Rest day!

Hey, friends.

This week has been ridiculously busy. We squeezed in a trip to Chattanooga, TN, to see my sister play some soccer in the state tournament!!

It is pretty hard to stay healthy in the midst of a busy schedule. Working at the clinic this week has been intense! So many sick kids! I know one of the best ways to stay healthy is for me to keep moving and planning meals in advance, if possible!

A grainy breakfast is the perfect opportunity to secure a healthy dose of goodness first thing in the morning.

Stovetop oats, cooked the night before, with granola and frozen blueberries.

I usually have my oats with almond milk and sprinkle on some flax seeds for extra Omega-3s. This morning, however, I got crazy and tried something different.
Breakfast quinoa. Impeccable.

Quinoa takes about 15 minutes to cook stovetop, so it can be prepared in advance and refrigerated, or cooked the morning of consumption . It’s done with each grain has a little band around it, like the planet Saturn. I poured some amazing peach kefir over my little Saturns and sprinkled ground flax seed on top.Sometimes meal preparation just happens serendipitously! I went to work this week and in the break room was a bag full of ripe green bell peppers from a patient’s garden. I stocked up! Of course, I didn’t keep my coworkers from having their fill either! Have you had a serenditpitous meal lately where everything just fell into place?

Roasted Bell Pepper Plate

I roasted the peppers in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes, turning them once. I cleaned them (removed all the seeds) and got cous cous cooking on the stove. I sauteed onions and mushrooms and added the cooked cous cous and a sprinkle of chili powder. A sprinkle of colby cheese and tomato later and done! Not the prettiest, but oh so good!

As you can see, I sorta splayed the pepper on the plate and piled on the toppings. So. Good. Try. This. Tonight.

Next, I have a review to share with you! I saw Nutridel cookies on many of my favorite blogs, and they just looked fantastic. I got a few in the mail along with their impressive nutritional facts recently. One of their flaxseed cookies has 57 calories, 3g of protein and 3g of fiber! One thing I didn’t know until I sampled them was that they are very thin and crunchy! I dug this, but wasn’t expecting it. Their sweet taste comes from molasses – no other sweeteners! I really enjoyed the cookies, finding them a very healthy indulgence. They are also vegan-friendly and I can see kids loving these as a snack! Thanks for sending these, Nutridel! I brought them to work and my coworkers were very curious!

All in all, I’m just thankful to have a rest day today! What are you up to today?

Thanks for reading. Have a fabulous Saturday!

Parmesean peaches

Hey, bloggies!

It feels great to have an afternoon to do “me” stuff like blogging, running, and cooking dinner! Yesterday I was able to go to the state park! The fall colors were gorgeous! We walked on abandoned cart paths on the golf course.

Bear naked granola and yogurt.

Cart path via my phone’s camera.

We had a hearty veggie dinner of pinto beans, boiled cabbage, okra and tomatoes, and fresh cornbread.

The best way to make cornbread!

My plate was so flavorful. Do you spot the sweet treat?

Baked parmesean peaches!

Oh my gosh, what a meal! I had a glass of red wine before dinner and water with dinner.

I’ve got to get moving. There is some serious cleaning to be done this afternoon before I exercise. I can’t wait to get outside in the sunshine! It is mid-sixties out and I couldn’t be happier! I’ve got some groats soaking in the fridge, which I’ve missed since we went out of town!

Have a lovely afternoon,

Sunset on gameday

Hey, ladies and gents!

Welcome to any Chocolate-Covered Katie readers! I was just featured on her hug-a-carb post. I love my carbs; especially you complex carbs out there!

This morning the sun peeked into the room and I knew it was going to be a gorgeous fall day! I love those. I am in disbelief that we have already reached NOVEMBER! I made a quick bowl of granola for breakfast and topped it with some uber juicy pear.

 

Last night we went to the football game and were greeted with this sky.

 

The light pole really adds to the beauty.

The fans had congregated much earlier than we could comprehend with all kinds of fancy set-ups.

I was impressed by the flat screen mounted to the outside of the cat wagon!

The sunset was one of my favorite parts of the night. Sorry, football!

We did sit near some characters. In addition to the regular, the super-fan, David, who rubs lucky coins all game long, we were joined by Captain America!!

Sorry about the blurry photo; he was just too memorable to exclude.

We lost the game, but still had so much fun cheering and watching the entertaining fans.

This afternoon we visited my sister-in-law and her daughter who is so much fun! We checked out their new place and went for a late lunch at Panera Bread. We split a sandwich and panini combo. Yum! Later, I got a hot chocolate to share with the Hubz. So good!

We are having a veggie smorgasbord tonight for dinner! I can’t wait!

Hope you are enjoying the day,

 

Cooking for two and the Big Blue

Well, Happy Halloween guys!

We are visiting family this weekend. I got to spend the morning playing with my fun niece. Isn’t she presh??

Here is the fun candy bowl they have out for visitors.

The witch and her mole.

I made a loaded omelet for the hubz the other night, and he claims it was the best ever!
I included spinach, feta, onion, black pepper, and of course tomatoes and green onions (from the garden) on top!

Then the hubz returned the favor with yesterday’s lunch, which was a fabulous quesadilla.

The whole wheat tortillas from Earthfare were amazing!

Have you tried Green Mountain Gringo salsa? Their roasted garlic variety absolutely rocks my blue chips here!!

Come closer to the cheesy goodness! He included some black beans and portobellos as well!

I hope you enjoy your Halloween. We are going to the football game tonight, not the Tennessee one, but the Kentucky one! I will probably freeze my tush off, but it’ll be fun. We are also having a late lunch at a place where I hear great salmon is served!!

Recreating the personal pan pizza

Hello, lovahs! (For Will Ferrell’s classic use of this word, go here! )

I am going to have a study-filled day off today. Yesterday was gorgeous and we played tennis with our friend John. Although the hubz beat the team of John and I, it was still really fun. I am slowly improving! I never played tennis until hubz and I started dating, and I remember a game of 21 in which he beat me 21-3!! Just last week I WON my first game of 21! It’s a tennis game without serving that improves ground strokes. Do you play any sports for fun? I really think it is the most enjoyable exercise! I love the arm workout I get from tennis.

Earlier yesterday, I had picked up some whole wheat pita bread, so I improvised dinner accordingly.

These personal pizzas (which take me back to the days of Book It! personal pan pizza awards from Pizza Hut for reading in elementary school!!) were very tasty.

(www.doobybrain.com)
Did you grow up with the Book It! program?

I made one pesto pizza with mozzarella and portobellos and a bite of the hubz’ red sauce pizza. I used my typical pesto recipe and added ample feta to the mix!

We watched The Graduate last night, also with our friend John! He had never seen it, so it was funny to see him react to it, and catch new parts I hadn’t remembered! Oh, Mrs. Robinson…

This morning I have been compiling my readings and digging in a bit. I made simple cereal with almond milk (totally hooked!) and bluebs and ground flax seed.

Thanks, Jill, for the cute fall fabric!

Have a great day, everyone!

Schooled and satisfied

It’s nice to be back blogging about some of my daily faves.

I had class all morning and we talked about weight management issues in primary care. It was a good review, and a few great points were made about healthy eating! We discussed eating disorders of all types, as well as strategies for weight loss and maintenance! I’ll share a few of the “pearls” from the lecture after I show you how I’m eating!

For breakfast I had a bowl of banana blended oats and red quinoa with almond milk and a sprinkle of pumpkin granola. The frozen blueberry stash is still going strong from when I picked them with a friend in July!! I knew I’d want them into the fall!

After class the rains poured in that cold, icky way. I heated up some vegan chili we had on hand. I topped it with some avocado.

Not beautiful, but delcious and filling!
Braeburn apple with Naturally More PB! Yummers.

 

I wanted to share a bit from today’s weight management lecture because I found it helpful for my own nutrition behaviors! For those of us who need to watch out for overeating, here are a few tips.

• Be careful about habitually eating at certain times of the day.
  I am in the habit of eating when I get home from a clinical rotation, even when I had a great lunch and maybe even a snack! It seems to help if I take a short walk after I get home instead of plopping on the couch. That eating is totally comfort and stress-related and not based on hunger whatsoever!
• The colder the room, the more people overeat. (I feel like this happens every winter, anyone else? )
• Dopamine, a neurotransmitter that makes us feel warm and fuzzy, is released when we eat delicious foods. Overweight and obese people become tolerant to dopamine so that they need to eat more to attain the same level of dopamine stimulation. A vicious cycle begins.
• The sleep-weight connection is legitimate. Even partial sleep deprivation changes hunger-regulating hormones and makes us crave more calorie dense/sugary foods. Get 8 hours a night!
• Use a smaller spoon! A study was published in Psychological Science in which bowls of M&Ms were left in the lobby of an apartment building with an “Eat your fill” sign. A mean of 66% more M&Ms were consumed when a larger spoon was placed in the bowl than when a smaller spoon was used!

I hope those were informative, and perhaps you can relate to some of the points! I just loved the spoon study!

Have a great day – stay warm and be well!

Bring on the brews

Hey, blog friends!

I am in a beer daze to some degree, but I’ve got to share pics from today’s Brewers Jam! I kinda feel like taking a nap. (Here is where I took a 10 minute nap!) Ok, all better!

Hubz signed us up several weeks ago to volunteer for The Knoxville Brewers Jam, which is an afternoon craft beer festival with live music!! We had no idea what a sweet deal it would be! Not only did we get free t-shirts, but we had very little work to do, so we were able to check out several of the stands and enjoy ourselves! Each guest was given a sampling glass! We went with our new friends, Jill and John, who handed out the sampling glasses to ticketholders!!

As you can see, it was packed! There were many local brews and a few food vendors as well!

I started the afternoon with a Magic Hat Pale Ale.

It had a yummy honey after taste and I was really impressed! I will definitely be getting this again!

I sampled delicious Chipotle Cheddar from Cabot! (Maybe this counts as two pieces!!)

Many people were wearing these ridiculous pretzel necklaces. Imagine the candy necklaces made of Smarties. Edible accessories!

This was a pear hard cider from California Cider Company. So sweet, and delicious!

Then I spotted this sign! Pumpkin ale! Unfortunately, they were out of it!! I picked the Belgian, sipped, and passed it on to the Hubz.

I ran into my freshman year roomie from college (!!) and a classmate from my current graduate program. I began seeking snacks after so many sips of delicious Magic Hat!

The salsa table was a must. I can only go for so much beer!
This company is local and they are the largest habanero producer in Tennessee! The salsa was great; chunky and fresh!
I love that I found another local product to support!

There were numerous interesting people at this event. Something about unlimited beer sampling must cause this.

Here is a sampling.

Somebody’s a serious beer fan!

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. No words.

We took home empty tasting glasses!

We played a game of cornhole before leaving. We were good, but didn’t prevail!
This was a great event and I enjoyed it more than I anticipated, not being a beer lover!

Now we are totally in relaxation mode, reading and watching football! This week was CRAZY busy, so I’m thankful to have some slow-paced time!

Have a wonderful day!

Paddling and pone

Hey, friends!

Sunday morn we journeyed to Abrams Creek. 6 of us made the trip and 3 planned to kayak! We knew it would be challenging for the kayakers because of the very cold weather! The area we drove through to get to the campground was called Happy Valley! This was an omen.

Blue skies!

Here is the view from the campground, which fails to reveal the immensity of trees surrounding us!

Here are the paddlers in their gear! It was a bit time consuming for them just to don all of this gear!

Readying the boats! Two of the guys were new kayakers, so they weren’t used to squeezing in to the boats!

And they’re off! We had a feeling they’d finish a bit wetter than when they started!

The rest of us drove back to the trailhead and hit the turf! Miles of trails were available, and we had just a few hours to hike. My sister and I went a short distance before arriving at this footbridge!

We posed on the other side, soaking up the sunshine!

We met up with the ‘yakers at the destination point where the creek meets Lake Chilhowee. And then we waited. And waited.

They were 2 hours late! My friend John and I were beginning to get worried, but they arrived soon enough. They were drenched and frigid! Tricky rapids had overturned their boats! Despite brief struggles to recover paddles and boats, they had a great time!

Here is my only food pic of the day! Hubz eats a curry mock chicken sandwich. I had one, too! Yums.

Thus ends our fun adventure! We stopped for candy bars on the drive home. I had a bite of sister’s Twix. We came home and cooked up a big pot of veggie chili. John made some sweet cornbread (also known as “pone“), and we played Scrabble! I sipped some Pinot and warmed up.

I loved every last bit of the day!

Adventure preview

Hey, peeps!

Here are some snapshots of the adventure we had this weekend! Full recap coming soon!

A fuzzy hat.

A rushing river.

Three musketeers Bear Grylls wannabes.

Happy Monday! I’m off to work!

Pinot and puppy love

Morning, folks!

Last night we warmed up with a spinach-mushroom quiche. It’s one of those dinners I can make quickly and with just a few ingredients! I added 4 eggs, feta cheese, a few tsp of cottage cheese, black pepper, rosemary, and the spinach and shrooms! It bakes at 350 for 25 minutes. I use ready-made trans fat free crust with no hydrogenated oils.

We relaxed and watched a classic film selected by our good friend John. I had a glass of Pinot, which made the meal perfect! The boys loved the quiche!

The hubz and I woke up and headed to our lovely food coop this morning. We found our trusty chili mix (TVP included) to make for friends on Sunday night. It includes lots of spices and the TVP, which becomes very similar to ground beef when you cook it! It sounds bad, but it’s actually really tasty.

I started the morning NOT with oatmeal. *shock and awe*

Honey wheat bagel (courtesy of hubz) with cream cheese, strawberry preserves, and flax

Moments later.

We picked up lots of goodies including some Peach Kefir which I can’t wait to try! It was on sale. As was the Almond Breeze. Happy girl. Tonight I am going to make polenta casserole, which is a new one for me. It was inspired by a friend who is not in the blogosphere. It has a little ricotta, some fresh basil, and plenty of tomato sauce . It’s promising, so we’ll see.

We got home from the food coop and across the street was a playful yellow lab running around with a leash on. No owner. No tag. Just a red leash. We ran around with him for a bit and pretty much fell in love. He was so sweet! He wouldn’t let us bring groceries in without acknowledging his need to play! No one recognized him, despite knocking on a few doors and asking walkers. He looked like this guy:

Then a few minutes after we decided to just leave him to run around in the yard, a SUV drove up and picked him up. Such a sweetie.

Have a lovely Saturday!