(Arc II) Act 8: Virtual Cooking and Tourist for a Day

Leave a comment

Hi everyone, hope the transition into 2022 has been smooth. As always, I wanted to wish you and your loved ones good health and success as we move forward this year. The weather has generally been nice in my area, but there have been some weeks where the days would teeter between warm and cold. Looking forward to comfortable beach weather!

It has been a busy past few months. I spent a lot of time with family and close friends over dinners and heartfelt conversations. It was the best way of decompressing and just really being in the moment with them as we shared stories. I also updated my site a bit with my current work along with mentorship of my direct reports when they moved to the next chapter in their careers (I’m super proud of them!).

I also finished up with my continuing education early this year for my recertification. The topics were pretty interesting (clinical trials, mental health for the elderly, issues surrounding marijuana regulation), and it has been great to catch up on the latest research, legal guidelines, and best practices for public health and pharmaceutical science.

In terms of this entry, this one will be heavy on the food and cooking content so hope you have your appetites ready!

Creative Endeavors

I was so happy to support and see a project from my former direct reports get funded on Kickstarter! The Experience Corporation is a comedy podcast focusing on the main characters’ (Delmont and Cameo) adventure navigating through their work at The Experience Corporation and unique encounters throughout Three Cloud City. I enjoyed talking to Thomas, Kate, and Samuel throughout the time period when the Kickstarter was active, and I could see how they were so excited to launch an audio drama for Readymade Utopia. They were incredibly passionate when describing what went into the script, music, and design, and it was wonderful that they now have an opportunity to bring the project to life.

If you are interested in learning more about their production company Readymade Utopia, go check out their site here. They are a very talented team, and I’m very excited to dive into their audio series once they launch it.

Learning

As I’ve been piecing together and organizing my website a bit more, I found a nice format for the learning section. I initially experimented with the ESL section on my site, and it ended up being an organized layout which was visually appealing for me.

For the Health Literacy and Cultural Competent Healthcare sections, they will follow a similar format in terms of the page structure. I started on the first health literacy handout and the page’s design which I hope to launch soon after this is posted. I will also create separate pages and downloadable versions for the handouts. This has been a big part of my research and work, and I am very excited to share this information with everyone.

Food and Shows

Season 19 of Top Chef had started in early March, and I dove right in. I had to also catch up on Season 18 (Portland) since I didn’t watch it when it initially premiered. I ended up binging Season 18 over the course of a week just as Season 19 started, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was no unnecessary drama with the chefs being supportive of each other throughout the challenges. Restaurant Wars in Season 18 was one of the highlights. I remembered that one of the main things of Restaurant Wars was balancing cooking for diners while interacting with the judges and guests. Even though Season 18’s was a bit different due to the pandemic, seeing the members of Kokosón work together and interact with the judges made me smile. It was still very positive and welcoming while showcasing their dishes. Kudos to them!

I’m a bit sad that the season finale is this week! This season had been a staple for my Thursday nights while cooking and eating dinner over the past few months. The top three (Evelyn, Buddha, and Sarah) had been very creative and worked really hard to get a place in the finale. Sarah rocked it at Last Chance Kitchen while Buddha and Evelyn were very consistent throughout the challenges. I’ll be happy with whomever wins. (By the time this blog entry is published, the winner would already be announced 😉)

When the first season of Top Chef premiered in 2006, I was finishing up my undergraduate studies and didn’t know whether to have high expectations or just see it as another reality cooking competition. The show did evolve, and I felt more invested in seeing the growth of the chefs throughout the competition. There were times in the past where I felt like the drama overshadowed the cooking, but I am happy to see more focus on the chefs’ skills and talent from the current seasons.

On the cooking side of things, there were a couple of dishes I was able to try through virtual cooking classes.

I did a virtual cooking class with my colleagues back at the end of 2021 with ingredients from Virtual Table and Kassava Co.. The entire event was from Offsyte’s Boba Milk Tea and Popcorn Chicken event. I highly recommend it! The popcorn chicken was absolutely delicious. The seasoning mix was flavorful and had a nice umami to it (There were several components to it but I didn’t get to take it down since I was focused on chopping. I wish I did write it down though! I remember the chef stating that there was a bit of anise in the seasoning when we all tried to guess what the seasoning was composed of).

The kit we received from Offsyte
The kit we received from Offsyte
Opening the box with thank you message
Opening the box with thank you message
The contents of the kit
The contents of the kit
Everything we needed to cook with!
Everything we needed to cook with!

The portion was pretty big and could be good for several meals or to feed several people. (Everyone around me loves popcorn chicken so it was definitely a nice treat!)

The final product: crispy popcorn chicken and jasmine green boba milk tea

At the start of the new year, we also had an event for Udon making with a choice of either tea or sake tasting. This was hosted by the Story of Ramen. It was a bit more fast paced, so I just ended up taking a picture of the final prepared dish. We did stomp on the dough for the udon noodles and you can see everyone jumping and moving around through Zoom. It was fun! A few of us had the sake while others had tea to taste while we were cooking.

I did like these virtual cooking classes, but I felt like it can be very fast paced. I remembered constantly listening to the chefs’ instructions while catching up to where we were supposed to be. But in the end everything turned out well! The udon was lunch for that day while the popcorn chicken and boba spanned several meals. All in all these were good experiences, and I highly recommend trying them out.

The completed bowl of udon

For dinner one night, I made roasted lemon rosemary chicken. I paired it with some sautéed brussels sprouts with potatoes and a nice slice of bread.

Roasted Lemon Rosemary Chicken with Brussels Sprouts and Potatoes

When I was a kid, I didn’t really like brussels sprouts, but now I really enjoy them. I love the nutty flavor especially when I also integrate some sweetness with mirin (Japanese rice wine) and Bull-Dog Worcestershire sauce. I had a few Sunrise Medley potatoes left over from a previous dish I made, so I chopped them up and added them together with the brussels sprouts. It was as my friends would say “Chef’s kiss”. haha

I do have a couple more food pictures and videos to share which I’ll include in the next few blog entries.

Reading

I was excited to read Reggie Fils-Aimé’s new book which had just come out in early May. He was the former President of Nintendo of America and had an extensive career in marketing and management for several companies (I didn’t know he was involved with Panda Express or Pizza Hut until this book). The book was a short, interesting read (took me around 4 days of light reading), and I enjoyed seeing his insight from his family background in Haiti to his leadership experiences.

He is a charismatic guy which is why I can see how he was pretty memorable in people’s eyes. There was a lot of general business advice which he provided in the So What? sections within each chapter. I can see their applications and he does highlight challenges such as how to navigate disagreements with an approach with a colleague (e.g. Nintendo of Japan wanted to take one approach with pricing or packaging a game with a system while Reggie felt that the Western markets needed a different approach to attract more sales).

It was a refreshing business read which was a casual break from the studying from my finance and accounting readings. Reggie demonstrated his professional conversational style while balancing his more fun and approachable personality.

Since I’m also finishing up Top Chef I’m going to dive into Gail Simmons’ book Bringing It Home next. Her first book Talking with my Mouth Full was very interesting, but there were times where it didn’t flow such as when she listed off ingredients at the beginning of a chapter. But overall she’s an incredible food expert, and I find her critiques constructive and insightful. You can tell that she genuinely wants the chefs to succeed and show their true potential. I like her as a judge on Top Chef and love hearing her feedback.

Tourist for a Day

One of my friends from the West Coast came to visit, and I took her to the Edge Observation Deck at Hudson Yards. Although I’ve been to Hudson Yards several times, this was my first time heading to the Edge.

I took a picture standing on top of the transparent glass, and I asked her if she also wanted to stand on top of it. She laughed and said, “No thanks!” People were laying down and posing. I was a bit nervous though (and I’m usually fine with heights!). But it was nice to at least experience this.

Looking down below!

I enjoyed catching up with her while we walked around. Before we visited the Edge, we walked around the High Line and shared stories of how things were going on our end with loved ones, work, and life. The time flew by quickly and we met up with my other friend for tapas later that afternoon.

Smiles from above

As we move towards the summer here in the States, I hope you and your loved ones continue to stay well! Whether you are traveling, enjoying some hobbies, cooking up delicious dishes, or catching up with family and friends, I wish you all the best. I’m going to explore more of WordPress and other people’s blogs over the summer since I’ve seen a lot of great content. Always appreciate the support from those who have subscribed to my site. You all rock!

(Arc II) Act 5: Iconic Dining, Night Strolls, and Artistic Finds

Leave a comment

Thank you so much everyone for your support! I’m really loving how kevinnissimo is progressing and hope you’re enjoying reading through my adventures. There are a couple of things I wanted to highlight in this entry (since I post updates on Arc II entries while Arc I entries will remain unchanged and keep to the original post from my past site). So I decided to create a new entry here before posting my first entry for the Archive section.

As I was going through my old phone (it was a Nokia Lumia 635–I had to plug it into my older laptop to access the photos 😅), I saw that there were a lot of pictures which I had not published online. I decided to organize them into folders and include them for future posts in Arc II. I was surprised to see a lot of them since I had forgotten that I had these pictures. These past pictures are what gave me the idea to write certain sections in this post.

Recipes

Another thing I was doing this past weekend was organizing a collection of recipes that family members gave me throughout the years. I was scanning them because I wanted to save them electronically in the event that I lose them during a move or they just get misplaced or become illegible and hard to read (some of them were from recipe cards from the 80’s as well as handwritten ones which look a bit fragile). This gave me an idea to put up a section on my site with these recipes so that you all can have access to them.

As I was reading through the recipes, one thing I noticed was that a lot of them were easy to make and can be modified as needed to suit your tastes and nutritional needs. I think I’m going to try out these recipes and post them here. I’ve tried variations of some of these dishes but have not made these specific recipes. This is exciting! Now I can liven up some dishes (off to the grocery store later!).

When I was looking for a style idea for the recipe page, I saw that one of the recommendations was an online menu from a restaurant. I thought it was clever and adorable, so I formatted the style to fit the recipes on the page. The recipe page has been published so go check it out if you’re looking for some meal ideas. I’ll try to update that page regularly as I get through the recipe stack. The main picture I put up on the page was a tasty dish from a wedding I attended which was Pecan Salmon in a champagne cream sauce with potatoes and asparagus. (It was absolutely divine!)

I should have the first two recipes put up: Swiss Chicken Cutlets (from Healthy Meals in Minutes) and Gwen’s Country Butter Cream Ribbon Chocolate Fudge Cake. Hope you enjoy them!

Reading

I’m finishing up My Life in France so that I can put up my mini review on Goodreads. After that I’m deciding on which book to cover next. There are a couple that come to mind such as The Girl with Seven Names by 이현서 (Lee Hyeon-seo) and David John, Tina Fey’s Bossypants, or Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist.

It’s nice revisiting these books as I begin putting up my reviews on Goodreads. Whenever I read books, I try to rotate through different genres and/or topics (for example, I would read a comedy after reading a political thriller). It was interesting for me to see how people who are learning English as a second language choose books to start reading with because whenever I’d ask them, the majority would say Harry Potter. Back when I was in grad school, one of my students was so excited reading the Twilight series. She would come to class and she’d give me a synopsis of what she had just read (she’d always tell me beforehand, “Oh! I hope it’s okay, so I don’t ruin anything by giving away spoilers for you!). It’s so nice seeing individuals be passionate about their interests, and I think it’s great when people find books which captivate them.

While I do enjoy the current books on my reading queue (which you will all see through my Goodreads as I continue posting reviews), I still revisit many of the ones I had read as a child like Stephanie Spinner and Steve Bjorkman’s Aliens For Breakfast. Roald Dahl’s Matilda was another one of my favorites (oh that chocolate cake part!). These are fun reads and can be done in one sitting.

Dining and Warm Company

In December 2017 my cousin and her friend from the West Coast came to visit to experience the holidays in New York. We were discussing what restaurant to have dinner at and she told me that her friend wanted to go to Beetle House since he was a big fan of Tim Burton. My cousin made a reservation for three for the evening.

When we entered the place, we were surrounded by iconic art from many of Tim Burton’s films. I’m sure you can recognize a few from the pictures below— The Nightmare Before Christmas, Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, and of course, the renowned Edward Scissorhands. We still had to wait a bit since they were cleaning and setting up our table. We waited at the bar and my cousin’s friend B ordered The Nine (which had absolut citron, triple sec, midori, and I think a sour pucker and lime juice) while I got Alice’s Cup O’ Tea (anyone close to me knows that peach is my favorite fruit so when I saw that it had peach vodka I knew I had to get it!).

I ordered the Butcher’s Stew (a take on Firehouse chili topped with cotija cheese, sour cream, and scallions served with garlic toast points), another Alice’s Cup O’ Tea, and the Willy Burger (which was a half pound burger with grilled pineapple, pepper jack cheese, smoked bacon, french fried onions, maple barbecue sauce, on a honey garlic butter bun). My cousin got Jack’s Jambalaya Risotto and B got the Sweeney Beef and they both shared the Cheshire Mac and Cheese.

During our dinner, there was also a group celebrating a bachelorette party. With Beetle House, there would be costumed characters who would come to the tables and chat with the guests. The character would change for each day. During our visit, it was Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka. The bachelorette party had a blast talking to him and taking pictures. The actor was so in tune with the character. The way he spoke and his mannerisms were exactly like Depp’s character in the movie. B took a picture of my cousin with the Willy Wonka character.

Throughout our dinner we were just catching up on life’s musings. B was asking us trivia on Beetlejuice and we were just laughing throughout the meal. “How many times do you call out Beetlejuice for him to appear?” The combination of the vibrant environment with good company made it incredibly memorable. I’m typing this entry in 2021, and I still vividly remember that night from December 2017. It’s bringing back so much smiles!

After dinner, we walked around the City (at the time it was past 11:30 PM). We started around the Bowery area and moved all the way up to Rockefeller Center. Below are a few pictures I snapped along the way from the tree at Rockefeller Center, the Macy’s Holiday Window displays, and Grand Central Terminal. We were just taking in the atmosphere and enjoying each other’s company. I’m sure you’ve all had those moments where you are walking and talking with a friend, loved one, significant other, or another individual and you end up just getting immersed in the dialogue. Then you look at the clock and it’s 3 hours later or you realize that you just walked down 25 blocks from where you started.

It’s these impromptu moments which make some of the best memories. We don’t expect what will happen next but everything falls into place. This is why I love writing these blog posts. I love sharing these memories with others and in a sense, I’m having “conversations” with everyone through my posts here at kevinnissimo.

Art

As I was going through my other photos, I found a picture I took with Sebastian Masuda’s Hello Kitty Time Capsule back in May 2015. I met up with my friend J and Rob to catch up after work. They spent the day shopping and playing around at FAO Schwarz.

As we walked down Hammarskjold Plaza (around E. 47th St. and 2nd Ave.), we stumbled upon this piece. It immediately caught our eye and we all took pictures with it. I was so excited when I saw this because it brought back memories of when I made a presentation on Murakami Takashi and his Superflat approach during my senior year at Rutgers. Seeing artists develop their style and come up with new works is great because you can see their evolution as you follow their exhibits and presentations.

Now that I discussed this, I’m going through book recommendations to see if there are any art books I can dive into next. If anyone has recommendations, please let me know! I still have my art history books (do you all remember Gardner’s Art Through the Ages from Intro to Art History?) and love perusing through chapters from time to time.

Hello Kitty Time Capsule by Sebastian Masuda

As I’m writing my entries, more focused ideas come to mind as I’m building up kevinnissimo. It’s great to have that creative spark reignite, and again, I appreciate everyone’s kind support for visiting my site! As I had said before, I love sharing my stories and adventures. I look back at these photos, documents, and other memorabilia, and I get a chance to revisit these memories.

I do have some movies to watch which my friend recommended during our video call–Nomadland and Minari. We also planned to do a virtual movie night and dinner sometime soon. She’s amazing when it comes to new films to check out or what beauty products to try. We’re anticipating when we can see each other again in person so that we can catch up over some good food.

I’m currently working through the Comic Con 2015 blog which I plan to post this weekend. I resized a lot of the pictures in my original entry from my old blog, so I’m going to replace them with the original ones when I publish the blog post here. The pictures were on my old phone (which I discussed at the beginning on this post), so I transferred them over to a folder here on my laptop. The one great thing with the format here is that I can create the tiled galleries and collages for pictures (which my old blog could not do). What ended up happening was that I had to place individual pictures and it made the entry become a long scroll down the page. At least here I can group them together and make it more manageable (plus you’ll get to see when I attended the Adventure Time panel). I’m pretty stoked and look forward to publishing it for everyone to read.

(Arc II) Act 4 Sweet Gifts and Artistic Delights

Leave a comment

I’ve been looking forward to getting back on the groove of writing blog posts. Just sitting down and going through my notes and pictures, I start to bring together what I want to cover for the post. Whenever I would write blogs in the past, I would outline different topics in my notebook and see which ones would flow well.

I purchased a new notebook a week or two after I started kevinnissimo since I knew that I would get back into writing (after taking a break from blogging on my old site). Continuing from my discussion of changes to the site (as I had mentioned in the past few entries), one of the changes I will make regarding my entries is that I won’t overload too many topics into a blog post. For my past site, I remembered deciding to just post a detailed entry once a month to try to space things out; however, it ended up with me cramming so many pictures and topics into one post which made it a lot more difficult to navigate. I think having these bite sized posts would be more manageable, and I can expand a lot more on a few topics rather than brush several ones superficially.

I decided to choose a light-hearted topic from my past blog to start as my initial post in the blog archive section here. It will be on my visit to New York Comic Con in 2015. It was an incredible experience where I got to see the cast of Adventure Time and hear Rebecca Sugar sing. Her series Steven Universe was one of my favorite shows to watch (not to mention the songs on the show were incredible! “Giant Woman” and “Love Like You” are two of my favorites.).

Food and Reading

I was going through my book list and decided that my next little mini-review on Goodreads will be for My Life in France by Julia Child and Alex Prud’homme. I initially read this book on January 2010 and wanted to learn more about her life and background. I remembered watching her cooking shows, specifically Baking with Julia in the late 90’s. She had such passion for the ingredients and dishes (both in her cooking as well as the ones shared by guests chefs on her show). During the time period in the late 2000s, my interest in cooking and other food related activities was at its peak. I tried to cook new types of dishes and also started typing out handwritten recipes as backup (in the event, the recipes become hard to read or get misplaced). I also watched a ton of Top Chef and other reality shows haha.

One of my favorite things when I frequently blogged on my old site was that I would take pictures whenever I would cook to keep a record of different food recipes I had experimented with. You’ll see a lot of my food pictures from past posts in the blog archive section. Now that I’ve restarted blogging again here, I started documenting my recipe experiments again. I’ll be adding more food pictures along the way so keep an eye out for them! 🙂 Here is a little collage I made back in May 2015:

From top left moving clockwise: Thai Basil Shrimp Fried Rice, beginning to prepare curried chicken, Herb meatloaf with rice, and Udon noodles with edamame pesto

The udon noodles with edamame pesto came from an America’s Test Kitchen cookbook I bought during that time. It was absolutely delicious and full of flavor! A couple of the ingredients included basil, coriander, toasted pine nuts, and edamame. It was refreshing and light but very filling.

Significance of Experiences

As I had mentioned in my previous post (ACT 3), sharing moments with loved ones through food have been key highlights whenever we’d share stories and catch up. I remembered my 10th grade English teacher telling us a story about how she met up with her friend for lunch. She ordered a tuna sandwich which ended up not tasting good, but the outing was still a positive experience for her because they both enjoyed catching up and seeing each other again. She emphasized how focusing on positive aspects (in her example, company) can serve as the highlight / central component for an experience. However, it’s not just solely applicable for social components, but can also be applied to the importance of one’s individual experiences.

An individual might venture on a solo trip or take a “me day” to examine things without distractions. In this case, their personal goal and what they want to gain from the experience are what serve as the highlight. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed times having a solo meal or going to a museum for my “me day” to center myself. It helped me focus and gain insight into my own personal plan for that day.

With my loved ones (family and friends), we would usually gift each other food whenever we would meet up. It could be chocolates, snacks, or ingredients for cooking. One of my close friends (the one who I had dinner and dessert with in the previous entry – ACT 3) started our friendship on our love of food and dining out (we were talking about Indian food at that time). We told each other we would still continue our tradition despite not being able to do it in person this year.

It was such a wonderful surprise when I received a package from Levain Bakery which is known for its massive cookies. I had the biggest smile on my face and thanked her for the thoughtful gift. I received it on a Friday which was a nice start for the upcoming weekend. The cookies are really good when you warm them up in the oven for a bit!

The oatmeal raisin cookie from the Signature Cookie Assortment (they’re huge!)

Books and spa / self care gifts were also main items we would give each other. She introduced me to Lush products and gifted me one time with the Rosy Cheeks face mask which she highly recommended. Since it has to be kept in the fridge, it provided a nice coolness when you set it on your skin.

Rosy Cheeks from Lush

I sent her the Hello Gorgeous gift set, Sympathy for the Skin lotion, and Angels on Bare Skin cleanser from Lush. She loved it. If you know both of us, we’re big on symbolism and the gifts we give to each other (and to others) would reference to something significant (like an event or something we learned about the other person through conversations).

Art

Outside of science, my interest lies in art and design. I enjoy going to museums, reading books on art history, and learning about different types of crafts. One of my art history professors, Virginia Bower was a big inspiration for collaboration and developing my handouts. During class she would cover the time period and other important details for a piece without information getting muddled. Too many times I’ve written notes in the past where I wrote so much information that I might as well have read the textbook!

Professor Bower’s background (Courtesy of Smithsonian Journeys – 2015)

It wasn’t just her handouts, but her passion that was so refreshing in her class. The way she described each piece, the cultural significance of the work in relation to the time period, and her stories traveling around Asia (it was so sweet when she spoke Mandarin to us!) really engrossed us for the entire semester. I took it over the Summer of 2006 and it was twice a week for four hours in the evening from 6-10 PM — Kudos to Professor Bower for keeping us engaged the entire time!

A snippet of East Asian Art – Courtesy of Professor Virginia Bower

Her notes had a conversational tone to them and reading through them felt like I was talking to her again. It brought back memories from when she would go up to each of us before class and start a conversation on art or ask questions about our major (ahh I miss Professor Bower!). Each experience afterward through cancer outreach and research built upon this foundation that I had learned from her. (I’ll elaborate further in the next few paragraphs)

I do have pictures from my past trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in July 2019 which I plan to include in an upcoming blog. However, I did attend a small art exhibition during autumn of that year which I will share here. My friend and I went to an art exhibition in the Lower East Side at Van Der Plas Gallery in November 2019. Many artists showcased and were selling their work on site. As you can see from the pictures, they are incredibly talented and have such unique styles. He and I grabbed a cup of wine and walked around and spoke with artists about their work. (We went to an Italian restaurant for dinner afterward but I’ll save that for another entry!)

One artist described a winter landscape which had been inspired from her childhood growing up. She had a big smile on her face and was very descriptive when describing the different elements of the piece. Similar to Professor Virginia Bower you could feel how much the artist enjoyed her work and wanted to share her pieces with others.

A major theme I had recognized from all of these experiences was how the delivery and presentation of information played a crucial role with how you engage with what had been presented. I still remember a majority of the art pieces I had encountered years ago as a result of the stories and vivid descriptions with which they were paired with.

When I was in graduate school, Dr. Cowart and I had a writing assignment for the students in the Culturally Competent Healthcare class in which students reflected on their background (covering facets such as their cultural, ethnic, and racial backgrounds) and how those influenced their approach to navigating the complex healthcare system in the United States. Everyone had such unique perspectives and we both learned so much from the class through their personal experiences. As all of you may know, with health it’s more than just preventive care or diagnosing an illness. There are many aspects which also play a role to provide a high level of care for these populations (e.g. understanding the importance of the family system, addressing language barriers, or taking into consideration cultural values when caring for a loved one).

Including the elements which I had learned from those past experiences in art and public health have been a strong influence for my current work. When presenting health information or working with populations to move their health in a positive direction, making the information accessible and relevant increased engagement and provided more successful outcomes. This made me appreciate how a course in another field unexpectedly played a major role in my subsequent work. (This is why I always try to keep an open mind about things 😉 )

I’m continuing to update more things on kevinnissimo in terms of pages and what types of topics to include. As I continue to write these posts, it has been helpful trying to preview different styles and see what works and what doesn’t. It’s a work in progress, but I am certainly loving it!