Category Archives: Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun

Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / Covid19 / Drinks

Quarantine Activity: Be your own barista

March 17, 2020

Throwback to our Amsterdam flat. I miss the city (but I don’t miss the mice).

How are you guys doing? Hanging in there? We’re doing our best over here — meal planning two weeks in advance, trying to get everybody on board with kids yoga, and FaceTiming friends and family like our lives depend on it.

Some of you might not know that my very first job was at Starbucks. I worked as a barista for 6 years — from age 16 all the way through college. (Fun fact: I hated coffee and didn’t even drink it until I started going to UCLA and discovered Coffeemate French Vanilla creamer — oh, college.) Because of all those years of slinging espresso, I’ve always played around in the kitchen to try and recreate my coffee drinks of choice at home, A. Because I’m frugal, and B. Because sometimes I just don’t want to wait/explain all the modifications I want.

Ok, buckle up for this one guys, cuz there’s a lot of info in this post. But we’re in quarantine so we’ve got all the time in the world to master a new skill right? Right!

To start with, let’s cover the basics. Obviously if you want to make an espresso drink, an espresso maker is preferred. Stovetop versions are the most economical, Nespresso machines are a nice mid-range option (we have an ancient one that works great!), or you can go nuts and be a real pro with something like this.

A standard espresso shot is around 1-1.5 ounces and here’s the size and shot breakdowns from Peets and Starbucks:

Peet’s Size Total Ounces/Shots Starbucks Size Total Ounces/Shots
Small 12oz / 2 shots Tall 12 oz / 1 shot
Medium 16 oz / 2 shots Grande 16 oz / 2 shots
Large 20 oz / 3 shots Venti 20 oz / 2 shots
    Cold Venti 24 oz / 3 shots

Once you have the general size/shot breakdown, you can move onto the next most important part: milk and foam. If you’re just heating up milk, you don’t need any special equipment, but if you want to make a “real” latte, cappuccino, etc., you’ll need some sort of milk frother. Here’s a budget option, this is a good mid-range and easy-to-use option, and then of course there’s the big kahuna again: this guy. You could try using a hand blender, but it will likely be a bit clunky.

There are a few different types of milk foam, which, without getting too technical, have to do with how much air is introduced into the milk as it’s heated. Basically, if you’re using the budget or really expensive frother options linked above, you’ll be able to control the type of foam you make by where you position the frothing wand — closer to the surface of the milk means lighter, more airy foam, while just below the surface (a sort of slow introduction of air into the milk) means denser, more velvety foam. (I don’t want to get too into the weeds with this, so feel free to look up a youtube video on this — it’s easier if you can visualize it.) The mid-range option above makes foam for you with the touch of a button, so while you won’t be able to control the type of foam you get, the ease of use is pretty nice. Below is how to make the sort of “basic” espresso drinks offered at just about every coffeeshop:

Macchiato espresso + 1 ounce steamed milk and/or foam
Gibralter / Cortado espresso + 2 ounces milk and foam
Flat White espresso + 2-4 ounces foamed milk*
Cappuccino espresso topped with roughly half milk and half foam
Latte espresso with milk, topped with a small bit of foam

*A flat white requires a bit more finesse, as it’s generally two ristretto (long pull) espresso shots and milk that has been steamed in a specific way to create a very velvety texture. Definitely doable to recreate this at home, but it might require googling some tutorials to get it just right.

Milk is generally steamed to somewhere between 145 – 165 degrees (Blue Bottle goes lower, around 145-150, Starbucks and Peet’s tend to go higher, around 160-165). I think 155-160 is perfect, but I honestly never use a thermometer and just eyeball it.

So, based on the above, if you generally order a grande latte at the coffee shop, you would put 2 shots of espresso into a 16 ounce glass, top with steamed milk and finish it with a bit of foam. Want to make a small cappuccino? If you like Peet’s version use 2 shots espresso, 1 shot if you like Starbucks version, and add it to a 12 ounce mug. Top it with half steamed milk and half foam and voila! Cappuccino!

If you’re looking to make a cafe au lait (called a “misto” at Starbucks), just combine 1:1 regular coffee with steamed milk and top with foam. 

Want to make a flavored latte? Make a flavored simple syrup and add it to your drink of choice. Combine equal parts sugar and water into a saucepan and heat until the sugar dissolves, then add in your flavoring. Vanilla bean or paste works great for this, though vanilla or other extracts work as well.

The general ratio for syrups are below. Please note that “flavored syrups” are things like vanilla, hazelnut, cinnamon dolce, etc. “Mocha syrup” is not simple syrup based (it’s more along the lines of Hershey’s Syrup) and the ratios below are for both regular and white chocolate mochas.: 

Size Flavored Syrup Amount / Mocha Syrup Amount
12 oz (Small / Tall) 0.75 oz / 1.5 oz
16 oz (Medium / Grande) 1 oz / 2 oz
20 oz (Large / Venti) 1.25 oz / 2.5 oz
24 oz (Iced Venti) 1.5 oz / 3 oz

I like mine less sweet, so I generally go with 1/4 – 1/2 oz in a 16 oz for regular syrups and around 0.5 – 1oz of mocha syrup.

My usual go-to is some form of mocha. You can use Hersey’s syrup for this, but I think regular chocolate actually tastes better, so I use that. Right now I’m obsessed with the Dark Chocolate Orange Mocha from Peet’s, and so recreated it at home with this recipe:

Dark Chocolate Orange Mocha

  • 2 pieces orange-flavored dark chocolate (I use 2 wedges of the Terry’s or Trader Joe’s dark chocolate orange)
  • small pinch of salt
  • 2 tsp sugar
  • 1 cup milk (I use whole)
  • 3 Nespresso pods (I use 1 lungo + 2 regular pods) — ends up being roughly 6-8oz of coffee
  1. Finely chop your chocolate, then add it to your milk, along with salt and sugar. Heat it together in a small pot while espresso shots pull. Once milk is warmed and chocolate is dissolved, add milk mixture to espresso and ta-da! Dark chocolate orange mocha. (You can use this same recipe to make a standard mocha, just replace the orange chocolate with regular chocolate of your choice — one with a mid-range cocoa content, around 40-60% cacao, works well.)

For other coffee drinks, here are some previous recipes for an at-home mocha and and gingerbread latte.

Social distancing sucks, but your coffee habit doesn’t have to suffer!

Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / Covid19 / Motherhood / Toddler

Quarantine Activities

March 16, 2020

Looking for something time-consuming to pass the time while quarantined? May I suggest: breastfeeding.

Here are some ideas for adults and kids to stay sane amidst the insanity (please note that I have two toddlers, so a lot of the “kids” ideas are geared toward that age range):

For Adults:

  1. Baking/Cooking: with or without your kids! I make dinner every night sans children, but am planning on having the girls help me make blueberry pancakes, oatmeal, zucchini muffins, and chocolate almond milk, among other things. (We love the book Pretend Soup for easy recipes to make with kids.)
  2. Date Nights at Home: use this time to reconnect with your partner on the cheap. Maybe drink that nice bottle of wine you’ve been saving, or break out a board game!
  3. Drinking: make your own cocktails!
  4. Getting Moving: I’m feeling really pumped about the fact that we quit our gym at the end of last year in favor of setting up a small home gym. I’ve subscribed to Bar Method Online and this pregnancy/postpartum workout for years now, and recently purchased a barre off craigslist (though I used the back of a chair or edge of a table to do the workouts forever).
  5. Organizing/Cleaning: this is a great time to clean out your closets, weed out unused books and toys, organize the fridge and pantry — the possibilities are endless!
  6. Go Green: maybe it’s time to revamp your cleaning materials and figure out how to ditch the chemicals while saving on cost and packaging! Here’s what we use for laundry detergent and our everyday cleaning supplies. I should note that I recently made my own disinfectant spray as well, since vinegar hasn’t been tested on  . I added 2 tbsp bleach to 4 cups distilled water and spray it on commonly touched surfaces then let it air-dry. (Please note that it shouldn’t be sprayed on fabrics — because, BLEACH — so I stick to spraying it on faucet handles, doorknobs, toilet flushers, cabinet pulls, etc.)
  7. Helping Others: If you’re looking for a way to do good during the quarantine, consider supporting local businesses by buying gift cards, or by ordering coffee or food from a local cafe or restaurant and having it sent to a nearby medical facility (call ahead to facilitate with the medical center first). Many small exercise studios are offering web-based streaming classes at a reduced price. You can also have your kiddos write letters or draw pictures to send to nearby senior centers or nursing homes — get creative!
  8. Start a new hobby: or hey, maybe resurrect an old one — like your blog that you started 10(!) years ago!

For Kids:

  1. Send mail: set up a weekly “mail day” where the kids draw pictures to mail to friends and relatives. My kids love to send and receive mail, so we will definitely be sending out some pictures to grandparents, family and friends (I love to ask them what they would like to say to the person and then transcribe it on the back of the picture they drew. A lot of the time it’s random and hilarious tidbits like “This is a cat holding a sword and red is my favorite color.”)
  2. Wash toys outside: fill one plastic tub with soapy water and another with clean water and let the kids “wash” things like legos, metal kitchen toys, bath toys, etc.
  3. Pool party: put on swimsuits and hop in the bath in the middle of the day. (This is especially good on really hard days when everyone is falling apart.)
  4. Get outside: go for a hike, ride bikes/scooters outside, go for a walk down the block
  5. Nature scavenger hunt: send kids outside with a list of nature items to find. Draw pictures for kiddos who don’t read yet (make it simple, like “find one green leaf”, “find a rock that looks like an animal”, etc.)
  6. Dance party: put on special dance clothes (whatever the kids deem that to be) and put on your favorite Pandora/Spotify station (the ABBA Pandora station is fun for this)
  7. Audio books: our kids are obsessed with audio books — so much that we gave them an old iPhone and a bluetooth speaker so they could listen to them whenever they wanted. I made this playlist for Prim to listen to at rest time, and it’s become a favorite for all day.
  8. Decorate delivery boxes: if you’re anything like us, you’ll be getting quite a few deliveries in the coming weeks. We give the boxes to the kids to decorate with crayons, paint, etc. and they turn them into a rocket ship or school bus before we toss them into the recycling.
  9. Afternoon tea: serve tea (herbal, with honey) or hot chocolate (or whatever!) with a fun little snack (maybe tiny, crustless sandwiches and cookies). Teach kids to drink with their pinky up. Speak in a British accent. Pretend you’re royalty and ask, “What is a week-end?
  10. Kids yoga: we love Cosmic Kids Yoga for “active” screen time.
  11. Library hour: set a timer and tell kids to explore books quietly. Tell them they can choose a certain number of books (maybe two each) that you will read to them aloud when the timer goes off. (Good for days when you’re losing your mind and need a little silence.)
  12. Pull weeds: fun after it’s rained (plus, free child labor!) Tell them they can look for worms and slugs too.
  13. Ooey-Gooey: (this was a favorite of ours as kids) — combine cornstarch and water in a plastic tub and let kids play with it outside. It goes from feeling like a solid to a liquid — fascinating!
  14. Blind taste test: cut up pieces of fruit, veg, whatever, and feed it to the kids with their eyes closed and see if they can guess what it is. Have them do it to you too (it’s funny for them to see an adult get it wrong!)
  15. Circle/sharing time: have dedicated time each day to sit together, sing a song, and talk about today’s activities. Allow them to “share” something: they could talk about a special toy, or how they’re feeling that day, something they’re looking forward to, etc. Structure is really helpful for young kids, and they may be missing this aspect of school while stuck at home.
  16. Weather/day of the week/date report: in the same vein as #15, designate one kid to ask Alexa (or google, or the internet) about the weather, then have them “report” it to the family. Have another kid ask about the day of the week and date and report it.

If you have more suggestions, please feel free to add them in the comments! 

Appetizer / Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / Cocktails / Drinks / Gluten-Free / Happy Hour / Pescatarian / Savory / Snack / Vegan / Vegetarian

Two Recipes for Summer

May 24, 2018

I realize that these recipes would have been much better suited closer to Cinqo de Mayo, but here we are. I have no issues indulging in margaritas and chips+salsa year-round, so I’m not about to hold onto these until next year so they can be posted at an “appropriate” time.

Appropriate schmrappropriate. Let’s all just live our lives, shall we? I did actually make this cocktail for the first time over Cinqo de Mayo weekend. There’s a Cali-Mex restaurant near us that has the best (let’s use that term loosely) Mexican food round these parts, but what I really come back for over and over again is this one cocktail — the Rosarito. It’s basically just a spicy margarita, so given that I figured it couldn’t be too hard to make, I decided to recreate it. If you like a margarita, this version with a little kick might be right up your alley:

The Rosarito
makes one large or two small cocktails

  • 1 hot pepper, sliced into coins
  • 1/2  oz agave syrup
  • 1/2 oz orange liquer
  • 3 oz tequila
  • 2 oz fresh-squeezed lime juice
  • ice
  • salt for rim (optional)
  1. Optional: sprinkle salt onto a plate, rub lime wedge across the rim of your glass, then dip into salt to create salted rim.
  2. Place 2-3 pepper coins into cocktail shaker with agave syrup. Muddle together with a wooden spoon or muddler (the more you muddle, the spicier it gets).
  3. Add orange liquer, tequila, lime juice and ice. Shake until very cold (at least 60 shakes). Strain into glass over ice. Garnish with lime wedge and/or additional pepper coins.

Notes: I have tried this with multiple types of hot peppers now. Jalapeños worked fine but were not my favorite, flavor-wise. My preferred peppers for this are Thai red chilis (also called Bird’s eye chilis). They have a solid kick to them, so keep that in mind while you’re muddling (it doesn’t take much to make this drink spicy!) I haven’t tried habanero chilis yet because I’m not a complete masochist.

In case you’re wondering why there’s a picture of a cheese board above this recipe, it’s because I realized I don’t have a picture of my finished salsa, aside from that picture above where it is very much not the star. Oh well, you guys know what salsa looks like, right?

Chipotle Roasted Salsa
makes a large cereal-sized bowl

  • 200g / 1/2(ish) lb tomatoes, quartered
  • Large handful mild peppers
  • 2 small to medium white onions, peeled and quartered
  • 4 cloves garlic, whole, peeled
  • 1-2 chipotle peppers in adobo (2 makes it spicy!)
  • cilantro
  • fresh lime juice
  1. Preheat oven to 425°f / 220°c
  2. Toss tomatoes, mild peppers, onions, and garlic in olive oil, salt and pepper. Spread onto a sheet pan and roast for 20-25 minutes, until just a little charred.
  3. Add roasted veggies and their juice to a food processor fitted with a steel blade, along with chipotle peppers, and blend together. Add cilantro and pulse to combine.
  4. Add lime juice and additional salt and pepper to taste.

Notes: I usually use 5-6 Roma or vine tomatoes, but any ripe tomatoes will work here. I use Padrón peppers for the mild pepper because that’s what is available here. Anaheim chiles, shishito peppers, or poblanos would all work. Bell peppers would do fine in a pinch, but don’t overdo it or your salsa will be overly sweet/mild. If you don’t have or can’t find chipotle peppers in adobo, add a few hot peppers to the mix before roasting (jalapenos, thai chilis, or habaneros if you dare) — remove ribs and seeds to lessen the heat.

Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / Family Fun / Life Abroad / Travel

How We Travel on a Budget

September 11, 2017

As you know, we have been traveling a lot recently, trying to take advantage of our current living situation by visiting many of the countries that are within arm’s reach of the Netherlands. I wanted to take a minute to explain how we do this on a budget.

While it may look like we’re rolling in dough over here, galavanting all over Europe, we actually took a pretty big pay cut to come to the Netherlands. I gave up my job when we moved and KC’s salary was adjusted to reflect Amsterdam’s lower cost of living, so we are definitely not in a position to be throwing money around on lavish vacations.KC and I had talked extensively about traveling while we were abroad and trying to really maximize our time while overseas. Unfortunately, when we started planning out trips for this year and working out the total cost, we were running into a huge hurdle: our “holidays” were killing us financially. KC and I are by no means financially reckless, so we opted to cut down the number of trips we were going to take.

Even reducing our vacation days though, I was realizing just how expensive these trips were going to be. Not only that, but traveling with two little ones meant we couldn’t book a cheap hotel room or studio — we had to book something with at least one bedroom (and ideally two). Furthermore, packing a major city into just a few days wasn’t really an option, as the kids can realistically only be subjected to so much sightseeing in one day, so we were going to have to take longer trips — spending more time in each city.

After stressing out over this and wondering whether we should just abandon most of our travel plans, I came across the website homeexchange.com. I poked around on the site and thought it might be a good option for us, but the site only allows you to actually contact other members by becoming a member yourself. I hemmed and hawed over it and finally brought it up to KC. I reasoned that the yearly fee of €130 would be worth if even if we only managed to get one night out of the membership, so we decided to bite the bullet and join.

I set up our profile one night and went to bed (as the setup took my entire evening — it was time-consuming!) By the next day I already had multiple requests for exchanges.That €130 membership fee has been some of the very best money we’ve spent this year. Not only have we booked three trips via exchanges for this year, we are in the process of potentially booking another five before we return to the states next year.

In case you’re curious, the exchanges are all free — you just pay the membership fee up front to gain access to to the messaging system which allows you to contact the other members on the site. We set up exchanges with other people like us — usually families with young children. It’s great because they already often have a toddler bed for Prim and/or a crib for Lark, plus lots of toys to keep the girls occupied.This post isn’t sponsored or anything, I just thought I would post about our experience because Home Exchange has been such a great options for us. I also think it’s important to be somewhat candid about our life on the blog, and while we are certainly having amazing adventures traveling Europe during this once-in-a-lifetime experience, it’s not because we’re making Bay Area tech salaries over here and have money to burn.

The service has also been especially awesome for us as all of the exchanges we have booked have been based on requests from other people (we’ve been members for 4 months and have gotten a whopping 84 requests for exchanges so far!) We are lucky in that we get a TON of requests on the site, so we have a lot of options; and it has taken so much of the stress of deciding where to travel off our (really MY) plate.

If you have any questions about our home exchanges feel free to leave a comment or message me — I’m happy to talk more about our experience with the site and discuss more of the specifics if you’re interested!

Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / Family Fun / Personal

A Day in the Bay

May 19, 2016

img_8624The Saturday before we left for the Netherlands, KC, Prim and I went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium with my parents and my sister’s family.

I have always loved the aquarium, but hadn’t been in almost seven years — the last time we were there was the week I got my BAR results back in 2009!

Going with Prim this time was so special, and she absolutely loved it. Watching her experience things for the first time is one of the very best things right now. She’s so fascinated by the world and you can really see her taking it all in. img_8630

Prim was especially into the wave room, where the waves crash against the glass and then drain back out to the ocean. She would yell excitedly when the wave would come in and press her hand to the glass, then when it would drain out again she would reach up towards the inlet, like, “Again! Again!” img_8631One of my favorite parts of the aquarium has always been the touch pools, but I wasn’t sure how Prim would feel about that section since it can be a little scary for tiny newcomers. Prim was totally into touching all the sea life, though (we just had to keep making sure she didn’t thrust her hand directly into her mouth afterwards!)

img_8549img_8629^^shoutout to pregnancy for providing me with that awesome postpartum hair. Nothing like having two-inch flyaways along your ENTIRE hairline^^ 

img_8552Prim and August were very into the tank where you could sit inside a little carve-out and look at the fish through a 360 degree window.

img_8626img_8627Prim takes any opportunity to steal a snuggle from Auntie Alexis.
img_8628I know this photo is out of focus and the lighting is kind of weird, but I don’t care, I love it.
img_8625

^^the carrier we use is the Beco Gemini, in case you’re curious^^

Our day at the aquarium was so great and such an awesome way to close out one of our last few days in California. And in case you think I’m totally lying about the fact that Prim loved the aquarium, just check out this little California surfer girl:

img_8556Tubular, dude. (Ugh my hair… my god.)

If you’re visiting the Bay Area I can’t recommend the Monterey Bay Aquarium enough — such a great place to visit! img_8545