Great Day

Work continues to be really busy - and obviously effecting the frequency of my posts!  :)

My day started with eggs and toast.  I buy a loaf of french bread in the bakery at my grocery store and then ask them to slice it.  They slice it pretty thin so it makes really good, crispy toast.  Love it!

When I came home this evening, I threw together some "clean out the refrigerator" pasta.  Just throw in anything you need to use from the refrigerator!  It was pretty good!

Chicken, mushrooms, spinach, red bell pepper, broccoli, lemon, cream, whole wheat pasta, crushed red pepper, and parmesan cheese.

I was determined to go for a run tonight.  It's been almost a week since my last run and I was feeling pretty crappy about that.  I have a 10k race coming up so I need to start building my miles up again.  This was a great run.  Isn't it funny how you just feel light on your feet sometimes?  This was one of those times.  I could have kept going, but it was starting to get dark and I don't like to run in the dark.  I'll go for more mileage this weekend!

Catching Up

I came home last night and totally crashed!  I wonder if I'm getting sick because I've had a mild sore throat all day today.  I will try my best to fight that off!

Rewind to Friday...

I forgot to make my oatmeal before going to bed, so I had to come up with a breakfast alternative that would keep me satisfied until lunch.  I fried an egg, over easy, and made some awesome toast with some thinly sliced french bread so it was really crispy...yum!

As usual, I was so famished in the morning that I didn't remember until halfway through my meal that I needed to snap a picture...sorry!  

We had a colleague come in town from one of our other offices, so you know what that means...FREE LUNCH!!  Not the place I would have chosen, but beggars can't be choosers.  The place definitely has atmosphere and the barbecue isn't bad, but I think they're overpriced and choices are limited.  It's an Austin establishment so it's almost taboo to say out loud that it's not your favorite, so I didn't.

I had the port loin, cole slaw, and the cream corn.  Their cream corn IS fabulous - best I've had anywhere!  I made a sandwich with my pork loin, but left it open for the picture so you could see in between the slices of bread.  With all of my co-workers around me, I chose to sneak a picture with my iPhone rather than giving an explanation since this is my extra-curricular activity!

I decided to grab a snack in the afternoon because my daughter had a team practice that evening and I knew it would be late before we would eat dinner.  I started with this new kind of yogurt I picked up at the store last week.  It sounded interesting and the flavor, Orange and Ginger, sucked me in!

I'm sure there's someone out there who likes this stuff, but I couldn't handle more than two bites!  I took the second bite only because I thought maybe the flavor was on the bottom and I should stir it up.  YUCK!!  This one went in the trash.  Luckily I had more yogurt in the fridge at work, so I tried this one:

MUCH better!  The fruit flavor was great - not too sweet or overpowering.  The texture of the coconut milk yogurt is different than I expected.  It was kind of slimy, for lack of a better word, but I got used to it.  I kept wondering as I ate it if this would be more like a gelato if frozen.  I'll have to try that!

After my daughter's practice, we talked ourselves into eating out since it was a Friday night and too late for cooking.  We stopped in at a California Pizza Kitchen where the wait was a surprisingly short 10-15 minutes!  A Mojito is the first thing I ordered.

The CPK Mojito was good because it wasn't too sweet and there was plenty of lime and mint!  My second course was a cup of chicken tortilla soup.  I won't be getting this again. It was really thick and had a very concentrated flavor - too much like a Cream of Chicken Tortilla soup.  Yuck!

That's all I ate.  About half a cup of that and I was done.  On to the main course - Cabo Crab Cakes - an appetizer that we get every time we visit the CPK.  This time I decided to make it my meal because I always love it so much.  Not so much this time...

I guess I was really on a roll with my food choices!  They were just okay.  The black bean and roasted corn relish wasn't as fresh, the dipping sauce wasn't as thick and creamy, and I kept getting pieces of crab shell in the cakes.  Boo!

I was so ready to get home.  The kids wanted ice cream for dessert, so since I had the ice cream out I made a blackberry shake for myself.  It was yummy and it was the most intense PURPLE!

Vanilla ice cream, milk, fresh blackberries, vanilla extract, and a few ice cubes.

On Saturday, I woke up early because I had a meeting and some work to get done.  After that, we lounged around and finally made breakfast around 10:30!  I was craving eggs again, but this time I remembered to snap the picture before digging in!

The funny thing about this breakfast for me is that I really don't like eggs.  Maybe I just need some protein, hence the craving, or maybe they are just growing on me.  I haven't decided yet, but just looking at this picture now makes me want to go cook another egg!  :)

We had some errands to run today and we saw the neatest chair in a department store.  It is made of woven wire.  Not comfortable AT ALL, but would make a great conversation piece!

It was a beautiful summer day so I wanted to run, but I just couldn't do it.  I started feeling worn out right before dinner and that sore throat was getting worse.  So much for motivation!  I took a nap instead, hopefully just what my body needed!

Dinner was really good tonight.  I made chicken piccata with tiny potatoes that I roasted in butter and a little bit of chicken broth and roasted asparagus (and no paper plates tonight - yay!).

Moody Monday

Today was a really yucky Monday for me.  Have you ever had a day where you wake up and wish you were sick so you could just stay in bed all day and not feel guilty about it?  That was me today...pretty sad, huh?  Well, I drug my behind out of bed and went to work, but was irritable and impatient all day.  I thought of several things I could do this evening to get out of the rut and end the day on a higher note - go for a run, do our taxes (wait, that might not have the desired effect!), or get started on a home project I've been meaning to do.  In the end, I decided that it's ok to be unmotivated once in a while so I did absolutely nothing!  And I'm ok with that. 

As far as food goes, it was a day of repeats.  Had my normal oatmeal and coffee for breakfast then some greek yogurt and a bagel with almond butter for lunch.  Luckily, no one was really hungry tonight so everyone was left to fend for themselves for dinner.

One thing I can share with you, however, is the bread I made last night.  It wasn't ready for dinner because of my poor planning, so it didn't make it into yesterday's post.  I came across a recipe for No-Knead Ciabatta Bread with a very helpful video.  I'm so glad I stumbled upon this recipe on the Food Wishes blog by Chef John and I can't wait to check out more of his great looking recipes! 

 

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of the dough before this stage, but you can see it in Chef John's video and mine looked just as he said it should.  This is a very easy recipe and would be great for people who may not be comfortable working with bread dough.  I LOVE to bake bread and do it often so I have gotten past the intimidation stage, but believe me it took some practice!

This made one BIG loaf of bread!  We're still eating it tonight dipped in some extra virgin olive oil and spices.  YUM!

Thank goodness "Moody Monday" is almost over.  Tomorrow I'm hoping for a "Terrific (not Terrible) Tuesday"!