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Most of the peacocks were up in the trees Yesterday my family decided to go to our favourite special occasion restuarant in Austin, Green Pastures. I love the historic home it's in, and the food is always delicious. Although, I think I've always ordered to tofu and roasted veggies as my entree. It's just so tasty, I don't want to deviate. Above all, possibly my favourite part of going there is the peacocks that live on the property. Those birds seem to have run of the whole neighbourhood, too. You can see them on the neighbour's lawns when they wander off property. June marks a lot of new starts for me, which I'm excited for. Most of May has been spent getting my feet on the ground here. Somehow, the move here has been harder than I thought. Thinking on it, I've probably had reverse culture shock . I experienced it when I returned after four months, so it should come as no surprise it happened after eight. Also, Austin feels like a much larger jump bac...

I swear there is little better than curling up with a cup of tea and a book on a snow day. Not to mention how amazing it feels on a sore throat, which I've had this past week. Needless to say, I've basically spent my days doing the above. Even when I am not sick, I drink at least a cup everyday (usually more). My aunt gave me a 12 sampler from David's Tea for Christmas this year, and I can't tell you how excited I was. Spiced Fig tea I generally have issues with fruity teas being too strong, but this one is delicious. It's just the right amount of fruit. It just has a nice sweet, warm flavour.  Ingredients: Apples, cranberries, black mission figs, calimyrna figs , dates , almonds, rose hips, cloves, natural vanilla flavoring. I love looking at loose leaf teas, and I love that you can see the fruit and nuts in this one. That probably makes me sound weird, eh? I have an unusually large tea cup collection. When my Dad moved to TX, and I moved to my...

Café culture is part of what I most miss about Seoul. I loved the selection of chain and independent cafés around Konkuk. My friends and I would often go to one to study.   It didn’t take long for us to learn that Super Junior member Yesung’s Mouse Rabbit was located in the Kondae area. It quickly became one of our favourites. It’s spacious, generally quiet and the staff is kind. The prices are about the same as everywhere. His mother, by the way, is one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met. She always went out of her way to help us find a spot to sit or say hello. I know we met his brother too, but I don’t remember anything about him...except that he looks a bit like Yesung. I love the design of this place, it has a vintage, almost storybook-like quality to it. There's a screen on the upstairs floor that always plays silent Charlie Chaplin films and the music they play is at a good volume and usually pretty relaxing. The basement area requires you to take of...

Recently I find myself really craving some of my favourite Korean food. Amongst them is without a doubt the 치킨치즈 죽 chicken cheese juk from 죽이야기 Juk Story.

Last weekend my program took us all to 부산 Busan and I finally was able to have some delicious 냉면 (naengmyeon). I chose 물냉면 (water naengmyeon) which is buckwheat noodles in a cold broth. The other doesn't have the broth. This one came with 1/2 an egg, a slice of pork, some kimchi slices, cucumber, and of course 고추장 red pepper paste to make it spicy \(^.^)/ Apparently the place we went to is quite famous, I believe it! We had to wait in line to go and eat! 맛있었어요! The whole time I was eating it I kept singing SNSD Jessica and 박명수 Park Myung Soo's duet song, it's quite catchy ^.~ Have you tried 냉면? What did you think? I will upload more photos from 부산 soon ^^

After our excursion to 경주 Gyeongju on Saturday we've all been a bit lazy the past couple days. On Sunday 3 of us decided to try 팥빙수 since we weren't up to doing much after the dorm festival the night before (more on that later). The school festival starts tomorrow, which is super exciting! I've heard Epik High is coming on Weds (the school's founding day).    The weather has taken a sudden jump here in Seoul to the '80s (F) which means time to try 팥빙수 (patbingsu). My friends and I shared the strawberry one from Cafe Bene. It was so delicious! 팥빙수 is a popular warm-weather dessert here. It's made with shaved ice, red beans, sweet condensed milk, sometimes fruit and ice cream (such as ours!) It's a must try ^.^  Tonight whilst wandering campus my friends and I decided to go onto the roof of the student union building. I wish I had brought my actual camera, but luckily I did have my phone on me. I love the 건대 campus, it's just so pretty in the...

Coffee the Sol If you have a sweet tooth and come to Korea, you must go to cafes. I've been told by my friends that even the coffee here is sweeter than back in the US. I can't say for sure since I don't drink coffee. The fact that milk tea is available is enough to make me happy. I've also developed a new love of green or black tea lattes. Also many cafes offer some delicious cakes. My friends and I typically order a slice to share. They give you enough forks to do so ^. ~ Cafes are excellent places to sit and chat with friends or go to study at. We go to one almost everyday for something sweet, or a study session, or just to relax for a while. I'm going to do more cafe posts after midterms end that will include photos of the cafes themselves, but for now here's some cute food shots. All of the cafes these are from are within walking distance of 건대 ^^

Normally my friends and I go to Sugar Mommy for our cupcake fix, but we decided to be a bit more adventurous this week and travel out to Westfield NJ to visit the Crumbs location there.  Crumbs Bake Shop is a popular chain of cupcake shops in the United States, with the majority on the East Coast. According to their website they first opened in Manhattan in 2003 and have expanded since. Keep reading for giant, but cute, cupcakes!

If you go back to my 10 Random Questions post , you’ll see that I listed cupcakes as my favourite food. In that post I mentioned that I hoped to do a post on my favourite cupcake place Sugar Mommy Cupcakes. Well, this is that post! With the start of the year Sugar Mommy has expanded to add café food available for lunch. My friends and I decided to go today for the first time and lunch was equally as good as the cupcakes. I later saw on Facebook that Sugar Mommy had a record breaking lunch, so congratulations to them!  Read more for delicious cupcakes, cute decor and yummy lunch! <3