Author Archives: Emily

Mixed Metaphor Magoo

by

Our evening plans ended up all wonky, but you gotta roll with what life throws you!  <– mixed metaphor much?  We had to go get some keys made at the last minute (don’t ask, I am a bit irritated with our new apartment) and I had to scrap dinner and workout plans.  Here’s what I did do –

  • get to take a walk with the husband
  • make the tastiest eggs I’ve ever fricking eaten
  • bake up some banana bread

I don’t know what my problem is today, I’ve been sooooo hungry!  Perhaps delayed hunger from two days of hard workouts?  I’m going to bust my butt tomorrow morning so I guess that means I’ll be extra hungry for yummy meals during my parents’ visit 🙂  I made a big (random) snack bowl this afternoon.

A mix of sour cream and onion Goldfish, cinnamon chips, dried kiwi, and dried apricots.  Bowls like this make me adore my kitchen scale with tare function all the more – if I had to eyeball those servings I would have ended up with a much larger bowl!

Dinner was basically epic. <– Caitlin is right, sometimes this is just the only word.

I melted .5T of butter in my skillet, cooked up some chopped green tomato and avocado, then scrambled in two eggs.  I tried to scramble the whites and leave the yolks alone until the last minute and the dish ended up being amazing.  Topped with some Newman’s Own Chunky Salsa.

On the side I had some Boulder Canyon Balsamic Vinegar and Rosemary potato chips; I did not measure that serving and I’m pretty sure I ended up eating more than recommended.

For dessert I ate a slice of banana bread fresh from the oven.

The recipe comes from Cooking Light but I added some chocolate chips to appease the husband.  Very tasty.  Note – if you decide to make your own beware, an hour cook time was way too long for our oven.

I also got to try another one of blogland’s obsessions –

PB cups made with MaraNatha.

The husband and I split the cups and we do NOT plan on spending $6 to get a jar, I just don’t see the obsession!

Do you have a kitchen scale?  What sort of things do you weigh with it?  Also, can someone explain the MaraNatha obsession to me?

Like Ice Cream

by

Today has been sort of … lame!  I guess maybe I should call it low-key?  I do have some baking and a workout on the agenda for this evening, but other than that, zilch.  The real excitement starts tomorrow when my parents get here for a visit!  They’ll be in town all weekend -yay! – and then the next weekend is BlogHer and a visit from two of my best friends.  I’m so excited!

I always say Siggis yogurt is so thick it looks like ice cream, so this morning I served my breakfast out of an ice cream bowl!

That’s a Pomegranate Passionfruit Siggi with a bit of fruit topping.

I will admit, it was a lot more fun to eat with my fancy spoon 🙂

I had a lunch date that got canceled at the last minute (seriously Katie, don’t worry about it, I was running soooo late) so I buckled to my near obsession with getting another tuna salad sandwich with red onion.

The red onion makes the sandwich.  On a similar note, I would consider myself a cheese fanatic (my husband calls me mouse!) but I didn’t miss the cheese on this sandwich at all.  I am going to offer everyone the advice that you should consider whether or not it will actually make a difference in the sandwich before you blithely pile on the cheese.

I did the combo (fountain diet soda? yes please!) so I also had this baggie of apple slices.

Not a bad lunch at all.

Are you going to be attending BlogHer???

I’m Just Mad About Saffron…

by

I can’t believe so many of you have never heard of the Slimcado; I feel like if it’s come to Buffalo it must be everywhere! 😉

The husband and I were both starving during our Goodwill visit so we ended up stopping for a pre-dinner snack.  I ate half of this huge slice of pizza.

And a few sips of this classic –

“they call me Mellow Yellow….”

Dinner was leftovers that were practically better than the first night.

Buffalo Blue Bean Burgers,

and Unfried Green Tomatoes.

We also cracked open a bottle of sparkling wine that the husband got at his brother’s wedding (before we were even seriously dating!).

Gag.  I took a sip and I think I’ll be sticking with Prosecco, thank you.

I had a good time catching up on tv this afternoon.  Has anyone seen Rizzoli and Isles yet?  I think I might be a fan!

Here Fishy, Fishy, Fishy

by

I made myself a smallish breakfast because I could tell today was going to be a snacky day, and sure enough at 11:30 –

1.5servings of ‘Smores Goldfish.

They were pretty good, but nowhere as good as lunch.

This sandwich was indeed pretty killer.  A pretzel roll with ~2oz sliced turkey, a slice of green tomato, hot pepper peach preserves, and ~1/6 of a slimcado.

The mix of textures and flavors here was amazing.

I didn’t misspeak by the way, that really is a slimcado and not an avocado.  I did a bit of research, and the slimcado has 50% less fat and 35% fewer calories.  Regular avocados are grown in California and slimcados are grown in Florida; the difference in growing enviroment gives them slightly varied properties.

Have you ever tried a slimcado?

Sick of Showers

by

I am sick of showering!  I took a show yesterday afternoon after working out, I took a shower last night before bed, and now I just got out of another one.  At least I have a good reason to be sudsing up – I was out getting my sweat on.  A run, a run, a glorious run; holy bananas did I miss running last year!

Since I haven’t worked out, you know at all, for the past year I’m pretty out of shape, but running makes me smile no matter how wheezy and like a dying walrus I look!  I’m trying to be smart and avoid another myriad of leg injuries so I’ll  try to space out my runs throughout the week and I’m throwing in lots of walking breaks.  Here was today’s workout –

  • 5minute warm up
  • 5minutes jogging
  • 3minutes walking
  • 5minutes jogging
  • 3minutes walking
  • 10minutes jogging
  • 5minute cool down

In total that’s 36minutes and ~3miles.  When I got home I spent 10minutes slooooowly stretching out on my yoga mat.

I tried to prolong the inevitable by browsing blogs, but finally I did go take a shower.  Which was good, because that meant it was breakfast time.

I piled up a serving of Van’s Minis Waffles and topped it with some berry topping…..and a crumbled cookie.

Yum!

On the agenda today is my magazine binder, a visit to Goodwill, and getting my car cleaned.  Also, watching a ton of Hulu because I missed tv while we didn’t have internet!

Running; like it, love it, or hate it?  Also alternately – showers; like ’em, love ’em, or hate ’em?

The Devil Went Down to Georgia…

by

We have internet!  And I cooked dinner in my oven!  A banner night all around 🙂

On my walk home this afternoon I realize that it had been 6hours since breakfast and was going to be another 4 until dinner, definitely time for lunch!  I made a stop into Subway.

I got a 6inch tuna salad sub with oil and vinegar and red onions.  I think the combo of tuna salad and red onions is just to die for!

I got a meal (hello, fountain diet soda!) so I also got some Baked Lays.

I took me a while to get hungry but once I was I got HUNGRY!  I also ate a serving of Goldfish,

and two cookies (yes in my Goldfish bowl, we have a tiny dishwasher I can’t be dirtying things left and right!).

Thankfully I was still hungry for dinner because dinner was a freaking masterpiece!

Every single component was through the roof tasty and the combination all together rocked my socks.  Plus, you know any meatless meal that the husband raves about is a winner.

My Buffalo Blue Bean Burgers,

Unfried Green Tomatoes from Cooking Light,

and 2 deviled eggs, recipe below.

Made for quite the pleasing meal.

The husband is obsessed with deviled eggs and since I won a year’s worth of Eggland’s Best it’s hard to turn down his request.  Tonight I tried out a new recipe that I thought up at the bar at Cheesecake Factory the other night;

Dirty Martini Deviled Eggs

  • 1 dozen large eggs
  • 2T olive brine
  • 2.5T blue cheese crumbles
  • 2T mayo
  • 6 pimento stuffed olives, halved
  1. Hard boil your eggs.  My method is to place the eggs in water in a big pan, bring to a boil, then turn off the heat and cover for 15minutes.  If you run cool water over the eggs when the time is up they will be easier to peel.
  2. Peel eggs and slice in half lengthwise.
  3. Dump yolks into a medium bowl and mash together with brine, blue cheese, and mayo.
  4. Spoon the yolk mixture back into the whites and top each egg with an olive half.

I’ve got my 2nd shower of the day and I’ve promised my pack-mule of a mover husband a back massage.  Then it’s off to bed so I can hopefully make it to an early morning tomorrow.

Deviled eggs; like ’em, love ’em, or hate ’em?

P.S. I apologize for the brain worm title, I’ll be singing that song all night too!

Silly Spiders, I’m Going to Smash You

by

Someone came by the apartment yesterday to fix the oven –> fire alarm dilemma but when we tested that evening we were still treated to screeching.  I shed a few tears of frustration and we ended up staying up way too late.  The lack of sleep wouldn’t have been so bad, but I was still super hungry and I ended up doing a lot of snacking.  Two mini chocolate chip cookies,

a serving of sour cream and onion Goldfish crackers,

and a bowl of cereal.

This morning, awesomely, started with another man coming to deal with the alarms.  Victory!  Nothing’s ever tasted so sweet, except, I suppose, breakfast –

A serving of Van’s Belgian Waffles topped with the fruit topping I made yesterday.

Now our new apartment is practically perfect.  I’ll let my remaining complaint be illustrated by Natalie Dee –

I needed a rest day Monday after our weekend of moving but today I was ready for a workout.  I had to walk to campus to update my mailing address so I decided to check out my new gym.  I have to go back to fill out my registration forms later but they let me work out today anyway.  I realized once I got to the machines that I forgot my water bottle, but I forged ahead and had a pretty good workout anyways.  I decided to do a circuit of sorts with the cardio machines –

  • 10minutes on the elliptical; random, level 6
  • 10minutes on the recumbent bike; random, level 7
  • 10minutes on the treadmill; 5mins of running then 5 of walking
  • 10minutes on the elliptical; same
  • 10minutes on the recumbent bike; same
  • 5minutes on the stair climber; resistance 6
  • 5minutes on the treadmill; walking cool down

I made it through my 60minutes sans h2o but the walk home (15ish minutes) in the sun was brutal.  Rehydration was key.

A serving of Grape G-2 mixed with an equal amount of water.  I think during these summer months I’m going to place Gatorade (and/or coconut water) on our regular grocery list.

I spotted yet another spider!  I took a quick shower – didn’t even wash my hair because it’s so hot I’ll have to shower again before bed anyways, eww – and threw on the saddest outfit on Earth.

That used to be my favorite teaching shirt.  Now it’s the artist formerly known as “button-up” a.k.a “button up to my boobs and then gape awkwardly.”

I walked down to Elmwood to search for some lemon essential oil; I have to try some natural spider deterrents because the husband said I can NOT Raid-bomb our entire apartment.  I’ll let you know if I find something that works.  I’m blogging now because I stopped at The Spot for a large diet soda and free wifi.  I’ve got to hurry home, we’ve got someone coming to set up our internet, yay!

Do you know of any natural spider deterrents that are actually effective?

A Grass Powered Day

by

It’s been one of those run-around errands days and I’m not gonna lie – it was nice to have a busy day that didn’t involve carrying things!

I drove the husband to work this morning and then drove to Barnes and Nobel and perused the “For Dummies” selection.  Sadly I didn’t find quite what I was looking for; I’m updating the blog this summer and I’m feeling very overwhelmed.  Does anyone with technical know-how feel like taking on a charity case???

Mid-errands I snacked on a Green SuperFood Chocolate Whole Food Energy Bar.

During vegan month Brandi kindly got us some samples from Amazing Grass.  Disclaimer – any AG products you see on the blog for the next bit will have been free samples.

This was my first time trying the AG bars and I actually quite liked it –

There was a good mix of “green” and sweet that balanced perfectly and I loved all the nuts.  Plus it had 5grams of protein and was loaded with micronutrients.

Next I headed to an out of the way mall to see if this rumor was true –

It was!  It was! It was!

I have been lamenting the lack of froyo in Buffalo for months (ever since I got self-serve froyo in Orlando) so this rocked my socks.  It was no Menchies, but still pretty fantastic.  I got a small serving of tart (plain) with strawberries, mango, kiwi, and oreo.

Smile indeed!

My errands took me to the bank, the drugstore, the co-op and finally to my kitchen table where I laid out the plethora of clippings for the magazine binder.

My goal is to get all of that in before school starts in September.

I pulled out another AG sample for the rest of lunch.

Pomegranate Mango Infusion Amazing Meal.  I smoothied it up with 1/2cup frozen strawberries, 1cup Silk Almond Milk, and 1/2cup water.

I thought I was going to hate it but I totally didn’t!  Be warned though, it was a bit chalky, you definitely needed some extra liquid.

I also spent some time at the stove, whipping up a batch of fruit topping for waffles and yogurt throughout this week.

This batch included a mix of plums, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries; I can’t wait to dig in tomorrow.

I came back to Adam’s school to pick him up and stopped in the computer lab to register for my final course (there was a waiting list that just opened up).  Now that my schedule is complete I’m a bit nervous: 16credits including Organic Chemistry and Anatomy, yikes!

Our final errand of the day was grocery shopping, so you know dinner came a la Wegman’s hot bar.

I was hungry, my plate ended up beyond loaded!

An assortment of Chinese chicken (aka fried and unhealthy),

roasted veggies,

chili garlic eggplant (not fried, I don’t know why it looks like that),

and raw kale salad.

All de-Lish!

I’m actually blogging on Wegman’s wifi, I’ve gotta go get my groceries!

Do you prefer ice cream or frozen yogurt?  I’m a froyo girl all the way.