An Epic Moving Sale - This Saturday and Sunday
For more information on specific items and directions, visit danielkonold.com/sale
I look forward to seeing you all there…
The Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
These past two years, I’d like to think that I’ve perfected my chocolate chip cookie recipe. I made a batch almost every week and gave them out to various friends and family. The only negative feedback I got was from my mother, who commented, “Too many chocolate chips!” Please disregard - everyone else has loved them. People have even done unimaginable things to get me to tell them the recipe. And now, I’m baring all.
My cookies aren’t your typical crunchy, crisp, dip-and-soak-in-the-milk, kind of cookie, either. They’re the soft, gooey, melt-in-your-mouth-not-in-your-hand, kind. And I will miss them greatly.
BUT… Now that you all know how to make them yourselves, I expect loads to be sent my way in China. Please don’t forget.
Ingredients:
1 cup butter, softened (not melted)
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 pinches of cinnamon
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 generous squeezes of fresh honey
2 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups of chocolate chips (my professional taste testers never could tell when I used the cheap ones)
Preheat oven to 375F. In a large bowl, put in the softened butter, sugar, brown sugar, and cinnamon. Mix by hand. Make sure all the butter is smoothed out and that the sugar dissolves together until creamy. Add eggs, vanilla, and honey. Mix in by hand until all is incorporated nicely. Pour in flour. Sprinkle baking soda and salt throughout. Gradually stir it together by hand, until all the flour is mixed in. (Note to self: this could get messy.) Add chocolate chips. Place balls of cookie dough onto ungreased cookie sheets and bake for 8 minutes or until the edges are a nice golden brown. They will finish while cooling. Eat them right away for the best results.
Some might say the secret ingredients are honey and cinnamon; I say the secret ingredient is love.
You’re welcome.
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of China…
It’s official.
I only have two weeks of normal life left.
And China will be here by the end of the year, with a nice little journey along the way:
June 11 - August 7
Global Expeditions asked me to lead and direct another trip this summer - I gladly accepted! I’m taking a group totaling about 150 teenagers to Germany, Czech Republic Brownsville, TX, Mexico, and Italy. In Mexico, we’ll be building houses. In Italy, we’re going to be working with YWAM and Operation Mobilization doing mostly sports camps in the surrounding cities and villages of Herrnhut, Torino, and Rome.
August 13ish - September 30ish
Working a temp job somewhere around the world… I’ve narrowed it down to 3 options. Feel free to give feedback! 1. Working on a salmon boat in Alaska. (anyone have connections?) 2. Working on an organic farm in Sweden. (http://www.wwoof.se/) 3. Teaching [English] somewhere in South America
First week of October
‘Back home for some very important dates and to say my “last” goodbyes.
China
People have asked what they can do:
1. Write to me
This is a very surreal part of my life and I’m definitely questioning and second-guessing a lot of decisions. A little encouragement would be greatly appreciated!
2. Come to my Epic Yard Sale / Open House on June 6 & 7, 2009, 10am - 3pm
Write this on your calendars now! This will be my last hurrah before I leave the country. I need to get rid of all of my stuff! Come over to my house and take away my old junk… You might even find some treasures in there. Buy a little memoir from my life to always remind you of me. ‘Not looking for money, just a chance to get my stuff into the right hands. I wouldn’t even mind you offering to take things to the thrift store for me. :) Location: 2933 Park Ave. S, Minneapolis, MN 55407 (map) (If you’d like to help out with this, let me know!)
3. Open a free online savings or checking account w/ ING Direct through me
If you use the link that I email you to sign up, and you deposit at least $250 up front, you’ll get $25 free and I’ll get $10 for referring you. How simple is that? It’s really a slick, secure online banking system and I’ve been using them for over 6 years… Their interest rates aren’t too shabby either! Note: this is limited to the first 25 people, meaning up to $250 for me. If interested, send me an email and I’ll send you a “referral” link.
That is all.
I probably won’t have time for a cup of tea with all of you before I leave, but you’re welcome to try. Also, you’re all welcome to stop by my house on June 6 or 7! Thanks for everything!
Pak Zam Zam
If you’re in the mood for Pakistani food (and when are you not?), my friends and I found the perfect place. For this “birthday” dinner, we visited Pak Zam Zam on Central in NE Minneapolis. It’s completely worth it and highly recommended! The first thing we noticed, of course, was the décor - bright bright bright orange walls… it made us feel just like we were in Pakistan! Note: I’ve never been, but I’ve heard.
This local gem is owned by a man named Saud and his wife, with minimal staff. In my mind, this makes it a true, ethnic, mom ‘n pop shop. They cook all the food themselves, use paper plates and cups to keep the prices low, and are relying mostly on word-of-mouth to keep their little restaurant running.
They’ll have no problem keeping their restaurant running if their wonderful cooking stays the same! The food was absolutely delectable. Since we had a fairly large group, Saud came and helped us order. I’m so thankful he did… we ended up in Pakistan paradise, literally. We had biryani (chicken and rice), bihari kabab (beef on a stick), and chicken karahi (chicken in curry-like sauce). The highlight of the meal for everyone was the parathas bread, hot out of the oven. It made even the complimentary naan seem dry and flavorless. The meal ended with lots of leftovers that kept me and my buddies fed for days, I’m sure.
Oh, and he overheard we were celebrating birthdays, so he gave us three huge take-out boxes of biryani, free of charge. I love how this man thinks! Now that you’re salivating, you’ve discovered what’s for dinner… and it was all under $10 a person.
Maze karein! (For language lovers, that’s bon appetit in Urdu…)
Pak Zam Zam (map)
1839 Central Ave
Minneapolis, MN 55418
(612) 706-1941
Best Places to Buy Vinyl in Minneapolis / St. Paul
The four building blocks of the universe are fire, water, gravel and vinyl.
-Dave Barry
There’s nothing like listening to a Keith Green record…. unless, of course, you’re listening to him on vinyl.
Last year, I just so happened to acquire my parent’s old record player. And it couldn’t have been better timing! It was in fairly good shape, but I decided to get a new needle for it anyways. I found a replacement at the first place I looked, The Needle Doctor in Dinkytown. It was a very friendly place with many knowledgeable helpers. I struck up a conversation with the guy who was ringing me up and we started talking about the best places to find vinyl in the area. He knew many more places than I did, so I asked him for a list.
These places are gold. I’ve browsed most of them. We’re not messing with garage sales or your local Goodwill here - these are the big guns. And yes, it’s true, vinyl sales had an 89% increase last year…
Electric Fetus
(612) 870-9300
2000 4th Ave. S
Minneapolis, MN 55404
Hours: Mon-Fri 9am - 9pm, Sat 9am - 8pm, Sun 11am - 6pm
Genre: All kinds (new & used)
Eclipse Records
(651) 645-7724
1922 University Ave W
St Paul, MN 55104
Hours: Mon 11am-10pm, Tue & Wed 2-10pm, Thur 2-11pm, Fri & Sat 11am-11pm
Genre: All kinds (new & used)
Extreme Noise Records
(612) 824-0100
407 W Lake St.
Minneapolis, MN 55408
Hours: 12-8pm everyday
Genre: Punk Rock, Metal
Fifth Element
(612) 377-0044
2411 Hennepin Ave.
Minneapolis, MN 55405
Hours: Mon-Fri 11am-9pm, Sat 11am-8pm, Sun 11am-6pm
Genre: Hip Hop (new & used)
Hymie’s Vintage Records
(612) 729-8890
3318 E Lake St.
Minneapolis, MN 55406
Hours: Mon-Sat 11am-7pm, Sun 1-6pm
Genre: All kinds (new & used)
Know-Name Records
(612) 869-1070
6009 Portland Ave.
Minneapolis, MN 55417
Hours: Mon-Sat 9:30am-9:30pm, Sun ’til 6:30pm
Genre: Used
Landfill Books & Music
(651) 644-8612
1222 University Ave. W
St. Paul, MN 55104
Hours: Mon-Fri 9am-5pm
Genre: All kinds
Roadrunner Records
(612) 822-0613
4304 Nicollet Ave.
Minneapolis, MN 55409
Hours: Mon-Fri 11am-8pm, Sat 11am-6pm, Sun 12-5pm
Genre: All kinds (rare, vintage, and used)
Treehouse Records, Inc.
(612) 872-7400
2557 Lyndale Ave. S
Minneapolis, MN 55405
Hours: Mon-Fri 11am-8pm, Sat 11am-7pm, Sun 12-6pm
Genre: Rock, Soul, Jazz, R&B (new & used)
Vital Vinyl
(612) 874-8892
3 W 15th St.
Minneapolis, MN 55403
Hours: Mon-Fri 1-9:30pm, Sat-Sun 1-8pm
Genre: Electronic, House, Techno (new & used)
Cheapo Discs
(612) 827-8238
1300 W Lake St.
Minneapolis, MN 55408
Hours: 9am - 12pm Everyday
Genre: All kinds (new & used)
What’s your favorite spot to flip through records? Any luck on craigslist?
Great Music Lives Here
Twenty aught eight was truly a great year for music, regardless of which genre you prefer… Better than ‘07, I think, and close to ‘06. It’s all relative to your music taste, I guess. Tons of wonderful albums came out this year, and many that came out last year become prominent this year.
Even more notably, local music found a very special place in my heart this year… The Minneapolis / St. Paul music scene is fascinating, “the backbone of the area’s counterculture”… (Fodors.com) Even Mpls mayor R.T. Rybak says, “This is a great music town, and you can come in here and find something that is not out of some kind of box or the big chain stores.” (Citypages.com) And living in the city has given me many opportunities to see live music this year - and it hasn’t disappointed.
There are simply too many great venues to enjoy music that I couldn’t possibly get to them all in just a couple years, but I tried. My favorite venue, by far, is the Varsity Theater in Dinkytown. It has a retro feel with excellent sound and lighting systems. It’s also in a great location, walking distance from the Loring Pasta Bar and Annie’s Parlour.
If you’re interested in more of the history of the scene, here’s a great, all-inclusive article on music past here in the cities: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Minnesota And here’s a radio broadcast on the history of rock in Minneapolis: http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/12/24/midday2
Also, don’t forget to tune into The Current on New Year’s Day to hear all the top tunes of the year as voted on by their listeners. It should make for a good day of music-listening. Their annual music poll. Now on to my lists… Most of the web has their “top ten” or whatever, so I just decided to showcase some local gems:
Favorite Local Albums:
Haley Bonar | Big Star (1)(video)
Chris Koza | The Dark, Delirious Morning (1)
Doomtree | Doomtree (video)
Bon Iver | For Emma, Forever Ago (sort-of local)(1)(video)
Jeremy Messersmith | The Silver City (1)(video)
A Night In The Box | Write A Letter (You just have to see them live…)
Atmosphere | When Life Gives You Lemons… (1)(video)
Most-Listend-To Album:
Kanye West | 808s and Heartbreak (only because it took so long to figure out if I liked it or not) (video)
Most-Listened-To Song:
M.I.A. | Paper Planes (video) Fabulously addictive song with a great message… And it was featured in the recent movie, Slumdog Millionaire, one of the best of the year…
Favorite Live Shows I attended:
Haley Bonar acoustic set in the rain @ Mears Park
Fleet Foxes early show @ The Cedar Cultural Center
A Night In The Box @ 331 Club - And they just so happen to be playing here again on New Year’s Eve!
Ra Ra Riot @ 7th St. Entry
The Fiery Furnaces @ The Whole
Black Audience @ “Movies in the Park” at Loring Park
Favorite Radio Station:
(a given…)
89.3 The Current (listen online)
What was your favorite music this year?
Storytellers and their Stories
I got interested in stories and storytelling a few years ago when I first started listening to the This American Life podcast. (I’m sure you’ve all heard of this show before but I hadn’t and was genuinely impressed with the stories they’d share surrounding a certain theme every week.) Three that I distinctly remember are: Break-up, The Ghost of Bobby Dunbar and Act V.
More recently, I’ve been listening to The Moth podcast and TED’s Master Storytellers.
For some reason, I find stories completely fascinating. And it’s not the story itself, many times, but the way in which the storyteller presents it. In translating to real life, I use stories a lot. Whether it’s explaining what “social networking” is to my older co-workers or discipling young people on the mission field, the art of telling stories helps tremendously in getting your point across to your audience.
The local storytelling scene here in Minneapolis seems to be fairly legit as well… A couple of weeks ago, I was able to attend a Story Slam at The Lab Theater in downtown hosted by MPR’s In The Loop. It was great! They had a holiday theme and randomly chose audience members who had signed up to share a story. I videotaped a couple of them, but due to poor battery strength, didn’t get them all. After the show, I looked up a few of them online and discovered most of them were part of a local storytelling collective called Rockstar Storytellers, which I’ll definitely be looking into in the future…
Watch Allegra Lingo share her story or download the entire MP3 of the evening.
May I forever be a student at the feet of storytellers… What’s your favorite story?
My New Favorite T-Shirt, I Bike MPLS
I Bike Mpls.
If you want to be cool like me, you can purchase this shirt at Stroker Ace in South Minneapolis. That’s what [the gifter] said!
And the website that inspires it, ibikempls.com…
The North Minneapolis ATM Story
So, if you hadn’t heard, ATMs in the inner-city are different than the ATMs in the suburbs. I could go into the reasons behind this, but I’ll save that for another time. Last night, I stumbled upon an awkward experience with an “inner-city” ATM in North Minneapolis. See, in Maple Grove, where I grew up, they had ATMs all the over the place - outside, in bank lobbies, even a drive-thru one… not the same in North Minneapolis, though! It’s another world.
I’ve been in the city now for over a year, but I’m obviously still learning the culture. I was on my way to a friend’s house in North and remembered I owed them money. “I’ll just stop at an ATM, get some cash, and all will be fine,” I thought. Or not.
I saw the bank and pulled through the drive-thru tellers, but they didn’t have an ATM. I drove past the lobby door, but still no ATM. It’s a bank, they’ve got to have an ATM, right? Finally, I saw a separate door with a separate room with an ATM sign emblazoned over the entry. Perfect. I parked my car and started walking toward the ATM room. Suddenly, another car quickly parked and a young lady on a cell phone came dashing out toward my destination. She got to the door first, put her little card into the slot next to the door [for some reason], and went in the little room. Someone must have been in a hurry, but did I need a security pass to get in? Weird.
The door was definitely locked and the girl inside wasn’t paying much attention. She was blabbering on her phone, not in a hurry at all. With this extra time, I decided to take in my surroundings. I noticed a sign next to the security card slot that said, “Insert ATM card to enter.” “One person at a time.” Sure enough, I tried sliding my debit card, but it still wouldn’t open… the girl was still in there. She finally made her way to the ATM itself, but started looking confused. She looked at me and gave some hand signals that I interpreted as the ATM being out of order… Great! No cash for me tonight, I guess.
I turned to walk back to my car, but when the lady tried to leave the ATM room, the door. wouldn’t. open.
Umm. What now? I couldn’t leave… she knew that I knew that she was apparently “stuck.” She started knocking on the door, motioning and mouthing to try to open the door with my card. That didn’t work. (A person was already in there, duh! Read the signs, people.) She tried putting her card in and out of the ATM again even though it wasn’t working, but that didn’t do anything either. We stared in awkward silence for at least a few minutes as she continued her phone conversation. It was very awkward.
We tried everything. We tried opening them at the same time, we tried waving our hands in front of the censors, we tried pressing the handicap-door-opener buttons, but nothing worked. If it had continued any longer, it was shaping up to be a pretty good premise for a B-list horror film.
And then she had an idea.
She backed up to the far end of the room, took a runner’s stance, and started reaching for something in her purse. Now - I’ve heard enough stories of crime in North Minneapolis that my mind started going all sorts of speculative places as to what could happen next. :) She pointed for me to back up as well…
Thankfully, though, after I took two steps back, the door unlocked itself, and the lady was able to leave. Supposedly, I was just standing too close to the door. Oops! If I would have left right away, the door would have opened just fine. She casually walked out like nothing extraordinary happened, still chatting on her phone, with no words of thanks for my harrowing efforts… Oh well.
Good practice for moving to another country, eh?
Featured in the Twin Cities Tour Guide
Blake, at Twin Cities Tour Guide, mentioned my choice of the Midtown Global Market as a favorite place in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area in today’s blog post. He’s had some great posts about weird things in the city, lately… I love it! If you’re into finding new things around MSP, then subscribe to his blog!
Also, check out a post I did on the Market last spring: The Penniless Sitar Player (videos)
If you haven’t been there yet, then get on it! I recommend the lunch buffet at the Holy Land Cafe (don’t forget to put a business card in their bowl - I’ve won 3 free meals this way!) and bubble tea from Pham’s Deli… (Trung, the owner, is really gracious to repeat customers).