Tag: tea

Happy tears

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The hospitality just knows no bounds around these parts!

Check out what was waiting for us when we ambled into the kitchen Saturday morning:

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Kristin had arranged an entire tea and coffee display (complete with a “good morning and how-to” note!) to greet us if we woke up before she and Dustin did. I chose a chai tea bag with a bit of skim:

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For breakfast, Kristin whipped out a box of Trader Joe’s banana bread mix. She’s so stocked! We mixed banana chunks into the batter and sprinkled slivered almonds over the top because we’re fancy like that. While the bread was baking, I licked the batter:

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Kristin then proceeded to make us a beautiful breakfast appetizer plate with expertly arranged cinnamon-sprinkled apples:

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And peanut butter!

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Oooh, that bread smelled so good coming out of the oven. There’s something about boxed mixes that is just too delicious and addictive!

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There were gooey pieces and crispy pieces.

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And lots and lots and lots and lots of peanut-butter-covered pieces!

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After breakfast, Kristin, Wife, and I took a lovely two hour stroll through a nearby park, greenway, and neighborhood. We saw the prettiest bungalow houses all with rocking chairs comfortably nestled into their wraparound porches. I kept saying I expected little old ladies to pop out and invite us in for sweet tea. Sadly, neither the old ladies nor the sweet tea made an appearance.

Wife and I returned to our “suite” after the walk to start getting ready for the wedding. Mid-prep, Kristin came knocking at the door with a plate in hand: “It’s going to be a while until you guys eat, so I brought you some snacks.”

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As you can see, Kristin went all out with these “snacks”! The plate included piping hot mushroom empanadas and onion jam ricotta tarts. I think I had 1.5 of each.

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Who thinks Kristin needs to open a bed and breakfast? I do! I’d be first in line for a room.

Also mid-prep, I received an exciting message from Erin Gunn‘s boyfriend Mike: “She said yes!” Ohhhhhhh my goodness!!! Of course, I called Erin immediately and confirmed the engagement news and cried and jumped up and down and flapped my arms around because I was (and am) so happy for her. Congratulations, Erin!

Erin’s engagement news was a good warm-up for Ilin’s wedding, during which I also lost quite a bit of fluid via the ol’ tear ducts. Do you cry at weddings?

I’m off to go to sleep, finally, but I should be back tomorrow with the full wedding recap. In the meantime, go visit Emily at Super Caloric Chalk Dust for a shot at winning her first ever giveaway!

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?

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!

Con dulce, por favor

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It’s been another sugary day around these parts!

Someone brought in Whole Foods mini-pumpkin muffins this morning and planted them right on the conference room table (aka an inch away from my desk). These muffins never really tempt me, though, since the ingredient list is right there and sugar is first on it. I always get so disappointed in WF when I see that. I did, however, take up a crumb collection and eat that once all the muffins were gone:

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Just before lunch, Myrna came around handing out a fun new food tool to everyone that Tupperware sent her because she started doing Tupperware sales. I had packed the perfect snack to test it out. Just watch the magic here:

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Pretty amazing, right? So I’m now the proud new owner of an orange peeler 🙂 I shared some orange and ate the rest:

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For lunch, I had another mama creation that came home with me from MA on Sunday: a cup of chicken, kielbasa, and root vegetable casserole.

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I also had another bite of Vianni’s tuna noodle salad:

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And 1/2 cup of Myrna’s rice and beans:

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And pulled a teeny bit of Myrna’s taaaaaaasty saucy chicken off of this bone:

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I also had my fruit salad + yogurt + golean crunch (from MA, too — I go grocery shopping in my mom’s fridge at the end of every visit):

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img_7938The star of the meal, however, was clearly Mildred’s husband’s habichuela con dulce (a traditional Dominican dessert drink that appears between Ash Wednesday and Easter and that I’ve raved about here and here). I definitely refilled my cup three times. The best comparison I can come up with is that it is like drinking liquid pumpkin pie. In other words, habichuela con dulce is delicious beyond your wildest dreams.

Two of my afternoon visits ended up canceling, so I accompanied Mildred on hers. Both happened to take place in excruciatingly hot apartments. When we finished, Mildred decided that she needed ice cream and that I did, too. Here’s my kiddie scoop of Rocky Road, courtesy of today’s sugar fairy:

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Now, I have not had Rocky Road ice cream in forever, and I’ve probably never had it from Baskin Robbins, but I have to say that this was the best Rocky Road I’ve ever had. It was amazingly creamy, and what’s more, the marshmallows were perfect little pockets of fluffiness! Every other time I’ve had Rocky Road, the marshmallows have been so frozen and mixed in that they weren’t even identifiable as such.

Around 3:30, I broke out another of the cheese sticks that mom sent back to NY with me. The m&m mug and I fought over who would get to eat it, but I won of course. It was no contest, really.

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In my final sugar hurrah of the work day, I heard Jessica whispering something about chocolate cake from down the hall. I got up to investigate, and she informed me that it was Cleo’s birthday in Preventive and they were struggling with a cake overage. We went upstairs together to assist.

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Cake rescued; crisis averted.

Umm, this spoonful of whipped vanilla frosting is on my camera for some reason. I don’t know why? 😛

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I got home and prepped a necessarily light dinner of salad, jasmine tea biscotti bites, and leftover almond sunset tea from this morning. Dinner enjoyed the company of my new Easter decorations: a straw bunny from dad and stepmom, a Lindt dark chocolate bunny from step-grandma, and a spread-eagle bunny planter also from step-grandma:

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The salad contained lettuce, arugula, 1 tbsp Newman’s dried berry blend, 1 tbsp peanut roasted chickpeas, grated homemade parmesan, and a drizzle of Annie’s lite gingerly vinaigrette:

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A few more tbsp of the chickpeas went directly from jar-to-mouth 🙂

What sweet things did you eat today?

Cake and cookies

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After the exercise class last night, I was only slightly hungry (and mostly tired) so I put together a little snacky plate with healthyish cheesecake, peanut roasted chickpeas, and prunes and apricots with PB2.

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There’s also a little piece of the caramel-nut-chocolate candy (on the stick) that my step-uncle gave me for Easter yesterday.

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As I mentioned, I took the Open Cardio Gyrokinesis class last night at the Madison Park location of kinespirit, a fancy gyrotonic studio, with the coupon that Melissa from Fitness NYC brought to the blogger brunch last month. Melissa very accurately reviewed and described the class here.

My experience was pretty much identical to Melissa’s (although my instructor was Christina). I was exhausted yesterday after work and almost didn’t go to the class at all, but I’m so glad I did! It was gentle and easy on my body and my poor strained glutes and hamstrings, yet it somehow snuck in a vigorous abs and arms workout I didn’t even realize I was getting. As Melissa explains in her review, gyrotonic seems sort of in the same family as pilates, although it is definitely NOT pilates. I was apprehensive going into the class because I don’t normally frequent this type of out-of-my-budget small private studio, but Christina and the rest of the staff were very welcoming, and I felt comfortable right from the start! Definitely check out Melissa’s review that I mentioned above and go experiment with some gyrotonic if it sounds good!

This morning …

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I’m quite enjoying this almond sunset tea! I probably need to rename it almond sunrise tea.

My breakfast cookie was such a success yesterday that I replicated it exactly for today’s breakfast:

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In case anyone is struggling with breakfast cookie texture, I’ve noticed a few key tricks that seems to help tremendously in solidifying the cookie in the fridge overnight:

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(1) As you mix the “cookie dough” the night before, it should be as close as possible to the consistency of real cookie dough. You should be able to pick up all the dough in your hands, roll it into a ball, and flatten it onto a plate. (For me, this involves adding no more than 1/2 tbsp of liquid, if even.)

(2) The addition of dried fruit works wonders because it helps the oats soak up all the moisture.

(3) Frosting makes everything better.

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I had a boat egg on the side again as well.

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Brandi asked yesterday why I called it a “boat egg.” Does anyone else do this? I thought it was a common thing, but maybe it’s just a weird family thing! My parents always called hard-boiled eggs sliced this way “boat eggs” when I was little. I think they did this for two reasons: (1) they sort of resemble little canoes in looks and in the way they slide around the plate (right?) and (2) it made the eggs more exciting for me to eat, along the same lines as “broccoli trees.”

Do you remember fun food names from your childhood that helped motivate you to eat?