Best Meal of the Day

Today was one of those whirlwind days at work. I got into the office at 8:30, not feeling hungry for breakfast so I decided to wait it out...well, work got so crazy busy that I didn't get to eat until 2 except for some whole wheat saltines that I was able to find. I didn't take a picture of any of my meals, but they included a bowl of cereal with yogurt and a banana and then another one 3 hours apart- sometimes a girl just has to eat and quick!


My best meal of the night is dinner! Here is a whole wheat wrap baked up in the oven with:

• Pumpkin puree
• Goat cheese
• salt & pepper
• Sweet chili sauce

I also enjoyed the remainder of a sauvignon blanc we opened on my birthday party. I'm honestly feeling it and about to go to bed to watch some TV and cuddle. I have managed to make it through this snack plate:

-2 TJ's dark chocolate-covered mini grahams, chocolate meringues, and an almond dipper. We have a LOT of dessert left from my party- can't let it go bad, right?





My fiance is a huge chocolate chip cookie monster and he bought some break and bake cookies tonight from the store and made puppy eyes at me until I made them. I wanted to share these gigantic things with you- they look massive! He will be enjoying these for breakfast tomorrow- ah the joys of being a young male!





Have a great day! One day down, 4 more to go!

Birthday Weekend Wrap-up

I am finally winding down from my birthday weekend. Around here we celebrate for an entire weekend, and since my birthday was on Saturday, the festivities began on Friday night. My fiance picked me up and had a beautiful bouquet of roses for me. I spent the evening cleaning up and setting up for our party and made some cupcakes and my cake. I used the box recipes and omitted the oils, but there was no culinary masterpiece here- just some good ole fashioned cupcakes.

I also put together a cheese tray with crescent cheese-filled rolls, spinach flatbreads, grapes, and lots of crackers. We also had chips, guacamole, salsa, and hummus- all courtesy of Trader Joe's. We had a bowl filled with Trader Joe's Oatmeal Cranberry dippers, meringues, and chocolate covered grahams. People definitely grubbed on these snacks once the drunk munchies set in. Now, without further ado- a photo recap of the party:


Food:



Food Platter:




Alcohol:




Alcohol in my Ariel cup and a lei courtesy of our florist friend:






25-year-old Birthday Girl!




The best fiance in the world:




I am so thankful to my friends and family for making my birthday weekend and making me feel so special and loved. I always whine about birthdays and all the work but this weekend was all worth it.

Interview!

We all love talking about what we know and who do I know more about than myself?

The lovely Danielle of A Year of Healthy Eating sent me these interview questions. (Thanks again for all the thought you put into these!) Please see the rules below and please play along!


Here's the rules to play along:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me." If a few people want interviews, I will randomly pick 2.

2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. (I get to pick the questions).

3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.

4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview others in the same post.

5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Le Interview:

1. If you had to pick a "last meal" what would it be?
Ooh- that's morbid, but I'll play along. My last meal would be sushi- extra spicy tuna rolls, sashimi, lots of edemame and wasabi! I would also have dessert (of course) and it would be a giant chocolate fountain with dark chocolate, every kind of sliced fruit, marshmellows, and more dark chocolate for dipping. Mmmm...not so bad for a last meal!

2. I know that you are planning a wedding right now, what has been the most challenging part?
While I have really loved the idea of getting married and spending the rest of my life with my guy, the planning process is a giant headache! Though we have worked out the kinks, the worst part has been balancing everyone's desires and opinions of what the big day should be like. We are both of Russian heritage and our families wanted our wedding to be very traditionally Russian while we have both grown up here and wanted to have a more balanced mix of cultures. This has affected the food, music, and almost every other choice. We have to keep reminding ourselves that the day is about us and celebrating with our guests!

As an aside- the best parts have been choosing rings, my dress (super secret!), and food tasting!

3. What was/is your favorite subject in school and why?
My favorite subject in Undergrad and High School was Spanish. I loved studying it and everything about it. I also got to practice it when I traveled to Mexico every summer for 6 years straight for my job. I also loved every single writing class I took as I was a more linguistic person than technical person. Ironically, I enjoyed Statistics and Operations Management in my business program. Right now I am in my first year as an MBA student and still trying to get used to the program, so the intensity has not allowed for any favorites, but I'm hoping I will get into some great classes since I'm kind of a nerd if I allow myself to be!

4.What has been the best part of blogging for you so far?
The best part of blogging in my very limited experience is the people I can learn from and interact with. I have learned so much about nutrition, recipes, outlook on life, organization (a sore point for me) and body image from the talented ladies who blog. I have also enjoyed taking pretty awful pictures of my food, realized that I eat really odd combinations of food, and really taking a look at my nutrition. Sometimes I read back and say "I ate THAT?" and the whole process is really a great reflection exercise.

5. Have your friends/family/fiancé, been supportive of your blog?
Since I have only started a couple of months ago, I haven't told anyone but my fiance. His blogging experience is really limited to what he sees me doing and he thinks it's a bizarre concept. At first, he thought I invented it and I had to tell him otherwise. He is becoming very supportive of it and sometimes runs to bring me my camera before I take a bite. I think as I get more comfortable, I will share with friends.

Phew- that was a long one but I enjoyed it. Please play along and leave your lovely comments.

Happy Flippin Friday!

I'm Back and Kickin'

Thank you for all of your sweet comments and suggestions for cold remedies! I also enjoyed the volume of comments and appreciate each and every one of them. My readers rock!

I'm feeling much better and my appetite has partially come back so I'm hoping my eats will be a lot more interesting moving forward and I'll try to keep the cereal intake down because that can get very boring.

Here are some of my meal highlights over the last couple of days. While I had the best intentions to do a post last night, I came home at 10:00 p.m. and here it is 10:00 p.m. on Thursday night. I guess school kinda gets in the way! Anyways, enough about me, here is the food:


Wednesday's Lunch:
Carrots, an apple, and my Turkey Lentil Meatloaf






Wednesday Night/Thursday Morning Snack:
Hershey's Kissables




Thursday's Breakfast:
Special K (bleh!) and Kashi Go Lean Crunch (yum!)





Thursday's AM Snack:
Beloved Granny Smith Apple






Thursday's Dinner:
Flat Out Wrap with Goat Cheese, Turkey Slices, and a sprinkle of Mozzarella fresh out of the broiler, pita chips and hummus while I was waiting for the 5 minute wrap







Thursday's Dessert:
Pumpkin puree mixed with Vanilla Yogurt, Cinnamon, Cocoa Powder and a Kashi Dark Chocolate Coconut Bar





I have an interview sent to me by the lovely Danielle of A Year of Healthy Eating and the questions will be up tomorrow. See you tomorrow- it's almost Friday!

The Randomness Continues

It's another day down and I have had another day of random meals fueled by my lack of or bursts of appetite. I started off my morning with 2 vices. I used to be very much into energy drinks. Now I know there is nothing healthy about them, but I was falling asleep and grabbed my drink on the way out of the door. We actually have a free stash of these since our friend is a sales person for Rockstar and gave us some samples. I also had a pre-breakfast of a chocolate chip cookie. Most important meal of the day right? This fueled me through my commute to work.





When I got to work I had my real breakfast about an hour later of Kashi Go Lean Crunch, Cheerios, and heated light soy milk.






At 11:45 I wasn't hungry enough for lunch but decided to grab something to hold myself over for another few hours since my schedule was packed. I had a very green snack of 1/2 apple, sliced kiwi, and green tea. A few minutes later I also ate another Dark Chocolate Coconut Kashi bar.






I waited to get hungry for lunch but wasn't feeling it so I grabbed 3 sliced carrots with my favorite hummus:







I remembered that we had a birthday party at work (ahem, after it happened and I was one of the February birthdays) and walked into the kitchen to see this:





This is about 1.5" x 1.5" x 2" of pure chocolate decadence. It was the most flavorful thing I have had in a few days!


I came home to prep a few more meals for the week and ended up making some whole wheat pasta. I'm embarrassed to admit that I don't know what a real serving of pasta is. I cooked up one cup of penne and added some sauce that I bought earlier this week with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese.





I also had the other half of my flat out wrap with a turkey slice for protein but forgot to take a picture...and also didn't take a picture of the chocolate chip cookie I just ate.


Balance

My meals haven't been the most balanced today. I got in my fruits and veggies (ok, 3 carrots count) but there is an overall lack of balance and I'm starting to feel it in my tummy. I know I can't be back to normal until I recover from this cold, but I am becoming frustrated with myself. I am trying to eat at least something so that I keep my energy up, but wholesome foods (not chocolate) are probably a little better for me. I'm also a horrible patient and don't like to eat soup so I just fall back on whatever is around.

I have got to start taking better care of myself since somebody has a birthday this weekend. We are having a party at our house on Saturday night so I've got to get it together.

Does anybody have any surefire cold remedies?

Don't Judge Me

Hello World! I hope you made it through another Monday. I hate to be one of those people, but Monday's really are no fun. Today I made a few strange meal choices. I am kinda doing this high carb thing- or at least that's what it feels like since they taste best and feel best on my finicky tummy and lazy taste buds. On with today's meals:

I forgot to take a picture of breakfast (ironically, it was a sandwich made of whole wheat toast, 1 slice turkey, and 1 slice cheese heated in the micro) but here is my LUNCH:

1 cup Kashi Go Lean Crunch, 1/2 cup Cheerios, 3/4 cup Silk Light Soy Milk and my apple:





Don't judge me, cereal can be eaten round the clock.





My work also has the most humongous bowls known to mankind so they make it hard to eyeball portions, but I'm pretty sure I got this right. I think filling it up all the way would be about 3 or 4 cups worth.


At 4:30 it still wasn't close to quitting time so I went down to get a snack. I got an Organic Oatmeal Cookie from Starbucks. Now I have to explain one thing- there is a Starbucks INSIDE my building. Do you know what this means? It means that I smell Mocha-Latte-Machiattos-Wonderful-Deliciousness every time I enter my building. I have been at this location for less than one week and I already cracked. In my defense, I said I wouldn't buy any drinks from the 'Bucks, but if you are keeping score, the damage is done.

This 350-calorie sucker kept me full until I got home at 7:30. I also enjoyed it with one of my many cups of herbal tea:





I thought that since I filled up on my breakfast foods for the day, I would just have a snack for dinner. This guy had arguably more breakfast food, but it's all I could think of. Here is 1/2 cup fat free vanilla yogurt with 1/2 of a green apple, a sliced kiwi, and a Kashi Dark Chocolate Coconut bar crumbled on top. This was very yummy and I can't wait to try it when my appetite is kickin':





My wonderful fiance is moving furniture and I'm helping him every once in a while, but waiting patiently for my bed to be assembled so I can go to sleep. Tomorrow is another early day. Have a great night!

The Texture is Awesome!

Since I last posted on Thursday, I have spent the last three days in the tastebud excitement that is a cold. Now, I must preface this with the fact that I know everyone gets colds and I am not the only person on earth, but this really, really bites. As a girl who likes her eats, not being able to fully taste anything has made the last few days really, really boring! Not only am I sick, but so is my fiance. He is a bit of a better eater than I am when sick but is still not feeling much better.

This morning I made him some french toast and an egg and asked him how it was. His answer was:

"I'm not sure, but the texture is AWESOME!"

I love him because he can really articulate things.

I have had a few textures over the last few days. Like I said, nothing too exciting since I can't quite taste it. The other interesting thing is that my hunger cues are crazy. I go from not hungry to crazy pains in my stomach while normally, I am hungry at 3-hour intervals.


I'm eating a power fruit plate right now with some fun dip (vanilla yogurt, cinnamon, and cocoa powder) and almond butter. I shall call this dinner.


Kiwi, Apple, Banana



Dip in my fancy glass:



Ironically, one flavor that has not been ruined is chocolate:




I am now sitting on the couch, watching the Oscars, and drinking out of what I have been calling my Crunk Cup for the last couple of days. The more cultured of the people living in this house told me that it portrays the Romanov dynasty, the last imperial dynasty of Russia before the revolution that threw them out of power. Whatever- it holds a lot of zen tea.




Have a great night. I'm off to fold some laundry and await my Nyquil time.