Broccoli, Brussel Sprouts, & Buffalo Chili
Monday night I made this chili except I used ground, organic, grass-fed buffalo, instead of ground, organic, grass-fed beef. Please pardon my need to justify my meat consumption by listing its redeeming qualities. Anyway, this was my first time cooking with buffalo and my second time-consuming it, but it is a great lean alternative if you’re looking for that ground beef taste with less fat. Honestly, I am so new to the world of meat so taking my opinion may not be the wisest, but I definitely enjoyed the buffalo substitute . In addition to substituting the buffalo, I also added:
- extra brussel sprouts (maybe 10-15)
- extra broccoli another small head
- 1/2 of a butternut squash cubed and peeled.
- 1 additional 14.5 oz can of stewed tomatoes
- 1/2-3/4 c. extra water
I also topped with:
- a sprinkling of organic cheese
- a dabble of hot sauce
- and I lined the bowl with oodles of mixed greens
This is such a great meal that you can eat for many nights & lunches to come. The husband and I ate it for dinner again last night and we still have at least one more full meal for the both of us and perhaps another one. The gift that keeps on giving.
Hope you are all having a happy Wednesday!
At what point in your life did you feel your best?
As a part of the holistic health coach curriculum that I am in, we do what are called health histories with fellow students and anybody else who wishes to be our victim. This afternoon I did a health history via tele with a fellow student whom I had never met. One of the questions on the health history is at what point in your life did you feel your best. After chatting with my health history partner, I realized that I felt my best earlier this summer and it occurred to me that this was the case because it was the first time in a decade (or longer) that I was not on a diet, challenge or any other restrictive eating plan. I simply ate what I felt gave me the most energy and enjoyed the freedom to do so. I also lost weight and stopped being so obsessed with the nutrition content of every morsel that crossed my lips. Hmmm. One would’ve thought that with such positive results, I would have stayed on the no diet, diet. But alas, old habits die hard and I am a sucker for trying and experimenting with dietary theories. I love nutrition and I literally cannot stop reading about it and throwing the theory of the month on for size, hence The 21 Day Primal Challenge and the 1,000 other undocumented attempts at going “primal,” vegan, raw and Lord knows what else. I am not for or against any of these diets or whatever one wishes to label them, but I am realizing that the more I try to pigeon-hole myself into one way of eating, the less I enjoy food and the nutritional benefits of it, which sort of defeats the purpose of it all. No?. The deeper I get into my curriculum the more I am aware of the conflicting evidence on the vastly different dietary theories, so if every theory is proven correct to one degree or another, how can one know the right way. Perhaps, the answer does not lie in the wonder diet of the month, but in ourselves? Perhaps. I know this revelation is not a revelation to most, but ironically for the past 20-30 years I have taken advice on my very favorite topic from everybody, but myself. Well, no longer will such madness ensue. This does not mean that I will stop learning and putting to use my nutritional knowledge, it just means that I am going to stop eating a certain way just because it fits nicely in Plan A, B, or C. I am an equal opportunity employer at this point. As you can imagine, this throws a bit of a monkey wrench in The 21 Day Total Body Transformation Challenge, so it looks like this is the end of the Two day Total Body Mind Transformation Challenge. I told you I was not good at sticking to these things. You were warned.
As a side note, I actually feel great and I may even continue to eat Primal (or I may not), but I would prefer to do so because I wanna and not because I bullied myself in to doing so.
On another side note, the book that sort of spurred the no diet, diet this past summer was little Gem:
the cover/ title is a little cheesy, but just trust me on this one
And with these very deep thoughts, I am off. My apologies to anybody who was anxiously awaiting the results of the 21 Day Total Body Transformation Challenge. Something tells me are less than a few. 
Day Uno
Today is the first day of 21 Day Total Body Transformation Challenge. Yikes, that sounds so dramatic. To get the deets on this madness check out Friday’s post.
In preparation for said challenge, I cleaned out my cupboards and the fridge. It was sad to see some old pals go. However, there may or may not be a bag of oat bran in the way back of the top shelf in case of an emergency. After cleaning out, I restocked with primal approved goodies.
the list
Upon restocking, I washed veggies, so they are ready for their call of duty for this week’s eats.
veggies in the bath
Because I am planning on making this chili tonight and I still have hard boiled eggs left over from last week, the only food preparation I did for this week, was to make coconut spice primal muffins. These muffins are an adaptation of the spice bread that I made a few weeks ago. I had to adapt this recipe because I wanted to use up the coconut yogurt in the fridge, cut down on the maple syrup content, I was low on almond meal and out of un-hard boiled eggs. These four factors are responsible for the creation of the coconut spice primal muffin.
not the prettiest of muffins, but pretty darn tasty
The Goods:
- 1 cup Canned Pumpkin Puree
- 1 container Coconut Milk Yogurt Plain
- 1 1/2 cups Almond Meal Flour
- 1/3 cup Coconut Flour
- 1/2 cup Vanilla Spice Hemp Protein Powder
- 1/3 cup Maple Syrup
- 1 tsp Cinnamon Ground
- 1/2 tsp Nutmeg, Ground
- 1/4 tsp Cloves, Ground
- 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
- 1/2 tsp Sea Salt
- 2 tbsp Flax, Ground
- Pre heat oven to 350
- make a flax egg by combining 2T ground flax w/ 6T warm water and whisk together then let sit for 3-5min (or you could use 2 regular eggs)
- combine all wet ingredients
- add all dry ingredients to wet ingredients in medium size mixing bowl and stir
- line muffin/cupcake tin w/ coconut oil or paper liners
- put batter in muffin/ cupcake tin.
- bake for 50 min
coconut spice primal muffins
Nutrition Stats:
not too shabby
So on my first day on the official primal bandwagon, here is my breakfast:
chocolate, peppermint latte & coconut spice muffins topped with a dabble of Kerry Gold butter
Although eggs are the suggested primal breakfast, I cannot do eggs for breakfast, so I am going the muffin route to ensure this primal transition sticks. The peppermint latte includes coffee, hemp milk, stevia, organic cacao and peppermint extract, which are all primal approved ingredients, but, again, it is suggested to enjoy your coffee black, so I may be stretching the legal limits. However, I am far less likely to stop the challenge completely with these tweaks.
On a different note: the chronicles of Burt and the blow dryer.
not so sure about this machine blowing hot air
warming up to hot air blowing machine
love for hot air blowing machine. I spy a pug tongue.
Off to the gym.
Happy Cyber Monday!
workouts for week of 11_20_11
workouts for 11/20/11
sunday:
20 min walk
mini cook-a-thon
Monday:
40 min dog walk
Elliptical w/ arms for 20 min
Treadmill workout:
- 1 min 2.0 incline at 3.9 speed
- 4 min 2.0 incline at 5.8 speed
- 2 min 2.0 incline at 6.0 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 6.5 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 7.0 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 7.5 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 8.0 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 6.5 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 7.0 speed
- 30 sec 1.0 incline at 8.5 speed
- 30 sec 2.0 incline at 6.0 speed
- 1 min 1.5 incline at 6.0 speed
- 1 min 9.0 incline at 6.0 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 6.0 speed
- 1 min 1.0 incline at 5.8 speed
- 5 min 15.0 incline at 4.1 speed
- 1 min 2.0 incline at 4.0 speed
10 min stationary bike at level 4 above 80 rpm while typing this workout up
10 min Various upper body exercises w/ free weights
10 min mat exercises & Yoga
10 min sauna stretch
Tuesday:
20min elliptical w/ arms
15 min stairclimber w/ a few various intervals
6 min rowing machine
10 min lower body exercises
a few minutes of yoga stretching
Wednesday:
cook-a-thon
Thursday: Turkey Day
15 min elliptical w/ arms
same treadmill workout as Monday, but w/ a few extra sprints
3 min rowing
15 min mat exercises that include planks, side planks, crunches, vinyasa yoga flows & poses.
10 min sauna session w/ a few exercises to make me sweat more.
Friday:
45 min dog walk
30 min elliptical
25 min bike altering levels and speed
15 in sauna stretching
Saturday:
50 min dog walk
15 min elliptical w/arms
Treadmill workout:
1min at level .5 and 3.9 speed
1min at level 1.0 and 6.0 speed
1min at level 1.0 and 6.5 speed
1min at level 1.0 and 7.0 speed
1min at level 1.0 and 7.5 speed
1min at level 1.0 and 8.0 speed
Repeat 2 more times increasing the incline by .5 each time
1min at level 15 and 4.1speed-holding rails
30sec at level 15 and 6.1speed-holding rails
Repeat 1x
Stationary bike 5 min level 4 above 80 rpm
15min various upper body exercises w/ free weights
5min stretch w/ yoga
10 min sauna w/ stretch
off to cook for the week to prepare my primal eats.
My new purchase
I have dabbled in Primal & Paleo eats in the past and I know it helped reduce my sugar cravings, I also had oodles of energy and my digestion was much improved. However, I only stick to it for about 2 days because I begin to make exceptions. The first exception always starts with a little brown rice protein powder, then a little oat bran and before I know it, my diet no longer resembles that of a Primal being, which I am fine with if I wasn’t so dang curious to see how I would feel if I really, truly adopted a primal lifestyle. My Achille’s heal is sugar and I have a sneaking suspicion that if I really gave The Primal lifestyle the ole’ college try, my sugar love affair addiction would be greatly reduced. I know this because in the little effort I have actually put towards eating more Primal and exercising in a more Primal manner, my sugar intake has gotten much lower and the cravings are much nicer, so imagine if I went full gusto? Well, kids, I do believe I might really give it a whirl. As of this Monday, I will be embarking on The 21 Day Total Body Transformation. My goodness that sounds intense. I so hesitate to post this in writing because I NEVER finish any sort of diet or exercise challenge. EVER. For instance, my challenge this week was to attend more group exercise classes. Ummm it’s Friday and I haven’t attended one. Nice work. Anyway, I am hoping that over the past six months I have dipped my toe into the primal waters enough times, that this may not feel like much of a challenge at all. Side Note: if you have no idea what all this “Primal” nonsense is, you are not alone. If you want to get to the bottom of the primal mystery then I highly suggest starting with the blog Mark’s Daily Apple, you will get more info than you ever wanted. Fear not, I will report my findings, so stay tuned!
Happy Black Friday!
On the menu
I write this post while sipping on my chocolate mint latte, all the while patting myself on the back. Damn this latte is good and there are many more good eats to come in the next 24 hours. Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday. Since our family is way too far away, we do T-day with our group of friends, which have quickly become our Oregon family. This year (and last year) we are heading over to Jess, Cody and Maxx’s house for the food frenzy. The lovely hosts are vegan, so this a BYOM affair. Keith is bringing a rib roast and there is rumor of turkey to be brought by another couple (Jack & Emily). The vegans are going to be surrounded by meat.
My contribution to the affair include the following four recipes I stole from two of my favorite bloggers. Ashley and Sarah. We are on a first name basis. Yep, they have no idea who I am.
These guys are just waiting to me made into magic.
The recipe I most excited about is the Raw Cashew Dream Cake I got from the blog My New Roots. I pretty much followed this recipe to a tee, except I doubled the recipe and put it in an 8″ spring pan rather than a 7″ and I used a medley of frozen berries. Unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of a slice of it to show off how beautiful this guy is on the inside, because he is still in the freezer anxiously awaiting his debut. I do have these photos though:
1st layer- coconut flakes
2nd layer pecan & date pie crust
3rd layer cashew, lemony, vanilla-ny, goodness
I am obsessed with this layer. The vanilla bean speckles kill me
Top layer. He is dressed and ready to go.
Next up. I decided to try to make the Black Bean Chili Cherry Cookies from My New Roots too. Sadly, I did not love these. They were a little too spicy. I will try to make them again and reduce the cayenne. I doubled this recipe too, so perhaps it would’ve been better if I kept with the original configuration.
Today I am swiping another of My New Roots’s recipes. I am going to try my hand at Sarah’s Poppy Seed- Crusted Butternut Squash with Pomegranates. Obviously I am obsessed with this blog. I promise you will be too. I do not have a picture because he has yet to be born.
I do have a picture of the Pumpkin Spice Hummus that I swiped from Ashley over at The Edible Perspective. I followed this recipe to point and it turned out swimmingly.
nailed it.
Off to walk the pug. I hope everybody has a truly amazing Thanksgiving!!
hemp “cheese”
This is kind of a random post given all of the hoop la around food in these next couple of days, but I have not made any of my T-day goodies yet, so I will report my findings on Mr. Hemp Cheese instead. Makes sense. No?
I was thinking of taking dairy out of my life, so I decided to try hemp “cheese.” Most vegan alternative products are filled with oodles of soy, and other processed nonsense, so I do not think the so called vegan health foods are very healthy. However, the ingredient declaration on this “cheese” is pretty clean. I tried said cheese with a little apple. Truth be told, it tastes nothing like cheese, but more like mustard. It you enjoy the taste of mustard, then this is the “cheese” for you.
yum?
Well on that thrilling note, I am off to the gym then the cook-a-thon begins.
Happy Day of Turkey (or tofurkey) to all!!!
Gluten Free Pumpkin Spice Granola
I think at one point I promised to stop posting recipes with pumpkin. Turns out, I lied.
I had some pumpkin pie puree that needed to be used up, so granola it is. This granola is filled with good for you ingredients and tastes oh, so yummers. If you like your granola to err on the sweet side, then I would up the honey or maple syrup content.
I got my inspiration for this recipe here from Ashley at The Edible Perspective. If you have not checked out her blog, you must!
The Goods:
- 1 & 1/4 c Gluten-free rolled oats
- 2T chia seeds
- 2T ground flax
- 4T raw walnut pieces
- 2T raw pecan pieces
- 1T raw honey
- 1T maple syrup
- 3T organic pumpkin pie puree
- 2T shredded coconut
- 1/2T coconut oil
- 1t vanilla
- 1t cinnamon
- 1t nutmeg
- pinch of cloves
- 1/8t sea salt
How To:
- Mix all wet ingredients in a medium mixing bowl
- add spices to wet ingredients. stir
- add dry ingredients to wet. stir
- put stirred goodness on baking sheet lined with parchment
- put in one at 325 for 15 min. stir every 5 mi
Enjoy a top:
coconut yogurt:
love
Or if you get a wild hair up your fanny, enjoy on top of pumpkin spiced oat bran:
can one eat too much pumpkin?
Off to the grocery store to pick up some day-of-turkey eats.
This week’s eats
I had a mini cook-a-thon yesterday because I am trying to save my energy for Wednesday and Thursday. Actually that is not true. Truth be told, I really do not have much to cook for the day of thanks, so there is no need for energy reserves. I was just having a lazy Sunday with ma fellas, so cooking wasn’t going to make the cut. However, I had some goods that needed to be cooked sooner rather than later, so a mini cook-a-thon ensued and I must say, last week my cook-a-thon eats came in very handy. I made some superb salads that rivaled Whole Foods salad bar. I don’t wanna brag…
On with the fruit of yesterday’s labor:
1. four hard boiled eggs. Oops I forgot to photograph them.
2. worcestershire roasted brussel sprouts and brocoli.
Broc
Brus
The Star of this recipe:
Gluten Free Worcestershire! It does exist!
How to:
- pre heat oven to 350
- combine 2T Worcestershire sauce, 2T coco oil, 1/2t in medium mixing bowl
- add 3 medium heads of washed and chopped broccoli to mixture. Make sure all trees are coated
- put broccoli on baking pan lined w/ parchment paper sprinkle w/ a dash of garlic salt
- roast for 35-40 min- stirring every 10 minute
- Repeat steps 2-5 for Brussels.
3. Sweet & Spicy Roasted Carnival Squash
carni squash
In this creation:
the four amigos
Confession: the recipe for this was not amazing, so I am going to tweak it a bit and report my findings.
This pumpkin spiced granola was fairly amazing.
amazing
confession: recipe coming tomorrow.
Need more amazing?
pug
Off to the gym, for some form of group exercise. Maybe.
Workouts for the week of 11/13/11
This week was not my best week of workouts. I had a weird week. I really wanted to workout a lot of the days and then poof I didn’t go or I went then I left shortly upon arrival. Good times. This up and coming week I am going to give group exercise a whirl. This is major for me because I have been anti group workouts for the past several years. There really is no reason for this other than the two very simple facts that: 1. I have social anxiety and 2. I hate having to be somewhere at a certain time. These simply are not valid reasons and I am bound and determined to give group sweating the ole college try. Here’s hopin’…
However, lets focus on last week- shall we?.
workouts for 11/13/11
Sunday:
cook-a-thon. What? this counts I was on my feat for at least four hours and there were a few times I broke a sweat
15 min dog walk
Monday:
20 min dog walk- the weather is getting crusty here, so out long dog walk days might be numbered
10 min walk treadmill. true story: went the gym, got on the treadmill, after 10 minutes I put on my sweatshirt and left. Well done
Tuesday:
30 min dog walk
15 min elliptical w/ no arms at an 8 incline and a 7 resistance
treadmill workout:
1 min at 2.0 and 4.0 speed
2 min at 2.0 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 6.5 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 7.0 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 7.5 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 8.0 speed
30 sec at 1.0 and 8.5 speed
1 min 30 sec at 1.0 6.0 speed
1 min at 8.5 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 6.0 speed
5 min at 15 and 4.0 speed
bike workout:
1 min at level 4 and stayed above 80 RPM
1 min at level 5 and stayed above 80 RPM
1 min at level 6 and stayed above 80 RPM
1 min at level 7 and stayed above 80 RPM
1 min at level 8 and stayed above 80 RPM
REPEAT
cool down for 1 minute
20 minutes various upper body strength training exercise.
5 min yoga
Wednesday:
pure cardio Insanity DVD
30 min dog walk- this weather is killing me
Thursday:
30 min dog walk
Friday:
15 min elliptical w/arms
treadmill workout
1 min at 2 and 3.9 speed
1 min at 2.0 and 5.7 speed
1 min at 2.0 and 5.9 speed
2 min at 2.0 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 6.5 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 7.0 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 7.5 speed
1 min at 1.0 and 8.0 speed
30 sec at 1.0 and 8.5 speed
1 min 30 sec at 2.0 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 9.0 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 2.0 and 6.0 speed
1 min at 2.0 and 5.9 speed
1 min at 2.0 and 5.7 speed
4 min at 15 and 4.1 speed
1 min at 2 and 3.9 speed
5 min on rowing machine
10 min of various lower body weight training
7 min yoga and abs
Saturday:
20 min cardio yoga off of Exercise TV
20 min dog walk
Off to bed.
Nighty, night.
