Month: April 2009

Magical properties

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While I had my new coffee bean grinder out last night, I obviously needed to use it to grind some of my Bob’s Red Mill flax seeds! Feeling inspired by Sarah’s flaxseed pudding (fyi, I’m talking about the hilariously entertaining Sarah and not me!), I ground three tbsp of the seeds. Half I kept aside to use for tomorrow’s breakfast, and half became part of my dinsert:

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In a small saucepan, I immersion blended the 1.5 tbsp ground flax seeds with 1/4 cup silken tofu, 1/4 cup unsweetened soymilk, 1/4 cup water, cinnamon, vanilla, and 1 chopped gooey Medjool date. Once blended, I brought the mix to a low boil for a few and then poured it into a ramekin that went into the fridge for a couple hours.

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While the pudding was setting, I snacked on three jasmine tea biscotti bites.

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Before chilling, the pudding was already pretty thick because of the tofu (I wanted to use it up before I left for the weekend), but after — wow! The flaxseeds definitely changed the consistency so that it actually set kind of like regular pudding would.

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I loved it alone but, this being dinsert and all, I needed it to be a bit more substantial. So I threw on chopped mango (Myrna gave me a whole mango at work the other day!), blood orange, strawberries, and blackberries along with the rest of the peanut roasteed chickpeas and some of my frozen Easter chocolate-caramel-nut candy.

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Mmmmmm, I am so excited about this flax seed “gelling” discovery. I never knew it had these properties, and I have a pretty full bag of them left so I can keep experimenting!

I used the other 1.5 tbsp of ground flax seeds for my breakfast this morning. I enjoyed my tofu oat bran with prune groatmeal topping for the third day in a row … with two (hmm, three four) key differences. First, I added the flax to the saucepan while stovetopping the bran last night. Second, I cooked the bran and assembled it with the groatmeal in an ovensafe bowl last night to allow for easy oven-reheating while getting ready this morning. Third, I topped it with homemade sunflower seed butter in place of my completely devoured cashew-almond butter. And fourth, I ate it in a takeout container on the subway 🙂

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In case I haven’t mentioned it yet, I’m loving the tofu oat bran! I think I could even eat it plain without any of the toppings. The fat from the tofu and soymilk add such a rich flavor to the already creamy oat bran. And the addition of ground flax made it even thicker! Such a satisfying combination.

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Despite the satisfaction, however, I got somehow hungry at 9 am while waiting for the plane in JFK (probably because I didn’t have any water to drink!) and whipped out this baby sweet batata that I baked last night:

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I’m now in the Charlotte airport awaiting the arrival of my super special local tour guide who offered to help me fill the afternoon until I meet Wife (who went wild for scones here) who’s driving up from GA this afternoon!

Have you made any magical food discoveries lately?

Busier off

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Ack, it’s pretty late for me to be getting around to this! I always expect to have so much extra time on my days off, and the opposite always ends up being true.

Anyway, I had today off since it’s my class day and Hunter is closed for spring break 🙂 I had lots to get done because I’m leaving for the weekend tomorrow — my old college roommate is getting married in North Carolina! I woke up around 8, got my laundry started at the laundromat, and then came back for breakfast:

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That’s right, exactly the same as yesterday: tofu oat bran with prune groatmeal topping! Such a pleasant-sounding name, right?

I topped it with cashew-almond butter and unsweetened coconut again today, but
I decided to go wild and throw on a sprinkle of cinnamon as well.

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Lunch, even though it was my day off from work, was the usual group effort.

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I had a salad made with rescued brown and leaky roommate lettuce and Heather’s leftover lunch lettuce from work yesterday; half of an abandoned zucchini that I found on the conference room table yesterday (I think it was Inginia’s?) sauteed with olive oil, garlic, and a few thawed pieces of seared tuna from the Electrolux event a couple weeks ago; peanut roasted chickpeas; Newman’s dried berry blend; grated homemade parmesan; and the rest of my sundried tomato dressing from last night’s salad.

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On the side, I had one of Myrna and Mildred’s empanadas from Heather’s baby shower and Heather’s leftover guacamole from her lunch yesterday.

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I didn’t know whether the empanada was chicken or cheese until I took a bite.

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Chicken it was! Delicious 🙂

Lunch dessert was another tbsp of peanut roasted chickpeas and the rest of the Newman’s berries:

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After laundry and lunch, I went out on a mission of many errands. I walked down to Brooklyn’s poor excuse for a mall, Atlantic Center, and picked up a new pair of sneakers (in the white/berry/storm color) from DSW on sale for $60. More money than I’m really free to spend, but the health of my knees is worth it!

img_8063I also hit up Target hoping to find a cheap dress for the wedding that suits my new, ahem, “curvier” figure (thanks to the injury-induced reduction in running). No luck, though, so I’m going to have to raid my closet! I did, however, pick up a coffee bean grinder. I don’t like coffee, but my mini-food processor bit the dust after three batches of nut butter, and I thought (rather, I called my mom and she thought) the grinder might be a good and cheap ($15!) interim solution until I can get my hands on a powerful processor. Mom was right, and I made some sunflower seed butter when I got home. Sure, it took three batches (and I had to stop the grinder after every pulse to scrape the sides) to make 1/2 cup’s worth, but I now have delicious sunflower seed butter!

I also stopped into several grocery stores on the way back to try to put a dent in my stockpile of coupons. In addition to heavily discounted produce, I also picked up a free kashi meal, free tempeh, free cereal, and free yogurt 😀 The checkout people kept doing double-takes as they rang up my coupons.

By the time I got home, I had been gone for three hours and 3.5 miles of walking. I had a quick snack of a date with my last tsp of cashew-almond butter and a sprinkle of cinnamon:

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And then I went out for an inaugural run with the new sneakers! I could definitely feel the difference in my knees. I felt like I was running on clouds, sigh. I made it about 22 minutes until the muscles started giving me grief, so I took a 20-minute walk/run/stretch pain-break. Once things had calmed down, I resumed a solid run for the last 10 minutes. I think I usually run by wildly throwing my legs out in front of me (yeah, I’m sure that’s part of why I’m injured, too) but I noticed today that I felt a lot less pain when I focused on lifting my knees UP instead. I’ll have to make a point of this on future runs. Anyhoo, stats: 55 minutes, 421 calories, 144 average heart rate, 168 max. It was probably around 4 miles total. After the run, I did most of the 20-minute Yoga for Runners — sometimes I just can’t keep my attention on it long enough to finish!

Now I’m off to go finish dyeing my hair, do a little wedding fashion show so I can figure out what to pack, and then start packing! I will hopefully be back soon — I should have a good amount of airport downtime perfectly suited to blogging tomorrow 🙂

Are your days off busier than your days on?

Erin at I Walk In This World is going to be hosting a bake sale/auction next week to raise money for the Jimmy Fund. Go check it out!

Leftover desserts and a cautionary tale

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Gina sent Kate and me an urgent message Tuesday that she needed help with desserts left from a family event this weekend. Kate and I are loyal friends, so we came to the rescue last night after salads 😀 We each had a slice of tiramisu and a slice of chocolate chocolate cake:

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These desserts came with a story from Gina (as does pretty much everything when it comes to Gina!). In fact, because these desserts sent Gina into such an extreme state of expansion on Saturday night, her husband dictated that her punishment should be to confess the gluttony here for everyone to see. Since I’m clearly not one to censor tales of expansion and I’m completely in favor of using indulgence-induced discomfort as a learning experience rather than as a source of guilt, I agreed to assist. Without further ado, here’s Gina’s cautionary tale:

I arrived in downtown Philadelphia late Saturday afternoon with Chris’s whole family. We had plans to go to dinner with my brother and my parents at Maggiano’s at 7pm. Here’s how the restuarant describes their style on the website:

“It’s true that we’re not exactly shy with our portions here at Maggiano’s Little Italy®. But that’s because we love for people to share a taste here and there. However, if you really want to experience an Italian-American tradition, order from our dedicated family style menu. Everything is priced per person, and the plates won’t stop coming until you’re done. There’ll be plenty to go around and everyone gets to sample a variety of delicious, Chef-prepared dishes.”

I was feeling a bit hungry around 5pm, but I knew that a big dinner was in store so I didn’t eat anything. We went to our hotel happy hour around 5:30 pm, and they had a little booklet of all kinds of fun sounding drinks, all for only $5! I picked out a Raspberry Mojito and proceeded to have two before we left for the restaurant. That was mistake #1: two Raspberry Mojitos on an almost empty stomach!

Once at the restaurant, we opted for family-style dining and got to pick out two appetizers, two salads, two pastas, two main entrees, and two desserts! My dad and I were the designated food selectors, making me even more excited. Of course, I selected all things I would like: mistake #2 … although there’s not much I don’t like! We picked fried calamari and mozzarella marinara for appetizers, Caesar salad and Maggiano’s salad (Iceberg and romaine lettuce, crumbled bleu cheese, crispy Prosciutto, red onions, tossed in our signature House Dressing) for the two salads, Rigatoni D (Rigatoni pasta, herb roasted boneless chicken, mushrooms and onions, tossed in a light Marsala cream sauce) and Baked Ziti and Sausage for the pastas, and Chicken Parm and Chicken Francese for the entrees (anything besides chicken cost extra per person).

When the food came out, OH MY! I really should have taken pictures. They brought out HUGE portions of the salads and appetizers first. I had some of everything. The pastas and entrees came out shortly after we were done with the appetizers. I, of course, took some of everything! I think more time in between courses also would have helped me. Again, there were two platters of each chicken and I think one big bowl of each pasta. The Rigatoni D was my favorite so I had second helpings of that: mistake #3! By the way, they gave us so much, we couldn’t eat it all, but if you do finish one thing, they happily bring out more!

We waited to pick the desserts until after we were finished everything else, but again, the dessert selector was me! I was so full from all that food, but who can pass up dessert when it comes with the meal? I selected Chocolate Zuccotto Cake (chocolate cake layered with Sambucca chocolate mousse; iced with chocolate frosting and dusted with cocoa powder).

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And Tiramisu.

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You should have seen the size of the pieces of cake! They brought out two plates of each dessert! I had a pretty large hunk of chocolate cake and some tiramisu.

Almost immediately after I finished dessert, the trouble started! My stomach was WAY OVEREXPANDED and started to hurt really badly. I had to get up and move around! I started making those overexpanded groans and told everyone I needed to head back to the hotel immediately. Luckily, the hotel was only a block away.

I was in so much over-expansion pain — I literally made myself sick from this meal! I do believe those Raspberry Mojitos played a part in this overexpansion tale … along with the three to four glasses of wine I drank during dinner. Alcohol plus overabundance of food led to a sick Gina! I had to stay in the room for about an hour while everyone else was downstairs in the hotel bar again, having drinks and socializing. UGH, What a mess I made of myself!

Lessons learned:

1.) Do not drink Raspberry Mojitos on an empty stomach.

2.) Do not let me pick out all the food at a family style restaurant.

3.) Ask for a smaller plate so I don’t eat such large portions of the family-style meal. Or at least exhibit more self-control over the portions I serve myself!

My brother would not stop making fun of me for the rest of the weekend! I recovered by Sunday morning, thank goodness. Anyway, that’s my cautionary tale of expansion. Hope that it never happens to you!

OK, I’m back!

Gina, thanks for sharing your tale and your lessons! I love Gina’s tale because it is such an honest account of her evening and how she felt. We all sometimes eat to the point of discomfort and, rather than responding to the expansion by making deals with herself to “run it all off” or “eat only vegetables for a week,” Gina reflected on what she could realistically do differently next time to (1) continue enjoying special food events while (2) maintaining physical comfort! In my opinion, Gina’s approach is the healthiest way to recover from extreme expansion, and it will have more significant and long-term benefits than a pity party or a crash diet. Gina, congratulations on a successful expansion recovery!

P.S. Unlike Gina, I was not yet desserted out last night when I got home and was desperately craving more chocolate. I heated the rest of the morning’s almond sunset tea and pulled two cookies out of the freezer for dunking:

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The cookies hit the spot and left me perfectly satisfied 😀

What is your cautionary food tale?

Todo lo demás

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Because there was nothing all that special about the rest of the day in between cupcakes this morning and dessert tonight (and because I’m running behind on everything in the world … except eating dessert!), I’m just going to do a quick rundown.

Another cup (the last one) of mama’s chicken, kielbasa, and root vegetable casserole:

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Three tomato slices left from Myrna’s tacos:

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Three inches of Mildred’s ham and cheese wheat Subway sub:

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Which I subsquently deconstructed into a ham and cheese half and a plain bread to dip in avocado salsa half (to get rid of the mayo):

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And 1/4 of Mildred’s white chocolate macademia Subway cookie:

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The last cup of my fruit salad with a sprinkling of golean crunch:

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And one final cupcake from Jessica:
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Afternoon snacks were two heated kitchen sink mini-muffins from mom with cashew-almond butter:

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And a blood orange:

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After work, I headed down to Brooklyn to meet Gina and Kate for salads at Chop Chop, a pay-too-much-to-make-your-own-salad takeout restaurant/gourmet deli. I have to admit that the salad was delicious, though!

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I ordered an arugula salad with beets, carrots, cucumber, red onions, sundried tomatoes, avocado, feta cheese, and sun-dried tomato dressing on the side:

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Mmmmmmmm, it was SO good. And then we headed over to Kate’s apartment to house some special desserts Gina scored for us 😀 Details to come! And when did my life become one nonstop dessert, seriously???


Danger zone

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Breakfast this morning was delicious and complex:

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But before I get into the details of this multi-layer marvel, I have to fill you in on my morning at the gym 🙂 I did my Self Challenge strength workout last night before I went to bed so that I could focus on cardio this morning and get to work on time! I did 20 minutes on the Stepmill, 12 minutes on the elliptical, and 12 minutes on the treadmill (plus the jog to the gym and back and some stretching).

This was my first time back on the treadmill since the muscle-straining incident (which occurred outside and not on the treadmill, btw). Usually, 5.5 is a very comfortable treadmill pace for me that falls on the lower end of my treadmill speed range. This morning, 4.2 was all I could handle! Anything faster than that forced me into a too-long painful stride. My range of motion is so limited. I’m not a fan of being injured, and this slow recovery makes me nervous for both the 10k I’m running on May 9 and the half marathon I’m running on May 30. I suppose the flip-side is that the injury is seemingly forcing my body to work unusually hard for cardio and I burned something like 560 calories this morning. But I’d rather be burning fewer calories if it meant I were healed :/

Anyway, back to breakfast:

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I went Bob’s Red Mill crazy on this combo. Before I went to bed last night, I pulled out the crockpot and filled it it with two cups of whey from Greek yogurt, 1/2 cup unsweetened soymilk, 1/2 cup BRM whole oat groats, 1/2 cup BRM triticale berries (similar to wheat berries), 1/2 cup pumpkin muffin crumbs (from the freezer), 1/2 cup chopped Newman’s Own prunes, and a big pile of cinnamon. I cooked the whole thing on low overnight.

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This morning, I cooked 1/4 cup BRM oat bran on the stovetop with 1/2 cup unsweetened soymilk and then immersion blended it with 1/4 cup silken tofu. That became my base layer.

I topped the tofu oat bran base with 1/2 cup of the crockpot prune “groatmeal” and topped that with a tbsp of cashew-almond butter and a sprinkle of unsweetened shredded coconut.

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picture-526Exciting, right? It was quite the production! I’m looking forward to doing it again tomorrow, too!

When I got to work this morning, check out what was waiting. Our very own agency Martha Stewart (aka Jessica) was inspired to bake her famous mini-cupcakes by the tray from yesterday’s mini-pumpkin muffins. She just knew it would make the perfect carrying case for her signature goodies.

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I milked these two over the first two hours of the day.

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They were the perfect morning snack!

However, the entire tray of cupcakes spent the rest of the day on the infamous conference room table. Here’s the view from my desk:

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Where is the most dangerous spot to leave treats lying around in your life?

Also, The Professional Vegan did a great review post today of a NYT article about “aspiring vegans” who follow “veganish” lifestyles. This is relevant because the subject of the article, Jeffrey Masson, was interviewed at Angelica Kitchen, a fabulous vegan restaurant in NY where I have eaten!