Bacon and Beer...mmmmmm...

So after Day 2 I am still feeling pretty good with this whole Herbalife thing.  Honestly, I have already spent

probably $40-$50 less on food this week than I would have and I don’t feel deprived or hungry at all so far.  Again, I am not being obsessive about what I eat when I’m NOT drinking the shakes, although because I also am focusing on keeping my digestive system happy I am not really eating a ton of junk or anything anyway, but for my main meal I am eating whatever I damn well please because falling back into disordered behaviors and thinking is WAAAAAAAAAY too easy when I start moving towards the “diet” mentality.

Anyway, yesterday was pretty easy.  Blendy shake** for breakfast tropical style with pineapple yogurt, shredded coconut, coconut milk, baby spinach, vanilla Formula 1 and water.  I snacked on some mixed nuts and tea halfway through the morning.  Lunch was a Shakey Shake** with almond butter, raspberry yogurt, coconut milk, chocolate Formula 1 and water plus I got a little cup of chicken soup (which was sadly mostly broth thanks to the noodle and chicken pirates of Au Bon Pain!!  Take your proper ratio of chunks to liquid ya jerks!!) to have something warm, and more nuts and tea in the afternoon.

(* Blendy Shake – includes greens, ice cubes, things that need a blender to combine.  **Shakey Shake – powder, liquid, maybe yogurt…can be mixed up in a shaker cup faster and on the go)

I was meeting up with a friend for dinner in the East Village, but I had about 2 hours to kill, so I walked

around for awhile and just soaked in the energy of a fall evening in the city, and then when I got cold sat down in this funky little indoor Belgian beer garden and had a YUMMY Tripel Karmeliet beer while waiting.  The best part was, because I am not holding any same or restriction around my food I was able to enjoy a beer, a salad, some French onion soup, and a very Greek diner plate of Bolognese and not feel like I had to stuff my face because it was my one food of the day, or restrict excessively because I had to be “good” (and then go home and stuff my face in hunger and frustration).  And because I am only spending money and stomach space on one “meal” a day I also have no issues making it the best and most fulfilling food I can, which is better for my body in the long run too.  Winner winner chicken dinner! (or pasta, as the case may be)

The issue came this morning actually, because I had failed to prep my Blendy Shake last night for breakfast, and I was running short on time and I only have the bottle space right now to make 1 Shakey Shake.  So whatever, if I have to substitute oatmeal and yogurt for one shake my life won’t come crashing down!  I figure it is closest to what a shake would be (and a whole lot cheaper) rather than having the shake for breakfast and going out to lunch.  But getting to work was a bitch and a half – bus was running over 20 minutes late, I got a different bus, which took me to a different train, which dropped me at a station that is twice as far away from work and doesn’t have a bus directly to the hospital.  So even though I raced to get out on time, I was still almost 30 minutes late to work and walked twice as far as normal.  Granted, it is only a mile, but I was cold and grumpy and annoyed and then I caught a whiff of the most beautiful smell in the world…

BACON!!!! 

Oh man, there is just something about the smell of bacon in the morning that is better than any other smell and better than bacon at any other time of day.  I didn't end up going and getting it, but it sure did trigger some happy and envious breakfast thoughts!

So, I am about to head into my first weekend on The Herb(alife) and trying to figure out how I am going to handle it.  I am not really telling anyone that I am doing this just because I don’t want to make it a big deal or have to explain or justify myself, or hear all the “good for you”s that I know would come and I think are wholly unnecessary and obnoxious.  Most likely I will just make good choices, try to choose light for any meals where I am with other people and not able to do a shake, and continue to not stress out over it because honeys…if you aren't enjoying your life (and the food that accompanies it) what’s the point??  Bottoms up boys and girls! Let’s make this weekend another new adventure!

Welcome to 2011

So I haven't posted in a little while, not because I wasn't cooking and eating and such, but I think I was just getting a little mopey and tired of being alone in my place and didn't want my blog to turn into a massive whining session :-) But today I am back at work, I have meetings scheduled with professors this week to get ready for classes, and school starts again on Monday! I am actually super excited about this because I feel like the semester is just filled with creative stuff happening. First semester back was to kind of ease into the habit of being a full time student again, this semester is to blow the lid off!! *Insert Rocky or Karate Kid theme song here*

No pictures today, although I have been cooking. But my potato salmon chowder while delicious, is remarkably unphotogenic. I also made a smoked salmon and roasted broccoli quiche that I sliced up and froze, and a chicken enchilada casserole with beans, chicken, diced green chilies, corn tortillas, tomatos, cheese and frozen fajita veggies (sliced bell peppers and onions basically). My freezer is just about at bursting point! I am almost done using all the ingredients in the freezer, so now I am just making more room for additional stuff I need to freeze. I REALLY hope my new roommate isn't much of a freezer user for at least the first couple weeks until I start to clear stuff out (Sorry Ethan!). But on the bright side, I think I have counted somewhere between 30-40 servings of food packaged and frozen in 1-2 portion sizes and ready to keep me eating healthy and cheap for the next 5 weeks of rehearsals.

I also made a list of New Years goals - not resolutions because that term carries to much of a loaded ideal behind it that if you make a mistake you have failed and you might as well just quit. But I made a list of 11 goals I would like to strive for in 2011 to help me with my health, fitness and financial well being

11 in '11:

1. Eat out no more than 3 meals a week - Financially I can budget for this, and being realistic on my time issues this allows for some wiggle room
2. Exercise at least 3 days a week - I have made a fitness plan for the first 30 days and then can reevaluate after that
3. Write in my journal daily, even if it is just a sentence - I got this inspiration from the Own Your Beauty project, journaling makes me feel so much better throughout the day
4. Become more skilled at my tarot readings - I have been doing tarot off and on for 11 years and I find it a great meditation tool, but I want to learn more and get more intuitive
5. Attend at least 1 support group meeting a week (in person or online)
6. Create a realistic budget and stick to it - I signed up for Mint.com and created a budget and activated my savings account again. Learning to live within my means!
7. Put some money in savings every month - Even if it is $5, I want to get in the habit of saving money so I have a little cushion when unexpected things come up
8. Set up an Etsy shop for my knitting/crochet - This is one I am going to tackle later in the year. I love knitting and crocheting and I think I could find a niche with my felted bags that would make a little extra money and give me another creative outlet.
9. Wash my face every night - Form the habit for healthier skin while I am still relatively young
10. Do laundry every 2 weeks - I get busy and tend to put this off for a month since I have to take my clothes to a laundromat and then it takes me 4 hours to get EVERYTHING done.
11. Work a professional theatre summer job - My first chance to really break into my chosen profession and get a taste of what it it like. This was my plan anyway, but putting it down means I can't make excuses and work in an office instead.

I think these are realistic goals that combined will help continue to move me forward in my quest for a healthier, well rounded life. I don't like the idea of wiping the slate clean and starting from scratch every New Year. I feel like it should just be continuing to build on the foundation you have already laid. Cheers to a healthy 2011!

Cranberry Love

So I finally got a fully functioning laptop! Yeah! I have spent the last 6 months with a laptop that wouldn’t type the letters W, S, A or D.  Understandably this made blogging difficult because it meant I either had to type a post missing all those letters, then go to a webpage and copy and past each letter individually throughout the post (which is probably one of the most annoying things to do EVER!!) or I had to post at school or at work.  And honestly, I found that time was more often used for, you know, school…or work But I got an early Christmas from my Mommy in the form of a fabulous little netbook, the perfect size to toss in my bag to take to school, and with up to 11 hrs of battery life.  So in other words – Tina is connected!!  Hooray!!

My food has been kind of boring lately.  I’ve been penny pinching and trying to stretch my food stamps  since my budget is about $30 a week so I’ve been taking bits and pieces from my pantry and eating the same thing almost all week.  It works though…still doing soup for lunch, been baking fresh bread using the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day recipe, lots of fresh fruit, some string cheese and almonds as snacks.  Hey, it may be basic but it is tasty, homemade and filling.  Can’t knock on that!

I have also been snacking on leftover cranberry sauce I made for Thanksgiving.  It was actually cranberry/apple sauce because when I made it with just the 1 bag of cranberries it didn’t look like very much, so I chopped up 3 apples, cooked them down a bit and mixed it in with the cranberries to bulk it up.  Of course I got to the potluck and someone else had brought a giant kettle of cranberry sauce so mine ended up coming home with me.  Hey, I’m not complaining…it’s good!  I put 1 bag of cranberries in a pot with about 1/2 cup of apple juice, the juice squeezed from 1 orange, the rest of that orange (peels and all), a dash of ginger and 1 cinnamon stick.  While it was simmering on the stove I brewed a cup of very strong Earl Grey tea.  After about 10 minutes I added the tea and then sweetened it up to taste with about 1/4 cup of brown sugar and about 1/8 cup of honey (the sweetening I did all by taste).  Let it all simmer about another 10 minutes and then pulled the orange and cinnamon stick out and put the sauce in a bowl.  Saw that the bowl was only about 1/2 full so I chopped up 3 apples and simmered it in another cup of strong Earl Grey tea for about 10 minutes until the apples were soft.  Added them into the cranberry sauce and refrigerated overnight.  By the morning it was nice and thick, bright red, sweet/tart and all the things I love about homemade cranberry sauce without just being a bowl of cranberry flavored sugar!  And this is what I have been nibbling on all week with lunch.

I have a bag of mixed chocolate/peanut butter chips in my cabinet that are begging to be baked into something…the question is, what?  Yet to be determined…

Snacks?

So one of the things I have been looking at in my move towards losing weight and also towards saving money, as how to handle snacks. I think that because I have a history with using food for so many reasons OTHER than being hungry, I have a tendency to reach for snacks throughout the day just out of force of habit or boredom or stress. Sometimes, I will even FEEL hungry when I know there is no earthly reason why I should!

Case in point - I made a fabulous green monster smoothie for breakfast this morning and drank it in my first class at 8am. Now I have calculated the calories on this before just to see about where it stands on the complete breakfast food chain, and with the protein powder, spinach, soy milk, flax seeds and fruit it averages around 400 calories and a good dose of protein and nutrients. Very healthy for a full breakfast, and no reason why this shouldn't last my tummy a solid 3-4 hours until it is time for lunch. BUT by around 10am I started to feel like I wanted to eat something. I had about an hour until my next class, I was sitting down to read, I was a little bored, and I almost felt like my tummy was rumbling for food. But how could this be? It had been LESS than 2 hours since I had my smoothie and really was it that difficult to wait until lunch at Noon? But I swear to you, I spent the next 2 hours going back and forth on if I wanted my string cheese that I had brought for an afternoon snack now, or maybe a bottle of soda (what?? I don't drink soda anyway! Why now??)

So what I ended up doing was telling myself to suck it up, that my tummy being a little hungry for the last 1/2 hr before lunch wasn't the end of the world (that in fact I SHOULD be going to lunch a little hungry!) and that I could wait and I wouldn't die of starvation - and it turned out to be true. I was just the right amount hungry for lunch at Noon when I got to work, and I saved my string cheese for my afternoon snack around 4pm when I actually WILL be hungry and looking for something to sustain me through the bike ride home and the couple of hours until dinner.

But I find myself facing this issue a lot. I don't just nibble because I am bored, my body will actually make me feel PHYSICALLY HUNGRY when there is no biological reason I should. For example, I eat a healthy sized lunch at 12:30, and 1-2 hours later I get bored and then feel starving. Am I really starving?? No way! I am just bored and my body is kicking in anticipating the food it knows I will most likely consume to distract it. Because as soon as I am busy the hunger goes away, so I know it wasn't really "I need fuel" hunger, it was just "You are bored which means I am getting a snack soon and I am going to find a way to make sure of that" hunger. Even now typing this post and THINKING about snacks I am feeling that fake hunger starting up in my tummy even though less than 2 hours ago I had homemade minestrone soup, a slice of sourdough bread, a container of greek yogurt, and a dish of peaches. In other words...my tummy in no physical way needs food but my mind is trying to convince me that it does. AUGH!! So I LITERALLY cannot trust my body to tell me the truth?!?! How do you listen to your body's natural signals if the signals it is sending are fake???

So I am thinking for both health and for budget I need to get better about planning my menus for the day. Just write it out, "this is what you are having for breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner and evening snack if you really want it and this is what time you are eating each of those items". That way, I am not digging into my lunchbag and downing my afternoon snack at 10am out of boredom. Saves money because I am not eating a ton extra than I need, helps with health and weight loss for the same reason. As long as I am regular about planning this out in advance and making sure I pack my lunchbag properly before heading out every day this should be a good thing.

So although it is a little late, here is my plan for today:
Breakfast - Green Monster (8am)
Lunch - Soup, bread, yogurt, peaches (12:30pm)
Snack - string cheese, orange slices (4:30pm)
Dinner - leftover Mexican casserole w/veggies, sauteed bananas (7pm)
Snack (optional) - mini bag of popcorn(10pm)

There - now I am accountable and everything is already packed and ready for consumption until I get home. I will plan tonight for tomorrow, and so on and so forth and hopefully this will help greatly with my budget and overall feeling of health and wellbeing!

Check In

Alright - I am going to not apologize for how long I go between blog posts and just accept that for the time being I am an inconsistent blogger and I will post when I have the time and inclination to. And if things come up, or I get more readers, I may try to increase that...but until then I am just going to let this be what it is - a place for me to share my thoughts, ideas, recipes, struggles and successes when they strike me.

On that note - I was home alone all this weekend. The roommates were on a roadtrip, my car is still broken down so I wasn't going anywhere. So poochie and me curled up on the couch and enjoyed the chilly (occasionally snowy) weekend together. And I won't lie, Saturday stunk...I was in a funky funk, feeling lonely and sorry for myself, irritated that I couldn't go anywhere and just kind of all together BLAH. It's funny because I think my Saturday blahs were kicked off by a Friday night party I went to.

Being back in school can be GREAT in many ways. Even the first time I went to school I didn't do a lot of the full time student stuff because most of my friends were older and already out of school. So it has been fun to just throw myelf in and experience some of the college things I didn't do as much the first time around (and maybe cut back on some of the stupid stuff...haha!) And the group of friends I am developing are fabulous, and hilarious, and awesome and I just love them to death. It's hard to believe that 3 months ago I didn't know ANY of them and now I feel like I might as well have known everyone forever. BUT...the fact of the matter is that I AM a decade older than most of the people in this group. And let's be honest, 10 years spent in college, out of college, working, married, separated, moving from the Pacific NW, to the Greater NE, and now to the mountains of the South makes for a BIG experience difference. And while I try not to harp on it too much (yes, I occasionally smack myself for getting a little too "well back in MY day!") Friday night for some reason I just felt the age difference very keenly. Maybe it was the fact that the music people were saying was "old school" was actually the music that was just coming out when I first moved to NJ so it brought up a lot of memories. Maybe it's that for some reason I was looking around the party and seeing the faces of people who I knew over the last 10 years but are now firmly in my past juxtaposed on my new friends here in NC. But somehow, I just felt like I was a person out of time and out of place in that moment and it weighed somewhat heavily on me. And that energy carried over into Saturday for me, and not in a positive way.

Yes, you may remember when Britney came out - but the difference is I could have been babysitting you at the time, while we were actually partying to her music!

And unfortunately I manifested my Saturday down energy in my old, not so healthy ways - namely, eating a bunch of junk food, watching almost the entire 3rd season of The Wire, and sleeping more than half the day away. But by Sunday morning I realized that this was no way to be, and that living in a melancholy past was doing no one any good! So Sunday I attacked with purpose and energy!

So Sunday I decided that my rear end was back on the healthy living bandwagon. First I pulled out my journal and did a little writing to center myself. Then I got out one of my favorite books, "The End of Overeating" by Dr. David Kessler. A really fascinating book that talks about how the food industries really do manipulate us through science and chemistry to eat more, take in more calories, be less satisfied with healthy, NORMAL food, and ultimately spend more money on their junk while getting less and less healthy as a society. I read that book entirely through during the course of the day, just to remind myself why I had made a commitment to eat whole, natural foods and get rid of the junk. In between I also cleaned my kitchen, which turned into me emptying the fridge and scrubbing it with soap and water, emptying my cabinets and putting the less healthy food up to out of reach and more healthy food down in plain sight, and cooked up a storm!
I admit, when I went to the grocery store last week I got JUNK...frozen pizzas, lean pockets, fried okra, Oreos, chips...all that stuff that makes me feel like crap. And you know what - it WAS making me feel like crap! For the week that I was eating a combination of that and junk take out I had a permanent headache, stomach ache, tummy problems, and just felt all around sluggy. As soon as I started changing over to the whole grains, more fruits and veggies, and less processed food I feel a MILLION times better immediately!
So I made 2 pots of soup (I have learned from experience that if I plan on taking soup for lunch every day and I only make 1 kind I get burned out by Wednesday. By making 2 kinds I can switch it up every day and not get bored and go spend money on fast food) A sort of minestrone, and spinach/lemon/orzo. I also made a quiche bake with bacon, cheddar cheese, sauteed mushrooms, and eggs that I will have for dinners. And I have the stuff to make a mexican polenta casserole a little later in the week. I am meal planning, packing, and keeping things healthy and whole. And you know what? I feel GREAT already! I think a combination of the change in attitude and the change in food is already kicking in and I feel positive and ready to move forward and continue with getting healthy.

And you know what else? 29 isn't really that old :-)

Stuff N' Nonsense

So I don't have a ton of updates - just kind of a random jumbling of thoughts health/food/living related that I thought I would share. I am about to go into tech week for the show I am currently Assistant Stage Managing so my schedule is going crazy yet again. Hasn't left as much time for cooking as I would like, so I am still trying to get things as put together on the weekends as possible because Monday - Thursday (and this week Monday - the following Saturday, yes, almost 2 weeks) I am at class/work/rehearsal from 8am - 9pm or later. So, here are where things are in the Shakespearean Tomato world at the moment:

1) I am the master of food stretching! I made a 2 lb. roast with carrots and potatoes last weekend in my crockpot and ate about 3/4 of it for dinners over the course of the week. So this weekend I took the remaining roast and veggies, added some kale, water, pasta and extra seasonings and turned it into an amazing beef veggie stew/soup that I got another 4 meals out of (currently in my freezer awaiting lunches for the week.) So basically, that one roast, 1/3 bag of potatoes, and 1 bag of too old to eat fresh baby carrots is going to feed me for almost 2 weeks. Not too shabby I would say!

2) In relation to the item above - part of me is feeling guilty that I am still eating on this grocery store meat that is still in my freezer. As I have said in previous posts, I have decided to go vegetarian but for economical reasons I just can't justify not eating the food that I already have in my house. Of course, being such a good food stretcher that single roast, 1 lb of ground beef and 4 chicken leg quarters will probably last me a month or more. That means another month of eating food that I don't think is particularly healthy for me, but financially it means another month of EATING which is always good. So I am trying to remember that valuable recovery phrase "Progress, not perfection!" Because honestly, even if I am still eating meat at the moment, averaging out to 1 lb. of beef per week for myself really isn't that terrible. And once it is gone, no more will be coming in!

3) Evidently I have crazy healthy hair that is THRIVING under this No Shampoo routine! I haven't used shampoo on my hair in over a week, just doing a nice, warm water rinse with a good scalp massage every morning in the shower to loosen up and get rid of any dirt or grime. My hair looks fantastic, I haven't had to use ANY product in it at all, it is holding a style better than it EVER has in my life, and that whole "dipped in a jar of oil" look that a lot of the blogs warned about for the first few weeks hasn't happened AT ALL for me. I am thrilled. I will still put together the baking soda and vinegar rinse and maybe start doing that once a week, but I feel like any more than that would be overkill because my hair is just doing great on its own.

4) I had planned on beginning the Couch to 5K routine again last week and I just ended up busy tackling other things to do with school and life and it didn't happen. But we were watching a video in my Nutrition, Fitness & Wellness class today that followed a group of fairly sedentary people of all ages as they trained for the Boston Marathon with the Nova tv channel. And honestly, it got my toes twitching to get out running again. I remember how good I felt when I was running every day and training for the half marathon. I just had so much energy, slept well, felt strong, and when I did the half marathon it was such a HUGE accomplishment. I miss that...I miss having a goal to work for and train for like that. I am going to start again, at least with Couch to 5K and then take it from there, see how I feel and time-wise what I feel like committing to again. But If I can just pack my clothes and plan on running for 1/2 hour every Tuesday and Thursday morning in between classes, running longer one day on the weekends, and adding in some resistance training 2-3 days a week for 15 minutes in the evenings before bed I just feel like I will feel SO much better. What do you think? Can I plan on starting this tomorrow? It means laying out my exercise clothes tonight and having everything ready. I bet I can do it!

Cha-cha-cha-changes!

So I have decided that it is time to start moving back towards a more environmentally healthy lifestyle in addition to a personally healthy lifestyle. I was very active a couple of years ago about reducing my consumption of goods, cooking a lot more, cutting back my meat intake, and just generally living a more concientious life. Now that I am watching my budget so intensely I have also started re-educating myself on the value of a simpler life for both my own personal health and the health and wellness of the planet!

If you haven't watched The Story of Stuff yet please take the 20 minutes and watch it now...it is a fascinating, entertaining and eye opening piece about consumption in our society and how we can make a difference.


Now...I promise I won't go all preachy on you :-) That's not my style! But what I do want to do is share some of the changes I am making, contemplating and planning in the near future.

1. I am going to go vegetarian and cut out most dairy - I personally abhor the industrial agricultural system. I think it horrifically abuses animals, introduces far too many antibiotics and pesticides into our food system, and pollutes the environment. (Watch Food, Inc. if you haven't yet for more info on this!) I am not opposed to eating meat, but I do feel that the meat, dairy and eggs should come from local, humane, small farm operations. However, that is expensive and I just don't have the budget for it on a regular basis. So I am going back to an idea that meat is for special occasions and maybe once a month or so treat myself to an organic chicken or roast and savor it and use every bit of it I can. The rest of the time, vegetarian with some local eggs but no dairy because it really seems to not settle well with my system and it is waaaaaay too easy for me to go wacky on cheese!
2. I am going to try not to buy anything that I don't need, and anything I do need I will attempt to find used at thrift stores, on Freecycle or will make them. I have my basic items already in place. Smoe "nice to have" things like a bookcase, bathroom rug, living room table, glass jars, etc. I can try to find on Freecycle or in a thriftstore and things like washcloths or new fashion scarfs I have BAGS full of yarn in my closet and I can knit or crochet myself! But by doing my part to avoid introducing new items into the system I will save money and the environment.
3. Ok, now this one may sound a little weird - but I am giving up shampoo. I have done a LOT of research on this as I was coming to the end of my shampoo bottle. Shampoo is simply not necessary for healthy, CLEAN hair! Modern shampoo is actually more of a detergent that strips your hair of the healthy oils it needs which then have to be replaced with other products. By going shampoo free and cleaning your hair once or twice a week with a baking soda/water mixture and then following with an apple cider vinegar/water rinse your hair not only won't get greasy and disgusting, it will actually get healthier and more manageable. So, I am embarking on a 1 month experiment to see how it goes...so far 3 days in all I have done to my hair is do a good warm water rinse with a scalp massage to loosen up any dirt and such and honestly, my hair looks great! All the product is out of it, it doesn't look greasy at all, it is holding a style without any fuss, and my hair color doesn't seem to be fading as fast as normal. They say it takes from 2-6 weeks for your hair to really adjust and not overproduce oil to make up for being stripped by the shampoo, so let's see how it goes!

Now, in the meantime while I am slowly transitioning to vegetarian I decided I just can't be wasteful and throw out or give away the meat I already have in my freezer so I am cooking it, one piece a week, and using it for dinners. So I have to share the AMAZING beef roast/stew I made in my crockpot this weekend!!

Again, not much on an official recipe, but I had a 2 lb. beef chuck roast that I put in a crockpot along with a bag of baby carrots, about 6 chopped up potatoes, 2 chopped onions, 1/2 bottle of red wine, about 2 cups of water and seasoned with rosemary, garlic and (the secret ingredient) 3 cinnamon sticks. Cooked on high for about 6 hrs - could do it on low too for 8-9 hrs, but I started it late in the day. Holy Cow was this amazing!!! The cinnamon was unexpected but really made it pop!! I took the roast out, shredded it, put the potatoes and carrots in another container and will eat on it for dinners all week with the broth to make it a stew.

P.S. I am attempting to attach a picture of this fabulous creation but Picasa and Blogger are giving me trouble so it will have to go picture free for the time being...I will upload one when I get a chance if possible :-)

Holy Super Sweet Smoothie Batman!

Oh my GOODNESS!! My sweet taste buds are going wacky this morning! So I made my normal green monster smoothie with one BIG difference - I had run out of milk so I opened a can of light coconut milk and used about 1/2 a can of that alone with some water to make my smoothie. Holy moly it was amazingly good but CRAZY sweet...Honestly, when I first tried it I thought I had died and gone to heaven, but about half way through I realized that it was in fact too sweet for me. I think I am going to repeat this coconut milk experiment, but I am going to cut the amount by about half and make up the liquid with more water. It will still be super creamy, tasty and sweet, but a little lower in fat/calories/tooth aching sweetness.

On that same note - I am seriously considering going at least vegetarian and possibly vegan again. I haven't decided for sure, but there are a couple factors coming into play here for me.


1) I am poor and beans and rice and stuff are cheaper than meat
2) I am EXTREMELY opposed to industrial factory farming and for the past couple of years I have been very adamant about only eating local, organic, humanely raised meat and dairy products. However, referencing factor #1 I am no longer really able to afford those things anymore. I have caved on my principles the last couple of weeks and bought standard meat items and honestly, felt like total crap and a complete hypocrite about it.
3) I have a very sensitive stomach - I had my gallbladder removed when I was 22 and my system hasn't been the same since then. Eating a ton of animal protein just doesn't settle well with me in general, eating lower fat and lots of veggies makes me feel better on a day to day basis.
4) I have been vegetarian and vegan in the past for varying lengths of time and felt GREAT while doing it

So I haven't fully decided yet, and on a practical note I have a pound of ground beef, a pot roast and a package of chicken quarters in my freezer that I can't really afford to let go to waste. So I guess the question is, just jump in and do it? Work on phasing it out while eating meat for the next month it will take me to get through the meat in my freezer? I mean, on a practical note I eat quite a few meatless meals anyway...my lunches for this week were tortellini and broccoli salad and baked tofu with brown rice and green beans, so it's not like going meat-free is going to be a huge shock or change (however my chicken enchilada casserole would have to get altered - no more chicken, sour cream or cheese although the refried beans and collard greens and homemade salsa could stay)

Any of you who are reading this who are vegetarian/vegan or have made that switch in the past - what do you think? Any suggestions or ideas on how I should move forward?

Oh yeah - My birthday was also this past Tuesday September 14th...I am now officially 29 and on the homestretch to 30!! I celebrated by going to school, working, going to rehearsal, and then taking myself out for karaoke :-) And I am still recovering...I must be getting old, it wasn't this hard to bounce back after my 21st birthday!! It's time baby, I am almost 30...the time to be healthy has arrived and it can't wait any longer!!

Massive Cooking Weekend - No Cooking Week

So I have disappeared for a little bit because I have been crazy busy! The musical 7 Deadly Sins runs this weekend at school and I am the Assistant Stage Manager so I have been in rehearsals from 6pm-11pm pretty much every night, and this is after being in school and work from 8am-5pm every day!! Knowing in advance this would be happening, though, I took my free time this past weekend and did a MASSIVE cooking frenzy to stock my fridge in advance. And I have to say, it has worked out pretty well.

Here is a rundown of everything I cooked this weekend with some pictures. No real recipes this week because everything was more of a throw together:

1) Cherries and apples stewed in red wine and cinnamon

2) Potato and oyster corn chowder

3) Homemade Macaroni and Cheese

4) Chili
5) Brown Rice
6) Marinated Tofu
7) Peanut Butter Cookies
8) Sweet Potato Muffins
9) Baked Eggs
- I whisked together 8 eggs and about 2/3 cup of milk with some seasonings as if I was making scrambled eggs. Put a small piece of whole wheat bread in the bottom of each cup of a greased muffin tin, topped with a little diced cheese, and poured the eggs evenly into each cup and then baked. Yummy, but I would make a few changes next time. I would toast the bread first so it didn't get as soaked up into the egg as it did this time and I would add veggies like spinach or broccoli to bulk it up and make it more satisfying (and healthier!). I have also seen an idea to do this with a crust made of biscuit dough or puff pastry which would also be an option, although more expensive. I will include pictures and a REAL recipe when I do it again and feel happier with the results.

10) Baked potatoes

Holy hell! Looking at the list even I am overwhelmed by how much I did! But it has worked out great...I have been able to take chili over a baked potato for lunches, muffins and eggs for breakfasts, have a cup of chowder and a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner, pack a couple of peanut butter cookies as an afternoon snack/treat, marinated tofu with brown rice...it has been super easy just to reach in the fridge, grab something and go!


Now granted, I didn't do a whole lot of planning on this and I probably overdid it. For example, I baked 7 potatoes and I am NOT eating a potato a day. I did freeze half the muffins, but I will probably need to freeze some of the chili and brown rice too so it doesn't go bad because I just can't eat it all when I am one person and I cook for an army (something I still need to work on). I think for next week I am going to do some better menu planning, for one to make sure I am getting more veggies in my meals, and also so that I don't end up overwhelmed with a fridge full of food I just can't eat in 1 week.

I am still on a strict budget (and I will be for the next few years, might as well get used to it now!) so I won't be doing much more grocery shopping except maybe some fruit and veggies. I am also planning on going through my freezer to see what I have already stashed there that I want to thaw and eat before it gets too old. I know I froze a couple containers of black bean soup so I think that will accompany some quesadillas for lunches and dinners next week! This pantry cooking is actually a lot of fun and a great challenge - Use what you have instead of going crazy spending a ton on stuff for a single recipe.

Still feeling healthy and riding my bike to school every day. It is definitely feeling easier too! I am taking less breaks heading up the hill (only 1 pause this morning and I was stopping 3-4 times when I started 3 weeks ago!) and able to do it faster without feeling like I am dying. Once it gets to the point where I don't feel like it is pushing as much anymore, I am going to start taking the gears up slowly so it remains a good workout. As long as I keep the intensity high, it will continue to be a good 1/2 hr or so of exercise every day and that is a good start to getting healthy! I will say though, riding my bike after 6 hours of sleep and riding it after 8 hours of sleep I can sure tell a difference in how sluggish my legs feel...sleep really is key, and once the show is over I will start getting it again :-)