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Sweat and Food

29 Mar

Please take a moment to vote for me (up to 10 times…a day…) in round one of the Hartford Courant 2012 Websters for CT’s Best Blogs! I’m nominated for Best Overall Blog, Best Health Blog, Best Food Blog, and Best Social Media Account! Thank you to those who nominated me, and voting for round one closes this Friday 3/30 at 11:59PM EST.

I’m glad that so many of you seemed to enjoy yesterday’s post about my appreciation for the friendships my blog has brought me! Sounds like a lot of you can relate – and that’s a great thing!

My makeshift home yoga "area"...computer booting up to play P90X Yoga this morn! My #PROOF.

I feel like it’s been forever since I just wrote about what was on my mind (instead of recapping the latest and greatest restaurants and events). I love doing that, but I also find it really therapeutic and cleansing, cheesy as that sounds, to just write whatever is on my mind! And based off of comments and feedback from my readers, it seems those posts are often enjoyed MORE than the ones where I share my delectable eats. Perhaps I’m giving you guys too much food porn? Do I need to take it away for awhile? ;-) OBVIOUSLY I’m kidding.

Typical healthy eats food porn...some may drool, some may wrinkle their noses.

I had a great workout yesterday. I have to share it with you guys! I did an hour-long spin class that totally kicked my butt and had me pouring sweat. I just LOVE how sweating makes me feel. It’s more refreshing than jumping into a pool on a hot day. Downside of sweating, just like getting out of a pool sometimes – I was FREEZING after that spin class. Complete icicle. Even 20 minutes of arm-breaking (don’t worry, not literally) weights after the class couldn’t warm me up. Once I got home I realized why – my sports bra, AKA undergarment completely 100% in contact with my skin, was totally drenched through. I don’t remember the last time it was like that after a workout. I TOLD you I sweated like a mad woman!

I came home and after a refreshing, HOT shower, I went upstairs to see what was for dinner. I was craving CARBS like a mad lady. No surprise after 1.5 hours at the gym! Thank goodness, my mom had heated up the last of our free Dr. Oetker’s Organic Veggie Frozen Pizzas that I received through a BzzAgent campaign, thanks to a coupon. She added garlic and leftover steamed broccoli to the pie, and heated it in the oven on a pizza stone. Perfection! After a few more minutes under the broiler, and with a pile of black beans for protein, this really hit the spot.

I also had half of a turkey burger, and later sampled some of my new Love Grown Foods granola (review/giveaway to come once I’ve tried every flavor!) with 0% plain Greek yogurt. I had it while reading the first 18 pages of my latest library find, “The Summer Without Men” by Siri (lol) Hustvedt. I already LOVE this book and am already gonna say that I recommend it to all of you , even though I’m 18 pages in.

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I will leave you with this hilarious gem…someone playing a prank on my cubicle neighbor at work!

Do you ever get really cold after a workout, because of how much you sweat?

What did you have for dinner last night?

Have you ever read the book above, or any of Siri’s other books?

How I Spent My 23rd Birthday!

23 Mar

Yesterday was my 23rd birthday! I ended up having a great day (so great that I didn’t have time to blog :-P ) and want to thank all of you that wished me happy birthday on Twitter and/or Facebook! So how did I spend my special day? Haven’t had time to upload cam pics yet, but I was tweeting a play-by-play of life, as per usual.

The day got off to a great start when I woke up to this. I love my mom!

My co-workers continued to make the day fabulous. My friend Steve got me these gorgeous tulips. The bow matches my St. Patty’s Day nails!

The fellow ladies of our sales row (of cubicles, ha) know me well. They gave me a bottle of local CT red wine from Sharpe Hill Vineyards! I haven’t had their wine yet and am super excited to try it.

Holy moly, look at this gem! It’s from Jim, a co-worker who has access to a pretty awesome bakery (he got another co-worker an equally awesome cupcake for her birthday last month). That chocolate-cake looking part is actually ALL icing. I am an icing freak. So let’s just say I’m gonna enjoy this. Saving it for tonight after dinner maybe!

I'm a lucky girl!

My boss was kind enough to give me a half day on my birthday, and good thing, because it was about 80 degrees without a cloud in the sky yesterday. Is this the new CT March? I’ll TAKE IT!

Obsessed with Vera towels.

No, this is not a summer ’11 photo, this is YESTERDAY. Amazing! I chilled with my best friend Lidia as we drank iced beverages (coffee for me, green tea for her), read magazines/books, and chatted. She was also kind enough to use my Goodreads to-read list to pick out a couple of new books for me as a gift – it used to be we were gifting each other off our Forever 21 wish lists, and now it’s Goodreads! Oh, how adult we are!

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Now I can see what all that hype is about!

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A classic that I’ve been curious about.

Call me weird, but I wanted to go to the gym despite the fact that it was my birthday. I completed 4.08 miles on the StepMill, Level 16, speed intervals AKA some kick-butt HIIT. Felt FABULOUS after! Read the issue of SHAPE with Kate Walsh on the cover. She is one amazing lady.

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I wrapped things up with the below workout created by the amazing Heather of For the Love of Kale (who gave me a birthday shoutout yesterday, THANKS LOVE). I’m not doing any upper body today so wanted to get some in yesterday. Quick and effective!

After showering my sweaty self off, I went to meet my friend Colin (of Taste of New Haven) at Mustard Seed Cafe, a cute local breakfast-and-lunch place, for a French Wine Tasting Class event put on by my favorite liquor store EVER, Sonoma Wines & Spirits. Apps were served to start and I put together a little tasting plate, but kept it light because I wanted to go out to a late dinner afterward.

Went back for seconds on the veg (obviously).

For a wine lover like myself, this was definitely an informative event, in terms of both tasting wine and its origins. I have to admit I found myself drifting a bit during the historical parts of the presentation, but I think that was because I was so excited to get-to-sippin…

Flight #1 (three total).

The most fascinating part for me was learning how to both properly smell and taste wine. Did you know that you’re supposed to cover the glass with your hand, swirl the wine around, and then just take a slight sniff from under your hand when smelling a wine? The whole swirl and stick my nose in the glass thing that I’ve had going on is NOT correct. Too bad I put on hand lotion right before the event!

The proper method of tasting wine is really cool and made a HUGE difference. I’m having no luck finding a video or series of photos on Google (I know, what?) demonstrating the method, but it involves taking a sip, tilting your head forward and letting the wine rest in the front of your “palate”, and then tilting your head back (it reminded me of taking a shot…) and letting the wine slide over the middle and back parts of your tongue before swallowing (or spitting, something I am not fond of, and I know, that’s what she said). The taste was SO much more intense. I kinda loved it.

My favorite flight obviously - three reds, how can you go wrong?

I had a few favorites, which I marked with stars on our info/ordering sheets, and ended up decided to purchase the Chateau Picque Caillou Graves Pessac-Leognan. I know – what?? Just know that it tasted sooo oak-y and fabulous. I also received a $25 credit with my admission, and the bottle was $30.59. How often do I have a chance to buy a $30 bottle of wine for $5?! Answer: never, so I leapt at it. I’m going to save this bottle for something very special!

After the tasting wrapped up, Colin and I headed out to get some FOOD. It was almost 9pm, so we hit up the late night happy hour at Max Fish! I love going to these kinds of happy hours at nice restaurants because I get the chance to order and sample food that would normally be out of my price range.

Recycled image from my last visit but obviously I had to get the cheese plate again.

Colin offers a useful hand-size comparison for this ahi tuna with jasmine rice and lemongrass sauce.

Frozen not fresh (as our waitress honestly told us when we asked), but still so good.

Does anyone else dip fries into their ice cream and/or milkshakes? Colin thought I was a weirdo for that one!

I’m asking about ice cream because Colin not-so-secretly (I noticed immediately…) approached our waitress and asked her to send over a birthday dessert for me. I was still surprised because I had no clue what it’d be! I wish this picture hadn’t come out so blurry:

CARAMELIZED BANANA SPLIT

SO DELICIOUS. I realized it had been too long since I last had ice cream. And it had been way WAY too long since I’d made that an ice cream SUNDAE. The caramelized bananas and slightly-salty nuts on that whipped cream made it extra special.

Fabulous, fabulous birthday. And it doesn’t stop there – off to J. Gilbert’s with my family tonight!

How did you celebrate your last birthday? Do you have any go-to traditions?

Tennessee Recap: Part One

3 Nov

Still no power at work so I am back at Whole Foods hangin’ out and blogging. I just cannot stay in my house, I need to be out and about and around background noise. People are confused as to why I’m here since I’m in the lucky 50% of the town that has power back. But I just like to be out and about! It makes me feel better about sitting on my butt and using the laptop for an extended period of time…anyone else feel me on this?

I got in another morning workout today – a Pilates Ball Fusion class at my gym, followed by 30 minutes on the elliptical to get my sweat on. The pilates class was very good for my tight muscles, and the elliptical allowed me to start a new issue of my favorite magazine More. Does anyone else read this? It’s for women over 40 but I honestly love it…so informative and there are always both inspiring and practical articles!

In book world I just finished Jennifer Weiner’s “Fly Away Home“ and really liked it more than any Weiner book I’ve read yet, probably because it wasn’t full of cheese.

I started a new book last night, Jodi Picoult’s “The Pact“. I’m already so intrigued and anxious to see how it ends. I could barely put it down after the first chapter – I think this will be a good one.

And finally, I’m going to get to work re-capping last weekend’s trip to Tennessee!

My adventure began on Friday. I finished packing right before we left (while managing not to forget anything, score) and had a pre-flight snack of half a toasted Fiber One whole wheat English muffin with Beltane Farms chive chevre.

I packed a nice, big salad for the plane because I am not usually a fan of airport food. We ended up sitting on the runway for about 20 minutes before we could even take off, so I ate it before we got up in the air. I used the beans and ground turkey from my mom’s latest chili creation for the salad’s protein, and it was good! I think packing food for airplane travel is the smartest choice to save money and ensure that you have food that you will enjoy and that will not leave you dragging in the rest of your travels.

That being said, when I was younger my favorite airport travel treat was a Cinnabon cinnamon bun. And the Biscoff cookies!

I went Biscoff-less and opted for a pretzel and peanut packet once we took off to make my own little trail mix. I was super hungry that day for some reason – I also had another packet of peanuts and a pear before our travels were complete.

My mom went wild and used a free drink coupon (we are a family of coupon-ers) to get a vodka cranberry. Keep it classy, Mom!

Our second flight was only 26 minutes long, a fact that I didn’t discover until we started descending, so that was a pleasant surprise. I ended up doing none of my paper and watching four episodes of “Entourage”. I’ve finally made it to season 5!

We landed, picked up some snacks and alcohol, picked up my sister from school at the University of Tennessee, and dropped our stuff off at the hotel. I was ravenous and had a few Special K crackers to hold me over.

We went to eat a great seafood place called Chesapeake’s. It was filled with the usual nautical décor and reminded me of somewhere we’d go to on a Florida vacation.

Hannah showing off the nautical decor.

They were packed, so even though we had a reservation, we did some waiting at the bar. I decided to get a glass of wine because – when in Rome! We were seated as soon as I got my drink (Cabernet), conveniently enough.

The specials menu alone had so many great options that I didn’t even really need to look at the full menu (but you know I did).

It took me awhile to decide but I ended up with the Red Snapper, minus the herbs, with the roasted garlic cream sauce on the side. I selected the veggie of the day (asparagus), sans lemon butter, as my side.

I love bread baskets with variety! I had a corn muffin as well as half of a croissant. The corn muffin was definitely the best – Southern corn bread, not that sweet Northern stuff.

I was so impressed with this House Salad that came with my meal. It was awesome! Field greens, fresh veggies, feta, garlic-y croutons, and even sliced almonds. I ended up donating the croutons to my dad and taking off some of the cheese/almonds. Oil and vinegar served as my dressing.

I loved the generous portion of fish, as well as asparagus (five spears is such a tease, but some places give only that much). The garlic sauce on the side was great too. I dipped my fork in it before some bites, a trick I picked up from some magazines. I’m glad I didn’t skip the sauce completely because it was tasty! I prefer grilled asparagus to steamed, but this still had a lot of great snap to it and I really liked it.

My dad got salmon with Hollandaise sauce and a baked potato with butter. I ended up finishing about a quarter of his fish for him, as well as his entire baked potato skin. I had a feeling he wouldn’t eat it, so that’s why I got a veggie as my side! My master plan worked perfectly. The salmon was great too.

Hannah kindly displays her plate (hand model?)

My sister got a filet, cooked medium, and she said it was perfect. And she was kind enough to donate a few asparag-i (that’s my own plural form of asparagus, thank you very much) to me!

We had a great time at Chesapeake’s and left satisfied and ready to REST after a day of travelling! Getting to a destination is usually stressful, but once I’m arrived and have had a real meal, I always feel so much better and sleep quite well. That’s exactly what played out here!

Stay tuned for more details on the trip – I doubted I’d have enough content for more than one entry, and now I see I’ll need at least three posts to sum this all up! Just so many good eats and so much fun!

What are your favorite air travel foods? How about your favorite post-travel foods? Do you watch “Entourage”?