And A Class To Go Before I Sleep

by Emily

My mom texted to check on me after I didn’t post last night, but I promise I wasn’t snowed in/buried alive/on a bender – I’ve just been busy! Monday wasn’t quite as crazy as Sunday, but I am getting this post up early before night class so I have some tiny chance of painting my nails this evening. If I miss another holiday colors polish opportunity I will be so sad.

Sunday I ate this Tandoor Chef Vegetable Pad Thai for breakfast.

Not traditional “morning food,” but one of the best frozen entrées ever. It is a little calorie-dense at 490kcal a package, but the texture and flavor makes it taste like a splurge and not a sad frozen dinner.

I tried to take a cup of my latest impulse purchase to work with me, but ended up passing Adam my glass after one sip.

I love Silk’s almond milks but I think I am just not a soy milk girl; this had such a strong aftertaste to me. Thankfully the husband enjoys it so our carton won’t go to waste.

Adam and Webster picked me up from work, and we got this box from the co-op hot bar on the way home.

Vegan “cheesy” pasta and 3 stuffed grape leaves, shared 70-30 my favor.

We also split this Opal apple.

It is fun to try new varieties, but we probably won’t get this one again for the increased price versus “regular” apples.

I was tired from work, and really didn’t want to go to the gym, so I bribed myself with this Justin’s Chocolate Almond Butter packet.

That stuff is just chocolate frosting, I swear!

At the gym, I finished my first week of CT10k workouts. 4 minutes walking/1 minute running, x 8. Except I shouldn’t listen to Fiona Apple while I run because I’m obsessed; I ended up running for 10 minutes straight in the middle of my workout.

Dinner was all over the place, but the components were all good. A handful of baby carrots.

Pizza crusts stolen from the husband.

A bit of Chocolove Currants and Almonds in Dark Chocolate.

Who knew I loved currants? They definitely helped break up the intensity of the bar.

Finally, we made tasty smoothies.

Thai young coconut, frozen banana, frozen blueberries, and a bit of brown sugar.

Adam has recently decided that he is obsessed with Thai young coconuts, so expect to see more of these. Especially since our coconut was so exciting – it was pink!

Apparently it’s a common variation relating to the varied levels of phenol found in the coconuts.

Today I grabbed a Coconut Chocolate Chip Clif Bar for breakfast.

I attended a workshop on TPN in the morning so I got to eat in the hospital rather than my car, which was nice.

Lunch was another tasty black-eyed pea salad.

Black eyed peas with bread and butter corn, green pepper, smoked almonds, and green Tabasco. I made a big batch so my lunch for the next two days is already packed.

With a serving of the dark chocolate for dessert.

And when I got home I ate a pear.

I took care of a few things for school when I got home from the hospital, and sudddenly I was starving.

Dinner was pretty lame, but I’m in a hurry trying to get to school so I can finish some reading before class.

And lame doesn’t mean it didn’t taste good!

A box of Health is Wealth Asian Spring Rolls,

with a dipping sauce of chunky peanut butter and Smart Balance Light.

Mmmmmmn!

P.S. – You can still win! Comment on this post before midnight for a chance to win a copy of the “Petite Treats” cookbook.

10Feb2013

Last Friday Night

by Emily

I spent Friday night getting a little drunk. Mind you, not so drunk that I would actually want to listen to Katy Perry’s “Last Friday Night.” We did watch some bad stand up comedy on Netflix though. <– Tim Minchin, not as funny as this joke would lead you to believe. (It’s so dirty, don’t click, Nana!)

Yesterday, Bitchtastic

Friday morning started with a Chocolate Dipped Coconut Luna Bar on the way to the hospital.

I had plans for a morning gym session but when I saw the weather report I decided to sleep in instead. We got really lucky here, the snow was annoying but not anything dangerous.

I had a nice day at the hospital in spite of the weather. I got to chart on several interesting patients and had a little more practice with doing pediatric TPN orders. I love the nutrition support aspect of dietetics but children are really different from what I’ve done with adults.

Lunch was a simple salad.

Chopped green pepper and cucumber with evoo, Sriracha, and some salty peanuts.

What a winning combination!

Plus a GoGo Squeez Cinnamon Applesauce packet.

Great on the go, but not as amazing as the pile of fruit I had when I got home.

Underneath my mounds of blue and blackberries was Naked Vanilla Oat Milk, a little honey, and 1/4 cup each All Bran Bran Buds and Nature’s Path Coconut Chia Granola.

So flipping good. And it was a good thing I got in a healthy snack because my responsible food choices took a downhill turn during the rest of the evening.

I blame the Bitch Bubbly.

A girlfriend came over and she, Adam, and I drank the bottle in mimosas.

The sparkling wine was pretty bad, but our next round was fantastic –

Sips Lavender Lemondrop Sparkling Cocktails! This was so fun, and quite delicious. I described it to my coworker today as “Kate Spade’s Four Loco.” I would definitely buy them again.

But maybe I’d eat dinner first next time. My evening meal ended up being… A slice of bread with Smart Balance Light,

and a huge bowl of popcorn with melted Earth Balance.

Major thanks to the husband for making me two bowls of popcorn; I spilled that first one within a matter of minutes!

Fashion Friday

Today, Tofutastic

Saturday’s meals were a little healthier. Still very tasty though.

For breakfast, Adam and I split a great pb & j.

With a pear on the side.

I worked today, but only a half shift, so I had time to get lunch from Wegman’s hot bar. Some tofu and veggies in mushroom dashi with two pieces of inari.

I did lots of Googling, and as far as I could tell mushroom dashi is just mushroom stock, so I’m still not sure what that yummy sauce was.

We made tofu for dinner too.

A bed of cabbage —a bag of “Asian Slaw” mix cooked with a bit of Earth Balance with caramelized onions tossed in towards the end— topped with walnuts —cooked in a skillet with salt and sugar— and tofu —super firm tofu cooked in the skillet we used for the onions, finished with a sauce of tamari, rice vinegar, sesame oil, Sriracha, honey, and orange juice.

I was glad I added the nuts at the last-minute to help break up the texture. The flavors were spot on though.

I had Goody Good Stuff Tropical Fruit for dessert.

Adorable, and much firmer than the other varieties.

Was your area hit with this weekend’s crazy weather?

7Feb2013

Petite Treats Book Giveaway

by Emily

Since the giveaway ties in with breakfast, I’m going to post this day in reverse! Also I’m going to do it quickly, since I’m late picking up the husband.

Dinner – Veggie summer roll from Wegmans while we knocked next week’s grocery shopping out of the way early.

Lunch – A tempeh sandwich with Sriracha Nayo and Strawberry Crofter’s on a Sandwich Thin.

A pear.

And more soft strawberry licorice.

Breakfast – A ridiculous coffee in the car on the longish drive to an off-site clinic. Venti soy latte with (half pumps) cinnamon dolce syrup.

And delicious mini scones.

Actually, Blueberry Lavender Skookies. <– squeeee!

The skookie recipe came from Petite Treats; Mini Versions of Your Favorite Baked Delights, a book I was sent to review.

Here is what the publishers said about it –

Good things come in small packages—and now so do all of your favorite desserts!

Introducing “Petite Treats,” an adorable cookbook featuring delicious, bite-sized, reduced-guilt sweets that are sure to charm family and friends at any gathering.

From the authors of “Mini Pies” and founders of the Seattle-based Mini Empire Bakery, “Petite Treats” shows you how to miniaturize everything from tiny fruit scones and mini pies to bite-size brownies and cutesy cannoli—sweet satisfaction guaranteed.

This book includes dozens of full-color photos and easy-to-follow recipes, as well as decorating and presentation tips. Let “Petite Treats” be the star of your next holiday, birthday or cocktail party.

And here are my thoughts –

a good mix of healthy and decadent treats, all in the miniature
the instructions were easy, and easy to follow!
some recipes are vegan (like the skookies)
they included a mini piecaken (a pie within a cake) so you know that the authors must be on top of their dessert game!
the pictures make me drool

They gave me the opportunity to share a book with my readers too. Since you guys like me, I knew that y’all love things that are small and sweet! <– that was so corny I think I made myself throw up.

For a chance to win a copy of the book – simply comment on this post by midnight on Monday (February 11th).

6Feb2013

Breakfast In A Jar And Dinner On The Lam

by Emily

Adding in exercise is making blogging very tricky this week. When you leave for the gym at 9pm, all you want to do when you get home is sleep. Especially if you have to run errands at Target on your way home from the gym. Especially if you were too busy all evening to eat dinner.

I started my day with packet of Spiru-Tein S’mores protein powder shaken with 1 cup of Naked Vanilla Oat Milk.

I was pretty amazed that the powder was vegan (minus honey which I’m not worrying about for the Vegan 20 Day Challenge). It wasn’t the best tasting thing I’ve ever had, but I was impressed with how thick it got. I shook it up in a recycled jar, making this a very easy to-go breakfast.

I’m having a good week at the hospital; it’s starting to feel like I’m hitting my stride. If there is one thing I’ve learned so far from this rotation it’s this – I knew absolutely nothing about pediatric nutrition.

Lunch was a pear.

A yummy sandwich of 5 grain tempeh on a Sandwich Thin with yellow mustard and Smart Balance Light.

And the other half of my rice milk chocolate bar.

When Adam got home this afternoon he helped me crack open this guy…

I may have had to eat over my work, but I still had a great afternoon snack.

Adam and I shared the Thai young coconut in smoothie form.

With frozen banana, peach, and blueberries too.

And fancy bread with Smart Balance Light on the side.

I’m glad I had a big snack, because journaling took so long that I never had time to make dinner.

I did make it to the gym though. 30 minutes on the elliptical at level 6 random. Certainly not the most intense workout ever, but a far cry better than what I wanted to do (sit on the couch).

And now all I want to do is go to bed!

4Feb2013

All Over The Place

by Emily

I’ve been all over the place the past two days, figuratively speaking. Literally, I’ve been in Buffalo, at work or in my apartment. Influencing the craziness of my eats? I started a 20 Day Vegan Challenge on Sunday, I was so hungry yesterday I thought I might actually eat a horse if one happened to gallop near me, and today I woke up far under the weather. What can you do?

Sunday was fairly ridiculous. In spite of being vegan and staying home from the Super Bowl party I definitely still managed to match the rest of America’s Super Bowl Sunday caloric intake.

Banana Bread Lara Bar.

Chips.

Summer roll from the co-op.

Fancy bread with olive oil, x2.5.

Vegan almond joy bar.

Gummies.

If my summer roll hadn’t been packed with veggies I probably would have had to turn in my diploma!

Then I got into bed at 9:30 pm Sunday night and barely made it out by 7:15 today. I don’t seem to be sick with any typical flu-like symptoms {knock on wood} but I am tired beyond reason. I swear to God I didn’t spend Super Bowl Sunday eating chicken wings and getting wasted, but when I woke up this morning I felt like I was drunk! It took me 10 minutes to really figure out where I was and I stayed in a haze for most the morning. And super embarrassingly, I almost passed out in the ICU during rounds! Hopefully no one else noticed but the RD I was with said I got very pale for a few minutes.

I grabbed a (non-diet) Dr. Pepper during a quick break and that helped get my blood sugar back up.

Lunch was a simple salad – romaine, raw veggies, pickled beans, and low-fat raspberry vinaigrette.

And I had a bowl of cereal when I got home. A serving of Nature’s Path Coconut Chia Granola topped with blackberries and Simpli Vanilla Naked Oat Milk.

The granola was some of the best I’ve ever had!

It held up in the milk without being too hard and it was loaded with big pieces of coconut.

I ate half of this Enjoy Life Ricemilk Chocolate bar while I did some history reading.

And kept dinner simple with an Annie Chun’s Korean Kimchi Soup Bowl.

I still had some reading to do for class so I needed to keep things quick.

Don’t ask me how I managed to drag myself to the gym after my night class, but I did. I am hoping to start up with the Couch to 10k program again. Today was 1 minute running/4 minutes walking, x 8. Except a great song came on and I ended up just running the last five minutes.

I was starving when I got home so I ate a slice of bread with Smart Balance Light while I packed our lunches.

All that stands between me and bed is a shower!

Did you watch the Super Bowl? What’d you snack on during the game?

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”

21Jan2013

Winter Weight Gain

by Emily

I came through my first full-time day at the hospital with flying colors! Well, I guess I was a little in the gray when I ran out of time in the morning and had to skip breakfast, but that was the only hiccup. I had fun, learned a lot, and made it through 8 – 4 without thinking longingly of my couch once!

We were busy on rounds (walking around the floor and listening to the medical residents give an update on all of the patients) all morning and I was too busy to miss breakfast. Then I got to grab a tea latte from Tim Horton’s while we charted.

My earl grey with frothed skim milk was great. And the RD let me chart on a patient! I’ve got to do a lot of work independently to meet all of my internship curriculum goals so it was a good sign that they let me hit the ground running. In the afternoon, among other things, I observed a gestational diabetes education that I’m eager to try on my own.

I was worried about finding a table in the packed cafeteria, but thankfully the RDs invited me to sit with them for lunch. I’m with a different person each day of the week so it was great to get to meet some of them in advance.

I packed a really tasty sandwich.

A multi-grain Sandwich Thin with Crofter’s strawberry preserves, 2 slices of Applegate Farms Honey & Maple Turkey, Cabot’s 50% reduced sharp cheddar, and pickled jalopeños.

A pack of Annie Chun’s Sesame Roasted Seaweed Snacks.

And a Trader Joe’s 100-calorie milk chocolate bar.

This lunch was perfect – fun, healthy, and it helped fuel my brain through its first afternoon of actual thought!

Before I knew it, the day was over and Adam was picking me up. His lab was closed for Martin Luther King Day and I was thrilled that he could drive me because it is brutal outside. My phone’s weather forecast for Wednesday is a giant, ominous looking snowflake.

My workday may have flown by, but our errands took forever. Adam and I ended up splitting an ice cream Twix bar while we were out and about.

He {claims that he} hates Twix bars so the sharing portions were in my favor.

I also snacked on a Caramel Pineapple Chobani Bite with the last of the blackberries.

This snack was so flipping good, I can’t wait to eat the rest of the pack of Chobani and I must buy more fresh berries immediately! The caramel gave the yogurt a little extra sumthin’ sumthin’ compared to the regular pineapple variety and the entire gorgeous carton only has 100 calories. Plus it smelled delicious and made me want a big slice of cheesecake.

– – – Sidenote: Why, oh why did I keep scrolling through Chobani’s website? I need the Key Lime Crumble and Almond Coco Loco Flips, need. I’m sure they won’t hit Buffalo for another couple of months and I’m basically going to die. – – –

Dinner was a big salad with some confusion about its roots.

Inside the jumble –

baby spinach
peanut sauce
1 Tbsp ground flax
chopped green pepper
chopped red onion
buckwheat groats
chopped honeycrisp
leftover 1000 island bbq sauce pulled chicken

Somehow all of those flavors just worked together.

I’m still feeling a bit hungry but I did a lot of nibbling while I assembled dinner and tomorrow’s lunch so I’m closing my kitchen for the day. I’ve been steadily gaining weight since we moved to Buffalo but recently my unhealthy habits have been out of control and I’m officially too fat for some of my work pants. Pride and health may not have motivated me (though they really should of!) but my wallet sure does – it’s time to lose some weight! I’m not planning on going on a diet, far from it, I’m just going to stop being ridiculous. Wish me luck?

Did you gain any weight over the winter holidays?

20Jan2013

30 Days?

by Emily

Since I last blogged… Adam was out-of-town on one of his very last trips this year (yay!) and I lived on the couch eating Chinese food and laughing so loudly at “30 Rock” that I hurt my throat. We all had our parts to play.

I did occasionally peel off my his sweatpants, once to visit the hospital where I will be spending the next month. The final semester of my Coordinated Program is full-time internship hours – though I will actually being taking a history class too, to finish up my graduation requirements. The semester is split into thirds: 1 = clinical work at a major hospital, 2 = time in long-term care and independent work on a business plan, and 3 = placement of our choosing.

I chose a local children’s hospital so I could get more exposure to pediatric nutrition. For the next four weeks, I’ll be at the hospital (M-F, 8-4:00), trying to soak up as much as I can. I am so excited! I’ll be sure to share more details tomorrow.

Since I have to spend the next month rejoining the world of the living – aka showering regularly and eating meals that wouldn’t make my classmates wince! – I figured I would try to knock off my 30 days of blogging goal. We’ll see how long that lasts.

And my new camera? I’m on the fence. I’m missing the old version (I rebought the Sony Cybershot but in a newer model) and hoping that I’m just working my way through the learning curve. For today, I forgot to resize the photos and editing this post took way too long. I’ll have to let the pictures speak for themselves and keep my descriptions short…

Cascadian Farm Berry Cobbler Granola with fresh blackberries and the last of the vanilla cashew milk.

Argo Tea Hibiscus Tea Sangria. <– so refreshing!

Chocolate Crisp Bumble Bar.

Spicy avocado brown rice inari.

Smart Fries.

Dinner.

Chicken – cooked in the crock pot then shredded – tossed in my 1000 Island BBQ Sauce.

Roasted green beans.

An Alexia Artisan Sweet Potato Roll.

A few words on the rolls, since Alexia sent them to me to review – we liked them. I don’t know if I’d say loved, since potato bread isn’t one of my very favorites, but they were certinaly the best packaged bread product I’ve ever had. The rolls were fluffy with a nice crust and while the flavor didn’t scream sweet potato there was definitely a little something extra there. They were easy to cook (12 minutes in the oven) and each roll has 110 calories and 5 grams of protein.

I spread a little Smart Balance Light on the split roll after I snapped the photo and I quite enjoyed it.

What’s your favorite type of bread? Mine is sourdough, mmmn!

Eating Chalk

Tag Archives: berries

And A Class To Go Before I Sleep

Last Friday Night

Yesterday, Bitchtastic

Fashion Friday

Today, Tofutastic

Petite Treats Book Giveaway

Breakfast In A Jar And Dinner On The Lam

All Over The Place

My Forever Alone Movie Date

Winter Weight Gain

30 Days?