Couscous caprese salad

As we play the waiting game counting the days for our baby's arrival, I must admit that I'm starting to get a little antsy. His room is set up, his clothes are washed and most things on my "to do" list are done. I'm passing the time going walking and swimming, lounging on the couch (or rather the exercise ball) and catching up on cooking shows via YouTube and enjoying lots of good food - occasional meals out and of course my mom's great cooking. I also get inklings to cook some days, such as this afternoon. Today, I was also looking at several friends' photos from beach vacations on Facebook and thinking about how much I miss the beach. It's one of the perks of living in Thailand...we go for beach weekends and holidays pretty regularly, which I'm now missing being stuck - so to speak - in Bangkok in the midst of the rainy season. I also fondly recalled beach holidays from the past, in other places, and immediately our trip to Capri in September 2010 came to mind...

Pineapple, mint & lime agua fresca

How many of you have a man at home that's a gadget fiend??? To say that of my husband Luis would be a bit of an understatement. When we first met, I was amazed to note that he possessed a pasta maker, bread maker, the best Kitchen Aid blender on the market (in our mutual favorite color - red!) and various other contraptions. Since we got married, our gadget collection has only expanded...mostly involving him scoring him new and exotic devices at crazy low prices and then coming home to excitedly proclaim that we would never be able to imagine life without our new X. Some of the time I'm quite skeptical, as I was when he brought home a pineapple corer that he found at the market for 30 baht (the equivalent of 1 USD). Sure we get amazing pineapples year-round here in Thailand, but just why did we need a corer when a nice kitchen knife does the trick just fine, I wondered?