A Topless Macaroon

Hey bloggies! I hope everyone is having a glorious Saturday morning. Mine has been very typical.

Breakfast

I couldn’t help but go for my lemon-poppyseed pancakes again. A little less on the lemon, a lot more on the poppy seeds.

Covered with microwaved strawberries and a banana

This time it needed just a bit more lemon. But it was most definitely delicious.

Farmer’s Market

The roommates really wanted to go to the Farmer’s Market this weekend again, and I wasn’t going to resist! I planned out my whole week’s meals around the grass-fed ground beef I knew that they were going to have there.

My loot:

Grass fed beef, zucchini, strawberries and my very first macaroon. I took a bite right when I got it hence why its topless

Guilt-Free Lemon Poppyseed Pancakes

Hey bloggies! I hope everyone is getting as much sunshine as we are.

Breakfast

As my weekend usual, I partook in two breakfasts

A small bowl of corn puffs, millet and special K topped with almond milk at 6AM so that I wouldn’t make too much noise in the kitchen and disturb the roommates.

Later I enjoyed guilt-free lemon poppyseed pancakes

In the batter:

• 3/8 c. buckwheat pancake mix (I halved the recipe on the box)
• 1 egg white
• 1/4 c. almond milk
• 1/2 t applesauce (instead of oil)
• 1T poppyseed
• zest of one lemon

While the pancakes were on the frying I put 5 frozen strawberries in the microwave for one minute

And used the leftover lemon in my water

The pancakes turned out beautifully. I topped them with strawberry sauce and one banana

The combination of strawberry + banana + lemon was perfect. I could have used a little less lemon and a little more poppy seeds though.

The best part was that the syrup was just strawberries and the pancakes were whole wheat. I could really eat this beauty with my eyes as well. I also at this baby SLOW, as in my body had been infused with molasses. I could really take my time and devour each of the flavors. I highly recommend this!

Farmer’s Market

It’s a glorious day today so Richard, Cally and I headed out to the Farmer’s Market. I forgot my camera (doh!) but when I saw grass-fed beef I instantly thought of Evan. Cally bought a pound for $3. If the beef gets a good review from her I will definitely pick some up the next time we go!

My findings included some cheese

And a beautiful cribbage board for my brother’s birthday in a couple of weeks.

Richard shared a slice of his chocolate-cherry sourdough which was to die for!

It was infused with both cherries and chocolate chips and tasted like a healthy chocolate cake

Anyone else go to a farmer’s market today? Did you have any good finds?!

Blender Happy

Between all of my activities today, constantly running in and out of the apartment, my blender was a very happy guy.

He blended my first breakfast of the morning, the banana-coconut cream

Farmer’s Market

Two of my roommates, Cally and Richard, and I headed off to Saturday Market soon after my first breakfast.

Richard got a scone and Cally got a cinnamon roll for Jeremy

I desperately needed some food so we headed to the cute food court

I ended up getting a Crepe filled with spinach, onion and LOTS of feta cheese

It was absolutely delicious. It had a lot more cheese than I had expected, but that just may have made it even better

My only goodie was a $2.50 bag of Arugala. I’ve never tried Arugala before!

Lunch

A few hours later my blender got some action with the cocoa-nut cherry smoothie from the smoothie compilation by The Fitnessista

It was sadly only okay.

Afterwards I dashed off to my sorority’s “BBQ” which offered hamburger and chicken burgers, chips, fruit salad and cherry pie.

I ate a couple sun chips and a good amount of fruit salad.

Feeling like a penguin after eating so much, I waddled to my studio to do some quick drawings.

Pottery

I then raced back to go to a pottery place with Cally.

I painted a bowl for my future salads

I loved how the leaves and the flowers turned out. Not too fond of the funky giraffe though. The stencil worked horribly. I could have done a much better job just eyeing it. Oh well.

Cally made a bunny plate for her mom

She was really happy about how it turned out

Dinner

Once again the blender got some action mixing up Chia Chili Cheese for some supreme nachos!

I added about 6 T of nutritional yeast instead of two because it didn’t taste cheesy enough for me with the two. The grocery store didn’t have yellow bell peppers this time, so I had to use orange instead. However it was still absolutely delicious on top of my nachos! I have some extra that I put in the fridge but I have a feeling it won’t stand for tomorrow.

Supreme Nachos

• About 20 Blue Corn Chips
• Spring Salad mix
• black beans
• brown rice
• tomato
• red bell pepper
• avocado
• Chobani greek yogurt (for the “sour cream”
• all topped with Chia Chili Cheese sauce

It was really good! I loved how I could “indulge” in supreme nachos, with out really indulging as far as it being unhealthy.

My blender got its fair share of a workout today that’s for sure

What is your favorite “indulgence” that you make a healthy version of?

Double trouble

I hope everyone is having a great Sunday evening. My day was spent running errands and studying.

First we have to back track to yesterday.

I snacked on the blueberry goat cheese that I got yesterday at the farmer’s market on top of some Mary’s Crackers.

Dinner was eaten shoveled in my mouth at 4:00 due to having to be at my sorority at 5

A goat-cheese & guava quesadilla (recipe from Barefoot Contessa), with Baja-style corn leftovers and a baby salad beast filled with avocado, red bell pepper and tomato with pear dressing from Trader Joe’s.

The quesadilla was the real star here. It tasted sweet and decedent like a crepe! Absolute LOOOOOOVE.

After the sorority function, we went back to the sorority house and chilled for a while. The sorority house isn’t filled with very healthy eats, lets just say. However apples and oranges are always available so I cut an apple (with a plastic fork), sprinkled some cinnamon and tossed it into the microwave for 45 seconds. I actually had two guys stand behind me and say how hot I was for “cooking” and not just top ramen. Wow. Anyways, everyone wanted a taste of it and loved it! I’m so sad I don’t have a picture of it, but just imagine apple slices with cinnamon on it. If I’m making this again I’m demanding at least a metal butter knife.

This morning’s omelette was posted earlier, so it’s time now for some lunch-action!

No, ladies and gentlemen you are not seeing double. I had another guava jelly & goat cheese quesadilla and a baby salad beast. I can’t get over how much the quesadilla tastes like a crepe!!! It’s so fantastic

I ran off to do some errands. Stopped at Target to pick up a few things but at the check-out line realized that I had forgotten my wallet. I had to run back to the apartment then run back again to Target to actually buy them. I swear my shopping trips can’t ever go right.

I also stopped at Trader Joe’s where I kept in mind the two parts of my grocery shopping goals. My first goal discussed earlier today was to Limit the Bill, by only spending $75 a week on groceries. The second part of my goal, Eat It, Not Buy It, is making me eat the food I already have stocked up instead of buying a lot more.

I have a very limited food storage space that includes half a cabinet for foods I use most often and two small boxes in my bookshelf for foods I don’t use as much.

Yeah, that’s all the room I have. Oh, well and some floor space for cereal boxes.

I apologize profusely for the horrendous camera pics, but I guess it’s better than nothing.

Anyways, so in order to make room and not have food shoved in every nook and cranny I’m going to try to eat what I have, and limit what I buy.

In that case, my haul wasn’t very big from Trader Joe’s

Turkey breast, Oatmeal bread, and Indian Fare’s Jaipur Vegetable and a reusable bag.

I’m very, very, very excited to try the Jaipur Vegetables

I had to rush off to a meeting, which wasn’t bad for once. Hoorah! It tends to help when I’m active in the conversation.

But after I was starving for some stir fry.

I grilled a turkey cutlet season with salt and pepper, and put it off to the side. Then sauteed frozen stir fry vegetables while washing the noodles.

And finally I combined the turkey, stir fry, noodles, 1 T of olive oil and 1 1/2 T of Stir fry sauce over low heat to come up with this beautiful sight.

It was all pretty good except for the turkey which was really tasteless.

I used these noodles

I didn’t even realize the calories on this guy until after cooking them! 20 calories per serving, so 40 total. Holy cow!

I just calculated up the calories on my meal and I’m honestly astounded. I’m not a usual calorie counter, but here’s the stats:

Noodles: 40 cals

Veggies: 45 cals

Turkey: 70 cals

Olive Oil: 20 cals

Stir Fry sauce: 30 cals

Total: 205 calories

Holy smokes! That is nothing for how big and satisfying it was! It’s been 3 hours and I’m still full.

Wow. Well it’s off to bed for me soon. I hope you all get some rest for the week ahead

Are you a calorie counter? Do you just watch them a bit, or not at all?

I tend to as what I call it, “know what I’m eating.” I look for what a serving size is and the sodium and sugar levels as well, plus scanning through the ingredients quickly.

Sunday Stuff

I love Sundays. I love the mentality of a day of rest. Not that I actually do rest on this day, but it gives me more time to catch up on life. Anyone else absolutely love Sundays?

My camera was left at a friend’s house last night so I had to take all my pictures from breakfast on my phone AND I don’t have pictures to post right now of my scrumptious dinner from last night! Humph. I will have to update you on dinner later today when I get my camera back.

This week I’m implementing two policies. The first is Limit the Bill. I currently spend way too much at the grocery store, around $100, every single week. I am going to try to limit this to bill to $75 for a while then eventually spend only $50. Two of my roommates spend $50 between them, so I should be able to meet that since I’m only spending for one person. Then again, I don’t buy cinnamon rolls because they are $2 or buy what ever cereal or bread is on sale at the time like they do, but I should be able to get to that while still eating they way I do.

The second policy I will reveal most likely in today’s nightly post

Okay, back to the best part: the food!

Today’s breakfast was inspired by the farm fresh eggs I bought yesterday at the farmer’s market.

I just love that the eggs are brown!

I grilled red pepper, onion, turkey, mushrooms and wilted the spinach. I then tossed in some tomato and added two whole eggs and attempted to make an omelette.

For the side I toasted half an english muffin and topped with maca, cinnamon and mesquite. I also cut up 1/2 of a small banana and added two strawberries.

Ta-da!

So my omelette-flipping skills need some serious help, but at least it tastes the same. Right?

Off to super busy day. I have to do a lot of “Sunday stuff” including studying and cleaning. I tend to like this though. What do you usually do on Sundays?

A Farm Fresh Saturday

Good afternoon bloggies! I hope you are having a spectacular weekend and enjoying my new layout and header!!!

The morning started off with another mixing of the cereals

First started off with the Special K, then followed by Life and Annie’s

and overfilled with puffed Kamut

Only a bit more Kamut left, then I’m back to my beloved millet!

I was soon off to the local farmer’s market with my roommate Richard. We had to run to catch the bus, but we made it.

I came home with some great loot.

Farm fresh Blueberry Ginger Goat Cheese which was snacked on immediately when I got home

A Summer Strawberry fruit wrap eaten at the track meet

Farm-fresh eggs!

I was rushed to get the to the track meet, but on the way had to stop to take pictures of these gorgeous flowers

They are so pretty! I have been seeing them on campus and I was really excited to finally take pictures of them

The track meet was fantastic! A little windy, but great weather overall.

B-e-a-utiful form

Ashton Eaton, world record holder

the beautiful hurdles

I’m really excited for the upcoming meets. I just love watching people attain new PR’s and records. Plus with all the events going on, it keeps my mind entertained.

On the way back I stumbled upon some students playing Quidditch.

I love Harry Potter and I guess they are running around so I approve.

I have a sorority function later tonight. Have a great rest of your Saturday!

What is your favorite part about a farmer’s market? I love all the free samples!