Tag Archives: veggies

Going on Walkabout

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Walk to The Spot

Katie and I were supposed to meet this morning for breakfast and a study session,

but we spent most of our time talking, whoops!

We did manage the breakfast part though.  A grande iced (it was so warm here today!) coffee with skim milk,

and a thing of artichoke and spinach humus.

I know that humus is a strange breakfast but it sounded so good I just couldn’t pass it up!

Unfortunately the flavor was too garlicy for my taste buds, but it was nice to get some veggies into my morning.  I finished about half each of the humus and the bread sticks.

Walk to school

I had a busy time on campus today – a meeting, two classes, and another meeting, all back to back.  I snacked on a small vegan pumpkin pecan blondie before my first meeting.

And during Anatomy I ate this Balance Pure Cherry Pecan Bar.

I was a little unsure about the flavor – I got it on super sale at Wegmans – but I ended up being a fan.  It wasn’t as amazing as the cookie dough variety, but it also wasn’t as caloric and had fewer grams of saturated fat.

School fun facts – 1. They recently discovered taste buds in our lungs.  2. I did such a good job on my Orgo homework (rewriting the class notes) that he gave me extra-credit points!

Walk to Wegmans

I knew I needed to get in a couple hours of solid concentration with my Orgo notes, so I headed to the Wegmans’ Cafe to study.  And to get a tasty dinner.

Veggies, veggies, everywhere,

and green beans and chicken and eggplant in garlic sauce.

Since I was alone, and therefore wasn’t sharing a drink with the husband, I decided to try this fun looking drink.

I don’t know if it tasted exactly like chai OR cola, but the flavor had a nice spice and wasn’t too sweet.

Walk Get picked up and drive home

I covered more than 2 miles just in transit today, but canceling my run was Adam this evening wasn’t an option.  We ran one mile out and walked one mile back, with a very exciting destination in the middle –

One morning few weeks ago, I was taking a walk and talking on the phone with my mom when I spotted that window display…..and I made such a loud exclamation of glee that the owner (who was in his car outside) asked me if I’d like him to open up the shop specially for me!  Excited much?  I told him I could contain myself, but my mom told me that for my ‘fall gift’ (yes, she’s crazy) I could go charge a couple of pumpkin brews.

Nice!  We are very excited about our selection.

A sampling of pumpkin/seasonal beers,

a Root beer from Abita (one of my top 3 favorite beer companies),

and a few Tuskers, our new favorite beer that is almost impossible to find in Buffalo! 

The Village Beer Merchant is awesome about having a great selection of things that are absent elsewhere in Buffalo, and the employees are all super nice and helpful.

Adam had to crack open a Tusker the minute we got home, and he saved a few swigs in the bottle for me.

Ahhhh.

What is your favorite type of beer?  I actually don’t like beer that much, but I have three obsessions – 21st Amendment, Hell or High Watermelon; Abita, particularly the strawberry and winter brews; and Tusker.

Hot Bar Makes the World Go ‘Round

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Today was Study Saturday, sort of.  We were up waaaaaaay too late last night, and it shifted the whole day back.  At this point I am at least all caught up and ready to begin studying for my two tests next week.

We puttered around the house a bit in the morning and I made myself a Pumpkin Pie Through a Straw.

We didn’t have a lot of pumpkin leftover so I ended up having to add some ice for filler, which made it less tasty than usual but still pretty fricking tasty!

Around 11 we packed up our stuff and headed to Wegmans cafe for a study session.  Between our hot bar obsession and the fact the booths are perfect study session size, Wegmans is the perfect spot.  And we were jazzed to see that they had Halloween decorations up and employees dressed in costume!

Not gonna lie, lunch was still the most exciting part.

I got a random mish-mash of little bites.  Steamed broccoli and brussels sprouts,

wok seared veggies, bbq tofu, and sesame chicken and shrimp.

Full-bellied, we got a lot of studying done.  Except for the two hours we wasted on an intense conversation about the social construct of gender roles/child care/alimony.  <– dorks!

We got our weekly grocery trip in before we came home.  I had to spend a certain amount of $ in the bulk bins to use a coupon so I filled a baggie with assorted chocolates.

And downed them the minute we walked in the house 🙂  Think chocolate covered peanuts, pretzels, sponge candy…

On the agenda for tonight is a tasty, saucy (<–puns) dinner that’s my entry into a certain fun contest…..

Jump in De Line, Rock Your Body in Time

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Ugh-dates –

1. The Wegman’s blueberry coffee is just not good 😦  It has a super burnt bitter taste.  I even added sugar (and skim milk) to my second cup and I still didn’t like it.

However, Adam says I can’t buy more until this is gone and there are some holiday flavors I’m excited about so I’ll be slugging this down.

2. The Orgo notes assignment that was due today took up my entire morning.  I was so slammed for time I couldn’t even eat!  Must work on the weekends, must work on the weekends, must work on the weekends….

UP-dates –

1. The husband has been bringing chocolate chip pumpkin squares to school and his classmates like them so much someone even requested the recipe!  It’s not actually my personal recipe (thanks, Martha), but it’s nice to feel like a good wife.

2. I lit a cinnamon pumpkin candle this morning and it brought my Halloween corner of the mantle to life.

Anyway, I didn’t have time to eat so I packed myself 2 servings of Sahale Snacks to munch during Orgo.

After my first set of classes I spent yet more time dealing with transfer credits and my class schedule.  The good news is that I’ve had two victories; the bad is that I call BS on the fact that they won’t accept my writing credits.

I spent so much time that I almost didn’t make it to the gym before lab.  I had to rush rush rush and eat food from the vending machine while I hightailed it across campus.

A pre-gym Rice Krispie treat is better than no fuel at all!

And a short work out is better than no gym time at all.  I did a quick treadmill session.

Lab went quickly tonight – all we were doing was building models – and I was home in time to make a nice dinner.  First though, I made a nice snack.

A Caramel Oikos with canned pumpkin and homemade pb.

I was starving when I got home and I didn’t want to be too hungry to enjoy my dinner.

And dinner was delicious;

I claim the 2nd night of Sandwich Week to be a success!

BLTs.  Rather, TBSTs – turkey bacon spinach tomatoes.  On sourdough with a smear of homemade mayo.

We ate roasted asparagus on the side.

Yum!  And this took all of 10minutes to throw together; dinner really can be healthy, tasty, and quick all at once.

We shelled out a bit of extra cash and bought Applegate Farms bacon; it is so much better than the other varieties we’ve had.

Turkey bacon doesn’t really make ‘bacon grease,’ but it does stick to the pan and make delicious browned bits.  There’s no chance I’m letting that go to waste; I scraped up the browned bits with a scrambled egg.

We got in the October spirit by watching “Beetlejuice” while we ate.  I love that movie, but I don’t think I’d realized before how sad it is.

I’ve got an Anatomy Lab quiz tomorrow to study for (announced at the last minute, arrrgh!), so I’m off!

What do you like on your BLTs, ya know, beyond the B, L, and T?  M (mayo or mustard)?  S&P? C(heese)?

Fright Night

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This Saturday has felt very holiday-esque. Technically, it was a holiday –

but I was feeling more Haloweenie. Perhaps because this has been looping through my head all day?

The husband was right, I am now a total “Nightmare Before Christmas” addict!

The day actually started rather early for a Saturday; I signed up to volunteer at a local health fair today and my shift started at 8am. Milkshake for breakfast? Don’t mind if I do.

I made my first pumpkin pie through a straw of the season. Just look at that perfect pumpkin pudding color –

I was pretty jazzed about it, clearly.

My volunteer shift was nice and easy, mostly stuffing gift bags and greeting people.  A lot of the other volunteers bailed so I ended up getting some one on one time with the president of the club; she is a senior in the program I hope to get into so it was great to hear her advice.

Pretty soon the husband picked me up and we headed to the cafe in Wegmans to get our study on. And our lunch on.

Scoop of buffalo and curry chicken salads,

and some green beans and roasted veggies.

I was still feeling super hungry after lunch but I didn’t want to waste any more time eating so instead I bought a coffee.

Half regular and half decaf pumpkin pie with skim milk.

We got a couple solid hours of work done too. And the grocery shopping too. Get excited about my dinner posts next week – I’m doing “Sandwich Week” and it’s going to be a lot of fun.

Not so fun? Our apartment is a frigid 64*. I drank a honey vanilla chamomile tea to warm up while I studied.

We had pumpkin pasta leftovers for dinner.

I swear, this stuff is even more amazing the 2nd day.

We ate an early dinner because just after 6 we piled into the car. We had season tickets to Darien Lake Amusement Park and today was the last night of Fright Night.

Adam and I ate a Divine milk chocolate hazelnut bar during the drive.

And I snacked on a serving of Halloween jujus while we explored the “horror.”

(Please excuse the terrible cell phone photos) There wasn’t a lot to it, but Fright Night ended up being a lot of fun.

Our favorite was the haunted house; I don’t scare easily, but they definitely startled me a bunch of times.

The real fun though was the 20minutes we wasted in the parking lot looking for our car 😉

Have you been to any haunted houses this season?

Life As I Know It

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It’s been a rather fun day, especially for a Thursday!  We’ve managed to pack in a lot of good times.  Plus, look at the sun rise I woke up to today:

Not quite as impressive foodwise; I’m not sure how I managed to get so completely out of food!  We actually made a special banana stop this evening so I could make myself oatmeal (a real breakfast) tomorrow!

I did the best I could with breakfast today though.

I knew I didn’t have time for lunch between classes so I tried to make a bowl that would hold me over for the long run.  0% Plain Oikos, maple syrup, homemade pb, peanuts, shredded coconut, and craisins.

Filling, and actually a very tasty combo of flavors.

I got some good news in Anatomy, an A+ on last week’s practical exam!  And in between classes I finished all of my work for tomorrow, which meant I had time to play later on.

Food lab today was all about veggies.  My group experimented with the effects of cooking techniques.  Did you know – if you want your broccoli to look extra green and appetizing you should use cooking water that’s a bit alkali (baking soda).  If you cook it in an acidic medium (with vinegar) you’ll end up with a very unappetizing olive-green shade.  I didn’t sample any of our experiments, but I did take some tastes of the dishes the other groups made.

Adam came to pick me up from school because of the rain, and we took a spontaneous trip to the movies!  You know we split a medium popcorn 😉

We saw “Life as You Know it,” which I’ve been jazzed about for months.  Normally I hate chick flicks but something about Katherine Hiegel makes me unable to resist!  The movie was adorable, very touching but with a lot of funny moments as well.  I give it two thumbs up!

Our apartment is seriously foodless, so when we picked up my banana we also swung by Moe’s for a quesadilla.

I ate my fair share of chips too.

And a honey vanilla caramel apple.

Have you made these yet?  Do it!

Now we are watching “Nightmare Before Christmas.”  Adam’s been trying to get me to see if for years and I’m actually totally loving it.  Hope you all have *sweet* dreams!

The Pants

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What, I drop that mega-post on you and then I just disappear?  Sorry about that!  I was in a terrible mood yesterday and it just didn’t seem right to subject anyone but the husband to me.  Plus, I was actually in such a terrible mood that I couldn’t even get it together to make dinner so there wasn’t a whole lot of foodage going on.

A lot of times a bad day is just about a bad mood, and even though I know that I still couldn’t shake my rain cloud yesterday.  possibly because I had to get up at 6:30 on a Friday.  I rolled out of bed early, but on the wrong side of the bed!

I had to get up early to attend a meeting about an honor society I was invited to because of my summer school grades.  What I didn’t learn until after the 7:15am meeting is that I’m actually not eligible until after a 3rd semester at my school. 

The minute we left the meeting I was starving.  Not just hungry, stomach-growling, headachey, starving.  Nothing was open until 8:30.  I buy a medium coffee with skim milk.

I wait.  I get really psyched about an oatmeal bar in the food court.  It turns out a bunch of people called in sick and actually nothing is open.  I could go get food from the coffee place though.  I know it doesn’t make sense to some people, but I get more picky as I get hungrier.  If my stomach feels like it’s eating itself I want something good; I don’t want a dried out bagel or a mass-produced croissant.

I ended up wandering around campus for 1.5hours in futile search, getting hungrier by the minute.  Finally, minutes before class, I found this cup of grapes.

The grapes lifted my mood considerably.  But then in class I learned that the portfolio assignment due next week has to be turned in in an actual portfolio.  An actual expensive portfolio.  I’m sorry, I realize it’s not exactly cool that I have to budget for a binder, but it pisses me off that I’ve had to spend so much money on school supplies this semester.

After my 2hour class I went straight to a group meeting for a project.  We didn’t finish until it was time for Orgo, good thing I had eaten those grapes! 😉

I had absolutely no understanding of what we were talking about in Orgo.  None.  I started freaking out about the next test, and being super angry with myself that I let myself get behind on the reading.  By the time Anatomy was done I just wanted the day to be over.  I didn’t even go to the gym as planned, I just went home.  Sidenote – I do realize that the gym would have certainly lifted my spirits, but I was still starving.

I poured myself a serving of Terra Chips Blues.

The plan was to refill the bowl with some food-food as soon as I was done.  Yeah, about that; I never got off the couch!  I just let my bad mood spiral out of control.  Not doing any errands, or doing anything fun, certainly didn’t make me feel better and it just got worse and worse.

This morning I was determined to have a good day.  Really, it’s all about attitude.  When the alarm went off at 7:40 I read a magazine in bed before getting up.  I took a much-needed shower.  I cleaned the apartment – that one’s not actually that fun, but the mess was stressing me out.

I made a healthy, tasty breakfast.

A serving of Special K Red Berries with skim milk,

and some leftover fruit (papaya, mango, grapes, watermelon) I brought home from food lab.

Adam and I went on errands and took care of business (including buying that portfolio!).  When we got groceries we also got smile-inducing hot bar and a diet pop.

Who doesn’t love hot bar?

A bunch of green beans with a little bit of eggplant tomato salad,

cashew chicken with a tiny bit of fried chicken,

roasted veggies.

To round out the good mood vibes, I got a fun package from my parents.  With seasonal gifts.

And “the pants.”

Some background on the pants – When Adam was a freshman in college (I was a sophomore) his mom sent him a great pair of pajama pants.  They were super comfortable and I borrowed them often.  As time went on I eventually just stole them.  I was wearing the pants the Christmas morning that Adam proposed.  I wore them through recovery from all my various injuries.  The pants are the item I would save if the house was on fire.

The pants have been getting thin (they are old and I wear them a LOT).  I hardly ever wash them, and my mom has done many minor repairs.  Well, a few weeks ago I tore a huge hole through the left knee.  I sent my mom the pants in tears.  She rocks, and now I guess they are “the capris.”

When I mailed the pants, I threatened my mom several times that I would stop loving her if she threw away any of the fabric.  Instead, she made the legs into a pillow (dont’ worry, she also saved the scraps!) –

Adam and I love it.

I guess the point of the very long, whine-filled post is that today is a better day.  It always is.  And this took me so long to write that I took a snack break and ate a Brown Cow 0% Strawberry Greek Yogurt with homemade chocolate pb.

The end.

Do you own anything like “the pants?”

It’s F-F-F-Freezing!

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Actually, that title’s a lie, my thermostat says it’s 65*.  But I feel pretty darn cold!  Right now (according to the thermostat and my phone) it’s 65* in here and 51* out there.  This leads to a couple of thoughts –

  • If I’m so cold in here, how the heck am I going to feel when I have to go outside?  And when I walk home from class at 9pm?!?
  • How much longer are we going to be able to push back putting on the heat?
  • Can I really wait until Sunday to switch out our summer and winter clothing?
  • Should we sign up for the October 30th 5k, or will the weather not permit the wearing of fun costumes?Th

My numb feet told me it was a good time to open up the Blueberry Cream Coffee I got on super sale at Wegman’s.

The flavor was good, although not at all blueberry.  Sadly, I didn’t realize until post-brewing that we are out of skim milk.  My Silk Almond Milk curdled 😦

I only managed a few sips of the mug and I still got a caffeine headache!  (Btw – my Orgo Lab tonight actually deals with decaffination.)

My tasty leftovers lunch made the headache seem like not such a big deal.

A big slice (~1.5servings) of Wegman’s Veggie Pizza, with ranch.

We got this we a free coupon for dinner last night and we pretty impressed; the quality was great for frozen pizza.  The veggies included peppers, broccoli, and black olives.  My only complaint is that I would have like MORE veggies on the pizza.

What at what date/temperature do you turn your heat on?

Sick Spouse

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Did everyone have a good weekend?  I hope so!  Today wasn’t really definitively good or bad for me.  I didn’t do anything fun and I still didn’t get as much work as I’d hoped done – Adam picked a hell of a weekend to get a cold and be needy – but I got enough done.  Plus I spent the whole day with the husband, and even when he is a whiney, snotty mess that still thrills me ❤.

Breakfast was supposed to be a serving of Van’s waffles with 1T maple syrup, cinnamon, and sliced plum.

Looks good, no?  No!  I don’t know why I fail at breakfast lately but something about how I heated this up made it inedible.  I took three torturous bites and moved on.

I was planning on studying at The Spot today but it was inexplicably packed to the brim.  I took a very irritating walk up and down Elmwood and finally Adam and I decided to go study at Wegman’s.  We got salad bar for lunch and then sat in the cafe and worked.

[small bites of – curried chicken salad, chicken salad, cucumber salad, sesame and general’s chicken, lo mein, Asian green beans, wok seared veggies]

I was hungry the whole time we were there so when we left the store I bought a bag of honey mustard pretzels.

Inhaled.  I also ate ~a serving of the husband’s Divine Milk Chocolate and Hazelnut Bar, unphotographed.

On one hand I am irritated with myself for eating junky food all day (especially on a rest day).  But on the other hand I had another “do I need this?” moment that I’m proud of.  The plan all day had been to get pizza – buffalo chicken pizza with ranch, yum! – for dinner.  When I finished my work at 9:30 we were heading out to get it when I realized: I ate 400calories of pretzels and 200calories worth of chocolate; I wasn’t hungry, even though pizza sounded good!  Since pizza does not = fruits and veggies I should eat because they provide nutrients, I decided to skip it.

How often do you eat pizza?  Is it one of your favorites, or just another meal?  I always thought I wasn’t that into pizza, but then we moved to Park Slope and lived next door to the best pizzeria on the planet.  We ate pizza 2-4x per week!  By the time we moved it was actually embarrassing because we were in there so often 😉