Tag Archives: SunStorm

“Greater Than The Sun” for Breakfast!

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Hey folks! Happy New Year! I know we’ve been into 2012 for more than a week now, but this is my first post of the year, so I figured I’d wish each of you a prosperous, amazing 2012. What better way to kick off the year than with a post that is a cross-section of all of the things I love: writing, music, photography, and food. This past weekend, I had the chance to have a house to myself, and that meant I got to play around in the kitchen. Cooking is one of my favorite things to do, but when I’m trying out a whole bunch of new stuff, I prefer to do it alone. That way, if it sucks, I can throw it away and no one is hurt that they’re in the house hungry but me. ;-)

Rewinding back a few days, I was on GChat with Cheekie when I mentioned an idea that I had for a post. I follow an amazing food blog called Carnal Dish, and the owner of said blog, Resha, has a recipe on her site dedicated to one of her favorite artists: Big K.R.I.T. Browsing her website and realizing that I had an entire weekend to play around in the kitchen, I had a brilliant idea. Why not do something along the same lines for my favorite group, The Foreign Exchange? And that’s what brings us here together today. Without further adieu, I introduce to you the “Greater Than The Sun” breakfast, inspired by the song of the same title off of Zo’s album “Sunstorm.”

i admittedly need to work on my pancake skills, but trust me. this tasted awesome.

I took a page from Carnal Dish, and put my own spin on the Lazy Lemon and Vanilla Bean pancakes. I was without vanilla bean, so my pancakes feature lemon zest, orange zest, and vanilla extract. The orange zest made something really special happen with these pancakes, and I’m certain I had a smile on my face from the first bite. Instead of syrup, I put together a glaze with raspberry preserves, lemon, lime, and orange juice, with some sugar and a bit of water. Once it reduced down, I poured it on top of the pancakes, and it added just the right amount of sweetness and tartness to the pancakes, and sort of reminded me of the color that the sky takes on when the sun is setting.

On one side, you see God’s gift to breakfast – bacon. Yes, there are 4 pieces there. I could get creative and say it’s one for every word in the title of the song, but it was really because I was starving. ;-) For my scrambled eggs, I used spinach, sundried tomatoes, and Monterey Jack cheese. MAN. Talk about some kinda good! It was just the right amount of heat, and the veggies really set it off. Last but not least, to celebrate the morning time, I poured a big glass of orange juice. Had I had some champagne in the house, it would have been a mimosa, but I figure I can save that for the next time I make this recipe!

So folks, there you have it. My culinary interpretation of “Greater Than The Sun.” Between the food on the plate and the song on repeat, it is impossible to have a bad start to the day. If you don’t already have Carnal Dish bookmarked, please do so, and if you don’t have Zo’s “Sunstorm” album, please traipse on over here to order yourself (and anyone else you care about) a copy.

Until next time, folks!

and this is what was left when I was finished...

Feature Fridays: Greatest Weapon of All Time

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Hey ya’ll! It’s been a while since I’ve been here…a long while, and in my opinion, way too long. In order to interact with you all more, and to keep the place looking like something, I came up with the idea of starting a weekly series. I came up with an idea for a series to do two things: 1) it’ll get me in a consistent writing/posting habit (which is key as a writer), and 2) it’ll give you all out there an idea of where my head is on at least a weekly basis. I win, you win, all we do is win (x3). Khaled.

The name of this new series is called Feature Fridays. In the series, I’ve decided to showcase one song per week, give you the audio of the song, and also discuss why the song was so vital to my week, what the song means to me, and then give you a chance to maybe discover some new music and to learn something about me along the way. If you’ve been following me for some time, or you know me in real life, you know that I’m always surrounded by music. When I go to work in the mornings, I have my iPod in my ears, when I’m at work, I’m on YouTube for the music, and when I come home, I have music on in the car, and on my computer while I’m doing work. It, in a nutshell, is my life. What better way to dig deeper than to see what I have in constant rotation?

Without further adieu, I present to you the first Feature Fridays track: Zo! Feat. Sy Smith – Greatest Weapon of All Time

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWRbEojOywY?rel=0&w=425&h=349]

We all know how I feel about The Foreign Exchange and any and everything that comes off of their label, so it’s no surprise that my first song comes from an artist on their label. This song was vital to my week for a couple of very distinct reasons. For starters, I’ve been in a bit of a rut when it comes to my writing. It’s always been a dream of mine to not only write, but to publish a novel. I struggle with the thought that what I write isn’t up to par with what else is out there on the market, so instead of trying to write more to get better, I clam up and write sporadically (as we can se by how I tend to this blog). Needless to say, that’s completely counterproductive to what I’m trying to do, and I’ve gotten to the point where I need to change that if I ever want to see my dream come to fruition. There’s a line in the song where Sy Smith says “Don’t ever underestimate/the power/of your heart and soul/cuz they might write the greatest/love story that’s/ever been told.” Now I know I’ve heard this song countless times before this week, but for whatever reason, that line has been on repeat non-stop in my head! It’s almost like it’s exactly what I needed to hear in order to get some inspiration. Within the last seven days, I’ve done research on what is needed to create a successful story, read a book about how to properly set yourself up to write, and created a skeletal plot outline. Talk about motivation.

The song has also helped me on a more personal note. I have my days where I feel like I live the cookie-cutter life: get up, get dressed, go to work, come home, work out, play on the computer, shower, eat somewhere within the day, sleep, rinse, and repeat. It’s not a hard life to live in terms of work, but it’s pretty difficult to live such a structured life when I used to thrive on freedom, which allowed me to do the things I wanted/needed to do without becoming an insomniac. After listening to this song on repeat a few (read: many) times, it dawned on me that I still have the freedom to do exactly what it is that I want and feel like I need to do – I just have to be a bit more creative in how I approach it, and if I want it bad enough, I’ll have to make the time to do it. It starts within my mind, and telling myself that I actually can achieve the things that I want to do, and to stop underestimating myself and what I’m capable of and destined for. As someone who spends a lot of time in internal reflection rather than projecting feelings outward, it’s been a difficult task to convince myself that I have what it takes to be successful. Whenever I feel like I’m not cut out for my dreams, I cut this song on, close my eyes if I can, and envision myself living out the life that I feel inclined to live. It’s an amazing feeling to see yourself in situations that you never imagined possible before.

For those of you that have heard this song, do you see where I’m coming from? Have you ever had a song that gave you the right mix of inspiration and motivation to get you to where you wanted to go, even if it was a very short journey to get there? For those of you that haven’t heard the song, check it out above, leave some of your thoughts and comments, and be sure to follow Zo! and Sy Smith on Twitter to keep up with them! Until next time, folks…