Baking Tasting

by Emily

My breakfast was pathetic. Someone {ahem!} only left behind a tiny bit of my Low-fat Coconut Chia Kefir.

I planned on taking it to-go and didn’t have time to grab anything else so I had to spend the morning hungry. Even worse, I think Wegman’s isn’t going to carry that flavor anymore.

I spent my morning in the formula lab at the hospital and my afternoon in an off-site clinic and I had to drive through lunch. I packed it simple with packaged things I could eat in the car. Luna Blueberry Bliss Bar.

Normally I’m all about the chocolate flavors, but this blueberry flavor is one of my favorite Lunas.

Key Lime Crumble Chobani Flip.

After all my anticipation for this flavor, I actually didn’t really like it. The yogurt was weirdly thin and every key lime Greek yogurt I’ve tried has tasted too artificial. But I have an Almond Coco Loco Flip in the fridge that I’m still excited to try.

I didn’t realize how sore I was from yoga until my drive home. Moving around during the day was fine but sitting for a long stretch on the highway was killer. Last night’s practice kicked my butt. <– I had to edit out a typo here where I wrote “butts.” It’s a Freudian fat joke!

During the drive I also realized how hungry I was. Days I don’t eat breakfast are a disaster because I end up eating so much crap in the afternoon. I started with a sliced Honeycrisp.

And two Alexia Artisan Sweet Potato Rolls with butter.

But then I had to do some baking for tomorrow’s book club.

Adam wasn’t here this evening to help me taste-test and I did an insane amount of nibbling and bowl licking.

Plus I ate one of the (mostly) finished baked goods.

Delicious but so unnecessary.

At least dinner was healthy.

My black-eyed pea salad is so easy to make – BEPs, chopped green pepper, smoked almonds, chopped Kerrygold Vintage Cheddar, green Tabasco, done!

It’s quickly becoming my favorite dish. There is even another serving in the fridge for tomorrow’s lunch.

I’m hoping that this weekend will include lots of baked goods and booze, but my goals for next week are bedtime, breakfast, and less sugar overload. {and the Vegan 20 Day challenge!}

31Jan2013

Two Days, Too Many?

by Emily

My mom called to tell me that not posting yesterday ruined my 30 day streak. But my focus wasn’t so much the daily posting as the posting of everything from each day. I’ve decided that as long as I blog everything I eat it will count towards thirty days straight of blogging even if I have to do some recaps. Thoughts?

The past 48 hours have included some really tasty things, but they have also included too many missed meals and way too much sugar. I need to keep getting better about my sleep schedule.

I didn’t have breakfast together Tuesday morning so I just had coffee – half sweet, half regular – from the cafeteria.

Lunch was a fun assortment. An apple.

A Cascadian Farm Crunchy Oats & Honey Granola Bar.

And an Artisana Cacao Bliss packet.

I planned on eating the coconut butter as a granola bar topping, but that got too messy and I ended up just spooning it into my mouth with a knife. That stuff is so flipping good; like a coconutty chocolate frosting!

When I got home I ate two fun sized candies, <– so unnecessary

and a Müller Strawberry FrütUp Yogurt.

A friend and I are doing a Vegan 20 Day challenge soon and I just can’t stop buying yogurt!

Adam and I haven’t seen much of each other lately so we decided to make Tuesday night Date Night and make use of our King and I Groupon.

We split the Tofu Tod to start. //fried tofu with a sweet and sour peanut dipping sauce//

This is one of our favorite Thai appetizers and King and I did not disappoint. We both kept grabbing spoonfuls of the sauce!

I went with the King and I House Noodles, vegetarian and Thai spicy. //broad rice noodles with egg, vegetables, and ground peanut//

I wish my meal had come with more vegetables, but I was very impressed with the spice level.

Adam commented that he could *hear* how spicy my meal was so I must have been doing a lot of sniffling! Sadly, his dish was too salty and he didn’t really love it.

The husband went with a coconut sticky rice and custard dish for dessert.

I took a few small bites, but decided to have these gummi candies instead.

They came from Wegman’s bulk bins and were totally to blame for the headache that caused me to lie down while taking off my boots, and end up falling asleep on top of the covers, fully dressed!

I was still pretty out of it this morning and I left for the hospital without so much as a scrap of food in my bag. I bought this serving of Kashi Heart to Heart from the cafeteria.

And I got Wegman’s hot bar after work to eat while I was journaling.

Many veggies with some chicken (salad and dumplings) and pasta.

I ate a Honeycrisp when I got home.

And then I ate a bowl of gelato for dinner.

And did so with impunity; I topped it with a protein-rich Bare Naked cereal sample.

The Talenti Caramel Cookie Crunch was good and the combination was even better.

And it was exactly what I was craving.

In healthier news, I made it to yoga this evening! 60 minutes of hot yoga was amazing, every time I go I love it. But – if I go both days this weekend I will have officially gotten 4 uses out of my unlimited pass, whoops!

I took advantage of my (messy) high yoga ponytail to show y’all my current hair.

The bottom is still good, but the top has lost a lot of color and has white streaks.

I have to go back to brown for my next internship placement so I won’t bother refreshing it, but I am still love-love-loving the purple. FYI: It is very difficult to take a picture of your own hair!

29Jan2013

The First Of The Last

by Emily

{Technically speaking} today was the first day of my last semester of undergrad! Yays! Instead of the hospital, I spent my day on campus for orientation. It was also the first day of my night class.

Orientation was definitely not as exciting as my days at the hospital. Cue medium non-fat latte.

Caffeine gave me the jitters though; I should have just waited for the adrenaline to kick in once we learned how busy this semester is going to be! On top of full-time internship hours there are many projects to be done. I’m the only person in my program who is taking a non-major class (my night class is a history to fulfill my final graduation requirement) this semester and balancing everything is going to be pretty nerve-wracking.

I spent my lunch break running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to get all of my campus tasks done (applying for graduation, registering my history class as pass/fail, buying books). When I did finally get to my sandwich it was worth the wait.

Sandwich thin with 2 slices of turkey, tons of pickled jalopeño, 50% reduced-fat sharp cheddar, and mango jelly (made by my aunt’s mother-in-law from St. Thomian mangos!!).

Plus a package of sesame seaweed,

and a 100-calorie milk chocolate bar.

I was starving when I got home and I snacked on a Tbsp of peanut butter,

and a cup of tea with skim milk and sugar.

You guys are geniuses – I actually heated the water (3 minutes versus 90 seconds in the microwave) and my tea was much stronger! I still didn’t love this cup but I think the tea itself was to blame (a pumpkin chai sample).

I did an easy, early dinner before I had to head back to campus for my history class. Leftover roasted brocoli with marinara sauce.

And a Kashi Mayan Harvest Bake meal.

I also snacked on these milk coffee candies during class.

He let us out early for our first day and so far I have no complaints.

Well, just one complaint – why the heck didn’t I get in bed already?!

27Jan2013

Cookie Sunday

by Emily

Cookie Sunday, could that be a thing now please? I had two today. But everything else was healthy. Now that we are trying to not be fat-fat-fatties we gotta keep things balanced.

Breakfast bowl.

The final serving of KIND maple granola (booo! We need more asap!) with chopped peach and plum and Lifeway coconut chia kefir.

Tortellini salad from the co-op.

I split a cookie with Adam at the grocery store.

Yes, we were back at the store, I’m unable to do my shopping in any less than twenty trips a week.

Dinner was great.

Buffalo chicken nuggets (I have a recipe for you below) with blue cheese for dipping,

sautéed mushrooms,

and roasted broccoli.

I made us cookies for dessert.

no. 2 pencil’s single serve cookies (recipe actual makes 2 cookies) are genius, but I crunched the numbers and they have 360 calories each – not an everyday treat. But they were perfect for Cookie Sunday. <– is it a thing yet?

Buffalo Chicken Nuggets, serves 4

1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, chopped into bite-sized pieces
1 cup buffalo wing sauce
1 cup cornmeal
1/4 cup cornstarch
2-3 Tbsp oil

Put chicken pieces into a Tupperware and cover with buffalo sauce. Marinate at least 4 hours.
Combine cornmeal and cornstarch in a large ziplock baggie. Add marinated chicken, seal bag, and shake until chicken is evenly coated.
Heat 1 Tbsp oil in a large pan over medium heat, add remaining oil to the pan as needed.
Working in batches to avoid overcrowding, place chicken in pan, cover, and cook for 2-3 minutes on each side until cooked through.
Transfer cooked chicken to a plate covered with paper towels to rest before serving.

27Jan2013

My Forever Alone Movie Date

by Emily

Why am I posting at 12:30, tomorrow would have been such a happier day if I had gotten into bed an hour ago? There isn’t much to share on the food front though, so at least I will keep this quick.

Breakfast didn’t happen at home, but thankfully my co-worker offered me her blueberry muffin (she bagged it at Wegman’s and then decided on hot bar instead).

I ate half. I’m not a big muffin person but this was pretty good.

I actually wasn’t supposed to work today, but was called in last night at the last-minute. Work = money, yay! But I had fun stuff planned with Adam that I was really bummed to miss and I was sort of in a funk this morning.

Lunch was a 0% Pear Chobani.

Holy frick I love that flavor so much! I tried one at FNCE and have been biding my time until they showed up in Buffalo.

Also a KeVita Living Green Sparkling Probiotic Drink.

Full disclosure – KeVita sent me some free coupons so I could sample their products. They sent me some extras to share with y’all too; stay tuned! I wasn’t expecting to love the drink, but then I did. It was so refreshing!

Adam was playing poker with friends all evening, so after work I took myself to a movie. I was seeing “Hansel and Gretel” so I didn’t even bother inviting other people. I’m still not sure why I was so obsessed with seeing the film but I did end up enjoying myself. I brought a .25 lb bag of candy for a themed movie snack but didn’t have time to take a picture. It was mostly conversation hearts and they were mostly disgusting.

Dinner didn’t happen until almost 10 pm and I’m still amazed that I managed to stick to my plan.

2 Quorn Cheeseburger patties* topped with some Cabot’s 50% sharp cheddar,

and a sliced cucumber sprinkled with lots of salt.

I also ate these Honey BBQ Smart Fries because I was too hungry to wait patiently for the patties to cook.

I enjoyed the flavor but it wasn’t worth getting seasoning all over my fingers versus the classic version.

Hope everyone is having a good weekend!

*Adam ate the other two Quorn patties when he got home from poker and proclaimed them to be “very good”

26Jan2013

Fashion Friday

by Emily

The hospital was great today.

I got to chart on several patients and I saw some really interesting cases; everything from cancer to Crohn’s, to burns.

If you think I actually got in bed early last night… you haven’t been reading my blog very long! Of course I stayed up another hour and of course I was exhausted this morning. I had to grab breakfast on the go, a Chocolate Peanut Butter Chia Bar.

The taste was good and I loved chewing through the chia. The bar only had 100 calories, but it did provide 4 gram each fiber and protein and 1000 and 800 mg respectively omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids.

Nutrition fun fact – it is important to get healthy fatty acids in your diets, but did you know that the ratio of omega 6:3 matters too? It should be about 1:1 but most Americans get too much omega-6 and not enough omega-3.

I also had a big cup of coffee at the hospital.

Half vanilla cappuccino (sweetened) and half caramel nut coffee (flavored beans).

I may have packed lunch yesterday, but it wasn’t much help sitting in my fridge all day! Instead I got a salad from the salad bar.

Spring mix topped with tomatoes, banana peppers, french dressing, and scoop of cole slaw.

I wasn’t interested in my packed-but-forgotten turkey sandwich when I got home, but I did eat my Pink Lady apple.

Plus a Caramel Pineapple Chobani Bite topped with some KIND Maple Walnut Clusters with Chia & Quinoa.

<– heavenly

Dinner was a big slice of pizza.

Buffalo chicken with blue cheese for dipping.

This will be my last slice for a little while (I’ll explain soon) and I really enjoyed it.

Fashion Fridays

This post was pretty short, so I figured I’d share my “professional” look with you all. I hope at least a few readers (hi, Nana! hi, Mom!) would like to see what I wore to my first week at the hospital.

Fact 1 – Lose-fitting tops with fun neckline details are pretty much my uniform.

Fact 2 – I know my mirror is filthy. Sometimes I hold Webster up to the mirror to see “the other dog” and I don’t always have time to clean off his nose smudges because by “sometimes” I mean daily.

24Jan2013

David Boreanaz Is A Hottie

by Emily

I am really trying to stick to my daily blogging goal, BUT I am tired and cranky. I guess it is serendipitous that I didn’t eat much today and thus can keep this quick. I shouldn’t have gone to bed so late last night, but we had a new “Bones” to watch! Hodgins and Booth were both really flipping hot in the last episode. When David Boreanaz’ character made a certain face after he took a certain shot (I don’t want to spoil it for any readers who haven’t watched yet) I was basically fanning myself!

To be fair, I’ve been tired and cranky since the moment the day begin. After Adam and I finished hanging out I stayed up past midnight last night doing absolutely nothing). And I didn’t pack lunch. Thanks to those bad choices, I headed to the hospital today without breakfast of lunch.

Breakfast I had to skip, but I did find lunch in the cafeteria.

Pickens were slim, but I came up with a small bowl of chicken gumbo.

When I got home, I made myself this frozen meal.

Not my favorite, though to be fair, the sauce exploded all over my microwave so maybe I didn’t get the full effect. It was way too rice \-heavy; even in my hungry state I still left some on my plate.

I also snagged three caramels from a box my parents sent.

[Mom – yum! What were those? Homemade?]

I would have scrounged for more food, but I had evening plans with a friend. We went to a $3 showing of Vedgucated. While we both agreed with a lot of the ideals, neither of us were fans of the movie. The science was really weak.

When I got home I ate a minneola.

And then I wrote this post.

And that’s all she wrote!

P.S. I also packed lunch. And I’m planning on going to bed as soon as I get a quick shower. Tomorrow’s forecast is looking much less cranky.

P.P.S. Confession: I did also find time this afternoon to watch the last ever episode of Private Practice.

P.P.S.S. Confession: I cried.

Have you seen Vedguated yet? Thoughts?

23Jan2013

My Pictures Went “Poof!”

by Emily

I’m over the hump! Three days in a row of full-time interning, cooking meals, and generally being an adult. And the thought of adding in workouts next week only slightly makes me want to order a pizza and eat it in bed.

[[[Updated to add – I typed my introduction as I was editing today’s photos. Only when I moved forward to write the next paragraph did I realize that I somehow deleted all of my dinner photos. {frick! frick! frick!} It is a good thing that I started this post in a chipper mood.]]]

Today was delicious! Breakfast had two tasty components.

A big glass of Lifeway Lowfat Coconut Chia Kefir.

Yumtastic, this variety is the best kefir I’ve ever had! Sometimes kefir has a bit of a sour aftertaste to it but this flavor had none of that. The coconut flavor was pretty subtle so I think this would appeal to you even if you’re not loco for coco(nut).

With a big bowl of (microwaved frozen) peaches topped with 1 tsp brown sugar, 1/3 cup KIND Maple Walnut Clusters with Chia & Quinoa, and a splash of skim milk.

Yesterday’s gross protein smoothie may not have tasted like peach cobbler, but this sure did.

It was a good day at the hospital. I’m still mostly observing but I got to discuss some pretty interesting patients. My cases today included eating disorders, ketogenic diets for seizure disorders, and failure to thrive. So far this experience has really cemented my desire to go into clinical practice when I graduate.

I did get up early to journal, and then I worked through lunch, but I’ve finally taken a chunk out of that project. There is still a lot to do tomorrow but tonight I managed to just have down time. And I did get to eat lunch while I worked. A big Pink Lady.

Some Skinny Cow peanut butter chocolates.

And I packed us both tuna salad sandwiches.

We split a can of tuna with Miracle Whip, pickle relish, and tons of red onion.

And then I had to chew gum to deal with my horrendous tuna/onion breath.

Worth it.

Afternoon snacks included 3 oz of trail mix eaten in the car.

And a strawberry milk tea with popping and tapioca boba from Gin Gin.

I’ve been raving about the double bubbles at Gin Gin for months and today I finally got to take a similarly obsessed friend to experience the wonder. I’ll have you all know that she too dug through her ice to snag all the boba!

As you know, I don’t have any pictures of dinner. {grrrrrr} Thankfully the meal didn’t photograph all that beautifully anyway. We sautéed linguine, evoo, a bag of frozen veggies (green beans, broccoli, onions, mushroom, and red pepper), 2 eggs, and peanut sauce until crispy and delicious. We each had a large bowl and loved every bite.

My new fun thing is to be starving an hour after dinner each day. I’m not going to fight it, but I am trying to stick to mostly healthy(ish) snacks to deal with my hunger. Today’s 4th meal was a yogurt bowl.

Fage 2% Plain Greek yogurt topped honey and a half serving of granola. A little more sugary than I’m hoping for every day, but the bowl was luscious and it did fill me up.

Are you a kefir fan?

Eating Chalk

Monthly Archives: January 2013

Baking Tasting

Two Days, Too Many?

The First Of The Last

Cookie Sunday

My Forever Alone Movie Date

Fashion Friday

Fashion Fridays

David Boreanaz Is A Hottie

My Pictures Went “Poof!”