Mish Mash Meal

by Emily

Fabulous day alert! After so many weeks of being a lazy blob I am seriously relishing my productivity. Post office, studying, dinner; check, check, check! Plus I rocked two of my grandma’s old necklaces which always makes me happy.

The line at the post office was redonculous, but a very sweet package from my mommy was a nice reward at the end. Lots of excitement ensued; I got a bunch of magazines, new book,

a baggie of my favorite candy of all time ever (I ate one of these without photographing), fruit gels,

and a P.E. T-shirt from my old high school!

After my not ‘rain nor snow’ing I met up with a friend from Chemistry to study. We got in a solid 5 hours! As much as we accomplished, I didn’t do so hot on the practice tests so I know I have my work cut out for me this week.

I got home around 8:30 and got right to dinner. My goal was to use up leftovers, frozen food, and my Annie Chun’s sample.

The end result was seriously socks rocking! I was in absolute heaven eating this plate.

I heated chipotle pepper oil over medium high heat. Added 2 chopped Apple Maple Sausages (I froze these a few months ago) and 2 big handfuls spinach/arugula and a small handful shredded carrot. Next I added leftover roasted butternut squash from yesterday and 1/2 of the black pearl rice. Then I stirred in a splash each of soy sauce, rice vinegar, and sesame seeds. Finally I broke in 1egg and stirred.

I couldn’t get over how good this was! What a mix of flavors and textures, lots of sweet/savory which I love.

For dessert I tried some of my new candies.

They were good, but the Sunkist ones are the best.

We started watching “Glory Road” while we ate and I’m enjoying it. See you tomorrow!

Have you made any good mish-mash meals lately?

6Oct2009

Burst Your Bubble

by Emily

I was losing my motivation after the last post – I was hungry and distracted and I could feel myself spacing out. However, my test is this Friday so I distracted myself with a piece of gum and buckled down.

I chipped away at the reading I’m behind on and have almost finished all of my notecards for the material on the test.

Lunch was another taco salad, I’m still not sick of these! I would like to say I put the bowl beside my work and took ladylike bites, but that happened for all of 30seconds before the shoveling began 🙂

lettuce base
~1/2C black beans
~2T 2% colby jack
heap hot/chunky salsa
1serving Lime Food Should Taste Good Chips

Mmmmn. I also snacked on one serving of roasted peanuts.

I’ve got to rush off again, I’m heading to the post office and then meeting a study buddy at the Spot. See you for dinner!

What is your favorite flavor of gum? I was actually going to cry when I found out that Cherry Coke Bubblicious had been discontinued! In general I don’t chew a lot of gum (Trident White once every few months) but in high school I chomped constantly!

6Oct2009

Great Blogs Think Alike

by Emily

Good morning! I hope everyone’s day is off to a good start. Mine has managed to be both relaxing and productive. Embarassing secret time – scary movies have made me afraid of everything. It’s gotten better as I’ve gotten older (when I was a teenager I would jump into bed so my feet didn’t go underneath the bed!) but I still can’t shake my shower anxiety. I am very uncomfortable to be in the shower when I’m home alone. I peek out the curtain multiple times and hurry through everything. And since Adam is so busy almost all of my showers are alone.

But this morning I switched up my schedule and found a solution. I got up at 5:45 and headed to the gym early so I could come home and shower before the husband left for school. I came home and took a nice luxurious shower; I conditioned my hair, and used my favorite body scrub.

I won’t be doing this every morning, but it’s a nice solution for me to keep in mind. The gym was pretty successful too. My training schedule had 3miles for today. With warm up and cool down I did 38minutes/3.8miles/420calories.

After the aforementioned shower I got started on breakfast. It’s possible I was so hungry that I snagged a small hunk of chocolate pb bread before I even thought about real food.

I think every blogger who received this Nature’s Pride bread from the Foodbuzz Tastemaker program thought french toast and I was no different! I received two loaves to sample but for now I put one in the freezer and am focusing on 12 Grain.

I soaked two pieces of bread in a mixture of 1egg, 1/2C skim milk, 1shake each cinnamon and nutmeg, and 1T vanilla. The bread took a luxurious shower of it’s own (a quick soak), spent a few minutes in the sauna (pan with 1/2T SmartBalance), and gussied up with maple syrup and a chopped white peach and nectarine.

I loved the texture of the Nature’s Pride bread, and the toast was nice and eggy.

So yum, full recipe here. The plan for the morning is lots and lots of Chemistry make-up. I have 2 chapters to read – I’m only planning on doing one today though – another chapter to make notecards for, and a slew of practice tests to work on. Gotta go get my brain working!

What are you afraid of? I also have a major aversion to spiders. But I actually like most other typical girl fears (frogs, snakes, etc.)! My “abstract” fears are that I won’t figure out what to do with my life in time and I’ll get stuck in something that I don’t enjoy and that I’ll injure myself and lose my ability to run.

5Oct2009

Borrowed

by Emily

I made it to campus in time to print off my materials and reschedule a study session with my chemistry friend. Class went well, we got out 10minutes early which is always exciting 🙂

When I got home the husband and I did a photo shoot to show off our new produce.

Check out our funny sized apples! The small one is called a “Mini,” but that pregnant Kate Gossling of an apple is actually just a Honeycrisp.

Adam and I split the biggie (in fact he did lots of sharing tonight, thanks hubby!), I ate my portion on a salad.

It was quite a good salad, it had arugula, chopped apple, shredded carrots, a few peanuts and ~1T of Adam’s creamy italian salad dressing.

I ate dinner in courses, each item alone, but it all added up to be a great meal.

After the salad was a tropical smoothie.

~1/2C Goya passionfruit pulp, ~1C frozen tropical fruit blend, ~1/2C oj. It was tasty, but a little too tart, I only drank about 2/3 of it.

Next Adam was the sweetest bear ever and shared 2 chicken nuggets with me.

And finally I ate some roasted butternut squash.

I spritzed it with evoo; sprinkled with salt, pepper, cinnamon, and nutmeg; and roasted for 20minutes at 475*.

Actually, finally was dessert. I prepped this Chocolate Peanut Butter Quick Bread my mom sent awhile ago while I drank my smoothie.

I did a lot of spoon-licking while I made it, but I saved room for a small piece.

It was good, chocolate bread with gooey peanut butter chips.

I’m heading to bed so I can get up early tomorrow. This week is off to a good start!

What foods do you like to “borrow” from your significant other? In general Adam’s food choices are a little less healthy than mine, but I usually don’t have any junk-envy. However, those frozen chicken nuggets are to die for!

5Oct2009

Why Do You Workout?

by Emily

Phew! Our rough weekend is over and things are starting to look up. I let myself catch up on sleep this morning, sleeping in until I had to had to the hospital. I felt a little off so I didn’t eat breakfast, but by 12:30 I was more than ready for lunch. I used my cafeteria voucher to get a slice of cheese pizza.

I thought a little bit about mindless eating while I lunched. When I entered the cafeteria someone handed me these Hershey’s Kisses.

I was planning on eating them after my pizza, but after a moments thought I realized: I don’t like Kisses. I prefer dark chocolate and while I love the truffle variety that was around for a while, plain kisses taste dry and bland to me. How often do you put something in your mouth without thinking about it?

I volunteered from 10-2 and then came home and did some organizing. Around 3:30 I headed for the gym. My foot’s been really hurting and I realized not being able to run has kept me from the gym entirely. That’s not right. While I am excited about the half marathon and wish I could train for it, that’s not the only reason I work out. I work out to feel healthy and strong, to relieve stress, and to be my best.

With that in mind, I did 30minutes on the elliptical machine (for about 3miles and 300calories).

After a quick shower I’m headed to campus. I want to print some materials before class so hopefully I’ll have enough time to get to the library. See you for dinner!

Why do you workout? Studies have shown that an active lifestyle can promote better sleep, regulate metabolism and hunger, prevent bone loss, bolster your immune system, and more!

3Oct2009

Emergency Room

by Emily

This has not been our weekend! I didn’t post yesterday because our internet was randomly down, but I had big plans for this morning. There was a gym trip scheduled in and I made a study date with a friend from Chemistry. However, no post because there’s been no food. “Why would I wait until after 2pm to eat?” you ask. Maybe I’m on a diet. Or, maybe, I spent 5hours in the ER! Everyone is ok now, but apparently the husband has kidney stones. Fun times 😦

I’ve given up on getting any studying done today (thank goodness for Sundays!) but I am going to go grocery shopping and we might see a movie tonight. I’ll see you all tomorrow. Hope everyone else is staying healthy!

What’s on your grocery list this weekend? It’s October, so I am finally allowing myself to buy everything and anything pumpkin!

1Oct2009

I Didn’t See Its Shadow

by Emily

A successful evening, all around! Lab went well and I got back my quiz from last week – 100%, woot! That makes me feel much more confident about next week’s test. Plus I made plans with a friend from class to study this weekend, so I know I won’t slack off. And on the way in we made a new friend, my very first groundhog sighting!

During lab recitation I snacked on this Perfect Pumpkin Boomi Bar.

This was nice and crunchy, and perfect for the first day of pumpkin month!

When I got home I had a gourmet dinner in mere minutes –

Moo Shu Stoup leftovers from August. No one ever wants soup more than twice in a row and it freezes well so it is the perfect thing for long-term leftovers. Plus it is easy peasy:

Measure portions into ziplock baggies
Lay flat on a baking sheet and put into the freezer overnight
In the morning, remove the sheet and you have perfect frozen soup stacks

All we had to do tonight was make new veggie dumplings, and Adam did that so for me it was easy 🙂

I’m still super hungry, but I’m trying to have a drink and see if it passes. We are watching Cold Mountain, so it’s possible I’ll get a snack in a bit. ‘Night.

Do you make long-term leftovers? What dishes work best?

*****Updated – We stayed up waaay to late watching Cold Mountain (which was super sad and sort of disappointing) and I did have a snack.

When I made cookies the other day I reserved 2 pieces of dough and tonight I crushed them into some Purely Decadent Coconut Milk Coconut Ice Cream. Good idea!

1Oct2009

Justin Time

by Emily

Cool_Justin_Timberlake_Wallpaper

No, no, no; I hate JT! Although I did eat at his restaurant in nyc once….. I meant just–in time, as in I got my flu shot just in time because it is frickin’ freezing!

There were lots of little bumps this morning, but the important things ran smoothly. Apparently I do Not like green Rockstars, I took 4sips before I decided it was inedible unquaffable. Then it was so cold outside I had to come back in for a hoodie which threw me off schedule. And when I stopped at the bank on the way home I got frozen out of my account and fixing the issue was annoying and slow. However, I had a good quickie workout – 25minutes on the treadmill for 2.4miles and 250calories – and I have my flu shot for this season!

Before my shower I rescheduled my doctor’s appointment and made some other business calls; my must do to-do’s for the day are all done! Which is good, because after my shower I wasted a ton of time sitting on the couch warming up. Finally, however, the thought of lunch prompted me to get dressed.

Taco salads = yum!

arugula base (which totally disappeared when microwaved, I’ll use way more next time)
1/4C black beans
~1/4C 2% colby jack cheese
salsa
chipotle Tabasco
1serving Lime Food Should Taste Good chips (I ate most of the serving straight from the bag)

I’ve been drooling over these chips on blogs for months so I was so excited when I received free sample coupons in the mail! My grocery store didn’t have the flavors I was looking for (Buffalo!), but Lime sounded good. It was tasty, but I’m going to keep looking for the spice.

Alongside I had another sample, a small glass of Kiwi POM juice.

This new flavor will be in stores in a few months, definitely keep an eye out for it!

I’m going to Hulu “Mercy” while I eat, so I’ve got to skedaddle before it gets cold. See you after class!

Have you had your flu shot yet? Are you planning on it? Everyone should. There is no medically supported reason not to and getting the shot protects your health.