Thursday, December 31, 2015

Restaurant Review - Grand China Buffet

I LOVE buffets!  There are 2 Chinese buffets near me, and I decided to try Grand China Buffet in Boise a few days ago since I had tried the other one a few years ago.

I always like to start off with a plate of appetizers.  I went for cream cheese won tons, sweet and sour chicken, veggie roll, fried zucchini, and a chicken meat ball.  They were all so good!

I love egg drop soup.  This was delicious!

My next plate of food had chow mein, veggie egg foo young, honey chicken, and chicken with broccoli.  The egg foo young was a little too thick for me, but otherwise it was another great plate of food.

Most of their sushi had fake crab in it.  The best one of the three was the one that had cream cheese in it.

Sooooo much dessert.  Two fried donuts, jello, chocolate pudding, and mint chocolate chip self serve ice cream.

This food was honestly so good.  Sometimes buffets only have okay food since they are making so much, but everything I tried here was amazing.  They also had tons of cold food that didn't appeal to me, a Mongolian noodle bar, and dim sum which I just didn't even have room for.  I can't wait to go back here!

Monday, December 28, 2015

A Huge Mysterious Garage

I try to walk different routes with Hunter all the time to keep both of us from getting bored.  I've walked by a huge garage a few times, and I keep wondering what's inside of it.  Maybe you all can help me figure it out.


You can see that it's almost double the height of that large truck.  My guess is an RV or a boat, but I've never seen it open.  Do you have any guesses?  Have you ever seen a huge garage like that?

Thursday, December 24, 2015

Restaurant Review - JB's Restaurant

I drive by JB's Restaurant every day on my way to and from work.  They advertise that they have a salad bar.  I went there with my dad just for that!

The salad bar has 3 types of soup!  I went with the chicken noodle and it was so good!  My salad was good also :)

For dinner I ordered 1/2 chicken salad sandwich (with pecans and cranberries) and fries.  It was really good, and the bread was nice and thick!  They give you a very generous helping of chicken salad!

My dad ordered the senior sirloin steak with mashed potatoes and gravy and corn.  The steak was a bit undercooked and the corn was plain, but other than that he really liked it!  Unfortunately, he started eating before I could take a picture!

This was a great diner, and the salad bar was really nice.  I have always loved diner food, so I know I will be going here again!

Do you like diners or do you prefer nicer restaurants?

Monday, December 21, 2015

Book Review: Love Letters by Debbie Macomber


I think Debbie Macomber will always be one of my favorite authors.  "Love Letters" is the newest paperback in her Rose Harbor series.  I've read all of the paperbacks in this series so far, and I love them!

The series revolves around Jo Marie Rose and all of the guests at her bed and breakfast.  Jo Marie's handyman Mark also plays a big role in every book.  I think they have crushes on each other!

Love Letters is about two different guests.  Ellie Reynolds is coming to Cedar Cove to meet someone she has been chatting with on Facebook.  She is coming to see if there is a love spark, and her mom thinks she is making a huge mistake!  Maggie and Roy Porter are coming to the inn to see if they can save their marriage.  Their marriage is a roller coaster throughout the whole book, and you really never know what's going to happen until the end!

The Rose Harbor novels are really cute love stories, and this was one was as good as the rest!  I hope Debbie Macomber keeps writing this series for a while!

Have you read the Cedar Cove or Rose Harbor books by Debbie Macomber?

Thursday, December 17, 2015

Restaurant Review - Panda Garden

I'm going to keep trying restaurants until I find the ones that I want to go to all the time.  I was craving Chinese food a few weeks ago, so my dad and I headed out to Panda Garden in Meridian.

We both ordered egg drop soup.  It came with chunks of tofu in it, and was pretty gelatinous.  It had a good flavor though.

My dad wanted to get sweet and sour chicken.  It was okay, but kind of had a peanut butter after taste.

I ordered chicken egg foo young.  It was a huge portion!  The only downside was that you had to put the sauce on yourself and I like my egg foo young soggy LOL

You also get a choice of white or brown rice, which is nice for those of us that like brown rice.

Over all, the food was okay.  I would probably go back, but I am going to keep looking for excellent Chinese food!

What's your favorite Chinese dish?

Monday, December 14, 2015

Chanukah Was Awesome this Year!

Chanukah started Sunday night, December 6th.  It ended today.  It's a fun holiday filled with lighting candles, exchanging presents, eating fried foods, and maybe playing dreidel.

I started a few days early by going to a women's gift exchange through Chabad.  I received this awesome laptop desk, which is totally my style!  I don't know about the cup holder though, because I definitely try to keep open liquids away from my laptop!

Sunday night I went to a Chabad Chanukah party at the bowling alley in Boise.  I helped to decorate, bowled a few frames, and volunteered in the kid's craft room.  There's a huge menorah in the background there, but it's kind of hard to see because I'm so short LOL

This is me with one of the Rabbi's daughters.  She goes to online school with one of the Rabbi's daughters in Santa Barbara (where I'm from).  I think it's fun that I get to hang out with both of these girls who are best friends!

I met a great group of friends that night.  The three women on the right are a bit younger than me, but they are all awesome!  We traded phone numbers and plan to hang out.  Yay for making new friends finally!

Night one.

Night two.  The flames look crazy!

Night three.  it looks like the menorah is holding up the candy bowl...and I got the flames under control!

Night four.  In case anyone wanted to learn, you load the menorah from right to left, but light the candles from left to right.

Night five.  The flames are still looking normal.

Night six.  It was still light out so the menorah looked awesome!

Night seven.  The flames kinda blurred together into one.

Night 8.  The last night,

I'm really happy that I was home to light all 8 nights this year.  I learned something new this year.  The candle boxes come with 45 candles, enough for each night.  I have 1 candle leftover.  They give you an extra candle incase one breaks!  I never knew that before!

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Skoshbox - My Monthly Subscription Box

Maybe 2 years ago, I decided I wanted to get in on the trend of monthly subscription boxes.  I did some research, and found Skoshbox, a company that sends out a box of Japanese snacks every month.  They have two box sizes, I get the smaller one.  Below is the contents of my November box.

Each box comes with a card explaining what's inside of it.

This is a picture of everyone in my box.  The knife is to cut things to share with my mom.

Strawberry milk candies.  I don't love strawberry, so these were only okay to me.

Senbei - extra crunchy baked rice crackers.  Again, these are not my favorite, but Japanese people seem to have a ton of senbei snacks!

Milk flavored biscuit cookies.  These were very yummy and I love the cute dinosaur pictures on them!

Sesame mochi cake chocolates.  These were so weird that my mom and I spit them out.  Sorry to anyone who likes them.

Chocolate filled marshmallows.  These were one of my two favorite things in the box.  I don't know why Americans don't have filled marshmallows, but we should!

Almond cream filled chocolate biscuits.  These were amazing and I want to eat them all the time!  Thankfully, my mom let me have most of them :)

Skoshbox doesn't even know I'm writing this post, I just wanted to share this amazing box I get.  If you all like it, I'll share every month.

Do you have any monthly subscription boxes??

Monday, December 7, 2015

Fat Guy's Fresh Deli

My dad invited me out to dinner a few nights ago, but gave me nothing to go off of to help find a restaurant.  I literally searched for "restaurant" on yelp and found a deli that looked promising.  My dad and I both love sandwiches and were excited to try out Fat Guy's Fresh Deli in Meridian.

My dad ordered a sandwich called "The Rancher".  It's bbq beef with homemade barbecue sauce, horseradish, and pepperjack cheese.  He also ordered a side of potato salad which I think I liked more than he did hehe

I ordered my somewhat usual, a "California Turkey Club".  It came with turkey, avocado, sundried tomato mayo, sprouts, tomatoes, and bacon.  Oh, and it was on a challah roll.  That might have been the best part, even though I loved the whole thing.  I ordered my sandwich with a bag of potato chips which were fine, but I will definitely get the potato salad next time.

I can't wait to take my mom here when she comes to visit in a few weeks, I think she will love it as much as my dad and I did.

Thursday, December 3, 2015

Book Review: Private L.A. by James Patterson


Everyone who reads my blog knows I love James Patterson,  I loved this book as much as all of his other books.  Private investigation firm is fantastic and I hope he keeps writing novels involving them!

This novel is about a famous couple named the Harlows, that just go missing with all 3 of their kids!  There was also a whole side plot about a group called No Prisoners that are basically committing terrorist attacks!  I love trying to figure out how multiple plots are going to come together, or if they're going to have nothing to do with each other!

If you're a James Patterson lover, or have never read one of his books, give this one a try! :)