One of the best parts of looking for a job at the moment is having a couple spare moments to go grocery shopping and cook meals. I generally cook quite frequently, but the free time is allowing me to be a bit more creative with my meals. Despite being so busy lately that I haven’t even had a chance to sit down for longer than a couple minutes, I find myself always trying to at least make time to cook a nice dinner from scratch. I generally don’t make anything too fancy. My motto is quick to make, simple and tasty! And always using fresh local organic ingredients.

Above is the Panko and Pecan Encrusted Halibut I made last night. The crust has olive oil seasoned with ginger and green onions, a little chopped habanero pepper in the crust, and it is topped with fresh tomatoes over a bed of garlic ginger broccoli and served with yukon gold nugget potatoes. On a side note, the halibut was previously frozen but it is actually the halibut we caught when we went deep sea fishing in Tofino last summer.

Here’s what I call “The Meat Lovers Kitchen Sink“. This is definitely Allan’s favourite. It features 3 kinds of organic meats: bacon, pancetta, and chorizo sausage. The sauce is a homemade spicy tomato sauce and there’s a number of vegetables in there, including zucchini and peppers. The noodle there is a fresh tagliatelle pasta from Granville Island.

Here is my Tandoori Chicken with Green Curry Vegetables. I always try to find a way to make sure there is a large serving of vegetables with every meal, and curry sauce is one of the best ways to include them! The Tandoori Chicken is marinated and basted with coconut milk, lime juice, garlic, cumin, coriander, pepper, saffron and an indian blend of chilis and spices.

This is called “Heart Attack on a Plate“. Yummy big fresh pappardelle noodles served in an alfredo sauce made with heavy cream, parmigiano reggiano, and green onions. Mixed with my favourite of course… LOTS of double smoked bacon, and some spinach, mushrooms, and asparagas.

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On a non-food note, I’ve been enjoying Twitter very much lately. Just to clarify, I’m not planning on using this account for work purposes or anything, it’s just a life feed from yours truly when I’m in between blogging. http://twitter.com/VancityAllie

I’ll be posting photos/videos from the trip this past weekend to Sun Peaks. Also, this coming weekend I’ll be doing a little Valentine’s stint in Victoria and then up to Courtenay for the snowboarding trip to Mount Washington every year with Allan’s friends.

Well, I’m back from Apex Mountain and we all had a great time there snowboarding for New Years!

I can’t believe it is 2009 already. 2008 was a year full of ups and downs, surprises, excitement, and many happy moments.

In 2008 I…

… rang in the New Year’s at Disneyland, finishing up an amazing one-month-long surfing, snowboarding, and scuba diving road trip throughout the States to Portland, San Francisco, Tahoe, Death Valley, Mammoth Mountain, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, Catalina Island, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Snowbird Mountain, Idaho, Mission Ridge Mountain, and Washington…

… went snowboarding at Big White, Whistler, Cypress, Mt. Washington and Apex…

… parted ways with the first video game company I worked for… and moved to a new, dynamic video game company…

… took a three week trip to Costa Rica for some warm water surfing and travelling…

… went camping, partying, and surfing in Tofino dozens of times…

… caught some seriously large Halibut going deep ocean fishing…

… enjoyed grocery shopping at Granville Island every week…

… traveled to Korea for business…

… and Japan…

… started to learn to skate and play hockey…

… sold my Nikon D80 and got my grubby little hands on a new camera set up with the Nikon D90…

… started working on an HD snowboarding movie project…

… went to Trevor Linden’s retirement night…

… completed my AST-1 Avalanche Training course…

… went to Apex to finish 2008 and welcome 2009!

I couldn’t be happier with how this past year has gone. I feel like I’ve learned a lot, tried new activities, grown as a person, realized how wonderful my friends are, made some new friends, and saw lots of new places.

Plans for 2009:

• Take more photographs of people, improving my fashion and portrait photography
• Grab better, more steady footage for HD snowboarding movie project
• Travel somewhere warm
• Travel somewhere cold
• Keep apartment clean and tidy
• Cook even more
• Do something active at least once a day
• Not worry about what anyone thinks of me!
• Finally finish Gears of War 2 because I’ve been a complete slacker

Thank you to my friends, family, loved ones, and coworkers who have filled the past year with so many laughs, hugs, discussions, activities, and happy moments! I hope you all have an amazing 2009.