Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Dinner + Dessert

As promised, here's my post-yoga dinner:


I made a big pan of stir-fry, one of my favorite anytime recipes. I keep a few different bags of frozen vegetables in my freezer at all times so that I can have a veggie-packed dinner even if I haven't been shopping recently. If possible, I'll mix some fresh veggies in too for a little crispness and fresh taste. Tonight's stir-fry was a combo of:
1. Bird's Eye Frozen Bell Peppers and Onions - I love this combination! It is so great to have on hand, especially when bell peppers are out of season and can be really expensive. Frozen onions can occasionally have a funny flavor, but in something like a stir-fry, with lots of different flavors, I never notice! Alternatively, Trader Joe's sells a bag of frozen bell peppers (yellow, red and green) without onions that I get too. 
2. Shelled edamamae - I love keeping edamame in the freezer for anytime that I want to add protein to a meal. It's so easy to throw a couple handfuls in the microwave to steam really fast and put on top of a salad or something else.
3. Green peas - I always keep frozen peas to add when I make fried rice, but I wasn't up for that challenge tonight, so I just threw some peas into the veggies. 
4. A TON of sliced zucchini and summer squash. It's that time of year people, and to prove it I bought a bag full of zucchini and summer squash for next to nothing at the farmer's market last week. 


And, on that note, I thought that the perfect way to make a dent in my zucchini stash (and satisfy my sweet tooth) was to make some muffins. I found this recipe on Eat, Live, Run that looked simple enough, and whipped some up. I used a combination of whole wheat (1 c.) and all purpose (1/2 c.) flours and they turned out great! I would highly recommend them! And now my apartment smells like Fall!

Have a good night!

Carbs Are My Friends

I got a slow start this morning, but because of it I've had some very focused and productive hours this afternoon. To start off, I had a cup of coffee with a splash of 1% milk while I checked emails, watched the Today show and talked to my mom. After about half an hour I made some oatmeal. I usually use a combination of water and milk, so this was 1/2 cup old fashioned oats, 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup 1% milk. I topped my oatmeal with a big spoonful of peanut butter, apple slices and cinnamon. It was so filling that I didn't need anything else until lunch about 3 1/2 hours later...that is a long time for me to go without snacks!


For lunch I finally finished my leftover zucchini and squash by having another bowl of pasta. After oatmeal and pasta I feel full of carbs, and am looking forward to a protein and veggie packed dinner. 


After lunch I had a hankerin' for something sweet, so I had about 1/3 cup of the trail mix I made yesterday to eat during class. 

Nothing too exciting, but I'm planning on making a big dinner tonight after I get out of yoga, so stay tuned! 

Monday, September 10, 2012

Snacks + Leftovers

I've eaten a lot since my last post, most of which I even remembered to take pictures of!

Between studying and running from class to class, my lunch and eating for the rest of the day was a little disjointed. My lunch turned into a series of snacks...



I had a Sargento Light String Cheese along with a handful of pretzels. Also (not pictured) I had one of my favorite afternoon snacks when I'm craving something savory: baby carrots dipped in salsa. I ate about 1/4 cup of salsa and 1/2 cup of baby carrots. I also snacked on an apple, accented with a few spoonfuls of Peanut Butter. And then some mini Snickers :)


A few hours later, right before my evening class, I had some leftovers for dinner. The other night I had sautéed some zucchini, summer squash, onions and garlic to put over whole wheat pasta. Well, it was just as delicious tonight as it was over the weekend. I also added about 1/3 cup of jarred pasta sauce to sneak in a few more veggies. That's been one of my favorite tricks since I started cooking for myself. To have a veggie-packed dinner, start with a kind of traditional spaghetti, and then top it with a bunch of steamed/roasted/sautéed vegetables to make it more filling and nutritious!


In my evening class I sipped some Chai tea and had about 1/3 cup trail mix that I had made this afternoon. It was a combo of almonds, peanuts, raisins and some M and Ms.

And that's it so far! I'll probably have another little snack before I go to bed -- maybe a bowl of cereal or some more of those sautéed veggies straight from the fridge. I'm pleased that I've made it through the whole day, and I think this is a good indication that I"ll be able to stick with this for the next 13 days!

Today wasn't the most exciting day from a culinary standpoint (see: string cheese for lunch and leftovers for dinner), but it was a pretty accurate representation of how I eat on a busy day when food isn't always my first priority. But stay tuned because there is a lot of variation in my diet from day to day!

And so it begins...

Happy Monday! Today I start my food journal! I've never kept track of what I've eaten in any sort of formalized way for longer than 2 days (which was required for a class) so I'm interested to see how this all turns out. My Monday schedule is a little funky, with my mornings free and then classes in the afternoon and evening. As a result, my eating patterns tend to be a little crazy. 


This morning I ate one egg with black pepper over a piece of whole wheat toast, along with 2 cups of coffee with a total of about 1/4 cup of almond milk added. I usually eat breakfast at my desk while checking email and getting caught up with blog reading.


I ran out to do some errands and came back around 11:45 completely starving, so I made a quick fruit and yogurt parfait to eat while I did some homework and reading. It was about 1/2 cup of plain, non-fat Greek yogurt topped with 1/2 cup frozen berries (no sugar added). I added 2 teaspoons of honey over the top to sweeten things up, and about 1/3 cup granola. This is my favorite store-bought granola as of late. It has an awesome mix of grains and almonds. The only downside is that I've only seen it for sale at Costco. 

That's all for now, I'm off to study GRE vocabulary words and then head to class. Have a good afternoon!


Thursday, September 6, 2012

Summer Recap

Welcome back! I'm just getting back into the swing of things for my last semester of undergraduate classes (!) and planning a lot of great posts. Coming up you'll see a two-week food diary of a busy college student (me), a peak inside my refrigerator, a series on whole grains and more.

But first, I thought I'd share a little bit from my summer, as told by desserts.

Death by Chocolate (layers of whipped cream, chocolate mouse, walnuts, toffee pieces and Kahlua soaked brownies).

Banana cake.

Ombre cake. (Tutorial coming soon!)

Fourth of July cookie cake.

Berry Cobbler.

Chocolate Melting Cake on a cruise.

Dessert salsa in Cozumel.

I'm going to go eat a cookie. Stay tuned for upcoming posts!

Monday, June 18, 2012

Putting the Pea in Pesto



Peas are not meant for pesto. A few weeks ago, craving pesto and finding this recipe for linguine with pea pesto on Smitten Kitchen, I decided to give pea pesto a try. Seems like a great idea, right? An easy way to get your fix of that oh-so-delicious garlicky green stuff, even when basil isn't in season (thankfully, not an issue now that we are only 2 days from the official start of summer!). Alas, I learned that peas are not meant for pesto. Something about their sweet and starchy flavor distracted a little to much from the garlic and parmesan. I advise that you leave your frozen peas for stir fry and save your parmesan and pine nuts for basil.

Photo via Smitten Kitchen

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Coffee Ice Cubes


I stumbled upon an absolutely brilliant idea while perusing Cupcakes and Cashmere this morning: coffee ice cubes. Coffee ice cubes. For iced coffee. So that it doesn't get all watery. Looks like I'm going to need a new excuse for drinking my coffee so fast :)

P.S. Coffee bean shaped ice cube trays (they're called Cool Beans...ha!).

Top photo from Kitchen Treaty