and after the sugar must come the salt

We're trying to eat a little healthier after my birthday binge week -- read: we're not eating healthy at all, but we're seriously talking about how terrible we're being and we'd like to make changes, we'll just make them after we're finished the ice cream and nutella. Anyway, I'm the type of person where I need to chase a bunch of sugar with something salty. I don't know why, I just really crave salt after sweet (and vice versa) and having both together? OMG total heaven. Well, last week, I attempted making kale chips. I've never had kale before in my life but (no kidding) every cooking blog ever (that I read) had a post on them. It was getting really hard to resist it. So all week I sat here thinking, I've never had kale before. I have no idea what it tastes like. Everyone says it's the best thing ever. The pictures look sooo yummy. Let me just write kale down on my grocery list. I don't even know if they have it or how much it is, but if they do...I'll just get some...yeah...

I ended up finding it and buying it and then I immediately freaked out because this idea could easily turn out like the 10 recipes I'd tried for brussel sprouts. I am not fond of those. I never have been. But the damn foodie blogs kept using them and taking freaking delicious pictures of them, and I kept seeing them and thinking like I could make them work for us. I don't know why I feel like I have to like brussel sprouts, but I just kept trying desperately to make them taste good! Every time they made an appearance, we were both like, yeah. I don't enjoy brussel sprouts. Still. No matter how you keep jazzing them up, they're not working, so stop already. (Secretly I'm still convinced I can make them work. Maybe I need to buy fresh ones! -- insert massive eye roll here)

Thank goodness the kale didn't turn out like all my brussel sprout recipes. I super love kale chips. Not only is the "recipe" easy -- throwing some oil and salt on kale leaves hardly counts as a recipe -- and super tasty, but they're also good for you. What's best? Idle Husband looked at them, said that they were green, took the tiniest nibble (I don't even know if a person could taste something that small), and snubbed his nose at them. So that means THEY'RE ALL MINE. Mmmmm.

I made some more today along with some sweet potato chips. The first batch of chips turned out not badly burned but just about. Crispy but with that smokey burned taste no one really likes. I don't mind, though. They're nice and crisp and have an underlying sweet potato flavour. The second batch was better, but I was kind of in a hurry to get them done so I didn't put salt or anything on them so they were a little dull.

Also, just for something to do (and because neither of us ever have), Idle Husband and I went around looking at show homes yesterday. One of the homes had a room decked out in a movie director/Hollywood theme, so I guess that would explain these choices in the master bedroom:

The thought of someone actually changing the stock photos in these frames and replacing them with Mike Myers and Nathan Lane & Matthew Broderick really boggles my mind. Especially for decoration in the master bedroom...on the bedside tables. Right where you're supposed to be envisioning a peaceful sleep. Like, really. I'm totally boggled.