Judgment Free Zone

I pay a ridiculously low monthly fee to work out at Planet Fitness. It took me a while to get used to not having all the amenities that Orchard Hills had, which also broke the bank at the undiscounted price of $75 per month. I had a corporate discount making it $50 per month and at this point I was living at my parents’ house, had no car payments, or much of any financial responsibilities due to living at home, so it wasn’t too much to offer up. Orchard Hills had classes going from before dawn and after dark, indoor pool, outdoor pool with water slide, indoor and outdoor tennis, indoor and outdoor basketball, indoor track, insane amount of weights and machines, not to mention the thousands of variations of cardio machines. Just simply walking into this facility made me feel happy and motivated. I guess the fifty bucks automatically coming out of my bank account motivated me just as well.

Well, so now I go to planet fitness which has no classes, courts, pools, or anything CLOSE to what I’m used to (yeah yeah, I’m a snob…). But with the help of someone (thanks J!), I have learned how to motivated myself without all the fancy services and classes, although I do miss the free yoga. Planet Fitness’s “thing” is that it’s the judgment free zone. Yeah…right… I’m all for not judging at the gym, because it can be pretty intimidating at times when you feel new and out of place, but at the same time I feel planet fitness goes against what they’re going for by having the “Lunk Alarm”.  As one can see, the link alarm is a planet fitness made up slang for one who grunts, drops weights, or judges.  I have seen this go off twice, and its horribly awkward. They are judging people who actually want to lift weights. Want to see the lunk alarm go bad? Watch this video:



yeah, when it went off at my planet fitness, that didn't happen...thank goodness.

The Bear's Personal List of...Foods to start eating NOW

 am going to compile a list of everyday foods (nothin’ fancy here) that I like to eat as much as possible, and I think everyone should include in their diet. I’m not a doctor or a nurse so please take everything with a grain of salt. Which reminds me, I have been eating SO much less salt and hardly adding any to my foods, and it feels good.


Okay here it goes:

1. Spinach. I have loved this since I was little and I always ate it like my Dad, sautéed with some vinegar on it, which led him to showing me what happens when you put baking soda and malt vinegar together. You can sneak sautéed spinach into any meal for example; sauces, toping, as a side, in soups, salads, Kraft Mac and cheese, chicken dishes, shrimp stir fries…literally anything. When it is sautéed it melts down to such a small amount when the water is cooked out of it. I think I ate spinach sautéed with fresh garlic and oil everyday my sophomore year. Spinach has high amounts of iron, more than your Daily Value of Vitamin K, and A. Vitamin K works on protein inside your bones, and helps build you a stronger skeleton. It is high in antioxidants and anti cancer agents. And it tastes GREAT.

2. Protein Shakes. Hmm, so I just got into these. Whey Protein to be exact and the occasional Casein Protein at night time. A lot of my friends and co-workers make fun of me as I shake my blender bottle  in public. I get even more shit when friends come over and they see the collection of protein Mr. and I have collected. Hey you never know when you’re in the mood for a chocolate shake or something that tastes like an Orange Julius. Strawberry Protein smoothies? No problem. I am not a body builder, I do lift weights and drink protein, but there is no way I am going to bulk up. It’s a common myth,my friends. A girl my size and height should be having about 115 grams of protein a day. Don’t get me wrong, I love chicken but I would have to be eating it all day to get that much protein in, so therefore I drink the shakes. End of Story.

3. Eggs. I love eating scrambled eggs with 1 whole egg and 2 or 3 egg whites. The whites are the healthiest part – low in calories (17) high in protein (7). They are also the part of the egg with low cholesterol because I know a lot of people have a stigma about the high cholesterol in eggs. Eggs are also good in many things, even fried on top of a burger!

4. Bananas. I eat them everyday. I love the way they taste and when they’re usually 50 cents a pound, it’s a deal I can’t pass up. They’re a little bit higher in calories than I usually go for in a fruit snack, but bananas are also great with peanut butter, chocolate chips, frozen, or just plain.

5. Greek Yogurt. Amazing. I started eating Fage yogurts my sophomore year of High School until about 2004, they disappeared off the shelves. I could only buy them at Trader Joe’s (I think in High School all I ate were Luna Bars and Greek Yogurt, both ONLY found at Trader Joe’s at this point in time). I went in with one of my dear friends and fellow TJ’s lover, to find that they were GONE! Apparently, Fage had lost their license to sell this yogurt in the United States and all stores were told to destroy any remaining product. Other than that the whole thing was a mystery, and it suddenly appeared on the shelves a couple long months later. When I taught English in Greece we ate Greek yogurt with fresh honey every morning and it was like being in heaven. Greek yogurt is double strained through cheese cloth so its texture is VERY thick and creamy. Its low in calories (if you get the 2% or non fat) and very high in protein. I am now obsessed with this brand called Chobani. Mr. and I ALWAYS have them in the fridge all flavors, plain, big, small. Try it. (Look how thick and delicious it looks in that picture!)

 

Hmm that’s all I can come up with right now that isn’t all the generic stuff about fish and Omega 3s, berries having antioxidants, and lentils and beans being high in protein. You already know that probably so I hope you enjoy my personal list and enjoy eating them all. Please let me know if you actually dislike something on this list (GASP)

57 Varities

Fast food and I do not mix well unless I am traveling or hung over, and even then they do not mix well. I have not yet ventured out into the world of meat eating at fast food joints, I am used to begging to go to Burger King on road trips to get their MorningStar Farms veggie burger or a pack of mozzarella sticks. If no BK is around, I literally order a deluxe burger without the burger. I want the cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and pickles, just no ground beef. My friends all laugh at me, and I do laugh at myself when I order this, but I just can’t help it. This all started at the Wendy’s that was located a town over from my town growing up, and it was open until 1am and I wasn’t going to let myself be punished from the late night munchies after a night of partying just because I was a vegetarian. In High School, ordering this through the drive thru window fascinated my peers more than the laws of a free falling apple fascinated Newton. And still, around a decade later, as a chicken and turkey eater, I STILL find myself ordering this…Now I know you’re not supposed to judge a fast food joint, but I do. When eating on the premises the first thing I must inquire about is whether the establishment has ketchup packets or pump ketchup. Like most folks, I like a good amount of ketchup on my fries, so the ketchup packets create a problem. I usually have to rip open 10 of these little guys to satisfy my disgusting fast food meal. Until Now….

Heinz just revealed their new ketchup packet design which allows the consumer to CHOOSE between a drizzle or a dip, and it also holds 3 times the amount of a regular ketchup packet. These awesome new
containers to hold our corn syrup sugary “tomato” pastes will be
released to the public at select fast food restaurants this fall.

Bird Burgers

My parents are coming up this weekend, which is great news. I lived at home for a year after I graduated from college and made the transition with my relationship with my parents from very parental to friends. It has been a nice transition and we enjoy each other’s company very much (well, I do at least, not 100% sure if it’s reciprocated both ways-maybe they want some alone time after twenty three years of nurturing). Well Mom and Dad (if you ever stumble upon this) thanks for everything!
I’ve decided to post a recipe that wasn’t created by my parents, but one that both my parents love. They have been making these for a while – when I was still a vegetarian. I remember they told me I should just try it anyways because it is so good and it sjust turkey. Let me tell you, I wish I had tried them when I did because Dad would fry up the grill and cook these burgers as they should be cooked (as opposed to my oven baked or skillet fried burgers). These Turkey Burgers are absolutely delicious. They were passed along from one of their friends who found out about them on (gasp!) Oprah! Oprah brought out the recipe and it is from one of Donald Trump’s private clubs in Palm Beach.
Well my friends, here is the recipe:
¼ cup thinly sliced scallions
½ cup finely chopped celery
3 Granny Smith Apples, peeled and sliced (I personally did not peel them).
1/8 cup canola oil
4 pounds ground turkey breast (as always, leaner the better!)
2 TBS salt
1 TBS black pepper
2 tsp Tabasco Chiptole Pepper Sauce (I only had Frank’s Red Hot around, and used that).
1 lemon, juiced and grated zest
½ bunch of parsley, finely chopped
¼ cup Major Ghrey’s Chutney

Sauté the scallions, celery and apples in the canola oil until tender. Let cool.

Place the ground turkey in a large mixing bowl. Add sautéed items and the remaining ingredients. Shape into eight 8-ounce burgers. Refrigerate for 2 hours.

Season the turkey burgers with salt and pepper. Place on a preheated, lightly oiled grill. Grill each side for 7 minutes until meat is thoroughly cooked. Let sit for 5 minutes.

Here is a picture of mine. I made my burgers kind of small (so I could get more joy from eating more of them. I put a little bit of light mayo and some spinach on  the Light Wheat Burger Buns.

S'ghetti-less S'ghetti

Spaghetti Squasah.
This winter squash is 42 calories per cup, where whole wheat and white pasta contain about 3 times the amount. Spaghetti squash contains high counts of dietary fiber, Vitamin B6, Potasium, and Magnesium. It still contains carbohydrates but not nearly as much as regular pasta does.

To cook spaghetti squash, I cut it in half lengthwise and put it in the oven for 50 minutes at 350 degrees. Once you take it out, I let it cool for about 10 minutes and then use a big fork to scrape out the spaghetti-looking strands of the squash. Add sauce, butter, or spices, and eat and enjoy!!

I ate mine with a homemade turkey meat sauce:

1 28oz can diced tomatoes
6 finely chopped sun dried tomatoes (I use the dry kind, if using the oil packed, don’t add oil to this recipe)
2 large onions (only because I am an onion fanatic…1 would do the trick just as well)
1 pound of the leanest ground turkey (I like 97/3)
5 garlic cloves chopped into fine slivers
Dashes of extra virgin olive oil
1 small can of tomato paste


1. Add a little dash (1 TB?) of EVOO with the turkey in a large pot.
2.Cook the turkey until almost all is not pink and add the diced onions and sliced garlic.
3.Saute in the pot for about 5-8 minutes then add the all types of tomatoes – the diced can, paste can, and sundried. Mix together thoroughly and add another splash of EVOO if you wish.
4.Simmer on low and stir occassionally for 45 minutes – 2 hours depending on how much time you have.

And here's the final product! Spaghetti Squash with Turkey Meat Sauce and some Pecorino Romano Cheese

FJL’s Watery Soup

When you work at a chain restaurant, you feel like a tool. No ifs ands or buts about it, you just do. You are burdened with responsibilies that you wouldn’t dream of doing in your worst nightmare. Example: singing a variation of Happy Birthday to guests/strangers on their birthday with a cake and candle in hand, wearing a name tag, offering mediocre wine samples, and other atrocities of the sort. After working at a chain for many months, these types of phrases and requirements that come with the job and once horrified you, fade away and just becomes part of everyday life.

The restaurant I work at has some “funny” rules. If you get a guest complaint, you’re demoted to working in the back of the house. And let me tell you, the type of people that come to my restaurant are quite the complainers. I was at work last week, doing my normal serving thing working a double with a 30 minute break. It was kind of slow because it was right after the holidays, which is why I offered to stay on all day (Makin’ Chedda). It was right before we switched to dinner menus around 3:30 when some monster comes in with her two sons. She was wearing a fur hat and jacket and was from out of state saying I had to rush her meal because “she had a plane to catch”. I went over and greeted the table, did my normal shpeel when I got interrupted with a finger in my face. Her sons translated this rude gesture and said to come back in a minute. So, I cooled off in the kitchen, told some other servers about the Fur Jacket Lady, and went back out in the dining room. She ordered, and I was still polite to her although I didn’t want to be. I brought out their tap waters with lemon, their lunch specials and then checked back up on FJL and received a horrible look and a very rude comment (that I cant remember word for word) I was confused because I made sure their meals arrived really fast (due to the flight they had to catch) and that I was polite.
I like to adhere by the kill them with kindness routine. It almost always works and usually makes the rude person dumb and sorry. The reason they are being rude is usually because they feel bad about something, and making other people feel bad will make them feel better. The only way I can pull this off is maybe throwing a breadstick across the kitchen and venting to some other servers in the kitchen (kitchen made for cooking food? Ha I don’t think so; it’s a therapeutic place for servers to vent about lousy customers).

So, the FJL and her family have finished up eating and I went around the corner to drop their check and gave them best wishes on their flight. I went back to the table minutes later as the Wolf ran past me as she bumped into my shoulder softly body checking me into the wall. I asked her if she needed change and she threw her hand and nose up in the air and replied,
“No, I am going to the FRONT!!”
Oh yeah, the front, where the hosts are. They really know what’s going on. I saw her walk up to the host stand, grimacing, as a host walked back over to me.
“Whoa, is she from your table?”
“Yes”, I replied, “what’s going on?”
“What a bitch, huh? I have to get a manager for her…sorry,” as she walked into the back of the kitchen to the office. One of our managers walked out and we made eye contact and I looked down. It was then that I realized I actually like my stupid-corporate-chain-restaurant-tie wearing tool-faced job. I saw her squawking away to him and I think she may have caught me spying. I waited in the kitchen, as they were my only table at 3:45 there are not many people coming into the restaurant. My manager came back with a very stern look on his face.
"So, you got a customer complaint,” he says as he hands me the exact change for their bill without a tip.
“Okay…”
“Bwahahha did you see her Princess Jacket? You’re not getting in trouble for this one, Claire. Do you know what she said?”
“phew! Oh man, I don’t even know she was so rude to me!”
“She said,” as my manager mimicked her, “’My waitress watered down all of our soups!! And she didn’t put any dressing on our salads!! She had absolutely no personality!’ Haha, let’s go check her salad and soup that she left on the table,” he said as he walked towards table 51.
“Take a look at this…this salad is SOGGY with dressing,” I said as I lifted a heavy forkful of wilted waterlogged iceberg.


We laughed and checked out the “watered down” soups I severed her, had laugh and then went back into the kitchen where I had to relay the story to other servers who wanted to know what FJL was doing bitching at the host stand. We all had a good laugh and then continued to serve semi-normal people for the rest of the evening.


So, I got to keep my job, and for those of you reading…try to be nice to people you don’t know. Don’t treat them like scum because you may or may not have more money than them. We’re all innocent until proven guilty, and if you’re rude to a server they will remember it, and tell all the staff about it, sometimes laughing at your expense.* So save yourself the embarrassment and wasted energy and be kind. Or don’t be kind. Just don’t be rude and mean.


*Also remember that servers are bringing you your overpriced food. They handle YOUR food. If you piss them off, you never know what they may do. (In all honesty I’ve never done anything like that, but its crossed my mind.)

A New Year.

My friend calls them “Resolutionaries”. My gym is packed with them right now. I have to wait in line for the treadmill. And the weights. And the ab rockers. And the lateral pull down. And the toilet. To define these people, I have found a very credible source called Urban Dictionary ;-) defining them as, “People who join a gym after the New Year, only to quit going within 3 months. i.e. I couldn't find a free treadmill, the place was crawling with resolutionaries.”
Hopefully it will die down soon, but until then, there’s a line.
I do have a couple of ways I would interpersonally like to change within myself for the “new year”, although I start assessing this internally in December.
1. Think more positive.
2. Run a 5k for a cause.
3. Eat to live, not live to eat.
4. Be better at staying in touch with old friends.
5. Save money/pay off loans/get new job.

Okay, I know these are pretty generic as well, but let me go over them with you.

1. Positive: also includes: not being quick to judge, looking for the good in people, developing a small altruistic view on life. I suppose this also stems from having a low self esteem, but mine is rising again (Thanks to Planet Fitness, the original judgment free zone)HA.

2. I could have said a ½ marathon, which would be nice, but I would like to run for a cause and raise some money. I have done no research on this topic so that is all. I know this may be the most standard and nonspecific resolution, but hey, it looks good on paper.

3. Eat to Live: WOW okay, this is definitely the hardest one for me. Food is amazing. I love cooking it, eating it, playing with it, taking pictures of it, presenting it, force-feeding others to try new foods (sorry Mom and Es), and so on. I heard this phrase from my mother when I was in High school and going through some young teenage diet fad, and she told me not to think about food and diet so much, just ‘eat to live…not live to eat.’ Apparently my enlightened mother was quoting the one and only Buddha. He also said that hunger is the worst illness because we are born with it and can never cure it until our lives are over. There are a couple more eating principles that Buddha has such as respecting the labor that people have put into creating the meal, to commit good deeds worthy of sharing the meal, arrive at the table without negative feelings towards anyone, eat in order to achieve spiritual and physical well being, and be dedicated in pursuit of enlightenment. My only qualm is that Buddha is usually portrayed as fa….er…having a big belly?

4. Staying in touch. It’s not too hard, and now that I have upgraded from

THIS:

TO THIS: (env3)
texting is a lot easier now, therefore, so is staying in touch.

5. Save money/pay off loans/get new job has been a goal of mine since I was 12. So just out of habit, I must include this. (and the fact my loans are a LOT bigger than ‘pay Kelly that $1.50 I owe her').

All this said and done, we’ll see how I do this year. Good luck to all of you with your new year’s resolutions, but please stay away from my treadmill time. :)