2.25.11 — Trophy Cupcakes

So Seattle has not one but two gourmet cupcake chains littering the city with their over the top cakes: Trophy Cupcakes and Cupcake Royale. It's interesting that some people have a very strong like or dislike for one or the other. I don't quite get that — they're all cupcakes. Apparently though, you're either a Trophy fan or a Royale fan, but not both.

Me? Eh. The few times I've had one or the other they've tasted about the same — way too sugary. Like some of the other items that come into the office these days, the over-iced cupcakes are fairly easily resistable.

They were apparently used in a client meeting to grease the wheels towards a signed contract. No word on if it worked or not.

2.24.11 — I think I'm getting bored

I think the love is waning. I used to pop up out of my chair, iPhone at the ready, snapping photos, styling the items on the kitchen table, getting my light just right. Then I'd be back at my desk, uploading the photos and getting all sarcastic on this blog.

Maybe it's the monotonous march of the same foods over and over, but it's getting a little old. I need something big. I need something new. Cookies, donuts, pastries, even the monthly fried chicken. Been there, done that. They aren't even a temptation challenge any longer. I guess that's a good thing. I've worked so hard at resisting this stuff that I don't even feel a blip when I'm facing much of it any longer.

Still, something that tests me would be nice every once in awhile. Cookies? Eh.



If I had the calories to spare, I would have had one of these. I did take a bite of the peanut butter one after someone opened it. It was extremely bland. How you can make peanut butter bland takes some real doing.

Anyway, Kashi's cereals make a great low cal granola substitute and I have some every day in my yogurt as a snack. So, these aren't something I had to resist necessarily — I did mostly to keep the calorie budget in check.

2.23.11 — Ho Hum

Yes, John bought more Top Pot. For the Nth time. There was much rejoicing and speed walking to the kitchen. Me? You know the answer to that one.



And here are the sloppy seconds from some client meeting. Meetings with clients go better with lots of sugar.

And yes, I'm running out of things to say about donuts and pastries since they show up here so often.

2.14.11 — Traffic Love

Speaking of showing your love and admiration by giving someone high calorie foods...



Each Valentine's Day, our Traffic department puts out a box and instructs the rest of us to show them the love... with the implied threat that if we don't they will make our lives a living hell. Since they actually have that power, we all tend to come through. My offering was not food-related, but most of the others were even if they were leftovers from the gift baskets that came into the agency last December.



Not all the offerings were safe ones. Yes, that is a VHS tape of the Vanilla Ice movie, Cool as Ice. Behind it, the Matthew McConaughey movie, Fool's Gold. Clearly, someone was tempting the Traffic wrath. We may watch the two as a double-bill feature, if we can stand to sit through them both.

2.12.11 — Poker Food 2

The monthly poker game rolled around and the snacks this time were dominated by chocolate. Cookies, candies, those new mini Reeses' bite thingys, two kinds of Oreos, etc. I was mostly good and stuck to the fruit trays (which I brought) and the veggies. I did have some of the pita chips and some regular potato chips. However, keeping with my new moderation attempts, I had very few chips and focused on the fruit and strawberries.



These looked very tasty, but since they were swimming in oil and covered by slabs of cheese, no benefits that the tomatoes or herbs might have were worth it.



Of course, all the chocolate was there because the next day is Valentine's Day and somehow giving high calorie snacks and chocolate to people is how you're supposed to express your love or admiration. I guess it would be okay if it all also came with a free diabetes screening.

2.11.11 — A Big Day

I've been feeling like we've been in a bit of a lull in terms of food in the office. Sure, we've had the normal stuff, but nothing big. Today, that ended.



I missed the first salvo, but caught the aftermath. I missed it because it was such a small box of donuts and was emptied by my coworkers in such a short time. There wasn't even really time for an intercom announcement. I imagine it was kind of like the Raptor feeding scene from Jurassic Park. The cow is lowered into the paddock. A murderous feeding frenzy ensues, tastefully (so to speak) obscured by some foliage. A couple minutes later, the tattered sling is removed. This box was the sling, complete with the messy "leavings."



There were several big meetings going on and they all seemed to have food. One must have had some heavy hitters in it because they got the Specialties' catering. There were 2 box lunches left over. Specialties knows what they are doing, in terms of flavor. Their sandwiches are very tasty as are their cookies. However, as we all know by now, taste isn't everything. These are also so loaded in calories that if I were to actually have one, I might not be able to eat for the rest of the day. You know, high taste doesn't always have to mean high calories. Specialties, I'm looking at you... and not eating your food.

And then...



Yes. Chicken from Ezelle's. Again. This time though, the agency at large didn't have to wait for the monthly managment meeting to end before they were let loose on the greasy scraps. We had a full agency meeting and the snacks were fried chicken, rolls, coleslaw and something that looked like potato salad.



I've described previously how I feel about that substance. I'm feeling queasy just thinking about it.

Here are some nice rolls to cleanse the mental palate...

2.9.11 — The Day of Cheese

Actually, this was more like the Day After Cheese. A group of ladies from the office had a fancy cheese party last night and this was the leftovers. So much mold. So much fat. I don't think it is a coincidence that all of them were complaining about stomach pain later on in the day.



Come on, something called Triple Cream and it's from France? I worried about my arteries just standing near this stuff. I was wondering if I needed a breathing mask to make sure no stray molecules made their way into my system. I figure this stuff probably had some sort of half-life decay rate not unlike plutonium. Too much close exposure and your DNA gets rewritten.



Who was the first person to think, "Man, that shit looks nasty, smells like ass and has actual mold in it. Let's slap it on a cracker and go to town!" An idiot, that's who. Seriously, it's one step away from eating rotten food and calling it a delicacy. Ugh.

2.8.11 — Re-Reuben Tuesday

We had another Reuben Tuesday and I decided to bring my new philosophy of moderation to the table.

I had a reuben sandwich and it was good. Before committing though, I did add up the calories for one sandwich and was a little surprised to find out it was only about 400 calories. We had the packaging for most everything available to confirm the calories that my calorie counter was suggesting. So I had one... and only one. Even though there were leftovers and the cook was pushing me to have at least another half sandwich, I made the decision to stop at one. I could alter my daily food intake enough to accommodate the 400 calories from the one sandwich, but didn't want to push it with more. Also, I had told myself ahead of time that I'd stop at one. So, success.



I did, however, completely resist the Lays potato chips. The cook brought three giant bags and the lunch crowd knocked back two of them.

Moderation? Check. Stop when I told myself I would? Check. Kept the calories reasonable? Check.

2.4.11 — Guac Off!

We had our first annual Guac Off today at lunch, and while I had intended to give it a pass, it was guacamole and I figured id stick to the tasting only and take the calorie hit. So, I did. I had 6 corn chips and about 3 tablespoons of the guacamole for a total of 185 calories.

The guac wasn't the issue. The chips were. One serving of chips was 9 chips for almost 180 calories. Who the hell can only eat 9 freakin' chips? No one. As a group, the people taking part in the taste set polished off almost 3 bags of chips or about 70 servings. Yeah, almost 11,000 calories just in chips. I love chips, but I stuck to the bare minimum to make my decision about the guac.

So, yes, I did eat today's offering, but did it with moderation and kept it reasonable... not something I have a good track record at doing. Small steps, right?