Need Flavor? Add Chili Sauce!

I’m not kidding folks, chili sauce fixes most things.  If it doesn’t need fixing, then chili sauce will only make it mas tasty!

Even though my leftovers from last night’s peanutty noodles and veg were already delicious, I thought I would add some chili sauce — just because I COULD!

Check out the beauteous dish!

Here’s something that’s awesome. Running makes me a bottomless pit! I’m pretty much hungry all the time. YUM!

Wonderful Wednesday!

I’ve decided to have a post on Wednesdays for things that are wonderful!  Today’s Wonderful Wednesday goes to my running visor!

Here’s why my Under Armour visor is amazing.

• It works as a sweat band so sweat doesn’t drip in my eyes.
• It has odor guard — so even though the ENTIRE thing is soaked at the end of each run, it never smells!
• It blocks the sun from my eyes when I run.
• It keeps my hair out of my face.
• It fits really well.  The velcro strap velcros no matter how tight you make the visor.
• It has reflective strips on it so I can be easily seen.

So go out and get yourself one of these bad boys, especially if you’re outside a lot!

Amazing Breakfast?

Behold my ability to create a breathtaking breakfast-scape!

Cantaloupe eaten out of the container and choco-shakeology. Classy, dassy.  Sometimes you just need a quick and dirty breakfast.  And today was one of those days.

Be Adventurous!

I have used recipes for a very long time.  But very recently I have started to make things without recipes (ahh, cooking, you are so different from baking!) I figure that I watch a lot of Food Network and a lot of Top Chef, so I can probably throw together at least a few things without a “how-to”.  That’s what I did tonight!

Peanutty noodle and veggie stir fry!

So I know that peanut sauce needs some

• peanut butter
• soy sauce
• lime juice
• ginger

Then I added some extra water and rice wine vinegar to thin it out a bit (I’ve never heard of vinegar hurting anything!)

Here’s a tip I used on my lime.  It wasn’t so juicy, so I nuked it for about 15 seconds — juice city!

I had some asiany noodles in the pantry, so I boiled them up.

I need some veg!  I just used what was in my crisper — green pepper, cabbage, zuc and onion.

They weren’t really cooking up fast enough just with the heat of the pan, so I added some water and a lid — Steam those suckers!  If the way you’re cooking isn’t working out, change it!

Then put it all on a plate and pour on the sauce!  Top with scallions — just because I know scallions in chinese food are delicious!

Don’t know what to do for dinner?  Just think about what you love to eat, think about the flavors that go into it, and give it a shot!  If it doesn’t turn out, remind your family that without you they’d be hungry and that they shouldn’t worry, they have many more years of dinners for you to perfect your culinary skillz!

What Are You Doing With Your Leftovers?

I’m eating mine like a mofo!

It’s not very often that I manage to make a meal without having some of it leftover.  This is especially great during the school year because the leftovers make great lunches.

Leftovers + Leafy Greens = Not your average sandwich and chippies!

I had a lot of leftover orzo bake from Sunday night so that has been my go-to lunch the past two days.  I have not been mixing in any extra greens though (naughty!) but I also don’t need to stretch the leftovers throughout the whole week like I do during the school year.

ORZO BAKE!

In other news, I’m totally loving this song!

*This time baby, I’ll beeeeee bulleeeeeetproooooooof!*

Strawberry Buckwheat Deliciousness + A Time Trial

I had a buckwheat pancake with almond butter, walnuts, strawberries and honey with a side of cantaloupe this morning.  So good.

Eating well never looked so deliciously decadent!

I have a time trial today.  I’m running a mile.

Like a model who won’t wake up for less than 10 large, I wonder if it’s worth getting ready just to run a mile.  I guess I probably should.  I’ll update you later and let you know how it goes.

Mexifabulous!

Thank you, Flavor Bible, for the incredible mexican feast last night!

I started with thinking I wanted to use an avocado in dinner.  So I looked it up in the Flavor Bible:

AVOCADO: lime, cilantro, beans, garlic

So I made an avocado sauce out of avocado, lime, cilantro, and garlic.  Thank you, Cuisinart!

Hmm, I have some black beans.  I wonder what goes with them?

This book is cool because in addition to giving lists of things that taste nice together they also have chefs give their favorite flavor combinations for whatever ingredient you look up. Under black beans I found this combo:

BLACK BEANS: bell peppers, onion, cumin, oregano!

OREGANO!?! Never in a million years would I have thought to put oregano with this!  I also added garlic to the beans which was delish!

And obviously, corn goes with most mexi-tastic meals.  So I grilled some up.

OH! I also made a chicken marinade with lemon juice, olive oil, chili powder, and cilantro.  I let it marinade for about 45 minutes.

Check out that fancy avocado peel boat for the beans!  I wish the pepper would have stayed a little brighter, but I cooked it a bit too long for that.

Grilled corn fantasticness.

Avocado limey cilantro chicken. With some tomatoes.

You know it’s good when the hubs walks in the door and says, “it smells awesome in here”.

Get That STANK Out!

My couch has a corner that reeks.  We have Febrezed the heck out of it to no avail. The odor stings the nostrils whenever you sit on the couch.  Something had to be done.  So I googled “getting sweat smells out of couches”.  The consensus was to use vinegar and baking soda.  So that’s what I did.

I made a mixture of half vinegar and half water.

I soaked the couch corner with it!

Then I mopped up all the vinegar with a cloth.  I got it as dry as I could.

Then I dried it even more with a blow dryer.

Then I covered the area with baking soda and rubbed it in with a cloth.  I left it on there for a few hours.

Then I vacuumed it all up!

Viola!  It doesn’t smell anymore!  What a cheap way to clean up a big mess 🙂

No Waffles Today

We shopped at the farmer’s market yesterday and then went to WalMart for the rest of the shopping.

Bad news!  They don’t have the waffles I like!  I checked the ingredients on Eggo Nutrigrain waffles and this is what I saw:

I’ll take my waffles without niacinamide, thank you though.  Yes, yes, it’s part of the vitamin B family but do I need it added to my waffles?  I think I’ll get mine from some pumpkin seeds.

So I made buckwheat pancakes this morning.  They freeze so well, so now I have breakfast treats for the rest of the week! YUM!

Ready for the freezer!

Ready for my belly!

These were bonkers.  The peaches were also delish!  And the good news is…I’m hungry again! What for lunch?

Ice Cream For Breakfast!

Or more like brunch, as I ate this at around 11:00am this morning.

How many times have you wanted to eat ice cream for breakfast?  If you’re like me, most days.

Here’s a way to do it completely guilt free — you could eat this everyday and not feel like a guilty goose!

I’ve been wanting to make banana soft serve for a while now, but the first time I tried it I did it in the blender, my bananas were too hard, and I didn’t add any milk.  It was a failure.

But then Barbie sent me this recipe (after I begged for help over twitter).

An amazing breakfast followed shortly thereafter.

The above recipe is good, but I added some things to mine.  Here’s what I did:

Cut up two bananas and froze them overnight.

Took them out this morning and let them sit for about 5 minutes (while I made coffee).

Put the in the food processor with a splash of milk and blended them up (this took a couple of minutes).  Then I added in a tablespoon of Chocolate Shakeology (you could probably use choco protein powder or cocoa with a little agave or honey, or even Quik).  Then a tablespoon of peanut butter.

When it was done blending I scooped it into a dish ice cream style and topped it with all my fav ice cream decorations!  Strawberries, raw oatmeal crumble, nutella and chopped almonds.

The only thing of questionable healthiness is the nutella, and chances were, later in the day I would have eaten that straight out of the jar anyway!

This is the biggest breakfast win I have had in a while!