I’ve been trying to cook a bit more lately and tried out this recipe for tofu and veggies in peanut sauce tonight. It was pretty awesome! The peanut sauce was especially tasty.

And of course, it went perfect with copious amounts of Sriracha.

We slightly modified the ingredients though and added garlic and and replaced the molasses with honey. The new recipe?

Ingredients

1 tablespoon peanut oil
1 small head broccoli, chopped
1 small red bell pepper, chopped
5 fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 pound firm tofu, cubed
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup hot water
2 tablespoons vinegar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon of garlic

Directions

1. Heat oil in a large skillet or wok over medium-high heat. Saute broccoli, red bell pepper, mushrooms, garlic, and tofu for 5 minutes.

2. In a small bowl combine peanut butter, hot water, vinegar, soy sauce, and honey. Pour over vegetables and tofu. Simmer for 3 to 5 minutes, or until vegetables are tender crisp.

This image from over a year ago at Dolores Park in San Francisco is especially relevant today. Blue skies, mid 60’s, an otherwise perfect day!

Last summer, Kerry and I moved into the Temescal neighborhood of Oakland. For one reason or another, life has been pretty busy over the past 6 months, leaving us little time to explore our “new” city.

Well, that ended today! We set out to Jack London Square and the Warehouse District for some good eats at Chop Bar. It was pretty good! According to various tips on Foursquare, they serve the “best hamburgers in all of the East Bay.” It’s definitely on my todo list for next time.

Walking around Jack London Square, we discovered some tall ships docked in the harbor.

Then there was this awesome statue of Cheemah, Mother of the Spirit-Fire — it’s part of a worldwide project to celebrate ” cultural diversity, world unity and care for the earth.” Awesome!

After that, we walked around Old Oakland. The buildings have this beautiful old architecture about them and the whole neighborhood was just awesome. So, obviously, the only thing I took a picture of was a sign. D’oh! Time to go back.

From there, we walked back to our neighborhood in North Oakland. Interestingly enough, the Oakland North blog is running a series on the history of the Temescal District today.

Speaking of Temescal history, earlier this weekend, some friends and I explored the Kingfish Pub, an old dingy dive bar in the neighborhood. Some commenters on Yelp have claimed that it’s the “second oldest bar in Oakland,” but I’ve yet to find an official verification of this source.

The SF Gate wrote about it last year:

It’s a mystery what, exactly, keeps the Kingfish from collapsing.

The roof sags, the beams lean, the floors slope more than some East Bay hills.

“The whole place is twisted. There’s nothing square in it,” said owner Emil Peinert. “One of the windows just popped out.”

The Kingfish Pub in its natural environment:

All in all, it was a pretty fun weekend in the East Bay and I’ve found myself loving it more and more. Others have mentioned that Oakland is San Francisco’s own Brooklyn. I believe it!

It’s fun. Does this mean I’m about to start saying “hella” though? Maybe not quite yet. 😉

Via: http://techland.time.com/2012/01/26/can-we-stop-talking-about-the-apple-cult-now/

Thirty-seven million iPhones. Fifteen million iPads. Fifteen million iPods. Five million Macs. A million Apple TVs. No matter how you do the math, that’s a boatload of gadgets–and it’s how many Apple sold in the final three months of 2011. The company’s profits–$13.06 billion–were the second-highest in the history of American business, after ExxonMobil’s last quarter of 2008.

But I don’t care about Apple’s bottom line. What I find fascinating about these big numbers is what they say about the size of Apple’s customer base. It’s enormous, and still growing. And the larger it becomes, the weirder it gets that some people reflexively dismiss Apple owners as empty-headed, style-obsessed cult members.

Via: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/01/i-am-lousy-copywriter.html

British-born David Ogilvy was one of the original, and greatest, “ad men.” In 1948, he started what would eventually be known as Ogilvy & Mather, the Manhattan-based advertising agency that has since been responsible for some of the world’s most iconic ad campaigns, and in 1963 he even wrote Confessions of an Advertising Man, the best-selling book that is still to this day considered essential reading for all who enter the industry. Time magazine called him “the most sought-after wizard in today’s advertising industry” in the early-’60s; his name, and that of his agency, have been mentioned more than once in Mad Men for good reason.

Via: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/01/space-station-concepts/

The history of space station design is littered with concepts — some elegant, some strange, and some remarkably cute — that were passed over for one reason or another. Here, we look at some space station ideas that didn’t quite make it off the drawing board.

Via: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/ron-paul-stars-astros-rainbow-uniform-76-congressional-135224691.html

Almost nobody likes Congress. The polls say so. But I’ll say this for the federal legislature: Republicans and Democrats play each other in a baseball game every year, and that partly makes up for whatever it is they do the rest of the time.

Back in December, Summer Anne Burton of NotGraphs published a wonderful post called “GOP Presidential Candidates and Baseball” that explored how each of the hopefuls has been affiliated with the national pastime.

What?! Another year in the history books? I say this every year, but time sure does fly. Especially when you’re having fun. This year seemed like one of the busiest yet! Let’s take a look back at my photographic year in review for 2011.

See previously, my photographic year in reviews for 2010, 2009, 2008, and 2007.

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The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The Orphan Master’s Son follows the life of Pak Jun Do, a young boy who lives in a North Korean orphanage with his father, the Orphan Master.

What ultimately transpires is a pretty gripping tale following the life of Jun Do as he grows up and lives life under the oppressive totalarian regime of Kim Jong Il. He ultimately joins to military and is assigned to tunnel duty — building tunnels for infiltration into South Korea. One day, he is visited by an officer and assigned a new task that will ultimately change his life, forever.

Some of my favorite chapters are written in an entertaining and light hearted manner — providing well timed, nice (almost comic) relief from some of the heavier parts of the book. They make you feel as if you’re listening to the latest daily propaganda dispatch from a nearby loudspeaker: “CITIZENS! Today is the Dear Leader’s birthday! Help us celebrate by DOUBLING your output quotas! Remember, it’s the only way to prevent a sneak attack by those imperialist aggressors!”

I don’t want to spoil much more of the story. There are twists and turns in the plot that will cause your jaw to drop. There are other parts that will potentially cause you to tear up. You really do feel as if someone peeled back a curtain, and you’re getting a genuine look inside North Korea.

This is a great book for any book club, as it has amazing potential for discussing fate versus free will, loyalty, love, fidelity, and courage. I often found myself laying awake at night, thinking about some of these central themes in the book.

My ultimate rating is 5 / 5 stars — I debated giving it 4 as I read along, but I think some of the deeper themes of the book, and the fact that it was so thought provoking, makes me belive it’s easily worth all 5 stars.

Forgive me for my hyperbole, but this was one of the most enjoyable books I’ve read since The Kite Runner. I highly recommend it!

View all my reviews

Civilization is one of my favorite games of all time. But good god man, this is torture.