Orange you glad you came to Orange County?

If you boiled my job down to a single sentence, this is what you'd get.  "I travel...A LOT."  Often that travel is to less than desirable locations (sorry all of you from Dallas, but I just don't like your city, same goes for you Indianapolis) or to really, really less than desirable Southwest Border locations like Nogales, AZ or Brownsville, TX (and don't even get me started on most of Western Texas, El Paso, Marfa, Del Rio, thanks but I'll pass).  But now that part of my team is in Laguna Niguel, a town right next to Laguna Beach in Orange County, California, I find myself complaining just a little less about my travel destinations.

I spent the week of April 26-30, working out of our Laguna location.  The first perk to this is that we have a great team in Laguna with whom it is always a pleasure to work.  The second perk is that while we keep a hectic schedule when traveling that typically starts very early since our DC office is three hours ahead, we get to enjoy all of what this beautiful area has to offer.  And we wasted no time on doing so.  In addition to myself, another DC native and two of our Indy team, met up with the California lead for sushi and some work scheming at Mahé in Dana Point.   What we learned was that this place has great happy hour specials and some tasty and different maki creations as well as a few delicious hand roll options.  When you get into the dinner menu, you're quick to realize that, as sushi places go, this place really is only about a B, but it was a great place for a group to get together, chat a little about work, a little about life and enjoy some tasty, if not tremendous, sushi options.  Perhaps the greatest selling point to this place is that it's walking distance to the Marriott Laguna Cliffs Resort and Spa, the lovely, laid back resort that offers a government rate and gets my patronage almost every trip.  Having recently completed renovations, this hotel is gorgeous and very, very comfy!

Following our Monday night festivities we launched full force into the work week, keeping crazy hours and working too hard.  But we did find a couple of occasions to enjoy ourselves, not least of which was the generous offer of a co-worker to have us over for dinner and an evening cruise on their boat around the Newport Beach Harbor.  Thanks to my happy little phone GPS we found our way to her home without incident and were immediately welcomed.  Her husband had prepared a lovely dinner for us, including twice baked potatoes, roasted veggies and most impressive, grilled tuna steaks, cut down from Tuna he caught!  After a lovely meal on their back patio, which is feet from their dock and three boats floating in the Newport Harbor, we boarded their boat for our cruise.  My coworker was a wonderful guide as we tooled around in the light of a full moon on the water, pointing out quite a few celebrity homes including the former homes of John Wayne and Nicolas Cage.  She also regaled us with tales of the plight of several fellow Newport Harbor residents including one who's boat was just too large for his current dock space, a sad situation that required him to just BUY ANOTHER HOUSE in the Harbor to keep his boat.  Really?!? Are you kidding me?!? Sure, let's just buy a multi-million dollar home as a boat house.  I wish I had your problems.  Aside from choking on stories like this, stories I should add were told with humor by my coworker as she too, even as a Newport Harbor resident, sees the ridiculousness of, we had a lovely tour and were so grateful to have been invited.

 (A day time shot of Newport Harbor)

Wednesday and Thursday brought more crazy work hours but a very strong sense of accomplishment that we decided was worth celebrating on Thursday night with another trip out to Newport Beach, this time to enjoy the deliciousness of Villa Nova.  This restaurant has been a part of the Southern California landscape since 1933 and boasts some fun celeb-history including its role in a blind date between Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe.  This particular venue (there are two) had suffered a crippling fire some years back and had been rebuilt, restoring exactly the restaurant that had burned.   Seated at a table with a lovely Harbor view (we'd passed this restaurant right on the water during our Tuesday cruise), we enjoyed a couple bottles of great Italian wine, courtesy of my boss, and some delicious, if not politically incorrect meat, in the form of Veal Saltimbocca (translates from Italian to "jump in my mouth").  While I have had better versions of this dish prepared elsewhere (Vinci in Chicago, it's one of their best dishes), this one was still very good and, paired with some delicious Italian red, made for a very pleasant celebratory/team building dinner.  

Friday morning dawned early as I boarded a flight at 630AM PST while already on a conference call with the east coast, but thanks to lots of United miles, I was able to get a comfy Economy Plus seat on the flights from both Orange County to Denver and Denver to Washington Dulles.  All in all, I had a busy but lovely week in Orange County, glad that now this will be a frequent travel destination, leaving me too busy to travel to those less desirable locations.  At least that's my plan.

Stick a fork in me...

I'm done!!!  Today marked my graduation from the ESI (George Washington University) Master's Certificate Program in Project Management. A Master's Certificate is not a huge deal since it's only about half an actual master's degree in terms of credits.  And this program was contracted through my employer and was designed to allow for relatively easy completion by a working person like me.  Specifically, the classes were presented as one-week intensives on a subject rather than having to sign up for semester classes.  All well and good except my work schedule is murder and for four of the nine classes, I couldn't be there, meaning I had to make them up at other times or in other formats (online).  This took what should have been an easy program to complete and turned it into a bear!  But I'm done. Today. I graduated.  Now all I have to do is apply to PMI (which involves cataloging 4500 hours of project management experience), get accepted, study like mad and take (and ultimately pass) the PMP exam, the professional certification exam for the project management professionals.  My goal is to have the exam taken and passed before my 29th birthday!

Meatloaf Sliders

Total deliciousness stolen right from the pages of the Food Network Magazine!  Every weekend is a new challenge to plan interesting and reasonably healthy meals for the week ahead.  So when I found this one while flipping pages, I got really excited.  They were quick and easy to make and very tasty!  We served them up with hearty helpings of steamed broccoli to get a little dose of green veggie into the mix.

 Ingredients

Cooking spray
1 pound extra-lean ground beef
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/2 cup ketchup
1/4 cup grated onion
1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon minced fresh parsley
1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
24 slider-size hamburger buns, split

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and place a cooling rack on top. Mist the rack lightly with cooking spray. 

Combine the beef, egg, 1/4 cup ketchup, the onion, breadcrumbs, Worcestershire sauce, parsley, thyme, 1/2 teaspoon each salt and pepper, and the garlic powder in a large bowl. Use your hands to mix everything together.

Shape tablespoonfuls of the meat into small, thin patties, about 2 inches in diameter. Place on the prepared rack on the baking sheet. Brush the patties with the remaining 1/4 cup ketchup and bake about 20 minutes.  Serve each meatloaf slider on a prepared bun.

Black Bean Wraps

Saturday at lunch time usually finds me standing in front of the refrigerator wondering what tasty creation I can whip up with what's left in the fridge from the week and what's in the pantry.  This is due in large part to the fact that grocery shopping gets done on Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning.  So this Saturday, inspired by a Food Network magazine recipe I'd debated for the week to come, I threw together what was sitting around and came up with the tastiest wrap.

Ingredients (per sandwich):

1 Mission Jalapeno Cheddar wrap (low-fat variety)
1/2 avocado
Pinch kosher salt
1/2 cup heated black beans
1/4 cup shredded jack cheese
1/3 cup pico de gallo
Handful mixed greens

Instructions:
Heat up your canned black beans.  Lay the wrap on a large plate.  Cut the avocado in half, remove the pit and scoop out half of the avocado and place on the wrap.  Smash the avocado with a fork and spread evenly along the center of the wrap.  Sprinkle with salt.  Drain the black beans and spoon 1/2 cup into the center of the wrap, on top of the avocado.  On top of the beans, sprinkle the cheese and the pico de gallo.  Top with a small handful of mixed greens.  Wrap up burrito style and enjoy!!