EAT | Mushroom Risotto

One of my favorite things to eat is Risotto. Mushroom Risotto to be more specific. It's such a simple dish, but so heart-warming and cozy. I love to eat it just with a poached egg on top. And I have a fool-prof recipe, that you can make with just some pantry staples. 

- 100g of arborio rice (or any other short grain rice)

- 150g of sliced mushrooms (fresh is better, but canned also work)

- 1 Shallot

- 1 garlic

- 1 tea spoon of chopped parsley

- 1 table spoon of olive oil

- 1 table spoon of butter

- 1 cup of shredded cheese (mozzarella, emmental, parmesan -- whatever you have on hand)

- 1 Knorr Natura Chicken Stock Pot -- I don't like to use stock cubes, but if that's all you have, do it.

- 500 ml of water

- Tree table spoons of white wine

- Salt and Pepper

Start by heating up the water to dissolve your Knorr Chicken Stock Pot in. Just drop the content of the chicken stock pot on hot water and stir for a minute until it's fully dissolved.

Move on to finely chopping the shallot, the garlic and the parsley.

On a wide pan, on medium heat, add your butter and your olive oil and wait until the butter is almost melted. Add the shallot and the parsley. When the shallot is translucid add the garlic, the mushrooms and the pepper. Let the mushrooms cook for maybe 5 min, string once in a while so that nothing burns. When you feel like your mushrooms are cooked -- I always taste them -- add the rice. Keep string, and let the rice cook and absorb all the yummy-ness going on on that pot. Once you have pretty much no liquid, add the white wine and keep stirring The trick here is that you always need to stir the rice because string helps releasing all the starches that make a super creamy risotto. When all the wine is absorbed and you can't smell alcohol anymore, add two ladles of the stock to the rice and stir. Wait until most of the liquid is absorbed, add two more ladles of stock, and keep repeating this process until the rice is al dente or until you run of of stock -- (you wont tho, 500ml of stock is more than enough). When you feel like the rice is cooked, add the cheese. Add as much as you want, and as much as you like. There's no such thing as too much cheese.

Right at the end, taste the rice to check it for salt. Sometimes the stock or the cheese is really salty and you don't need to add any more salt, other times you may need to add some salt, so I always wait until the end to do it. And it's ready.

OSCARS RED CARPET 2019 TOP 3

For me these were the 3 best dresses on the red carpet this year. I love the simplistic elegance while being sexy and slightly avant-gard. 

-- Kiki Layne in Versace --

-- Charlize Theron in Dior -- 

 

-- Amy Adams in Versace --

RANT | HBO Portugal

Finally FINALLY we have HBO in Portugal. And oh my god I've waited for this for a really long time.

HBO is a streaming service, much like Netflix, that produces a bunch of movies, documentaries, and tv-shows. Yes, the one where Game of Thrones, Westworld, and Sex and The City come from. Ever wonder why these shows aren't on Netflix? Well, it's because they belong to the competition. HBO works exactly the same way as Netflix does -- it's pretty much the same thing, actually. The price is 4.99€/month, and the first month is free. You can add up to 5 devices to your account but you can only watch on two screens at the same time -- which is actually better than the cheapest Netflix option! They claim to have 4500 movies and shows, including Game of Thrones, True Detective, Westworld, and the 90's classics The Sopranos and Sex and The City -- which I am dying to re-watch. 

And yes, the last season of Game of Thrones will be available on the Portuguese App at the exact same time as it is in the US, so no more spoilers and no more having to wait for the next day to see the new episode!

Sounds too good to be true? Well in fact, it is... But only if you are an iOS user. They don't have any app available on the App Store for iPad or iPhone and it is not possible to see the contents on the website trough safari -- if you try to open any content, it says that you need too download the app -- that doesn't exist -- and it has a link that does nothing. So yeah. So much hype for nothing. They even had an awesome lunch-party, with a bunch of famous people -- that probably all own iPhones and that can't see their contents -- ironic much? -- From what they say on their website they don't give you the possibility to watch on an iOS mobile device -- only android. I wanted to subscribe but now I won't because I am always on the go and I like to watch stuff on my iPhone. I subscribed anyway, and Ive been watching on my laptop. But if they don't come up soon with an app for iOS I will just stick with Netflix.

EAT | Dear Breakfast, Lisbon

Ok, I’ll admit. I’m into brunches. I absolutely love breakfast food and I to able to have - a lot of it — for lunch and not be judged it’s awesome. Eggs, Croissants, Cheese, Jam and Butter, all together, that’s my jam.

This time, my love for brunch took me to this lovely coffee in São Bento — Dear Breakfast.

Dear Breakfast has been on my list forever. It’s one of the first Brunch places I’ve hear about. And people talk really good about their eggs Benedict and their pancakes! I was drying to try it and last weekend I finally had the opportunity to visit it.

Dear Breakfast is small, like many of these trendy bunch places, but it didn’t had a 45 min line at the door -- They sat us down right away. Their menu is filled with all these different amazing things, but to keep it simple they only have one brunch menu that is designed to make you drunkenly roll out of your table. Yes, drunkenly. Because this menu includes three drinks that can be plain old orange juice, a Bloody Mary or -- my favorite -- a sparkly Mimosa. Trust me you can get DRUNK at 11 AM. And yes, it's awesome! If you follow my IG you may have seen some drunken stories. The menu also comes with a yummy french flaky croissant, perfectly toasted bread and they also give you a little dish of butter and jam for you to put eat as much as you want. The brunch menu gives you the option to chose between eggs or pancakes, but being the fat-ass I am, I asked for both and just payed the pancakes separately. I had their famous eggs Benedict and their sweet pancakes, with chocolate and fruit.

The croissant, the toast, the butter and the jam, where good. But you know, it's
bread. It feels you up so much. But the eggs. THE EGGS WERE AMAZING. They were perfectly poached, laid on top of some nice yummy crispy bacon, and covered with the most delicious zingy hollandaise sauce. I could go trough life only eating these eggs, really. They were so good. I asked for a cappuccino -- that was yummy, but all cappuccinos are yummy. And I had the three mimosas that I was entitled for. At the end we asked for the pancakes and that took a while to come, but since we had booze, we were fine. And it was so worth the wait. The pancakes were light but tall and fluffy, and they were covered with a rich dark chocolate that was so tasty and that just went perfectly with the sweetness of the fruits. Just perfect. My mouth is watering just from thinking about them. 

This was not not a cheap brunch -- well, but to be fair when is Brunch cheap? In fact, you could eat a full meal in a good restaurant with the money we paid, but it's worth it. You will be full, and drunk, that's for sure. And if you can splurge, do it. Do it once in a while. Go to one of these instagramable places and have cool yummy food. It makes you feel like a million bucks.

GIVEAWAY | EMBELLEZE NOVEX MY CURLS MOVIE STAR!

Guys! Let's just take a minute and look at this. This is definitely the coolest PR box I've ever received. Really cool. Novex is really stepping up their game.

This is Novex's New Line -- My Curls Movie Star -- and it's design to give you Hollywood worthy curls. The line is composed by a Shampoo, Conditioner, Deep Hair Mask and a Leave«-In Conditioner, that Embelleze kindly sent me to try. Much as the other products in this line, this Conditioner promotes long-lasting modeling, leaving your curls more flexible and moister resistant! Because, now, with the help of these products taking care of your curly hair does not have to be a DRAMA or a HORROR movie!

Because I don't want any more curls in my hair -- in fact I'm always trying to get rid of mine! -- I'm giving this away to one of my blog followers! That's right! We haven't had a blog giveaway in a while and I think it's time to shake things up around here.

To be qualified to win, all you need to do is to:
1 - Follow my blog via GFC. To do so, you have to look on my side bar (right over on that side --->) for the the thingy with a bunch of small squared pictures. Have you found it? GOOD! Just click on follow, it will probably ask you to log in with your google account, you do that, and BAM you are following my blog. This doesn't have any impact in your life! You won't reverencie emails or spam or anything. Don't worry. And it will just help me grow. If you already follow my blog, you can skip this step.
2 - Leave a comment right here on this post, telling me that you are in.

And that's it.
The giveaway it's open worldwide. And you have until February 28th at 23.59h to participate!
Good luck!

Best Eggs Benedict in Lisbon (?)

I have a mission --  to find the best Eggs Benedict in Lisbon. I've tried a few, but my favorites are the one from Dear Breakfast -- full post coming soon, with tons of pictures. Perfectly poached eggs, with crispy bacon on an English muffin, covered a really velvety, tangy hollandaise sauce. Very simple, and very yummy.

Where should I go next? Where can I eat the best Eggs Benedict in Lisbon?

Super Bowl Halftime Show 2019

Did you see this year's Super Bowl Halftime Show? Omg, It was dreadful. It lacked soul and passion! It was just dull.. plain old boring. I was so disappointed. I love Maroon 5, and Adam Lavine is one of my top 5 celebrity crushes, but his performance was so underwhelming. Even the line up they chose to perform was not that special.

The show it's self just failed to impress. There was no awesome light effects or people flying through the air, the dynamic between Maroon 5 and Big Boi and Travis Scoot was flat, there were no connection between Adam and the audience... It was so bad. I think this was the worst half-time show of the last years. 

They have done so well before -- remember when they did the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show in 2015? That was so amazing. So energetic, so charismatic. What happen Adam, WHAT HAPPEN?

The only great moment of the show, was when Adam was singing Moves like Jagger, and right after that part where he says 'I swear I'll behave', he takes off his shirt. That was good. But Adam's abs weren't enough to save the show. Oh, and don't get me started on the Sponge Bob thing! I mean, the main attractions of Maroon 5’s concert were characters not on stage, and not even in the stadium. I love Sponge Bob but it didn't make any sense. I feel like they were trying to add a whimsical character to the show to make it somehow memorable -- remember left shark from Katy Perry's 2015 half time show? Last summer, when I saw her live, SHE HAD A THE LEFT-SHARK ON STAGE! No one is ever forgetting that one.

REVIEW | NIVEA Make up remover for the shower -- DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY

A while ago, while I was picking up my regular bathroom supplies I noticed a product that I'd never seen before. The NEW yellow label caught my eye and made me really curious about this product --  A Makeup removing product to use IN THE SHOWER. Being the lazy girl that I am, I never take off my make up before getting into the shower. I just go straight in, take a shower like I normal would -- this includes washing my face with whatever face wash I'm using at the time. And usually when I get out and dry my face with a towel, all my make up ends up on that towel because the face wash didn't really did a good job removing it. We've all been there, don't lie! On a daily basis I don't wear a lot of make up -- just concealer, brow-stuff and mascara. And usually getting out the mascara is what gives me more trouble. If it's not completely off it goes all over my towel.  And make up is so hard to remove from clothes that I absolutely thought that this product could be a life safer.

The instructions on the bottle make it sound pretty straight forward -- they suggest you should apply the product to your face directly with circular motions, rinse it thoroughly and all the make up is gone.

Well ... honestly that didn't quite work for me. Yes, it release some of the make up but nothing that my regular face-wash wouldn't do. It didn't to any magic with the mascara -- it ran all around my eyes, giving me pretty huge panda eyes...

But dying to make this product work, the next day I decided to try it out with a sponge that I often use to exfoliate my skin. I squirted some product onto the sponge and tried to remove my make up with with it. And yes, this got me some better results -- most of the make up was gone, and it got transferred to the sponge, and no panda eyes. But I don't think this success is the work of the product as much as it is the work of the sponge, because I think I would get exactly the same result with any other product combined with that sponge. 

Not everything is bad. As all Nivea products, it smells really nice, it has a hint of that classical blue tin Nivea cream smell.  I love the texture, it's something in between a cream and gel, super smooth and easy to apply.

The new label actually is misleading. That label, combined with the fact that I've never seen any ads for this product made me think that this was in fact a new thing on the market, but no. After some research I found some reviews from 2016 but I'm pretty sure that I'd never heard of this before! I think that this product never worked as intend and Nivea just kept it on the selves so that suckers like me would still buy it. It sounded too good to be true. Don't waste your money.