Caroline Dines

I awoke this morning to the bright sun creeping through our blinds. After rising, I quickly remembered it was one of the best days to be in Boston, Marathon Monday! In honor of the Marathon, I had decided to do a long run just after breakfast. Therefore, I wanted to keep my breakfast smallish so as not to weigh me down, but at the same time provide my body with some good fuel! What better than two small pieces of peanut butter and banana toast!

Along with my toast, I had some strawberries, grapes and two glasses of homemade Iced tea (Cranberry Green!).

I browsed through my Runner’s World which had a number of “Boston” Features. I absolutely love living in a city with such an old tradition. Having run the Cape Cod Marathon in 4:19  (2008), I think my chances for qualifying for Boston might be pretty far off. However, I never really “trained for speed” for this marathon and maybe if I had a Garmin Forerunner to help me I could shave some serious minutes off of my time? Either way, I know that I want to run Boston one day and if it isn’t with a qualifying time I would be just as proud to run it for charity!

I was so excited for my run this morning for a number of reasons: 1.) it was gorgeous out (a little windy but really sunny which made the water sparkle!) 2.) I wanted to explore a bit to see the set up for the marathon and 3.) this was going to be the longest distance I had done for probably 6 months?! Along my 7.5 mile route, I snapped a few shots of the beauty around me. Boy do I feel lucky to have these running paths right outside my door!

Everything is in bloom!

There were multiple stretching/picture breaks involved. I used to get all stressed out about this but honestly I think that taking the time to stretch every now and then during a run is what keeps me running and not in the physical therapist’s office.

I ventured all the way to the end of the river by the Museum of Science which is awesome because on the way back you get views like this:

After my run, I showered and put on comfy clothes, and geared up to go watch the Marathon with my cousin Meg! I was smart this year and brought beach chairs for us to sit in. I remember last year standing with Darin in Coolidge Corner and feeling quite jealous of the people sitting in their chairs. Meg and I had plans to buy lunch from Trader Joe’s which was quite a treat for me since I never do that! We both had the same idea of what we wanted. Our “maine course” was this tangy and spicy new product:

Ummm….yummm? This salad is amazing and pretty awesome nutritionally speaking. Fun to eat too! I was glad I remembered my special Swedish utensil!

As a little “add-on” to our salad we split the spicy sushi rolls. I am never going to say no to a few sushi rolls even if it is a little random of a combo. Eaten on Beacon Street, so close to the T that every time it came by I screamed to Meg, “We’re gonna die!” or something like that.

We watched the race for a good 3 hours and I was hoping to see Meghan or my friend from college but I must have missed them! I did get their updates, and both did fantastic, so congrats to you both! (and to all the runners out there!)

So many runners!

Meg and I sat and chatted away but started to get cold after awhile (where did the clouds come from!?) and decided to head back. Meg had run all the way from Newton to Coolidge Corner (5.5 miles, a new P.R. for her!!!) and had to take the T back and then walk 30 minutes to her house. I of course had to go to work so we packed up and parted ways. But not before a quick photo. We probably have 500 of these shots from over the years.

Luckily I was all showered and just needed to change before heading into work. Being a quite night here I took advantage of the open kitchen and decided to make one of my all-time favorite dinners: Breakfast for Dinner! Now I love French Toast and almost always get it when I go out to breakfast. However, I always feel bad about eating it out because they cook it in so much butter or oil. So, tonight, I made a healthy french toast with mango sausage on the side.

Of course this was made with the Rustico Bread I have been raving about from TJ’s, 1 egg, a splash of skim, dash of vanilla, and a healthy shake of cinnamon. I cooked them in the pan with the sausage for a little extra flavor and served it all with a side of fresh strawberries and a glass of watered down OJ. I don’t know what was better the sausage…

or the french toast…I think the combination was what actually threw me over the top. This was an amazing meal and I am proud to admit I licked the plate clean!

What a wonderful day! Did any of you run the marathon today? How about a marathon in general? Share your stories!

Today was just one of those days. Not one of those bad days, but instead one of the best days I have had in awhile! It started off on the right food with a healthy, filling and mouth satisfying breakfast. In the past few weeks I have been experimenting with Green Monsters and while I love the taste and the way they make me feel, I haven’t had much luck with the color looking particularly green. This is probably because I am adding Amazing Grass Chocolate Powder and most of the time frozen berries. This tends to create a somewhat muddy greenish color, not that appealing but they do taste “amazing”. Anyway, today I felt inspired to blog so I tried a new recipe.

This particular combo created a gorgeous shade of green and a knock-out flavor! In my blender I put a huge handful of baby spinach, a handful of frozen mango chunks (TJ’s), 1 cup of unsweetened Almond milk, and 1 small ripe banana. Yum. It even matched my Haley House t-shirt I had on. Pardon the hair, I literally JUST rolled out of bed.

Since I like a little something extra with my shake in the morning, and because I had plans for a run with Meg C. later on, I made some peanut butter toast.

This bread was recommended to me by my cousin and I have to agree it’s the best I’ve tasted in awhile. It’s from TJ’s surprise surprise, and it only has 80 calories per slice and 4 grams of fiber! It’s called Soft Multigrain Rustico Bread. Look for it. Perfectly toasted, with a smear of peanut butter and a sprinkling of craisins and golden raisins, this breakfast was again, the best I’ve had in awhile.

After my amazing breakfast, I did some homework, tidied the apartment and finally got geared up for my run. Meg met me at my apartment around 11 and we hit the trail from there. She’s training for a half Marathon in May and this was one of the days she had scheduled to run between 4-5 miles. I had done a little calculating ahead of time and planned out one of my favorite routes that took us along the Riverway to Leverett Pond and finally to Jamaica Pond. We ran a hard 4.5 miles which is why I don’t have any pictures to show you from the actual run. However, here is the proof on Meg’s fancy Garmin that we actually ran it. Hint…hint…anyone who wants to buy me a stellar birthday present, I would be more than happy with one of these babies (Darin!).

Our run just happened to end at one of my favorite markets ever, City Feed. After perusing the store, we realized we weren’t in the mood for any of their sandwiches and would rather piece together a meal to share on our picnic. At that point I was really craving nothing more than a coconut water. I miss these and decided to treat myself to one.

Meg had the same idea about getting a “fun drink” and grabbed a Honest Tea.

Perhaps the best find of the day though, in my opinion, came from this aisle.

Tortilla chips are one of those foods that I absolutely love but tend to overeat and because the good tasting ones usually have 6 or 7 grams of fat and around 150 calories per serving, this isn’t a great thing. This is why I was so pumped when I found this bag!

These Garden of Eatin’ chips only have 120 calories, 2 grams of fat and 3 grams of fiber per serving! The even better part is that they don’t taste like they have such awesome stats;  they’re full of flavor, nice and salty and are miles beyond the old “Baked Tostitos” I used to eat all the time. We paired the chips with a Mediterranean Lentil Salad and some super creamy lemon hummus.

Here’s our view and picnic spread.

THE BEST BITE!

With the bright sun beating down on us we rested and refueled. We then walked about two miles back to my apartment, changed, and headed out to do a little shopping. We ended up not buying much of anything but it was still fun to look. After an afternoon snack stop at Berry Freeze (forgot my camera for the shopping trip!) we parted ways and I got myself ready for work. Honestly, it was a fabulous way to spend a gorgeous wednesday and I feel lucky to have a friend that has random days off during the week! I am thinking there will be many more runs/picnics/beach outings this summer. I can’t wait. Oh and since I owe you a dessert picture for spacing it on my Berry Freeze, how bout I share my newest love from TJ’s?

This is a picture of my dessert from yesterday. The ingredient list is crazy on these, and by that I mean crazy short. 6 ingredients (one of which is Beet Sugar!) and all recognizeable. At 30 calories per stick, I don’t think I have found anything that can even compare calorie wise but in the taste department these feel super indulgent and buttery even though they’re dairy free! How DO they do it?

This weekend I traveled south to spend time with various family members. The weekend began in Little Compton, with my grandmother and parents. Despite the chilly temperatures the day was bright and sunny and we enjoyed a walk by the ocean. It’s hard to believe that summer is just around the corner but seeing this glorious site got me totally in the mood.

Saturday evening, my parents and I drove to Hopkinton, where my Godfather and his family live. They recently moved, so this was our first time seeing the new place. Besides wanting to visit the new digs, my aunt was up for a few days from N.C., which made it the perfect excuse to all get together. We typically don’t ALL get together unless it’s summer so we referred to this party as our “Summer Primer” (getting us excited for Summer!).

We set to work on a bottle of wine and while catching up, Trader Joe’s goodies were enjoyed by all. I brought one of my favorite combos: Cilantro and Chive Yogurt dip with Everything Pretzel Thins. There were also some absolutely delicious pita chips with lemon zest hummus.

And of course, Popcorn is always a crowd pleaser with this group.

My uncle Rob, (AKA Napoleon) brought along an assortment of sausages to grill outside. There was Bratwurst, Chicken Sausage, Italian Sausage etc. I tried a nibble or two of a couple and then ended up with some chicken sausage on my plate as an accompaniment to the main meal.

I’ll tell you who really wanted a bite of the sausage though: Briggs and Bailey!  Their two Goldens were quite disappointed to be left out of the  tasting. Poor pups!

The main course of the evening was a crockpot turkey chili which was phenomenal! I really enjoyed the corn and the turkey meat together. I always leave corn out but it was a nice addition. I think the fact that it had been simmering ALL day also made the flavors really standout. I enjoyed my portion with some shredded cheddar, a dollop of light daisy sour cream and a square of homemade cornbread! Chili and cornbread is really hard to beat in my opinion.

And as if it couldn’t get any better, we also had a loaded salad on the side! This was seriously chockfull of veggies which included: sprouts, peppers, and mushrooms! I really really love alfalfa sprouts.

I was determined to get a group shot and was pretty impressed that this actually came out half decent. I should have been scooching down just a tad more since I am partially blocking my cousin’s face! Sorry Meg! At least all our eyes are open.

After all that food I still managed to make room for dessert. Probably because I knew it was going to be healthy and fresh since my Mom and I made it! I give you the Fresh Fruit Pizza!

This is a simple recipe that can be adapted many ways. You start with a sugar cookie “crust” (just make an extra large sugar cookie), spread lemon curd on top (lemon, egg, sugar and a little butter) and then top with whatever fruit you desire! We used strawberries, blueberries and mango (because I have recently discovered that mango is absolutely delicious right now and I can’t get enough of it). This piece is not very representative of what I ACTUALLY ate of the pizza. I would say times this by three….ooops.

…I just haven’t been documenting as much! With Christmas fast approaching, work and personal business have been taking priority over my daily posts. I have been working extra hours so that I can take a nice long break beginning Christmas Eve all the way through the New Year! I am so excited since I will be heading home to Maine to be with my family and Darin’s family and will be cross country skiing (my favorite form of exercise!), sledding, skating, maybe even snowboarding. So as I said, you can rest assured that I have still been consuming food, (probably too much with all the sweets around here!) but with holiday parties that don’t allow for paparazzi shots I am feeling like quite the neglectful blogger. Either way here are some of my highlights for the past few days.

Breakfast on Wednesday was a lovely Multi-Grain Bruegger’s Bagel which was “scored” from the Community Social at the house which took place on Wednesday instead of it’s normal Tuesday this week. I added Light Herb and Garlic cream cheese to my hollowed out vessel.

After breakfast I hustled off to the Haley House which turned into a very rewarding shift. I had quite a few customers and also some individuals who stopped by to just get warm (I actually gave one a free cup of coffee). Since the Haley House is not JUST a bakery and it’s primary goal is to provide community to individuals in the South End who may not have a home to call their own, I felt really pleased that the regulars were starting to become familiar with my face and felt comfortable talking to me. I put out our fabulous cupcakes as free sample; partly because I wanted to try a bite and also because I knew they would draw people in!

The rest of Wednesday was spent working and saying goodbye to a co-worker who is moving to Denver and will be dearly missed. We went out to a local bar called The Mission which had delicious bar food in my opinion. Sadly I have no pictures from the evening but I am sure you can picture in your mind such dishes as Sweet Potato Skins, Mussels, Bruschetta, and a killer Nacho plate. I had a Magner’s Cider with my appetizers which was such a treat since I was actually “working”. The next morning I was craving some fruit and “carby” goodness so I dug into my last ruby red and prepared a peanut butter toast to eat with it. The flavors here weren’t exactly complimentary but it hit my cravings perfectly and provided adequate nutrition I believe.

I’ve been hitting yoga hard this week and after my session on Thursday I came home ravenous. Lucky for me I had a fresh bag of TJ’s Salsa chips and a tub of Sabra Hummus.

I don’t think I have ever tried these chips before but let me just tell you if you have any love for Doritos and just can’t justify eating them anymore, try these! They are not as heavily doused in seasoning but have a great taste which allows the chip to stand alone fine or pair with salsa, hummus or any other dip you can think of.

This morning I woke up thinking about breakfast. This hasn’t happened in awhile (maybe I have been too full from the night before?) so I decided to resurrect an old classic: GREEK YOGURT MESS! This one contained one little tub of Strawberry Oikos, a sprinkle of blueberry muesli, some walnuts, and unsweetened coconut. SOO good and even though it’s not very seasonal the coconut looked like snow so that has to count for something right?

Yoga was another awesome sweat sesh and I came home ravenous. I actually dreamed this sandwich up on my frigid walk home and it came out better than I had expected.

I toasted two slices of my low carb When Pigs Fly bread, smeared one slice with Sabra hummus and the other with TJ’s roasted red pepper spread. Then I cut two slices of cheddar cheese and topped it off with two Claussen sandwich stackers.  Such an awesome sandwich! A good cheese sandwich is sometimes so satisfying in my opinion.

It was “oh so photogenic” too, don’t you think?

And I would be remiss if I didn’t include the dessert from last night since a bite or two of it did make it’s way past my lips today. I had a full “tree” last night and was able to photograph them without many questions since I just said in front of the families that they were too cute not to picture. After all they ARE too cute! They are a brownie base with green colored frosting, m+m’s for decoration and a candy cane trunk., They’re supposed to be Christmas Trees if you couldn’t tell!

After a long week I am so ready to be done with work related stuff. Luckily I have plans to meet up with Meg C. for a vegan dinner at Veggie Planet in Harvard Square and hopefully some drinks afterwards. Happy Friday everyone!

Since yesterday I have been feeling a little off. Today I was hit with cold symptoms (runny nose, cough, slight chills) and have spent the day resting and hydrating like a mad woman. Breakfast this morning was an old classic but in a smaller bowl than normal. My appetite hasn’t been all that strong today, so I listened. Plain yogurt, apple butter, 1 barney butter packet and a sprinkle of muesli on top.

My plan was to stay in the house all day but we have NO food and it was a bit of a crisis. I saddled up my “granny cart” and walked to Trader Joe’s (not that far at all) to stock up. When I got back I was hungry for lunch. Funny how grocery shopping always does this to me. I thought up this lunch on my walk back and I think it might be a new favorite!

2 rice cakes (reduced salt) with 1 laughing cow cheese spread over both. I used to love cream cheese on rice cakes as a kid and this was just as good if not better. Actually the final topping on each made the meal. I topped one with pumpkin butter…

…and the other with a TJ’s eggplant spread. One sweet and one savory.

I even stuck with the sweet and savory theme for my accompaniments: pickle and apple slices. The apple was my first Macintosh of the season. I have been sticking with the honey crisp variety this year and since my farmer’s market is closed I had to buy apples at TJ’s today. Since the Mac’s were local I went with them and was not at all disappointed. A good local Mac is just as good as a Honey Crisp.  :)

Since this meal was on the light side, I finished with a serving of peanut butter filled pretzels (TJ’s, no salt variety). My Nana had these this weekend and I kind of became addicted! I am going to be limiting myself though to the serving size though!

Not feeling up to par is really messing with my appetite. I am basically just drinking tea and seltzer water and haven’t felt like much else all afternoon. Dinner tonight was one of my favorites of the month: Thai Food. I couldn’t just miss it all together, so I made sure to try a little bit of the three dishes: Veggie Pad Thai with Tofu, Basil Fried Rice, and Yellow Curry with Tofu. My favorites were the curry and the pad thai. The Basil Rice was too spicy/weird-ly flavored for my taste. This food actually tasted really good to me, despite feeling off. I am not really surprised since Brown Sugar does Thai right.

Hopefully this thing passes by me and I start feeling better tomorrow. Maybe it’s allergies? I have no fever so as long as I am not running a temperature I will continue working (just basically sticking to my office rather than mingling with families). I’ll keep my purell by myside for now. How about you guys? Anyone feeling sick or just getting over it? Any suggestions on how to beat it off?

My run this morning/afternoon was absolutely what I needed. It got me out of the house, moving and I got to chat with a new friend the whole way. I have never really done a run with another person before. Occassionally my cousin and I would run together for a short distance but we would both have our ipods on. Chatting and running is a whole new world in my opinion. It keeps the pace slower which is good for longer distance and keeps your mind on something other than the pounding the pavement. What fun I had. I managed to take some shots of the beautiful sky line…

… a bit of Harvard…

…some sail boats by the B.U. Boat House…

…and 2 of the 6 Sport Beans I consumed along the way!

After this glorious run, I met Darin at Starbucks for a tea. While this tea tasted good I was drinking it on a somewhat empty stomach after my run so I needed some food to go along with it. I can’t seem to drink tea on an empty stomach without getting nauseous.

So this Cherry Pie Lara Bar I picked up at CVS would have to do. I have had a strong aversion to Lara Bars for awhile now since I had a bad experience with a flavor once (not sure I remember what it was to be honest). This one tasted very similar to my beloved PURE bars so it was a good re-introduction. Maybe I will be adventurous and try some others. They are pretty awesome little bars.

After a nice long shower, I made myself a lunch plate. This was a “deconstructed” wrap which was a lot better in theory than in actual fact. It was just hard to eat. The tastes were great but I got pretty messy. Note-to-self: Wraps are meant to be eaten as a wrap. Duh. This plate contained the following: carrots, smoked salmon, lettuce, one wrap cut up, cilantro and chive yogurt dip, and a pickle.

This did a great job of holding me over until I was able to finally eat dinner much later than expected. The house was CRAZY  busy tonight. Thank god I had planned my dinner ahead and was able to prep it before I went into work. I basically cut and peeled a butternut squash and placed it on a jelly roll pan to cook with a little olive oil, salt and pepper. I then put some beets in some tin foil and cooked them both at 375 for over an hour. Once these were close to being done I added some lightly cooked (in a pan) chicken sausage to the pan and cut up the beets (peeled them) and added them back to the pan to keep cooking. At this point I worked on my beet greens and kale. This was also the point where a family asked very curiously, “What ARE you making?” At this point I really had no idea but I knew that all the ingredients were good and it would come out on top. Boy was I right. This was one of the best dinners I have had in awhile.

The kale and beet greens were cooked with garlic and olive oil until they were soft. I served them first and then topped the greens with the roasted veggies and sausage, drizzeled a bit of Balsamic on the top and called it good.

This dish didn’t need anything else. Sure cheese of some kind would have been nice but it might have overpowered the natural sweetness of these veggies. The best part is that I have left-overs! I went without dessert tonight. Sadly I am out of yogurt and wasn’t feeling plain frozen berries. It also is so busy that I don’t really have time to be bothered. This is the kind of night where I would normally just keep grabbing a handful of candy corn every time I walk by the kitchen but I am proud to say that I am not going there tonight and it feels good!