Two Saucy

I woke up yesterday feeling heavy and bloated, which was to be expected. I was feeling very unmotivated and not really into doing much. I wasn’t even in the mood for cooking. Once dear husband woke up, I asked him what he wanted for breakfast and he said eggs so I decided to make what I call an oven omelet. I think it might actually be called a fritata but I like oven omelet better. I loaded it up with an assortment of random veggies we had around, soy cheddar cheese and eggs. I served it with one of those whole wheat sister shuberts rolls and it turned out great. I’m not really one for savory breakfast so at the end, I decided to put some juice sweetened local apple butter on the other half of my roll.

savory breakfast

i love apple butter

After breakfast, we got caught up on the DVR and then headed out to the grocery store. But first me made a pit stop at Target for a starbucks. I got an iced doubleshot plus energy and I added a smidge of half and half to it. It was what I needed to get me through our grocery shopping adventures.

shopping energy

Once home from shopping, I made some lunch. I made myself a hummus and cheese on 100% whole wheat bread with lettuce an tomato. On the side I had a few spicy thai chips and a peach. I ended up eating most of the sandwich, about 6 or so of the chips and half the peach. It was really good and thanks to Jenna for inspiring me with hummus and cheese. 

lunch

After lunch we both just kind of piddled around the house.  I did a little cooking for the week ahead and dear husband cut the grass. Around 4 we decided to head out for a walk but we didn’t make it very far. I was so tired we only did .6 miles! I decided it was probably best to rest rather than push it. We can home and read instead.

Once I finished my book, we fired up the grill and made dinner. We made chicken on the grill and I made some oven fried squash, zucchini and hanover green tomatoes. For the chicken, I made a similar glaze to the salmon from a few night ago and for the “fried” foods I made a lemon aoili.  It was all really tasty though I must say I was a little disappointed in the tomatoes. I’ve heard such great things about them I thought they would be out of this world. But really, I couldn’t really taste a difference between those and the squash or zucchini.

southern "fried"

saucy

 

Once dinner was over, we snuggled up on the couch and watched some tv. By nine I was off to bed to get ready for an early morning.

Chocolate Cake and Vanilla Ice Cream

Yesterday was a long day. I woke up feeling fantastic. I was full of engery, I felt light on my feet and ready to face the world. Which was good because we had a full and busy day planned. I started my day with a  bowl of hot grain cereal (wheatberries, oats and bulgur) topped with a fresh virginia peach and some almond butter. I also had a glass of milk on the side. I was nervous that the almond butter and the peach would not “go” but it was actually mighty tasty.

peachy

After breakfast, dear husband and I headed out for a long walk around the neighborhood. We did a loop around ours and the one across the street plus a couple extra times in some cul-de-sacs to make a 5 mile walk. My legs were really tired after that! After a shower and a banana, we headed out for the day.

perfectly ripe

We had a couple of errands to run before lunch and by the time we made it to lunch we were both pretty hungry. First we stopped at one of our favorite local places and it was closed. We aren’t sure why but they are no longer open on Saturdays or Sundays and they are only open during the week at lunch! I guess it will have to stop being one of our favorite places . We ended up at The Villiage Grill, which is another one of our favorites around town. It is a little tiny diner that has really great fresh made food. We both ordered a vegetarian sub and an order of sweet potato fries to share. The veg sub has american, provolone and jack cheese, marinated sweet peppers (totally what makes the sub), onions, lettuce, tomato and italian dressing all served on a toasted wheat sub roll. The sweet potato fries have something secret sprinkled on them. It is something sweet and savory at the same time. I know for sure cinnamon is involved but that isn’t all. I’ll keep ordering then until I figure it out so I can make them at home . The lunch was so good and we remembered why we normally share one sub between the two of us, those things are huge! I ate a little more than half the sub and probably 10 or 12 sweet potato fries.

doesn't that look good?

 

what is that sprinkled on there?

After lunch we went to the shopping mecca of our own little world, Target. We got our lattes, of course, I got a tall soy latte and he got a grande caramel frappuchino. I bought three new workout outfits suited for hot hoga and that met my $100 quota so I was good. After Target we headed to the bookstore for a book for dear husband and then off to our nieces 13th birthday party we went.

an afternoon pick me up

The birthday party was at a gaming center with lots of odd looking teenage girls and dear husband’s family. Before a round of putt putt we had some birthday cake and ice cream. It was chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and a little cup of vanilla ice cream. Dear husband and I shared much to the disliking of dear husband’s mom. For a 13 year old’s birthday party, I thought the cake was actually pretty tasty. I apologize for the lack of photos (for the rest of my day) but the camera was in the car along with some awkard feelings about taking photos of my food in front of dear husband’s family.  I will have to build up to that one. We played one round of putt putt and the sun was beating down on us like no other. We both ended up with sunburn and I ran out of water half way through so I thought I might thirst to death.

After putt putt, we went to dinner with the family and I was exhausted, my legs were killing me and I was starving. This would be one of those times when my decision making skills regarding food aren’t the best. An area I really need to work on. We ended up at Ruby Tuesday, which for a chain, it has a nice salad bar. I ordered the mini trio and the salad bar. It is three mini burgers, one beef, one turkey and one crabcake. They were about the size of a silver dollar pancake and in all honesty, they weren’t that great. I have had the crabcake sandwich in the past and it is always so tasty, I was surprised that it’s mini counterpart was not that great.  I had a couple bites of each, a few fries and my salad. I really enjoyed the salad, it had spring mix, blue cheese, edamame, dried cranberries, pumpernickle croutons and a little french dressing. After dinner, we ordered dessert. We ordered a chocolate tall cake with vanilla ice cream. I know, I know, cake and ice cream twice in one day. Something I really try to avoid and I didn’t even remember that I had eaten the cake and ice cream the first time until we had already started eating it.

This is when it gets hard and it gets really real. I had just been telling dear husband on our walk how proud of myself I was. Since I started the blog, I had dropped almost 2lbs without any sense of being on a diet. I was feeling great, making good choices and not letting my emotions rule what goes into my mouth. I hadn’t felt any guilt about my food choices and I had not let myself be over run with the words good and bad when it comes to food. The sense of accountability with the blog was helping me tremendously but I knew in the back of my mind that there was still lots of work to be done.

You see, the funny thing about the choices I made at dinner last night is that when we were playing putt putt, I was really craving a salad with shrimp on it. So much so, that I even said out loud that I wanted a salad for dinner. But in the heat of the moment, feeling so many things, I bailed on that idea and went for the burgers. Isn’t it ironic that the only part of my dinner that I really enjoyed was my salad? As I write this, I feel riddled with guilt wondering if I should eat just salads and excersie all day to “make up for” my choices last night.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not upset that I ate a burger and dessert because I feel that those things can fit in with a healthy lifestyle. I am upset because I let my emotions make my decision and I didn’t listen to my body.

It is times like these that the diet mentaility really kicks into overdrive and I have to remember that these things will happen. I am human, not some sort of robot that always does the right thing. Heck, I’m sure even robots break down sometimes. So, just like my yoga teacher says about meditating, there are unlimited do overs and I just need to keep moving forward and not beating myself up for straying.

Hot Yoga Friday

What a day, yesterday. I got up super early yesterday so that I could get to work early. I was going to my first hot yoga (bikram) class and I needed to adjust ny schedule a little. More on that later. I woke up pretty hungry, my stomach was growling even as I was getting ready. I finally calmed it down with a bowl of hot grain cereal (that i finally got our of the freezer), it has wheatberries, oats and bulgur. I mixed in some ground flax seed and topped it with a banana and some almond butter.

TGIBreakfast time

At work, the day started with a bang. One of the projects I have been working on is our new website and yesterday we went live. I was running around all morning long changing everyone’s email settings to they would get their email. I even went to the maintenance department twice which would make a total of 3 times the entire year I have worked there. I wonder if the maintenance department of other world class golf course require rubber gloves to touch anything? But I digress.

By the time I made it back to my desk it was almost noon and I was ravenous. I barely had time to even have some water which was worrying be because of the hot yoga class. I decided that I would have all natural peanut butter on a whole wheat wrap when The Chef and T talked me into the the member lunch special. T even gave me a little bite of hers to help me decide. The member special was a sirloin tip salad with balsamic reduction topped with feta cheese. I wasn’t really in the mood for beef but I was still pretty tasty. I hope the picture is OK but there was someone in my office when it came and I felt kind odd about taking a picture so I did it really fast and only took one. I guess that as my time with this blog goes, I will get over that.

beef...it is whats for lunch

After lunch, I had a few sips of my cinnamon latte I made at home but it wasn’t really doing anything for me so I put it away. The rest of the afternoon was hectic. I have major deadlines on Fridays and because my morning was busy being the resident IT guru, I hadn’t had time to do any of my “real” work. It seemed like the clock was moving faster than I could work. My phone wouldn’t stop ringing and the fellow staff had a number of questions about the new email/website. It was an intense day and when it was over, I was literally running out the door 10 minutes later than I wanted. I was worried about not making it in time for the hot yoga class.

The Prius didn’t let me down. I put the pedal to the metal and made it there in time. My friend Jessy had told me that if I could get there in time to lay on my mat before the class started that it would help me acclimate to the hot tempature of the room. I got there about 20 minutes before class started and was able to fill out the paperwork and get changed. When I walked in the teacher said “This must be your first time” and I meekly said yes, she told me that I looked scared. I was sure I did because I was. I quickly changed and quietly put my mat down in the back of the room as instructed. It was hot in there! And for some reason, when I walked it in it shocked me as if I hadn’t been expecting it. First I laid down, sat up, laid, sat up. I couldn’t figure out what to do. Some people were in child’s pose, one girl was hanging out in downward facing and other were just sitting quietly.

At promptly 4:30, the teacher walked in, clapped her hands and said “Everyone up” and like little soldiers we all stood. The class began with some breathing exercise and sweat was already dripping down my face into my eyes. I knew I was sweating, obviously but it really dawned on me how much when we put our arms towards the ceiling the first time and I could see sweat pouring in little streams down my arms. Then in our first forward fold I saw sweat popping out of the pores of my legs. I had never seen sweat like that.

The class continuted and I was doing pretty good. A few times my brain was asking me what the hell I was doing there but I resisted the urge to flee. I didn’t feel and dizziness or nausea until AFTER the water break which I found to be really odd. A couple times I had to just stand while the others were in the poses and even a couple times I had to sit all the way down. Some of the poses felt easy and some of them felt really hard. I noticed towards the end of the class that bending forward was really getting the dizziness and nausea going so I was really gentle with myself. I wasn’t able to go as far as in a normal class on some things but was able to go farther in others. It was really an odd yoga experience.

Right on the dot at 6pm the class ended, she told us the lay as long as we needed to. I tried to stay still and just lay but I was really ready to go. I probably only stayed a minute or so. On the way home, I had some odd sensations in my head. My jaw felt really tight and I felt I was kind of unable to focus. I wonder if I should haved stayed a little longer. I also wonder if I was clinching my jaw during class.

I arrived home to find that dear husband had made us lovely salads for dinner. It was spring mix, cukes, almonds, dried cranberries and crumbled goat cheese. Which was awesome,  I had really been craving goat cheese lately from reading Jenna’s blog the past few days. I heated up some Sister Shubert’s whole wheat yeast rolls to go on the side, topped the salads with some oil and vinegar and dinner was ready. It was delicious! The odd thing was that I wasn’t really hungry even though it had been about 7.5 hours since I had last eaten. I blame that on the hot yoga because lunch was pretty light and I had avoided eating before class because that can increase nausea.

another salad

After dinner, I delved into my book again. I am reading How to Survive your diet by Linda Moran. It is a pretty interseting book about not dieting, which of course is what I am doing. I keep falling asleep while reading it so though it is a very short book, I haven’t even read half of it. So, in true form, I fell asleep while reading. I was had wondered if the hot yoga was going to keep me up but I was actually really relaxed and I had a great night’s sleep. I’ll be doing that again.

Thursday aka Almost Friday

I seem to really be getting into the routine of getting up earlier and I really like it. It makes the mornings go by so much easier. But an ironic thing did happen yesterday. Though I had blogged about the fact that I needed to get some grain cereal out of the freezerer, I still forgot! So, yesterday I ate some of dear husband’s live active cereal. It was pretty good, it had flakes, clusters dried blueberries and dried cranberries. I topped it with milk and some almonds.

quick breakfast

The drive to work was pretty uneventful but once I got to work, everything began to unravel. The Pro and I were working on a big meeting notice when the copier decided to break. Yeah, at 7:30 in the morning, not a good sign. Then we realized we didn’t have enough envelopes so I had to run out to Staples to get some, otherwise known as an emergency staples run. When I was leaving, T came in and said that the emergency staples run warranted and emergency Starbucks run. So, while I was out, I picked up everyone’s favorite. I wasn’t in the mood for a latte so I got one of the new smoothies, mango banana or something like that. It was really good and so filling, they add some sort of protein/fiber powder to it. I was only able to drink about two thirds.

smoothie

A couple hours after the smoothie, Chef asked me to have some of the soup of the day, he was worried it would be too spicy to serve. It had choirzo, chicken and lots of veggies, I had it with a yogurt and a peach. It was really good, just not that spicy like I had expected.

soup

 

a great way to round out lunch

The afternoon unfolded the same way the morning did. We loaded up the printer with the new envelopes and low and behold we had to manually feed each one in, yep, all 425 of them. T and I took turns with this exciting task. Once all of the notices and envelopes were printed, we each took a stack and got to stuffing. We were on a good roll when T started putting postage on them and guess what happened? The postage meter ran out of ink. Seriously, what else would happen with this thing? I told T that I felt like this meeting is surrounded by bad karma! The project ended up taking up my whole day and I had only planned on it taking up the morning. So, I was able to leave right after finishing. By this time I was hungry already, I guess the soup just wasn’t very filling so I had a banana.

perfectly ripe

On the way home, I felt exhausted but I had to stop for my hair appointment. After the cut, I went home and made some dinner. I made salmon with orange chili glaze. It was a spicy sweet combo of soy sauce, orange juice, honey, thai sweet chili sauce and cilantro. The Chef at work had made this for T and I a couple weeks ago and I decided to replicate it at home. It was fantastic. I’m thinking that combo would make a good stir fry sauce as well. I served the salmon with BIG HUGE slices of hanover tomato and some broccoli that I sauteed in olive oil, garlic and salt and pepper. I usually add crushed red pepper too but I didn’t want to overwhelm our palates with spice. It was all mighty tasty.

dinner

After dinner, I started to read and I fell asleep. Yes, at 7 pm at night, I fell asleep. I guess I really was exhausted from the day at work. I woke up on the couch around 8 and went directly to bed. Well, you know what they say, early to bed early to rise.

Hump Day!

Finally, I had a no rush morning. Everything seemed to go smoothly even though I had to prepare breakfast from scratch. I forgot to pull more oats out of our deep freezer that lives in the outdoor storage. So instead of the usual mixed grain hot cereal, I made a bowl of old rashioned rolled oats with milk instead of water. I mixed in some ground flax seed and topped it with a banana and some almond butter. It was so good! I love making rolled oats with milk, they are so creamy that way.

banana overboard

When I got to work, I was pleasantly surprised at my low level inbox. I was able to work at a nice tolerable pace and not feel stressed and over worked. Though I was working at a slower pace, the morning still flew by. I had my hummus and cukes since I am so stuck on that lately. I really love hummus. Anyway, about an hour after the snack I was ready for lunch and I had the same as yesterday. An egg salad sandwich on 100% whole wheat bread with lettuce and tomato and a stoneyfield farms low fat strawberry yogurt. When I decided to use the olive oil mayo in the egg salad, I was nervous but it is pleasantly almost the same!

um...how much can I cram is my lunch bag?

After lunch, I had a homemade latte with espresso, milk and cinnamon and today it really hit the spot. The afternoon went by just as quickly as the morning had; before I knew it, it was go time. I had an appointment after work so dear husband was in charge of dinner. When dear husband is in charge, frozen pizza it is. We buy the archers farm brand from target, they have extra thin crust so the calories aren’t as high as a regular frozen pizza and they are yummy. They have a few varities and tonight we had pepperoni along with a green salad with oil and vinegar. I was pretty hungry so I ate two slices. So good and just the right amount of fun food.

fun food

After dinner, we went for a nice walk around the neighborhood. We only did one loop plus a couple extra laps around two of the cul-de-sacs. Dear husband did not wear his GPS but I think it should be almost 2 miles. Once we finished our walk, we setttled in for a little television and then to bed we went. Another day awaits.

Tired Tuesday

I decided after the rushed morning I had on Monday to get up even earlier yesterday. What is it with getting up earlier that makes the morning routine longer?  By getting up 30 minutes earlier, I made it to work right on time rather than a few minutes past 7:30. Breakfast was the same ole same ole. Can you tell yet that I am big into batch cooking? Anyway, it was half a serving of hot grain cereal (wheatberries, oats, bulgur) topped with an almost perfectly ripe banana, flax seed and some almond butter. I also had a cold glass of milk and a tall drink of ice water. I guess the reason I stick with this breakfast is because it really holds me over, sometimes even for six hours! 

hot grain cereal…again

Today, Golf World was a madhouse. My phone rang at least 100 times before 10 am. I have multiple projects going on all at once and it makes for a pretty hectic day. But, I stay focused and keep in mind that in November things will settle down. Today both my snack and my lunch were eaten out of “I  need a break” instead of actual hunger. Well, I take that back, the snack was eaten in as an avoidance tactic against garlic bread. The staff lunch is held in The Pro’s office which is right next to mine and the smell of garlic and butter was really getting to me. So, I noshed on some cukes and hummus, my favorite go to snack.

 

 

I will not eat the garlic bread

Lunch came about an hour and a half after the snack and I really was in “I need a break” mode then. I had just finished the work I had anticipated being done with my 10 am, it was almost 1. I had and egg salad sandwich on 100% whole wheat bread with lettuce and tomato. I made the egg salad on Sunday with olive oil mayo, yellow mustard, salt and pepper. Is there a different way to make it in the south? I also had a stoneyfield farm low fat strawberry yogurt. I had plan to have the peach you see pictured but I was full and didn’t want it.

have lunch, will travel

For my afternoon snack..er..pick me up..I had a cinnamon latte I made at home with espresso, milk and a couple sprinkles of cinnamon. 

wake me up

This is my favorite way to have a flavored latte without all the added sweeteners (fake or not) of the syrups. I do like to have those every now and then but I really try to keep the sugar monster at bay.

     The rest of the afternoon was busy, as per usual, but T and I did get a fun little lesson about pin sheets from PVV. I think it is so funny to work in an industry that I know absolutely nothing about. Did you know that they move the hole…EVERY DAY… in golf? Every day. Seriously, who knew. Anyway, it was nice to get out onto the nice soft grass and get some sunshine. By the time the lesson was finished it was time to go. I was wiped out.

     The drive home was spent in a trance of “I want pizza, I want to go to sleep, do I really have to make dinner, will I work out, will I just bail on working out”. Luckily, when I got home I already had a plan for dinner so I could do it without really thinking or giving myself time to give in to the thoughts of cheesy gooey italian food. The plan was pork tenderloin stir fry, I know stir fry twice in just a couple days but it comes together so quickly and it makes such a nice balanced meal I make it alot. Today, it was sliced pork tenderloin, broccoli, snow peas, peppers, zucchini and carrots stir fried in sesame oil/olive oil and then mixed with a sweet and sour stir fry sauce and a dash of rooster sauce. I added some sesame seeds on top to make it pretty and served it over brown rice.

yumma

After dinner, the decision was made to bail on a workout. I had got in about 4 hours of exercise in the previous three days and a rest seemed like a great idea. It was almost time for Monica’s teleclass when I decided to have an after dinner snack. After dinner I was feeling like I wasn’t quite full but by 7:45 I was sure. I had a deep chocolate vitatop with a squirt of low fat whipped cream and a dark chocolate covered walnut.

dessert

Now that was a satisfying treat! After the snack, I dialed into the call with Monica, my holistic health counselor friend. There were about 6 participants total, myself included. Monica told us about the 8 reasons why the body will start to crave thing, the number one being dehydration. She also talked about the yin and yang balance and primary foods and secondary foods. Primary foods being things that fufill ours souls, like family life, work and social activities. We deconstructed one of the cravings that I have often, greasy pizza after a stressfull day, and determined this was probably a mix of a yin/yang craving and a primary foods/secondary foods balance. It was all very interesting and now I am armed with a list of things I can do when those types of cravings arise.

After the call, it was off to bed I went. It had been a long day and another one was right around the corner.

Monday Monday

Monday, Monday. Gotta love em. Somehow, someway, I woke up earlier than I *have* to and still ended up running really late. Normally, I can everything I need to get done in about 45 minutes and still get to work on time, it seemed to be taking double that! Though I work in an environement that being a few late doesn’t really matter, I was still stressed. The breakfast was pretty typical for me. I had half a serving of hot grain cereal that has wheatberries, oats and bulgur topped with the last of the blueberries, ground flax seed and  almond butter. I also had a glass of milk and some water to take my morning vitamins.

a hearty breakfast

The drive to work was horrendous, it was raining monsoon style the whole time. My commute is 40 minutes each way, thats alotta monsoon.  Once I arrived, it was pretty normal. I work for one of the countries best golf clubs and on Monday’s the club is closed. It’s just my boss, aka The Pro, my supervisor, aka T, and myself. We all work like busy little bees on Mondays because when the club is open, things get really out of controll sometimes. You would think in a leisurely industry the work pace would be the same. I assure you it is not, at least during the season.

Lunch on Monday’s is always The Pro’s choice. He seems to have some sort of complex about that, he insists every Monday on buying lunch. T thinks that it is because during normal club hours the staff is provided with free lunch of which T nor I partake. It is generally really heavy man food. Cheeseburgers, pizza, white pasta with white creamy sauces. So, on Monday he insists on taking care of us. Most of the time, his choice leaves plenty of healthy options and luckily yesterday was one of those days. He chose Firebird’s Rocky Mountain Grill. 

The Pro also decided that today he would pick up the lunch since he was going out anyway. I ordered the Mixed green salad with wood fired salmon. It has spring mix, jicama, tomatoes and a cilantro lime vinegarette. It is so good, one of my favorite Monday lunches.  

i puffy heart jicama 

 

Our lunch delivery also included a grande soy latte from Starbucks. Another one of those things he does that no one understands but we all appreciate. It was all mighty tasty though I think I drank too much of the latte, I normally get a tall but I think The Pro just likes to say the word grande .

soy latte

After lunch, the rest of the work day flew by as they always do during the season. I left without knowing what was on the menu for dinner. After a long discussion with dear husband on the phone, I decided that I would just cook whatever struck my fancy once I arrived home. It was a yoga night so I knew it needed to be quick. Once home, I was inspired by a jar of portabella mushroom sauce we bought at a local farm stand. I made some creamy polenta with parmesan, topped it with the sauce, some soy mozzarella and some fresh basil from the deck garden.  I served it with a simple green salad with balsamic vinegar and olive oil. It was delightful, I think the basil made it.  

a quick weeknight meal

 

After dinner we watched Army Wives that was on the dvr and then headed off to yoga. Yoga class was great, the normal instructor was out and Sonja was there in her place. Sonja is the one who really gets you sweating. There is just something about her flows that you know you are getting an instense session. It is probably the sweat that is dripping all over the place. Though last night, she took it easy on us. There was a beginner in the class, only one yoga class ever and she had never even heard of vinyasa.  After yoga, we checked out Sonja’s new Smart Car and then headed home.

When I got home, I chatted with Monica about her teleclass tonight on cravings. I’m so excited for it, I hope to learn a lot about why I crave the things I do and how to battle those cravings. After our chat,  I caught up on blog reading, my secret hobby and then off to bed I went. 5:30 comes early, ya know!

A busy Sunday?

Sundays are sacred to me. Not for religious reasons, not for any reasons really, they just are. If it were up to me, I would just stay at home every Sunday for the rest of my life and read, cook, watch the food network and piddle around the house. Oh and nap. Well, yesterday just wasn’t like that. Sure, I stayed home all day but boy was I busy!

I woke up late, around 7:15, and since Sunday’s are special breakfast days at our house, I delved into making some cranberry orange muffins. I found some recipes online and kinda tweaked them because I wanted them to be low sugar/low fat and I wanted to use oat flour instead of white flour. They turned out pretty good though alot of them stuck to the pan. Maybe I should have let them cool longer?

sunday morning muffins

I ate two of the muffins along with a glass of milk, it was a tasty breakfast though I was worried it wouldn’t last me very long. A little while after breakfast we went for a long walk around our neighborhood and the “HIlls of Death” neighborhood across the street for a total of 4.5 very hilly miles. I love long walks with the dear husband.

Soon it was lunch time and neither of us knew what we wanted. I looked around the fridge and freezer and came up with turkey burgers. I broiled them in the toaster oven, topped them with soy jalapeno cheddar cheese, ketchup, mustard, pickles, lettuce and hanover tomato. I served them on 100% whole wheat bread along side a fresh Virgnia peach.

lunch!

The burgers were tasty and pretty filling. I got started on my 4000 loads of laundry, lunch prep for the week and I started working on the nights dinner of chicken and brown rice. Through all of that I got hungry and decided that since dinner was a 3 hour process, I better have a snack. I had a stoneyfield farm low fat strawberry yogurt topped with blueberries. It was so tasty! I normally eat plain greek yogurt with fruit on top but for some reason, the stoneyfield farms yogurts looked really appealing this week.

a summertime treat

The snack was followed by more laundry and more prepping for the week. We moved all of my workout clothes to our guest bedroom closet because the gym is upstairs and it is just easier if I can get dressed where I workout. Now we just have to wait and see if that encourages me to workout. After about load 3097 was done, it was time for dinner.

I talked to my mom on Saturday morning and she really got my craving up for chicken and rice. The last time I made that was in my fat days, loads of butter and white rice. Instead, I made it with brown rice and no butter. I poached the chicken, the cooked the rice in my rice cooker with some of the broth and water. Then I combined it all together with a little more water for a creamy texture and WALA we had a healthier version of chicken and rice. I served it with a salad with tomatoes, rice vinegar and olive oil. It was mighty tasty and really satisfied my craving.

comfort food

Dinner was followed by more laundry. Does the laundry ever end? By 8:00 I was wiped out and off to bed I went. Maybe next Sunday I will just do some reading.

A Super Saturday

Yesterday was a great day, the perfect kind of Saturday. I started the day with a nice cup of black coffee and a phone converstaion with my mom.  For some reason, the coffee made me feel more jazzed up than a typical morning so I was ready to go. Dear Husband and I normally eat the same thing on Saturdays as we do during the week, so, I had my ususal. I reheated some hot grain cereal I made last weekend, it is mainly wheatberries, oats and bulgur that I added the last of some Bob’s Red Mill 5 grain cereal to. I added a spalsh of milk for some creaminess then I stirred in some ground flax seed and finally topped it with fresh blueberries and a tbsp of almond butter.

Breakfast was followed by a trip to the local veggie stand for some of those fantastic hanover tomatoes, some cukes, squash, zucchini and peaches. Then we went to the regular groceries store for some of the standard stuff, salad mix, milk, soymilk, yogurts, etc. When we came out of the grocery store it was HOT, I mean HOT. The car said it was only 90* out but it really felt like 115*. Of course, I don’t really know what 115* feels like but I imagine it would be like that. We took the groceries home and unpacked them and then headed to Target. Normally, we would have done a one stop shop but Target has some amazing pizzas and we wanted to stock up and we didn’t want the groceries to go bad in the heat.

When we got to Target, we got our obligatory starbucks. I got a tall soy latte and dear husband had a tall caramel soy latte. There is something about those lattes that make our Target trips seem so fun. I have to say that Target is one of our favorite places, sentimental in a way. When we first starting dating, I told him that we should just go to Target to see if we can function in the real world as a couple instead of doind the same ole same ole date thing. We had a great time and we still do. Anyway, we got the standard $100 worth of crap that we needed and headed home.

Once home, I made us some lunch. I decided to do a little healthy twist on my favorite summertime lunch from back in the day. Instead of tomato, duke’s mayonaise,salt, pepper and white bread, I did 100% whole wheat bread, hummus, tomato and spring mix and I had the rest of the tomato on the side.

mmmm....lunch

After lunch, we decided to hang out on the back deck and bask in the rays of the sun. I know, I know, it is my vice, I must admit. After our fun in the sun we went upstairs and posted some of our crap on ebay. I started to get hungry so I decided to have a target brand granola bar, they are the knock off of fiber one bars but they don’t contain HFCS. While I munched on that, I sliced my very well drained tofu and then threw it in the oven, at Kath had suggested. I took about 50 minutes to get nice and crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. Once we were finished with the ebay stuff, I cut the tofu into smaller cudes and made a veggie stir fry. It had green beans, broccoli, mushroom and onions and I topped it with some Joe’s Market stir fry sauce. I served my portion over less than half a cup of brown rice and topped it with sesame seeds. It was quite tasty.

bright green stir fry

After dinner, we went for a walk around our neighborhood, twice. It ended up being a little more than 3.5 miles. It was nice to get out and see the neighbors. After the walk, we settled in for the evening and since dinner was so early, about 5pm, I was hungry again about 9. So, before bed I had a small bowl of cocoa bumpers, the organic version of cocoa puffs, topped with some milk. A few more minutes of television and I was out like a light. I just love Saturdays like these.