my new favorite salad

i used to be a spinach salad gal. my favorite was spinach with mozzarella, bosc pear, coconut flakes and pecans with a vanilla flavored dressing made from protein powder. sounds yummy, huh? can't get it in a restaurant.... you have to make your own. and i did, sometimes every day for weeks.

photo by Marcus Nilsson, from O online

NOW, i make this salad almost every week and munch on it for lunch. it's so tasty. i found it in one of O's recent issues and figured i'd give it a go since i had most ingredients here at the house.

here's my version. it's truly yummy. i add a little pb2 in my dressing. just felt like it was calling for a smidge of peanut taste. and remember, the fresher your kale, the tastier the salad. and see those golden rounds on the plate? that's another recent favorite that goes smashingly well with the salad.... goat cheese rounds. (goat cheese battered in flour, egg, and panko and then sauteed). my in-laws are coming to visit in a few weeks. hope they like kale, cause i'll be serving this.

let's talk food

i love sweet potatoes. and goat cheese. and grapes. and honey. i came across this photo the other day on pinterest. it had me at hello. i made these this weekend and they are seriously the best thing i've made in a long while.

you absolutely must try them. here's the recipe. hubby liked them too.

a few months ago i discovered i am allergic to soy. soy is in everything. i've had to search high and low for soy-free foods or else suffer the headaches soy was instigating. in searching for a soy-free protein/health bar i found larabars. these are great. moist, flavorful.

 

and what i like best about them is that each flavor has between 3-6 ingredients.  here are the ingredients for the peanut butter cookie bar.

i've been reading about shakeology everywhere lately. my boot camp instructor is a distributor. she hooked me up with their chocolate flavor. i drink this most nights for dinner, especially after my evening bootcamp session. it's really good.... and in combo with 3-nights-a-week of bootcamp i've already lost a few pounds in just one week.

 

THIS! oh my word, i just tried this this morning in my coffee. it is wonderful! i've been mourning the loss of my full-of-soy coffeemate french vanilla creamer. i found this last week. the taste is wonderful. bonus for having 0 fat grams.

peanut + noodles

i've been lately craving noodles with a peanut sauce. i wanted to try this new thai restaurant by our house the other night, but instead we ended up eating mexican, which we do like 2-3 times a week. good thing it's plentiful around here.

i was craving pad thai. i love pad thai. i don't eat it often because usually when i do, i top the scale at 2 lbs more the next day, or so it seems...

anywho, i spotted this over on smitten kitchen.

peanut sesame noodles. now this is one peanut sauce i can make. easy peasy... i already have most ingredients here in the house. how good does that look. click here for the recipe.

hmmm... and did i mention i have a peanut allergy? no. probably because i don't take it very seriously. i have never had any obvious reaction to peanuts, although i do eat a lot less of them (mostly in the form of peanut butter) since i had a blood test done a few years ago, and it showed an allergy to egg whites, garlic, and peanuts. it won't stop me from making this.

photo via smitten kitchen

today

is my birthday. if i could have any birthday cake i wanted, i'd have this one, from smitten kitchen. i'd even make it myself.... i don't mind. i love.love.love a yellow cake with chocolate icing. instead i'll probably make this one for myself. it's good. i've made it before. and it's flourless. i've been eating no flour (or very very minimal) for the last few weeks and feel tremendously better when i do. flour just doesn't agree with me. i have more energy... my mid-afternoon slump is almost non-existent now. and i have fewer headaches. big plus.

and one would think that since i'm the boss i could give myself my birthday off. but alas, no. i'll be working. all day. but don't worry.... hubby made me breakfast. and hopefully we'll get in a birthday bikeride this evening. and we celebrated my birthday this weekend at my favorite sushi restaurant with some close friends. we had a great time.

yum

my book club met this past friday evening. i love book club nights. good food, good friends, good conversation. in fact, when steve and i first discussed whether or not we should move from seattle to dallas.... my first reaction was "but i just got into a book club!".

anywho, back to friday evening. we met at bridget's house. she's a cook, a serious cook. she had the most awesome food.... bowtie pasta salad, grilled shrimp, grilled corn, lemon chiffon pie for dessert, and my favorite... this salad. from tom douglas. tom douglas is a famed seattle chef with several restaurants and cookbooks. bridget made one of his salads for us. i haven't stopped talking about it.

image via here, by mark thomas

it's grilled cornbread salad with red onions, arugula and red wine vinaigrette. i found the recipe for it here. bridget modified the recipe slightly. she served a sweet cornbread on it, and didn't grill her cornbread. it was delicious! thanks bridget. i'll definitely be making this myself.

raw berry pie

seleta posted about this pie the other day. raw berry pie. i love a berry pie. especially in the summertime. she found it on this food blog, whole family fare. here's your fair warning... do not read this blog when you're hungry. you will jump through the screen. her photos are breathtaking. i've never seen even lettuce look so scrumptious.

but, back to the pie.... here's the recipe. i think i'll make it this weekend. made with almonds, cashews, coconut, honey, and berries. it's healthy. i won't feel so guilty when i eat the whole thing.

photo from whole family fare.

randomness

morning time multitasking. coffee. conference call. and giving pixel her morning rubdown.

i saw these over on bryn's blog recently. i think i need them. i had a pair of the most comfortable adorable wedges that i never saw past our move from atlanta to seattle 4 years ago. i'm thinking one of the packers liked them as much as i did.

***

learn from me...always pass your cellphone over the bowl of chips and not over the bowl of salsa.

***

speaking of food.... you must make this. pioneer woman's chicken salad. my mil turned me on to it. it's awesome. we both used a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store instead of boiling our own. i used red onion instead of green. did i mention it was awesome?
and now for the really important stuff.... who do you think brad will choose?

my gut says he'll choose chantel, but i really really want him to choose emily.

the weekend

in no particular order, my weekend....

i made cauliflower soup sunday afternoon. it was perfect. my mother-in-law made this recipe first, told me it was good, so i tried it. she lied. it was great! loved it. steve loved it. you'll love it too.

image via here

we had it with these burgers. can you say yum? i did, several times, during dinner.

image via here

sunday night, the oscars. star of the show, for me... miss sandra bullock.

image via here

first of all, beautiful. secondly, witty, funny and amusing while giving best actor award.

friday night, my first book club meeting. we talked about this.
it was a mixed crowd in reviewing the book. some liked it. some didn't. i liked it. i thought it was good, not great, but good. it's the story of a 90-something man in a nursing who recalls his days as veterinarian for a travelling circus in the 1930s. there's some animal abuse, some people abuse. that's why some people didn't like it. i thought all that was secondary to the story and didn't focus on those elements, but i can see where it would be bothersome to some. but, hostess dayna put out a spread of some awesome food and we had a lot of laughs. a lot.

saturday afternoon, i walked across the street to my neighbor's house for a clothes party. we viewed CAbi clothes. i'll be sporting the tee shirt on the right in 7-10 days when it arrives in the mail.
i have never laughed so hard. i was there for 4.5 hours it was so much fun. funniest part of the whole evening... after a trying-on-clothes-session, a couple of women were telling another woman not to purchase that jacket she had on because "it didn't fit right, it looked like something from the 80s,....". the woman with the jacket replies "um, this is my coat. i wore it here this evening.". open mouth, insert foot. thank goodness they were all very close friends and even coworkers and it resulted in a lot of laughter.

hope your weekend was just as great.

saturday night's dinner

the recent issue (march 2011) of the martha stewart living magazine had some recipes for salmon baked in parcment paper. steve and i created our own version saturday night. and it was awesome. seriously. the best dinner we've made in awhile. i loved it. i'm still thinking about it. i've never cooked with parchment paper before. i don't know... something about paper and heat that doesn't sit well with me. anybody else like that?

anywho, we start by layering salmon, asparagus, and red onion on the parchment paper. then drizzled with olive oil, lemon juice and sprinkled salt and pepper. topped the pile off with the lemon slice.then folded and tucked and creased the parchment paper so no steam would escape. steve had the grill going at 400. but you can also do these in the oven.
final product. yum! he cooked them for about 20 mins. martha's recipe called for 12 - 13 minutes for a 5 ounce, 1 inch thick filet, for medium doneness. other recipes i found said bake for 20-25 mins. i think 15-18 would be a good compromise.
we added baked potatoes to this. again, it was awesome. and incredibly healthy. and inexpensive. total cost of the meal was about $10 for the 2 of us together.

sunday suppers granola

one of my favorite blogs to pop in on is sunday suppers. their photos and styling (by karen mordechai) are phenomenal and make me want to jump thru the screen, grab that antique fork, and help myself to the fig crostata.these photos almost had me running out to buy brussel sprouts. almost. boy do i hate brussel sprouts. but the photos are that good.... they can make you eat things you don't like to eat. almost.

images via sunday suppers

recently they shared this recipe. i put it on my to-do list and made it last night. so simple.

start with oats and chopped nuts. i used almonds only.
melt butter and honey.
mix and spread on cookie sheet. bake.
and you have this. i added raisins.

yummy. so incredibly yummy.