Slooowww Day Through....

So after a week of teasing Facebook posts from "So Delicious Coconut Milk" with daily delectable recipes for "slow cooker" oatmeal, I knew Sunday morning breakfast would be the PERFECT time to try one of these out.  And how could German Chocolate Cake Oatmeal NOT be the first one on the block?? :) 

I rounded up all of my ingredients:

Have you ever made Steel Cut Oats??  They are the least processed oats that you can buy.  The catch, however, is that they take around 15-30 minutes to make.  (Unless you have some TJ's "Oats in a bag";) 

And here's where the slow cooker comes in:)  6 1/2 hours on low *while you're sleeping* and you wake up to piping hot steel cut oats all ready and waiting for you:)

It's like little elves had been toiling away to make you breakfast;)

The oats were nice, chocolaty, filing & chewy...but it was the topping that really kicked it into high gear:)

• 3 tablespoons chopped pecans
• 2 tablespoons coconut
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar (we didn't have any brown rice syrup)
• 1 tablespoon agave nectar
• 2 tablespoons So Delicious Coconut Milk

How often do you get to say you've had CAKE for breakfast??   (Well...apparently a lot now since I can't wait to try her strawberry layer or hummingbird cake oatmeal, as well:)

Lunch was a quick one amongst a bevy of chores & errands yesterday but it hit the spot for a sweet/salty/crispy/snacky lunch:)  Pretzel Slims + PB = bliss:)

That along with a Cracker Barrel 2% cheese stick kept me full till dinner.  LOVE that cheese...90 calories a 'square' and nice & filing! :)

And on this slowwwwwww cooker Sunday, it wouldn't be right if we ONLY used it for BREAKFAST, right??  So Sunday was also my first attempt EVER at pot roast in the cooker as well;)

OK...so I had a little help;)  I bought this "Cabernet eseasoned/already trimmed" one from Trader Joe's;)  However I DID brown it on all sides before tossing it in the pan!!

And from there, that's where all of my cooking ceased;)  6 hours later and it was falling apart at the seams:)

As one of our sides, I made some kale chips.....

Yes, you heard me correctly! :)  All you do is dice up the kale in 'chip sized' pieces, spritz them with some olive oil and a sprinkle of salt and pop em in the oven for 15-20 minutes at 450. 

These come out SUPPPPPPPPPPPPPER crispy...you could almost fool yourself into thinking your eating potato chips:)

Especially the little guys...they give the BEST CRUNCH! :)

And finally, I thought some more caramelized onion mashed potatoes would go well with the seasoned pot roast....mmmmmmmm, perfect Sunday night dinner:)

We ate dinner while catching up on "An Idiot Abroad"....have you guys ever seen this show?????  A friend of ours clued us into this show on the Science Channel (I know;) and it. is. HILARIOUS!!!!  Ricky Gervais sends his non-travel fond friend around the world to see the 7 Wonders and puts him up in the worst accommodations and situations.  Every episdoe just keeps getting funnier & funnier;)  Last night we watched the new Brazil episode and could NOT stop laughing!  You MUST watch this show;)

And after "Idiot," we thought we'd break into this little box of gold that I got for me Scott for Valentines Day...

I know....sick, right??

Sharing is caring, so we decided to split a few flavors to try.  We sampled spicy Carrot Cake, creamy Cheesecake, dreamy Red Velvet, oozing Chocolate Lava and the clear favorite: Tiramisu....

Perfectly elegant for Oscar Night:)

So I had planned that whole meal yesterday to revolve around what I THOUGHT was going to be a lazy & rainy Sunday.  Well, guess what:  TODAY IS that day!  Nothin worse than a rainy Monday, huh???  Oh well...at least I'll be on a plane to California this time next week....EEEK! :)  I'm trying to get Scott on the sharing bandwagon so we can split LOTS of our meals/food finds in San Fran....we have WAY TOOO MANY things we can't wait to try;)  hahahahahaha....hopefully sharing & HILLS will keep us just a little bit "in line" :) hahahahahah...

Alright, I've talked enough...have a "best you can have" Monday;)

Day of Rest....

Soooo...I don't have a dinner from Friday night to show you since I had no camera for our dinner at Fediric's  (always TOOOOO GOOD!)....butttt, I can show you LUNCH from Friday;)  I met Scott at Trader Joe's for a quick "grab & go" lunch;)  He had an AWESOME sirloin wrap, while I stuck to half of this salmon wrap.  It just sounded too good...yum:)

We had our wraps along with some of our favorite tortilla chips...these taste totally decadent (aka. fried & crispy).... 

....but have a really great & simple ingredients list... 

Andddd while we were in "sampling" mode, I just HAD to pick up these try.... 

...just tooooooooooooooooo good!  Super chocolaty, bite size and totally addictive;)  We each had a few and then the rest of this container went into work for "afternoon cookie hour" ;) hahahahhahahaa.....too tempting to keep around;)  They were SO. GOOD!

Soooo after our pizza/cookie/and ice cream day on Friday, I woke up yesterday craving some extra healthy oatmeal;)  I whipped up some warm spiced pumpkin pie oatmeal with a topping of pumpkin granola...mmmmmm.... 

And after some COMPLETELY INSANE & sweat drenching Power Yoga, I just wanted lunch to be light & simple!  A Mango Smoothie in a Jersey glass along with some "Jersey SHORE" was just the ticket;) hahahahahahahaha.... 

And as a snack...well, you knew it wouldn't be long before we tried out ANOTHER brand of TJ's granola bars:)  This time I had one of these... 

These had the nice little sweet & salty kick I was craving for;)  Yum!

Dinner was yet ANOTHER dinner this week that felt like it was going to take a long time to cook and then was pulled together 1,2,3! :)  Wanting to use up some of the stuff we had on hand, I thought I'd make a Vegetarian Taco Pizza...

I heated up the peppers & onions, roasted corn & a drained and rinsed can of black beans in a skillet mixed with a little cumin & chili powder for a little southwestern kick... 

While the veggies were heating up, I got a crackin on the (99 cent!) crust...

It went from bag to pan in less than 5 minutes... 

Next, I topped the dough with the pepper mix and finally with some of this cheese we found at the farmer's market before popping it in the oven... 

15 minutes at 450 and we were good to go.... 

And finally, I gathered together our final, VERY GREEN, toppings..... 

• shredded lettuce
• chopped cilantro
• diced scallions
• a drizzle of guacamole 

It wasn't the PRETTIEST pizza and it was definitely a knife & fork pie...but was it gooooood.  Scott said it was one of his favorite pizzas that we've ever made!  Quite a compliment;)

And we added more green to the mix with some champagne pear vinaigrette.  I MEAN...SALAD! :) 

Too satisfy our sweet tooths (while catching up on a week's worth of Survivor, Modern Family & The Office:), we had a couple of the "all natural cupcakes" I had made on Thursday night... 

I had made Bethenny's Joyful Heart Chocolate Muffins before and they are one of my favorite recipes.  In her 2nd book, "The Skinnygirl Dish," she topped the muffins with this butter/confectioner sugar/soy milk/vanilla/cocoa powder chocolate frosting.  These were really good, but I must say, I think I was a bigger fan of just the plain, non-frosted, muffins.  I know...ME!  The "more frosting, the better," girl;)  Hahahhahahahha....But my favorite part of these cupcakes/muffins is that they are made with 1 teaspoon of canola oil,  all natural oat flour & turbinado sugar and they are super moist and delicious.  LOVE THAT!  Healthy & guilt free dessert....is there really anything to complain about?? ;)

Well, after a Saturday filled with cleaning our house LITERALLY from top floor to basement; today we are having a much slowwwwwwwwer day;)  You'll see what I mean tomorrow;)  That on top of the fact that between Friday Power Sculpt AND Power Yoga:  My legs are SHOT today! ;)  No Zumba this fine morning...Sunday is gonna be a true day of rest this week;) hahahahhahahahaha

Hope you guys have a great AND relaxing Sunday too!  See you tomorrow:)

3 for 1 ....:)

Hi!  I apologize for my delayed post!  I passed OUT on Wednesday for the night at 8:30PM, then couldn't get my pictures to upload...a whole mess.  But as a BONUS, you get 3 posts in 1 today:)  We'll start with Wednesday night's dinner:  Charred stuffed poblano peppers with Green Couscous...(based on this recipe)

First, we took the pobalanos (or any peppers you want to use) and seeded them.  They tossed them in the broiler to toast up for about 20 minutes (flipping after 10 minutes)....

While the peppers were cooking, we got to working on the filing...which could NOT have been easier.  You heat up a drizzle of oil and a few cloves of garlic before adding in 3 cups of corn (we used Trader Joe's Roasted Corn...yum!), a can of diced tomatoes, a diced onion and a teaspoon of cumin, salt & pepper to season it up.  Let that all cook together for 7 or 8 minutes, or so....

Next, make a small slit in the tops of the peppers and stuff them with the corn & tomato mixture.  Top with a little bit of cheese and then toss em back in the oven to allow the cheese to melt...

YUM!!  These tasted like they should have been SUPER fattening, and yet they couldn't have been MORE guilt free!  All the veggies just made tons of flavor with hardly any oil and zero grease.  Gotta love homemade Mexican;)

As our side dish, we went a little GREEN:)  We cooked up some Israeli couscous like last week....and then in the food processor mixed up some spinach, cilantro, lime zest, scallions, a drizzle of chicken stock & olive oil...

The herbs just made the couscous BURST with flavor, especially from the lime zest & cilantro.  Just goes to show that you don't need a lot of fat to create AMAZING flavor!  Herbs are awesome for that!

Whichhhhhh bring us to yesterday's lunch, that was almost equally as GREEN:)

In the non-green corner, I had my beloved pineapple Chobani yogurt for breakfast.  Mango & Pineapple are so decadent & delicious!  (that is, if you like yogurt I suppose;)

And in the VERY GREEN corner, I brought a salad with crasisns, chopped pecans & scallions, some leftover GREEN couscous and a pear....

But let's be real:  The salad was just the vehicle to try out this dressing I got from Trader Joe's and OH-MY was it good!! :)  And only 45 calories for 2 tablespoons...winner!

Anddddd speaking of Trader Joe's, it pretty much made our dinner for LAST night;) 

When it was time to make our "TJ's pick" for the week, Scott knew just what he wanted to try:

We added some leftover carrots, bean spouts & snow peas to bump it up a bit.  This was really good....HOWEVER, they weren't kidding in the SPICY department.  My lips were BURNIN toward the end!  I couldn't even finish the last few bites!  (although I don't mind the "instant portion control" :)

I'm sure you "normal spice" folks will think this is a cake walk, but my "sensitive palate" was on FIYAH!;)

Thankfully, we had a NON-BLAZING side dish to balance it out:)

Mmmmmm...these little babies went from frozen to steamed in about 2 minutes in the microwave!  They were little chicken & veggie bites sealed in a thin wrapper, made complete with their own "tangy soy sauce"....

LOVED these little guys...and 6 of them were only 160 calories.  Not TOO shabby....better than a oil drenched egg roll any day;)  (oh, but they weren't kiddin about THIS sauce either.  It WASSSS tangy!)

The rest of the night was spent making some "all natural" cupcakes  (more on those tomorrow!), FINALLY finishing "The Lost Symbol" (since it's due back to the library TODAY!) annnnddd catching up with ALL 20,357,209,357 hours of "American Idol" while chowing down on the last half of my Red Velvet "Sweet Eats" cupcake...

(don't worry...it had been in the freezer!:)  The freezer is the best way to stretch out those desserts:)

Sooooo...since it's been a few days, I'll catch you up on my workouts:

Wednesday Morning:  20 minute Circle Pilates

Thursday Morning:  40 minutes dance, jogs, weights

Thursday Night:  40 minute treadmill interval routine  (3 miles in 38 minutes....slowly getting there;)

Friday Morning:  Biggest Loser-Power Sculpt -Level 2 & 3  (HATINGLIFE again lifting those weights;)

And in random blog news:  I created a new tab at the top of the page for all of my "Food Finds" that I've mentioned on here!  Honestly, the Trader Joe's section is almost embarrassing...but I can't sing their praises enough;)  Hahahahahhahaha...so I thought you guys would enjoy the new little feature!  I've also updated my "Cooking" page for all of the January recipes, even though I'll have to update it again soon since TUESDAY will be MARCH!!  Can you believe it??!!

So anyway....I hope wherever you are that it's sunnier then it is here in Jersey!  Oh my, it is a NASTY day!  Rain, winds, possible flooding & thunderstorms...eeeeeeek!  Oh well, at least it's Friday!!!!  Rain, be dammed;)  Have a great day everyone!