Seven Pounds, Explained...

Hello, friends! 

Before we got on the plane to go to California for Thanksgiving, I weighed myself, just like I do every morning that we're in Omaha. When we got back a week later, I weighed myself the next morning, just like I do every morning that we're in Omaha. The result? Let's just say that I ate very well and am now sufficiently insulated for winter in Nebraska. =0). 

All in all, I gained 7 pounds, which is about a pound a day. I have no idea if that's a low amount, a high amount, or a regular amount. What I do know is that it was a DELICIOUS amount. 

Usually, when I go on trips, I come back and blog about a what I did on the trip, running through things chronologically. This time, in honor of those glorious 7 pounds, I decided to focus instead on the food I ate while I was in California as a way to talk about our trip. Strap on your bibs, because here we go! 

Jook: My brother makes fun of me because of how much my family likes jook. It's just rice porridge. Some call it "poor people food." Yet, it's a Leong family staple. As soon as we got off the plane in California and back to my parent's place, everyone had a big bowl of jook as an evening snack. The amount of love and care that my dad puts into making the jook is something else. JoJo says that it's his favorite meal of all time and that Gung Gung (my dad) makes jook even better than mommy (Note: Megan thinks so too). =0). I'm not saying that we ate a lot of jook, I'm just saying that there my dad had to make a second pot of it by Day 3. 

Dim Sum: Omaha has a lot of really great food. One thing it does not have is good dim sum. Maybe there's a place that does good dim sum in Omaha. I haven't found it. So, when my dad suggested that we do dim sum after church on Sunday, I was all in. Did I order all my favorites? I did. Did my mom over order because she wanted to make sure that I had my fill? She did. Did I end up eating a bunch more the next day or two to eventually finish everything? Yes, yes I did. 

Popcorn: There's nothing special about buttered popcorn. I was just surprised that I ate as much of it as I did. Namely, because we went to go see Moana 2 (super good) and the circus (also super good!). Side note: apparently, our family is a circus family! I think this is the third or fourth time that I've been to the circus with the family. That is not something that I would have guessed I'd say before starting a family. 

Burgers: I only ate 2 burgers while I was in California. The first was an In-N-Out Double Double wiith grilled onions (also with fries and a shake) after the circus (it really was a good circus). The second was a chiliburger from Tommy's, which I might actually like better than In-N-Out but don't get nearly as often because no one else in the family likes it as much as me. Both burgers were classics and both were delicious. 

Lobster: We celebrated my dad's 70th birthday while we were out there. He wanted a Chinese banquet so we threw him a Chinese banquet. We had lobster, noodles, fried tofu, pork chops, oysters, and some veggies for good measure. Seriously, it was one of the best lobsters I'd ever eaten. We had 3 tables (my dad is VERY popular...) so at my table was our kids, my niece and nephew, and my uncle and aunt, meaning I was the only person at the table in their prime eating shape. That lobster never stood a chance...

Sushi, Noodle, and Nuggets: Tuesday was Jonah's birthday so we did all the things he wanted to do. We went to the beach and ate Chick-fil-A nuggets. I came home and had sushi and noodles. We generally doted on the boy. All of it was fine, if unspectacular. These are all things that we have in Omaha but they are the things he wanted, so that's what we did. (Confession: I had my sister pick me up a bahn mi for the beach because we don't really have those in Omaha either.)

Mandarin Noodle House: The Mandarin Noodle House has the absolute best spicy beef noodle soup in the world (Megan's being a close second). I will fight anyone who says otherwise. I try to get out to "The House" every time we're out there but it sometimes doesn't work out. Thankfully, it's not too far from where my brother lives and my siblings were kind enough to plan a day in that area (including the banquet for my dad) so I could grab some for lunch. It was everything I remembered it being. 

All the things: Y'all, I ate a LOT of stuff on Thanksgiving. First there was breakfast because I needed my energy before playing football with some family friends (threw 5 TD's with 2 picks; intercepted my brother at least twice, we won 2 of the 3 games. Thanks for asking). I went to my sister's house where we ate lunch, which would have been a light affair, had she not seen that the taco truck was open while running errands. We went with my parents to watch Moana 2 (popcorn + milk duds + the Rock = a very entertaining time) before coming home to make final preparations for Thanksgiving. 

Quick note about a Leong Thanksgiving: My parents are the kind of generous and hospitable people who invite everyone over for Thanksgiving. When you include immediate family (which is already 18 people), extended family, and friends, you end up with somewhere between 40-50 people inside the house, which means a LOT of food. There were the traditional Thanksgiving staples like turkey, ham, roast beef, yams, stuffing, cranberry sauce, etc. My aunt made Chinese sticky rice. There were LOTS of desserts. I pretty much stuffed my face while watching the Dolphins not even really put up a fight against the Packers. 

There were other things I ate too. I had some really bad diner biscuit and gravy while visiting with my old youth pastor. We drank tons of boba and Megan got her avocado smoothie. My mom took us to Dairy Queen. My dad made St. Paul sandwiches, and I had a gobbler (or two) with the leftovers. We went to see Megan's uncle and her cousins and ate the famous Horner Spaghetti (which is so good, y'all...)

I think there were only two things I DIDN'T get around to eating. We didn't have time on Sunday for me to get a donut at the shop down the street before church. A few people brought cranberry sauce to Thanksgiving, so I didn't get to make it with Thaliea like we normally do. But, only missing 2 things is pretty good! 

Friends, looking back, it's pretty obvious how I gained 7 glorious pounds. Maybe I should be surprised that it wasn't more. But hey, that's what Thanksgiving is all about right? You spend time with your family. You eat way too much delicious food. And, most importantly, you only pack your stretchy pants on the trip. =0). 

Have an excellent day!

~Adam

Note: I didn't take a ton of photos on this trip. Mainly because I'm bad at taking photos in general but also because my hands were usually full of food...