I cooked like a downright housewife yesterday.  It was a delicious day and I enjoyed it because lord knows I have time to brainstorm/prepare/cook recipes once a millennium.

Breakfast

Honey Nut Cheerios, flaxseed, and a banana with almond milk

Next was my workout for the day, which was crazy and involved a move that made me feel like Spiderman.

It’s hard to visualize, but wall climbs look like this: start in a push-up position with your feet against a wall.  Push yourself up and then move your feet up the wall behind you and walk your hands as close as you can to the wall.

http://crossfitdivision.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/wall-climb.jpg

This picture does a good job showing the different stages of the workout.  It’s VERY difficult and even though I could barely move my arms to the wall, my arms and back are really feeling it.  The best part is that you can do this at home.  All you needs is a wall, so no excuses 🙂

I came home and literally dove head first into a few cups of coffee (with pumpkin coffeemate…I know, such a vice)

The coffee did a good job powering me throughout the workday.  I had a few projects to finish up, so I was busy all day.

Lunch

I made a tuna sandwich with sliced tomatoes and served it alongside a cup of artichoke soup.  I purchased the soup from the farmers market at the urging of a local vendor, and it didn’t disappoint! It was made with artichokes (first ingredient, always a good sign), chicken stock, onion, a little lemon, and cream cheese (weird but it helped make the soup really creamy).

Snacks were nothing out of the ordinary. I enjoyed a couple of my favorites throughout the afternoon.

A roasted sweet potato and a spoonful of peanut butter with chocolate chips. It was sugar city but luckily the pb and sweet potato did a good job keeping me full until dinner.

Dinner

I had the night off from the restaurant so I headed to the city to make dinner with Zman.  We went to the grocery store and came up with a recipe that we thought we’d both enjoy (we don’t like many of the same foods except pizza haha so sometimes it’s tricky).

We came up with caprese chicken, garlic bread, and roasted green beans.  It was one giant experiment so I think I used more oil/butter than necessary, but hey, now I know (plus it was extra delicious).

Dessert

As if I didn’t get enough sugar already during the day, we decided to buy a giant tub of vanilla ice cream.  I had a few spoonfuls along with some animal crackers and pieces of dark chocolate. Zman doesn’t believe in bowls. He also didn’t want to be featured on the blog so he decided to go incognito. It totally worked.

I was a hungry monster yesterday–blaming it on those wall climbs.  Spiderman tricks require superman fuel, right?

Also, I have to dedicate this post to my friend, Spencer, who just can’t seem to wrap his head around What I Ate Wednesday posts. I hope he can get over the scandalous revelation that these are actually Tuesday’s eats posted on Wednesday and go back to being an actuary and properly estimating people’s insurance rates (good guess, right?). Let’s stick to what we know, Spencer. Yeah?

Question:

• What was the best thing you ate yesterday?

I love today because I don’t have work! Wooo! Three day weekends are the best, aren’t they?

I’m heading down to the city soon for a girls weekend but I just had to share some pictures from my town’s last farmers market of the year.  I haven’t been there in a while so it was cool to see how all the goods have transitioned with the seasons.  It really shows you the authenticity and goodness of all the farmers’ products: they bring what they grow that’s in season and will truly taste the best.  

Instead of raspberries and tomatoes we saw a ton of apples, squash, gourds, and pumpkins.  Plus lot’s of “cozy”  foods such as artichoke soup and hot cider. Those things warm my heart 🙂

Breakfast was a two-parter (my favorite because it means more food!)

First was a mango smoothie (oj, greek yogurt, frozen mango chunks) with chia seeds. I loved the way the chia seeds look in a smoothie–plus the added crunch was nice.

Part two was a sweet potato topped with chunky pb and cinnamon

Why did I need so much food, you ask?

This. Workout.

There was a 30 minute time cap for this, but no one got even remotely close to completing ten rounds. It was brutal! I got through 7 complete rounds, and the constant movement meant for one of the sweatiest, most exhausting workouts I’ve done in awhile. ((You know 10 minutes after I got over the whining I had an endorphin high like no other. Thank you, exercise))

Now I’m planning on heating up some leftovers from dinner last night.  It was a mammoth sized quesedilla that I couldn’t dream of finishing, as it was jam-packed with cheese, chicken, black beans, and veggies, not to mention I could use it as an umbrella if I held it above my head (but, really, who is going to turn down that much cheese-filled deliciousness?)

Yeah this is only half. I consumed this while catching up with last night’s Scandal episode (it’s my favorite show of the fall, with Nashville coming in close second)

Now time to get ready–I’m going to a turtle race tonight. Yep, you heard that right. I’m definitely going to bet my money on whichever one is most motivated by food, as I firmly plan on holding a mozzarella stick at the finish line as my turtle’s motivation.

Have a great weekend! And listen to this song if you think for even a second that you want to spend your Friday night wrapped up in cozy pjs, eating ice cream and watching Bridget Jones’ Diary. This song is so catchy! I put it on repeat when cleaning my bathroom the other day and I couldn’t stop dancing.

Hey guys!  I have a new recipe to share with you all.

Now, I’m not going to lie–I like healthifying stuff (that’s not a word, but moving on…)

Truth be told, you can usually subtract half the sugar in most recipes and you’ll hardly be able to tell the difference.  In case you didn’t notice, we Americans like our sugar so apparently every recipe needs to have 2+ cups of the stuff.

A lot of times, these “experiments” end up in disaster. I once tried to make brownies using chocolate protein powder and it tasted like a cross between a Necco wafer and a cocoa sponge.  Thankfully, I finally discovered a semi-healthy recipe that actually tastes great:

Chocolate chip pumpkin bread!

Now, in no way shape or form is this dessert low-carb, low-sugar, low-whatever.  But it IS higher protein and lower in calories than your average dessert bread, all while tasting just like it was made in a bakery. Plus the protein makes it easy to just have one piece of the stuff, instead of doing that fun trick where you keep cutting off “slivers” and convincing yourself that “slivers don’t count” (guilty as charged).

Most dessert breads rely on copious amount of oil to make them moist–but here I’ve replaced the oil with a container of greek yogurt and two bananas.  Between the yogurt and the mashed bananas, even after an hour of cooking this bread comes out like the delicious dessert bread you know and love.

So if you a) like pumpkin b) like chocolate and c) love pretending dessert breads are healthier than pieces of cake, make this!

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread (adapted from Courtney @ Sweet Tooth Sweet Life)

• 2 ripe bananas, mashed (I used frozen ones that I defrosted)
• 1 6 oz container plain greek yogurt
• 1 cup canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup white flour
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 tbls. vanilla extract
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice

Combine bananas, yogurt, sugar, egg, vanilla, and pumpkin in a large bowl.  In a separate bowl, combine both flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and pumpkin pie spice.   Toss the chocolate chips and walnuts into the flour mixture.  Finally, slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, mixing until just combined.

Pour the mixture into a 9×5 loaf pan lined with aluminum foil and sprayed with cooking spray (this speeds up cleaning time).

Put it in a 350 degree oven for 45-60 minutes, or when a toothpick comes out clean. My bread took 55 minutes, and I took it out because I noticed the sides were browning and would burn soon if I didn’t do it.  This is a very moist bread like I mentioned, so sometimes the toothpick trick won’t work.  Keep an eye on the color of the bread and if it’s past 45 minutes and looking a little too dark, take it out. Breads will continue to cook in the pan anyway.

Good luck  keeping this around the house for more than a day or two!

Fun fact:

There are 1927 calories in one cup of vegetable oil. Here I replaced that with two bananas and a container of greek yogurt, which comes out to approx.  310 calories. Hence why it’s totally okay to add all those chocolate chips 😉

happy wednesday!

Yesterday was full of activity so I’ll just jump right into it. Lot’s of great food and good sweat sessions.

First I have to share with you my last two workouts. Monday’s workout left my arms and legs feeling like jello, and Tuesday’s was basically a giant shake-out for my whole body: lot’s of running and core work.

Now the best part of the week: What I Ate Wednesday!

Breakfast

Kashi GoLean cereal topped with cinnamon and bananas. Served along with two cups of coffee that, for some reason, left me so jittery! I guess I spoke too soon saying caffeine doesn’t have much effect on me.

After breakfast I decided to throw together a crockpot dinner for later. Fall always makes me want to use the crockpot. It’s so easy

Before lunch I did some serious grocery shopping.

 Highlights included:

• Annie’s Organic mac n cheese — Arthur shapes!
• Key lime greek yogurt
• String cheese (current snack obsession)
• Horned melon
• Granny smith apples and unsweetened apple sauce — perfect for Fall

Aren’t groceries pretty? 🙂

Lunch

The highlight of my day was lunch because I got to grab a quick meal with Zman.  We were lucky enough to spend a few hours together before he left for a few days to mourn the loss of his grandmother with his family in Dallas.  I’ve been wanting to take him to an awesome bbq place in my town and since he hardly ever has the chance to make it out to the suburbs, yesterday was the day.

I chose pulled pork tacos with a side of fries and Zman got the brisket platter (so Texan)

I ate one of the tacos and all the fries (plus some of Zman’s fries as well…my favorite)

Dinner

I really enjoyed my afternoon taking care of some errands with Zman and driving him to the airport, but by the time I got home the last thing I wanted to do was think about making dinner.  Thank goodness for the crockpot!

I prepared one of my favorites: shrimp creole!  Recipe will come later this week.  It’s a delicious combination of peppers, onions, celery, shrimp, crushed tomatoes, along with paprika and other spices. Incredibly healthy and satisfying when served over brown rice.

Dessert went unpictured but let’s just say I’m doing a great job getting rid of a stash of tootsie rolls that I found in the pantry.

I’m working hard on a project for work today so wish me luck! Enjoy your day–the week is halfway over wooo!

Question:

• Do you use a crockpot?  If so, what’s your favorite recipe?