Category: Cooking/Recipes

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 18

heather

I tried a new recipe today, Sesame Chicken and Rice.  It is a primal recipe, so of course, it wasn’t made out of real rice.  It was made out of cauliflower rice, which is basically ground up cauliflower cooked with chicken broth, onions, and garlic.

It was a very complicated recipe – one that caused me to use the majority of dishes in our kitchen – even all of the ice cube trays.  First you have to stuff a chicken full of seasonings, then boil it for 1/2 an hour, than plunge it into a cold water bath, then rub it down with sesame oil, then let it cool, then chop it up into pieces.  I ended up pulling off the skin because it looked gross, so it seemed pointless to have rubbed it all over with expensive sesame oil.

Between these steps you have to mix up 7 or so ingredients to make a “fiery ginger sauce.” You also need to chop up ingredients for and cook the cauliflower rice.

The recipe was a lot of work, and while the chicken tasted ok, and I liked the ginger sauce, the tastiness of these items did not equal the amount of work that went into creating them.

The cauliflower rice gave me fits, too.  I couldn’t get all the liquid to cook off, so it was pretty runny.  Even being runny, at first it tasted really good, but the more I ate it, the more it grossed me out.  This is the second time I’ve cooked cauliflower in the guise of something else.  I’ve also made cauliflower “mashed potatoes.”  Those, too, at first tasted delicious, but the more I ate them, the less I liked them.  I am crossing cauliflower cooked as other foods off my list.

So, this is the second recipe I’ve tried and tossed.  But, at least we are trying new things and experimenting.  Most of the meal will be edible tomorrow too.  I can put the chicken on a salad and use the ginger sauce as salad dressing – add some avocado, and it will be delicious.  I also saved the chicken broth, so we’ll probably make a nice primal soup with it – add some carrots, celery, onions, and cabbage.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 17 – Regression Analysis

heather

Today I was supposed to:

  1. Eat all meals outside of the home and stay primal-aligned.
  2. Do a full-length PEM workout (2 to 3 sets).
  3. Lifestyle – Reach Out – Talk to a family member or friend about going primal.

I did none of things things today.

The day started off on the wrong foot.  I reheated some of the frittata from last night, and I have to agree with Tim.  It is way overspiced.  It was almost nauseating.  It did not agree with my stomach at all.  I think it actually semi-poisoned us last night because Tim and I both slept horribly – woke up every hour, couldn’t get back to sleep, etc.  I am blaming the cumin.  It’s a hell-spice.

Then I had a meeting all day at work, and we worked through lunch, which was pizza (of course).  Short of eating all the toppings off (which doesn’t seem to be a super professional thing to do in a work-setting), there is not much you can do to make pizza primal.  So I ate it.  Two pieces to be exact.  My stomach didn’t explode, for which I was grateful.

After the excruciatingly long meeting, I caved into my desire for a refreshing drink and had 2 Amstel Lights (they were better than I thought they would be).  Tim and I went to Van’s for supper, and I had a not-very-primal supper of 3 fried mushrooms, a hamburger with no bun, and pencil-thin super crispy, salty fries.

Before you shake your head in disgust, look at the positive side.  Had I not been doing this primal diet at all, I probably would have had a bagel for breakfast, 3 or 4 pieces of pizza for lunch, a cookie and/or the little cakes they offered for desert, 2 or 3 carb-heavy microbrews, a full hamburger with fries and the bun, and at least 6 fried mushrooms.  I may have also dipped my fries in the ranch dressing.  BUT, I didn’t it.  I ate good bad, not bad bad.  I’m learning!

In regards to the full-length PEM workout, I tried.  I really tried, but my lats hurt like a mother from my “pull ups” Monday night.  I couldn’t even do more than 6 pushups because I am so sore.  Instead I did some other exercises to work the glutes and the rotator cuff.  Now I have a headache, though.  My third one of the day.  Is it because of the cumin?  Not eating carbs?  Eating too many carbs?  Mold in the humidifier filter?  Allergies?  Who the heck knows?

On the third point, I didn’t really “reach out” to anyone today.  I did tell my boss that he should go primal because he thinks he may be allergic to wheat.  If you can’t eat wheat, you might as well go primal.  I don’t think he seriously listens to me though – to his detriment, I say!

So today was overall not a good day, primally speaking.  Tim encouraged me, though, by saying that he noticed that I look more toned.  It was just the positive comment I needed to refocus myself to do better tomorrow.  I only have 4 more days of the official diet and then I’m on my own – for better or for worse.

Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 16

heather

Today’s big news is that I tried another new recipe:  A Fajita Frittata with Avocado Salsa.  It was pretty simple to make, once all the ingredients were cut up.  Two notes about this recipes – be sure to spread the seasoning evenly over the meat.  I didn’t do a good job of this, so there were some very seasoned bits of flank steak.  Secondly, maybe my pan was not hot enough (or maybe our cast iron skillet is broken), but I had to cook everything at least 2 to 3 minutes longer than the recipe called for.  Except at the end that is – you are supposed to finish up the frittata in the broiler, and that took the 5 minutes designated by the recipe.

I thought the frittata was pretty tasty, but Tim was not a fan.  I liked the avocado salsa too (avocado, lime, green onions and jalapeno), but Tim didn’t think the green onions mixed well.  Overall he liked the supper, but it wasn’t one of his favorites.  I’ll be happy to eat it for breakfast tomorrow morning though.  I took a picture, if you want to see what it looks like – check out the Instagram feed to the right.

Today my energy levels were a little lower, and my stomach was a little rumbly.  I was trying to figure out what I may have eaten that was outside of the primal norm.  I had 1 bite of Tim’s breaded tenderloin, but that was the only thing I could think of, and I don’t think that would affect me much.  Let’s just chalk it up to hormones.

For exercise today, I slapped on a hat and some boots and took a 2+ mile walk outside after work.  It was chilly, but it was really nice to be out-of-doors.  I walked in the snow a lot of way, partially to avoid the ice and partially to get a better workout.  I think it worked because I am T I R E D now.

Tomorrow at work I have a meeting from 8:30AM to 2PM.  My ass is already sore just thinking about it.

I caved tonight, just a little bit, and had some dark chocolate chips for a snack after supper.  They are Hersey’s and non-organic, non-free-range, non-free-trade, non-super-high-cocoa-content.  But they were tasty none-the-less.  And since they were in such small pieces, I could eat several of them.  Sometimes the act of eating itself is comforting.  That’s a huge reason why I like pistachios so much.  You can eat them for a long time because you have to shell them as you go.  It’s fun.

Good thing I only have 5 days left because these posts are getting less and less interesting, even to me and I am writing the goddam things.

Take care, sleep tight, pray for sunny weather and a mild, ocean-scented breeze tomorrow.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

Primal Days 13 – 15

heather

Um, yeah, so I’m a little behind.  Weekends are like that.  Busy.

So, where did I leave off?  Oh yeah – Saturday.  We went to the Farmer’s Market, ate primally I’m sure for breakfast and lunch, saw “Haywire,” ate HyVee Chinese (chicken kabob instead of egg roll and Mandarin Chicken with no rice).  I’m trying to remember…  All the days are blending together.  Let me just hit the highlights.

Tim got the Power Tower put together.  I am supposed to be able to (eventually) do 5 complete, real pull-ups.  At this point, I can do 0.  None.  Zip.  All I can do at this point is hop off a chair and lower myself down until my arms fail.  I have spindly, weak arms.  BUT.  BUT!!  I am up to 10 bent knee pushups!  That’s 4 more than I could do 2 weeks ago.  Progress, sweet progress.

What else?  Oh, I made my first primal shake. I was kind of craving ice cream, but instead I put all the following into the blender: ice cubes, frozen blueberries, dark cocoa powder, a frozen banana, a date, shredded coconut, pecans and coconut milk.  I tried to blend it all up in our 14-year-old, seldom-used blender, but nothing was happening, so I had to transfer the contents to the food processor, where everything blended up pretty nicely.  But, boy oh boy, was it messy – dark as night, delicious shake residue all over the food processor, the counter, the blender, my fingers, the bar, the  stool, the phones, the bartender – everywhere.  I thought it was damn delicious though.  Tim thought the darkness was off-putting.  Check out the pic in my Instagram feed (see the link on the right).

What else?  It was cloudy and depressing today.  I feel happier now that I have done a little exercise, but I was feeling pretty down in the dumps earlier.  I was hating my blue and tan cubicle and my stupid, uncomfortable office chair that makes my back hurt like a mother every Monday morning.  Argh.  I am so looking forward to sunshine and longer days.  I’m itching to get outside, so I can do some sprint workouts.

Today I was supposed to do my first “intermittent fast, ” which is where you try not to eat until you experience strong sensations of hunger.  I didn’t really do that.  Since I’m on a schedule at work, I kind of have to eat when I have my lunch break.  I should have tried it for supper, but, well, I didn’t.

I’m also supposed to get some “cave time” – time to disengage from digital stimulation.  Mark recommends going hiking for an hour or meditating on a park bench.  It’s 28 degrees and drizzly outside, so that doesn’t work for me today.  We need to move to California.

Tomorrow I am supposed to do a 20-60 aerobic workout, but we have to go grocery shopping tomorrow night, so I’m going to try to go at 5AM.  I feel way happier during the day if I work out in the morning, but it’s so difficult and unpleasant.  Wish me luck.

So, 2 weeks down, one more to go.  So far it’s been a positive experience.  My allergies have improved.  I’m down to 144, and I’ve lost another inch all around.  My stomach seems to be happier.  I’ve had some mood swings, but I have those anyway. I’m excited to see how I feel next Monday, after the 21-day challenge is over.

Take care, and have a pleasant evening!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 12

heather

Breakfast – Two hardboiled eggs cut into chunks with 1/4 an avocado chunked up, both drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper.  Super, super delicious.

Lunch – It was snowing, so I didn’t want to trek home and back. Instead I went to the mall and had 2 entrees (no rice) from Panda Express.  I had Fire Chicken (chicken with pepper strips) and an all veggie entree (cabbage, onion, zucchini, etc.).  It was actually really tasty.  I’m sure it had more bad oils and sugars than I would use at home, but it was  good lunch for $5.35.

Supper – Tim had a long, rough day because of the weather, so I met him at Creekside on his walk home.  I had a glass of wine (a merlot that tasty good at the top and not so good at the bottom).  Then we walked over to Filling Station where I got the Filling Station Burger (a hamburger with an egg and bacon on top) with no bun and coleslaw instead of fries.  Again, I know this was not as healthy as something I would make at home, but for a supper out, it was good, and it was better for me than what I would have eaten before I went primal.  I would have eaten the bun and lots o’ fries.  And I would have had at least 1 if not 2 beers, but I had none.  A piece of cheese snuck in under the egg on the burger, though.  If I had read the menu more closely, I would have asked for them to leave that off.  Right after eating, my stomach started to get bloated – something I’ve notice happening whenever I eat cheese. I love cheese, but it doesn’t love me.

I was supposed to a PEM workout yesterday, but I ran out of time.  Instead I shoveled the steps and sidewalks around our house, walked to Creekside and Filling Station and then home.  It wasn’t hard-core exercise, but it was movement.  Walking in snow, even just a few inches takes a lot of energy.

Today is the Farmer’s Market, so I’m trying to figure out what I want to get.  I’m a little beefed out, so maybe some chicken?  No one at the FM sells grass-fed pork.  I might have to order some of that and some US wild-caught salmon from US Wellness Meats.  They seem to be the vendor of choice for the Primal crowd.

I have several CAFO pork chops in the fridge that I bought last week, so today I’m going to make either pork posole or pork fried rice.  The “rice” is actually made of grated cauliflower.  I’m really curious to try it.

Oh, and I was down to 144 this morning!  Six more pounds, and I will be able to wear my Luckys again.  I’m gonna be gifted all natural and burstin the seams.  Konichiwa bitches!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 10

heather

I don’t mean this blog to be my daily diary, but since how you eat has such a huge impact on how you feel and how much energy you have, I’m going to tell you all about day – albeit quickly and succinctly, hopefully.

This morning before work, I started some crockpot chicken tacos.  Then over lunch I ran to the grocery store because I decided that it would behoove me to make some primal treats for our Junior Achievement Fundraiser Bake Sale tomorrow.  (I decided to make primal chocolate chip cookies and primal omelette muffins.)  Then I went home and reheated some of yesterday’s beef soup.  When I got home from work this evening, I did the dishes from last night and then shredded the cooked chicken, chopped up some lettuce, grated some cheese (for Tim), ate supper with Tim and then made the cookies and the muffins and then did the dishes all again.  I sat down and watched a Lost episode with Tim, and then I did sets of planks, pushups, squats, side planks, and supermans.

To you that may not sound like that unusual of a day.  For my old self, that was almost unheard of.  I used to come home from work (starving), eat supper as soon as possible, sit on the couch to watch TV for a couple of hours, crawl into bed at 8:30 to read for 1/2 an hour, and the go to sleep.

So I would say that my energy levels on this eating plan are way, way better.

We had a team meeting at Azteca today – all the free chips and salsa you could want, but I resisted.  I wasn’t even that tempted, which was surprising because I LOVE chips and salsa.  But I knew that if I ate it, I wouldn’t feel good afterwards, and that was enough to keep me from it.

It might be more of a struggle to stay on point tomorrow, however.  My team is bringing TONS of delicious treats.  My treats are not delicious.  They are OK, especially for things that are good for you, but they are not deeeelicious in the way a Snickers cupcake or a Scotcheroo is delicious.  The cookies turned out OK.  I think I may have burnt them, but it’s kind of hard to tell because they are basically made of nuts and dates.  They look really dark, but nuts and dates are dark.  They don’t taste burnt, really.  If no one buys them tomorrow, I will definitely eat them.  They aren’t…bad.  The omelette muffins TASTE really good, but look a little silly.  After I took them out off the oven, they kind of collapsed into themselves.  They look weird but taste delicious.  The recipe called for 1/8 cup of mayo.  I toyed with idea of making my own mayo (found tons of good primal recipes), but I’ve already spent more on these treats than anyone will be willing to donate, so I had to draw the line somewhere.

So, synopsis for today – lots of energy.  My stomach felt better than yesterday; I avoided all dairy to be on the safe side.  I intended to go to the gym to get in some cardio, but it was super cold, and when I drove by the gym, it looked super busy.  So I super didn’t go.

Now I better head off to bed to read and to get my eyes away from the freakish, unnatural laptop light.

Good night all!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 8

heather

We spent the night at Mom & Dad’s last night, so I didn’t make my usual breakfast of eggs and sautéed veggies.  Instead I had a slice of Mom’s spinach quiche.  It was very rich (made with spinach, onions, eggs, cream and lots o’ cheese), but very tasty.  It did have a crust on it, but I pulled most of it off.

We got back to the QC in time to go to the gym.  One of today’s challenges (from The Primal Blueprint 21-Day Total Body Transformation) is to do a Sprint Workout.  This involves doing brief bouts of exercise at 80 to 90 percent of your maximum heart rate.  Preferably, I would sprint outside, but since it’s snowy and muddy and cold, I “sprinted” on the exercise bike at the gym by pedaling as hard as I could for 60 sections every 5-10 minutes or so.  I’m really looking forward to better weather, so I can get outside and really get my heart going.  I’m too scared to try sprinting on the treadmill – getting the treadmill to go faster is no problem, but getting it to slow down when I’m running super fast – disaster.

For lunch Tim and I ate at Bent River.  We both had today off, so we celebrated a little bit.  I got a beer to see how it felt.  It felt alright.  It did taste a little sweeter than usual – again, maybe my taste buds have changed over this past week.  For food I got the Wisconsin Pub Burger, which consists of a hamburger topped by, oh yeah, a brat.  Of course I pulled off the bun and proceeded to make a “salad” of the burger, brat, sauerkraut, and coleslaw.  I’m sure it wasn’t the healthiest meal in the ‘verse, but it was tasty, and it kept me full until 7PM.

After lunch we did our monster grocery shopping trips to Hy Vee and Target and stocked up on veggies, nuts, and meat.  The grocery bill at HyVee was $75, which seemed like a lot for 3 bags of groceries, but they should feed us for a week.  And our meal at Bent River was $26 (with a coupon), and that only fed us one meal.

Once we returned home, Tim combined Nappa cabbage, regular cabbage, radishes, ginger, and peppers together in a glass jar to make some kimchi.  Should be ready in a couple of weeks.  If you want to see a picture, check out the link to the right, My Instagram Feed.

I had put an arm roast in the Nesco roaster at 11 this morning.  We had a little wine leftover from Friday, so I added that to the pot instead of water.  By the time we got home around 4 or 5, it was already well-done.  It tasted good, but I think I’m already starting to get roasted out.  All the roasts have this same sweetish smell to them that’s starting to get to me.  I’m planning on making some chicken in the roaster later this week.  Hopefully it won’t have that same sweet smell.

We had a late supper of a huge salad (romaine, radicchio, radishes, avocado, green & yellow peppers, and mushrooms) with chunks of the roast cut up into the salad.  I bought some olive oil from the farmer’s market on Saturday.  It’s from OliveMillGeneva.com.  I drizzled that and some apple cider vinegar over the salad.  It was quite tasty.

So tomorrow I should do another weigh-in.  I haven’t been following the diet this weekend as assiduously as I had planned, so I am just hoping for the best tomorrow.  If I haven’t gained,  I will be happy.  I am feeling really good – very energetic and positive.  Hopefully I will feel so amazing by the end of this 21 days that no one will be able to resist my proselytizing, and I will be able to convince my parents and Tim to join the fold.

And now it’s time to go to bed.  What a busy, busy. day.  How is it that 3-day weekends go by even faster than 2-day weekends!!

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness, Uncategorized

Primal Day 6 and Day 7

heather

I went to the party last night with the best of intentions.  I was going to eat primally and have, at the most, 2 glasses of red wine.

My good intentions were not enough to prevent a hangover today, unfortunately.  I drank more than I intended, partially out of an over-developed sense of not being wasteful (e.g. it would be wasteful to not use a free drink ticket), and by fault of being too nice.  Someone bought me a dirty martini, which I really did not want, but I felt obligated by their generosity to drink it.  I wish I hadn’t.  All day today I wish I hadn’t.

Food-wise, I did better.  At the party I ate a coconut chicken skewer and 1/2 a plate of shrimp stir fry (no rice, of course).  Once we got home, I snacked on pistachios.

Today, since I was not feeling the best, we did not do a whole heck of a lot.  We started off the day with a good primal breakfast – bacon, over easy eggs and a couple of left-over coconut flour pancakes.  Tim was not a fan of the pancakes, but I kinda liked them.  I would make them again, at least.

For lunch we headed to La Rancherita, a local Mexican joint.  I ordered the chicken fajitas and a side order of guacomole.  I was disappointed in the fajitas – they were super sweet.  Maybe I am more sensitive to sugar since I haven’t been eating much of it, but Tim thought they were really sweet too.  Between the mediocre food and the cash-only policy (and the in-store ATM that charges you a $1 in fees), Tim and I have now written La Rancherita off.  If we want good Mexican food in the Quad Cities, we are going to have to make it ourselves.  We’re going to have to open our own restaurant one of these days. Sleepy Chihuahua, here we come!  I’m sure I could concoct some delicious primal Mexican meals.

After lunch we retired to the house for a little nappy-poo, and then we headed to Monticello to visit the folks.  We stopped at HyVee on our way to pick up some groceries – Amana ground beef, an organic salad, yellow and green peppers, and avocado.

At Mom and Dad’s I watched Mom, Dad, and Tim eat a whole loaf of delicious-smelling, airy fresh-out-of-the-oven bread and oatmeal, banana, walnut, chocolate chunk cookies while I again filled up on pistachios.  On Day 7 the book says you can eat a non-primal favorite (as long as you think seriously about it and how it makes you feel), but I figured I used up all my free passes last night, so I refrained.

After the snack I fried up the hamburgers and made a salad with the aforementioned veggies – dousing it all with salt and pepper and balsamic vinegar and olive oil.  It was super delicious.

We finished out the evening by playing 500 (Dad & Tim beat Mom & me.  If Iwasn’t short a few brain cells from Satruday night, that never would have happened).

One good thing did come out of drinking last night.  My allergies all night were horrible.  I realized that my allergies seem to be exacerbated by alcohol.  I’m going to have to test this out over the next week.  If I was really able to find the cause of my evening/morning allergies, that would be awesome.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 5

heather

Heather Fail.  I didn’t make a post last night.  The evening just kind of got away from me, all sneaky like.  Next thing I know, Tim’s falling asleep while watching Star Trek TNG, and it’s time to hit the sack.

Breakfast was the usual.  I got kind of lazy and didn’t want to dirty a bowl, so I dropped 2 eggs right into the sautéed spinach, leeks, and onions, and then scrambled them together in the frying pan.  It wasn’t as tasty as doing a real omelette, but it will do in a pinch.

I met a few friends for lunch at Granite City.  Of course they mocked my new healthy habits. I told them that it will be I who has the last laugh, when I’m all toned and healthy, and they are still pasty and pudgy.  Well, I didn’t call them pasty and pudgy, but I should have for making fun of me.  ANYWAY, I got the Bruschetta salad with no bread (the bread is the tastiest part of the salad – thin slices of French bread, spread with butter and toasted cheese.  Sigh).   The salad had greens (of course), olives, feta, onions and chicken.  It was really tasty.  It came with a free soup, which caught me off guard, so I ordered the clam chowder.  It was creamy, rich, and delicious.  I basically just dunked my spoon in and licked it off, I did end up accidentally eating one of the potatoes in it.  Plus, I probably ate a good amount of cornstarch.  But it was soooo tasty.

For a snack, again I had a couple of kiwi (I just remembered that I left one on my desk at work.  Hope it doesn’t get too disgusting over this 3-day weekend…) with macademia nuts.  With not eating a lot of sugar, they seem soooo sweet to me.  They are organic, so they shouldn’t be modified to be sweeter.  Well, I guess they could be bred to be sweeter.  Anyway, I think I’ll stay away from kiwi for now – makes me all phlegmy.

For supper, I basically cleaned out the cupboards and fridge and threw everything into a stew pot – the rest of the arm roast with bone and broth, 1/2 a head of cabbage, some leeks, onions, celery, a can of chicken broth, 2 cans of diced tomatoes, a can of tomato sauce, 4 gloves of crushed garlic, garlic power, a little thyme, a little basil, salt, pepper, and you got yourself a stew!  Tim and I both added a little Tabasco to our bowls, and it was pretty good for a kitchen-remnant stew!

Since it’s Friday night, I did enjoy a glass of wine – Tim picked up a Tempranillo from HyVee.  I restrained myself to one glass.  It was very nice.  It helped calm my mind down before bed-time.

My allergies since Monday had been fantastic – until last night.  My eyes were itchy, I started sneezing a lot, and the roof my mouth got all itchy.  Was it the wine?  All those tomatoes?  I don’t know, but I don’t like it.  I’ll have to see how today goes.  I will probably be drinking more wine (our company party is tonight), and I’ll eat some of the leftover stew.  So maybe I’ll have to see how tomorrow goes instead.

This morning for breakfast I am going to make pancakes with coconut flour.  Tim is going  to get us some bacon and berries from HyVee.  I can’t wait. After that I’ll have to make a trip back to the Farmer’s Market to restock on eggs and grass-fed meat.

I woke up this morning from a fevered dream about shopping at Sephora. I had stopped really quick over my lunch hour, to search for just a few things.  Of course, they didn’t have any of the things I wanted, the store was all disorganized, and the stuff I did find, I kept losing somehow or realized after I had in my hand for awhile that it had already been opened and used.  It was a bad, bad dream.  So I woke up and came out to our frigid living room and wrote a blog post.

So that’s the story for yesterday and a little bit of this morning.  Hopefully I can stay pretty much on the wagon today, despite this party tonight.

Cooking/Recipes, Health & Fitness

Primal Day 4

heather

See now, doesn’t that look delicious?! It was delicious.  I couldn’t eat it all, though.  I think that eating primally has made my stomach smaller, which is yet another good thing I’ve experienced on this ‘”diet” in the four days I’ve been on it.

For lunch today, I had to get creative, as I went out to Azteca with my boss and our friend, Gus.  I ordered fajitas with chicken and steak.  I topped it with the lettuce & guacamole and left the rice, beans, and tortillas untouched.  Next time I’ll have to tell them to not even bring those things out.  Even though I only ate 1/3 of the food proffered, I was still full at the end of lunch.

For a snack I ate two kiwi, which from all accounts is a magic superfood, and a few macademia nuts to mellow out the sugar rush.

Marta and I were going a little stir crazy on account of the bad weather preventing us from taking our morning and afternoon walks, so instead we hit the stairs and did 5 loops from the east stairwell, down through the main floor atrium, and up the west stairwell.  We got a few queer looks, but it will be we who have the last laugh – what with our healthy bodies and toned calves and whatnot.

After our stairwell trek, we got back down to business, which this afternoon consisted of planning a bake sale fundraiser for our Junior Achievement bowling team.  It’s going to be a doozie of a bake sale.  One of our teammates makes these awesome gourmet cupcakes.  Once the cupcakes even had an Oreo in the bottom of it!  It was a delightful surprise.  Of course I won’t be able to eat any of them, but I can sure sell the heck out of them.  I will be making my world famous (at least family & work famous) chocolate chip cookies, and I’ll also be selling my hand-made crocheted coozies for $5.  The lighting in here sucks right now, but you get the idea.

They are delightful.  Hopefully people will buy them and give me tons of orders for more, so I can quit my job and start crocheting coozies for $10 an hour.

If you care to make a donation to my team, you can do it online here.  We need to raise at least $300, and we’re about 1/2 way there.  I have a feeling that our awesome bake sale will raise like $40.

Okay, I’m back from that tangent.  As I mentioned yesterday, I was going to cook a roast today.  And I did!  It didn’t turn out half-bad.  It may have been slightly overcooked, but it was still tasty.  I re-heated the leftover brussel sprouts from yesterday and steamed a head of broccoli.   It was a very good meal.  I may have to resort to have some chocolate for dessert tonight, though, because Tim is torturing me by making cookies.  I will have to substitute.

On to another tangent, it snowed today!  Look at poor Lucent.

And finally, in regards to exercise.  I was supposed to do 20 to 60 minutes of cardio today, but, well, it snowed, and I didn’t want to go to the gym.  So there.