Song of the Day

beautiful.

The Bay State

Driving down to good ol' Massachusetts tonight after a long day at both jobs. It's a terribly long work day followed by a terribly boring night drive, but it’s all to see my sister at University of Massachusetts, then seeing my parents out in the hometown. I may be bringing down a pint of ice-cream I just bought that was insanely good.

Hannah Teter brought home the silver metal in Women’s half pipe up in Canada a couple of weeks ago. She is from Vermont which is why Ben and Jerry’s got her to make a flavor. She’s the first athlete to create an ice cream flavor, and they did a wonderful job. It’s maple ice-cream blended with bits of blond brownies and maple caramel swirls. The maple connection is due to being a Vermont native, but Teter also started a charity called Hannah’s Gold. Hannah’s Gold sells delicious maple syrup and she donates all profits to the children of Kenya. This ice-cream should be on store shelves nation wide, so pick up a pint soon!

Rolling Eggs

Egg rolls are a common appetizer in Eastern Asia, especially within the Cantonese/Southern portion of China. They are also delicious. Since I don't eat too much pork (if any at all), I tend to get Spring Rolls when I'm at a Chinese place, and I miss the added protein. On Super Bowl Sunday a couple weeks ago, we went to a friend's place where he  made 2 types of delicious egg rolls. There was also a $75 delivery purchase of wings, a plethora of pizza, 4 types of homemade dip, bread, crackers, cheese, icecream...the list goes on. I think everyone drank about fifteen Keystone Lights, and still no one got a buzz on due the absurd amounts of food.

The said friend that hosted this smorgasbord football party created two types of egg rolls; he made traditional egg rolls without meat and banana cream cheese egg rolls.  Both were great.

I made egg rolls the other night with J but we attempted at making them "healthy".  It's pretty hard to make something that's deep friend into something healthy, so we hardly used any oil when frying them at the end.

I chopped up half a head of cabbage, a carrot, 3 green onions, 3 mushrooms, and a handful of snow peas and bean sprouts.   I sauteed them on a low heat until everything was soft with some rice vinegar, soy sauce, and cheriyaki sauce.  In a seperate pan I chopped up 2 whole chicken breasts into very small/fine peices of cooked them on low heat with some rice vinegar.  When the vegetables were done cooking, I added the chicken, and now we were ready to roll.

By this point in the process, I was starving so every other fork full of the chicken vegetable stuffing either went into an egg roll or directly into my mouth.  We continued to roll and got ready to fry them up! Yeah, they weren't the most beautiful little pieces of artwork but I knew they were going to taste damn good.

We used Nasoya brand egg roll wrappers, which is a premium tofu company.  They have other great products I have tested out like the wonton wrappers, silken, organic tofu, Asian noodles, and nayonaise.  Forgive me for the photo below, they sure tasted good but this isn't a great photo of the egg rolls we made.  Although we didn't use a lot of oil (usually calls for being deep fried or submerged in an inch of oil), they still tasted good and were crunchy on the outside and soft and flavorful on the inside.

You can add whatever you want to egg rolls for the inside. A common ingredient for the protien is meat, but you can also use ground turkey, beef, tofu, or just all veggies.  You can also try new things like the banana cream cheese egg rolls that we put caramel sauce on.  My only qualm was that we didn't put any ginger in ours, and I think that may be an important ingredient to tie all the flavors together.  Have fun making creative egg rolls....Ni Hao!!

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.