Indian For Lunch

I found some multi grain bread hiding in the back of the fridge that needed to be used up and had a bit of time this morning so I made myself some coconut blueberry French toast:
-3 slices multi grain bread (this was bought from a bakery)
-1/4 cup egg beaters
-1/2 cup coconut milk
-cinnamon and lots of it
I made a VERY quick blueberry sauce by heating the blueberries in the microwave for a minute with a tsp of cinnamon apple honey. I also spread a wee bit of coconut butter on the toast. Lush. This meal was 100% satisfying to me!

I didn’t go to the gym today because I had a lunch date with my supervisor. She takes each of us payroll gals out for our b-day every year. Mine was a bit late because I was off the week of my birthday, then she was pretty sick last week. No matter, I don’t mind the wait. I didn’t want to hit the restaurant starving so I ate an orange late in the morning:
This one was SO juicy! The last few I’ve had have been duds. Maybe I’m just a bad orange picker….

For lunch I chose a restaurant that serves up some great Indian food. It’s called Diana’s Downtown. We both decided to go with the Tandoori Naan.
We were pretty psyched by the looks of it when the server set it down!
The meal was delish! I loved the Tandoori spices on the chicken and the naan was oh so soft and fluffy.

Towards the end of the work day I ate a dark chocolate chip avocado muffin:
The weather here today was positively beautiful! I had anticipated this and pulled some ground bison out of the freezer for burgers. I dressed mine with Dijon, ketchup, relish, mayo, pickles, lettuce, a slice of turkey bacon and hot pepper rings. On the side I had some steamed green beans and 2 curly fires. Those are sure a blast from the past!!

As soon as dinner was done DS and I hopped on our bikes and went for a 3 mile bike ride. Pure bliss! I loved everything about it. The temp was perfect, the sun bright and DS and I had chance to catch up. We went on one of the routes that I like to run in the warmer months. Ironically, our bike ride took us about the same amount of time as if I were running. HA! When we got back I made a coffee for myself. Coco! This is the one you were asking about:

I enjoyed this out on the front porch while reading a magazine. Oh, how I’ve longed to be able to do that all winter long! I’ve lived here long enough to know that it’ll likely get cold again before the nice weather is here to stay, but I’ll take it while it lasts!

I’m off to gather “stuff” for tomorrow and then I’ll be watching some tube. Don’t forget to enter my Nature’s Path giveaway!!! Hope you’ve enjoyed you day!

Bye for now!!

Day 1 & Day 2

I had a brilliant post written up, but it vanished on me. I know some of you can sympathize with me here! Now I’ve got to wrap up the past 2 days quickly because the Biggest Loser has started!

Breakfast Day 1

Dark chocolate cherry mocha oats!

Breakfast Day2

• 2/3 cup water
• 1/3 cup Quaker oats
• cinnamon
• almond butter
• Crofter Superfruit jam
• kefir

Snack Day 1

Snack Day 2

Dark chocolate chip avocado muffin!

Gym Day 1 = 30 minutes treadmill, 20 minutes weights, 4mph, Lunch Day 27% incline

Gym Day 2 = 45 minutes treadmill, 4mph, 7% incline

(K-I-L-L-E-R workouts, major calorie burn!!!)

Lunch Day 1

Rinsed chicken curry, baked buttercup squash

Lunch Day 2

See below dinner for what this is! ;)

Dinner Day 1

This recipe is in the newest edition of Chatelaine magazine and is amazing! We served it with a scoop of Fage on top:

Dinner Day 2

BBQ’d pork tenderloin, couscous salad made with WW couscous, cucumber, red pepper, cherry tomatoes, carrots, cheese cubes, red pepper, 1 tbsp garlic infused olive oil, 2 tbsp white balsamic vinegar. YUM!

Sweet End Day 1 & 2

Chocolate with coconut flakes. Heaven.

Random

I stopped by the health food store after Pilate’s tonight and scored their last jar of coconut butter. I also discovered that they carry the ever elusive Liberte Greek yogurt!! Major score. Got me a box of ginger chews. (These are for you, Katie!!) Lastly, I bought 3 Luna bars because my lovely son has decided that he loves them. And I’m too greedy to let him have any of the flavours I bought in the States! LOL!!

And do not forget to enter my Nature’s Path giveaway! Click here to check it out.

Bye for now!!!

Nature’s Path Granola Bar Review and Giveaway!

Hi everyone!! Over the past 2 weeks I was lucky enough to taste test Nature’s Path newly revamped line of organic granola bars. This post is dedicated to a full review of each bar, plus something fun at the end. Enjoy!!

Chococonut

This was the first of the bars that I reached for. Imagine that! It was very coconutty, which was a huge plus, but I would’ve liked to see a bit more dark chocolate spread throughout. I give this a 4/5.

Mmmaple Pecan

Maple + pecan = one of my favourite flavour combos. And this bar didn’t disappoint! There were lots of pecan chunks and a nice, strong maple flavour. An icing drizzle sealed the deal. The Mmmaple Pecan is one of the 2 new flavours that include flax plus which is an excellent source of Omega-3’s. 5/5

Sunny Hemp

I liked the sunny hemp bar best of all. It seemed thicker than the others and was really dense and chewy, yet crispy like a rice crispy treat. This bar in particular had tons of fruit and oats packed into it. A definite 5/5!

Berry Strawberry

This little gem tasted naughty in the best of ways! LOL! Full of berries with a generous yogurt drizzle. If you want something good for you that tastes like a treat from DQ, this is your bar. This is also the second bar that contains the flax plus. I personally found it a tad too sweet so for that reason only I give this one a 4/5.

Pumpkin Spice

This was my second favourite of all the bars. I found it to be perfectly spiced and just as dense as the Sunny Hemp. Also, it wasn’t quite as sweet as some of the others. This is a strong 5/5.

DD taste tested the Peanut Buddy and Peanut Choco for me.

She thoroughly enjoyed both. When I asked her how they were all she could manage was Mmmmmm….awesome!!! HA!

Lotta Apricotta

Although I liked this bar, it was my least favourite of the lot. I found the apricot to be a bit on the strong side and the icing overly sweet. The 2 seemed to clash rather then meld together for me. I must say though….LOTS of apricots!! 3/5

These new bars are packaged in boxes which use 36% less cardboard which saves 472000 gallons of water and 46 tons of waste yearly. Pretty cool stuff!

Overall, all the bars were chalk full of flavour and were loaded with fruit and/or nuts and seeds. They’re on the sweet side, which is just fine with me, but if you aren’t a sweet type of person, you may find them a bit overwhelming. At 130-150 calories per bar, they were a decent size and worked perfect for a morning snack or afternoon pick me up. At my grocery store a box of these bars runs about $4.50. Definitely more expensive than what I would normally spend, so they wouldn’t be a staple in my pantry, but I would buy them say, once a month.

I hope this review has been helpful and that you’ll give these bars a try. With 8 different varieties to choose from, I guarantee you’ll find a fave!

And now for the giveaway part. Nature’s Path has offered one lucky Krista’s Kraving’s reader a months supply of their Organic granola bars!!! YAY! Here’s what you need to do.

1. Leave me a comment letting me know where your granola bar has been. Maybe in your nightstand? Or your gym bag? Let’s see who’s the wildest! You can leave more than one crazy place, but leave a separate comment for each.
2. Link back to this contest on your blog, then come back to this post and let me know you did that. Please leave the link with your comment.

This is open to Canadian/US residents. I’ll pick a winner using a random number generator in this Thursday’s (April 1) post. You do not have to have a blog to enter! That’s all folks!!! Let’s have some fun with it!

Bye for now!!

Flip Flopping My Meals

I was a real rebel today and ate lunch for breakfast, dinner for lunch and breakfast for supper. HA! This all came about because my Uncle treated us to Sunday Brunch today at a ritzy (for us) hotel restaurant. It was a blast….he’s the coolest to hang out with. Here’s a picture of him ad DD at Christmas time:

I woke up at 8 and knew I’d be too hungry by 11 if I didn’t eat anything. My being hungry + a buffet = a mad belly the rest of the day. I had about a 1/3 cup of goat’s milk yogurt left which I mixed with the rest of last night’s coconut quinoa:

I relaxed with the computer before hitting the shower and then we were on our way! The brunch this restaurant puts on is spectacular! I really had to pace myself so I could taste all that it offered. My game plan for buffet’s is usually to only serve myself food that I 1) can’t usually find 2) don’t ever make 3) rarely have. My first go around was French toast, a waffle, egg Benedict w/o the sauce (don’t like it!) and some fruit. I also ate a piece of DS’s bacon:

Round 2 was lunch foods. There was some Asian ginger pork, paella, lemon chicken, salmon, a rye bun, asparagus, fresh mozzarella, pickle and baby carrots:

There were some fabulous looking stuffed potatoes that I was hoping my hubby would select because I knew I would never be able to finish one myself and I don’t like to waste food. Alas, he passed, too. Round 3 was to be dessert but when I got up there all the scrumptious looking cakes not only hadn’t been touched, but were cut into fairly large pieces. Again, I knew I wouldn’t be able to finish a whole piece so I opted to go back for another helping of French toast, waffle and fruit!

They had a make-your-own-omelette station which the kids were pretty impressed over. They enjoyed picking their toppings and watching the guy cook right in front of them. DS wanted me to take a picture of his cheese and ham creation:

I wasn’t too stuffed when we left, but a few more bites woulda put me over the edge so I’m glad I stopped when I did! I forgot to mention yesterday that DD gave me New Moon as a late b-day present yesterday. I watched it last night with my hubby and we all changed into our cozy clothes, snuggled under blankets and watched it again this afternoon. L-O-V-E-D it! I don’t want to say that it was better than Twilight because I loved that one too, but New Moon was made better than Twilight. Obviously, there was a better budget for this one! I also think that New Moon followed the book closer. My hubby and I decided that next weekend we’re gonna watch them 2 back to back. I’m (pleasantly) surprised that he likes them enough to do that! LOL!

I still wasn’t too hungry when “dinner time” rolled around. The fam heated some pizza in the oven and I wasn’t feeling that so I went with my old stand by, oatmeal.

• 2/3 cup water
• 1/3 cup Old Wessex 5 Grain oats
• cinnamon
• strawberries
• granola
• kefir

This was the perfect sized meal, as far as my appetite was concerned! After eating a whipped up another batch of my dark chocolate chip avocado muffins:

I brought a few to my parents place and plan on sharing some at work tomorrow. I did just eat one myself, for quality inspection, of course!! :)

I’m off now to watch The Amazing Race and then Undercover Boss. Hope you’ve all had a great day!!!

Bye for now!!

Half Way Through The Weekend

Look who’s doing a double post again! HA! Last night instead of posting I watched “Where The Wild Things Are” with the fam. The kids loved this movie. I did not love this movie. Now, I have not read the book which in my experience is always better than the movie, but I really felt like the movie condoned, and awarded, bad behaviour. I had no patience for the behaviour of the main character at the beginning of the movie and very little tolerance for how the Mother handled the situation in the end. My opinion, of course!

Breakfast yesterday was simple, yet delicious.

• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup Quaker oats
• cinnamon
• 2 tbsp granola

The sun has been shining brightly the past few days, but it’s been rather cool. I’ll still take the sun, though. The only drawback is that the windows at work do not have curtains/shades/tint or anything else to block the sun. From 8-11am it beams directly at my work station forcing me to get very creative in how I block it. Check this out;

Yes, that is a post it note! HA! It does the trick and I have thick enough skin to handle the teasing. ;)

Before going to the gym I ate a PB cookie Lara bar:

I like this flavour a lot, but wouldn’t put it in my top 3.

I did hit the gym yesterday, but my HRM was on the fritz so no stats. I did 30mins on the treadmill at a speed of 4mph with a 7% incline. I gabbed with a co worker the whole time, too. Then I got my 20mins of weights in. Three weeks ago when I started “lifting”, I was using 7lbs weights for some of the moves. Now I’m up to 12lbs! Progress!

Lunch was yogurt and granola again.

This time it was goat’s milk yogurt with some jam mixed in. AKA, cheesecake! I also ate half a chopped up pineapple:

Friday’s we usually do some kind of take out for dinner. My hubby and I wanted Chinese from a new place that just opened up, the kids wanted Mary Brown’s. Rather than arguing about it, I picked up both so we had quite the feast.

There was 8 pieces of chicken, taters, gravy, shrimp lo mien, steamed shrimp & mixed veggies and chicken curry. I went with about a half cup of each of the Chinese dishes:

YUM! I really like this new place because they make everything fresh right in front of you. After dinner came the movie, some Criminal minds and bed. There was also an unpictured small bowl of Wild roots cereal somewhere in there. Here…

I woke up at 8 this morning after a very good sleep. Before I even though about eating I sorted all the laundry and got that business underway. That made me kinda hot so I went with a bowl of Kashi UP cereal for breakfast:

I had a bit more than what you see because there was still quite a bit of USVAB left at the bottom of the bowl so I went back for a bit more.

As I was eating I noticed that Pepper was checking out a cute black cat that was sitting on the neighbours fence railing.

Judging by his position, I’m sure he was gauging whether or not he wanted to chance jumping! LOL!

The morning was spent on the computer, cleaning out the laundry room and the downstairs bathroom. Fun times. Lunch came around all too fast so I warmed up some leftovers from dinner. I used a trick that I read about over at Hungry Girl which involves rinsing food that has been drenched in sauce. Although I loved the chicken curry, it made me rather stinky last night so I put my serving into a mesh strainer and ran it under the tap for minute. I also ate the last of the broccoli with some soy sauce on it.

I was very pleased that rinsing the curry did not take away any of the flavour. And my tummy was OK after eating it.

DS and I made a trip to the mall this aft to develop some photos, get the sticker for the plate on our car and to buy him new shoes. He requested a small chocolate sundae from DQ as a treat and I stopped at Starbuck’s on our way out for a tall NF 1/2 sweet dark cherry mocha:

This is what an 8yr old boy looks like while his Mother is in a long line at Stabile's:

HA HA!!!

I made myself a tasty dinner tonight. There’s been a buttercup and butternut squash sitting on my counter for WAY too long so I decided to bake them. I cubed the be-nut and seasoned it with salt, pepper, cumin, oregano, basil coriander, chilli powder, cinnamon, garlic infused olive oil and lime juice. The be-cup just got sliced into wedges and sprayed with olive oil. I also made some quinoa with a 1/2 cup of coconut milk, 1/4 cup quinoa, 1 tbsp raisins, 1 tbsp shredded coconut and 2 tsp of pecans. I served myself about half of everything:

Very enjoyable, indeed! Here’s my sweet end:

Chocolate, my love. Speaking of chocolate, some pip squeak came to the door selling it today so my hubby bought some.

Haven’t tried any yet, but I’m looking forward to the coconut one!

Bye for now!!