Tag: tea

Running behind

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BSI Dates: Final Recipe Tally

  1. Submitted 1/27 by ttfn300 at Tri to Cook: Butternut Squash & Date Puree
  2. Submitted 1/28 by Meghann at The Inner Workings of a College Graduate: Perfectly Portioned for One Roasted Eggplant, Date, & Kale Curry
  3. Submitted 1/29 by Denise at Denise’s Kitchen: Pork Candy (aka Stuffed Dates with Goat Cheese & Prosciutto
  4. Submitted 1/31 by Brandi at Bran Appétit: Barley Date Pudding
  5. Submitted 2/1 by Kate: Mystery Date Muffins
  6. Submitted 2/1 by Emily at Sheila Moon/Big Swingin’ Cycles Team: Powdered Sugar Coated Date, Walnut, & Butter Balls
  7. Submitted 2/1 by Vani at Fit for Free: Whole-Wheat Coffee Cake Muffins with Date-Nut Streusel
  8. Submitted 2/1 by Victoria at The Idle Loaf: Banana Date Coffee Cake
  9. Submitted 2/1 by Kath at Kath Eats Real Food: Blue Cheese, Date, & Pecan Stuffed Pork Tenderloin
  10. Submitted 2/1 by Tina at Carrots ‘N’ Cake: Oatmeal Date Cookies
  11. Submitted 2/1 by Biz at Biggest Diabetic Loser: Date Wontons
  12. Submitted 2/1 by Andrea at Bella Eats: Peanut Butter Date Blondies
  13. Submitted 2/1 by my mom: Date, Feta, & Toasted Nut Stuffed Butternut Squash
  14. Submitted 2/1 by Jenna at Eat, Live, Run: Whole Wheat Date-Banana Bread Cookies

They all look so good!!! How will I ever choose? I’ll be back late tonight (prob won’t get home from work and class until about 9) to announce the winner.

I bundled up like crazy this morning for the gym as usual, only to run outside and smack into a wall of temperate climate. Weather.com says it was 30 degrees, but it felt more like 40 to me! As I jogged to the gym, I had to take off my scarf, my ear flap hat, and my gloves — and I wished I could take off my fleece pants and two long-sleeved shirts, too! I only did 30 minutes StairMaster this morning because I was running late. Stats:  53 minutes, 391 calories, average heart rate 142, max heart rate 166.

Breakfast was, of course, my crockpot gingerbread spice oats that spent yesterday slow-cooking. I’d been looking forward to these all night, and they did not let me down! Along with one cup of the oats, I had 1/3 cup healthy cream cheese icing, 1/4 Greek yogurt, two crumbled graham sticks, and a sprinkling of powdered ginger:

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And a chocolate caramel enchantment chai tea with Silk on the side.

See you at lunch!

BSI prize sneak-peak (!!) plus cracker pizza

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Ahhh, what a day. And I’m not nearly done with all my reading for class tomorrow! I’m going to try to make this post quick (although whenever I say that, the post ends up going on for ages and ages).

Make sure to submit your BSI recipes by midnight tonight! Scroll down to the previous post for more details and list of entries thus far.

While I’ve been working all day, a pot of chocolate caramel enchantment chai tea with unsweetened Silk has been keeping me company. Clearly the teapot is struggling to stay afloat just like I am!

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(I think something exciting might be happening with the Superbowl? I’m hearing lots of “Oh my god!” shouts coming from the apartment downstairs.)

For lunch, I made leftover cracker-pizzas. On my pizza stone, I placed two Kavli Crsipy Thin Crackers:

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Tomato sauce:

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Roasted veggies and tofu left from last week’s lunches:

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The last of Thursday night’s cheese and butternut squash seeds:

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The stone went into the oven at 450 for about 12 minutes. And then it came out:

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On the side, I had the rest of the roasted veggies that did not fit on the crackers:

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I ate the pizza taco-style:

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This was SO good. I’m really excited I finally found a use for these crackers! I’ve had the box sitting on top of the fridge since September. Expect pizza crackers to be appearing again at some point.

For dessert, I had a jumbo Medjool date stuffed with goat cheese  (Fitnessista-style) and sprinkled with cinnamon (expansion-style ;-)):

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Ahhhh, this was delicious, too! Perhaps next on the agenda is a date & goat cheese cracker pizza??

I also had a few more bites of frozen cake:

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Because I ate all this so late (around 4:30 I think), I never really got hungry for dinner and contented myself with lots of tasting as I worked on cooking my lunches for the coming week. But you’ll have to wait until tomorrow for details on that. Can you stand the suspense?

In honor of tonight being the last night for BSI submissions, I decided to give the BSI prize a test-drive. Here’s my sugar cookie sleigh ride tea (and some sort of apparition riding out of it) with two Earl Grey Biscotti Bites:

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As “toasty” on the bottom as they are, these bites were delicious — even better today than last night! I hope the winner likes them. I’m always a little bit apprehensive about feeding other people my healthified and substituted-to-death desserts!

OK, off to take care of some more loose ends and prep for tomorrow … and hopefully bed by 9. Can’t wait to see the rest of your submissions!

Dates ‘n’ oats

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Update: Blogger Secret Ingredient — Dates

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Remember that today is the last day to submit your recipes! You must email either your recipe + photos OR the link to your BSI post to talesofexpansion@gmail.com by midnight tonight. I will judge the entries tomorrow based on creativity and potential deliciousness. The winner of the contest will receive:

– TWO boxes of Celestial Seasonings Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride Tea

– one dozen Earl Grey Biscotti Bites

– plus a couple more little mystery prizes

Here are the submissions I have received so far:

Think you can top those?? Send your recipe to me TODAY!

Breakfast

I could think of nothing but oats when I got up this morning. I got my laundry going at the laundromat and then raced back to start preparing this week’s edition of crockpot oats: gingerbread spice oats! I had to run to the store for eggs and ginger root (and cheese samples!), bringing this week’s grocery tally to $31. The oats are gurgling away in the slowcooker as I write. Can’t wait to eat them tomorrow! This batch includes:

– 1 cup steel-cut oats

– 1 cup unsweetened Silk Soymilk

– 1 cup water

– 3 eggs

– 1 tsp vanilla

-4 small shredded apples

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– 1/2 bag fresh cranberries

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– 1 inch grated fresh ginger root

– 1/2 tbsp powdered ginger

– 1 tsp coarsely chopped whole cloves

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– 1 tbsp molasses

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Since I got such an early start, I decided to do the authentic slow-cooking five-hour method.

For today’s breakfast, I made a batch of stove-top Strawberry-Banana Cardamom Oatmeal with 1/4 cup old-fashioned oats, 1/4 cup unsweetened Silk, 1/4 cup water, 3 chopped strawberries, 1/3 mashed banana, coarsely chopped seeds of 3 cardamom pods, tsp vanilla, dash sea salt. I mixed in 1/4 cup plain yogurt and topped the oatmeal with 1 chopped almond toasted in dry skillet, cinnamon, and unsweetened coconut:

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So creamy!

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So laundry’s done, gingerbread spice oats are cooking in the crockpot, belly’s satisfied, and now it’s time to move on to studying. Be back later!

All is not lost

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** I’m bookending this post with BSI reminders since we’re getting right down to the wire! Check here for more info. If you missed my announcement earlier, the BSI prize will include, amongst other things, two boxes of the RARE Celestial Seasonings Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride tea, the best tea in the world. Are you not ridiculously excited right now??? **

I woke up around 8:00 this morning, and Erin and I set out (in her car!) to hunt down a location for our five-mile run (half marathon, here we come!). The first trail we checked was completely covered in snow and ice, but we lucked out with the second: a paved bike trail in Tibbetts Brook Park. The clear-enough-to-run portion of the trail was just over two miles long, so we ran the length and back plus did a little bit extra to make it a full five. While the trail was not completely covered in ice, we still had to “ballet run” over several slippery sections, slowing us down significantly. Stats: 57 minutes, 457 calories, 149 average heart rate, 164 max heart rate.

Back at the condo, I got started on breakfast:

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img_2776I popped two Nutrigrain waffles in the toaster and set out to develop some oatmeal pancakes! I found a packet of oatmeal in the cupboard that I recognized from the post-race goodies we received at Race for the Cure in September. I mixed the oatmeal with an egg, a splash of water, and some baking powder and baking soda. I Pam’d a pan and poured the batter in:

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Flipped when set:

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And spatula-ed the pancake into four pieces when it was done so that we each had two pancake quarters and a waffle. For the topping, I mixed some banana pieces I had saved from my mommy’s group at work yesterday with the last of Erin’s frozen blueberries and 1/4 cup plain yogurt.  A drizzle of real maple syrup and a dollop of berry jam from a local farm joined the yogurt topping:

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Delicious, if I do say so myself!

After breakfast, Erin and I continued our productive streak with more suburban car errands (yay!!). Accomplishments of the day: Erin’s car passed inspection, she successfully redeemed a Bed, Bath, & Beyond coupon, and I found another little mystery goody at Target to include as a BSI prize. Erin, the most generous hostess ever, capped this string of accomplishments with an offer to drive me allllll the way back to Brooklyn (saving me a 90-minute subway ride!), including a stop at Fairway, my favorite grocery store in the world!! If you live in this city, you know that the combination of a car + Fairway is pretty much a New Yorker’s dream come true. I only wish I hadn’t had so much food still left from last week in my apartment — if I had more fridge/freezer space, I would have taken advantage of the car to buy enough groceries for the next six months!

Once we arrived at Fairway, I wanted to capture the beauty of this foodie heaven with a photo, but when I tried to turn my camera on, nothing happened! I may have actually said the f-word (something I never do!) when I realized I had forgotten the battery/charger in the wall back up at Erin’s house. Ahhhhhhhh!! After all of that productivity, I was going to have to go all the way back to Yonkers with her to collect the battery and then take the subway home. DISASTER. Regardless, we forged on with the shopping. Expecting that I wouldn’t be home until at least 6:30 pm, I did my favorite trick of turning samples into lunch. I had cheese, mini pumpernickel rounds with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and one of the best samples I’ve ever encountered: magic pop rice cakes with freshly ground (still warm!) almond butter, peanut butter, and honey roasted peanut butter. I piled the nut butter onto three different magic pop pieces and may have had approximately 1/2 cup of freshly ground goodness before I was through. Obviously too much, but I was feeling stressed and it was soooooooooo delicious.

Post-shop, Erin and I made the quick drive from the store to my apartment so I could at least drop everything off. Once at my apartment, however, roommate Brigitte saved the day– first with an offer to let me use her camera and second with the genius idea to transfer the memory chip from my camera into hers (which seems like an obvious enough solution, but I had been thinking I’d have to wait to get my battery to get all of my pictures back!). Erin, as if she hadn’t been generous enough already, promised to overnight ship the battery and charger back to me on Monday. So all is not lost :-).

I had a successful shop at Fairway (where it is impossible to have an unsuccessful shop). I got a gallon of skim (for yogurt), 5 bananas, 3 lbs Fuji apples, a big bag o’ oranges, Medjool dates in honor of my BSI choice, a baby butternut squash, and tons of grains from Fairway’s bulk bins — steel-cut oats, quinoa, millet, yellow corn grits, and raw wheat germ:

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Total cost: $27. Gooooooooooooooooooooo Fairway!!!

I’ll be back later with dinner. In the meantime …

** SUBMIT YOUR BSI entries!! Deadline is end-of-day Sunday (aka TOMORROW), and I will announce a winner Monday evening. Check here for more details. I’m so excited to see what you all come up with that I bought that container of dates at Fairway so I can try some of the recipes next week :-). **

Remember me?

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While I work on a marathon post of the last 36 hours (and simultaneously conquer myriad technical difficulties), please allow this photo of jumbo Israeli Medjool dates to inspire your Blogger Secret Ingredient creativity:

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Soooooo, please submit your BSI: Dates entries ASAP! Sunday (tomorrow) is the DEADLINE. The contest is open to everyone, even if you don’t have a blog. Check here for more information and a running list of submissions. Please help by spreading the word on your blogs!!

I’m still tweaking the prize a bit more, but to whet your appetite, I do know that the winner will definitely receive TWO boxes of the hard-to-find Celestial Seasonings Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride tea, featured here and elsewhere on the blog. If you’ve never tried this tea, you have to trust me that it is the most delicious flavor ever to grace the planet. The winner of this contest is going to be one lucky chef!!