Caroline Dines

Happy December All! I woke up this morning (struggling a bit due to a restless night of sleep and sore muscles!) and promptly realized that it was bagel tuesday at the house. I had been planning on eating something entirely different but when I went out to make my tea I was overwhelmed by the smell of these freshly bake Bruegger’s Bagels. How can you say no? I did hollow mine out though to save a little and toasted it to perfection. I think, no, I know that I like this method better than eating a regular old bagel. I am one of those people that toasts my bagel 4 times in order to get it crispy so I was delighted to find that after one toasting with the hollowed out method my bagel was the crispness of toast or a bagel crisp if you will. Spread with a little bit of Light Garlic and Herb Cream Cheese and I was in breakfast heaven.

Along with my bagel I sipped some Candy Cane Green Tea from Trader Joe’s. I have had this in my pantry for about 6 weeks now and finally felt like I could open it since it was December after all. Let me just say if you have a craving for a candy cane this season and would rather not indulge yourself, buy this tea. The flavor is spot on. It’s sweet without being overpowering and it tastes more like a candy cane than the peppermint teas I have had. Honestly, I felt like I was sucking on a candy cane. Yum. It’s decaffeinated which is good if you want to drink it at night as a little after dinner treat. And just look at the box, how can you resist that cute polar bear?!

The temperatures this morning in Boston certainly corresponded with the turn of the calendar. It felt like December outside and I liked it. My walk to yoga was on the cold side, especially since I haven’t yet dug out my hat and gloves for the season. It sure did feel nice to walk into that warm studio again, I think I could get used to this hot yoga in the colder months. It was a little bit of a turn off during the hot summer days but now it’s a welcome retreat, almost like going to the Carribbean (well, almost). After yoga I came home to shower and eat! I wasn’t too surprised that my bagel didn’t hold me over as well as an almond flour muffin and yogurt, but I thought it would have made it more than 2 hours! I listened to my stomach and ate lunch a bit on the early side. I’ll say that lunch was kind of eaten over the course of 3 hours and it began like this.

An entire Ruby Red Grapefruit and a scoop of low-fat cottage cheese. This combo was to die for. The sharp citrus flavor with the smooth creamy cheese, really knocked me out. I added a roll of turkey meat to the mix a little later.

And then because I was still hungry an hour later, I ate a small bowl (the last portion) of chili. After this I was FULL!

Well, I was full but an hour later I was craving chocolate in a bad way! Lucky for me I had a Luna Bar lying around just waiting to be eaten. I used to eat these bars ALL THE TIME. I would order them in bulk and had every flavor. I literally ate one every day. Now my palate has changed a bit and I find them a little on the sweet side. They also contain some ingredients that I don’t want to make part of my every day diet. However, in a pinch these bars are a great replacement to a candy bar which is totally what I could have gone for this afternoon!

Dinner was a mishmosh of sorts but the key ingredient deserves a little recognition. Trader Joe’s makes a mean Vegetable Masala burger. You would think that these would be loaded with fat and calories the way they taste “fried”, but at 120 calories and 8 grams of fat this is a great lunch or dinner choice for those of you who are watching your intake. I would have liked to “pan-fry” mine tonight but instead I microwaved it because it was easier and the kitchen was busy.  It worked fine in the microwave but I can imagine that the crispy exterior would have done better on a grill of sorts.

These burgers are also all vegetable and contain no soy products which I find appealing when it comes to veggie burgers. I am not always sure of the soy ingredients in this type of food and tend try to get my soy in the “real” form like tofu or edamame. The rest of the salad wasn’t too bad either. A bed of spinach topped with carrots, sunflower seeds, craisins, feta, balsamic and steamed broccoli. It was a glorious veggie mess for sure!

I must get back to work now since this week is turning out to be busy. We have a big Recipe Night planned for tomorrow where the menu is “Soul Food” and Thursday night will be Holiday decorating and sugar cookie making with the kiddos.  Enjoy the rest of your Tuesday night!

Morning! …..Afternoon! This morning totally got away with me with a work meeting and a lot of internet surfing but I have something exciting to report. Last week I placed an order for some Glo Bars from Angela’s Glo Bakery and they came yesterday!

I was so excited to try the new flavors since I had only tried the original at the Healthy Living Summit this past August. I bought the Coffee Lovers variety pack because it was on special I am not a HUGE coffee lover by any stretch but I do like coffee flavored things and who couldn’t use a little burst of caffeine in a bar right? This morning I tried the “Empower Bar” which is Dark Chocolate and Roasted Coffee flavored. I had a little bit of fun with it.

I decided not to crumble this bar on top of my yogurt because I really enjoy eating it as a bar. I knew I wanted a little calcium and nut butter as part of my breakfast too and that’s when things got fun. I took a bite of the bar without anything else on it at first and was stunned at how delicious it tasted. These bars are seriously so moist and flavored just right they make me want to eat them all day, every day. The coffee flavor matched with the chocolate was hard to beat and that means a lot coming from someone who doesn’t drink coffee. I definitely felt a little rush after it and felt totally empowered!

Greek yogurt frosting if you will? I am so glad that I bit the bullet and ordered a box of these bars. The shipping to the U.S. is a little tough to swallow but I am happy to support a fellow blogger in her new and promising business venture. It makes it easy when the product is so superb! I know these bars have been making there way around the blogging community, so have you guys found any favorite flavors yet? I am interested to hear since I will probably be placing another order sometime soon!

Sounds like I’ve had quite the “healthy” day huh? Well I did start out on the right foot with an Amazing Grass shake made with water around 12:00 while I checked emails.

The Corn Dog I had for ”real lunch” wasn’t your typical corn meal breaded and fried hot dog. It was from Trader Joe’s and contained a soy hot dog so this one didn’t count on the junk food tally for the day. I am happy to say that this was my first corn dog in my life and it was awesome. Maybe I thought it was so good because I had nothing to compare it to but I certainly felt like I was eating some fun “fair” food when in fact the dog only had 3 grams of fat and roughly 150 calories (9 grams of protein too)! I served it on a bed of lettuce and drizzeled a bit of BBQ sauce over both.

I have a confession to make. I really love soy dogs. I try not to eat them that much anymore since I categorize them as “fake food” even though they are “healthy” in some respects. This lunch was a total treat though and if your curious about them I would say try them. It’s worth a little splurge

After my doctor’s appointment I met Meg at this lovely establishment. Meg went to the one in Cambridge last night and afterwards called me saying it was necessary that I try this ASAP.  So I guess I lied in the title. This wasn’t really ice cream, it was better, it was FRO-YO!

Welcome to Berryline. I think this is how Frozen Yogurt is SUPPOSED to be done. The business was started by two students (one from M.I.T. and one from Harvard) and they now have three locations: two in Cambridge and one in Boston.   They have three flavors that rotate and each location has different flavors. I find this refreshing because less is often more in my opinion. Having three flavors instead of 10 means that those flavors are going to be worked to perfection and you know that it’s fresh since it will need constant replenishing. With that said, today’s flavors at the Fenway location were: Original, Green Tea, and Peach.

I tried a sample of the Green tea while I perused the topping selection. I was surprised by how much I liked the Green tea. It kind of reminded me of a Green Tea latte from Starbucks but a little bit better flavor wise. I would have gotten it but I really had my mind set on the peach.

This turned out to be a great choice. I have never had fro yo that tasted so natural. I bet this has something to with the fact that their ingredients are just that, all natural. They use cane sugar, skim milk, yogurt and real flavors. This peach tasted just like a peach if you can imagine that in fro-yo form.  I topped it off with the toasted coconut for fun but ended up tossing about half of the coconut in the trash. It was delicious there was just far too much! Next time I will monitor the scooping actino and just ask for less so as not to waste it. Meg got original/peach swirl with crystallized ginger (she tossed some of that too) and fresh black berries! Yummm.

On our way to the car we spotted this van. I had to hold myself back so as not to break in and steal a case or two. Cute marketing though huh?

Dinner was the standard Thursday night fare: Upper Crust pizza. I enjoyed my slices with some lettuce and a little Newman’s con limon dressing.

Even though most of today’s eats were healthy varieties of junk food there was still a good amount processed food, fat and a little too much sugar for my liking. I think I am going to try for a clean eating day tomorrow. We’ll be on the road to Maine for dinner so I am going to have to strategize and plan ahead so that we don’t end up stopping at some Fast Food chain.

I was up and at it again around 5:45, which after reading about a fellow blogger that gets up at 4:30 a.m. every day to run, felt pretty good. It’s so dark when I wake up and I know it’s only going to get darker which is somewhat scary but also exciting because I do love winter and can’t wait for the snow to fall. Here’s my Banana Oatbran Kind bar eaten at 6:00 a.m. on my walk to yoga.

It’s hard for me to admit but my hip has been bothering me more than I expected lately. Since I signed up for the Tufts 10k I have been focused more on getting some runs in (nothing really that long) rather than just focusing on yoga. While yoga helps tremendously with my hip pain, the more I run the more it hurts. I think that after I run this race in three weeks I am going to take another total break from running and re-focus all my attention on yoga. It’s so hard, but I think taking a complete break will really help. This morning after yoga, the cover of Runner’s world caught my attention. I have read through it all or so I thought but one of the headlines on the cover said “Beat injuries: A new Post-run stretching routine”. I was intrigued and thought “oooh maybe there’s something I could learn and be doing to help my hip after I run!”

Even though I didn’t find any new information, I was really pleased to see that my yoga moves are exactly what Runner’s world recommends. I did all of these poses today in class, no wonder I feel so much better when I am done, yoga really helps runners! If you don’t want to pay for the classes in the studio, and your feeling tight from your runs, just grab a mat and stretch it out in your living room!

Breakfast was a little weird this morning. I am running low on food and wanted something hot but didn’t want waffles and actually didn’t feel like almond butter mixed with anything either. I grabbed two packets of instant cream of wheat from the house kitchen and mixed them up with some almond milk. I don’t think I have ever eaten cream of wheat at least that I remember. It soaked up the milk so much that I ended up adding more before heating it and then more after wards. It was still a little dry. I topped it with pumpkin butter, currants, coconut and a mixture of walnuts and almonds.

It definitely didn’t stay looking this way. I quickly mixed it all up (there is more pumpkin butter hiding below) and dug in! The packets were a little salty for my taste, they were the original kind but I could definitely taste the added salt. This probably wasn’t the worst thing though since I had sweat a ton out in yoga.

I really enjoyed the texture (I am such a texture person) of the cream of wheat but I don’t think this will become a “go-to” breakfast. It’s more like an emergency breakfast when I am out of food! It definitely filled me up though and was fun to eat so not a complete waste. I was super thirsty so I thought it would be a good opportunity to try the POM juice that I got for free at the Healthy Living Summit (I know that was like a month and a half ago!). I like to save things until the perfect time

I mixed a small amount with a large glass of water to cut down on the calories. I took a small sip of it straight out of the bottle and was surprised at how tart it was. I don’t think I could drink this straight, seltzer water would be ideal for a nice spritzer.

Inspired by a fellow food blogger’s recent post, I thought I would focus my post this afternoon on some simple pleasures that have made me smile today. Heading out to the farm this morning was energizing. The sun was shining and I had Ingrid Michaelson’s new album blaring in my ears.

We did the typical harvest of cherry and grape tomatoes, large tomatoes, zinnias, bok choi, collards, peppers etc. I helped with the tomatoes and flowers again I wanted to take a picture of this perfect flower because it was so beautiful but sadly it didn’t make it in the bucket to sell because it broke in the process. It was too pretty to just toss on the ground without at least documenting it!

Since we are nearing the end of the season, the tomato plants are starting to look a little worse for wear. We were all joking around that the smell emanating from the rotten ones is enough to ruin tomatoes for anyone. While it was gross job, it gave me and the other volunteers a real sense of satisfaction. We worked hard to get rid of the rotten ones and I was so proud of our efforts that I snapped a shot. Sorry it’s not the prettiest but it’s real and dirty and it made me happy that we were able to get this job done!

While I was cleaning up, I spotted these beauties in the green house. They’re not for sale and I believe that they’re holding on to them until we get more but I was super impressed that our little garden yielded this many already! Beautiful Pumpkins get me in the mood for Fall!

Soon enough it was time to go, and I was starving! The wrap didn’t really hold me over as well as I would have liked. Next time I will pair it with some yogurt on the side which seems to always do the trick when combined with nut butter and banana. I snacked on this KIND bar on the bus home. I think this may be one of my all time favorite bars. The flavor is Almond Apricot and it’s just so moist, chewy and sweet in a natural sort of way that I can’t get enough of them! Every ingredient is really apparent in the bar as well, you can actually see huge chunks of almonds and apricots which lets you know they’re REAL ingredients.

I stopped off at Harvest Co-Op to get some groceries and found these crackers that I have been dying to try since Jess recommended them last week! I got the “herb” flavor and was not at all disappointed. I had a few while I was cleaning the apartment (top to bottom) and doing some laundry. I found myself wondering exactly what the box asks “How can rice and seeds taste so good?”

Lunch came around 1:30 once I was done with my chores. Having a clean apartment makes me so happy and I knew I wouldn’t really enjoy my lunch until it was done! I whipped up the simplest of salads using the giant heirloom tomato I took home with my today from the farm. This salad was spinach, tomato, feta and the secret ingredient basil! Topped off with a drizzle of straight up Balsamic, this was I think the best salad I have made all summer. While I love my messy salads with everything but the kitchen sink on them, this one was so perfect in it’s absolute simplicity. I also had no idea how awesome basil is on a salad?! Has anyone else tried this?

Here is the rest of my lunch (minus the peach, it was quite ripe when I went to bite into it so I will wait). Lunch was eaten outside which was lovely even though it was a little windy.

And just because they deserve a pic all to themselves; the newest love of my life “Mary’s Gone Crackers”. Look how thin they are. I was seriously amazed and can’t wait to try the other flavors!

Everything in this post contributed to my happiness today. I hope that you too find pleasure in every day things since it is truly the simple things that add joy to your life.

Is this really in my fridge right now? I am afraid so.

I apologize for not posting dinner last night. After Darin got home, we changed and got ready to go out to dinner. Once we walked outside we realized that it was raining too hard to walk and didn’t want to take a cab so we came back up and ordered take out. We were both kind of craving Chinese food (which hardly ever happens, it’s usually Thai food) so we caved and ordered our favorites: crab rangoons, egg roll, sweet and sour chicken, sesame chicken, and rice. I have no problem splurging once in awhile but when I do I want it to be good and enjoyable. Darin enjoyed his plate but my sesame chicken was too sugary and just not worth the splurge. I only ate about two pieces and two crab rangoons with some white rice. I didn’t feel like photographing it because it wasn’t in my opinion “blog worthy”. I am glad that I didn’t just continue to eat it because it was there. I made a conscious decision that it didn’t taste good and wasn’t worth it. The unfortunate part is we have left overs! Oh well, live and learn

We awoke this morning to lots and lots of rain. Since we needed to go pick up the car, we geared up with umbrellas, rain coats, and my rain boots. Instead of walking the two miles or so, we took the bus and then decided to walk the rest of the way (maybe a mile) because the rain had let up at that point. On our walk we stopped into Starbucks where I purchased my first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season! I ordered a tall made with skim milk and added extra cinnamon and nutmeg to the top.

Our mission was successful; we had a nice walk, coffee, retrieved the car, and even scored two free apples from the dealership! Who knew car dealerships liked to give away free fruit!

Since we were out, a trip to Trader Joe’s made sense. They had free samples of waffles on offer which reminded me that I like waffles and could definitely make them part of a healthy breakfast! Besides the Whole Wheat Blueberry Waffles we got a lot of awesome groceries including Pumpkin Butter! Trader Joe’s Pumpkin Butter is one of my favorite products. It’s super versatile (use with Almond butter to make a delicious sandwich) and really says “fall” to me. I am not sure if they sell it all year round or if it’s a seasonal item. I only look for it around this time because that’s when I crave it.

Breakfast was eaten around 11:00 so I don’t think I will be eating a real lunch today, I’ll probably be back to post this evening. The pumpkin butter mixed with yogurt was dynamite! I ended up eating the waffle with the banana and pumpkin butter yogurt, surprised?

I also wanted to share this with you all just in case you haven’t seen it yet. Kelsey from Bites and Bowls posted it earlier this week. I feel like this is information we all know intuitively but it’s interesting to see it laid out.  Bottom line: Real food wins every time!

http://www.precisionnutrition.com/what-are-your-4-lbs

Mmmmm….I absolutely love mixing flavors and ending up with a big mess on my plate! You know those plates that little kids use with the sectioned off places to put your peas and potatoes? Not for me. Today’s lunch was eaten in a hurry which was too bad because it was so good I wanted to savor it longer. I had to shower, eat, blog and get out the door in about an 1 hr so things were a bit hurried to say the least! Lunch combined the bean and tomato salad from earlier with some veggies from the shrimp stir-fry. It reminded me of a something I would get at from a salad bar. I get so excited to try everything that I end up picking slightly different dishes that wouldn’t normally go together. This is why I LOVE salad bars, you get to be so creative!

So the scary (creepy looking not tasting!) part of my lunch is pictured below:

Yes, that is a whole fish! A rainbow trout to be precise. He looks angry but I guess I would be too if I got put in a smoker! This little guy was smoked to perfection by my uncle who was nice enough to send me home with an entire fish this past weekend. My uncle is quite the fisherman. He travels all over the state of Maine and even goes as far as Florida and New Zealand in search of a good catch. It’s not his day job but it could be based on his success! I was so happy to find this in the fridge today because I haven’t been to the store all week and needed something to add a little protein to lunch.

It was really easy to eat because all the work had been done. I simply pulled the meat off and took a few of the really apparent bones out. I ate it on a Suzie’s Spelt Flat Bread (Italian Herb), which was great because while the fish was well flavored the herbs on the flat bread only enhanced it. I am always in search of new cracker options and try to stick with gluten free and lower carb choices because I notice that they make both Darin and me feel better. I will definitely get these again; great flavor and I love how 3 of them equals 1 serving (95 calories!?)

The fish was so good; so flaky! I love smoked salmon and had never tried Rainbow trout so this was a real treat! It was hard not to eat the whole fish but I wanted to save some for Darin to have a taste.

For an afternoon treat/snack I had a cup of vanilla chai tea with a petite brownie at the salon I go to in Cambridge. I love these little bite sized brownies and always get one when I go. Not sure what is on the docket for tonight, it’s starting to rain here. Maybe a movie? Maybe take-out? Not sure, I am just looking forward to a relaxing weekend not being on the road!

And just because I like playing with photo booth on Darin’s computer, I’ll share with you all my hair-cut. It feels so nice to have it healthy again!

Jeez, my eyes look tired, maybe a night in is just what I need

This afternoon I took the T (subway) out to my cousin Meg’s new pad. She is basically house sitting for the next 10 months for some friends of hers who have a huge house with two cats. It was nice to get out of my tiny apartment and hang out in a big spacious home. I also appreciated having new backgrounds for pics! We didn’t have a plan for lunch but managed to throw together a delicious one using what she had on hand.

Everything we ate was from TJ’s except the lime chips. We made wraps filled with edamame hummus, fresh salsa, roasted red peppers, and parsley! The brown rice tortillas needed to be heated and since there was no microwave we used a cast iron skillet with  a little olive oil spray. These were not like other wraps, very hard to handle, but they had excellent texture and flavor. They were almost like eating a combination of a hard/soft taco.

Now, if you don’t like parsley then this wrap would not be for you. We used parsley as you would a green since we didn’t have any lettuce or spinach and had TONS of parsley. I actually really liked it and would probably do this again even if I had another green option. It gave it a real punch and tasted super fresh. The roasted peppers were fabulous as well and I think the hummus mixed with salsa really pulled it all together. On the side we had “Food should taste good” Lime chips which were awesome. I had never tried this flavor and was impressed with how they were flavored; lime juice and sea salt! Perfect

I was so excited that I got to try TWO kinds of these chips today! Meg saved me a mini bag of the Cinnamon variety because she knew that I wanted to try them. These were not sweet as you might expect, which I loved. The cinnamon flavor was well represented but it didn’t have the normal counter-part, sugar. I think you could eat these on the side of a sandwich and enjoy them as you would chips but you could also pair them with something as a dessert which is the way we went this afternoon. These are tied at the moment with the chocolate variety which is still high on the list.

Meg was nice enough to share a scoop of her TJ’s rice pudding which was an awesome accompaniment.

We split the bag and probably had 1/4 cup each of the pudding (if that). Overall an awesome lunch! Thanks for the good eats Meg.

When I went to bed last night I had no intention of doing anything except cleaning and organizing today. This changed when I woke up and realized that it was going to be a beautiful day and possibly one of the last really great beach days of the summer. I said to myself that the cleaning and laundry could wait and began packing my beach bag. In order to make the train to Rockport I had to leave before I could eat breakfast. Therefore breakfast was a bit of a treat this morning, I felt like a commuter going to Dunkin Donuts except that instead of a brief case and high heels I was holding a beach bag and wearing flip flops. This cinnamon raisn bagel with light cream cheese was delicious and satisfied a craving that I had been having for a bagel and cream cheese, one of my favorite foods.

The train from North Station to Rockport was about 1 hour and 5 minutes. The beach is a short walk from the station which I didn’t mind at all since Rockport is a truly beautiful North Shore town.

Victorian Bed and Breakfasts

A historic downtown with plenty of shops

An ocean view

Famous fishing shacks (Motif No. 1)

And most importantly a beach that is accessible by train from Boston!

I was craving fruit since my cinnamon raisin bagel didn’t deliver much in that department. This served as my morning snack in between swimming, reading and chatting on the phone.

I got hungry for lunch around 12:15 and was very happy with what I had packed this morning in my frantic rush to get out of the house. A very simple yet nutritionally balanced meal: caprese salad and nut thins.

My saving grace was however the perfectly chilled coconut water.

It was hard to leave at 1:45 but I had to make the train back to the city in order to be at work on time.

I made it with time to spare and managed to pick up a raspberry iced tea to enjoy with my afternoon snack and book for the ride home.

I was very suprised at how much I liked this. I have never tried any of the Amazing Grass bars, only their shakes. I thought the texture was perfect, not too chewy but not too dry. I liked the fact that it was green and I liked the bits of nuts that you could see and crunch. This bar is completely organic, vegan, raw, dairy free, gluten free etc. If I liked the original this much I can’t wait to try the chocolate covered variety! Something about eating a bar that looks super healthy (the green hue) makes you feel super healthy and if it tastes good what do you have to lose?

At least my snack was good for me because dinner tonight was a different story.  The meal was donated by Rebecca’s Cafe and it included, BBQ chicken, Mac and Cheese, and Salad. I had a small portion of all and enjoyed mixing all the tastes together. BBQ sauce and Mac and Cheese go VERY well together.  This was my first time having real mac and cheese in probably 3 years so I made sure to enjoy every bite. A little went a long way.