I have to give it to the Stanley water bottle

After seeing the Stanley water bottle craze all over social media for the better part of a year, I finally gave in because I wasn’t drinking enough water during the day and I knew my vessel was part of the problem. (Look, I’m as susceptible to hype as anyone—that’s how I ended up at the Wicked movie.) The Stanley (sorry, the Quencher H2.0 Flowstate™ 30-oz. Tumbler) checked all of my boxes: I wanted something dishwasher safe and insulated, with a hard straw, and not too sporty.

You guys…I’m here to tell you that I love this water bottle. So much that I now own two identical ones, as well as a Stanley-shaped ice cube tray that you definitely don’t need and a straw cleaning kit that you probably do. 

Kiyana was anti-Stanley, but even she has had to admit that it’s pretty convenient and keeps water so cold throughout the day. She even borrows it from time to time when she’s working out! Her one complaint—that I think is completely fair—is that it’s kind of top-heavy, meaning it tips over easily if you set it on the floor next to the couch and then your partner doesn’t see it when she stands up. (My guess is the bottom is narrow to fit in a car’s cup holder.) 

I was surprised to learn that you can also put hot drinks in this bottle and sip through a different hole on the lid that stays covered most of the time. That’s not something I have any interest in doing (honestly, I can’t even imagine putting any other cold liquids into it) but I figured I’d mention it in case that’s a selling point for anyone else! 

Get it from Amazon or Stanley for $35. The ice cube tray ($12.99) and straw cleaning kit ($3.59) are also both on Amazon.

Also, I ended up really enjoying Wicked! Sometimes things are annoying on social media and also worth it. 💧

I can’t recommend this rice cooker enough

Lately, I’ve been thinking about all of the good shit I haven’t gotten to blog about in the past two years—the stuff that I’ve used super consistently, and that really stands the test of time. This Zojirushi rice cooker ($172 on Amazon) is one such thing!

I wasn’t a big consumer of rice for most of my life, but Kiyana had mentioned wanting a rice cooker several times, so I decided to buy this one for her for Valentine’s Day a few years ago. She now says it’s one of the best gifts she’s ever received, and I have to agree—this thing is amazing! It just makes extremely delicious rice literally every single time with minimal effort on our part. It’s fully turned me into a rice person…like, I will now sometimes just eat a bowl of plain white rice straight out of the rice cooker because it’s that good.

This particular rice cooker also has some additional features (including a vegetable steamer and the ability to bake a cake) that we haven’t taken advantage of. My only real complaint is that there are two components that aren’t dishwasher safe, but it’s also not that big of a deal because they are very easy to clean (especially compared to burned-on rice that’s glued to a pot). 

A few items I recommend to go with it:

• Rice washing bowl with strainer ($8 on Amazon). Washing the dried rice before you make it is the most tedious step in the process, and while it’s truly not that big of a deal, it’s significantly easier now that we have this tool. Pro tip: Use a whisk to swish the rice around in the bowl when you’re rinsing it! 

• Tamaki Gold California Koshihikari Short Grain Rice ($22 for 4.4 lbs. on Amazon). I think the Zojirushi could make any rice taste good, but this rice is excellent.

• Rice storage container with measuring cup ($15 on Amazon). This is definitely just a “nice to have” item, but I do think it’s helpful, given that our go-to rice comes in a 4-lb. bag that is a bit unwieldy. And the built-in measuring cup makes the whole process that much easier. 

There are a lot of different Zojirushi models, and I have no doubt that they are all fantastic (especially after seeing what other people are saying about the brand online), so if a different model is speaking to you, I’d say go for it! 

Please share your favorite rice-centric recipes in the comments if you’re so inclined! Our go-tos are slow cooker chipotle-honey chicken (great over rice instead of in tortillas), miso honey chicken and asparagus (we do green beans), and a sticky miso salmon bowl, but I’d love to add some new ones to our regular rotaysh. 🍚

Just a really good Bolognese recipe (+ a weeknight red sauce!)

For the past several years, Kiyana and I have been making the pinwheel lasagna from Don Angie to celebrate various holidays. (Our tradition is to have it on Christmas Eve, New Year’s Eve, and Valentine’s Day.) It’s a time-intensive but very special recipe that is totally worth the effort.

To make it, you have to make three separate sauces, one of which is a Bolognese. And because you end up with a lot more of this than you need, we’d freeze the extra portion to eat with pasta a month or two later…and that’s how we realized it’s totally worth making on its own, separate from the lasagna entirely!

This Bolognese is really rich and hearty, and kind of a showstopper—Kiyana’s been making it whenever we have friends over for dinner (with the Via Carota house salad as a side) and it’s been a huge hit. It feels fancy but it’s not overly fussy, which is ideal for guests.

The recipe is available for free on Cherry Bombe, and it’s in the Don Angie cookbook (which is great and I also recommend!).

Some additional notes if you’re thinking of making it:

• We use beef instead of veal because it’s easier to find

• We don’t prepare the Bolognese in a single day anymore—Kiyana usually combines the meat and makes the mirepoix a day or two in advance, just to break things up a bit

• If you have a tea ball, put the star anise in that when the sauce is simmering so it’ll be easier to fish out at the end

• This recipe makes a ton of Bolognese; we’ve been sending friends home with a portion and we still have plenty left over for ourselves. It also freezes/reheats very well!

Also! While you’re getting the Bolognese recipe, it’s also worth grabbing the one for red sauce that’s also prepared as part of the pinwheel lasagna. This has become our go-to weeknight pasta sauce; it’s ridiculously fast and easy to make and really upgrades a bowl of plain spaghetti! 🍝

Something delightful: The Thursday Murder Club

In the fall of 2023, I started getting into reading “cozy mysteries”—basically, mystery novels that don’t have any gore/graphic violence, and that feature an amateur detective in a small town. (Think the vibe of Murder She Wrote as opposed to Law and Order: SVU.) After reading a couple of real duds, I eventually found my way Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club, a four-book series (with more coming!) that I love so, so much. 

The books are centered on a British retirement village, and the amateur detectives are four septuagenarians who live there. Richard Osman’s writing is really clever and truly laugh-out-loud funny, but the books are also surprisingly beautiful and tender. (I should warn you that as the books go on and you get to know the fantastic cast of characters better, you will cry.)

I initially bought the books for my Kindle, and then went ahead bought physical copies because I liked them so much that I wanted to be able to see them on my shelf, and then I also bought the audiobook for the first one because I wanted someone with a British accent to read me a story. I’ve already re-read the entire series once, and I will probably read them again right before the fifth book arrives this fall. 

If you need a nice little pick-me-up as we enter the muddy part of winter, I’d highly recommend the whole series!

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The best things I read in 2021

Happy New Year’s Eve! If you’re planning a cozy night in — which I personally highly recommend — might I suggest reading (or re-reading) some really fantastic longreads from the past year?

Here are all of my faves from 2021, in no particular order:

The Only Strategy Left for Democrats, The Cut.
“Govern like you won, winners.” I think about this line…all the time.

The Road to Terfdom, Lux.

Airbnb Is Spending Millions of Dollars to Make Nightmares Go Away, Bloomberg.

The Pain Was Unbearable. So Why Did Doctors Turn Her Away?, Wired.

The Murders Down the Hall, NY Mag.

As a Black Man in America, I Feel Death Looming Every Day, NYT.

Britney Spears Was Never in Control, The Cut.

Lab-grown meat is supposed to be inevitable. The science tells a different story., The Counter.

On the Internet, We’re Always Famous, The New Yorker.

I Canceled My Birthday Party Because of Omicron, The Atlantic.

How Coffin Flop’s Coffins Got Flopped, Vulture.

It Is Unconscionable That The Gay Community Has Ostracized Me Simply Because I Was Born A Cop, Defector.

And the thing I’m personally most proud of from 2021: Shantay, You Pay: Inside the Heavy Financial Burden of Going On ‘Drag Race’. 🎆

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Tomatoes!

I’ve had tomatoes on my mind since a friend shared this New Yorker cartoon that has the caption, “Summer’s here. Do you want to start talking incessantly about tomatoes or corn?”

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A post shared by The New Yorker (@newyorkermag)

While I don’t truly love tomatoes like some people do, I realized there’s a handful of tomato-centric recipes that I really like, and that I figured are worth re-upping as tomato season approaches!

First, there’s this Claire Lower/Lifehacker post that is nothing short of life-changing: Marinate Your Tomatoes for Extra Flavorful BLTs. I can’t say with 100% confidence that this will make even tomato-haters like tomatoes, but I do think if you’re not, like, actively repulsed by tomatoes, this marinade might be enough to get you to a place of real enjoyment. I made a batch of these last night and even though the tomatoes I got aren’t even that good, they were still great! (I’m extra thrilled because I just bought a bottle of the much-loved Kewpie mayo, making these BLTs even more special.)

Next, up: Nora Ephron’s tomato sauce, via Kelsey Miller/A Cup of Jo. After I read this for the first time, I went on a farmers market trek to find the perfect tomatoes, and when I finally secured them and made the recipe, it did not disappoint. I’m looking forward to making this one in August…it’s not time just yet.

Moving on to cherry tomatoes…I love the roasted tomato, feta, and chickpea mix in this recipe.

Finally, if you can’t choose between tomatoes or corn, I humbly suggest NYT Cooking’s summer shrimp scampi with tomatoes and corn. We use canned corn for this, and have made it without the shrimp on several occasions, and always get great results. 🍅

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The best things I published in 2020

Photo of laptop by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

As the year comes to an end, I wanted to share some of the work I’m most proud of! Here are some of my faves:

• The Answer to All Your Social Distancing Loophole Questions Is No

• A Beginner's Guide for 'Straight' Women Who Want to Act on Queer Feelings

• How to Talk to Relatives Who Care More About Looting Than Black Lives

• Self-Care Tips for Black People Who Are Really Going Through It Right Now

• 'RHOP' and the Hypocrisy of 'Your Behavior Is Bad for Black Women'

• 11 Tiny Pride Floats to Help You Celebrate This Year

• If You’re Already Dreading Winter, Here Are Some Small Ways to Prepare Now

• Love/Hate Reads: 'He's Just Not That Into You,' Revisited

And my book! 💻

Earlier: The best things I read in 2020.

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The best things I read in 2020

Photo of phone by Mel Poole on Unsplash

In my mind, I read very little this year besides news articles, tweets, and Notes app apologies from canceled girl bosses. But when I checked my “best of 2020” tag in Pocket over the weekend, I was surprised/happy to discover that I actually read quite a bit of good shit on the internet this year! So here, in no particular order, are my 2020 favorites:

This Is Not the Apocalypse You Were Looking For, Wired.

Do DC Renters Who Are Evicted Know About Their Court Dates?, DCist.

‘I apologize to God for feeling this way.’, Washington Post.

The Soft Butch That Couldn’t (Or: I Got COVID-19 in March and Never Got Better), Autostraddle.

Coronavirus, Charity, and the Trolley Problem, Crooked Media.

The N95 shortage America can’t seem to fix, Washington Post.

A Failure, But Not Of Prediction, Slate Star Codex.

What Did Emile Weaver Know?, ELLE.
Content note: this is a pretty harrowing article about the death of a newborn.

Tear Gas Doesn’t Deploy Itself, The New Republic.

You Want a Confederate Monument? My Body Is a Confederate Monument, The New York Times.

My Mustache, My Self, NYT Magazine.

The Consequences of Your Actions, Design Mom.

The Darkness Where the Future Should Be, The New York Times.

How hard will the robots make us work?, The Verge.

Eating for Two, The Cut.

Learning to Swim Taught Me More Than I Bargained For, NYT Magazine.

Applying for Unemployment Is My New Full-Time Job, The Cut.

How Salon Shutdowns Are Disrupting Black Women's Haircare, Jezebel.

Dear Fuck-Up: My Close Friend Is Being Radicalized On the Internet and I Don’t Know What to Do, Jezebel.

Apparently, I’m Too Fat to Ski, The Cut.

The very real, totally bizarre bucatini shortage of 2020, Grub Street. ✨

Also: The best things I published in 2020.

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This tinsel is a pretty good way to spend $15

One of the unexpected winners of the at-home birthday celebration I threw for my girlfriend a couple of weeks ago was the pack of metallic tinsely curtains ($15.99 for two silver and two gold on Amazon) I bought.

Each curtain is approximately the width of a door and fairly long/tall, with a horizontal adhesive strip at the top; I put three over the window/door to the terrace, and one over the bedroom door, and they genuinely made the space feel different and celebratory.

In fact, we liked them so much that we got a second pack to use for the “office holiday party” that we had on Tuesday night.

The curtains flutter and reflect light in a really nice way, and you actually don’t need to do anything else to make them shine. But if you want to take things up a notch, you could turn on a mini LED party light. (We used the one that came in a company swag bag my girlfriend received a couple of months ago, but you can get a similar one for $16.99 on Amazon.)

Even though you can see some window showing behind the curtains in these photos, they look great and plenty thick IRL. (But if you wanted to make them appear thicker, you could easily double them up.)

We also kept them up for our “supercouch” (aka air mattress inflated in front of the couch) movie day.

I was pleasantly surprised by how much delight/novelty the curtains provided; in this bleak year, it’s always nice when a small thing actually helps quite a bit. If you’re a New Year’s Eve person and want to do something to mark the occasion while also being safe, or if someone in your household has a birthday coming up, these are totally worth it.

Get the gold and silver four-pack from Amazon for $15.99. (They also come in a bunch of other colors, like this pretty rose gold.) ✨

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This is the only store-bought hot chocolate mix I recognize

After trying a bunch of store-bought hot chocolate mixes last year and being extremely disappointed by all of them, my gf and I finally came across one that we ended up loving: Lake Champlain traditional hot chocolate mix.

I meant to write about it at the time, but never got around to it — and then remembered yesterday, when I came across the pics on my phone. It’s just, like, a perfect classic hot chocolate that you make with hot milk.

We discovered it at Whole Foods, but ordered more directly from the Lake Champlain website (where it’s $13 for 16 ounces). It’s also available from Amazon ($14.22 for 16 ounces).

And if you want to make something from scratch, my friend Jess’s hot chocolate recipe has been my go-to for years! I’ve actually got plans to make it (minus the booze, because I can currently only handle a thimble full of liquor) this weekend. ☃️

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