Category: Food

Tales of Expansion: Finding a Home for Every Last Crumb

Sweet dreams

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I decided it was time for dinner about an hour after I had lunch. I’d been formulating a plan to make a variation of the Date, Feta, and Toasted Nut Stuffed Butternut Squash that my mom submitted for last week’s BSI. Of course I didn’t have her exact ingredients, so I improvised as usual.

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I used 3/4 of the baby butternut squash that I bought at Fairway last weekend (the other 1/4 is for butternut squash fries tomorrow!). For the stuffing, I mixed the remaining half cup of ravioli filling with some of the squash and with the spices recommended by mom. I topped it all with five chopped toasted almonds, two chopped dates (the end of my supply), and some of the squash’s seeds (I seasoned and toasted them in the oven while the squash was roasting). Ahhhh, it was soooo good. Not a surprise since my mama’s a genius in the kitchen :-).

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If you didn’t notice already, I had the squash over a bed of 1/4 cup Vianni’s vegetable rice and 1/4 cup brown basmati rice:

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After dinner, I headed out to meet up with the ladies: Gina, Kate, and Pam. They’d gone to a Thai restaurant for dinner, but my bank account couldn’t handle that so I skipped the meal and joined for them a movie after. We saw He’s Just Not That Into You, and I actually liked it! I laughed, I cried … the whole thing. It’s been ages since I’ve enjoyed a movie, so I’m glad this one came through. When we finished with the movie, we went across the street for dessert at Sweet Melissa, a local patisserie of which I am quite fond. Here we are displaying our treats:

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Gina and Kate each got the Chocolate Peanut Butter Indulgence (layers of rich chocolate cake, peanut butter, and ganache):

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Inside:

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I had two bites:

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Gina got vanilla ice cream for the side, and I ate many bites of that:

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My dessert was the Toasted Lemon Meringue Tart (sweet tart lemon curd in a pate sucree crust topped with a dollop of toasted meringue):

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Mmmmm, it was deeeeeelicious. The crust was so buttery and crumbly and shortbready:

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I’m back home now and setting up a new batch of yogurt for overnight incubation. My roommate’s boyfriend is eating this Chipwich and it’s killing me:

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So I’m going to eat this Godiva dark chocolate:

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With a cherry inside:

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And quickly brush my teeth so I don’t eat any more. Night night!

Run for your lunch

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My favorite part of a long run is eating after it :-). Kate and I did 7.5 miles (two loops of Prospect Park + the jog there from my apartment), and I spent pretty much the entire time envisioning my lunch. Stats: 1 hour and 15 minutes, 654 calories, 155 average heart rate, 181 highest heart rate. After the run, I did my 20-minute Gentle Hatha #1 yoga download for a good stretch. And then it was lunchtime!

I had half of a toasted pumpernickel bagel with another tbsp of peanut butter, the other 1/3 banana, and a sprinkle of cinnamon AND a cup of kale and date curry with a dollop of plain yogurt and an extra sprinkle of curry powder:

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Mmmmmmm.

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And mmmmm again.

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I have a feeling that dinner is going to be happening very soon!

The end of an (oatmeal) era

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I slept until 9 this morning!!! That’s a record — I usually only “sleep in” until 7:30 when the sun and the birds start coming out. Earplugs are saving my life, let me tell you.

Heather noticed that the little doll/decoration that I knocked over and had to glue back together on Thursday had red hair and wondered if people have been giving me red-haired things all my life since, you know, I’m a redhead. The answer, unfortunately, is no. This is why:

with siblings at high school graduation party in 2000 (I'm on the right)

with siblings at high school graduation party in 2000 (I'm on the right)

That’s right — in some sort of biological accident, I was born with BROWN hair.

On to the oats …

I was hungry the second I got out of bed, so I threw my last serving of gingerbread crockpot oats into the oven. You might be happy that these oats are gone since this is the sixth day in a row you’ve had to hear about them, but I am very sad to say goodbye :-(. I usually take a million pictures of my oats and then choose two to post, but today I can’t choose and I’m going to show you more. I won’t make a habit of this, I promise.

with 1/2 cup yogurt, 2 crumbled graham sticks, and more powdered ginger

with 1/2 cup yogurt, 2 crumbled graham sticks, and more powdered ginger

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And tomato plant tea on the side:

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chocolate caramel enchantment chai with unsweetened silk

Around 11:30, I got hungry again, so I refilled the hot water in my tea and made a happy snack:

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A tbsp pb split between ants on a 1/3 banana log:

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And a juicy Medjool date:

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The existence of the Brooklyn half marathon may be up in the air, but I’m feeling psyched for my imminent 7-mile run in the sunny FORTY degrees we have going on outside. I think I’m going to be able to swap my running tights for capris today, yayyyyy!!

New woman

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Last night’s bedtime snack:

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A dark chocolate Godiva heart filled with chocolate goo!

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YUM!

Onto today! Not only have I been taking pictures with my very own camera again (Erin, thanks again for sending the battery to me!), but I am also blogging from my very own computer! That’s right — my new adapter arrived today, so I could finally charge my latop again. My roommate Brigitte’s camera and computer have valiantly kept me afloat this past week (thank you, Brig!!), but it’s so nice to be back to my own gear. I feel like myself again!

I started this morning with my favorite 5am workout — 5 minutes jog to the gym, 15 minutes arms with free weights on an aerobics step, 30 minutes stairmaster, 10 minutes abs/stretching, 5 minutes jog home. Stats: 1 hour and 12 minutes, 422 calories, average heart rate 126, max heart rate 157.

Breakfast was more gingerbread spice crockpot oats:

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For this morning’s oats, I actually stirred in the egg yolk that was left from ravioli-making last night and then baked it at 375 for 40 minutes. Nothing goes to waste around here! With 1/2 cup healthy cream cheese icing, two crumbled graham sticks, and more powdered ginger:

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I love love love gingerbread oatmeal. I would make it every week if I could. Come to think of it, why can’t I??

I ate lunch around noon, right before the parents’ group. Kale and date curry with brown basmati:

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Yogurt with apple, banana, raisins, cinnamon, ginger, and grumbled graham stick:

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Orange:

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I ate the equivalent of one more orange in the group :-O.

Jessica restocked Belkis’ candy jar, and it was suddenly full again today:

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I found (and ate!) some pretty crazy stuff. I had the standard three pillow mints of course:

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And a wild apple bubble-gum lollipop and a tootsie roll:

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Jujyfruits:

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Fangs:

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And … wait for it … a chicken lollipop!!

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So weird, right? It actually tasted like canned peaches with a bit of heat to them. Here’s another angle:

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I might die tonight from the ingredients, but I think I’d be ok with that since at least I got to experience candy chicken on a stick first:

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After my final visit of the day around 4:30, I dug out my broccoli trees and hummus:

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And my apple:

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And with that, the week was over!!! Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh …

After work, I met Vani from Fit for Free briefly for a little impromptu tea exchange. She stopped by to pick up her participation gift from the BSI: Dates contest I hosted last week (Kath and I decided to split the tea portion of her winnings amongst the participants since she’s drowning in tea as it is!). Vani was so sweet (and beautiful!) in real life, and she brought me a little treat, too:

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Inside the package, I found an array of very useful tea types considering my frenzied pace lately. Calm bedtime tea, peppermint tea, pink lemonade emergen-c, organic Indian vanilla creme tea (wicked excited for this one!), and TJ’s pomegranate white tea:

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Thanks, Vani! I’m so excited to try these new flavors:-).

For dinner, I had the other half of my BSI Spinach entry: Citrus-Berry Spinach and Goat Cheese Ravioli with Balsamic Glaze:

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SO.

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GOOD.

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Thanks for choosing spinach as the ingredient, Brandi! Eating this was so fun :-).

Dessert was a chocolate fig vitatop with peanut butter and chopped apples:

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What a satisfying food day!

Tomorrow’s going to be a busy one, too … but fun busy (finally!). Among other things, Kate and I have a 7-mile run planned as part of our Brooklyn half marathon training, though HangryPants Heather has passed a rumor my way that the Brooklyn half is no longer happening??? I am off to go check into this now!

Frantic

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Ahhhh, how does every night end up nonstop activity?? I have to be fast for real now! I got home from school around 3:30 expecting my camera battery to have been redelivered, but even though the mail had arrived, there was no battery, grrrrrr. I tried calling the post office a million times but kept getting the busy signal, so I decided I might as well head over there anyway since I had to send off my Blogger Valentine’s Day Exchange package. I needed a snack first, so I had 1/2 cup of chopped apples and melon with cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, and nutmeg (love my spices!):

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As an afterthought, I filled my empty ramekin with the rest of my frozen carrot cake because I was so crazed:

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I was running around like a crazy person trying to do 12 things at once to get ready to leave, and I knocked this poor little girl off my shelf:

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So I had to glue her back together:

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I actually managed to get my battery from the post office (wow, something worked out!), and then I raced back home so I could get started on my work homework (that was really supposed to get done yesterday!). Because stuff falls and breaks when I rush around, I took a mammoth spill on the sidewalk coming back. There wasn’t even any ice, so I don’t know what happened! And it was one of those falls that just keeps going and going. I kept thinking it was about to be over, and I kept going down more. By the end, I was totally splayed out on the ground with my arms stretched out in front of me. I tore my gloves and my jeans, but no skin, yessss!! The lady walking her dog behind me was horrified, but I reassured her I was ok and resumed my mad dash (will I ever learn?).

I banged out the rest of my stuff for work while also getting several things going to make my BSI recipe. I don’t have time to post the recipe tonight, but here are some visuals to whet your appetite:

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Cross-section:

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It was SO good!!! I’m thrilled about how it came out because I’ve never made ravioli from scratch before, and this particular ravioli was sizzling with flavor complexity :-). I’ll post the full recipe tomorrow night.

OK, back to my frantic whirling. Still have a few more things to do before sleep, and my bed is worried I am not going to give it enough attention tonight!