Life Lately- A Little Food, A Little Progress, A Little Thought

Hello, poor, abandoned blog!  I’ve not written in a long time. Why?  For a few reasons.

1. My job has been so demanding that I haven’t had much energy for anything besides getting things done at the office and getting my exercise in.
2. My Post-European Travel Despair has yet to dissipate. Happens every time I come back. Usually lasts until I can start planning my next trip.
3. I’ve been cooking a whole lot less because of the aforementioned things.

Between my bouts of misery and stress, I have, however, still been progressing in living a healthier life and surrounding myself with healthy food.  As I said, I haven’t been whipping up meals on my own as much, but I’ve been seeking out more ready-made or quick to make, no-cook healthy foods.

Oh, and I discovered coffee.  I’m not quite sure how that happened.  For my entire life up until about two months ago, my burgeoning hatred and mistrust for anything coffee-related was a defining aspect of my being, but something changed.  “I think I want to try coffee,” I announced one night after dinner.  My best friend bestowed a few Keurig cups on me, and it was all downhill from there.  At this point, I’ve become enough of a connoisseur to assure you I do hate K-cups, and I’ve developed a preference for medium-bodied varieties brewed in a French press.  Seriously though, I still have barely a clue what I’m doing with coffee.  I just know that our loves deepens with each passing day.

 

My favoritest coffee so far.

I kind of wish I’d discovered it before taking on a healthy lifestyle.  I would have loved to be able to enjoy a pumpkin spice latte in total ignorance of the horrific nutrition facts (even the “skinny” Starbucks version has something like 260 calories for a 12 oz, plus around 4 bajillion carbs and grams of sugar).  Having forever been a pumpkin spice loving, coffee hating creature, I always felt miffed on missing out when pumpkin spice latte season rolled around.  Luckily I found a recipe for a truly “skinny” version, and edited it down into something I could enjoy without guilt!  You can, of course, use real sugar and real maple syrup in this.

Recipe (made in a French press):

2 tsp pumpkin pie spice

3 tbsp coffee (hazelnut coffee tastes best, in my opinion)

2 Tbsp Walden Farms Pancake Syrup (or syrup of choice)

8 oz skim milk

2 tsp sweetener of choice (I like Splenda or Truvia, but whatever works)

-Brew the coffee + pumpkin pie spice with 18 oz of water.

Fill the bottom of your mug with the syrup.

Shake the milk until it's nice and frothy, then heat it in the microwave for about a minute.

Pour the hot coffee and milk into your mug and stir in some sweetener if you prefer.

Enjoy your 80 calorie latte!

Other things I’ve discovered:

Quest bars- holy omg.  These. Things. Are. Amazing!  Especially when you heat them up in the microwave (most of them).  The Quest protein chips are amazing, too (though probably not in the microwave).  I’ve been focusing on a more low-carb/low sugar diet recently, and these things really go above and beyond in that aspect.

And continuing my trend of "What Can I Just Slap Together" meals, we have:

Oatmeal and sliced bananas, with coffee of course . . . 

Toast with cream cheese and apple butter, with coffee . . . 

Mom's homemade banana bread with cream cheese, cinnamon apple butter, and...you guessed it....

Scrambled eggs on toast with Canadian bacon...

Oh, and the delicacy I like to call Bachelorette Pizza. It's toast with a wedge of laughing cow cheese, mini pepperonis, and fresh basil on top.  The basil looks fancy and the pepperonis are cute, which makes it not look as sad.

It's not actually all that sad.  It's actually pretty delicious.  

Which brings me to last night’s dinner- beet and apple salad with balsamic vinaigrette. 

My mom’s single apple tree has proven itself to be a veritable orchard unto itself, and we’ve had to get very creative with ways to use up the plethora of fruit.  I have about four quarts of applesauce tucked in my freezer at the moment, along with three varieties of apple butter, two more quarts of applesauce, a jar of cinnamon apples, and a bowl of raw apples in the fridge. Oh, and two bags of dried apples on top of the fridge.  Needless to say, about every meal these days is accompanied by some sort of apple product.

Anyway, it was simple salads for dinner because yesterday was one heck of a day.  For the sake of being a bright-eyed, positive professional, I won’t hash out details, but my work day was rough.  Don’t get me wrong- I love what I do, find it very rewarding, and feel supremely lucky to have found a position that goes along with my degree and allows me to be creative.  That’s not the problem.

The problem, at its very core, I think, is that I’m not Southern.  By all technical accounts, I am, but by all accounts of my behavior, personality, and soul, I am not.  I had a good heart-to-heart with my mom about it, and she reminded me I am still young, and I am still free to chase my dreams.  There truly is nothing holding me back, besides maybe the necessity of keeping a few fluffballs with me wherever I go.  And what has been my dream forever?  When people ask me, if I could do anything, what would I do, what do I say to them?

I have a few answers to that, but there’s a common thread throughout all of them, and it’s that none of them have anything to do with living in rural North Carolina.  They all have to do with being far, far away from it.  Europe, more specifically.  So, what IS holding me back?  I sometimes feel a bit down about being a nearly-30-year-old woman who has never come close to being in a committed relationship, having no kids, having no home of my own, no grand salary or savings, etc.  Ok . . . maybe “sometimes” is an understatement.  I feel pretty crappy, undesirable, and unaccomplished for the vast majority of my waking hours.  But maybe I’m missing the positive aspect of my lack of ties to anything permanent and lasting: I have complete freedom.  And perhaps I’m squandering it.

I can only hope...

I’m not sure what I’ll do next, or how I’ll make it happen, but I think it’s time to get what I really want out of life back in focus.  There is so much pressure- especially in the South and especially in your late 20s- to be stable and have everything figured out, but that seems to refuse to happen for me.  And maybe if I get back to chasing what I really want, it will finally come together.  

Watermelon + Heirloom Tomato Summer Salad

Beauteous, no?

Most people reading this will know I recently returned from am amazing trip to the United Kingdom, where I enjoyed some especially amazing meals.

For some reason, whenever I travel somewhere new, it's always that first meal that really knocks my socks off and sticks with me.  On this trip, that meal took place at Draper's Hall restaurant in Shrewsbury, Wales, and began with an appetizer of watermelon and heirloom tomatoes.

The original!

When I got home, I knew I wanted to reproduce it!  The flavor combination was unexpectedly complementary and so refreshing on a hot summer's day....not that we experienced any of those in Wales, but back home is another story.

It's also a delightfully easy, no-cook recipe.

What you need:

About 3 cups chopped watermelon

1 large heirloom tomato

About 2 tbsp feta cheese

A sprig of fresh rosemary

6-10 large basil leaves

A dash of salt and black pepper

Makes 4 servings

Just chop it all up, toss together, and serve!

Nutrition Facts:

Calories- 53

Fat- 1.5g

Carbs- 8.7g

Sugar- 6.5g

Protein- 2g

Pretty healthy! Plus it's just pretty to look at. Surprisingly filling, too!

And it paired very well with some prosciutto-wrapped roast asparagus (that recipe shall be shared next).

.....On to things I could not replicate, sadly:

Draper's Hall Restaurant exterior in Shrewsbury.

Boyfriend's lamb dish.

My beer + bernaise sauce dish.

Some sort of chocolate mousse something.

I did have some success with recreating this face!  Boyfriend highly approved of the salad.  No leftovers!

                                     

Vanilla Berry Protein Pancakes

 I think I've finally perfected them, so here is the final recipe!

Mmm...fresh raspberry vanilla.

A few weeks ago I decided I really needed to focus on upping my protein intake in light of how much more I was working out.  I wound up overdoing it and making myself sick, mostly because I was in a frenzy to try all the protein powder recipes I could and gorged myself on the (crazy low calorie) results, but I'll spare everyone the details there.  Since I've been experimenting for weeks though, I can guarantee any protein powder recipes I share here are absolutely delicious, and don't taste like protein powder nastiness at all.  Just beware if you decide to eat a few batches of these a day along with the apple pudding muffins I shall share soon...

I have to say though, I bet none of what I've made would taste as good with another protein powder.  I highly recommend the BodyLogix Natural Whey.  I initially bought it just because it seemed to the the best powder around so far as giving me the most protein for the least calories, and I was shocked that it was also the best tasting I had tried, by far!  The vanilla flavor is like a white chocolate milkshake, even just mixed with water.  Not to mention it is one of the less expensive powders out there, to boot.

My Nana tells me these do not look good and she can't believe they would taste ok with protein powder, but she's wrong, I promise.  They taste different from your average IHOP rendition, for sure, but they're also way, waaaay healthier.

On to the recipe!

What you need:
1 scoop BodyLogix Natural Whey
1.5 tsp Ener-g Egg replacer
1/4 cup King Arthur Organic Whole Wheat Flour (white whole wheat works, too, and is 10 less calories)
1/4 cup low fat 1% cottage cheese
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp Stevia
(optional) handful of your berries of choice
(optional) pancake syrup/toppings (look for Walden Farms 0 calorie syrup- it is a miracle in a bottle!)

Makes 4 medium sized pancakes.

What to do:
Add all ingredients except the optional berries to a blender and blend until everything is nicely combined. Heat a greased skillet over medium heat, pour some batter in, toss in some berries if you like, and cook them like you would any other pancake!

Nutrition facts (without berries or toppings) for the WHOLE stack:
285 calories
2g fat
33g carbs
33.5g protein
4g fiber
2.5g sugar

These turn out pretty moist, so it's not entirely necessary to top them with anything, but it doesn't hurt.  They don't fluff up as much as your average pancake though, so if you toss in something like blueberries, it gets tricky to cook them evenly on both sides (because the blueberries are thicker than the pancakes).  I chopped up some raspberries from my dad's garden for them this morning and that problem was avoided!

You can also substitute plain Greek yogurt for the cottage cheese, but you wind up with a denser pancake.  The cottage cheese is better for fluffing them up, it seems.

Suggestions for making them fluffier without losing nutritional value are welcome!  I like this version a lot, but it's always fun to try more variations and see what I get.

Previous versions:

The very first try.  Not bad, but very dense...

Getting better....more pancake-shaped at least....

Mmm blueberry!

Dungeon Dinner Date Night- Cajun Sweet Potato Zucchini Fritters + Chocolate Mousse Cake

Tuesdays in my life have been known as Dungeon Dinner Date night for a while now.  Why?  Well, because on Tuesdays I cook dinner and tote it over to my boyfriend's office....which is decked out to look like a dungeon.  I've never been quite clear on why.  But it has been this way since before his or his boss' time there, I am told.

It's, uh, well....I'm sure there are people who would find it romantic....

I mean, there's rusty shackles on the wall and everything....

Yesterday I decided I was going to rush home and whip up this recipe for sweet potato zucchini fritters with the stuff I picked up at the local farmer's market last week, and my new favorite recipe for single-serve (67 calorie!) brownies, adding a dollop of cookie butter in the middle as a special surprise treat.

And let me tell you, I hated making these things at first.  My spiralizer wasn't cooperating to slice up the veggies as I had planned, so I begrudgingly used a small hand-held grater to grate the majority of the veggies. I also added a special Domestically Impaired ingredient in the form of my thumb nail, which got sliced off by the spiralizer and lost in the zucchini.  At least it wasn't my finger!  

So, nothing was going terribly well.  I thought about quitting and throwing it all out in rage before driving to Panera, but I decided I really wanted to see if these were worth it.

And oh boy, they WERE.

They were smelling pretty amazing by the time I got to this point.  Startlingly so for globs of veggies and spices.

The original recipe calls for chipotle seasoning, but the Ms. Dash Cajun seasoning I used was on sale, and I have no regrets.  They may not look like anything amazing, but these were mind-bogglingly delicious!!!

All crispy and cooling off while I whip up the chocolate cakes!

I mixed up some zesty sour cream to top them with using a package of Old El Paso zesty seasoning mix and light sour cream, but they were so moist on the inside that they really would have been great just plain, I believe.

Loading everything up to head to the Dungeon!

The Boyfriend was very quiet as he took his first bites, so I was nervous that perhaps he wasn't thrilled with them, but I am learning that this is indicative of just the opposite with him.  He later announced that I need to spread the word about these fritters like gospel to people in every land.  They are just that freaking amazing.

Loaded up with sour cream!

The absolute glory of these fritters was further evidenced by the fact that neither of us discussed the molten chocolate cookie butter cakes much.  We were still in awe of the fritters.  And people, let me tell you, Boyfriend and I love us some cookie butter real hard.  

Delicious cookie butter goo!

I'll be making more again very, very soon.  Hopefully minus the thumbnail this time.

-Dungeon Fritters-

What You Need:

1 large zucchini

2 medium sweet potatoes

1/4 cup unsalted butter

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

1 tbsp Egg Beaters egg replacer

2 tsp Ms. Dash Cajun seasoning

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 pepper

makes 6 big ole' average burger patty sized fritters

What to do:

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and line a baking sheet with greased parchment paper.  Grate/chop/spiralize/somehow dissect the zucchini and sweet potatoes and add them to a big bowl.  Melt the butter and add this along with the remaining ingredients to the bowl.  Goosh it around then scoop out handfuls and make them burger patty shaped.  Plop them on your parchment paper and bake for 10 minutes.

After 10 minutes, lower the heat to 350 degrees and pop them back in on the same side for 15 minutes.  Flip them carefully (they may still be goopy on the underside at this point) and bake for another 15 minutes on the opposite side.  Remove and let them cool and set for about 10 minutes before removing them from the parchment paper.

Nutrition Facts:

Calories- 113

Fat- 8g

Carbs- 8g

Fiber- 1g

Sugar- 2g

Protein- 2g

-Zesty Sour Cream-

1 package Old El Paso zesty sour cream seasoning

8 oz light sour cream

Just mix it together! Per 2 tbsp serving- 46 calories, 4 carbs, 2 g fat, 2 g protein, 2g sugar.

Since I really made no changes to the single serve gooey brownie, other than using a no-calorie sweetener and dolloping some cookie butter in the middle for this version, I'll just let the link to it above suffice :)  I have a feeling a post about microwave mug cakes will be happening soon though...it's a growing addiction for me....

There and Back Again- A 10 Mile Challenge

Overlook from the edge of Bluff's Mountain

Recently I made the decision to focus more on bumping up my fitness regime and less on losing pounds.  I set a goal for myself of walking/running/doing something for 3-5 miles per day, or 20 miles per week, and the first week of this went pretty well!  I logged 32.62 miles, 10 of which happened yesterday.  Mostly uphill.  I have some regrets.

The Boyfriend and I decided to spend our weekend at my mom's new house, way up in the nowhere-land of Laurel Springs, NC.  On our way up, we stopped at the Watauga County Farmer's Market intent on picking up a smorgasbord of bread, cheese, and jam to go with our wine.  And organic chicken and carrots.  And flourless chocolate cake.  It was rather indulgent, to say the least, so I was feeling pretty guilty the next day and announced that I had the goal of hiking 10 miles before we went home.

We started out with exploring the area beside my mom's home hitherto known as The Enchanted Forest.  It's a gentle woodland stroll along the river, which I'm told goes for 3 miles.  We went for 1.7 before things started getting too grown up for my comfort level/fear of slithery things in the tall grass.

The raging river right before the trail got seedy.

Char and Boyfriend choosing rocks for skipping.

I picked up a lovely hair accessory from one of the trees without my knowledge.

After walking home and grabbing lunch at the local biker hangout/only restaurant within 45 minutes, we decided to continue our day of hiking at a place very close-by and dear to my heart: Bluff's Lodge.

I have so many wonderful childhood memories of family vacations spent here, and it breaks my heart that the lodge is no longer open.  Apparently this was a result of budget cutbacks to the National Park Service in 2011, which made it difficult for the NPS to employee their regular seasonal workers.  They're seeking someone willing to take over operations of the lodge/restaurant, but so far there have been no takers.  At least we were still able to hike the beautiful trails surrounding the place.

At night, guests would gather around this fireplace to roast marshmallows.

We started our journey across the field up to the peak of Bluff's Mountain....which really doesn't appear to be much of a mountain until you get to the edge and see how high up you are.

A single tree growing out of the field stones.

The overlook before beginning our 0.8 mile descent, which I immediately realized we would have to ascend on the way back...uh-oh.

View of the mountain on our return journey.  The feeling of "Ohmygod what have I done?" really set in about here, as I realized we would have to scale that thing, then travel onwards another 2 miles to get back to the car.

It was definitely a challenge, but I'm proud that we got through it!  I think a lot of people who live in this area never stop to fully appreciate that we truly live in one of the most beautiful places on earth.  Just look at those colors!  It's like a lush, turquoise ocean of mountains.  Maybe doing a good bit of traveling and seeing the world has really made me realize how lucky I am to call this area home.  Very few places have this sort of natural beauty.

I'm even luckier to have these two companions to enjoying taking it all in with.

Cheesey Veggie Polenta Lasagna- a 272 calorie dinner

I wasn't even sure what polenta is until a week or so ago, but it kept cropping up as a main ingredient in healthy recipes I've come across, so I had to try it out.  If you don't know, it's a bland, corn-meal substance that can easily be transformed into a gluten-free substitute for pasta noodles, dough, and a variety of other things. Recently The Boyfriend has suspected he might be gluten intolerant, so we are trying out some recipes to work around this!  I was pretty thrilled with the results on this one, and it still boggles my mind that it is under 300 calories.  I've added everything up and run it through my recipe calculator serveral times just to make sure I'm not leaving something out.  It is so filling!  And you can have a HUGE slice, 1/4 of the whole dang lasagna, for 272 calories!

To avoid making it sound like an awful, scary "health food" meal, you could call it corn meal lasagna.  Or just present it as regular lasagna, and I bet people won't ask many questions after they taste it and figure out it's glorious.

I had seen a few different recipes out there for Polenta lasagna, but decided to kind of wing it and use up some things I had in my fridge to make my own.  To make the true Domestically Impaired version, be sure to entirely forget to include the garlic and balsamic vinegar you see here in my ingredients picture.  I'll toss those in next time, maybe.

Cut the polenta in half, then slice it into about 1/8" thick slices to completely line the bottom of a baking dish.  Add a layer of sliced zucchini.  

Then a layer of sliced tomato.  

Another layer of zucchini.  

Then spoon your pesto over the top.

Then add half of the vodka sauce.

 Next, slice up the other half of the polenta and layer it on top.

Spoon the remaining vodka sauce over this and pop it in the oven for 25 minutes at 375 degrees.

After 25 minutes, carefully remove the burbling vat of  lava that is your lasagna at this point and spread your mozarella cheese over the top.

Put it back in under the broiler and broil until the cheese starts bubbling and browning!

Enjoy and join me in the amazement over NOT missing pasta noodles at all!

What you need:

16 oz polenta

1 large zucchini

1 large tomato

1 cup Monte Bene Vodka Sauce

1 cup Kraft Fat-Free Shredded Mozarella

1/4 cup pesto

Makes 4 servings

What to do:

Heat your oven to 375. Place a layer of sliced polenta in the bottom of a large baking dish, then layer zucchini-tomato-zucchini over the polenta.  Spoon the pesto and half of the vodka sauce over these layers. Top with a second layer of sliced polenta and the remaining vodka sauce.

Bake for 25 minutes, remove to add the cup of mozarella shreds, place under your broiler, and broil until the cheese starts to brown.

Nutrition Facts:

Calories: 272

Fat: 8g

Carbs: 31g

Fiber: 3g

Sugar: 6g

Protein: 19g

Blueberry Basil Grilled Cheese- 110 calorie breakfast

A delicious, quick, and easy breakfast treat!

I don't normally do any cooking for breakfast on the weekdays, but after seeing a recipe for blueberry grilled cheese somewhere out there on the interwebs yesterday, I decided to get up a bit early and try making my own version!

What You Need:
- 1 tbsp blueberry preserves (I used some locally made blueberry-lemon-thyme preserves, but highly recommend Bonne Mamman Wild Blueberry spread as an easy-to-find alternative
- 2 slices Nature's Own Double Fiber Wheat Bread
- 1 slice Borden Gouda Cheese
- 3 big basil leaves
- Olive oil cooking spray

What to do:
Toast the bread slices and top with blueberry spread, cheese, and basil. Spray lightly with olive oil cooking spray and transfer to a panini grill.  Grill until the cheese is melted.  Enjoy!!

Nutrition facts:
Calories- 110
Fat- 3g
Carbs- 19.8
Fiber- 4.5g
Sugar- 6.5g
Protein- 5g

Liquid Cake!

50-90 calorie Liquid Devil's Food Cake

Today I’m not posting a recipe so much as a suggestion.  It’s probably obvious at this point that I have a bit of a sweet-tooth, and that’s been my biggest challenge to overcome so far as striving to maintain a healthy diet.  I’ve found a brilliant alternative to cakes, and cookies, and all that other sweet stuff though: TEA!

I’ve always been a tea lover, but a while back I started venturing into the world of loose leaf teas and varieties beyond what you’re going to find on the shelf at the local grocery store.  I’d tried a few supposed “chocolate” flavored teas and such in the past, but was pretty disappointed.  Now I know though that not all tea is created equal, and if you go for the right thing, brewed correctly, you’re going to be pretty amazed by how extravagant tea can taste.

Some of my favorites from Tattle Tea.
French Toast Chai, Honeybear Green Chai (salted caramel honey), Blueberry Lemon Cake Rooibos, and Forbidden Love Oolong Chai (devil's food cake).

My current favorite sources for tea are Tattle Tea and The Spice and Tea Exchange.  There are so many creamy tasting or right-out cake flavored teas to choose from!  On a whim a few months ago, I tried steeping the Black Chocolate tea from Spice and Tea Exchange purely in milk, and to my surprise wound up with the most decadent tasting hot chocolate I have ever had!

What you need:
Yummy tea of your choice
Milk or milk alternative of your choice
Sweetener of your choice...or no sweetener; whatevs.

To create my liquid cake, I heat the milk on high in a sauce pan just until it starts frothing, then pour it over tea leaves into my cast iron tea pot and steep it just as I would in water.

Using regular dairy milk and sugar still made for a fairly high-calorie treat for me though, so I started looking to alternatives that might make this a treat I could enjoy more often.  I love my raw sugar, but I’ve found Truvia to be an acceptable alternative, and I’ve found out I’m quite a fan of soy and almond milk, which have way fewer calories than dairy milk.  Yes, I know skim milk is also an option, but...yuck.  Go for it if you want some watery-bleh-icky tea, but I'm telling you there are better options.  Silk vanilla soy milk is my personal favorite!

Cookie Butter is NOT a part of a balanced breakfast...but a teaspoon of it can be on some double fiber wheat bread paired with low-cal almond milk tea.

Recently, I brewed up the Forbidden Love (devil's food cake flavored chai) tea from Tattle Tea in Silk Vanilla Almond Milk and added two teaspoons of Truvia baking blend sweetener.  The result: 90 calorie cake in a glass!

And last night?  Decaf French Toast Chai in Silk Unsweetened Almond Milk + 2 tsp Truvia baking blend = 50 calorie liquid French toast glory.  I mean, seriously.  You can have three cups of this and still come out healthier than a single tall chai latte at Starbucks (and having once been an addict of those, I can attest that this alternative is actually tastier).

The options for creating liquid cake are endless, and I'm having a pretty great time experimenting.  For anyone else with a disastrous sweet tooth, it's worth a try, and cheaper than a slice of cake, too!

Most importantly, liquid cake is Weebie-approved!