Finally…

Happy Friday everyone! How’s everything? Any plans for weekend?

I will be hanging out with my college friends tomorrow for lunch and maybe bowling. I haven’t seen them for couple months because of some family matters. Anyway, I’m glad I finally can see them again.

Btw I FINALLY got my car’s bumper fixed! After shelling out $500 for deductible, I’ll just wait for the insurance to jack up my policy at my next renewal.

Tomorrow morning I’ll bring my car for 40k service – it’s been overdue! Heesh…I just wanna get the car thing outta my way.

Ok let’s go to the fun stuff.

I took a half day off from work today for an appointment. That didn’t take too long so I figured I wanted to stop by Sprouts Farmers Market — FINALLY!

I’ve heard this market before but I’ve never got a chance to check it out. There’s no Sprouts Farmers Market nearby my neighborhood area and today I decided to go to this one which I’d say kind of close by where I was today. Even that, the drive was waaay out of my usual route.

Anyway, my first impression: It’s like a Whole Foods with Trader Joe’s price 🙂 The place is clean and their produce look very fresh! They also have a bulk bins of nuts, rice, flaxseeds etc. Their staff are pretty helpful. Earlier I saw their Organic fuji apples were not stocked and asked whether they still had them in stock. They happily went to the back to check and minutes later they told me they already restocked the shelf. Woot!

C’mon, when was the last time I could get Organic Fuji Apples for 88 cents/lbs?

These babies ARE HUGE too and they aren’t bad looking either! I restrained myself not to get too many or I’d blow off this month’s grocery budget.

48oz 100% Raw Unrefined Honey for less than $10.00? I’ll take that!

5lbs Organic carrots for $4.49? Sure, bring it here!

88 cents/lbs red seedless grapes. I immediately grabbed 2 bags of those!

For some reason, I COULDN’T FIND ANY full fat Greek yogurt, so I figured I’ll try these 2 brands.

For organic pricing, Sprouts Farmers Market has won my heart. However, since it’s located far from where I live, I don’t think I’ll make it part of my weekly grocery trip. Maybe monthly. It’s a different story if they start to open nearby my neighborhood place though.

Btw yesterday was the actual Chinese New Year (or Lunar New Year) and my workplace provided some kind of Chinese sweets for all the employees (geez I was hoping they’d give out the “red pocket” aka bonus)

Obviously I didn’t touch any of those sweets, not my favorite so no worth cheating.

But I scored this Loose Leaf Green Tea from one of the gift basket from our vendor! 😀

And no Chinese New Year meal would be complete without NOODLES!

Noodles symbolize long life in Chinese, so during special occasions (birthday, new year etc) it’s good to have noodle dish. Simple dinner yet very filling and yummy 🙂 Do you notice the ground pork dish? It’s the same ground pork that I used for the dumplings. 🙂

Just stir fry, added some veggies – voila – another dish!

And FINALLY, I made my OWN Coconut Butter – Thanks Katie for posting it!

It is SUPER SIMPLE!

Homemade Coconut Butter (from Chocolate Covered Katie)

Ingredients:
1 package of unsweetened coconut flakes (I used Let’s Do Organic) – I got those from Amazon.com – 12 packs of 7oz.  for $21!

Directions:
Blend unsweetened coconut flakes in your food processor and blender until it clumps up together- like this!

Be patient..just like nut butters, take a little a while sometimes..depending on your blender/food processor

Homemade Coconut Butter!

Any favorite grocery stores that you always go to?
I usually go to ethnic market rather than Vons, Albertsons, Ralphs etc. Since most of my dishes are Asian, I usually shop at Chinese market for veggies. For meat and other stuff, Superking Market, a Mediterranean-Mexican is one of my favorite as well and I blogged about it before here.
I very rarely shop at Trader Joe’s and never shop at Whole Foods (sorry for TJ and WF shoppers – no offense). For me, Whole Foods is like a rip off. Sure they have organic guarantee stuff, but I am not willing to spend my whole paycheck on it.