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!

Dehydrating Frenzy

Hello all. These past few days have been very busy trying to make all sorts of dehydrated goodies to bring back to school with me. I love my excalibur dehydrator, and it really allows me to make a huge variety of delicious and nutritious raw treats, but it is very big! In fact, I keep in it the basement at home or it just looks like an ugly black box hanging out in the main stream of things. I think it would also take up to much room in my tiny dorm room (which is already going to have the new additions of my juicer and vitamix), which is why I have been on a dehydrating frenzy lately. A couple of the many things I made were cinnamon maple crispies and cocoa crispies (same recipe except you replace the cinnamon with cocoa). I originally made one batch of each, which gives you about 4 cups for each, but everyone in my house loves it with milk in the morning so it is already almost gone! Last night I made two more batches of the cinnamon maple variety (my favorite) and I am putting them on lockdown to take back to college! I also made a new granola that I am super excited to try.

I have also been busy making nut milks (or nut mylks as the raw food world likes to call them). I have been drinking my first homemade batch of almond milk with my cinnamon and cocoa crispies :)

Lots of raw desserts have been coming out too! I made caramel bars for the first time...yummm. They took a lot of dehydrating time (48 hours) but kitchen time was minimal). And I made another batch of the congo bars. I have plans to whip up another batch of the cinnamon raisin cookies (this time as a chocolate chip cookie variety though), however I am not sure if I will be too wiped out tomorrow to make another recipe.

Last but not least, I have been whipping out tons of juices and green drinks. I have created some really great juices--my favorite so far was pear, pineapple, and beets. I was really excited when I found bright orange beets with orange, yellow, and red shoots coming up from them the other day in the store. They made for a beautiful glass of juice! Not to mention beets are chock full of potassium. I even threw in some of the beet greens which are high in vitamin A, vitamin C, and calcium.

I think my next post will include my favorite cookbooks! Have a great Saturday!

Green Monsters

Good morning! My juicer finally came in late Friday night, and I made my first juice concoction yesterday morning for breakfast. Wow was it a fun experience! Perhaps the most fun was putting a whole apple into the shoot. It would start of with a slow little drip into the juice canister and then all of a sudden would begin spurting out like a fire hydrant! And the color of my juice was really spectacular too...

Don't you love the bright green color?!

...and it tasted as good as it looks! I used 4 kale leaves, a handful of cilantro, 2 green apples, and 2 limes. The green flavor didn't come through at all really, but thats what I wanted for my first homemade green juice because I want to ease into them a little slowly. That morning I also made grapefruit orange juice for my sister. I was actually really surprised of the yield from these fruits. I used only one of each and we got a beautiful sunset colored 8 oz glass of juice from them. I had a sip and the was definitely better then any store bought juice (plus it used all organic fruits so you aren't getting any pesticides with your juice)! 

Later in the day I made a juice out of beets, apple, and pear. That too was really delicious and the bright pink color from the beets was really beautiful. (Sadly I don't have a picture but more beet concoctions to come.)

This morning I made my second green juice...here's what I put in it this time:

4 kale leaves, a bunch of cilantro, 2 celery stalks, one medium green apple, and one lime

I think next time I may try using a less tart apple, perhaps a fuji, to give a bit more sweetness to the juice. So what do I think about the Ikon 5-speed juicer? I absolutely love it. I am really pleased that this is the one I decided to go with. I am impressed with the juice yield, and the pulp is not very wet so I am confident that I am getting optimum yield from the juices with little waste. It is really a ton of fun to use (although maybe this will wear off after a bit) and I think bringing fun into healthy food preparing makes you more willing to eat healthy foods! I also love that it is easy to clean. I clean it right after using so that nothing dries and although there are a lot of parts to clean (maybe 6?), cleanup goes really quick. It takes me about 4 minutes, and I clean it really thoroughly. From what I have heard some juicers take up to 10 minutes, so 4 minutes seems like a bargain to me!

My workout for the day that I am really looking forward to? Ice hockey! Friends of mine and J's have a pond at their house and in the winter we play ice hockey. Not only is it a ton of fun but its a really great workout (believe me your thighs will be feeling it the next day). When I get home I am thinking of making a couple of raw desserts and watching the Jets game. Go Jets! 

So thats the plan for today. What are all of you up to today? Making any fun treat for football?