Month: February 2009

Top o’ the mornin’

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Up before the sun as usual, but it came out just in time to light my breakfast:

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There’s a plan afoot for running club tonight, so I kept this morning’s workout heavy on the strength and light on the knees and cardio. I did the workout from Self Magazine’s 2008 “Reach Your Goal” challenge — I think it came out in August because I did it all the time last fall until my body got too used to it — along with 15 minutes on the elliptical’s cross-training program. Stats: 1 hour and 6 minutes, 268 calories, average heart rate 106, max 175.

Breakfast was the rest of yesterday’s custard oatmeal:

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Topped with 1/3 cup yogurt, 1/2 tbsp pb, unsweetened shredded coconut, and 2 crumbled graham sticks:

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And on the side, 1/2 cup “roasted” cantaloupe. Brigitte’s cantaloupe had fallen off of its last leg and was a little sour, so I tried to doctor it with heat, nutmeg, and coconut:

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It almost worked.

With soymilky black tea and water:

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I have a lunch packed (well, really, I left yesterday’s lunch at work since I obviously didn’t need it then :-)), but as you know, anything can happen …

See you after running club tonight!

Did you eat your breakfast by natural or artifical light today?

P.S. Tina at Carrots ‘N’ Cake is doing another photo scavenger hunt. I know from experience (scroll down to the bottom to see the prize) how lucky her winners can be, so make sure you go enter!

Work, taco, work, taco, class, taco

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Comí muchos tacos hoy.

But it all started with an orange at 10:30 am to fuel me through my 11:00 visit:

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I got back to the office slightly after noon, just in time for the parents’ group with Inginia. For the group, Inginia made spaghetti with chunky tomato sauce, chicken, and corn. It was such good comfort food and of course became my lunch even though I had brought one from home. I had two small bowls:

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And then one of the moms in the group brought a surprise treat: homemade tacos!! I had two of these as well:

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They had chicken and tomato inside, mmmm:

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picture-044I probably would have eaten several (read: at least 7) more if I hadn’t had to run out at 1:40 to get to my 2:00 visit. On my way out of the office, I tried to placate the taco breath with this candy. The jar is out of mints again, so I grabbed what appeared to be a cinnamon … but it was cherry, blech. I ate it anyway.

picture-052As soon as I got back from my visit, the little girl I see for counseling arrived, so no time for a snack! Immediately following our session, however, I rustled through the tissue box for the last Russell Stover dark chocolate of the four I swiped from Jessica’s Valentine’s stash last week.

Here’s the inside in all its raspberry caramel goodness:

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I left work at 5:20 and made my way down to Hunter for class … which was actually interesting tonight. Probably because we talked about some of my favorite topics: infant brain development, parent-infant attachment, etc. Class started at 6, and by 6:15, I had broken out a “dinner” cup of work leftovers. On top of the cup are some samples of manchego cheese (yum!) I scored from the gourmet deli that’s right by school. I chopped up the cheese and mixed it into a bit of leftover corn from lunch:

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On top of the corn in the cup was another taco — this one was left over from my coworker Nydia’s lunch, and she donated it to the feed-Sarah cause :-P. Her taco was from a restaurant and had some sort of potato-bean-meat mix inside. I normally despise potatoes, but the taco had enough flavor and texture variety that the taters didn’t really bother me:

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And on top of that taco was another one of the chicken tacos from lunch (I swiped it as I left the group this afternoon to head out for my visit). For dessert part 1 around 6:45, I had the yogurt I packed this morning (with the intention of eating it for lunch part 2):

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In addition to 1/2 cup yogurt, the mix also had chopped strawberries, chopped banana, and a sprinkle of kashi golean crunch.

Dessert part 2 at 7:09 (I held out as long as I could!) was a cute little apple along with two dates and two prunes:

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And dessert part 3 — one of the chocolate brownie mini-luna handouts from running club — happened the moment I got home at 8:58 because my tum had started growling again:

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So in conclusion, I ate lots of reasonably portioned, healthyish food today. Expansion status: under control :-D.

And now for a few announcements/suggestions:

1) I won this week’s BSI: Kale for my kale-crust pizza! I’m thrilled about this for two reasons: (a) I am proud of my recipe! and (b) I got to choose one of these gorgeous handmade beaded earrings as my prize. Thanks again for hosting, Beadie! SweetiePie from Just Sweet Enough has taken over the reins for this week’s BSI. Go check her post tonight for more details and the new ingredient!

2) I’m glad you all enjoyed the cupcake post from my amazingly talented multi-tasking buddy, The Professional Vegan. I know that some of you have questions about the specific recipe and its components (i.e. what the heck is vegan buttercream??). Because the recipe is from a cookbook and there is this crazy thing called a copyright law, I can’t post it for you. But I’m sure that if you go post a comment here and ask nicely, the PV would be happy to share her baking secrets with you on an individual basis.

3) And finally, Heather and Mark at HangryPants have a giveaway of something scrumptious underway. Check their post here for info about entering the contest!

Guest Post: The Professional Vegan Bakes Again

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And this time, it’s cupcakes!

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Hi — The Professional Vegan here! Two guest posts on Tales of Expansion — I feel so honored.  I have been baking up a storm lately; I foresee the baking frenzy cooling down considerably, beginning right after this guest post.  Today is my co-worker’s birthday, so I made vegan cookies & cream cupcakes to bring to work in honor of her.

I used a recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World.  Basically, the cupcakes are vegan chocolate cupcakes with a cup of coarsely chopped vegan Oreo-like chocolate sandwich cookies thrown in (I used Newman’s Own Creme-Filled Chocolate Cookies) topped with vegan “buttercream” frosting with half a cup of ground cookies thrown in — and then half a cookie on top of each cupcake. Here are the cupcakes pre-baking:

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(Large lumps = cookie crumbles)

And after baking:

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The frosting with ground cookies mixed in:

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The final product is worth showing twice! Notice the half of a cookie on top of each cupcake, all set to go to work:

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The recipe yielded an exact 12 cupcakes, so I didn’t try the final product (though the batter was yummy, as was the frosting). I’ll sample Monday during the festivities.  Thanks for letting me share my kitchen adventure, Sarah! The guest posting really spurs me on in my vegan baking :-).

It happened again

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Monday comes every week, but somehow it always ends up surprising me! Does this happen to you?

daffodil says hi!

daffodil says hi!

Gym this morning was my all-about-the-steps favorite workout :-). And my body seems to have finally picked up on the fact that I increased both my weights and the cardio level! Stats for arms on an aerobics step + 30 minutes StairMaster + jog to gym and back + stretching and abs: 1 hour and 14 minutes, 476 calories, average heart rate 132, max 171.

Breakfast was custard oatmeal:

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I made two portions of this last night because I needed to use some up some dying roommate fruits (strawberries and cantaloupe) and some open pieces of my own fruit (banana and pear). For extra zip, I added nutmeg, cardamom, vanilla extract, and almond extract. To make the two servings, I used 1 egg, 1/4 cup soymilk, 1/4 cup old-fashioned oats, and 1/2 cup steel-cut oats. I re-heated half of what I made in the oven this morning while I got ready:

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Today’s toppings included the last tsp peanut butter. There’s little I love more than scraping a pb jar clean!

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Along with a crumbled graham stick, unsweetened shredded coconut, cardamom, and 1/2 cup yogurt:

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Come back this afternoon for another guest post from The Professional Vegan, and I’ll return after class tonight with the rest of today’s food!

Chained to the computer

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Ahhh, technology is driving me insane! Hunter has this big push to make the social work program more “current” and is mandating that all courses have an online component. But the online Blackboard has SO many bugs, and it literally took me four hours to leave a comment about one of the articles I read for class. Gah!

Anywayyyyy, my quinoa salad from Friday night made its final appearance as today’s lunch. With more soymilky chocolate caramel enchantment chai (same tea bag, new water) and a stuffed tomato on the side:

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Reassembly of the quinoa salad took place in much the same way as it did yesterday: salad greens on the bottom, warmed salad “substance” in the middle, re-toasted tortilla strips on the top:

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I beefed up the salad by sauteeing the quinoa mix with the scrambled egg yolk and kale stems left from last night’s BSI adventures, 2 chopped asparagus spears, and 2 chopped mushrooms. I also mixed in 1/4 chopped cucumber and sprinkled 1/2 tbsp fat free feta on top:

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The tomato is stuffed with leftover filling from the Stuffed Kale Leaves I made last night:

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I had a little snacky mid-afternoon:

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Chopped pear and banana sprinkled with nutmeg (and eaten with a toothpick for fun):

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And a banana boat — slices of banana on a sliver of toasted flax and fiber bread with a tsp of pb and a sprinkle of cinnamon:

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[Insert 10,000 of the worst expletives you can imagine directed at Blackboard right now, grrrrrrrrrrr!]

For dinner, I finally got to try a substantial amount of each of my BSI: Kale creations. Three slices of Kale-Crust Pizza and three Stuffed Kale Leaves:

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I had the stuffed leaves cold and reheated and re-crisped the pizza slices on a pizza stone in the oven.

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Both of these were so delicious. I almost feel guilty saying that since they are my recipes, but ahh, I’m so impressed! The textures, the flavors … incredible. I always get surprised when my kitchen experiments work out. Thank goodness for the BSI — if I didn’t need to be creative and crafty, I probably would have been having steamed kale for dinner tonight!

Dessert was an assortment of little tastes:

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Taste #1 was half of a small baked sweet potato with plain yogurt and cinnamon:

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Taste #2 was a mess with yogurt, kashi golean crunch, strawberries, cookie crumbs, and a chopped/crumbled piece of Lindst hazelnut chocolate:

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Taste #3 was Italian cookie pieces and the other half of last night’s Sassy Mango-Lime dark chocolate truffle:

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And now, I’ve had it with this online homework disaster!! Sorry, Blackboard, we are going to have to part ways for the night because you’re wasting my time. Ohhhhhh well. Laterzzzz. What’s the most frustrating waste of your time?

Have a good night, and enjoy these few remaining weekend hours!