidding. Of course, there is something for everyone at Stanley Park, so there’s no need to make a case…

My favorite these days is the Teahouse, which offers a scenic view as you sip mimosas by the glass windows or glass-walled heated patio.

Weekend brunch is offered from 10:30am to 3:00pm. The freshly baked croissants with homemade jam (CAD$6.50) are not to be missed, and so is the mimosa to start. I’m such a lush.

I’ve tried their Belgian waffles, classic eggs benny, steak and eggs, but my favorite so far is what I ordered today: the Ferguson Point Benedict. Those wild mushrooms made me do a happy dance in my seat this afternoon because they were so good. And I always enjoy the roasted potatoes and tomatoes. Mmmmm.

Scrumptious brunch in the midst of a cool summer day is a treat I’ll take whenever I can, and I case I’ll make when no one in the family can make a decision over what to do on Sundays. Everybody can agree that today was a good day, and it all started with a delicious meal. That’s what it’s all about, right? :-)

P.S. I love seeing raccoons at the park. I find them so endearingly cute, and I really wish I could hug and take them home! [Yes, I do know better.]

What’s your favorite Sunday brunch spot? Do you cook at home? Do you eat out?

**Disclaimer: I do not work, and have not worked, for/with the Teahouse in Stanley Park, and have not received remuneration in any way, shape, or form to write this post. All views are personal, and all monies paid for food consumed were personal.

My history with blogging photos of things I’ve done or places I’ve gone to shows that this shouldn’t be happening. That less than 24 hours of being out, I’m already showing you photos I took. But look here, this is real blogging progress. I’m posting Canada Day (July 1) photos for you guys! Hope my fellow Canadians enjoyed this holiday.

I ventured out with family to Granville Island. We were there for the activities, I swear, but we ended up either eating or buying food. We haven’t even been a few hundred meters  past the bridge and we were already holding plates of Canadian lobster from The Lobster Man:

We were happy campers eating $16 lobsters.

After eating lunch, we decided to walk again. We stopped to watch a street performer balancing on a ladder, while juggling knives. I squeezed into La Baguette to grab a loaf of bread and a bag of half baked potato baguettes. Why yes, more food! A few more steps and I was hoarding the last few donuts at Lee’s Donuts after being so patient waiting in line. On our way to the False Creek Community Center, we got so distracted and no sooner, entranced, by the scent of barbecued seafood: squid!

Fresh, tasty squid in a small plate for $4. Not bad, not bad at all, considering that we’ve been talking about having bbq squid for the longest time. To be honest, I think we all miss our Asian street food, too.

They do sell other barbecued food, such as chicken, tofu, and lamb, but there was no question that we only had eyes for the tentacled kind.

Yeah, I didn’t take a lot of photos, mainly because I was busy eating or buying food. No trip to Granville Island would be complete without a good few pounds hauled from the farmer’s market: Rainier cherries, local cherries, raspberries, and blueberries, avocado, figs, and fresh herbs. Can’t wait to make stuff in the kitchen this weekend! Fig galette anyone?

The year flew by and half of it is over. Happy July to you all. Hope the first half has been fun, now time to really bask in the summer fun. :)