Heather Haddad

I was considering deleting my blog because twitter has ruined my attention span and I am now only able to communicate in less than 140 characters. But then I began to look over my old posts, and I realized, I can’t rob the world of my hilarity! Some of my posts were so funny and I enjoyed looking over them so I thought, hey, even if it’s just for my own posterity, I’ll keep this thing around. Maybe my dog will want to read it to remember me when I die.

One thing I was stunned by is how quickly things have changed for us. Some of these posts, just over a year old have really illustrated how far my business, Fumee, has come! I read posts about how I was working a zillion hours a week until 3 in the morning, some times even sleeping at Fumee. I whined about not having any help, no employees, no life, no time to even clean my house. There were lots of posts about how stressed out I was all of the time.

But now fast forward to today… well, I made vegan sloppy joes today. And I cuddled with my dog. I watched the first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. I did Kenpo X (yes, I’m a month into the P90X work out program!). I did some work, sure, but really, how things have changed!

I turned 28 this year. Anthony and I are celebrating our 3rd anniversary this month. Fumee has now been open a year and a half. We have four, count ‘em, FOUR, employees (ah, it was only a year ago, to the month, that I could only afford one employee for only one day a week!). Ralph has left Fumee on a day to day basis, and I am down to only four days a week there. I’ve also landed some sweet consulting work lately. So things are good, which isn’t to say I don’t still have stressful days or that Fumee is making me so much money I’m swimming naked in it, but there’s PROGRESS. And it’s tangible. I have my life back! And that makes me happy.

I’ve also recently launched my new business, E-Content Creators, and inspired by my new consulting gig, I’ve turned this web site into a static post about my consulting work, which means you now have to click to get to the blog part. Consulting is something I really enjoy doing, and who knows, it may turn into another business for me!

Another thing I noticed while reading my blog was how my New Year’s resolutions are going. I’m happy to say they are going very well. I’ve finally dedicated myself to working out and eating well with P90X and I’m seeing great results. If I’m brave enough I may post my before and after pictures up here (I’m even frowning and looking depressed in the before pictures, just like on the infomercial!)

Well, this is well over 140 characters and I’m starting to see steam coming out of my finger tips as I type. So, I bid you adieu until the next time I randomly decide to post something. If you’re jonesing for some Haddad, you can always read my husband’s blog, he’s much better at updating than I.

I like to make new year’s resolutions because I belive setting goals is an important step to achievement! I also like to take the opportunity to review my prior year and see if I’ve made any progress in my life towards my ultimate life goals.

Last year’s resolutions were:

1. To figure out a good work/life balance so I can enjoy my time off instead of stressing out, and still get everything done that I’d like

2. To go to the gym 3 days a week

I think that I have accomplished #1. Last year at this time, I wrote a blog saying: “I am really struggling with balancing my life. Yesterday, I saw my husband for 45 minutes. I was at Fumee working from noon until 3 AM and came back the next day at 10 AM. I am overwhelmed with the amount of work I have to do, and am frustrated with not seeing the fruits of this labor.”

Things are much better now. We have an employee, and I get one day off a week, sometimes even two! I also don’t have to clock as many hours as I used to. Life’s pretty chill now: in fact, I actually feel guilty sometimes for not being more stressed out!

Resolution #2 was pretty hit or miss through out the year. Which brings me to this year’s resolutions:

Personal:

#1 to take the 10:30 AM yoga and pilates classes at my gym 4x/week

#2 to stick to a diet…it’s about time.

#3 to visit my mom! I haven’t seen her in over a year! I see my dad and sister a lot since my sister visits every summer and my dad and I always go on cigar trips together, but I miss my mommy!

#4 to finish the pile of books on my nightstand that are half read. Amongst them: Anna Karenina, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, The Courage to Be Rich, and Grimm’s Fairy Tales

#5 to get health insurance

#6 to consolidate and begin repayments on my student loans

#7 to save up for a down payment on a house

Then I have some business goals, but I have decided to keep those off the blogosphere for now.

All in all, 2009 was successful for me. I feel that I am better off at the beginning of 2010 than I was at the beginning of 2009. Business is strong, sales are up, tips are up, and time off has increased. In 2010 I hope to see some really great things out of Fumee. I predict that 2010 is the year we finally get this all figured out and running smoothly, as well as the year that we make some great strides towards financial security.

PS, I know some of you have been worried about my cancer situation. My results came back better than expected, but still conclusive for pre-cancer. I do have to have a surgical procedure but the good news is I’ve caught it early and I’ll live. =)

Today has not been a very fun day. Because of a series of abnormal pap smears, most recently one with high grade abnormalities (the worst you can get), I had four biopsies on my cervix and I will find out in 10 days if they are pre-cancerous or cancer (or as I will now call it, “The Cance”). At the very least, I will need a LEEP (Loop Electrosurgical Excision Procedure)  procedure, which just sounds like a barrel of monkeys! I’m a little nervous and stressed, although I know I’ll be fine because we’re catching it pretty early. I think I’m mostly stressed because as a small business owner, I don’t have health insurance and I’m afraid of the bills that will soon be rolling in. Anyways, this serves as a good reminder for women to get their annual paps and to get the Gardasil vaccine so you can avoid what I am going through. Wish me luck, and if you want to help, buy some cigars from Fumee so I can pay those doctor bills.

For over a year now, I’ve been having a dull pain in my upper back, just on one side. It was annoying, but bearable. For the last two weeks, the pain has also manifested in my hip on that same side, and this pain is sharp, shooting and crampy. For the last two to three days, it’s been constant and nearly unbearable. I can’t stand up at work for long periods of time, I have to keep sitting down, and at times the pain hurts so much I want to cry. Last night I made my husband go with me to walgreens at 2 AM to get icy hot and heating pads. I don’t know what to do about this! Is it muscular and therefore I need an acupuncturist or masseuse? Is it skeletal meaning chiropractor or an actual doctor?

I did try a deep tissue massage on Friday and the therapist said my entire right side was in spasm. My back felt better for most of the day after my treatment, but started hurting again that evening. Obviously daily massages are not in the budget. Chiropractors and acupuncturists are sort of hokey, I’m not sure I even believe in either of those things, which leaves a real doctor. Unfortunately I don’t have health insurance and I don’t want to establish a pre-existing condition since, as a small business owner, I won’t be a part of a group plan once I do get health insurance.

So my current plan is to take ibuprofen daily and to go on a diet. I think that losing some weight will help my back feel better as the pain seemed to start when I gained some weight. Hopefully this will work as the pain is making me incredibly irritable. Every single thing has pissed me off today. Now leave me alone while I drink my coffee and sulk.

So after my feta failure I decided to try again by doing as much as possible differently. Instead of goat’s milk, I used cow, instead of buttermilk culture, I used yogurt, etc… and this time GREAT SUCCESS!

Here is the cheese in the curd stage, which is basically gelatinus milk. This right after I cut the curds up:

Close up of the curds:

Amazingly,  you take these gooey curds and drain them in cheesecloth over night, and you get this:

Heck, yeah! That’s feta like, baby! The next step is to slice the feta, and then to salt all the surfaces and let it weep out its whey for three days straight. Here is where I messed up a little. Every time I drained out the whey (probably 9 times), I re-salted. I think that was an error as the final product is too salty. After 3 days have passed, you brine the feta in water and this much salt.

Holy cow, that’s a lot of salt! The cheese then sets in brine for up to four weeks. You can eat it anytime, but the longer it ages the more crumbly it gets and the stronger the feta tastes. This is a feta and bean burrito I made last night after about a week of brining:

At this point, the texture is pretty darn good. As I mentioned, my problem is my feta is hella salty. Next time I make it, I will make three changes: I will use goats and cows milk mixed, I will cook the curds a bit more, and I will skip the salting for 3 days step and go right to the brine.

I’ve found dozens of feta recipies, and they are all different. In many ways, substantially. It’s interesting that there’s no one way to do it. I think the third time will be the charm for me! Next up, I may try my hand at brie or cheddar.

Freaking feta.

I decided to foray into making semi-soft cheese. Feta, one of my favorite cheeses, was naturally my first choice. Sadly, it turned into a total disaster. I tried using goat’s milk (which, by the way, does NOT taste good raw) but I accidentally bought half as much as I needed (even if I had realized my mistake, I would have still only bought half as much, as a gallon equivalent of goat’s milk runs about $16 at Whole Foods). Anyways, I was forced to half the recipe, and it was either that, or the fact that I accidentally heated my milk up 40 degrees too high on my second attempt, that made my cheese nothing more than a pot of slightly thickened milk.

I’m bummed. I’ve never failed at cheese making before. I am going to try again tonight, but this time with cow’s milk, as it’s cheaper if I fail.

Freaking feta. Why do you have to be like that?

Tomorrow I am off for South Padre. I have never seen the Texas shore, so I am excited. We’re going with two of our customer/friends, Tim and Laurie! I’m looking forward to a couple days of beer on the beach and tacos across the border in Mexico.

This week I went to Houston and saw a cigar shop we might buy. While I was there we checked out the beer house. This guy drank a lot of beer:

I wanted to go to NASA while we were there, but we didn’t have enough time. Maybe next trip! Anyways, there’s some very exciting stuff happening on the business end of things, but I can’t say anything for another couple of days. Stay tuned!

We recently got netflicks, and I went a little crazy. See, I decided this would be a great time to catch up on all those “classic” movies I’ve never seen. So I would add something to my queue and netflicks would recommend something complimentary, which I would also add, and the next thing you know I’m sitting at home with three movies in my hand.

Deer Hunter, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull. 2 Oscar winners, 2 Scorcese movies, and all starring Robert De Niro.

I was dreading watching every single one of them. It took me over a week, and normally I can blow through three movies in two days. I started with Taxi Driver, which was alright, but slow. Then I went for Deer Hunter, which I fast forwarded through at least of third of (I mean HOW LONG can a wedding scene actually go on for, geeze!). I didn’t really like Deer Hunter, but the Russian Roulette scenes were pretty cool. Last night I finished Raging Bull and it was the best of the lot. I actually liked this one, even thought it was also excruciatingly long.

I’m not sure watching classic movies is really worth it. Maybe I was better off in my oblivion.

Luckily, I’ve had some relief in the form of classic chick flick. For my birthday my Grandma sent me Anne of Green Gables. I used to watch this when she would babysit me when I was young. I remember loving it and last night I staid up until 5 AM watching it. It’s as good as I remember.

One of the presents I received for my birthday was The Home Creamery by Kathy Farrell-Kingsley. I have mastered making mozzarella and ricotta in the past, but I’ve been wanting to try some new things and eventually move on to the much more complex hard cheeses. This book doesn’t get that far- it ends at semi-soft, like feta, presumably so that there’s something for the sequel.

Last night I broke in my book by making homemade butter (super easy, it’s exactly like making whipped cream, only you keep whipping until your whipped cream is butter!). The butter is creamy and nice and tastes better than store bought. I can’t decide if it’s any cheaper than store bought, though. One benefit is that once you form butter, liquid seperates out and this liquid is called Buttermilk, so you get two products in one, I guess! The buttermilk tasted great, like cream without the fatty mouth-feel. Not at all like the sour store-bought concoction I remember drinking at my grandmas when I was a kid!

My next task was yogurt and yogurt cheese. Yogurt is simply milk heated up with some “starter” (a little bit of already-made yogurt) added in. Then it’s incubated for 6-12 hours (basically it’s just thrown in a thermos in a pan of hot water during that time). It takes a long time, but it’s mostly just waiting around. The longer you incubate, the sharper the yogurt is. I stopped at 6 hours and I think that’s pretty good- it is still a bit sour, but much creamier on the palate than store bought yogurt. Maybe next time I will try the full 12 hours and see how sour it is! I have to say I LOVE my yogurt, it is definently better tasting than store bought, and it comes in at about half the price, too.

Since I made yogurt and had to use store bought for my starter, I decided to use the rest of the store bought yogurt to make yogurt cheese. This was the easiest of all! You simply dump the yogurt in a strainer lined with mutiple layers of cheesecloth, place over a bowl and leave it over night. Periodically you dump out the bowl which becomes full of the whey as the yogurt is draining out. In the morning, stir in a teaspoon of salt, and you have a delicious spread! It’s very much the consistency of soft cream cheese, but has a nice sour taste sort of like goat cheese. This stuff is awesome. I am going to try it with non or low fat yogurt next, and if the results are the same it will be a very nice low-fat cheese substitute! My book recommends mixing yogurt cheese with mayo and peanut butter to cut the calories, but I don’t know about that idea!

My next task is to buy some vegetable based rennet online and tackle feta. I am also going to give sour cream and cream fresh a shot. I love making my own dairy products because I am just amazed at how one product, milk, can make so many different delicious things just depending on how you heat it up! I asked Anthony if we could get a cow, but he told me they have to be pregnant to give milk, which makes sense, but I never thought of it before. Keeping a cow preggers permanently sounds pretty hard.

If you want to try making your own dairy products, get this book! It’s a good beginner book, and hopefully they’ll come out with a hard-cheese sequel soon. I can’t say it enough, making your own dairy products is SUPER EASY! Once you try it you’ll never go with store bought again!

Today is my 27th birthday! Boy, I am getting old! It’s turning out to be a great day already, one of my customers sent me cookies from Tiff’s Treats and a birthday balloon to me at work. Delish! I am working, but I am drinking Mimosas with my dog at my side, so it’s perfectly lovely. My dear friend Sarah sent me fandango dollars which I will use to go see BRUNO tomorrow and Harry Potter next week. What a great day!

Tonight I am going out for my first birthday in THREE YEARS with more than one person in attendance! My first year in Texas Anthony was away on business and it was just me and my sister. My second year we can’t even remember what did, but it was just me and Anthony. But THIS year will be awesome. I am going out with my favorite Fumee customers and good friends for some hip-hop happy hour and then Thai food. And I took tomorrow off so I’ll get to sleep in to boot!

YAY FOR BIRTHDAYS!