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Thanksgiving Recap

Before the recap – look what I did!

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I got a milk frother at the Foodbuzz Festival the other week and I finally used it… for coffee. Did you know you can froth coffee? I did not. It’s really cool. Unfortunately this is decaf instant coffee courtesy of Nescafe, but the froth made it better.

Yesterday Bobby and I (and we brought our friend, Justin) spent the day in New Jersey with my family. My Grammie hosts Thanksgiving every year and I was really excited and happy to see her – I hadn’t seen her since January!

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Everybody futzed around in the kitchen for a while (Mom, Grammie, Dad, Bobby)…

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More futzing (Justin, Uncle Rudy, Aunt Mattie)…

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Playing with cameras (Rob, my brother)…

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Then it was time for the food. Somehow we ended up with 3 Tofurkeys (!), but it was actually the perfect amount. They were cooked with onions (from the garden), carrots (from the garden), and potatoes (not sure – probably from the garden). We also had sparkling cider (I opted for sparkling wine instead). Everyone in my family (grandparents included) loves Tofurkey.

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Dinner is served! (Julia – sister, Rob, Dad, Justin) This was actually lunch; we ate around 1:30 or 2pm.

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There was real turkey too, of course. A little dry, but remedied with lots of delicious (vegan) dressing.

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Creamy chestnuts were great – always a favorite of mine.

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My mom’s sweet potato pie (from the Moosewood cookbook) stole the show. It had pecans and a cheddar-poppyseed crust.

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I didn’t get a picture, but there was also a bowl of pureed squash that I attacked without mercy. Grammie made it – must get the recipe from her. She wasn’t sure what kind of squash she used; it was bright orange (but not kabocha, butternut, buttercup – possibly hubbard).

Other things that were unpictured: Brussels sprouts, stuffing (one vegan and one from the turkey), cucumber salad thing, pickled beets, … I think that was it.

Dessert was impossible pumpkin pie, apple pie, and an apple-pecan dish. Served with whipped cream.
I actually skipped out on dessert in the afternoon (though I did have a generous bowl of whipped cream – real cream) but I brought home leftovers and had them last night with supper (more leftovers).

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I think my favorite was the apple pie; the apple-pecan thing was amazing but a little bit sweet for me. And the pumpkin was pretty delicious as well… I just have a fondness for apples.

I didn’t do any Black Friday craziness today, but I’ll probably go out for a walk in a little bit and maybe do some yoga later.

How was your Thanksgiving?

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Back to the grind!

Yoga

This morning I woke up to do a quickie yoga routine.  I found this new site by an instructor named Eion Finn.  Cool name right?  That link has a bunch of free podcasts ranging from 25 minutes to 1.5 hours.  I have done one 25-minute and I liked it a lot.  It’s not as vigorous as some of the yogadownload.com sessions, but it is still a decent workout.  It’s perfect for gently waking up or a nighttime practice.

Breakfast

  • 1 cup of raspberry lowfat yogurt
  • 1 hot vitabrownie
  • (mashed together)
  • 1 apple

After breakfast I went for a walk (1 hour, first finishing my book – Love the One You’re With by Emily Giffin – and then on the phone with momma then dada).

Lunch

  • 2 large plates of Greek salad (with feta): sliced tomatoes, romaine, hot peppers, onions, and other typical Greek salad toppings.
  • No dressing (feta was enough)
  • Apple on the side

Snack

  • Another apple (3 for the day…)
  • Warmed Chocolate Brownie Zbar (I think I have Zbars every day.  They are too good.)

Yoga

After work I did a 1.5 hour Ashtanga yoga class!  I took the same class on Wednesday after work as well.  The teacher is fantastic and I love it.  I might buy a membership to this studio.  For now I just bought 10 classes that expire in a year.  The studio is Yoga is Youthfulness in downtown Mountain View.  My teacher is Mojdeh.  Her main critique of my self-taught yoga was that I need to learn to tame my flexibility.

Dinner

For dinner I had to cook up a squash that was starting to mold. I cut off the small part that had the mold and baked it up into squash fries.  I made a meal of it, topped with organic ketchup. Bobby had food that I brought home from work today – Greek stuff.

Dessert

  • 2 apples (is this seriously 5 apples in a day)
  • A couple T of peanut butter.  I think peanut butter will always be my favorite nut butter.  I do enjoy almond butter and I have a gigantic jar in my fridge, but in the end – every time I have PB I reconfirm it as the best.

Like my spoon?  I got it at Crate&Barrel.  I also got a cute blue appetizer spoon.  The bowl is from there too.

Bobby and I are watching Amelie now.  It’s one of our favorites.  I adore French, Italian, and German movies because I speak those languages (at diff levels).

What’s your favorite movie?

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Anniversary Day :)

Today is our anniversary!  3 years 🙂  Still not sure what we’re doing tonight, but I’ll fill you in later…

Review: Cassava Chips

These are really good!  They have double the fiber of normal potato chips.  Bobby got them at Whole Foods and I had to try them.  I’m guessing I had about 1 serving (23 chips is the serving size, 150 calories, 6 grams fat, 2 grams fiber).  No preservatives in these guys either, and 70%+ organic ingredients.

Yesterday (Tuesday) morning I woke up before the alarm and got in a lovely 40 minutes of yoga from yogadownload.com.  Thanks so much Julia for recommending this!  I also got a rec from Heather to check out yogatoday.com, so I’ll let you know what i think of that too.

Breakfast was a standard – 1/2 cup oats, 1 cup water plus a splash, and a whole sliced banana.  Add in at the end: 3/4 cup soy milk.

Mid-morning I snacked on an apple, then went for my lunch walk.

Lunch was a sandwich made of 1/4 cup lowfat ricotta and 1.5 tablespoons of olallieberry jam (all out now – I scraped the inside of the jar).

On the side I had a salad – 1/2 an apple (the other half is in Bobby’s lunch), broccoli, mushrooms, carrots, onions, vegan nacho cheese, topped with olive oil and lemon juice.

And an apple on the side (love apples).

Snack was the same as yesterday – a vanilla Chobani Greek yogurt and a BSI muffin, and later another apple.  Bobby and I really like these muffins.  I think there are only 6 left and we started with 16!

Bobby and I went to guitar center to look at things… He’s getting me a piano!

We went out for dinner – the pre-anniversary dinner – to a Thai place called Blue Mango.  We got 3 things and shared them all.

  • Shrimp Papaya Salad
  • Chicken Pad See Ew (thick noodles stirfried with a few veggies) – kind of oily but that didn’t stop me.  So good.
  • Mushroom Mountain (self explanatory name; also had baby corn, bamboo shoots, and tofu)
  • Brown rice

So I was very very full after this meal.  Definitely a splurge.  It certainly was delicious.

Can’t wait until tonight… thanks for all of the lovely suggestions!

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New month!

Last night I had this:

And also another BSI muffin.  They are so good.

This morning I did yoga – Vinyasa power flow #3 – from yogadownload.com.  Such a great site.  Let me know if you check it out.

Breakfast at work was 1/2 cup oats, 3/4 cup soy milk, 1 cup water plus a splash, and 1 sliced banana.  The extra milk made it so creamy.

Snack was a Chocolate Brownie Zbar (my favorite).  Then I did my walk.  I finished a book I got from the library on Saturday called The Day I Ate Whatever I Wanted: And Other Small Acts of Liberation by Elizabeth Berg.  It’s a bunch of short stories about life and doing what you want and being happy.  It’s really good and I definitely recommend it.

For lunch I made a salad (3/4 apple, 1 tomato, romaine, mushrooms, bacon bits, balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and s&p):

And a delicious open-faced sandwich (thinly sliced chicken, vegan nacho cheese, sliced 1/4 of an apple) on this new bread that I got from Trader Joe’s – the brand is Alvarado Street Bakery.  They make great bread.

I had a nice big snack of a BSI muffin, a vanilla chobani, and an apple.  I crumbled up the muffin and stirred it into the yogurt… so good:

And then when I came home I made dinner.  I gave the kelp noodles another try but I still don’t like them.  Tonight I mixed together the kelp noodles, veggies (carrot, tomato, onion), and I chopped up a big chunk of tofurkey.  I topped it with a soy sauce/vinegar/sugar dressing. I had to throw it out.

I also made butternut squash fries again, and due to the kelp noodle failure, I mostly just had the fries with organic ketchup.

For dessert I had 2 small fuyu persimmons and some grapes topped with a little more than 2/3 cup of lowfat ricotta cheese.  I am in love with this stuff.  I crumbled BSI muffins on top.

Bobby’s and my 3 year anniversary is this Wednesday – we still haven’t decided where to go out!  Any suggestions for type of food/cuisine?  What do you guys do to celebrate anniversaries?

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Carrot Soup with Roasted Apples Recipe

I had this with lunch today – I wanted some comfort food.

Carrot Soup with Roasted Apples Recipe 

Ingredients (serves 2-3)

  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 1/4 cup chopped onions
  • 1/2 teaspoon cumin
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, plus some to sprinkle on the apples
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt, plus some to taste
  • 3 medium carrots, chopped
  • 1/2 teaspoon thyme
  • 1 tablespoon dijon mustard
  • 2 cups of water
  • 1/2 apple, finely chopped

Directions

  1. Spread the apple out on a baking pan and sprinkle with cinnamon. Broil for 7-8 minutes. I did this in the toaster oven – very easy.
  2. Heat the butter in a pan over high heat, then saute the onions with the cumin, cinnamon, and salt for about 2 minutes.
  3. Add the carrots and the thyme; saute for 3-4 more minutes.
  4. Add the water and mustard and reduce heat to low; let simmer for 3-4 more minutes.
  5. Blend the carrot mix in a blender – add water if you’d like the soup to be thinner.
  6. Reheat the soup and mix in the roasted apples; feel free to sprinkle some more cinnamon and salt to taste!