What I Ate Wednesday, 11/19/14

Hello friends! It’s Ashley…returning from my bloggity hiatus! I missed the blog quite a bit, but I’m so happy that Lynda was able to fully take over while I was gone. A lot has happened in the last month…some of it wonderful and some of it, well, not so wonderful. Things are finally settling down now and I am feeling more like my old Ashley Pants self. I will explain more in an upcoming post, I promise! For now though I will just tell you all about the yummy foods I ate today.

Breakfast

I made a packet of instant oatmeal because I didn’t have time to cook my usual oatmeal. The brand is Nature’s Path and it’s called Blueberry Cinnamon Flax. It’s pretty good for something quick in the morning. I made mine with unsweetened vanilla almond milk. I also fried one egg to go with it. I also had coffee, of course, but I failed to get it in the picture.

 

 

 

 

Snack

My snack while at work was this KIND bar in the Vanilla Blueberry flavor. I’ve mentioned these before I think. So good! I also drank lots of H2O because I need it to keep doing the living.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lunch

My Lunch wasn’t all that exciting. I had a turkey sandwich with pepper jack cheese and mustard on some Ezekiel bread. I toasted it in the toaster oven. I also made a smoothie, which actually turned out to be more of a slushy. The “smoothie” consists of about 1 cup of frozen blueberries, 1/2 cup frozen pineapple, a handful of baby spinach, and a cup or so of coconut water. It was very good! A little thick, but that can be easily fixed by adding more water, I just didn’t care that much. The pineapple makes it naturally perfectly sweet. And look how pretty it is!

 

 

 

Dinner

My dinner was Crock Pot Santa Fe Chicken…a recipe I found on Pinterest. I’m not sure what to call this, but it ended up being a burrito bowl of some sort. The recipe is really simple. It’s pretty much chicken breasts, corn, black beans, tomatoes, and spices all thrown in the crock pot and cooked for several hours. It’s really good over rice and/or with chips. I added some salsa and some Trader Joe’s spicy guacamole on top. The recipe can be found here. I also ate some Trader Joe’s Quinoa and Black Bean infused Tortilla chips with it! I drank more H2O…

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now we are all caught up to right now. I’m not eating anything, but I have to say I wouldn’t hate it if that ice cream in the freezer somehow magically ended up in a bowl and then in my belly. I’m not gonna do it though! I hope you guys have a wonderful night. I’m looking forward to posting on here more regularly again. Thanks for reading! xoxo

Bows and Arrows,

Ashley

Baklava Cups

The first time I ever had Baklava it was love at first bite. Almost every trip I make to Neomonde in Raleigh results in me leaving with 1 or 2 variations of their bite size baklava treats. This weekend, I decided to try to make a comparable bite size dessert on my own, inspired by traditional Baklava. Because it turned out to be quite delicious, I’ve decided to share it with you!

Ingredients:

½ cup walnuts

2 tbsp water

2 tbsp honey

2 tbsp sugar

12 mini fillo dough cups

1 tsp cinnamon

Bee Blessed honey from the local State Farmer’s Market in Raleigh and mini fillo shells by Athen’s (found at Harris Teeter).

Makes 1 dozen

Time to make: 30 minutes

Walnuts baking on a cookie sheet in the oven.

Crushed walnuts in mixing bowl with cinnamon.

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Place your walnuts on a cookie sheet and place in oven for 7-10 minutes, or until fragrant. Remove from oven and place in a mixing bowl.
3. Add cinnamon to walnuts in mixing bowl and crush walnuts. Set aside.
4. In a small saucepan, combine water, honey, and sugar. Place on stove over medium low heat for 3 minutes stirring often. Remove from heat and set aside.
5. Place fillo dough shells on a plate and spoon walnut mixture into cups.
6. Pour ½ tsp of syrup into cups on top of walnuts. Syrup should drain into the shell. Place cups into fridge for 10 minutes.
7. Remove cups from fridge and add remainder of syrup into cups.
8. Store Baklava cups in fridge.

If you like Baklava, then you’ll like these! And they are much easier to prepare and take a fraction of the time. You can also try them with pistachios and cashews. Or mix all three types of nuts into one cup! Try them out and let me know what you think!

Bows and arrows,

Lynda

What I Ate Wednesday, 7/2/14

Hey guys! Happy Wednesday! I hope your week is going well and hopefully this is a short week for most of you guys thanks to Independence Day. Keeping my fingers crossed that this tropical storm threatening to hit the east coast doesn’t ruin all of the fourth of July festivities for us! I had a pretty busy day today between work and running errands, so I actually didn’t eat very much. Here is what I did manage to eat today…

Breakfast

Are you shocked!? It’s not oatmeal. I made some muffins on Monday night and I had a couple left, so I figured I better eat them. These are peanut butter banana muffins, which I made on Monday spur of the moment and just happened to have all of the ingredients on hand. They turned out pretty good. They are not overly sweet, so they’re perfect for breakfast. The recipe I used can be found here. I also had one scrambled egg and some strawberries and delicious blueberries from the farmers market. I had some coffee with organic half and half in my adorable coffee mug from Marshals. If you can’t see it, it says “luv my cup of joe”.

Lunch

I didn’t really eat lunch. I just munched on a bunch of raw mixed nuts. These came from Target. I tend to buy a big huge container of them so there’s always something quick to munch on if I am busy but going into starvation meltdown mode.

Snack

After work I picked up an Americano…just because. Do I need a reason? :-p

Dinner

We picked up food from Jasmin Mediterranean Restaurant for dinner. This is a chicken zaki with a side salad. Oh, how I love Greek and Mediterranean Food! I would eat it everyday if I could afford it. I also had water with this and some throughout the day, although I didn’t drink nearly as much water as I usually do.

I think I will make myself a big glass of water now and call it a night! Thanks for reading.

Bows and Arrows,

Ashley

Sea Salted Peanut Butter Cookies

My last few recipe posts have been decently healthy recipes.  This one…not so much.  But that’s okay, because it’s nice to have a dessert here and there!  And if you’re someone who avoids eating gluten, this is a cookie for you, because it’s flourless!!

I was bored after work the other night and was craving something sweet, so I looked at what I had in my kitchen, and whipped these up.  They are so delicious (about 6 other people who tried them agreed), I just had to share them with you!

Minus the semi-sweet chocolate chips

Ingredients:

½ cup natural peanut butter

½ cup sugar

½ tsp vanilla extract

1 whole egg

2 tbsp mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

Sea salt

Directions:

Step 1:  Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit

Step 2: Combine sugar, vanilla extract, and egg and mix

Step 3: Add peanut butter and mix until smooth

Step 4: Add in mini chocolate chips and stir until they are evenly distributed into batter (if you don’t want any chocolate in your cookies, that’s ok!  Just leave this step out!)

 

Step 5: Spoon out batter onto ungreased cookie sheet (I did spoonfuls about the size of a ping pong ball) about 1.5 inches apart and press fork into balls to make the crosshatch design

Step 6: Sprinkle sea salt on the top of each cookie

Step 7: Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 10 minutes on center rack

Step 8: Remove from oven and let cool before removing cookies from cookie sheet

Step 9: Enjoy!

This recipe yields 1 dozen cookies.

 

I like eating mine while they are still a bit warm, and I’m sure they would taste great with vanilla ice cream!

Try them!  You will be addicted!

Bows and Arrows,

Lynda

Healthy PB&J Smoothie

Since it’s heating up outside, here’s something to cool you down!

 

Ingredients:

10 frozen strawberries

1 banana

1 ½ tsp PB2 powder (you can leave this out if you want it to be more of a strawberry banana smoothie instead)

Around 20 baby spinach leaves (I counted because I was plucking them out of a salad mix)

4 oz. Soymilk

 

Blend all ingredients.

Yields 1 10oz smoothie

Just a few benefits of this smoothie:

•  A much better cold treat option in warm weather as opposed to ice creams, soft drinks, and other beverages or snacks that are full of sugar.
• Great for a breakfast on the run because it meets the minimum amount of protein and fiber needed for a healthy breakfast.
• Equivalent to 2 servings of fruit!

Hope you try it!  If so, let me know what you think!

Bows and Arrows,

Lynda

Lemon Chicken Orzo Soup

Last week, I stopped into Panera Bread for lunch and since the AC was on full blast, I decided to order a soup.  I know it sounds crazy to eat soup when the weather is over 90 degrees Fahrenheit outside, but there are some great summer soups out there!  When I discovered that their Lemon Chicken Orzo soup was on the menu, I was instantly excited.  I ordered this a lot last summer, and forgot about it for quite some time because it is a seasonal soup.  Once I tasted it again, I remembered how much I loved it, and decided I must attempt to make it on my own, so I could eat it whenever I pleased, not just on the certain days Panera Bread decides to serve it.  Well, if I do say so myself, my attempt was a definite success.  It tastes so delicious, and my boyfriend loved it as well!  Here’s my recipe:

 Ingredients

 1 rotisserie chicken (I used everything except for the wings and drumsticks in my soup), so about ½ pound of chicken…I got my rotisserie chicken from Whole Foods

4oz of uncooked orzo pasta (I used star pasta which is actually the same exact thing, just different shapes, as I mentioned in my WIAW post)

2 carrots, chopped

3 ribs of celery, chopped

Baby spinach

½ onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, minced

¼ cup of lemon juice

32 oz low-sodium chicken broth

Olive oil

Thyme

Oregano

Black pepper

1 small bay leaf

Lemon slices

 Directions

Step One:  Chop up your onion, carrots, celery, and mince your garlic.  Set aside.

Step Two:  Bring a pot of water to a boil.  I always add a pinch of salt to my water so the pasta doesn’t stick to the pot.  Add orzo (or stars) to the water and cook for 5 minutes.  (This is not going to be what your bag of orzo says to cook it for, but we don’t want to fully cook the orzo because it will be added to the rest of the dish later, and we don’t want to risk over cooking it.)  Drain the orzo and set aside.

Step Three:  In a large pot, big enough to hold all of your soup contents, heat a tiny amount of olive oil on medium heat.  Add your carrots, onion, and celery, and shift around in pot for about 5 minutes.  You want the veggies to begin to soften.  Once they begin to soften, add the garlic and stir veggies around in pot for 2 more minutes.  You’ll begin to smell the garlic fragrance.  Yum!

Step Four:  Add some thyme, oregano, black pepper, and your bay leaf to the veggies.  I just shake my spices into the pot, so there is no exact amount that I use, but I would just say use your best judgment.

Step Five:  After another minute of stirring around your veggies and spices, add your chicken broth.  Bring the mixture to a boil.

Step Six:  Once the mixture is boiling, cover the pot and reduce the heat to medium-low.  Check frequently and stir often for another 7 minutes making sure to not leave the lid on the pot for too long.

Step Seven:  Once the veggies seem to be tender, remove the lid, and add the lemon juice to the broth.

Step Eight:  Add your orzo pasta and chicken to the broth and continue stirring.

Step Nine:  Cook and stir for an additional 3 minutes to ensure the orzo and chicken are heated back up.

Step Ten:  Add the spinach to the pot (I didn’t use a specific amount, so use as much as you’d like).  Continue cooking until the spinach is wilted into the soup.

Step Eleven:  Place your soup into a bowl and garnish with a lemon slice to add extra lemony flavor!

 

I absolutely loved this soup!  If you want it to remain a soup for your leftovers, I recommend setting some additional chicken broth aside to add to your left overs as the orzo will soak in any stored broth once in the fridge.  I, however, did not save any chicken broth, and my soup turned into an awesomely flavorful pasta dish for my lunch the next day!

I hope you try it, and if so, tell me what you think!  Also, if you’re eating normal portions, this recipe serves 6.

Bows and Arrows,

Lynda

Recipe: Lynda’s Chicken Bowl

Ashley previously mentioned making a burrito bowl that mimicked what she gets from Chipotle.  A few weeks ago, I actually did something similar, except similar to what I get from Moe’s Southwest Grill, minus the tortilla.  As you can recall from my May favorites post, I had a guacamole kick, which lead me to Moe’s a few times last month during my lunch breaks at work.  This inspired me to make something similar to what I order from Moe’s for dinner one night.

Why not drink a glass of Lambic beer too!

 Ingredients:

2 chicken breasts

1 cup of Long grain wild rice (approximately)

1 can of Black beans

1 Roma tomato

3 leaves of romaine (or more depending on how much you want)

2 tablespoons non-fat cheddar cheese

Coarse ground pepper, just a pinch

Garlic powder, just a pinch

Celery salt, just a pinch

Ranch dressing

Lemon juice, about 2 tbsp

Directions:

Step One: I sprinkled garlic powder, celery salt, and ground pepper on both sides of my raw chicken breasts and brushed both sides with lemon juice.  Then I set them aside to ‘marinate’ for about 20 minutes while I prepared everything else.

Step Two:  I then warmed up my black beans and cooked my rice.  I added a tiny bit of lemon juice to my rice as well after it was cooked.

Step Three:  While my rice and beans were cooking, I chopped up the romaine leaves and Roma tomato into tiny pieces.

Step Four:  I cooked my chicken on the stove, making sure to cook all the way through (this varies with thickness, so check your packaging for cook times).  After my chicken was finished cooking, I cut it up into small cubes.

I served my chicken bowl as a “pick your own” toppings, but of course I used everything that I made, and just mixed the amounts of each item together that I wanted.  I then topped my chicken bowl with a small amount of ranch dressing.  I did have guacamole, but I decided to not top my bowl with it, but rather eat it as a side with my chips.

I will say, that when I was inspired to make this recipe, I just used what I had in my kitchen at the time.  If I could tweak this recipe, I would add salsa, cilantro, and a spicy ranch dressing instead of basic ranch (even though I don’t like spicy stuff, I can handle some chipotle ranch)!  Try it out, and let me know what you think!

Bows and Arrows,

Lynda