Author Archives: Emily

Spring Has Sprung

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“Spring has sprung.”  That’s what Adam said during our tv interview (which our friend Brandon actually heard on the radio!) and that’s what I was saying with today’s outfit –

Actually, what I was saying with my short sleeves was “I hibernated this winter, please don’t judge my pale, flabby bat-wings.”

It was so exciting outside that I didn’t even mind adding an extra walk home so I could eat dinner before my night class.  Dinner wasn’t especially spring-y, a Smart Ones Angel Hair Marinara with yellow squash and zucchini.

I wasn’t expecting much – I sort of hate angel hair pasta – but it was actually pretty good!  I loved the squash.

Let’s be real though, I picked dinner based on the nutritional info –

I knew I needed the caloric wiggle room for dessert.

Those Magnum ice cream bars did not last long!  I scraped it off the stick and ate it with a spoon.

Delicious.

Way Back Wednesday, Wk 3

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I missed WBW last week so I tried to make this a good one!  First, the present…

I packed a nice sandwich for lunch,

A slice of 2% Swiss, two slices of turkey, and Crofter’s Strawberry Fruit Spread on an Everything Bagel Thin.

Plus some roasted green beans.

Hopefully it’ll be enough to last me through my night class, but my huge breakfast probably did the trick.  Now on to the good stuff…

Way Back Wednesday is a new blog series.  Since I have to pre-blog lunch on my long days, I’m throwing in pictures from life BB (life before blogging) for fun.  (week 1, week 2)

This week’s WBW is about the NYC apartment I shared with the husband.  Adam and I actually lived together in college, but this was our first “real” apartment, the one we had to pay for on our own.  Apartment is a little generous of a term though, this was a studio.  For those of you who’ve never been poor teachers in New York City, studio = room.

As in Adam and I, plus all of our stuff, in one room for two years.  The place was gorgeous, but building up a mess was unavoidable.  Here’s the living room –

And this is the bedroom –

You’ll notice that the bedroom is also the living room, and that we slept on the couch.

Honestly, even with all of our stuff, it wasn’t that bad.  Fighting was a little ridiculous (how do you slam the door when there are no doors?!), but we felt so blessed to be in our neighborhood – Park Slope – that it was worth it.

But then there was the bathroom.

I wish I could really show you how small the bathroom was, but the pictures just don’t do it justice.

I’ll put it this way – our larger relatives couldn’t even fit into the bathroom.  And my model-tall best friend could only pee with the door open.  It was a little insane.

But even though I cried every shower as I smashed my funny bone into the wall trying to wash my hair, I loved that apartment.  We got to live in Park Slope, and when we moved in on a whim we had no idea it would quickly become our favorite neighborhood in the city.  Our studio was less than a block away from Prospect Park.

We also lived walking distance from 5 major subway lines, and walking distance from the arch at Grand Army Plaza.  I wouldn’t have traded those two years for all the floor space in the world!

What was your first apartment like?

Toppings Heaven

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Happy Hump Day!  I hopped right over the hump today with a nice morning workout.

Elliptical for 30minutes, on level 6 random (with several sprint intervals).  Plus a short session of stretching and strength moves.  I love my walk home from the gym because it helps me to continue to stretch out my legs.

After a quick shower I tucked into a heavenly breakfast.

I think some people think eating a yogurt bowl for breakfast will be boring, but with the right toppings it can become dessert.

Today’s bowl basically did move right past breakfast and into dessert –

Chopped banana, a sprinkle of cinnamon, Yoplait 0% Plain Greek Yogurt, butter toffee almonds, toasted coconut, a dollop of marshmellow filling, and 1 Tbsp Smuckers Natural PB with Honey.

Man, oh man!  Boring was not on the vocabularly list.

What are your favorite unorthodox yogurt toppings?

Marys, Monkeys, and Magnums

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As the title implies, it’s been a fun day!  Also, in case the title leads to any confusion, mary = an upcoming half marathon and magnum is not referring to condoms!

Yep, I said it, I’ve got another half marathon in my sights!  I’ve been agitated ever since my 6-week illness killed my training for the Buffalo Half Marathon and I finally found one to take its place.  My goal is to run in the Presque Isle Half Marathon on July 17th.  I say goal instead of plan because I’m mindful of the fact that I have a history of injuries and pushing through pain isn’t worth the risk.  I’m going to wait until I’ve made it to at least 7 miles without incident before I put money down on entry fee.

I do however have a training plan (which I’ll share sometime soon) that had me slated for 3miles this morning.  The husband and I ran a nice loop around our neighborhood, 3miles and 30minutes.  Since I don’t have a Garmin I can’t really track my pacing, but I use MapMyRun as best I can.

When we got home I had to run through my shower since Katie was picking me up for a brunch date at Betty’s.

I’d never been before but I’ll definitely be going back to Betty’s soon, the place was adorable and the food was delicious!

I ordered off the specials menu, the Portobello Benedict –

Hashbrowns,

fruit,

and two English muffins topped with roasted Portobello mushroom, spinach, two poached eggs, and smoked gouda.

Mmmmmmn!  It shouldn’t be called a Benedict without Hollandaise (I would have gotten it on the side though so I probably shouldn’t quibble..) but this meal was not lacking for flavor.  The egg yolks melted perfectly into the bread and it was great to get some veggies into my morning.

Katie was kind enough to drive me back to school and I snagged a “mocha” (half coffee, half hot chocolate) along the way.

I don’t have classes on Tuesday but I was headed to an Anthropology-sponsored speaker on the topic of primates.  Ever since I attended the Body Farm lecture (love!) my name has been on an e-mail list and when I saw “live primates in attendance” I jumped on the opportunity!  I recruited a few friends to come with me and we all had a ton of fun –

Where else can you see a man diaper a monkey?

We’ve been putting grocery shopping off and are running out of food so Adam picked me up from the lecture for a trip to Wegmans.

I had to show off my primate pictures so we had to get hot bar for lunch.

Tons of grilled/steamed veggies with a little bit of sesame chicken,

with fruit for dessert.

Tastes like summer, the mango was definitely swoon-worthy!

While we were out, I cashed in a coupon from the Foodbuzz Tastemakers’ Program for some Magnum Ice Cream.

I grabbed a box of Double Caramel Bars.

I am so glad that I was given the opportunity to taste this for free because it’s not it’s not a product I would have bought on my own and now I might be obsessed!

Holy double layer of chocolate, Batman; this was good!  It’s (surprisingly good for vanilla) vanilla ice cream, wrapped in chocolate, wrapped in caramel, wrapped in a second chocolate shell.  The premise reminds me of this SNL skit, but the execution was perfection!

http://www.hulu.com/embed/umxmTijZLcnMhDPJjmYd5g

I also snacked on baby carrots with blue cheese,

and shared a few tastes of the husband’s new fancy cheese.

Dinner was a Cooking Light find, Quick White Bean, Asparagus and Mushroom Cassoulet.

Per usual, my changes included –

  • using baby Portobellos for half of my mushrooms
  • skipping the wine and oregano entirely
  • subbing in chicken broth for veggie broth
  • roasting the asparagus instead of boiling it
  • putting the cassoulet into the oven instead of the broiler (I don’t have a single broiler safe vessel!)

Even with my changes it was still pretty delicious though.

I ate my serving with some chips for scooping purposes.

Delicious.

Ok, this has been a very long post, time to wrap things up.  Hope everyone had a good day!

Cupcakes Worth Celebrating

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It’s an exciting day around here, Adam’s semester is officially over!  He took a final this morning, marking the end of this portion of his schooling.  They finish school early because they have two months off to study for an important exam.  Then they start back again mid-summer, this time on rotation in the hospital!  He’s celebrating by playing poker with the boys and I celebrated by making the boys a batch of cupcakes.  And boy am I glad to have a reason to celebrate, said cupcakes are the recipe I’ve been testing/obsessing over the past few weeks: ‘Smores cupcakes.  The recipe is at the bottom of this post and I totally won’t blame you if you skip right to the end.

For those of you who are still with me, lunch –

I packed a toasted Bagel Thin, topped with a slice of 2% Swiss and Crofter’s Strawberry Fruit Spread,

and a sliced Gala apple.

I don’t think my Biochem test went as poorly as I was expecting, but my nutrition quiz was pretty gosh-darn awful.  It’s too late to really fix my grades for this semester, but I’m excited to work hard the next few weeks just in the interest of feeling better about myself.

When I got home this afternoon I made myself a plate of baby carrots with blue cheese dressing for dipping.

I’m glad I ate a snack, one with a veggie natch, because dinner was a no-go.  I did so much “tasting” while I baked that I ate enough sugar to give myself a migraine!  Whoops; #healthylivingbloggerfail!

But what a way to get a headache…

‘Smores Cupcakes, serves 15

cake ingredients

  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup butter, softened
  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 and 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1 and 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 and 3/4 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 6 sheets graham crackers (4 rectangles = 1 sheet)

filling ingredients

  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup water
  • 1 large egg white
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/8 tsp cream of tartar

frosting ingredients

  • 8 oz 1/3 reduced fat cream cheese, softened
  • 1/2 cup butter, softened
  • 1 and 1/4 cup confectioners sugar
  • 10 oz semi sweet chocolate chips

cake directions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Line muffin pans with 15 liners.
  2. Place graham crackers in a baggie and use a rolling-pin or a sturdy cup to crush them into a homogenous mixture with a rough sand texture.
  3. Stir together flour and baking powder in a small bowl.
  4. In a medium bowl, cream together sugar and butter.  Beat in eggs, one at a time.  Then stir in vanilla.
  5. Working in batches, mix flour mixture into wet ingredients.
  6. Stir in milk, then fold in crumbled graham crackers.
  7. Spoon batter into cupcake pan, filling each liner about 3/4.
  8. Bake 20minutes, until tops of cupcakes spring back to the touch. 
  9. Set aside to cool.  Cooling can be sped up by placing baked cupcakes into the freezer for 1-2minutes.

filling directions

  1. Place sugar and water in a medium pan over medium-high heat.  Cook, stirring constantly, until sugar has completely liquified.  Remove from heat.
  2. Place egg white, vanilla, and cream of tartar in a **clean and dry** bowl.  Beat until soft peaks begin to form.  A stand mixer would be preferable, but I’ve definitely done this using a handheld mixer and lots of patience.
  3. While mixer is running, carefully stream sugar syrup into bowl.
  4. Beat, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed, until stiff peaks form and mixture is glossy; 7minutes.

frosting directions

  1. Place chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl.  Melt, microwaving for 30second intervals and stirring in between.  You want to stop heating when the chips are mostly melted, as they will continue to melt as you stir.  This step can also be done in a double boiler.
  2. In a medium bowl, cream together butter, cream cheese, and sugar.
  3. Pour melted chocolate – it only needs to cool for a moment or two – into frosting.  Beat, scraping down the sides of the bowl, until the mixture is incorporated.

assembly directions

  1. Lay cooled cupcakes on a flat surface.
  2. Use a spatula to transfer filling to a pastry bag fitted with a medium piping tip.  A plastic bag with the corner will work as well, but be carefull not to cut the hole too large or the pressure will force out the piping tip.
  3. Push tip flush into the top of a cupcake and pipe until you feel increased resistance.  Repeat, piping 3 holes into each cupcake.  It’s ok if you make some craters because the thick frosting will cover them up.
  4. Apply frosting liberally.
  5. Consume!

Note – you will probably have leftover frosting and filling, even after all of the cupcakes have been assembled.  Both are fabulous stirred into plain Greek yogurt or eaten with a spoon 🙂

I Have a Biochem Exam Today

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So our Scrubs and pizza date was wonderful.  Sidenote – as we walked (in sandals) to get our pizza we were stopped for a short but fun interview by a local tv crew doing an interest piece about the weather!

Sunday – which included brunch and a movie date, to “Scream 4” of all things – was wonderful too.

What was not wonderful, was the feeling in my stomach when I woke up and realized I have a Biochem exam today.  It’s not that I forgot about the exam, more like I forgot to care.  Sometimes I get frustrated here (I didn’t choose Buffalo, the husband did; BSC isn’t the type of school I’d love to attend; I’m afraid I’m not as passionate about nutrition as I am about other things), and sometimes I let that frustration get in the way.  But frustrated or not, I choose this; I quit my job career to be here.  So I need to make the most of it.  “Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.” ~Josh Billings

Breakfast was very well-played.

Greek style, fat-free honey and almond yogurt from Target.  A chopped banana.  1Tbsp of Smuckers Natural PB with Honey.  A few butter toffee almonds.  A sprinkle of toasted coconut.

As I set off to cram I may be disappointed in myself, but at least I’m well-fed!

What is/was your study style; last-minute cram or responsible do-ahead?

Frosted

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I’m having a blogger conundrum – I’ve made immediate plans to hang out with the husband and I want to go be with him, BUT I had a fun day I’d really like to blog about.  Let’s compromise: good content, quick and boring post.

We had some errands to run this morning before the fun, so I grabbed a 2% Pineapple Chobani to eat in the car.

I’m never going to stray with Mango again, this is sooo much better!

Then we headed to our fun activity – a cake baking/decorating class at Delish!

Delish is an adorable bakery in our neighborhood that also does cooking/baking classes upstairs.  When Groupon offered a 50% of deal a few months ago I jumped on it.  It took us a while to find a class we were both excited about, but cake decorating definitely fit the bill.

We watched the owner bake two kinds of cupcakes and two kinds of buttercream, and learned a few buttercream tips that I can’t wait to use.  We took a few tastes and in total I’d say my bites added up to one small cupcake.

Next they did some cake layering and icing demos and let us loose.  The husband was shockingly talented at writing in icing, must be those future surgeon’s hands!  We each got our own cake to layer and frost.  Mine –

Adam’s –

It was a lot of fun.  If you live in the area I’d highly recommend taking a class at Delish.

The two-hour course got our hunger worked up so we walked across the street to Blue Monk for lunch.

Our friend Danielle is a bartender there and we’ve heard nothing but good things.

Good things that we’ll now echo, because our food was delicious!  I ordered an appetizer special, the veggie Napoleon.

Grilled zucchini and tomato, layered with house made lemon ricotta and sliced baguette.

This was light but filling.  The texture was great and you could taste the fact that the ingredients were high quality.

I also split the famous duck fat frites with Adam.

Swoon!

And snagged a few bites of his duck reuben.

It was good, but my veggies definitely stole the show.

I think I needed a bigger lunch after my small breakfast though (especially after the smell of baking cakes revved up my appetite), so I ended up making myself a snack when we got home.

1.5 oz of tortilla chips, 1.5 oz of 2% sharp cheddar, corn relish, and jalopenos.

Is there a Nachos Anonymous?!

Finally, the plan for the evening is Scrubs reruns and pizza!  I know that sounds dull to some, but this combo is so exciting to the husband and I that I actually talked about it in my wedding vows!  I can’t wait!

Have you ever taken a cooking class?

All Sorts of Win

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My day has been like Charlie Sheen, all sorts of winning!  Seriously though, it has been one of those days that are just randomly fantastic.  Good workout, mostly good food, good times with the husband…

Win #1 of the day was the realization that music makes my workouts fly by.  My i-pod broke months ago and my parents gave me an IOU for a replacement in my Christmas stocking but it’s taken me a while to finally cash it in.  I got a nano, in lime green, engraved with my phone # and part of my favorite quote from Robert Frost.

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.”

Once I got of Biochem this afternoon I headed straight to the gym, my new i-pod stocked with a new 30minute playlist –

  1. Sweet Light, The Chapin Sisters
  2. The Cave, Mumford and Sons
  3. Coming Home, Diddy
  4. Signal Fire, Snow Patrol
  5. Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangster, Geto Boys
  6. Heartbeats, Jose Gonzalez
  7. My Dick, Dirt Nasty
  8. Somwhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World, Israel Kamakawiwo’ole

For 30minutes on the elliptical, random level 6.  “What a Wonderful World” is actually the song Adam and I walked down the aisle to once we were married, and when it came on I started to cry!!!  I had to elliptisize as fast as I could to make myself stop being embarrassing (double win!).

Once I was home and showered I headed out on errands with Adam.  Win #2 was the free coffee I picked up at Starbucks for Earth Day –

Seasoned with a big pour of skim milk and two sugars.

Our errands included a trip to the mall for Adam to get an eye check up, where I sat in the food court for an hour and wrote notecards like a weirdo.  I may have looked like a creeper, but I actually got a lot done.

Not a win, was the fact that we were busy straight through lunch and ended up not eating anything.  By 5:30 when we left the mall I was having a definite panic attack of hunger.  I ended up randomly grabbing this Liquid Taffy candy to split with Adam.

Such a win!  The texture of this was divine; a velvety, less chewy taffy.

We continued dessert before dinner by splitting froyo.

Fat free chocolate and vanilla twist, topped with strawberries, sprinkles, and granola.

Total win!

Dinner, not such a win.  It was poised to be good…

We headed to Taste of Thai on Hertel (an avenue with tons of good-looking restaurants and next to no parking), where we split our regular order – Pad See Eiw with tofu,

and Cashew Chicken.

The dishes had tons of veggies (our complaint with Buffalo Thai has been the lack of veggies), but that’s where the compliments end.  The renditions were painfully inauthentic, and way too salty to boot.  Fail!

But being with the husband is always a win.  Especially for the rest of the evening, for which our big plans include the latest Community and the splitting of two mini ice creams.

This day has been sweet, in every sense of the word!

What was your most recent #win?