September « 2009 « eatingRD.com

September 27, 2009

granola bars & a happy anniversary

Filed under: Blog,Breakfast,Dinner,Restaurants — Tags: granola bar, pizza, whole grain — Kristen :) @ 10:04 pm

Thank you all so very much on your encouraging comments on my funk this past week. I think just being so tired with work and school really wiped me out, and I have to be more cognoscente of this happening. I can’t run myself ragged without sleep. I also have to make it a priority to get some kind of activity in because it always gets my energy levels up and makes me feel good. I was stuck in the cycle of tiredness, no activity and no sleep which fed the cycle of more tiredness. I always like to think that this too shall pass and I just have to pick myself up for the next week 🙂

Friday night wasn’t too exciting and we had good ol’ sloppy joe leftovers for dinner. I love how tomato-based dishes taste even better the next day. Boy, these were good! The cinnamon really added that extra sumthin’ sumthin’. The highlight of my night was a new energy bar experiment! Getting in the kitchen always makes me feel better and I really wanted to try these when Emily had a guest post of Dan’s Pumpkin Spice Bars.

Oh my goodness, these are the BOMB! They are similar to Clif bars, but not as sweet with lots of spice, just the way I like them. The texture was superb, slightly cookie-like, but not as gooey and sticky as Clif bars.

I had a few alterations: (FYI the Kashi Warm Cinnamon Cereal is out of this world, in a bar or not). I couldn’t find red flame raisins, so I just used regular ones. I used mixed nuts instead of walnuts. I only had peanut butter, not almond butter. Had canned sweet potato instead of pumpkin. I also whirled my dates & H20 in the food processor after whirling the cereal.

The bars turned out really wonderful and I put them in baggies for us to take on our rides and have during the week as a yummy snack. Look at those nutritionals . . .

This bar has a great nutritional profile, thanks to the help of the kashi cereal and all the wholesome ingredients. I got 17 bars out of this batch, well not counting the little bit I scraped from the bowl (shhh!)

Other good stuff:

18% Vitamin E, 31% Vitamin B6, 30% folate, 24% Vitamin B12, 54% Manganese, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, selenium . . . awesome!

Also for the bar about 72% CHO, 23% fat, and 14% pro, nice balance for some good energy. Yes, 12% DV of CHO! I don’t know why I was thinking of the entire bar, not the %DV that is on the label, hello 🙂 (just having a retard moment)

Thanks Dan and Em for a great bar recipe! Chris told me that he really likes them and wants to eat them all! I will have to make a double batch next time. I’m just wondering when the next installment will be or if we can go into business together?! hehe

Speaking of rides . . . what a better way to banish the funk than going on a nice ride?! aahhh so invigorating, tiring and I loved it. We went on a club ride for about 36 miles and it was great to get back in some activity. I just really miss it when I can’t get it in. I also had a pumpkin spice bar on the ride 🙂 I love how it isn’t too sweet and sits well on my tummy.

That night we decided to have a nice little anniversary celebration at that pizza place we went to last weekend called Settebello. We signed up for their newsletter and they have special pizzas each week. This week was zucchini blossom pizza!!!!!! Oh my gosh, I really wanted to try this, especially since they specified it as a limited appearance!

We started out with a little appetizer called the misto. It had various Italian meats, olives (they weren’t too bitter like regular kalamatas), mushrooms, artichokes, and flatbread.

It was really good, Chris was ravenous from his 62 mile ride that day so he ate most of it. It’s nice to have the bottomless pit around to eat for you 🙂

But on the other hand, have you seen this study? It’s surprisingly true, darn you Chris! hehe

Along with the appetizer I had a small glass of the Danzante Pinot Grigio. This is my favorite type of white wine. Very fruity, dry, not too grassy and nicely balanced. I just wish their pour was a little bit taller 🙂

The pizza was really interesting and yummy! It was a white sauce pizza (I traditionally like the tomato-based sauces), with sweet corn, ricotta, mozzarella and topped with zucchini flowers and olive oil. It did need a little something extra so I put some black pepper and chili flakes on mine for just a little heat 🙂

Zucchini flowers are so neat and taste very delicate and sweet! They matched perfectly with the sweet corn.

Overall it was a great night. We were thinking of going to see The Informant after dinner, but poor Chris was so tired from his ride that we just rented a movie to take home in case we fell asleep. We try to watch movies, but usually both of us are so tired, we just fall asleep to them! We rented Yes Man, and it was actually pretty funny. I myself am a huge Jim Carrey fan, especially Dumb and Dumber!

Today I even got a jump rope and weights class in, yay! Now about that studying . . .

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!

What’s your favorite granola/energy bar?

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September 25, 2009

in a funk

Filed under: Blog,Comfort foods,Dinner,Recipes in a Flash — Tags: Beef — Kristen :) @ 5:37 am

This week was certainly not my best as far as fitness goes. So far I haven’t made it to the gym this week! I think all the studying/working and fitting in the fun last weekend with lack of sleep really started to get to me. I think it was Tuesday when I started to feel like ick and my body was definitely trying to tell me something. After having to get up for work at 4:30 that day, I came home, took an hour long nap, ate dinner and then went to bed for a total of 10 hours! This is totally not like me. If I take a nap after 3pm I usually can’t sleep at night. I think I’m just running myself down right now and really need to take it easy somehow. It was really weird, I felt nauseous tired and my muscles didn’t want to work. Has anyone else had this feeling?

I loved college because at least when we stayed up late studying and working (and occasionally a fun time?), we got to sleep in to at least 7 or 8am. I’ve been taking my daily vitamin as an insurance policy right now, especially with the season of germs starting and going out to the middle schools (germ factories) now. My iron levels are normal since last visit, so I don’t know what’s my deal. Ah well, hopefully the funk will pass and sleep will miraculously just not be needed. I think that would be wonderful if I didn’t have to sleep because so many things could be accomplished in those 5-7 hours!

I am looking forward to the month of October though because my hours are being cut back. It’s just for one month based on my contract position which is kind of weird. This really isn’t a good thing as far as the paycheck goes, but I think it will be nice to have a tiny bit of extra time. It seems right now my time is worth more than what I’m getting paid. Unfortunately, I think I will have to request less hours with my next contract. Just for me, I don’t think I can do this and work on my thesis and research. Half the time I’ll be working on something only to look down and see that it’s already 11pm and wonder where the heck the time went and why didn’t I accomplish more?

Anywho, I turned in my first very rough draft outline to my chair today and hopefully we can get my committee formed! I’m excited, yet nervous!

This weekend doesn’t look as exciting as last 🙂 I’m going to try to at least get a bike ride in on Saturday morning and then I’m not sure if Chris has any plans Saturday night for our 3-year anniversary (the non-wedding type)? I told him we don’t have to do anything, especially since we splurged on dinner and the concert last weekend. Sunday will be reserved for lots of school stuff!

Lately, I’ve been going for easy dinners 🙂 Tonight we had some good ol’ sloppy joe’s! Kind of reminds me of childhood when my mom would use that packet or canned stuff. As I got older, I really didn’t like those pre-prepared packages, and making sloppy joe’s from scratch isn’t too bad.

I adapted the recipe only slightly from the blog Pinch My Salt. This blog has some great photography and recipes 🙂

Sloppy Joes

1 onion, diced
1/2 red bell pepper, diced
3 garlic cloves, pressed
1 T. Olive Oil
1 pound lean ground beef
2 t. chili powder
1.5 t. ground cumin
1/8 t. cinnamon (this is so good!)
1/8 t. freshly ground black pepper
1 t. kosher salt
1 small can tomato paste
1/4 cup fruity balsamic vinegar
1 T. brown sugar
1/3 C. ketchup
1/2-3/4 C. water

Sauté onions, peppers and garlic in olive oil until softened; add beef and cook until browned.

Make a circle in the middle of the pan, add tomato paste and balsamic vinegar and cook down for 10 minutes.

Add all other ingredients to the ground beef mixture and cook, stirring, over low heat until thickened (about 10 minutes). Add more water if it gets too thick.

Serve in whole wheat buns and get messy!

I like to serve a big salad along side. This time mine had goat cheese, cranberries, heirloom mater and carrots.

Also topped it with some gooey cheese . . .

What’s a food you remember from childhood? What do you do when you get in a funk?

Have a great weekend!

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September 21, 2009

whirlwind

Filed under: Blog,Dinner,Restaurants — Tags: Greek, pizza — Kristen :) @ 10:48 pm

It’s been a whirlwind of a weekend, but it was lots of fun and fairly productive. Yes, I could have accomplished a lot more to be honest, but there were fun things going on that I couldn’t pass up!

Friday night was spent studying and trying to get something done without getting distracted by the fact that it was Friday night. This usually signals my brain to think that it is the weekend (freedom!) and I have ample amounts of time (ha!) funny funny. This is not the case.

Saturday I also tried to get more studying accomplished, made a trip to the library and also met with my advisor to discuss my next steps in the thesis process. He’s actually very approachable and believes that I should just go for it. I’m getting caught up in small research methods that I’m not sure if I can do. There is my planning oriented mind getting the best of me again! He wants me to just come up with a simple outline of the study for now, even if I don’t know how to do something or what to measure, because this will be discussed during the pre-prospectus meeting. He even told me not to spend too much time on it before the meeting because it will get hashed anyways. I like things to be definite and known, so this is hard for me, but I actually left the meeting feeling very excited and empowered! New Motto: Just go for it!

Saturday night we went to the Greek Food Festival!!! We look forward to this every year and really enjoy the festivities and most importantly, the FOOD! Oh how I love all Greek food! My friend, Chris and I got there a little early to get a seat and munched on things through the evening. It’s good to come with a couple people so you can get different foods to try without having to eat the entire thing by yourself. I love sharing food 🙂

There was live entertainment too.

First we started with a greek salad. It was really good and fresh, but a little heavy on the dressing.

Next we decided on a gyro and greek fries with lemon and spices. I think gyros are my favorite, well one of them anyway. I love lamb and all the spices that they put in the slow-roasted goodness.

oooh! and I can’t forget the tzatziki sauce. This is my condiment of choice for pretty much anything.

Moving on I decided to get some Loukoumades to share. It is pretty much fried dough, drizzled with honey and cinnamon. Now who doesn’t like that?! This isn’t something I really eat, but it is sure fun every once in awhile. I had 2 of the chewy, doughy, heavenly goodness. Don’t they look like they are glowing?

Another group of friends came to the table and they got a bottle of wine to share. Yay, more sharing!! This wine had some rich, deep back notes to it and a good finish. I had a small glass and also a sip of this really good greek beer. Not too much of a beer fan when there is wine to be had, but it was good!

We sat and chatted for quite awhile. Poor Chris, he was so tired from biking 65 miles earlier that he went home and slept (he didn’t share any food and ate a lot!). I promised I would get him some baklava for later and came out with these beauties. The honey cake was delicious. Again, can’t be trusted in any fun food purchasing situation!

This festival was really fun and we all had a great time, I can’t wait for next year!!

I spent a good part of Sunday catching up on cleaning, wash and errands. I also got a little studying done. The highlight of my day was the Pink Martini Concert!!!! Chris and I decided to go out to dinner beforehand since this is kind of our anniversary gift (can’t believe we’ll have been together 3 years on Saturday). Boy was it a great night, although I wish it wasn’t on a Sunday. I’m pretty tired today, but it was really worth it. I haven’t been to many concerts in my life (maybe 2), but there’s just nothing like hearing a great group that you love right there in person. What’s your favorite concert?

We went to a restaurant nearby so that we could just walk to the concert in case we had some drinks. It was a little place called Settebello, and I’m so glad we tried it out! The food was right up my alley. Mostly pizzas and antipasti, but very delicious and simple. The food was actually quite reasonable, but we got a little crazy with the drinks. That’s where they get cha! Another great thing about this place? . . . the lighting was PERFECT for pictures, yay! Most restaurants are like a dark dungeon, so this was a nice and pleasant change.

We started with a salad of various greens and herbs, roasted mushrooms, pine nuts, tomatoes, artichokes, parmesan and a vinaigrette, along with a glass of Ruffino Chianti. This is always a great pick on most restaurant menus and isn’t too expensive if you buy it at a store either.

Dinner was the Pizza Lasagna with tomatoes, ricotta, cheese, sausage, roasted mushrooms. We always order a side of basil because everything is better with basil 🙂 Their dough is really delicious and chewy, not too thin or crispy. The menu claims they cook their pizzas traditionally, and they have a great pizza oven. Boy I wish I could have one of these in my kitchen or backyard some day. That would be awesome!

Instead of ordering dessert (they had some yummy looking gelato), we had some time to kill so we decided to go hang out at the bar. I ordered a lemon drop with grappa, limoncello, lemon juice and basil, and Chris ordered this drink with tuaca, amaretto and frangelico.

These were so good! I would go back just for the drinks, even though they are pricey. It was kind of fun just to hang out at the bar after dinner because we don’t usually do this 🙂

Chris and I really enjoyed the concert. We were in row B, so we were right there! It brought us back to Portland when we saw them the first time. After the show they signed our t-shirts and a CD and also took a few pictures. How cool! This is a great group if you like instrumental music, yet it’s a little different (she also sings in different languages like Spanish, Italian and Turkish) and fun to listen and relax to. I really want to wear my shirt, but they all signed it so now I can’t wash it!

Whew, I was so pooped when we finally got home. I didn’t get to bed till after midnight and then had to get up early today for work and had an exam today . . eek! I think I did pretty well on the exam. Most of the stuff I had learned before, so I hope I didn’t make some stupid mistakes. I hate when that happens.

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!!!

I am catching up on all your blogs, slowly but surely, thanks for reading! I really appreciate all your encouraging comments on my thesis topic 🙂

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September 19, 2009

study hard, play harder

Filed under: Blog,Dinner — Tags: dates, noodles, whole grain — Kristen :) @ 2:51 am

whew, this week just flew by! This is great but it’s been a little too fast. I feel like the weeks are just getting away from me. While I never really was a party animal, I’m employing the motto of ‘study hard, play harder’ this weekend since I’m going to try to fit in both! While tonight is Friday, I’m going to try to get somewhat caught up so that I can enjoy the Greek Food Festival Saturday evening and the Pink Martini Concert Sunday night. Boy do I have lots to do, as I’m sure you guys are no stranger to this, right?

Thursday I rushed to the farmer’s market after work and before class and found some yummies. I think I cut the cantaloupe too soon because it wasn’t very good, but the dates are AMAZING!! I think this is my new love. I have to be careful because when I brought them home I had 5! hello fiber and carbs! I want to try to make granola bars with them or some kind of quick bread. Do you have any good date recipes to share??? Yum!

The bag had a bunch of different varieties, I liked the tiny brown one in the back the best.

They also had date bread and cookies and I about bought them all! Next time I want to try the bread. Oh my gosh, this cookie was just wonderful, you’ll see . . .

I’m meeting with my chair tomorrow at a coffee shop, since it’s so hard to meet during the week with work. I need to look over some more research, but I think I’ve decided on a thesis topic focusing on coconut water! eek! I’m excited yet very nervous about the whole thing. It will be something like ‘The effect of coconut water on rehydration after exercising in the heat’ What do you think?

Everyone I’ve told or asked about it doesn’t seem too excited and many people don’t even know what coconut water is. But, no one in the department is giving me any other ideas!!! I’ve been very frustrated and discouraged trying to find something, but I hope this will work. I’d like to compare it to traditional electrolyte replacements to see if it is better (that would be neat), does the same, or is not a good sports drink. I’m just having a discrepancy between how much sodium is in the product. The USDA database says 252 mg/cup, but most of the brands available say 60 mg or less. That isn’t really ideal for a ‘sports drink’. I contacted ZICO brand and they said the USDA must be in error. Anyone have any ideas? I haven’t heard back from the USDA as of yet.

Yesterday for dinner I made peanutty noodles. Peanut butter is one of my favorite things and I can have it for breakfast, lunch, dinner and dessert pretty much or just straight from the jar. I love this recipe because it’s pretty darn versatile. I didn’t have any bokchoy so I just left it out and added more carrots. Yum! I like to use soba noodles, but anything you can find works.

Here is the Peanutty Noodle recipe.

And the yumminess I promised! I topped 1/4 of the date chocolate chip cookie with a bit of vanilla 1/2 fat ice cream. Wow, it was the perfect combo!

So that’s what my weekend is going to look like, I need to get to studying and brainstorming asap! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend 🙂

What’s your motto lately?

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September 16, 2009

munchies

Filed under: Blog,Dinner,Lighter Fare,Recipes in a Flash — Tags: Asian, pasta — Kristen :) @ 5:37 pm

Yay for Wednesday! I hope all your weeks are going well. Last night I was determined to be efficient with my limited time. I was thinking about stopping at the Whole Foods on the way home, since I was missing a few ingredients for dinner, but I knew that would just be danger. I try to make only one or two grocery-related stops per week, otherwise if I just stop to pick up one thing I tend to walk out with the entire store! I like to peruse the aisles, finding any cool thing to try and discover. Any one else like that? Plus it’s a big waste of time, so I decided to fight the urge to stop and improvise with what I had at home. But, somehow I still managed to go to the store, you’ll see (I mean read).

I decided to make lettuce boats sometime this week and last night was perfect because they are really pretty quick. I also killed two birds with one stone and prepped veggies for the peanut butter noodles I plan on making for Thursday. I think this is really what I need to do from now on. I need to prep on the weekends with the little spare time I have (ha!) so that dinner during the week isn’t so laborious and time consuming. Cooking is supposed to be fun, right? I love cooking because it is like an outlet for me and I enjoy the time and every sensory aspect of it, but it is just not as feasible now. Plus, Chris is also working full-time and taking classes at night so while he’s getting ready for class, I’m left prepping and cleaning up. Even though he is a good helper when he has time 🙂

Another great and quick dinner is Annie’s Mac and Cheese, but I always have to ‘spruce up Annie’ with a little extra ingredients like veggies, tofu, mushrooms, yogurt and cheese. This time I just threw in random leftovers we had in the fridge, easy and yummy!

Here’s the lettuce boats, don’t you love the ancient plates 🙂 Hey, they work, right?

Yum! They turned out really good and refreshing. Here are the lettuce boats 🙂 I also like to pair them with some soba noodles.

Before I left from work around 4pm I had a snack of greek yogurt, cereal and cantaloupe, because this helps me from getting too hungry for dinner. If I get too hungry I tend to raid the kitchen like a crazy person. Usually I just much on baby carrots while I make dinner and that works. I also felt pretty full from dinner, but for some reason I was still craving something after dinner! Oh no, the munchies were attacking! Okay plan B. When this happens I try to go for a walk or go upstairs to work on things to take my mind off of it. I did the above and usually that works, but last night I was really craving some fro yo!

The urge would not leave me (Chris was also not helping) and so I decided to fuel our cravings and went to a nearby Fresh & Easy to get something cold and creamy. I normally don’t shop here exclusively, but boy this store is dangerous and has really good prices. I went in for some frozen yogurt and came out with cereal, fig bars and pb pretzels too, geez! All for only $10, though. I can’t be controlled in any grocery situation 🙂 Every grocery store should come with a warning: CAUTION! you WILL buy more than you really need.

I had a bowl of 1/2 fat vanilla bean and a crumbling of 1/2 leftover banana muffin on top mmmm . . . but then I proceeded to grab a handful of popcorn and pb pretzels to try! And that was it, the munchies were defeated, well sort of.

I am sooo looking forward to the weekend and the GREEK FOOD FESTIVAL!!!!!!!!!!!! We absolutely love this every year and the food is well, phenomenal. We may also be going to a pink martini concert on Sunday night (this group is really awesome), but I really have to study, research, get ready for a project and an exam on Monday eek!

What do you do to battle an attack of the munchies?

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September 14, 2009

just one more day

Filed under: Blog,Dinner — Tags: Beef, coconut water, muffin, pancake, pasta — Kristen :) @ 4:04 am

Sunday always rolls around too fast and I’m left wishing I just had ONE more day, one more day would make all the difference in the world! Last weekend when we did have the 3-day weekend, it was just glorious, and I felt like I got a lot of things accomplished.

This weekend, well not so much . . .

Friday night is always a chill night for us. It’s a time when we can cook a little something together and/or enjoy a little vino. Chris rode his bike to work, since he is training for a century race in October (118 miles!) and got home a little later, so I got started on dinner with this recipe. I changed it a little bit and added some goat cheese to the sauce and also used this pasta I recently discovered at TJ’s. It was sooo good! I normally don’t like to buy packaged long pastas because it can be so much cheaper to make it on my own, but since it was late and Chris wasn’t home, I thought it would be perfect in an emergency 🙂

I think I’m going to add lemon to my pasta from now on because it gives it a nice refreshing and subtle yumminess. This pasta would also work really well with seafood. I didn’t know if it would go well with a tomato-type sauce, but it actually was really nice.

First I made the meatballs . . . and used oatmeal as the binder instead of breadcrumbs this time.

It really helps to form the balls beforehand and get them ready for the hot pan.

Once they are nice and golden around the edges, I added the sauce with the additional goat cheese to make it creamy. It will look a little loose, but don’t let it reduce down too much because the pasta will absorb all that goodness.

Then I added all the pasta (I used 1.5 bags of the lemon pepper pasta), basil and parmesan and mixed it all up 🙂

At this point I decided that, yes I would like to have a glass of wine, please!! Since Chris (crazy bike man now) was going to ride again tomorrow, he decided to abstain 🙁 So I thought I didn’t really want to open up a whole bottle of wine only to waste 3/4 of it. Hmmm . . . wait I had a bottle of barefoot chard in the fridge, yes!! Perfect for any occasion when you can’t drink the whole thing because it’s only about $4 /bottle. To tell you the truth it wasn’t that bad and actually good! I really don’t spend more than $10-15 /bottle most of the time anyway, and you really don’t have to to get a decent bottle 🙂 I saved the rest in the fridge, but the quality just isn’t the same after several days.

And with that dinner was served! I had to take the picture outside because the lighting inside was just terrible by the time dinner was ready.

Hello, my name is Kristen and I’m a pasta-holic 🙂

Saturday was a big frustrating whirlwind for me. I decided to go to the library to get focused and get things done, but it really felt like a waste of time, well sort of. I spent most of the time trying to figure out how to print since I had my laptop (well, my hard drive in Chris’ laptop since mine fried itself) and their printers aren’t supported by vista, and I forgot my unlv password, and then I had to figure out the scanner to send something and then . . . . ok I’ll just stop hehe I did find a few articles for my thesis that sound interesting. One of them compared 4 different drinks on hydration. I’d like to do something like this with coconut water, just not have so many variables. I just feel like I keep searching and searching, but still don’t feel completely confident. I e-mailed a few professors, so we’ll see what they think and if it is doable.

Since I got myself so flustered, I decided to bake a batch of banana muffins! I like to watch them poof in the oven, it’s very therapeutic 🙂 This recipe is from the blog Pinch My Salt. I really like her pumpkin pancakes too.

Sunday was spent mostly cycling! woo-hoo! Breakfast was a quick omelet with tofu, black beans, corn and spinach (leftovers from the week) on a flatbread and of course a muffin 🙂 I went on a women’s ride and then they had a little clinic afterwards on how to change a flat and clean your chains. They also had bagels, juice and coffee. I completely forgot my camera! Riding back home was really HOT and soooo windy! This was the worst wind I’ve ridden in and I thought I was literally going to blow off the bike, yikes! It is still blowing like crazy out there as I type.

While the ride was pretty easy, when we finally rode back home around 1pm, I was sweating like crazy from pushing against the wind in the heat and decided to re-hydrate with coconut water!! Oh my gosh, I think I’m in love.

It has such a wonderfully sweet, yet very subtle flavor that sat well on my tummy. I love that it has more potassium and 230% vitamin C compared to your conventional electrolyte replacement drinks, and it’s natural. No red #40 in here. Love that! I’m going to look at different brands because this one didn’t have that much sodium, which is a key to rehydrating when working hard in the heat. Yes, you need sodium! When I looked on Nutritiondata.com, they said there was 252 mg of sodium in coconut water. Has anyone seen this in a brand??

The version that I bought had 60 kcals, 15g CHO, 680 mg potassium, 40 mg sodium and more vitamin C than the one on nutritiondata.com. I’ll have to look into that. I didn’t know if brands are different?

I can’t wait to experiment with more because I really liked how it made me feel and settled on my tummy. I usually can’t drink Gatorade and such because they are so darn sweet.

Whew! Long recap 🙂 I hope you all had a more productive weekend than I did and have a good week! Lots of things to do.

How do you best stay hydrated, and rehydrate after endurance activity?

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September 11, 2009

supplement regulation

Filed under: Blog,Fitness/Health,Sports Nutrition — Kristen :) @ 8:33 pm

It’s amazing to me that such a popular, multi-billion dollar and ever-evolving industry isn’t better regulated by the FDA. While supplements are regulated per se, it is nothing near where it should be. This is disheartening and scary to me.

With the DSHEA Act in 1994, the term supplement was legally defined and the FDA began ‘regulating’ supplements. Just recently, only a mere 15 years later, they began to require that supplement companies ensure that what they say is in the product is really in there. I’m still wondering at this point how long it will take them to ensure that product claims are really true and scientifically based? So essentially, most supplement companies (not all yet) have to make sure that what’s on the label is in the jar which is great, but they don’t have to have a reliable and truthful claim to their product.

What’s scary is that many consumers believe that just because a product is on a shelf with a fancy label and too-good-to-be-true claims, that every thing is dandy and safe. Many athletes put their career at risk by taking supplements, only to find out later, when they have been disqualified, it had traces of banned substance in them.

Another thing that is sad is how understaffed the supplement division of the FDA is. In 2005 there were about 60 employees with a 10 million dollar budget for a 450 billion dollar industry, while the drug division had over 3,000 employees for a 500 billion dollar industry. It doesn’t make sense? I believe the ‘food’ and ‘drug’ should each be a separate regulating entity.

Supplements are considered foods, not drugs and no FDA approval is needed before they are marketed to consumers. Manufacturers don’t have to disclose interactions or problems to the FDA. There are no regulations on serving sizes or potency. The FDA does have the authority to pull the product once problems do arise, hmmm sounds a little bit like our healthcare system at the moment? Why is it not proactive?

As a dietitian, we can’t recommend or tell someone to take a specific supplement for liability issues, especially if the product claims aren’t required to be substantiated and based on research. What we can do is present what research is out there for the product and then let the individual make their own decision. Here are some good tips to follow because as consumers and educators we have to be careful:

Be aware of the media because many times they highlight one aspect of a product (mostly the good parts of course), but totally miss important considerations.
Do your research! That means from peer-reviewed journals, not magazines and TV commercials.
Be honest with someone if you don’t know about a certain supplement. There is no way to know them all, but allow time to find the research, and tell them you will get back with them.
Don’t assume that ‘natural’ = safe
Let the person decide whether to take a supplement based on a comprehensive research review.

There are some good resources out there that review the research on supplements for you:

The Health Professional’s Guide to Popular Dietary Supplements, 3rd Ed. The American Dietetic Association, 2007. – I think there is a new version coming out
PDR for Nutritional Supplements, 1st Ed.
PDR for Herbal Medicine, 3rd Ed.
PDR for Non-Prescription Drugs, Dietary Supplements, and Herbs 1st Ed (2006).
FDA
Office of Dietary Supplements
Tips for the Savvy Supplement User
The Natural Pharmacist
Consumer Lab (these last 2 require a subscription I believe)
Supplement Watch

What do you think? Do you take supplements? I’m not saying that supplements are all bad because they are not really regulated, I’m just saying that we should be careful and make sure 🙂 I myself do take a standard multivitamin on occasion as an ‘insurance policy’ and with all the aerobic activities. A little while ago I also was taking high-dose iron since my levels were low. Otherwise I try to eat healthfully 80-90% of the time. I do like my desserts, I’m not going to lie 🙂

In other news . . . TGIF! This weekend I plan on locking myself in the library and doing a lot of research to make a decision on a thesis topic. I’m so indecisive and I have trouble with this. Just deciding on something that I know I will be able to do and will enjoy doing for a long part of my graduate career is making me crazy. I don’t want to make it so overwhelming that I won’t be able to do the research. Ugh!

What are you looking forward to this weekend? Tonight I am looking forward to pasta!!!!! with this recipe (pictures to follow), and maybe a glass of vino? I don’t know, I love wine and pairing it with foods but the alcohol and sulfites, even in one glass, just makes me blah sometimes. My cycling performance is worse and I can almost feel it turned into fat the next day. I feel bloated and dehydrated even though I try to drink lots of water with it. Anyone else get like this? I love having a glass, but my weekends are just so short, I want to be productive, active and not feel like crap. I can’t have some without planning on being out of commission for at least part of the next day.

I also plan on doing a women’s ride on Sunday that GVC club has scheduled. It should be pretty easy, but then afterwards they are going to have a clinic on learning how to change a flat tire with free bagels and refreshments. Isn’t that cool?! I’m excited because I have no idea how to change one and always rely on Chris or someone else. I need to figure it out myself 🙂 I am going to take pictures!!

oooh! and check out this great giveaway from Lainie. BIG wholesome cookies, for only about 60 kcals each, who doesn’t like that?!

Have a great weekend everyone, sorry again for such lack of postage. I need to get my head on straight first 🙂

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September 9, 2009

yep, I biffed it

Filed under: Blog,Dinner — Tags: fish, ice cream, taco — Kristen :) @ 4:51 am

I know it’s a little delayed, but I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend! I sure enjoyed the extra day. I don’t know what it is but that one extra day makes such a difference in getting things done and feeling ready to start the week again. We didn’t really have any specific plans or go to any BBQ parties, but just made time to get things done, go on a bike ride and also to relax a little bit which was really really nice.

I made some progress on my sports nutrition project and have decided to do it on a supplement/ergogenic aid called FRS. It is endorsed by Lance Armstrong, along with other athletes. It’s main component is an antioxidant called quercetin, along with other antioxidants and a little caffeine. I’m not sure that this product will cause someone to have amazing athletic abilities, but some of the research is somewhat favorable for it. The only question I have is that FRS does contain the same amount of caffeine as 1/2 cup of coffee, as well as green tea extract, so how much of the energizing effect is from quercetin and the other antioxidants and how much of it is from caffeine alone? We’ll see. I’m also meeting with my advisor tomorrow . . . eek!

Today was a pretty normal kind of day except for one major thing, I didn’t use my car! Chris and I decided to bike to work this morning now that we work pretty close from each other and live not too far from work. It is about 16 miles each way for me and not too bad. Well, the morning stretch wasn’t bad at all. I wasn’t too tired, even though we had to leave the house by 5:30am, and the temperature was just perfect and actually slightly cool. On the way back, well, it was 98 degrees, very windy and I felt like my legs were going to give out. I also managed to experience my first mishap with clipless pedals. Let me explain . . .

Shimano 105 – the tip of the shoe goes about where my finger is and you push your foot it until you hear a ‘click’ Seems easy right?!

In the beginning of our ride home I felt pretty good, a little tired from getting up so early and working all day, but good. I fueled up with a banana, 1/2 a luna bar and 1/2 package of luna moons with lots of water throughout the day of course, but I could tell my hunger wasn’t satisfied. I had been ravenous all day. It seemed like I couldn’t tame the flames of my metabolism no matter what!

By the last stretch of the ride home I was feeling a bit shaky tired and knew I better finish the last of the luna moons I had with me. At this point we were on a nice straight path, so we decided to stop there rather than at the street to grab a quick refuel. Well, as I went to stop I completely spaced that I was locked into the bike. Since we didn’t stop at a stop sign or light I didn’t register and think of clipping out! Yep, there I went teetering and cursing before I fell hard into the dirt on the side of the path right on the side of my a*# gosh dangit! How could I let that happen?! I thought I had escaped the curse when I successfully finished my first ride with them, in a group no less, without falling over. Ah well, I guess everyone has to fall over sometime. Only the better reason to pick right up and keep at it. I have a nice goose egg bruise on the side of my bum, ouch! I still really like the pedals because the are very efficient with transferring the energy from your legs to the momentum of the wheels or something like that. It’s like instant gratification 🙂

Anyhow, when we finally made it home, I was, and can you believe it . . . RAVENOUS!! I made grilled fish tacos the night before and boy did they hit the spot for leftovers. I had to have 3 of them before I even started to feel satiated, and then proceeded to have a 1/2 cup of cantaloupe and a mochi. Mochis are the best invention ever and I usually get them at TJ’s for a special treat (another reason TJ’s rocks my socks off). They are little pockets of chewy, gelatinous coating filled with creamy ice cream! We like the mango flavor, but they also have chocolate and green tea I believe, yum! And there is about 100 kcals in one.

oooh! And another little snack that I just love and seems to disappear all too quickly is True North. I hadn’t tried this flavor before, and it’s sure yummy! Just have to be careful like most trail mix because in 5 clusters there is 170 kcals. Great, concentrated energy!

I found this recipe from CookingLight (what’s new?) and I thought I HAD to try it! I love fish tacos in the restaurants, not the battered kind, but the nice grilled ones, topped with creamy lime cilantro sauce and crispy cabbage. This is one of those recipes that really tastes like it does in the restaurant, well pretty darn close! I adapted it a little bit, mostly increasing everything because it wasn’t really enough spices to flavor the fish.

Grilled Fish Tacos with

Creamy Lime Cilantro Yogurt Sauce

Ingredients

Sauce:

1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
3/4 cup low-fat greek yogurt
2 tsp grated lime rind
3-4 tsp fresh lime juice, more for sprinkling
1/4 tsp salt
2 garlic cloves, minced

Tacos:

3 tsp ground cumin
3 tsp ground coriander
1 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1/2 – 1 tsp ground red pepper
1/4-1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 1/2 lbs red snapper fillets (I had halibut in the freezer)
olive oil spray
8 (6-inch) corn tortillas
2 cups shredded green cabbage

Preparation

Preheat oven to 425°.

To prepare sauce, combine ingredients in a small bowl; refrigerate.

To prepare tacos, combine spices in a small bowl; sprinkle and press spice mixture evenly over both sides of fish. Place fish on a baking sheet lightly coated with oil. Bake at 425° for 9 minutes or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork or until desired degree of doneness (alternatively you can use a grill pan for about 2 1/2 min per side). Place fish in a bowl; break into pieces with a fork. Heat tortillas to your liking (we like to get them crispy). Divide fish evenly among tortillas; top each with cabbage and sauce; sprinkle with more lime. So good!!!

Whew, that was a long one, hope you are having a good week so far!

Any good biff moments for you?

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September 4, 2009

nice and refreshing

Filed under: Blog,Dinner — Tags: broccoli, lemon, pasta, rotisserie chicken — Kristen :) @ 5:44 pm

ahhhh, Fridays, the love of my life, I look forward to you all week!

Overall the week was good! Progress has been made in my thesis in that I am meeting with my chair next week to get the ball rolling and hopefully I can come up with a topic that will be both interesting and doable. I’m really interested in the coconut water topic, but there are no studies out there that I can find as of yet. This would not be good for me in that I wouldn’t have any suggestions or methods to base my research off of. Any of you with an MS out there have any suggestions for me as I embark on this crazy journey that you wish you would have done differently? I’m still trying to learn the proper protocol for everything, and I can’t believe all the grammatical rules, yikes!

I am sooooorrre today! My muscles are not liking me at the moment, but I tried to win them over with some chia, flax, wheat germ oats love this morning 🙂 Workout week looked something like this . . .

tuesday – hip hop

wednesday – kick box (always makes me sore) I think my HR monitor is freaking out because it has told me twice now I maxed at 222, um cardiac arrest?!

thursday – first jazz class in a long time and I have definitely lost a lot of my technique and my hips were in shock.

friday – spin

I have to say though that since I’ve started cycling, my exercise classes have been feeling a lot easier and I don’t get very winded. Granted I am still sucking air like a girl on my rides trying to keep up with the pros, other things are now feeling easier, just for conditioning. I’ve got my clipless shoes, so now I just have to get the pedals. Why did I decide to start something so pricey, geez! I’m really nervous about this because you are practically locked into the bike and I can just imagine myself falling over while screaming ‘I can’t clip out!!!’ oh dear. positive thoughts.

Many of you around the blog world have been joyously praising the new fall weather coming your way and I’m jealous!!! Please send some out my way! It’s still freaking hot here and I look forward to the days when I can actually do activities outside in the afternoon without dying from heat stroke and bake lovely comforting warm casseroles without heating the house to oblivion. So because of that I have a nice refreshing pasta dish, adapted from my pasta idol Giada, that is great really at any temperature and very refreshing!

Lemony Roasted Chicken & Broccoli Pasta

Ingredients

about 3 bunches broccoli, trimmed and chopped
1/2 box of your favorite long pasta (I usually make fresh fettuccine, but in a crunch we had spaghetti rigati)
1 (14-ounce) can reduced-sodium chicken broth
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 cups shredded roasted chicken (from about 1 roasted chicken)
3/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan
1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon zest
Salt, freshly ground black pepper and all-purpose seasoning

Directions

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add pasta and cook until 4 minutes from al dente, then add broccoli and finish cooking together. Reserve 1/2 cup liquid; drain and rinse with cold water.

Meanwhile, bring the broth and lemon juice to a boil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Boil until the broth reduces a bit. Add the garlic and chicken, simmer on low. Add broccoli and pasta to the chicken broth and stir to combine. Add 1/3-1/2 cup of Parmesan, pine nuts, oil, and lemon zest. Toss to coat, adding some of the reserved cooking liquid, 1/4 cup at a time, to moisten if needed* Season to taste. Sprinkle with the remaining Parmesan and serve.

*note this is a really light sauce so it will seem as if it’s not ‘coming together’ give it time and some good light stirring. The chicken and broccoli will absorb all that lovely juice.

It’s great as a cold salad for leftovers too!

If you couldn’t tell, I’m really looking forward to the extra day this weekend. We don’t have any specific plans, but I do hope to make some progress on my school projects, organization and sanity, along with other house stuff like cleaning and wash. Oh and hopefully a bike ride in there somewhere. Tonight I plan to get together with a good friend for a little bite to eat and some drinks 🙂

Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

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September 2, 2009

this one’s a keeper

Filed under: Blog,Dinner — Tags: chicken, quinoa, squash, walnut — Kristen :) @ 3:26 pm

Yay for midweek! I don’t think I get really excited for the weekend until Thursday evening when my classes for the week are over. But, then that just means more studying and work for the weekend, boo! But I am excited for the 3-day weekend! Woo-hoo! That extra day just makes all the difference. Have any fun plans?

Not all too much going on this week, I’m still trying to decide on a project topic for sports nutrition. I’m very indecisive with pretty much everything. I asked the green valley cyclists group on Yahoo! groups and they had some interesting ones too, including Quercetin, Optygen, and Hypoxico. I’m actually interested in the altitude training, but I don’t think that would be considered a supplement? I guess blood doping and EPO are pretty well-known in the cycling world, but of course they are illegal. Living at high altitudes and training low has been shown to improve performance. One must live at least 12 hours/day at a high altitude for 3-4 weeks, along with training, to see improvements. Can you imagine sleeping in a altitude tent? Very interesting! I appreciated all your suggestions, it’s too hard to choose which one I’d like to do. It’s amazing to me how many performance enhancing agents are out there, kind of scary and boy are they expensive!

In other news, Chris is still really enjoying his job so far! This makes me happy too because there is just a different feeling in the house, and a more positive vibe. I’m one of those people that can ‘feel’ the emotions of others. Have you ever talked with someone that just sucks the energy right from you? Or someone that just makes you feel calm and happy? For some reason, I’m really in-tune with little things like that and I can almost ‘feel’ it. Weird!

He also started biking to work yesterday. I think once the weather cools down here a little bit (we are still averaging 103 F days), I’m going to try my hand at it. I could really only do it on Tuesdays or Fridays since I can’t ride to school from work. That might be kind of fun, but I’m sure I would forget something and have to walk around work in spandex bike shorts, oh no!! It’s only about 15 miles one way, but may be a way to sneak in some extra training/exercise. I can’t seem to find time to get a ride in before work since I have to get ready by 5:30am. We’ll see how it goes!

Oh the life of a Basset! Buster is doing well too, and is as stubborn as ever. His ears haven’t been too bad and we clean them at least 3-4x/week.

I have an awesome recipe to share with you! This is just one of those meals that I keep making time and time again because it’s a real keeper. It has a bit of clean-up in the kitchen, but is really great to make the components ahead of time on the weekend and then savor the flavors during the week!

Walnut-Crusted Chicken and

Summer Squash Baked Couscous

(adapted from CookingLight and FOOD)

For the Couscous:

1 (14-ounce) can less-sodium chicken broth, divided
3/4 cup uncooked WW couscous (you could also use quinoa)
2 cups sliced yellow squash (about 3 small) – used the ones from the farmer’s market!
1/2 cup sliced green onions
2 tbsp fresh basil (1 tbsp dried)
1 tbsp fresh oregano (1/2 tbsp dried)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/3 cup shredded fontina cheese
1/3 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
1/4 cup egg substitute (or 1 egg)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 400°.

Bring 1 cup chicken broth to a boil in a medium saucepan; stir in uncooked couscous. Remove from heat; cover and let stand 5 minutes. Fluff couscous with a fork.

Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with a little olive oil. Add squash, onions, basil, oregano, and garlic; sauté until slightly golden. Set aside.

Combine fontina and Parmigiano-Reggiano; set aside. Combine couscous, squash mixture, and half of cheese mixture in a large bowl; stir in remaining chicken broth, egg substitute, salt, and pepper. Spoon mixture into an 8 x 8-inch baking dish lightly coated with cooking spray. Top with remaining cheese mixture. Bake at 400° for 25-30 minutes or until golden.

For the Chicken:

In a food processor, pulse about 1 – 1 1/2 cups of toasted walnuts, 1/2 cup bread crumbs (I used TJ’s garlic ciabatta) and 1/2 cup grated parmesan – place this mixture in a large shallow pan, like a baking dish.

In another shallow pan – combine about 3 egg whites.

Take about 1 pound of chicken breasts, make sure they aren’t too thick and pound them down first. Place the breasts in the egg white mixture then dredge in the walnut mixture, pressing down. Shake off excess and place in a large skillet coated with a few good glugs of olive oil. Cook over medium-high heat until slightly firm and cooked through (about 4-5 minutes per side depending on thickness); drain them on paper towels.

We really enjoy this recipe and it’s great for leftovers, especially salad toppers 🙂 Sorry for the lack of pictures with this post!

Oh and remember when I posted about perfection a little while ago with Jessica Setnick’s take on the topic? I would recommend you read it if you get the chance, very eye opening. She also wanted to tell those of you who would like to work with individuals and eating disorders to check out her new site www.eatingdisorderjobs.com The site’s re-launch includes information for students and new graduates who are interested in the field, including Advice from the Experts – stars in the field and how they got into eating disorders, and advice they would give to others interested in the field. All this in addition to job postings and upcoming events. Any readers are welcomed and encouraged to sign up as members at the site to access all the info!

Hope your week is going by fast!

What’s one recipe you could make time and time again?

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Ingredients

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Ingredients

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