-
Mini-Pumpkin Pies!
Happy happy happy thanksgiving everyone! Thanksgiving is an amazing time to celebrate the amazing year thus far and enjoy great food and good company. I am a huge fan of all thanksgiving foods (minus of course the Turkey since I don’t eat Turkey.) The warm comforting flavors of squash, cornbread, green beans, yams, mashed potatoes, & stuffing make me wish it was Thanksgiving more than once a year. But no thanksgiving is complete without pie!! Now I know most pie-litists would frown upon putting a pumpkin pie in a graham cracker crust, but I disagree. The crumble texture of the graham crackers is such a great compliment to the pumpkin…
-
Red, White, & Blue Shortbread Tarts
Tomorrow is election day, so I feel the need to take this opportunity to tell everyone to VOTE! Public participation in government is so important and so it seems quite ridiculous to me that a large number of American’s choose not to exercise the right that many people have fought so hard to gain. GO VOTE GO VOTE GO VOTE! p.s. did you know that in Australia it’s against the law not to vote? Crazy. Anyway, I made these shortbread tarts for a friend’s bridal shower last week, but since they are red, white, and blue they are very appropriate for election day. …
-
No Bake Cheesecake
THE GIANTS WON THE WORLD SERIES! That may not be relevant to this post at all, but I needed to put it out there because this is such a great day. Here is an easy adaptation of Julia Child’s no bake cheesecake recipe. Ingredients: 1.5 C graham cracker crumbs 6 T butter (unsalted) 2 T sugar + 1/4 C sugar 8 ounce cream cheese at room temp 1 T vanilla extract 1 C whipping cream juice of half a lemon Recipe: 1. Combine graham cracker crumbs, 2 T sugar, and melted butter. Press evenly into a pie pan and refrigerate. 2. Use the whisk attachment to whip the heavy cream…
-
Face distortion!
Exciting news!!! My first coauthor paper came out today in Journal of Neuroscience. It’s pretty cool to feel like I’m actually starting to become a “real scientist.” The paper describes the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electrocorticography (ECoG), and electrical brain stimulation (EBS) to study the area of the brain involved in facial recognition. Here are a few relevant links: The Journal of Neuroscience News Coverage: Stanford Press Release with embedded video link Huffington Post SF Chronicle (front page!) ABC News Time!
-
Review: Oyamel (DC)
This past weekend I had the pleasure of eating at one of Jose Andres’ restaurants, Oyamel, in DC. Jose Andres is a James Beard award winning chef from Spain who is credited with advancing the tapas (small plate) movement in the US. I’ve eaten at some of his other restaurants before in Las Vegas and DC, but Oyamel far surpassed the others. First off, I absolutely loved the decor and feeling of the Oyamel. It was warm and friendly with bold colors. There were orange flowers covering the ceiling and intricate Oaxacan carved animals on display. I wish I had taken a picture of the peacock hanging off the side…
-
SFN 2012
I’ve been in new orleans for the past week at the Society for Neuroscience 2012 Annual meeting. This is my fourth SFN meeting and as per usual it didn’t disappoint. There were tons of great posters & talks, ridiculously long lines for coffee, bad conference center food, and people sprawled along every hallway on their laptops. One very exciting thing about this year’s meeting was that I presented a first author poster!! It was really great to hear encouraging feedback from scientists from around the world and talk to inquisitive and insightful people in a variety of neuroscientific disciplines. The collaborative nature of the conference really is a special feel-…
-
Pumpkin Cupcakes
So first off, sorry for the huge blogging lag. Basically I’ve been spending a bunch of time trying to move my website from tumblr to wordpress (with the help of an amazing task rabbit) and getting ready for my upcoming trip to New Orleans for the Society for Neuroscience conference. I’m really excited to go to NOLA because a) I’ve never been before and b) I absolutely love creole flavors and cannot wait to try them at the authentic local spots. YUM! Anyway, here’s a really good recipe for some pumpkin cupcakes with cheesecake frosting. It’s loosely based off the recipe from Martha Stewart but I tried to change it up to make…
-
Watermelon feta salad
For some reason, people are trying to convince me that autumn has come and summer is over. I refuse to accept this (though the arrival of pumpkin spice lattes at Starbucks does make me question my resolve.) I really do love summer and am trying to hold out on accepting the arrival of cold weather for as long as possible. Though, let’s be serious, I live in California and it doesn’t get all that cold anyway. Yes, I am spoiled. Anyway this watermelon salad is a great way to use the bounty of summer watermelons. It is SUPER easy and really refreshing. I highly recommend it for an afternoon BBQ…
-
Math & memory
Copied below is a news article from Stanford’s Scope blog discussing a new paper published in PNAS by Brett Foster (and others from our lab.) Exciting work that is getting a ton of press coverage today including Australian, Indian, Russian, and Dutch news sources. Very exciting- Go Brett!! 😀 ——- Why Memory and Math don’t mix: They require opposing states of the same brain circuitry Bruce Goldman on September 3rd, 2012 Can you compute your taxes while simultaneously remembering what you had for lunch yesterday? Neither can I. But doing two things at once isn’t always hard – in fact, it can be as easy as listening to music while driving, or talking…
-
Mango Sriracha crumble
There is no obsession in the Indian-American diet like mangoes. When mangos are in season, we all work tirelessly to find the exact variety we like… Alfonso is the best? no, Kent is? Our willingness to spend upwards of $3 per mango astounds many of my non-indian friends but they just don’t understand. Couple that with some Sriracha, and this recipe is bound to be a crowd pleaser. I saw this recipe online and decided to change the topping and use sriracha instead. Ingredients: 1 C chopped mangoes (about 1 inch cubes) 1.5 T sriracha hot-sauce 1/2 T cinnamon 1/2 T honey 1 C all-purpose flour 1 C oats 1/4 C butter 1/4 C brown sugar 1/2 t salt…
