Mmmmm…Oatmeal!

Posted on 07/17/2009 by doubledogyoga

I just had the best lunch and the greatest part is that it was super simple. oatmeal

I had…(drumroll please)…OATMEAL!

Yes, OATMEAL!

I know, not exactly what you’d think of having on a hot and muggy Virginia day.

Here’s what I did:

Got the oatmeal started while I was finishing up on the elliptical machine.
When the oatmeal was ready (15 minutes) I scooped it into a bowl and topped it with:

A teeny amount of brown sugar
Honey
Sunflower seeds
Peanut butter
Dried cherries

That’s it! You could throw in whatever you like, really.

It was really satisfying, quick to prepare, and yummy. Just one of those things I normally wouldn’t have thought to have for lunch

Watermelon Lemonade, Bean + Barley Salad, and Insomia (AGH!)

Posted on 07/06/2009 by doubledogyoga

Last night I slept a whopping THREE HOURS! Ugh. I hate when I can’t sleep. I used to have insomnia a lot – monkey brain would spin and I wouldn’t be able to turn it off! That rarely happens now though. I think I just slept too much over the weekend (naps!) and so last night I was tired, but wide awake. So I played lots of Wordtwist and now have a new personal best of 222! Top that!

Even on just a measly three hours, I still managed to walk the girls this morning and run 7 miles! I’m a big believer in trying to stick to a regular schedule so even though my sleep was @#$%ed messed up, I went through the rest of my day as if it hadn’t been.

Anywho, over the weekend I made a couple of recipes that I thought I’d share with you.

First, how better to get into the July 4 spirit than with Watermelon Lemonade! Here’s what I did:

Ingredients:

2 cups watermelon juice
1 cup fresh lemon juice
3 cups water
3/4 cup simple syrup
several sprigs of fresh mint

Just add everything together and stir! Yum!

To get the watermelon juice, I just cut up chunks of watermelon and pureed them in my Vitamix until completely liquid. Then I strained the puree through a fine wire mesh strainer.

The simple syrup is just one cup of sugar added to one cup of water – bring to boil until sugar dissolves and then allow to cool before adding to the other ingredients.

Doesn’t it look festive and very 4th of July-ish?

The second recipe I wanted to share with you is a salad recipe by my friend Kristen. It’s called Two Bean and Barley Salad and it was really fabulous. I brought this to a July 4 pool party and everyone really liked it.

I loved using barley! I very rarely cook with barley so it was fun to get to use it in this recipe. The salad was very garlicky - I used fresh picked garlic from the farmer’s market and it might have been a little on the strong side. I think next time I will decrease the garlic and try to bring out the tahini flavor some more. Maybe some miso? I don’t know – I’ll let you know if /when I play around with it some more. THANK YOU TO KRISTEN for creating this masterpiece! Check out Kristen’s blog – she has some great original recipes on there!

Ok that’s it for now. I’m going straight to bed and look forward to a really great night of SLEEP!

I’m wondering, what do you do when you can’t sleep?

PBU LUV

Posted on 07/02/2009 by doubledogyoga

It is SO FANTASTIC to be healthy again! YAHOO!!!

I slept in until 7am today and then got up to make our morning smoothies:

Lite Vanilla Soy Milk
Kale
Spirutein Vanilla Protein Powder
Banana
Cinnamon + Vanilla + Salt

I know – boring! I have some version of this every morning. It’s just SO YUMMY and it’s exactly what I want when I wake up. So there you go.

I walked the girls and then headed out to teach yoga at Beloved Yoga. It was kinda crazy teaching after laying around for three days – I actually felt out of breath a few times. I wasn’t too breathless though that I couldn’t go for a run afterwards! After class I ran 4 miles and walked 1 mile. It felt really good to be back

Anywho, lunch was another fruit salad with coconut and almonds – yummy! Like the morning smoothie, I’m not getting tired of fruit salad either! I also melted some mozzarella cheese on a warmed-up Ezekial Sprouted Grain Tortilla and rolled it up with some fresh baby spinach stuffed inside.

Afternoon snack: Amazing Grass Superfood in Chocolate mixed with 8 oz coconut water + an apple.

Dinner: another smoothie! DOH! I think I’m a SMOOTHIE ADDICT. A smoothieholic, if you will.

At some time during the day I was perusing the interwebs and stumbled upon a nugget of pure genuis: PBU!

PBU is the brainchild of Emily over at Curly Top. Plagued by stomach aches caused by fatty peanut butter and unable to find a suitable alternative, she created the answer to her peanut butter woes and hence PBU was born.To make PBU she mixes regular peanut butter with almond milk, and adds in any additional flavorings or seasonings such as sugar, salt, cinnamon.

I gave it a whirl tonight while watching “4th and Long” (don’t ask). When I used Emily’s ratios I came up with something that was quite runny. I added in more peanut butter, and, since I then ran out of peanut butter, I threw in some PB2. I also used a hand mixer. I unfortunately didn’t measure out the exact amounts of the ingredients I used but the the result I got is light creamy peanutty goodness.

Of course I already ate a few spoonfuls! Tomorrow I’ll be trying it out on rice cakes, in Fage, and yes, in my smoothie

Do you love peanut butter too? What’s your favorite recipe or use for it?

Easy Bean and Veggie Salad Recipe

Posted on 06/29/2009 by doubledogyoga

Happy Sunday everyone! I just loved today

I got up at 645am and took the girls for a walk. It was so lovely outside that when we got back home I decided to go for a run. I ran for 40 minutes -not sure how many miles that was but I’m guessing around 4.25 – 4.50. It was perfect running weather – overcast and slightly cool. I listened to Achtung Baby, my favorite running tunes

Then I taught a yoga class at Flow Yoga – what a nice turnout we had! Again it was super hot in the studio and we were all dripping with sweat at the end. I LOVE practicing in the heat – not too hot though!

Then I got to hang out with my friend Ginny, one of my favorite people! We did some yoga together and then headed into town for lunch. Ginny is an AMAZING massage therapist. I told her my hip was a little sore and right away she said “well we can work on that right now!” (I love having massage therapist friends!) Well my hip feels 1000 times better. Thanks Ginny!

The food rundown for the day:

Breakfast: Smoothie

banana
spinach
homemade almond milk
touch of vanilla + almond extract + cinnamon + salt
Spirutein Cookies n’ Cream

Delish!

Lunch: Minestrone soup + curried chickpea salad + decaf soy latte at South Street Under.
The curried chickpea salad was AWESOME. I have to figure out how they made it!

Ginny gave me a small piece of Gnosis raw chocolate to try. It was so yummy that I went out and bought a bar for myself. They are really pricey ($10!) but you really just need a tiny piece to feel really satisfied. I got their Fleur de Sel Bar – these are the ingredients:

Cacao beans
Cacao butter
Agave nectar
Fleur de Sel salt Pink Himalayan Salt crystal
Manna blue green algae
Vanilla bean
Love

Isn’t that cute? I can’t wait to try it.

Dinner: Bean and Veggie Salad + home-brewed peach iced tea + Skinny Cow

Easy Bean and Veggie Salad Recipe

15 oz can mixed beans – mine was kidney, garbanzo, and northern
15 oz can black eyed peas
1 pint sugar snap peas, trimmed and cut in half
1 shallot, minced
1/2 red pepper, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
1 carrot, diced
1/2 zucchini, diced (it was leftover )

Dressing

2 T white wine vinegar
2 T extra virgin olive oil
1/2 t dried basil
1/2 t dried oregano
1/2 t garlic powder
1/2 t salt
freshly ground pepper to taste

This was a wonderful, light salad – just what I was in the mood for tonight!

Best part of the day: D. suprised me with this when I got home!

Isn’t it beautiful? I’ve never had an orchid before and I love it!

I’m listening to Blue Shoes by Katie Melua right now. What a beautiful voice she has!

Back on Track

Posted on 06/23/2009 by doubledogyoga

After my weekend in Florida and my donut extravaganza yesterday morning I’m feeling like I’m back “on track.”

Breakfast: Green smoothie (3.5 points for those of you who count

unsweetened almond milk
vanilla Spirutein protein powder
banana
spinach
cinnamon, vanilla, almond extract

Lunch: Fruit salad

blackberries
blueberries
raspberries
strawberries
mango
kiwi
shredded coconut
sliced almonds

+ Trader Joe’s fat free vanilla frozen yogurt drizzled with honey for dessert.

Dinner: Salad + 2 homemade biscuits + another small bowl of froyo

Salad

mixed greens
cherry tomatoes
cucumbers
carrots
red pepper
Newman’s Own Lowfat Sesame Ginger dressing
hemp seeds

The hemp seeds kept getting stuck in my teeth – I don’t recommend adding them to salads! I keep trying to find a good use for them…any ideas on how to use hemp seeds?

Exercise:

Yoga: 20 minutes
Walked: 2 miles with the dogs (40 minutes)
Ran: 6 miles in 50 minutes
Walked: 2 miles with the doggies (35 minutes – hubby wasn’t with me!)

Sorry for the blurry pictures – I’m working on it! I did manage to snap this beauty:

awwww….isn’t she awesome??

Waiting for Kombucha

Posted on 06/11/2009 by doubledogyoga

Hi there!

So it’s raining again today for the 1 billionth day in a row! Really it is crazy how much rain we’ve gotten. On the positive side I saw this outside my house today:

flower

This morning I took Marty and Rosie for a walk and as usual they were FREAKING OUT with happiness as soon as I picked up their leashes. It’s so cool how they are completely jazzed about going for the SAME WALK that we went on yesterday, and the day before, and the day before!

I had my standard Smoothie for breakfast: banana, spinach, Spirutein vanilla protein powder, cinnamon, a little salt, vanilla hemp milk (unsweetened), and pb2. In addition to Better N Peanut Butter, pb2 is my other favorite peanut butter-type product. I even wrote about it on the Double Dog Blog.

For lunch I had another gigantic salad, this time with lots of cauliflower, tomatoes, and chickpeas and topped with Newman’s Own Low Fat Sesame Ginger dressing – YUM!

SNC00015

I also had the other half of the deceptive Trader Joe’s muffin that I started yesterday. And an apple. I’m HUNGRY today!!

I just checked on my kombucha. Yes, I’m making kombucha from scratch! Kombucha is a fermented sweet tea – you can read all about it here. My friend Kristen gave me the starter kombucha mushroom (called a “skoby“) and besides that all you need is tea, water, and sugar. My first batch didn’t turn out so well (it didn’t taste great and it wasn’t fizzy like the kombucha you buy in the store) but I think I figured out what went wrong. I used decaf green tea and you have to use caffeinated tea. So this time I used a black Chai tea. I also learned that once it’s ready you have to bottle it up and let it sit on the counter for a few days before refrigerating it. SO…it’s fermenting on my counter as we speak and tomorrow I think it will be ready I’m really excited to try it. For now, it looks like this on my counter:

SNC00016

Don't Forget the Edy's!

Posted on 06/11/2009 by doubledogyoga

Over the winter I gained about 5 pounds and I’ve been trying to get rid of them but they are sticking to me like glue! I swear it gets harder the older you get. So I decided to go back on Weight Watchers, which is how I lost all my weight in the first place. I get a whopping 19 points a day! In case you don’t know, that’s not very much. So here’s what I had today:

Breakfast

Smoothie made with Spirutein vanilla protein powder, vanilla hemp milk, banana, lotsa spinach, cinnamon, and a dollop of Better N Peanut Butter*

Lunch

1/2 of a Trader Joe’s muffin. I was totally schnookered by the package that said “120 calories per serving” (see it? It’s on the right side). I LOVE muffins so I was pretty excited except when I got them home I realized that a serving is HALF a muffin! What a joke! So I had half a muffin today

Organic Moral Fiber

A huge salad with cucumbers, chickpeas, tomatoes, carrots, cauliflower, radishes, and baby greens

Salad with my homemade oil-free dressing

And finished with an Edy’s Orange & Cream Fruit Bar (I love these)

I felt pretty satisfied with my lunch. After a little time to digest, I headed out for a 6 mile run that felt AWESOME. I used my new Phillips headphones and they worked really well and didn’t slide off my head like other headphones have in the past.

So…dinner.

We made personal pizzas with Boboli crusts. Doug piled his high with cheese but I used less than 1/4 cup on mine and instead piled it with spinach and sauteed mushrooms. I’m trying to get cheese out of my diet all together but when it comes to pizza…

pizza

(The spinach puree is hidden under the sauce (Sorry for the bad photo!)

I was surprised how good it was because I always thought you had to have a ton of cheese on your pizza. I think next time I’ll skip the cheese altogether and see how it goes.

I had a few other snacks today but I thought I was within my points. Then I realized that I forgot to figure in the Edy’s! So I was over by one point – but I figure that’s ok since I did run today! I’m trying not to get too hung up on the points thing anyway – it’s just a guideline

Time for beddie-by!

*Better N Peanut Butter is AWESOME! You have to try it if you haven’t already. It has half the calories of regular PB and 85% less fat than regular peanut butter. I use it in smoothies mostly – I haven’t yet baked with it but the BNPB website has some recipe ideas.

Eat. Run. Do Yoga.

Category Archives: Lunch