I woke up with a major food hangover yesterday, I didn’t want to get out of bed for anything. I had an 8:30 am yoga class so I got up anyway and made breakfast. I made 2 eggs n baskets with local nine grain bread and earth balance. I didn’t have anything on the side because I actually wasn’t hungry but I knew I needed to eat because I wouldn’t be out of yoga until late morning.
This weeks hatha flow yoga class was taught by Candy, a teacher I had never practiced with before. When I first saw Candy, my first thought was relief. She was overweight! I can’t tell you how many super thin yoga teachers there are in this world so to see one that I would consider to be like me, I was excited. For a couple of reasons, really. My big dream is to be a writer while teaching yoga “on the side”. She eased my mind that not all yoga teachers have to be thin. And secondly, I knew my ego would not come in to play because I would not be constantly comparing how thin the teacher is to how overweight I am. It was a wonderful feeling.
After class, I had a private lesson with Laura, the owner of the studio. If I have a mentor in this world, I do believe it is Laura. She compels me to want to live a yogic life and be my own best person. From the moment I met her, I felt a connection with her that makes me feel like she has been a cherished friend my whole life. Needless to say, I always enjoy my private lessons with her. This lesson was about a yogic approach to my anxiety, depression and seasonal affective disorder. I could write an entire article on all of the things that I learned but the biggest thing that I learned is that my body needs two different things depending on whether I am anxious or depressed. The two are so closely tied in my mind that I had just assumed the opposite. She taught me some “real world” techniques for when busting into warrior II just isn’t appropriate as well as the proper asanas and flows for when it is. The whole session helped me understand why I enjoy the poses and the flows that I do with some real legit yoga wisdom to back it up.
In addition to the yogic techniques, we also explored a little more into ayureveda. We talked about my being a kapha and some of the foods that will help keep me balanced. From, that I have decided that I would like to educate myself more of these principles and probably make some changes to my diet accordingly. Laura urged me to take a real world approach and to avoid any extremist ideas which I find to be the most rational and intuitive.
Once I was home from expanding my yogic horizons, it was lunch time. I was pretty hungry and wasn’t up for much involved cooking so leftovers and frozen veggies came to my rescue. I had a mango sausage with whole wheat couscous and steamed green beans with almond. The couscous and green beans didn’t really do it for me so I ended up only have a few bites.
After lunch, we headed to Barnes and Noble to look for books about ayureveda. That idea turned out to be a dud but we did get a latte while we were there 🙂 I got a toasted marshmallow mocha and a pretzel because I was still hungry from lunch. The pretzel was revolting, really, so I only had the one bite. It looks much better than it tasted.
Once we were home from B & N and the rest of our errands, I started on a pot of chowder right away. My friend was coming over for dinner and I knew it would be a really long cooking process. I had seen a couple of recipes for edamame chowder and with those, here is what I came up with.
Roasted Edamame Chowder
4 cups shelled edamame
3 tbsp olive oil
salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder to taste
3 slices bacon, cut into small pieces
1 large onion, diced
1 clove garlic, crushed with salt
1 lb of small red potatoes, sliced into half moons
2 cups frozen corn
4 cups chicken broth, plus more as needed
1 cup half and half
Cheddar cheese for topping
Instructions:
Pre heat oven to 400*. Coat the edamame the olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder and toss to combine. Roast in the preheated oven for 20 minutes stirring often to ensure even roasting. Once roasted, turn off the oven but the leave the edamame inside.
Meanwhile, cook bacon on medium heat until crisp, about 7 minutes. Remove the bacon from the pan as set aside of paper towels. Remove as little or as much of the bacon grease as you would like but be sure to add a little olive oil if you remove all of it. Sautee the onions in the bacon grease (or olive oil) until they are translucent, about 10 minutes. Stir in the crushed garlic and sautee for another minute. Add the potatoes and corn and sautee for 5 minutes. Add in the chicken broth and increase the heat to med high. Bring the mixture to a boil and then reduce head to med and let simmer for 10 minutes or until the potatoes are cooked through.
Remove half of the soup mixture and add to the blender and puree until smooth. Once smooth, add back to the cooking pot along with the roasted edamame. Stir well to combine and taste for salt and pepper. Turn heat to low and let simmer for 15 minutes. After simmering, stir in the half and half and let stand for about 5 minutes. Top with crumbled bacon and cheese.
The chowder turned out great, I served it along side whole wheat yeast rolls and everyone was happy. The soup was rich and creamy and just what we needed on a cold rainy night! For dessert, I had a small bowl of local butter pecan ice cream, it was so good but it made me really cold. I think it is ALMOST time to retire ice cream for the season.
Thought Provoker: Do you make note of how certain foods make you feel? Do you have a tendency towards eating them anyway because they taste good even if they make you feel bad? My body does not like to be overloaded with sweets but my mind always wants to eat them. I try to only have a little but sometimes the sugar monster takes over.
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