25 Nov

Oats to go

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , .

Woo hoo! I’m done for the week! I decided to take Friday off. I have the vaca time to do so, and I really need to use that day to get stuff done and well, quite frankly, sleep in. So that’s the plan. Here’s the rundown of the day.

My oats were so good last night that I had to recreate them this morning. This time I heated up the apple sauce first and put the oats on top of them, so they’d stay hot during my commute.

Look how pretty!

So good!

I think I would consider taking oats to work for breakfast more often if I didn’t get major anxiety all morning wondering if I turned the stove burner off before I left the apartment. I was 99% I did, but still worried about it until I got a chance to go home for lunch. I had to pick up all the food stuffs I’m taking to Thanksgiving plus my overnight bag. The house was still standing, but I forgot to look at the burner. Doh!

I ate lunch at work today – and I ate it in shifts. Before I left to go home, I had one lone sweet potato that hadn’t been eaten. I knew it had to be mine.

Along with a leftover roll.

Carbs much? Yeah, I love ‘em. Can’t help myself.

And on my way back to work, I picked up a salad. I was craving veggies like woah – but unfortunately the only place I could find to get some was Subway.

This salad was pretty good, but I wish there had been some more substantial greens up in there. Also, I normally get just vinegar for dressing but since there were like zero kcals to that salad I decided to get a creamy dressing to up the satiety level. Like my logic there?

The day dragged by, as I expected it to, but it wasn’t as torturous as it could have been. It was one of those days when everyone was chatty so I kept getting visitors to my office, which helped pass the time a bit.

I’m about to jet on over to my brother and SIL’s and we’re carpooling to my Dad’s house in Enid, Oklahoma. Don’t worry, I’ll get some cardio in tonight in the form of Extreme Guitar Hero. I take it very seriously – no sitting allowed. Apparently we’re having enchiladas for dinner, which sounds fab. There will most likely be quite a bit of alcohol consumed as well.

Tomorrow morning I will be making breakfast for everyone and then hopefully will cajole my SIL and maybe some others to go on a walk around my Dad’s neighborhood. I brought my sneaks just in case! Then the whole fam-dam-ily will arrive for Thanksgiving Dinner and I will get to showcase my pie-making skills.

THEN the bro, the SIL and I will head over to my Mom’s for dessert and movie watching. We’re going to have a separate dinner with my Mom next week, but we still wanted to spend some time with her on real Thanksgiving.

Lots of fun to be had, but I won’t be blogging again until it’s all over. I’ll be back Friday if not before.

Have an extremely Happy Thanksgiving if you are celebrating. I hope it is wonderful and relaxing and delicious :) And if you’re not celebrating, have a fabulous couple of days!

25 Nov

Pie X 3

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , , .

Good morning! One more day until Thanksgiving :) I’m hoping work passes by quickly today, because I’m really excited about going home for the holidays.

Last night’s baking was 96.3% successful. I made three pies. All seem edible, and two are attractive. Pretty good for a girl who has never made a pie. Disclaimer: I did NOT make my own crust. I am not that impressive.

I got the first two pie ideas from the lovely and endlessly insightful Abby. Pie numero uno was a Praline Pumpkin Pie.

I wish I would have taken a picture of the praline layer on the bottom. So luscious. If I liked pumpkin, I would be all over this bad boy.

Next up was a PHILADELPHIA 3-STEP Pumpkin Cheesecake.

If I decide to indulge in dessert, this will probably be where I turn. There is only half a cup of pumpkin in this guy and 2 packages of cream cheese. Right up my alley. However, I usually tend to turn down desserts on holidays and get seconds, thirds and tenths of the mac ‘n cheese, mashed potatoes, and random veggies. I love me some warm cheesey carbs.

The third and final pie was a traditional pumpkin pie, since the original task I was given was to bring a pumpkin pie – and the other two are variations. I used the Libby’s recipe.

I put that foil around the edges as a suggestion from my mother, who said it would help keep the outer crust from burning. She was right about that, but my pie was overflowing and so some the filling seeped onto the outer crust and caused the foil to congeal to the dough. So, when I took the foil off much of my crust went with it :( This was the 3.7% fail. The pie innards smelled just like my Grandma’s pumpkin pie though, so I’m hoping people will enjoy it even though the store-bought crust is all crumbly.

Since I don’t like pumpkin, I didn’t do a whole lot of “quality checking” like I usually do when I bake. So I was more than excited for my dinner – Cranberry Apple Sauce Oats.

I just cooked up some oats and topped them with cold apple sauce and some chopped pecans. It was truly magnificent. The cold/hot combo was a sensory delight and all the spices in the apple sauce really took the oat experience to a new level for me, since I never really add that much stuff to my oatmeal.

I baked and oatmealed while watching The Biggest Loser, and at some point I got in some ab work (Jillian makes me to planks every time I watch that show) and some random arm exercises. Then I bathed, packed for tonight, and hit the hay. One benefit of being super busy and stressed? It knocks me out at night! I think I fell asleep before 11 both nights this week.

Have a good Wednesday guys! Whether you’re on holiday already, finishing up your workweek or living outside of the USA and celebrating Hump Day :)

24 Nov

Thanksgiving Pot Luck

Posted by lowandbhold in 1.

Groan. Thanksgiving Pot Luck at work was a success today. Too much of a success. I don’t have great pictures because one of our really important customers was dining with us so I was busy schmoozing.

My dishes were a big hit! Namely the twice baked sweet potatoes.

I got a lot of compliments on the cranberry apple sauce too, but there was leftovers of that so I am guessing it wasn’t as well received as the potatoes were. No worries, me thinks it would make a kick ass bowl of oatmeal, so the more leftovers the better :)

By looking at this plate, you might think that I practiced some sort of self control during this meal.

Clockwise from the roll: smidge of Southern Mac ‘n Cheese, twice baked sweet tater, asparagus (which is covering some green bean casserole), tofu and cranberry apple sauce.

Now, had I stopped there it would be have been the perfect amount of food. But I definitely went back for another smidge of mac ‘n cheese, another serving of cranberry apple sauce, and lots more green bean casserole. And then I had an unpictured bowl of fruit and a few bites of cheesecake.

My stomach was not pleased. I’m not mad that I ate that much – it happens around this time of year – but I do wish I would learn to listen to my hunger cues. I hate being miserably full. I could have strung that amount of eating out over the course of the afternoon and been much more comfortable. Perhaps I will learn my lesson at home on Thursday? Yeah, probably not…

I was pretty bloatatious all day, so I got up and walked around as much as I could all afternoon. And after work, I took the pastiest legs you ever did see, put them in shorts and took them to the gym. All the food must have given me some intense energy because I was a machine on the elliptical. My legs just went as fast as I would let them go. I only had time to do 30 minutes, but that half hour truly restored my sanity.

Now, I am working on my baking. I’m making three pies for Thanksgiving and I’m also in charge of breakfast. I’m drinking one of these to make the process flow more smoothly.

I’m a huge supporter of Miller Light and have been quite a fan of their MGD64 – but I have to say that Bud’s version of ultra light beer is superior. Just in case you were wondering.

Have a good night guys, and for those of you who are already done for the week – kick back and enjoy it :)

24 Nov

Work with what ya got

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , , .

Hello! The stress levels are pretty high over here right now. I’ve never taken on this much responsibility at Thanksgiving before, and with work, doctors appointments and moving stuff I feel a bit frantic.

But instead of getting all worked up, I’m really just realizing how thankful I am for all the Thanksgivings and other holidays of my childhood when I just woke up and a wonderful day had been planned without me being aware of any of the stress that went into it. I’m glad I am able to help this year and no longer just taking everything for granted.

My appointment went well last night and since I was in Norman, I used a coupon I had to get a free burrito at Freebird. I tried with all my might, but I simply could not get an appetizing picture.

My burrito had: rice, black beans, fajita veggies, onions, pico and sour cream on a cayenne pepper tortilla. Their guac is nasto, so I decided I could have some sour cream as a replacement :)  I know a lot of people are grossed out by sour cream - but I love it.

After downing the majority of that sucker, I got to work on my twice baked sweet potatoes. A slight fail happened in that I didn’t have time to bake them long enough the first time before my appointment, so the filling ended up being chunky instead of smooth. They still taste great though (I tried a little one when they came out of the oven this morning – sweet potatoes for breakfast are amazing fyi).

Again, I’m not going to publish this recipe, but if you want it just ask and I’ll email it to you. Sweet taters plus mascarpone cheese plus vanilla = heaven. I’m just sayin’.

Shower curtain rod update: it’s still not up. My hair has gone as long without a wash as it can go, so if it isn’t fixed today it looks like I’ll have to get creative. I don’t think people will eat my pies if they can smell my hair before I walk into the kitchen.

On a workout note – I’ve been trying to get in as much little stuff as I can even though I haven’t been able to do a full-fledged workout. I’ve done ab work every night and I do squats, push-ups and plyos when I get a few free minutes. I’m trying to work with what I’ve got!

Are you doing much cooking this Thanksgiving? Any time-saving tips?

23 Nov

Let the holiday cooking begin

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , , .

Hello! I’m happy that Monday’s work day is over – it was a weird one on my end. I don’t have all that short of a week, I basically just have Thursday off and the option to use vacation time to take Friday off (which I may do in order to get some packing done) but the holiday is certainly making the work atmosphere different.

Breakfast was the usual. So even though there are no veggies pictured in this post – I did get some in this morning and I plan to do so again for dinner.

I went home for lunch to make some headway on all the Thanksgiving dishes I’m making this week. I made a quick Cranberry Apple Sauce for my work pot luck tomorrow and it turned out great!

I got the recipe from the cooking class I went to last week, so I don’t think I should publish the recipe. But if you want it, just email me and I’ll send it over to you! It’s really delicious and can be served warm or cold, which is great because that means you can make it ahead of time or last minute. Plus, it’s vegan :)

I have some leftover cranberries, so I think I might have to make some cranberry muffins if I have time! Since when did I become a person who likes to bake? Changes are a brewin’ my friends.

For my actual lunch I whipped up some oats in a jar.

The jar contained: 1/2 cup oats, squirt of agave, one under-ripe banana (ick), and the residual peanut butter. It was pretty good, but it didn’t hold me over as long as oats usually do for some reason.

I broke into my snack at around 3 p.m. I got some Greek Gods greek yogurt on sale this weekend.

So I paired it with some pomagranite arils.

I’m not sure this pom was in it’s prime though, because the arils were a lot darker than the ones I’ve been seeing all over the blogs lately. It was my first time eating/cutting one, and I made a huge mess. It seriously looked like a murder scene in the kitchen! The end result was pretty tasty though.

I’m about to head out – I’ve got to get my sweet potatoes baked up so they can cool while I’m at my doctor’s appointment tonight. I hate going to the OBGYN, but it’s a necessary evil I guess. Sigh.

What does your week look like? When does the weekend start for you?

23 Nov

Fire and Ice

Posted by lowandbhold in 1.

Fire: This spicy ”snack” (aka full meal eaten at non-meal hours) I’ve been enjoying due to my lack of real groceries. It consists of whole grain pasta, asiago cheese, and hot sauce.

Ice: The fact that I ate this three times over the course of the weekend, and it pretty much boasts no nutritional value :/

Fire: The piano that Lady Gaga ignited last night on the American Music Awards. I don’t know how I feel about Lady Gaga, her music doesn’t really appeal to me – but she can certainly entertain a crowd.

Ice: Adam Lambert. I liked you during American Idol – but it’s never necessary to push faces into your crotch. Never. I could go on and on about the AMAs (I love award shows) but since this is a food blog…

Fire: Local, homemade peanut butter for $1.89.

Ice: Eating another meal that is devoid of any vegetable whatsoever – even if it is delicious organic flax waffles with yummy peanut butter and preserves.

Fire: My first Thanksgiving after discovering my love for cooking. I love the challenge of cooking for people and trying new recipes and dishes.

Ice: Having no time to cook because of work, lady doctor appointments, and moving – resulting in having to wake up early every morning this week to get everything made. And thus resulting in a pretty lame gimmick post about fire and ice.

22 Nov

My rod won’t stay up

Posted by lowandbhold in 1.

Hi guys! I took a blogging hiatus this weekend. I was super busy and had a lot of fun! The highly inappropriate title will be explained at the end of the post, don’t worry.

Friday night I went to dinner with my brother and sister-in-law and then while the SIL went to see Twilight, my brother and I went to an art exhibit. It was a pretty cool exhibit, even though I have to admit that I don’t really understand art very well. It was still fun to check it out and attempt to become more cultured.

Saturday morning I made another pathetic attempt at an omelet. I need an omelet pan!

After breakfast I headed to the gym where I did a 20 minute elliptical warm-up and then did a leg workout, followed by abs. I’m trying to focus on strength training a little bit more. However, that might be the last gym workout I get in for quite awhile since I have every minute of my life planned out before I leave to see my family on Wednesday.

After showering I headed over to my brother’s to watch the game. I had an arugula and goat cheese salad and an MGD64 over there for lunch.

After the game me and the SIL went grocery shopping to get all the supplies for Thanksgiving. We went to a really cool new market I’ve never been to and two other grocery stores. It was a lot of grocery shopping! But now I have everything I need to make the dishes I’m taking to my work potluck on Tuesday and the breakfast and pies I’m making for my family Thanksgiving.

I also got some sushi to have to for dinner.

Then some of my friends came over and we went out to a country concert. No pictures were taken though :(

I’m definitely still nursing a hangover, so today has been interesting. I had some pre-made veggie lasagna that I bought yesterday for lunch today (slept through breakfast).

It was alright, but I bit to ’shroomy for me. I am not a fan of fungus. I got some packing done today, but definitely not as much as I needed to.

Something else I needed was some Thai food. Seriously, I needed it. I had to get some sweet potatoes (they only had mondo huge ones yesterday) so I picked up some veggie pad thai.

Ah yeah, that hit the spot! I was planning on getting in a workout today but a friend just called and she’s going through a hard time and needs support. So I’m going to go hang out with her – definitely more important than the elliptical!

So now I have to go figure out how to shower since my shower curtain rod has decided it no longer wants to hold up my shower curtain.

Have a good rest of your weekend ladies!

20 Nov

I may not get the vampire thing…

Posted by lowandbhold in 1.

But I sunk my fangs into a delicious cinnamon bagel this morning.

Plain, stale bagels from a trade show are crap. But warm, cinnamon bagels from Panera attract me like the sweet smell of a young Kristen’s Stewart’s blood attracts a man with really big hair and freakishly red lips.

I may not be a vegan for multiple days in a row… but I can drink the shiz out of a vegan Green Monster for lunch.

This is the one thing that I can turn to over and over again and just feel dang good about what I’ve just put into my body.

I may not be a Twilight character named Bella… but I can hold an apple in my hand and silently elude to the seduction it represents.

Okay, maybe I can’t do that either. But I can hold an apple in my hand. And eat it thereafter.

I may not be young enough to be spry after only sleeping three hours the night before… but I can use an extremely popular movie premier to attempt to keep my lovely blog friends interested.

I may not be going to the movie… but I am having dinner with a friend before she goes and then hopefully going to bed at an hour that even a great grandmother would scoff at.

Are you a Twilight fanatic?

20 Nov

Vegan for a Day – dinner and thoughts

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , , , .

Good morning! I’ve never been so happy for a Friday. I laid awake last night until almost 3 a.m. so the only thing getting me through the day is the knowledge that I can sleep in tomorrow!

Last night I did indeed eat a vegan dinner in order to complete Katy and Michelle’s Vegan for a Day movement . It just so happens that of the very few food items I have left in my house (and there are very few), the majority of them are vegan friendly. I started out with an appetizer of vegan dumplings and dipping sauce.

And, just to prove they were vegan – here is the package.

I bought these on clearance for less than $2 a few months ago and I really enjoyed them. I hope I can find them again. For my entree I had some leftover split pea soup with a sprinkle of paprika.

My thoughts on Vegan for a Day: I really liked doing this. One of the main reasons that I eat very little meat is that I want to do my part in reducing the effect that my food choices have on the environment. Even though I will occasionally eat meat (mainly fish), and I eat dairy fairly regularly (as it does not upset my stomach at all and I think it is delicious) - I think focusing on whole, local, plant-based foods is incredibly important and the more I am able to do it, the better.

I wish I could give up all animal products and biproducts because I do feel an ethical twinge every time I purchase something that I know was provided by the cruel treatment of animals. However, that’s just not realistic for me. Maybe someday it will be, but I don’t see that day anywhere in my horizon.

Moving on… I let dinner digest for about an hour and then hit the gym. I did 40 minutes on the elliptical, ten of which were a feeble effort at doing Jessica’s HIIT workout.

Holy mother. That thang is no joke. I could not for the life of me get my RPMs up to 155. Just could not do it. Apparently I’m a pansy. The rest of the workout I did level 15 resistance 6 and watched Grey’s Anatomy. Looks like I have a new goal to work toward though! I will make that workout my bitch!

I also got 2 more boxes packed last night, which is good because I haven’t gotten much packing done other than that this week. I have lots of ground to cover this weekend.

And that takes me to the point where I went to bed and couldn’t sleep and stayed up until 3 a.m. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the day goes!

Enjoy your Fridays everyone! Anyone have big plans?

19 Nov

Vegan for a Day

Posted by lowandbhold in 1. Tagged: , , , , .

Hi all! As I said this morning, I went Vegan for a Day today as part of a movement that’s going on throughout the blogs.

My vegan meals are not incredibly inventive because I am not doing much grocery shopping until after the move, but I did my best.

Anywho, my mornings are usually vegan for the most part because I have a green monster.

Sorry about the ugly slime lining the edges. But a commute will do that sort of thing. Today’s greenie included (I’m including a list of ingredients for all my meals to ensure that they were, in fact, vegan):

  • vanilla rice milk (first time trying this, but I’ll be buying it more often because it’s a bit cheaper than almond milk)
  • 3 cups spinach
  • 1/2 tablespoon natural peanut butter
  • 1/2 frozen banana
  • 1/2 fresh banana
  • ice

Delicious and vegan as can be! The one area that was hard for be, veganly speaking, was not having half & half in my coffee. I like the consistency of fat free half & half over almond milk in my coffee, but I think I’ll start buying a dairy-free creamer (I know there is a Silk version and a coconut milk version) substitute from now on. I don’t see a completely vegan lifestyle in my future, but those little changes can make a difference. Today I just drank my coffee black, but I can’t do that too often. I’m not that hardcore!

For lunch I had an amazing bowl of oats.

The bowl had:

  • 1/3 cup oats – cooked with water
  • 3/4 of a ripe banana
  • 1 tablespoon agave nectar
  • 1 tablespoon sweetened coconut
  • 1/2 tablespoon natural peanut butter

I think this was one of the best bowls of oats I’ve ever had. The dash of coconut really took it to another level.

Snack was an apple I snagged from the trade show.

However, in my opinion, Red Delicious apples aren’t all that delicious – or at least this one wasn’t.

I also had a stolen (from the trade show) orange.

The rest of the day went okay. My mood didn’t stay as chipper as it started out, but 8 hours of work will do that to ya. I would tell you that I didn’t really feel good all day, but then I would sound like a major hypochondriac/whiner, which I’m NOT. So I’ll just say…. have a good night! :)

Oh, and you’ll have to tune back in tomorrow morning to see if I made it through my Vegan for a Day challenge! I think the odds are in my favor.

« Older Entries