Happy Birthday Hubby!!

Wednesday was Mikey's b-day, the big 3-0! I had to work so I couldn't do a whole lot the day of... I laid out a steak for him as his birthday treat. 

Breakfast was a Larabar and apple slices, snack was the same old thing, lunch was a tofurkey sammy with a soygurt. Trader Joe's soy yogurt is delicious by the way!! 

When I got home I hurried up and threw all of our CSA goodies in the fridge and excitedly opened my first Conscious Box!!! (More on that later...)  Then I delved into dinner.  I made steamed purple potatoes, tomato salad, braised bok choy, and I sauteed some garlic and beans with some smoked salt for protein. Mike had a Del Monico steak with smoked salt. He seemed to enjoy it quite heartily. 

Delicious summer meal... I need more tomatoes ASAP!!!

I didn't know what to get Mike for his birthday so I raided his Amazon wish list which was barren.. Therefore, all he got  was some new batteries for his XBox controllers, some shirts and underwear.  But luckily a friend gave me a great idea for a fun birthday gift which is currently en route!! I hope he likes it! 

I also made him black bean brownies... I wasn't up for making a full blown cake after the day I had, which I feel really bad about but I don't think he minded.  I think he enjoyed the brownies!! 

He dug into it before I could take a picture haha!

So, happy birthday to my cute, loving, and wonderful husband!!  May you have many, many more years of  health and happiness! 

Cooking with a Vengeance

Whelp... I tried two recipes from one of my cookbooks and they weren't successes... one my fault, one not my fault. Both recipes are from the book "Vegan with a Vengeance" by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. I made the peach cobbler but added some blueberries since I was short on peaches. Maybe it's because I have the Nook version of the book but the cobbler batter was so liquidy, I feel there had to be a mistake with the measurements. I checked them, double checked, and triple checked to make sure it was correct before I added in the liquid. Who knows. The fact is my cobbler was flat and disappointing. Boo! 

But tastes delicious, yaaaaaay! 

Sorry it looks so terrible. I'm ashamed and disappointed...

My second recipe I tried out was the frittata recipe from the same book, I did a variation of the optional add-ins. I included: mushrooms, onions, sun-dried tomatoes, olives, and basil.  What can I say, I like my frittatas and scrambles Italiano. 

This here begins a tale of tragedy... I wish Poe were still alive to tell it better. 

I began by crumbling up the tofu and adding some of the seasoning when I realized I hadn't pulled the nooch (nutritional yeast) out of the cubbard.  I looked high and low for my little jar of nooch and it was nowhere to be found! There was no nooch in my household- how could this be? I was devastated, my frittata was ruined!! What on earth could I use to replace the NOOCH? Ugh.. So I got a little crazy and panicky and added a bag of non-dairy galaxy cheese. What the heck. I'm an idiot... 

For breakfast, I'm having my failure of a frittata which looks like a goopy scramble and some sliced apples. Snack will be soygurt and some almonds. 

Lunch will be leftover beans and greens I found in the fridge. Whoopee. Not. 

Now the clincher here, amongst all this ridiculous misfortune I experienced, is what I found while packing my lunch long after the fact.............

I don't even want to talk about it. 

Tofutti Cutie Patootie

I've been feeling really guilty about the fact that I have probably 10+ vegan cookbooks and I rarely actually cook out of them. I'm usually doing all that I can to play catch up with my CSA goodies and I just cook by the seat of my pants.  Well I was rummaging through my veggie drawers when I found that yuca root I bought a while back when I went to the Strip District.  Oopsie, a little embarrassing haha! Good thing it's a root and was still perfectly fine. 

I made the yuca quesadillas from Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Veganomicon only I added black beans, green bell peppers and red onion.  While it was quite delicious and filling, I have to say it was too time consuming and I'd rather just slap some veggies and Daiya cheese in a tortilla and call it a day.  Buy hey, I fully embrace the processed vegan foods at my fingertips. If you're more into whole foods and avoiding that processed jazz I would highly recommend this for your 'dilla fix! 

I took the leftovers for lunch along with some soygurt.  For breakfast, I had a Lara bar, I tried the cashew cookie but I should have known better seeing as how I'm not that big of a fan of cashews.  For snacks I had a gigantic apple and some almonds.  Oh, I also bought some broccoli and cheese soup from the cafeteria but it was so nasty I ended up throwing it out. Definitely lost my taste for cheese. Blargh. 

I had one and a half of the leftover quesadillas for lunch so I was pretty darn full still when I got home.  Nevertheless I fired up the stove top and made Mikey his dinner.  I made two cups of basmati rice for us to split and assembled this beef and broccoli kit I bought at Trader Joes for nights such as this. As in, nights I don't want to cook.  The kit was pretty nice, I just popped the broccoli in the microwave, thawed the sauce, and sauteed the beef strips in a nonstick pan for 6-8 minutes.  Then I tossed all the ingredients together and cooked until the sauce thickened. 

While Mikey ate, I went and worked out to my exercise DVD- talk about being proactive!! I was so jazzed because I can tell the DVDs are working, I feel so much stronger and don't get nearly as tired as when I first began! Aaaannddd it's only been a week and a half!! 

After I exercised, I had worked up QUITE the appetite and I was jealous of Mikey's little beef and broccoli  dinner so I decided to grab my Chickenless Mandarin Orange Morsels and make one myself.  Where's my vegetarian kit Trader Ming!!! 

I microwaved a box of broccoli spears and repeated the steps from Mike's meal and voila! My own Chinese deliciousness.  I added some soy sauce because it's against my religion to eat white rice without it. Wow! It was so.. so.. good. I will definitely be buying this stuff again!!! I'm working on building up my arsenal of ready made vegan foods and this just made my top ten! I ate the entire bag and I don't even care.. 

Then I followed up dinner with a chocolate Tofutti Cutie (which I ate while writing this post). 

P.S. I hate Nicki Minaj

Working on the Weekend

Whenever I work on Saturday, I like to pack things I can grab quickly (or spear with a fork) and munch on while I type since I see on average 18-24 patients and have to chart on... all of them.  For breakfast I had an Odwalla bar and the bag of almonds and prunes. 

By lunch I was sooo hungry- beyond famished.  My stomach was gnawing on itself and threatening to eat a lung if I didn't feed it ASAP! So I heated up the Brussels sprouts and topped it with TJ's edamame hummus which, by the way, this combo is a-ma-zing. I scarfed that down and plowed through my peaches and berries a few minutes later. 

It.. was not... enough.. I ran down to the cafeteria looking for further sustenance... Lo and behold I found...  

Garden vegetable soup. So, so, so good. I dunked some whole wheat crackers in it and went to town! YUM! It gave me the energy I needed to bust through the rest of my charts! 

I had to wait for Mike to come pick me up so I decided to take a stroll through Oakland. 

Big mistake. 

What was I thinking? It's literately like 100 degrees outside and I have to wear pants and sleeved shirts at work. Boy was I dumb (and sweating in 2 minutes flat).  I walked by a Starbucks and grabbed an iced coffee with soy milk and splenda.  The ice was melted in five minutes of me walking back outside but who cares? I drank the glass super fast anyways. 

I didn't feel like cooking dinner today, so I popped into Chipotle while Mike drove into Oakland. I ordered a burrito bowl with brown rice, black beans, onions and peppers, corn salsa, pico de gallo, guacamole, and lettuce. It's my staple. I get it every time. Actually I think anyone that's vegan would also get this same exact bowl (well I bet the salsas differ but still). This bowl (being sans meat, cheese, and sour cream) comes in at 555 calories. Not too shabby. The guacamole wasn't that exciting so I think I'll leave it off next time so that my bowl will only be 400 calories. Oooooh go me. I broke the Chipotle curse of being extremely high calorie.  I kinda have to because....

I eats the whole thing.. nom nom nom... 

No working out tonight because I worked on a Saturday and that would be cruel. 

Ta ta! 

Element-ary My Dear Watson...

This was my breakfast and lunch today- I know the picture's crappy and sideways but GUESS WHAT! I am just too lazy to fix this. Tilt your head to the right, man. 

Breakfast: Odwalla bar and peaches

Snack: Almonds and Prunes

Lunch: Leftover pizza (sans turkey pep) and cukes with hummus

Noms

Razor really wanted some pizza but too bad pup, you're eating salmon and sweet potato dog food. Also you'll be having some peanut butter with your thyroid medicine hidden inside. But you won't know it because you're a dog. Bam. 

So before I decided to start eating less/no meat, poultry, eggs, etc, we purchased a Groupon for half off a prix fix menu tasting at Elements. The Groupon was about to expire so I had to bite the bullet and order up.  Perhaps this will be my last hurrah? 

The menu tasting consisted of 6-8 plates we could choose from, the Groupon was for 4 courses.  All included meat and/or cheese so I just went with it. 

For my drink I ordered a Bloody Mary, it was your standard Bloody Mary- actually I've had better. I had to put salt and pepper in it. Oh well. 

Our appetizer was a sampling of olives, meats, and some crostini with a side of mustard. It was superb. I highly recommend this for the olives alone- I wish I knew what all the different kinds were. The meat was salami, sopressata, and duck speck.

Our salad was a delicious goat cheese and beet salad with a balsamic reduction that was killer. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture because I was so jazzed about eating it. D'oh! 

For our entree we ordered the braised beef cheeks over creamy polenta with a side of carrots and leeks. Everything was drizzled in beef au jus. That polenta was out of this world and I loved the cute little carrots with the greens left on!

For dessert we had a variety of goodies. The selection includes almond frangipan petit fours, peanut butter chocolate fudge, and the chocolate almond bars. All were sensational and the portion sizes were just enough to satisfy your sweet tooth, but not so large that it stuffs you to the gills and makes you hate yourself for eating so much. Because then you wanna yack, I've been there. 

I really, really liked Elements, the atmosphere was classy and nice, the music rocked (Elton John, Eric Clapton, Rolling Stones, etc.) and the booths were super comfortable. The owner actually was out on the floor serving drinks and clearing tables which I found truly impressive and I appreciated seeing his evident hard work and passion for his restaurant. I just really wish they expanded their vegetarian entree options or at least added that on as one of the prix fix choices. OH WELL! I'll be back for sure. 

And... now I have to go work out. Bummer. 

That's amore

Last night I slept like crap, I kept having the weirdest, terrible dreams.  In one, I dreamt that my two most favorite animals in the entire world (Razor and my niece-dog Daisy) had died and we were collectively trying to find dogs to fill the void in our hearts.  Mike got me this awful Frankenstein looking dog that smelled like a sewer and kept snarling at me. When I complained to him about the dog, he said "Oh he'll grow on you!" Nightmare central.  

I need to bake my two pups some treats to show my appreciation after that night of terror. 

Today was uneventful, the first day back after a nice long break is always terrible, and I work this Saturday- boo!! 

I was super busy, so I wasn't able to eat my entire packed deliciousness... I had the Lara bar and some coffee for breakfast, a few almonds and a prune for a snack, and then my PB & J for lunch. Oh yea, I had my hummus and chips too!

Not to worry though, my dinner ROCKED!!! 

Cuz I made pizza... mmmm... 

Pic's a lil blurry, my bad. Actually I didn't take it- but I'm not ratting that person out! 

Trader Joe's herb dough + roasted tomato sauce + mozzarella cheese + onions + black olives + basil leaves + tomatoes + turkey pepperoni 

I'm really failing on this whole vegetarian thing this week. C'mon Lindsey, back on the wagon, back on the wagon. 

Gotta keep the veggies coming! This is my CSA lettuce bag with some heirloom tomatoes ontop. I also added some avocado, red onion, and beets after this photo was taken. 

For dessert we whipped up a batch of my peanut butter nanner ice cream. 

Happy Fourth of July!

The 4th was my holiday for the year to be on call so we had to laze around the house in case I actually did get called in. But seriously, who in the heck needs a dietitian STAT? We are so not an emergent field I don't even get the point of this.  I also don't get the point of working weekends- it's stupid. But regardless, it is what it is. 

I started my morning with a delicious omelet made by my boo, made of onions, bell peppers, mozzarella cheese, Morningstar Farms veggie patties, and eggs. I also had some toast with butter and blackberry jam (which in my opinion is the jam of jams). 

After I got the go ahead that I would not be called in for the day, I worked out to one of my Firm DVDs, showered, did some laundry, and then we headed downtown for the regatta and fireworks.  We first started out at McFadden's where I had a grilled chicken caesar salad which was delicious, followed by two Miller Lites, a Corona with lime, and an I.C. Light Mango. 

We then headed over to take our seats on the river bank and watch the regatta (I also ate a basket of chicken fingers and fries). I sucked at healthy eating today- boo. 

Here's the regatta 

Close up! 

Beautiful Pittsburgh skyline

Some crappy fireworks photos that don't do it justice.

Pittsburgher's sure like their fireworks!! 

After the fireworks we ran for a bus and got home ASAP because I have to work in the morning. When we got home I threw some clothes in the wash, did the dishes, ran the dishwasher, showered, packed my lunch, and got all set for tomorrow morning. 

I DON'T WANT TO GO BAAAAAAACK!!! 

Here is my frazzled, haphazardly made breakfast/lunch: 

Breakfast: Larabar and two peaches

Snack: almonds and prunes

Lunch: PB & J with crackers and hummus

Carb fest tomorrow! Looks like veggies and protein for dinner- oh well!! 

Annndddd I'm out....

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!!