andifeelfine

…anybody? …anybody?

I hope everyone else’s day has been as splendid as mine. I just can’t get over this beautiful weather! I have been in a nonstop amazing mood since this morning.

I thought I woke up wicked late – it was so light out and I had that groggy “slept-in” feeling – but it was really only 6:30! I caught up on some blogs before strolling out to the kitchen and makin’ up a repeat of the other day. Sorry!

carrot-cake oats

Because I am having an affair with carrot-cake oats, and they will never grow old.

In the mix was oat bran, rolled barley flakes, and wheat bran, brewed coffee & almondmilk, goji berries, 3/4 carrot – grated, cinnamon, nutmeg, ground clove, ginger, vanilla, and a couple slices of ripe nanner.

On the top was chia-acai icing, dates, crystallized ginger, ground flax, Justin’s Maple Almond Butter, drizzle coconut butter, strawberry-pom jam, and the rest of the carrot, sauteed with raisins, maple syrup, and coconut.

I almost threw in the kitchen sink, but couldn’t quite get it loose. Oh well, maybe next time I’ve been thinking it’s rather comical that I load up my breakfasts so much that you can’t even see the oatbran and whatever other grain I’m using! Haha…it’s under there. Somewhere

I flipped through some magazines while enjoying this beaut, and then cleaned up, spiffed myself up, did a mini photo shoot because I was really bubbly and haven’t held my baby in a while

and then set sail for tax-free shopping. Woo-hoo! I decided I’d take you guys with me today, too! You’ll probably be sick of my face by the end of this post. I apologize. But I’d been thinking about how it probably seems like I’m not even a real person behind this computer because I never show my face. This is primarily because it’s tricky to take a picture of yourself when you’re using a camera with a fixed, manual focus lens. And you’re too lazy to switch it, like moi.  But I love seeing all of your beautiful faces, so hopefully you don’t think I’m a robot anymore

Wild Mtn. Blueberry & Vanilla latte. Copco spokesperson.

You’ll probably be sick of my bony, dry, old lady hands by the end of this, too. Oh well. I tend to wait until it’s too late to fix those sorts of things.

AB&J muffin with Justin's Maple AB

Yeah, I’ve still got these muffins and scones, haha. I freeze them right away, and tend to forget. That and I have a large variety of carbs to choose from daily, and unfortuately, out of sight out of mind tends to have a strong affect on me. Sometimes it’s good – sometime’s it’s depressing. Like when there’s a freezerful of these and these.

I stopped at the discount foods store first, and there may or may not be any more boxes of Sugar Cookie tea left in the state of Vermont. I may or may not know who should be held accountable for this. Jus’ sayinnn.’

When I’d reached my final desired location, it was time for a refuel before a shopping spree.

I'm supposed to look sad because of the ugly nanner... I'm not sure I was successful.

The rest of my nanner from breakfast, and the plaza in the background. Okay, you only see Dicks. Pretend that’s BB&B and Hannaford.

I was strangely conservative in BB&B, but I am not complaining. I think it’s just because I wanted everything – so I just stuck to what I went there with the intentions of getting – which you’ll see soon enough! They do have so many cool gadgets, and I really wanted to get a bunch of kitchen organizational stuff, but refrained. It’s a lot more expensive there, I could probs go to wally world or something.

Afterwards, I hit up Hannafords for a couple goodies and ran into some old friends. This was weird because I never run into people and I thought they were out west somewhere. So it was a pleasant surprise!

As a side note, I love shopping when you’re in a really good mood – I like being the pleasant customer. Is that weird? I know when I wait on people at work, I love when a happy cheery person comes in. I’m not annoyingly happy, I’m just polite. I think. I hope. You all must think I’ve been sneaking some sort of happy pills lately. aha. Yeah – it’s called sun and spring air!

Afterwards, I hit up the co-op! Again, I was surprisingly well-behaved. I think I have this “go big or go home” slogan. I knew what I went in for, so I tried to stay just to those aisles, haha. I just wanted to get some more almondmilk, and see what they had already packaged for dried fruits and nuts. I was successful

But all that shopping made me work up an appetite!

Sick of me yet? That's okay - this is the last one

And all I wanted was a big, crispy, juicy, apple! I still had to stop and clean the office on my way home, though, and wasn’t sure it’d tide me but wanted it anyways. For some reason, apples make me really full at first, and then really hungry. I guess it makes sense in a weird way – the fiber making you feel full initially, but then your body realizes it wasn’t that much food? maybe? Anyways, after my cleaning expedition decided it was time for another snack. I planned to stop some places to take some funky photos on the way home, too. Can’t do that hungry, you know

Other than the mis-spelling of "sesame," can you really argue with those ingredients?

Okay, maybe you’ll argue with the butter – but hey, at least it’s a real food. No complaints over hurr!

Yum. They’re really dense, so I had a little less than half, since I was going to be home in an hour or so for lunch anyways. But I had forgotten how good these are! I can’t wait for one of you luckies to win some – I hope you find them as good as I do! I may be doing another giveaway with them soon, too.

I stopped some fun places on the way home to snap some photos, but haven’t finished sorting through them all yet. Sneak peek? Oh, okay.

After unpacking everything and gettin’ in my cozy pants, all I wanted for lunch was a fried egg sandwich on a chewy english muffin with hummus. Weird lunchtime craving for me, but I followed it.

I must have really wanted some sodium and carbs, because I wasn’t even into the carrots…and I’m always into raw, crunchy, yummy carrots! So, fried egg and english muffin it was. With some hummus, spinach, parmesan, sundried tomatoes, half a dill pickle, and some dijonnaise. Hit. The. Spot. I’m usually all about fresh veggies and letting them sing with minimal bread-age, but I just loved crunching into the english muffin and the crispy & salty fried egg, complimented by the oozy cheese and creamy hummus. Yum!

But of course dessert was in order, too.

You’ll be seeing this often. Puffins, granola, honey apple buttah, almond milk, and the star of this one was some sliced dried turkish fig! The figs keep getting forgotten about in the back of my fridge. A shame, because I love figs as much as I love dates – and you all know how much I love dates

overstock (dot com, that is!)

Apparently, my mom had the same thoughts I did while she was out. I may or may not have had one or two throughout the course of the day.

is that...is that...a FOOD PROCESSOR?!

oh, yes. It’s actually a Ninja processor. Apparently, it’s been seen on TV, which makes me unsure it’ll last all too long, but hey. It fits the bill for what I need. And it’s a blender, too! The blender I had was pretty awful, so I killed two birds with one stone on this one. Which is a shame because I like birds.

But what in the hay am I makin'?

Ohh, just a lil’ comethin’ somethin’ that required chickpea flour. I had no chickpea flour. I did have chickpeas. I made a quasi-flour. I do what I do.

The girl's gone mad!

oh yeah, baby! Wafflin’ it up. Should we take bets on how long it is until I use both of these appliances next, now that I’ve made my longed for fawaffle? Hopefully not just a phase.

I pretty much  just threw everything even vaguely reminiscent of falafel into this and prayed to the waffle gods. Surprisingly, it worked! I thought for sure it’d be a relative fail. Unfortunately, however, I wasn’t really in the mood for falafel – but of course, I had it in my mind, had chickpeas I needed to use, and have been eyeballing fawaffle for months. So, I still had it. I can’t wait to make it when I’m craving falafel! haha.

Although that pickle may have killed my taste buds.

Dessert of puffins, scone, currants, maple AB and granola. Although, in the time it’s taken me to write this post, I’ve already consumed a kiwi-yogurt-and granola parfait. It’s been a couple hours, what can I say?

What is everyone’s favorite kitchen gadget?

and I’ll be picking (randomizing?) a giveaway winner tomorrow – so make sure you’ve taken advantage of the chance to enter up to three times! I’ll probably do it around the time of my usual posting – so early evening-ish

Hope everyone has a great night!

[Via http://healthyexposures.wordpress.com]

Never Look Back

More looking back: Old photo of my house in Pittsburgh

Going through my old entries, I was quite the cook last year in Australia. It seems that I especially loved hot and spicy salad and stir-fry. Here on Kwajalein, I don’t get to cook much at all. Instead I mostly eat at the dining hall with my meal card. Maybe I will start using the kitchen to make a large weekly meal.

Unfortunately, I do have some older vegetables in my fridge to feed  the sea turtles.

Island Pet

[Via http://tinybuttons.wordpress.com]

Protein: How much is too much?

I have had several conversations lately about protein, and how much is too much. As I track my food on SparkPeople.com I always get just the right amount that is recommended for me, or I go over. It’s not surprising since I eat egg white every morning, have a small lean protein for two snacks a day, and eat turkey or chicken every day for lunch and dinner. So what happens when you get too much protein? I know it’s good for me to have in my diet since I work out a lot, and the protein is used to repair my muscles. But I’ve heard two things: If you get too much it’s okay because your body disposes of it anyway; and it’s bad to get too much because your body stores it as fat.

So I read up on it via the internet, so hopefully the sources are credible! Here’s what I found:

According to Sparkpeople, “A very high protein diet can cause the kidneys to work harder and cause the bones and teeth to excrete calcium since protein foods (meats) are usually higher in fats (depending on your choices). This can increase the unhealthy saturated fat and be a risk factor for heart disease, certain cancers, weight gain and high blood pressure. It all comes down to how much is too much and what else you are eating. A healthy diet should be made up of 10-35% protein. For someone eating 2000 calories/day, that is 50-175 grams daily.” http://www.sparkpeople.com/community/ask_the_experts.asp?q=34

According to WebMD, “But unlike fat and carbohydrates, the body does not store protein, and therefore has no reservoir to draw on when it needs a new supply.” http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/guide/benefits-protein

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Most people eat more protein than they need without harmful effects However, protein contributes to calorie intake, so if you eat more protein than you need, your overall calorie intake could be greater than your calorie needs and contribute to weight gain. Besides that, animal sources of protein can be sources of saturated fat which has been linked to elevated low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, a risk factor for heart disease. In addition, for people with certain kidney diseases, a lower-protein diet may be recommended to help prevent an impairment in kidney function.” http://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/everyone/basics/protein.html

Even the website for the US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health didn’t say anything about too much protein causing weight gain. However, it did discuss the best kind of proteins are the ones lowest in fat, such as chicken without skin, fish, eggs, soybeans, etc. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002467.htm

So I’d say that similar to other vitamins and minerals our bodies only need so much of, our body just disposes of what we don’t need. This doesn’t mean go out and eat 3 hamburgers for breakfast, lunch and dinner tomorrow, because those have lots of fat. Try making skinless, grilled boneless chicken breast for salads, sashimi tuna, or just drink milk!

If you are interesting in finding out how much protein your body requires, check out some of those links. There should be information on there to help you. But you also have to account for the activity you do as well. So if you are a workout fanatic like myself you are most likely going to need quite a bit more than

What the RDA tells you.

Kyra Williams

The Get In Shape Girl

[Via http://thegetinshapegirl.wordpress.com]

Apartment Camping

Interesting article about Propane:

http://www.propane101.com/propanevsnaturalgas.htm

Its apparently more environmentally friendly than natural gas. Interesting, again most of the things made for camping are more environmentally friendly and ideally better suited for the home or apartment as well.

http://www.foxhill.net/

Of course the Asian nations are way ahead. They use propane stoves continually in Turkey and through the middle east to make tea.

[Via http://schlachthausfunf.wordpress.com]

Pizza Pointers

One of my favorite quick, easy-to-make dinners is pizza. Not only is pizza always a crowd pleaser, but it’s a great way to use up the leftovers in my fridge. You might be thinking homemade pizza and easy are not words that go together, but my secret is that I don’t actually make the dough myself. Truth be told, I don’t even roll out dough that I’ve bought. I could, yes, but really, why bother? We have a ton of amazing pizza places in our neighborhood, so if i want the real deal, I’ll let them do the work. As an alternative, I buy Whole Foods whole wheat pizza crusts (I’ve used the Trader Joe’s version too, but Whole Foods’ crusts are thinner and also come in a package of two, which is great to have on hand in a pinch) and then top them with whatever’s in the refrigerator. Tonight it was fresh mozzarella and walnut pesto that I picked up at Russo’s earlier in the week, marinated mushrooms (also from Russo’s. I don’t know what they steep them in, but oh they are delicious) leftover spinach, and a baked chicken cutlet from Monday’s meal that I cut into strips. I piled it all on and baked the pizza for 20 minutes. I served it with a basic salad of baby romaine, shaved romano and homemade croutons. The result? A delightful dinner in 30 minutes or less.

[Via http://madebymichellec.wordpress.com]

Super-simple and semi-tasty

This is my first attempt at a recipe from The Best 1001 Short, Easy Recipes. I made Asian Beef and Noodles. Now I know the title of this blog post is probably not going to make anyone rush out and make this themselves…but it really was good, I just would make a few changes.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 Ground beef

2 packages oriental-flavored ramen noodles

1 package frozen oriental stir-fry vegetable mixture

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

3 tablespoons thinly sliced green onions.

-Brown the beef (or ground turkey)and drain, I just scootch (sp?) the meat over and dab the fat all off with a paper towel. This  prevents me from dirtying up some other pan….oh laziness.

-Add 1/2 cup water, salt and pepper and simmer 10 minutes.

-Then in another skillet (or the same one if you remove the meat) add 2 cups water, veggies, noodles, ginger and both seasoning packets. Bring to a boil and reduce heat.

-cover and simmer for a few minutes or until noodles are tender

I’m feeling pretty proud of myself. I know that’s pathetic, it’s just stir-fry…but pretty good stir-fry…

-Add the Beef and serve!

Now the first bite I was like, “Oh I did really good!” But as I kept eating I thought it was too beefy. I may be the only person with this problem but I think I’ll double the package of vegetables next time and then it will be perfect! The good news is that we ate it for dinner and lunch the next day…What a money saver!

[Via http://francescarobinson.wordpress.com]

Pass the Quinoa

I’ve been wanting to make quinoa for awhile now because it’s not only tasty, but it’s also a super food, meaning that it contains all of the essential amino acids in one serving. I’ve eaten quinoa several times (the Whole Foods on Bowery makes a Grain Shop salad with quinoa and wheat berry that’s to die for.)  and was looking for a fresh way to prepare it. So when I came upon a recipe on my foodie friend Anne’s fantastic blog, Poetic Appetite, for Farro with Broccoli, Walnuts and Golden Raisins, I decided to substitute the farro with quinoa. I also substituted Thompson raisins because I couldn’t find goldens. The picture below is actually my second date with quinoa. The first time I added grilled chicken to the mix, and it was a bit overcooked. This time I cooked the chicken cutlets separately, and served the quinoa as a side, topped with grated Locatelli romano cheese. Delicious! And since dinner was so well-balanced, I can treat myself to a little dark chocolate. (Who am I kidding? I’d be having the chocolate whether dinner was healthy or not!)

[Via http://madebymichellec.wordpress.com]