Category Archives: Uncategorized

Oct5

Part II: Visiting Martha’s Vineyard

Posted on October 5, 2016 by athaidek

When Labor Day approached, our rhubarb started waving its goodbyes and the fall leaf pie decoration starting trumping the flower. Then, as the mornings got chillier and the air started smelling bonfire-y, my ticking summer adventure clock reached midnight and I returned home from the Vineyard. My body was all of a sudden tired of checking for ticks every night and screamed, “gimme air conditioning and my bed at home!!” While I was sad to leave, I’m so happy to be home with my family and friends.

Now that I’m back and missing all my places, I must tell you about visiting the rest of the island. The good thing is, it’s still a great time to go visit the Vineyard given that the tourists are mostly gone but the weather will be nice. So, if you read this and have some extra vacay days, visit ye ole Vineyahd! Last time, we talked pastrami sammies, a lil fishing village and my favorite breakfast spots. Today I want to share Edgartown, Katama and OB with you.

For all you ath-a-letes or outside-junkies…

My number-one activity for you to do as a family or group is to bike State Beach. Because I didn’t have a car, it was a bit harder to figure out transportation to and from each town when people came to visit. I figured out you could make a whole day activity out of biking from Vineyard Haven to Edgartown by going on the State Beach route. If you have a car, it is a 7 mile drive, but the scenic bike route ends up being closer to 8-9 miles.

If you’re willing to take the longer route, I’m telling you it’s a great 1-2 hour adventure depending upon how many times you stop and enjoy the views. Starting in Vineyard Haven, you can bike over Beach road, flanked by water on both sides and even a small beach (Eastville) if you’re interested. When my soul sistah Christine came to visit, we explored a new path and biked the East Chop loop around to Oak Bluffs’ town center.

This East Chop loop is a great way for you to feel completely obsessed with finding some way to live in one of these beachfront cottages with by far the prettiest sunset you may ever see on the East coast. That being said, proceed with caution. Zillow stalking is a REAL problem. Once you get into Oak Bluffs, you’ll see sooo many people and wonder how this much of civilization managed to cram onto an island with no stoplights and enough parking for about 1/10 of its visitors.

Stop at Nancy’s, have a cocktail to ease those tight glutes, or visit the Donut shop in the little town square for some delicciouuuusss donuts or apple fritters. As you continue along through OB and get to State Beach, you get to pass one of those fancy golf courses and then stumble upon the “Jaws Bridge.” I’m telling you, I still have not seen Jaws so I’m not sure where this actually shows up in the movie, but apparently it’s a thing. For most adrenaline-seekers, jumping off the Jaws Bridge is a MUST for all summer residents. If you ask me the MUSTS for a summer resident, eating a donut from Back Door donuts is much more important than visiting this bridge.

Here’s Mom on the other side of the Jaws Bridge

Riding along State Beach might be my absolute favorite thing about Martha’s Vineyard, to be honest with you. On one side, you see blue waters and beach for miles. On the other side, a serene lagoon with inlet-nestled homes offers calmer waters for kayakers, windsurfers, and slower boats. Also, according to my Google search as of 2 seconds ago, the rumor (that I started) that one of the houses lining State Beach was in Wedding Crashers is completely false. Ugh, failed the tour guide test

Anyways, if you think you’ve felt the letters V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N slowly start to form a different aura around your being when you go to the beach, you haven’t felt anything yet. Get on your bike, get up to State Beach, and get on this bike ride. It’s freeing, beautiful, serene, sunny, just warm enough, and there are sweets and ice cream at the end of your ride.

I like to end the bike ride in classic Edgartown. As much as I didn’t want to like Edgartown, with its expensive restaurants, art galleries, and manicured homes, I couldn’t stop coming back. Though the air is a bit haughty, Edgartown is what you came to Martha’s Vineyard to see. You came to see those shingled houses, white painted fences, waterfront views, blue blazers, and Vineyard Vines pastels. And here it is 🙂

When the bike ride is over, it’s off to Rosewater market, the cutest lil deli shop with all those cutesy cards you want to write your bestie along with lunch and expensive seltzer water. When my sister and I came here, we had some delicious BBQ and brussels sprouts. With Spencer, it was a massive strawberry cupcake. And Christine and I had a classic cold brew. When you’re ready for ice cream, I’m a tried and true Scoops girl, right across from the Seafood Shanty. Don’t make the same mistake as The Mitchell men and myself – we visited Scoops before END OF JUNE and apparently in Martha’s Vineyard it’s not ice cream time until END OF JUNE??? Bring your ice cream up to the second-floor dock that overlooks the Chappy ferry. Laugh at the ferry that carries literally 3 cars about 100 yards from Edgartown to Chappaquidick. Then, sit, and breathe. Close your eyes and listen to the breeze. To the sounds of boats entering the harbor, kids running for ice cream, and smile REALLY BIG. Sitting here on my bed back at home, I feel like the image of the those boats dotting the harbor in Chappy is one carved so permanently in my mind. My dad even did his pushup challenge up on the dock!!

An afternoon in Edgartown requires a walk down Water Street to look at all the white houses, shiny red painted doors, Mercedes Benzs, and to peek in at the intricately carved staircases inside these homes. If you’re lucky, you might hit happy hour when one of these houses with the lush green grass backyards is hosting a cocktail party. Hint: follow a chic older lady who is hooking arms with a dapper older man, blue-blazer or polo clad strolling up Water Street…Either way, if you’ve got your bathing suit, you can go relax for a bit down by the Edgartown lighthouse. My sweet momma and I went down here after a long afternoon of biking. It’s amazing that with all the touristyness of Edgartown, going down by the lighthouse feels almost remote. It’s a nice quiet place to take your Rosewater sammy or a couple drinks to watch the sun go down

(view above is looking back to water street from the Edgartown dock)

Don’t think I forgot about dinner. All of you who have been to MV to visit me know that there’s only one place I ever want to go…..The Port Hunter. My dearest friend Raquel introduced me to this place. After our first round of drinks and dinner, I brought all my visitors there!! I must say, it worked out well for the baker’s schedule – we liked to be in bed by 9, so we would get there right when it opened for dinner (5:30 or 6). Getting to the Port Hunter early is essential, since there is a line out the door before it even opens.

I highly recommend sitting at the bar, drinking their cucumber-y lime cocktail or this spicy margarita that has Mezcal !!! There’s absolutely no question that you have to get the fried brussels sprouts with buffalo sauce and blue cheese dip. YUP, THAT IS a thing. Other great dishes include this harissa grilled chicky sammich that Christine enjoyed, their calamari, whole roasted fish, seafood chowder, fish tacos, and the chicken livers. And don’t forget why Raquel and I went there in the first place….for the FRIES!! My mom and I had a lovely girls night with Raquel and also ordered this amazing roasted chicken all loaded with herbs. Ugh, I could go back there every night, fresh off work from the bakery, loaded with french fries and in bed at 9. An IDEAL summer night 🙂

Goodness, I thought I was going to get all my recommendations out to you but looks like I’m going to have to extend this share-an-entire-summer-in-a-few-internet-writing-bursts a bit more!!

Here are a few more snaps from when I walked through this fancy tennis/polo-y club neighborhood and imagined my future life as a person with a very manicured lawn:

Jul26

Beetsmesumma on the Vineyard

Posted on July 26, 2016 by athaidek

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Hello from Martha’s Vineyard, summer babes! I’m currently donning a bright yellow rain slicker, waiting for the sailboat captain to get to the right spot for our lobster fishing adventure today. Just kidding, that’s just how I imagined my Martha’s Vineyard experience before coming up here.

So, why am I 1,000 miles from home on an island off the coast of Massachusetts? To bake ALL the pies, scones, cookies, and granola for 3 months straight, obviously! I wanted to do it all day everyday to learn more about baking and get to know the scoop on working/owning a kitchen. I’m a little delayed in telling you about this because I had to make sure I had some good experiences to share. Here I am, almost 6 weeks into my summer adventure, having the time of my life.

I live in a house with three other women, right on the lagoon where we have a motley crew of animal friends. Looking out my back window, I can observe a swan family, several ducks, an occasional deer, our two cats, and our 14 year old dog Bubba. The most frequented family to our yard is a group of WILD TURKEYS. YES, TURKEYS. The other day, I came home with my bike and almost ran into the lil turkey chicas darting around our yard!! It’s so bizarre walking down the road and confronting a large turkey. Takes geese crossing to a whole new level.

I’m working at this amazing wholesale bakery called (cue fun girly The Cranberries or Sara Evans song) ….”Pie Chicks.” There’s seven chicks this summer. Our days start at 6:30 am on a normal day, usually to the sounds of John Mayer or Bruce Springsteen Spotify playlists. If you visit Martha’s Vineyard, you can find our pies at local grocery stores, farm stands, restaurants, and the West Tisbury farmers market. Every day, I’m in there, baking and doing a whooollleee lot of cleaning.

This island is incredibly gorgeous, and much more rural than I anticipated. In addition to sandy beaches and calm waters, there are many farms to explore, artisans to get to know, and hiking trails. My house has a CSA share at a farm where you can pick your own flowers !!!!

There’s so many things I have to tell you about this place and adventure and all the people and swanlings and pies.

I’ll start with a few snapshots. Last week, one of my tasks at work was to walk around with a frozen piece of key lime pie on a popsicle stick, eating it in the sun while trying to figure out how long someone could walk around outside before it would melt. #workworkworkworkwork ?!? I also was able to visit the West Tisbury farmers market a few weeks ago and I’m still wondering why in the world I did not buy a lassi from Mermaid Farm. We’ve been getting all sorts of fresh fruits delivered for our fresh fruit tarts with lemon pastry cream. One of the most fun parts of the day is watching these things come together, as our pastry chefs slice up plums, nectarines, strawberries, or peaches and carefully make pretty spirals on the gorgeous tarts.

Okay, with that glimpse in mind, here are some pics of MV!!!

Here is a pic of the little swanling who lives somewhere near the lagoon? He used to come through our backyard a lot but maybe we scared him off Any thoughts on what his/her name should be?

On my first week, I got to work this event called Taste the Vineyard and we set up our pies all cute like this !!

Welcome to Chez Pie Chicks! It’s actually a commercial kitchen in a residential neighborhood. Kinda cool. I think there’s also some sort of camp nearby because as I was walking to work one day I think I saw an archery range. During the day, you can smell fancy butter, bubbling fruit pies , and the sinful smells of oats, chocolate, and brown sugar wafting from our doors.

Here’s our sweet shed. You can find me in here lifting big boxes of frozen fruit, attempting to carry big A bags of flour over to the kitchen, or playing tetris with boxes of scones and cookie dough in our freezer trying to get them all to fit.

And here’s my stylish bike that my awesome boss found me for the summer! It’s a little cruiser and it has ventured all the way out to West Tis and even Edgartown on my leisurely days off.

Now for the pieeeee

Below is the lighthouse out at west chop…so pretty! Can I live here and be in a Wes Anderson movie?

Edgartown on the 4th of July! This isn’t what all of MV looks like, but this is what I thought the whole island would be like before I got here.

Last, this is the beach closest to my house. It’s great to bike to after work for a lil walk or just a nice view.

Off to bed , tomorrow we bake some more!!

May23

FeedmePhoebe’s Gluten Free Sriracha Ginger Meatloaf + Broccoli Fried Rice

Posted on May 23, 2016 by athaidek

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I made this dinner for a St-Charles-house-family-meal a few months ago. To give you some context, Webster’s dictionary defines a St-Charles-house-family-meal as one where a) the fire alarm goes off because our windows are painted shut and literally everything you cook sets it off, b) someone gets accused for not eating carbs , subsequently carbs are consumed by all, c) we run out of plates, chairs, cups, or utensils and resort to more artistic ways of eating. (slices of cake served in coffee filters , people sitting on the floor eating on the coffee table, people eating in a lawn chair eating off a small side table, people sitting on the ground eating off of a square cooler, boys stealing our silverware/cups/pots/oven/spices) , and the most necessary part of a St Charles house family meal is discussing buying a dog or hosting a Murder mystery dinner.

For the past two years, I’ve lived in a house fondly known as “The Quarter House,” (I think we’ve called it that a whopping 2 times), because it looks slightly like a New Orleans French Quarter house. With a full porch on both levels, the house has welcomed its fair share of fun visitors, held many parties and dinners, but most importantly, it’s been a welcoming home base. Of the 9 (actual) tenants in 4 units in the house, 4 of us went to high school together, all of us are friends, and we have at least 5 others who don’t live in the house but may as well be our roommates. This weekend marks the last that we live together – some of us having lived here for 1 and others for 2 years, together.

In honor of our last week as roomies, I’m sharing with you a great Sunday night meal for you and your friends/ family / fr-amily. I still have many tips and stories to share with you from my tiny kitchen, but I’m excited for my new farmhouse sink and GAS RANGE in the new place! I’ll be missing our house, but thankful for continuing friendships with the people in it.

I understand if you do not meatloaf, but I will not have a discussion with you about it. It’s like when you bring something up with your dad that you knooowwww is going to end with both of you STILL feeling passionately about the OPPOSITE side of the other. Yea, I understand, it’s a loaf of meat. But it’s so comforting – you mix up some classic ingredients, throw it in the oven, and during the hour while it bakes, you’re getting excited for your warm cozy meal with friends.

I love Phoebe Lapine’s blog because she posts recipe that align with different dietary restrictions, but also are takes on classic dishes. I have been wanting to make this meal for a long time and am so glad I did!

Thanks to my housemate Daniel for the final plating pics. It pays to have friends with the more artistics capabilities 🙂

Sriracha Ginger Meatloaf, from FeedmePhoebe, serves 4

For the glaze

1/2 cup ketchup
1 teaspoon minced ginger
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tablespoon sriracha

For the loaf

2 large eggs, beaten
4 scallions, finely chopped
2 teaspoons minced ginger (really a 1-inch knob of gingner, peeled and grated)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 tablespoon gluten-free tamari (just uesd low sodium soy sauce)
½ cup gluten-free oats (I just used regular oats)
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 pound ground beef
1/2 pound ground pork

1. Preheat your oven to 375 and set the rack in the upper-middle of the oven. Middle is fine if that’s confusing. You want your meatloaf not to burn by being too high up

2. In a small bowl, mix the glaze ingredients. One of my housemates doesn’t like ketchup very much so I reduced the amount of glaze. However, the glaze is delicious, dont skimp.

3. In a large bowl, mix together eggs, scallions, ginger, garlic, soy sauce, oats, and salt until combined

4. Next, add in the beef and pork and mix the meat with egg mixture until JUST MIXED. This is key. The second time I made this dish I mixed up the meat too much and it was a bit dry. It helps that you’ve already mixed the other flavors together so the meat should get incorporated with the spice mixture fairly easily.

5. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or aluminum foil, and form a log-shape with the meat mixture on it. I think I saw this on Ina Garten – apparently you want to pack the meat in the middle first and start pushing it outwards, ensuring that you don’t leave any air pockets in the meatloaf. This will keep it from drying out.

6. With a spoon or brush, slather on about half the glaze on top of the meatloaf.

7. Bake for 1 hour , until the top is all crispy. Let stand for 15 mins before serving

Broccoli fried rice, adapted very slightly from A House in the Hills , serves 4

1 cup any rice you like – I prefer jasmine
2 heads broccoli, chopped, including the stems if you like them
1 medium onion, diced
1 tablespoon + 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil
2 TBS fresh ginger, peeled and grated/minced
3 cloves crushed garlic
3 tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
1 tsp rice wine vinegar
1 lime

1. Cook rice according to directions but add on 2 tsp of the sesame oil with the water when cooking.

2. Once rice is close to done, heat a large skillet and add the rest of the sesame oil. Cook onions until they start to sweat and you can see through them.

3. Add broccoli and sautee until the outsides get a little crisp. Add a bit of water if the pan is too dry.

4. Add the soy sauce, garlic, ginger, rice, and vinegar, sauteeing all the ingredients together until the broccoli is cooked how you like (about 4-5 minutes for me) and the rice is coated in the oil and sauce. If you want this to be really fried, let it keep cooking and turn up the heat to get some more crisp.

5. Squeeze in lime at the end. Serve with meatloaf and sriracha on the side.

This is really yummy. It’s not going to make it out of the pan before you trying it so just serve from here 🙂

Feb15

Honey cornmeal pancakes

Posted on February 15, 2016 by athaidek

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Three places you can guarantee I will be on a Saturday morning in Atlanta: 1) Walking to Ponce City Market to get coffee from Spiller Park, 2) laying on my couch watching an episode of the Pioneer Woman or 3) in my kitchen making the best food of all time, pancakes.

I’ve been making the most out of the box of cornmeal I bought recently as we are in the thick of chili and cornbread season. A few weeks ago I made this cornbread which was the perfect mix of not-too-sweet and extremely moist for a chili dinner, and I also made these cornmeal waffles to top off another chili dinner! I highly recommend both recipes if you like corn! (sorry Arianna)

This Saturday morning, we had a good girl-talk group at my St. Charles casa – my roommate Kelley, my sister, and I sat and chatted whilst the sweet cakes sizzled 2 inches away in my shoebox kitchen. Winter 2015/2016 has been a fun time for communal eating at my house and I’m learning more and more about how to entertain without a) pulling my hair out and b) burning my house down.

From entertaining thus far, I’ve learned that to get my sister to come over asap, I should keep a bag of bagels on hand in the freezer (which happens to always be the case), and that apparently a paper bag can entertain up to 20 people in my living room for at least 4 hours.

A few weeks ago, my friends and I ran the Will to Live 5k (find our stud teammate William at 2:17 in the video) in memory of our friend Harry and later that night decided to all re-convene at the house where I live along with three of my high school friends. Clearly the first thing I thought was “what will we eat?” while I think others had the cocktails covered. Besides playing “the bag game,” where you try to pick up a paper bag with your teeth while balancing on one foot, we ate these carnitas accompanied by the necessary guac and salsa.

For breakfast entertainment, I try and have the coffee going before people get here and to have a sweet and savory option. My sister doesn’t like sweets as much (still not sure how we are related), so I usually provide the bagels, and some people don’t even really want breakfast which makes the stocked coffee jar that much more important!

Another thing that’s key here is getting the music selection right. To start off the new year, we matched the mood of a yoga class taught in my living room with the “Acoustic Soul” Spotify playlist. When Julia and I cook together, we play country often. With my sister and roommate Kelley, we listen to Mat Kearney’s Air I Breathe on repeat along with Needtobreathe, I Am They, Chris Tomlin, and Casting Crowns.

Pancakes are my comfort food – both in the fact that they’re a warm, sweet dish and that they remind me of so many good memories.They’re comfortable.

Though I’ve been bad about posting some of my recipes lately, I’ll share with you a few here in addition to the pancakes that I made lately.

Melissa Clark’s Sweet and Spicy Chicken – so so great, had it again the next week

Spiced jam cake with Salted Caramel Chocolate Ganache

Honey Mustard Brussels Sprout slaw and Curried Chicken Salad for a bridal shower

On to pancakes!

Honey Cornmeal Pancakes, adapted just slightly from Brooklyn Supper

Ingredients:

1/2 cup white wheat flour
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup fine cornmeal – I used the regular yellow kind from Kroger
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 TBS unsalted butter
2 TBS coconut oil
1/4 tsp fine grain salt
3 tablespoons honey
1 cup buttermilk, or a mix of buttermilk, yogurt, and regular milk
2 large eggs

Heat your oven to 150-200 degrees, this will be for the pancakes that are ready but need to stay warm before you’re ready to eat.
Start by measuring the butter, coconut oil, and honey into a small bowl. Pop them in the microwave for about 15 seconds at a time to melt all together. Let these cool for a few minutes – you don’t want to add to the pancake mix when it’s too hot because it will curdle the eggs.
Whisk together both flours, cornmeal, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl until evenly mixed.
In a separate bowl or in a glass measuring cup, whisk together milk and eggs.
Mix the buttermilk/egg mixture into your dry ingredients until JUST mixed evenly (try not to overmix).
Then, pour in the honey butter mixture and fold into the batter.

7. Heat a wide skillet to medium heat (my burner tends to get really hot so I put it at around medium) and melt about a 1/2 tablespoon of coconut oil.

8. Here’s where you have some room for creativity. I like to pour a ladle-ful at a time per pancake, but if you like minis you could do just a few tablespoons. If you like your cakes really big, you could do ones that fill up half the pan that are closer to 3/4 cup. I went with around a 1/3 scoop mix of batter at a time into the pan.

9. Let your pancakes cook for about 2-3 minutes on the first side, until bubbles form across the entire surface.

10. Flip with a spatula, and cook on the other side for about a minute.

11. Put the ready pancakes on a baking sheet in your low-temp oven until ready to eat so that they stay warm. Meanwhile, for each additional round of pancakes, add a little more coconut oil to just coat the pan each time so as not to burn the cakes

12. Serve with maple syrup and fresh fruit!

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Dec3

Office baking: Blueberry Coconut Almond Baked Oatmeal

Posted on December 3, 2015 by athaidek

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Hi. Remember me? Brown-haired, smudged-glasses-clad, Gilmore girl of the pancake-loving sort? This post may help explain the time lag as I’ve entered a new stage of cooking. In fact, if I were doing a market analysis of cookbooks/blog offerings, I’d say I’m filling a gap here. It’s called “analyst-office-baking” and it’s not for the faint of heart.

Here’s how I’ll let you know if you’re cut out for this sort of cuisine: do you find yourself wishing you had time to make breakfast before work in the morning? Do you sometimes make smoothies for breakfast but then feel too bougie and adult and basic be–(you get the picture) and want real food? Do you find yourself at the office OFTEN??? I think I’ve described a very large population of people. Last question is, are you committed to steppin it up knotch?!!? That’s the big question peeps.

I was talking to someone the other day about living out what you say you’re going to do and really, it’s hard. Do you say you want to cook more and eat healthier? I surely do but then find myself eating leftover Cookout milkshakes for dinner (peanut butter has protein, OKAY). So here’s the sort of thing you do when you want to eat healthier but “don’t have time.” You bring. it. to. the. office.

Maybe not the most ideal thing to do, but hey, if a few oats and the wafting smell of warm butter and coconut luring from the 2 inch wide snack room put a little pep in your step, I’d say it’s a win for this week.

Many of you may have heard of my oatmeal-cart dream. Well, while I haven’t been so good about saying-I’m-gonna-do-it-and-doing-it, I have been slowly working my way through kinds of oatmeal recipes. It all starts back in college when I made the microwave kind and it would ALWAYS blow up in the microwave. Why does that happen? Lately I’ve even explored pumpkin baked oatmeal!

These days, I’m usually working with steel-cut oats of the McCanns kind, but I have wanted to venture into the baked oatmeal side of the species. To be honest, I also REALLY wanted to see my co-worker Jon, dubbed “johnny springtime” on a particularly nice day, become overjoyed at what he’s described as his favorite style of oatmeal.

Key ingredients to making this kind of cooking work:

The bag – make sure you’ve got your yuppie Whole Foods reusable tote to carry your ingredients in
A toaster oven at your office
Tups – get some good tupperware, preferably mason jars if you’re cool and can and stuff
Hungry eaters to taste test – nuff said

I chose to take a stab at Heidi Swanson’s Baked Oatmeal. I couldn’t 100% tell you why Heidi is such a legend in the blogging world, but she is. You’ll see her referenced often, and I wanted to finally test out one of her recipes.

The great thing about this is that you can really substitute out any nuts or berries. I have frozen blueberries on hand usually, and the good thing about that is that if you’re office baking, it’s probably thawed by the time you’re at work. Unless in fact, you work from home, in which case I shouldn’t have to instruct you on how to office bake.

I am just now realizing that many of my friends reading this may walk/subway to work. A few strategies to making this work for you:

Drag a wagon to work with your cooking ingredients, thus saving your shoulder the stress of carrying a heavy bag of ingredients
Introduce yourself to a cute girl/guy on the subway and ask them to help you carry your ingredients to work
Buy ingredients at the grocery store close to your office
Fill a large backpack with all your ingredients, strapping eggs to your stomach wrapped in bubble wrap so as to not crack them.
LOL, I’m giggling at the suggestions above. Please let me know if you take me up on them

Okay, ready to cook??

Blueberry Coconut Almond Baked Oatmeal, adapted from Heidi Swanson

2 cups rolled oats
1 cup almonds, toasted and chopped
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1/2teaspoon fine-grain salt
2 cups almond milk
1/3 cup maple syrup
1 large egg
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
half a bag of frozen blueberries
1/3 cup shredded sweetened coconut

Preheat toaster oven to 375 and butter a 8×8 square pan
In a bowl, combine, oats, baking powder, salt, and half the nuts. Listen to your co-workers joke by the coffee maker and ask them to make you a cup while you’re prepping ingredients.
In a separate bowl, whisk egg, milk, half the butter and vanilla together
Spread about half the berries in the pan and then sprinkle the oat mixture over it.
Pour in the milk mixture, shaking the pan slightly to ensure the liquid gets in the pan evenly. Then pour the rest of the berries evenly over the top, sprinkle the coconut, and sprinkle the last bit of nuts.
Bake for 35-40 minutes until the pan is nice and golden brown. During the time that this is cooking, check email, make another cup of coffee, say hi to your boss, twiddle your thumbs, and most importantly, get excited breakfast is on the way!!!!
Take the pan out and let cool for a few minutes. Cut in slices and top with more butter and syrup. Enjoy with your co-workers Patrick and Jon (oh wait, that’s just me) and carry on with your day! Carpe diem!!

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