Tag: cooking

May 23, 2018

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Remember when my old English teacher visited me at the hospital (see May 6, 2018)? She was my Honors English teacher. Well, she failed me in her class. I think the reason is because I was gone for half the school year and I couldn’t keep up with her class. Also when I came back I didn’t have the energy to do my best on her projects.

Or maybe I’m just dumb.

A week before my heart transplant, I switched out of her class into Regular English. I thought I could make up my grade in her class, but I didn’t expect to be in the hospital again.

In the hospital I emailed my teacher about making up my grade. The school year is ending June 1st, which is under 2 weeks. I have to do my make up work fast.

I spent my entire day doing my English homework. I had to annotate every soliloquy in Romeo & Juliet, and write an essay. My work isn’t that great, but I think it’ll bring my grade up. I’m hoping to get a C.

Unrelated, at the same time I made some bread. I decided to make bread so I could share it with the Ronald McDonald House. Bread’s also convenient to make. I just make some dough, and let it do its thing for a couple of hours.

I don’t know if you remember, but back in the hospital I had a heart pounding sensation. Heart pounding was a major problem for me because it would give me unnecessary anxiety. I still have that feeling, but I’m trying to push my endurance. Cooking is a great way to that. I’m standing and doing physical activity with my fists. Great cardio.

#cooking, #english, #exercise, #heart-pounding, #ronald-mcdonald-house, #school

June 7, 2018 (Sick Pt. 5)

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My coughing was better today. It’s not as bad as before. I can soothe it with tea. Luckily the Ronald McDonald House provides free tea.

I made key lime pie with Angela today. Angela is my friend at the Ronald McDonald House. We followed a recipe from AllRecipes. We squeezed a lot of lemons and limes for our key lime pie. Squeezing was okay though because it was fun making the pie.

At the Ronald McDonald House there’s a community fridge where you can give food. Angela and I shared our key lime pie with the community.

June 10, 2018

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My church family visited me. Since today is Sunday, they came after church ended. I’m not radically Christian, but after all that has happened, I do believe miracles happened (see June 13, 2018). My church family was really supportive of my heart transplant.

I also met Joe today. Joe is the father of Nicole. Camp Taylor posted about Nicole (see June 5, 2018). Nicole is in the hospital after complications after her 5th open heart surgery (see September 20, 2018).

Joe is a chef. He had a fast casual teriyaki restaurant chain in Southern California. He built his first restaurant by hand at 18. When Nicole asked her dad to be with him, he sold his restaurant chain to have more time with his daughter. Being in the hospital is a challenge, so you need to have as much support as possible.

Joe and Nicole have place their faith on God. They’re both radical believers. Although Nicole is 8, she has a boyfriend: her pastor’s son. Nicole is loved by God, and she is supported by her church family. When Nicole was in the hospital, her church family went in a circle prayed for her.

June 11, 2018

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Angela and I made chocolate chip cookies today. Angela is my friend at the Ronald McDonald House. Cooking is a good way for me to push my endurance. We both made chocolate chip cookies, but there were extra chocolate chips so Angela’s mom made some modified cookies. After our chocolate chip cookies were done baking, we shared it with the other families at the Ronald McDonald House.

Joe made lobster rolls today. Joe’s daughter, Nicole, is in the hospital after her 5th open heart surgery had complications (see September 20, 2018). As a result, her family has to stay at the Ronald McDonald House while she’s being treated.

I helped him make them. After the lobster was done cooking, he tasted them, and found out they went bad. Joe had to drive back to the store to buy shrimp for the rolls instead. It was fun making food with Joe.

June 15, 2018

~ Campjustin ~ 2 Comments

I like to cook at the Ronald McDonald House. It’s a good way to get some activity into my day and meet/talk to new people. However, since I experience heart pounding cooking is difficult.

After transplant, I have a sensation of heart pounding. It’s when I can do as little as walking across a room and my heart starts pounding. I can feel it in my chest and I feel thumping in my ears. It’s not as bad as when I was in the hospital, but it still inhibits the amount of activity I do. That’s why I want to push my activity levels every day. If I do more activity, I raise my endurance levels. That’s why I walk on the treadmill everyday and cook often.

I’m planning to cook mushroom cups with Angela. I got the recipe online. Angela is my friend I made at the Ronald McDonald House. She’s at Stanford for treatment of her liver. She can only eat 20 grams of protein per day. 20 grams of protein is nothing. An egg has 6 grams of protein, so she can only eat under 4 eggs each day.

My mom took me to Safeway for ingredients of the mushroom cups. Mushroom cups are cooked mushrooms in a cream cheese mixture stuffed into filo cups. I bought mushrooms, heavy whipping cream, and filo cups. When I came back, I cooked the filling with Angela. We diced the mushrooms and cooked it with the whipping cream. After the mixture was thickened, we saran wrapped it and stored it in my room’s refrigerator overnight.

June 16, 2018

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My Mom’s friend, Joanna, visited me at the Ronald McDonald House today. Joanna was my piano teacher, and I’m friends with her son, Andrew. We went to eat at Calafia Cafe & Market A Go-Go. We went there because I saw that restaurant on a TV show called Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.

Update: Calafia Cafe & Market A Go-Go is permanently closed.

When Joanna and Andrew left, I made mushroom cups with Angela. We followed a recipe online. Angela is my friend at the Ronald McDonald House (see June 15, 2018 for her condition). I already made the filling for the mushroom cups yesterday, so I brought it out from our community refrigerator. I put the premade filling into the filo cups and baked it in the oven.

Angela’s family had a BBQ today. I joined in their barbeque and they liked my mushroom cups. I met Angela’s sister and her English teacher. I had a great time with them!

After the barbecue my Dad visited me at the Ronald McDonald House. Dad brought Julia, my sister, too. This is the first time after transplant that I’ve seen Julia. The reason is because UCLA doesn’t start summer break until June 10.

We went across the street to the Stanford Mall to eat dinner. We ate at Tender Greens, a restaurant that serves salad. I couldn’t eat so much since I had to walk to the Stanford Mall. Although it’s across the street from the Ronald McDonald House, that distance is enough to make my heart start pounding. When I do activity, my heart starts pounding. I can feel the thumping in my chest and ears. When heart pounding happens, I’m usually too uncomfortable or nauseous to eat.

July 16, 2018

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I cooked today. Since I have chicken breast in my room’s refrigerator, and onion in my room pantry, I decided to cook some chicken breast.

At the Ronald McDonald House you have your own section in a refrigerator, and your own pantry. Although they’re your own, they’re very small. You don’t have your own section in a freezer, so you have to throw all your frozen items in a bag, put a label on the bag, and stuff it into the freezer.

The Ronald McDonald House also has a community pantry, refrigerator, and freezer. You can take any of the items from them and use it. For example, I can take baloney from the community refrigerator, bread from the community pantry, and ice from the community freezer. I can make a sandwich and ice water from those ingredients. If I didn’t eat my sandwich, then I can take some saran wrap from the community pantry, wrap the sandwich up, and put it in the community refrigerator for anyone to eat.

I also took some garlic powder and from the community pantry and canola oil on the counter for my chicken breast. I diced the onion, sauteed it with the canola oil, and seared the chicken with garlic powder. The chicken took longer to cook than I expected.

While cooking I talked to Angela. Angela is my friend that I met at the Ronald McDonald House. She’s here for liver treatment, and because of her liver disease she can only eat 20 grams of protein per day. I talk to her everyday because she’s a good friend.

My sister came after I made the chicken. She wanted to go eat, but since I already cooked I didn’t go with her to eat. My sister stayed overnight.

August 9, 2018

~ Campjustin ~ 3 Comments

Today I went to Make-A-Wish headquarters in Oakland. At 7 AM my Mom drove us to Oakland’s Chinatown to park our car. First we went to a local bakery to buy some breakfast and take my medicine.

Afterwards we went to the Bay Area Make-A-Wish headquarters. The headquarters is in an office building shared with other companies. After getting directions by security, we went inside these huge double doors. The first thing you see is Make-A-Wish Greater Bay Area behind the reception desk. The walls were painted light blue and the floor was blue carpet. The waiting area featured books that had pictures of other people’s wishes on there.

Beth was excited to see me! Beth is the Make-A-Wish coordinator that plans out all the wishes. At the Ronald McDonald house she called me to figure out more details. Beth told me the headquarters used to be at San Francisco, but then moved to Oakland. She also told me that the headquarters usually don’t have kids visiting. Usually the kids are at the hospital or at home, so me coming was rare.

Beth, my Mom, and I walked past portraits of other children with their wishes. There’s actually a girl who made a fashion runway show. She’s also a heart transplant recipient.

Edit: I met her August 11, 2018, at the transplant reunion party! She’s in the middle wearing a blue shirt:

The girl who did the fashion runway is in the middle.

Victoria, the chef granting my wish, came from Bart. She’s a nutritionist and personal chef that creates healthy meals for others. She said when she was a child, her aunt had a heart attack in front of her and died. That’s when Victoria teared up. One day, Victoria quit her job and went to culinary school. Since then she’s been a successful personal chef. Her goal is to show people a healthier way of eating.

I explained why I wanted to do this. I have a tube inside of me. Before transplant, I didn’t eat enough food each day, so through the tube I insert food inside of me. I would plug my tube to a machine and go to sleep. The next day I would skip breakfast, eat a light lunch and dinner, plug myself in, and repeat. After transplant, I have an appetite. I can start eating full meals every day. I want to develop recipes so that I’ll have enough food to not use my tube anymore. If I eat without my tube for 6 months, then my doctors can take it out.

My Mom, Victoria, Beth, and I went to take a picture in front of the Make-A-Wish logo.

Victoria will meet up with my Mom and me at our own house for cooking lessons (see August 25, 2018).

My Mom and I also checked out a government building nearby. Pictures above!

August 25, 2018

~ Campjustin ~ 1 Comment

Today is my second session with Victoria, however this will be the first time we’re cooking. Victoria is the chef that’s granting my Make-A-Wish (see August 9, 2018). Her son also came today. He’s a marketing major and is helping Make-A-Wish by taking videos of us cooking. We’re making seared salmon and pancit.

For the seared salmon we rubbed the salmon fillet with garlic and dill. We seared both sides until they were pink. If they’re the slightest raw then I get a chance of catching a virus. My Mom was shocked by how simple it was.

The noodles for the pancit was soaked in water until they became soft. We fried frozen shrimp and cabbage strands in a pan, then added the noodles. We seasoned the noodles with soy sauce, sesame oil, and dill.

Check out Victoria here: https://www.eastbayhealthychef.com/

September 1, 2018

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Another cooking day with Victoria! Sadly her son didn’t come. We made chicken salad and pesto noodles.

Yesterday, my Mom made a baked chicken. We shredded the leftover chicken and mixed it with mayonnaise, halved grapes, and dill We put the chicken salad between toasted bread to make a sandwich. It was savory but the grapes had a burst of sweetness. The texture of the bread made it amazing.

For the pesto pasta we made our own pesto. Victoria bought a pot at Trader Joes for $3. Victoria cut the basil leaves from the stems. The leaves were thrown in a blender. She told us if we placed it outside and water it moderately it’ll sprout new leaves.We toasted pine nuts in a pan and added it to the blender. We also added garlic, olive oil, and parmesan cheese. Since we’re trying to be low sodium, we didn’t add salt. Blending all these ingredients made us pesto. We combined the pesto with chicken and tomatoes to add over pasta.

Check out Victoria here: https://www.eastbayhealthychef.com/

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