Pre-Cleanse

Hello all,

I went on a verryy long shopping trip today (the GW bridge was crazy both ways ugh!) but also a very successful one. Preparing for my cleanse, I made two stops. Trader Joes and Whole Foods. I just discovered that their is a Trader Joe's right down the road from the Whole Foods I shop at. Hearing about how other bloggers love TJ's I decided to give it a try, hoping to get some cheaper produce. I got what organic produce I could at TJ's and then headed to WF to finish up. All in all I spent $80.29 on the produce for my cleanse. Not too bad considering I would have paid $195.00 for the Blue Print Cleanse, more if I decided to have it shipped rather then trek down to pick it up. Plus, I bought all organic produce :)

I spent an hour and a half washing every single piece of produce I will be using. I even prepared the green juices by assembling the ingredients in containers. Although it took a decent amount of time preparing for the cleanse, I am hoping the this makes the whole process go smoother, as the only work I will have during the cleanse is cleaning the juicer and drinking the juice :)

Tomorrow starts day 1!

Have a great night...and if you have any advice for me on juice cleansing I'd love to hear it!

3-Day Cleanse

Hello everyone,

Since the summer I have been contemplating the idea of doing a cleanse. At one point in the summer, I decided I would embark on the Master Cleanse. Yes, the cleanse in which the only calories you consume are in the liquid concoction of water, lemon juice, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper. I went into the cleanse planning to stay on it for ten days. Two drinks later, I quit. The drink tasted revolting, and although I wasn't hungry, I simply could not stomach it.

Thinking back on this cleanse now I am not sure it would have been the best idea to go through with it. I feel that the nutrients this cleanse provides are simply not adequate. Although I love maple syrup and am known to put it on a whole array of foods, it is not exactly overflowing with nutrients (it does contain high amounts of zinc and magnesium). 

This past summer when I first started to learn about raw foods, I came across juice cleanses. I was new to raw food at the time, so I put the idea on the back burner. Then, a couple of months ago I bought my Breville Juicer and started experimenting with fresh juices. Fresh juices are nothing like store bought! Feeling that I was comfortable with juicing having eased into it, a couple of weeks ago I started looking into doing a cleanse. I had heard of the blueprint cleanse, but the price was a little steep. Then I discovered that the founders have a book on recreating the cleanse at home! So I ordered it, and now I am ready for a cleanse! I feel much more comfortable with a juice cleanse, and feel that the nutrients I am going to get from it are going to be fantastic (I may head over to whole foods and get a wheat grass shot for an extra boost).

After planning my menu for 3 days I have decided on this:

Day 1:

1. Greens with Apple

2. Carrot-Apple Ginger

3. Apple-Pear-Beet-Ginger

4. Pineapple Mint

5. Spinach-Carrot-Pineapple-Cilantro

6. Cinnamon Cashew Milk

Day 2:

1. Greens with Apple

2. Carrot-Apple-Parsley-Beet-Orange

3. Grape-Cucumber-Pear

4. Pineapple Pear Lemongrass

5. Spinach-Carrot-Pineapple-Cilantro

6. Cinnamon Cashew Milk

Day 3:

1. Greens with Apple

2. Watermelon-Lime

3. Pineapple-Beet-Ginger-Pear

4. Pineapple Mint

5. Spinach-Carrot-Pineapple-Cilantro

6. Cinnamon Cashew Milk

I am beginning the cleanse on Friday and ending on Sunday. My plan is to post each day on how it is going...

In the meantime, I made a delicious juice this morning:

Apple-Beet-Carrot Juice (2 granny smith apples, 1 medium beet, and 3 medium carrots)

Supurb!

Stay tuned for cleansing details!

Steph

Citrus and Avocado Salad

Hello everyone, I hope your weeks are off to good starts...tomorrow is the end of my three-day crazy busy streak, so tomorrow my week will get a whole lot better. Just a quick post tonight on Daily Garnish's scrumptious looking salad that I whipped up tonight. You can find the recipe here. The salad is very simple, only requiring...5 ingredients plus salt and pepper.

I will leave the instructions to Emily but urge you to make this quick and yummy salad!

On a bad note...I am sorry to say that I am officially all out of my homemade maple crispies cereal. Sniff sniff. I am now left to no other option but to eat packaged cereals until I am able to make a trip home to restock. 

Thank you all for reading, have a great night!

Philly + Pure Food and Wine

Happy Super Bowl Sunday! 

It has been another crazy week that left no time for posting. The week left zero time for anything besides school and internship (and working out of course) and the weekend wasn't too much different (although their was a very fun segment to the weekend which is coming).

First, a recap on last weekend:

I visited my best friend from home in Philadelphia and had a wonderful time. We both new that if we didn't make plans to get together early on in the semester we would never end up doing it as our schedules got busier, so we made plans for the first weekend back at school. Good idea! For a late lunch we went to a hot spot that specializes in froyo and salads. Sweetgreen (a really cute name I think...sweet from the froyo and green from the salad) uses local and organic produce from farmers they know and leave a small footprint behind. Gotta love it! Both Maura and her friend got froyo and I was famished and got a loaded salad. Mesclun greens with avocado, fava beans, hard boiled egg, grapes, and asian vinaigrette. Everyone was very pleased with their choices.

Now for this weekend!

I went to Pure Food and Wine! I made last minute plans with my sister and a friend to see Mamma Mia on broadway, and we decided to start the evening off right. We started with two appetizers: Hazelnut Crostinis with Crimini Mushrooms and Caper Bearnaise (little crostinis piled high with pureed mushrooms and capers) and Niwa Maki of Avocado, Enoki Mushrooms, Pickled Heirloom Baby Carrots (like sushi, delicious!) The pictures on the appetizers didn't come out great because of the lighting.

Quick side note: J is currently distracting me by throwing popcorn in the air for me to catch with my mouth. He says I should be blogging about snacking on popcorn because it is Pop Secret homestyle after all.

For the main course I had Zucchini, Local Roma and Heirloom Tomato Lasagna with basil pistachio pesto, sun-dried tomato marinara, macadamia pumpkin seed ricotta. It surprised me that it was served cold (I thought maybe it would have been warmed in the dehydrator) but I found that I really enjoyed the cool refreshing mouthfuls.

My sister had the weet Corn and Cashew Tamales with Chili Spiced Portabella salsa verde, cashew coconut sour cream, avocado, raw cacao mole. Another hit (we all passed around the meals).

My sister's friend had the Spanikopita with Spinach, Almond Feta, Cucumber Yogurt, local cauliflower and white grapes. Delicious too!

The over-21 crew also had a pitcher of sangria...which passed their high standards for sangria. This will be one of the first places I go to try all of the creative cocktails when I turn 21.

We headed to show after a wonderfully satisfying dinner and had a fantastic time. Mamma Mia may be my favorite broadway show (even over Wicked). Great humor, amazing voices, and a wonderful story line (I am happy I hadn't seen the movie yet). Perhaps the highlight of the show was when the elderly male usher began dancing and singing very enthusiastically during the encore. 

A great night that made my otherwise homework-filled weekend an enjoyable one!

One week down

Good morning! The first week of the semester is down and it was certainly a busy one (despite the snow day we had on Thursday that cancelled five of my classes). I also have a new medical internship which is going to take up a good chunk of my time (but that I am very excited about). I have done plenty of eating and whipping up new concoctions, but was a busy blogger and didn't pull the camera out until last night. Perhaps two missed photo opportunities: the beautiful aftermath of the 14 inches of snow we got here in metropolitan New York and a wonderful sushi meal at Momoya in NYC with my sister. This is my second time ordering sushi at Momoya (and rest assured not the last) so I will be certain to take photos on my next Momoya occasion.

As I am writing, I am noshing on this:

A delicious bowl of cinnamon maple crispies with almond milk

I am really in love with these crispies. I made two batches to come back to school with, and I don't think it was nearly enough. Only the first week has gone by and already I am half-way through my stash! I also want to give praise to homemade almond milk. It is loads better then the cartons of almond milk you can buy at the store. I drank store bought almond milk for many months before I finally bought a vitamix, and did just fine with it. However, now that I have been making homemade milk I don't think I will ever truly enjoy going back. The flavor of homemade almond milk has more of a natural sweetness and lightness that the store bought just doesn't seem to impart. 

I also made this yummy smoothy yesterday afternoon:

pear, apple, 3 blood oranges, and 2 cups frozen pineapple

When I took it out of the fridge this morning it had separated and I thought looked really neat:

I am visiting a friend in Philly this weekend and on my way back am going to stop at the whole foods and stock up again. I have been doing some research on tasty ways to fill collard wraps, and so my plan is to pick up some produce for these. I will let you know how my collard wrap adventures go this week!

I don't have too much to share on the exercise end of things. Yes, I have been working out, but nothing new and exciting. I have been using my Insanity program which I still love and I believe is making my arms stronger! I am able to bang out more pushups now before resting then when I could at the start, which is definitely a solid improvement.

I did happen to come across a great hot Bikram yoga deal on redeemio a couple of weeks ago. Only $59 for a month unlimited, when it is usually $135. I purchased one, and am just waiting to start my month until I am a little more settled into my schedule. I'll keep you all updated :)

Hope you have fantastic weekends and thank you for being be readers!

Steph

Cookbooks

Hello all! Just a short little post on my favorite cookbooks that I have acquired so far :)

 One of my first raw food books :)

 Another of my early raw food books

 The most delicious cupcakes and desserts (my go-to book for whenever I make cupcakes)

 After so much success with my first Magnolia cookbook I just had to get the sequel!

 New from this past Christmas but definitely my favorite raw food cookbook

 Another Sarma cookbook (and Matthew too...I can't forget him!)...love this one but I still use Living Raw Food more

 I actually haven't had a chance to make any recipes from this yet...but I think it will be a winner!

 Oh my goodness you must buy now!

 Another first raw food one

David is the master of desserts (non-raw) and this is the book that started my love affair with ice cream making...I even have my own labels (read: Steph's Scoops)

Back to school!

Hello all! Today was the first day of the new semester...nice and easy with only two classes. I am all moved in with my new appliances set up (read: vitamix and juicer). However, I am feeling that I need to do some reorganizing but I am not sure how! I stopped at Whole Foods on the drive back, and stocked up on load of fresh fruits and greens. I even bought a bag of carrots, which is very uncharacteristic of me. I actually don't like carrots. I like every other fruit/veggie/green around, from mangos to fennel to brussel sprouts to spinach to kale. For whatever reason I simply do not like carrots. Anyways, my reason for buying them then? I know that they have loads of nutrients, and I figure with my juicer I can whip up juicer with some of the benefits of carrot juice, while attempting to mask the flavor!

Here is a look at my college fridge, jam packed with all sorts of delicious and colorful food!

I could barely fit everything!

This morning before class I whipped up a green smoothy. In fact, it was the most delicious green smoothy yet! I stuffed my vitamix with one big bunch of watercress, a bagful of frozen mango (about 2 cups), one peeled lemon, two packets of stevia, and about a cup and a half of water. All blended up it looked like this:

I had a glass full of it, and this container is what was left over. This was the first time I tried watercress, and it just may be my favorite green yet! It tasted really great in the shake and watercress has TONS of nutrients to boot! In fact, watercress is a better source of Vitamin C, B1, B6, K, E, Iron, Calcium, Magnesium, Manganese, Zinc, and Potassium then broccoli, apples, and tomatoes! It also has more Calcium then the touted spinach (which I also love so I am not trying to diss...I am just excited upon watercress!). Anyways, this shake was delic and I am fairly certain that I will be on a watercress kick for some time now.

I also made myself a salad for dinner last night. By the time I was done unpacking I was really starving and begining to get a little grumpy (that happens to me when I am really hungry). This salad did the trick! A bed a arugula with goat cheese, pecans, and diced apple. Topped off with a lemon vinaigrette (lemons, olive oil, honey, salt, and pepper). I would have loved avocado on it too but it wasn't ripe yet. Really yummy none the less and I was in a much better mood after I gobbled it down.

I have a really busy say tomorrow with classes, so I need to figure out snacks to pack for the day! (Five hours of class in a row) I'm thinking a repeat of today's green smoothy for breakfast (may bring it in a coffee mug), a bag of my homemade raw granola, and a banana should hold me over until two. Hope your weeks are off to a great start!