Christmas-y weekend....

Hey everyone!  Hope you guys had a great weekend.  Mine was filled with CHRISTMAS-Y events at every turn.  Tis the season!

Friday started off with "CHRISTMAS/Advent Yoga" which was relaxing AND a workout all rolled into oneJ  Romy always does such an amazing job coordinating these 'special event yogas.'  The whole practice was based on spreading Peace, Love & Joy.  Awesome way to kick off this season. 

And since my best friend joined me AND we both had worked out for two hours, we (+ Scott!) decide to break into a few 'CHRISTMAS cupcakes' from Crumbs...

The Peppermint Hot Cocoa was good, but I FLIPPED over the gingerbread!!!  It was just sooo sweet AND spicy...too festiveJ

Saturday brought my Mom, Aunt, cousin & I on another house tour.  This time to the 50th Anniversary of the Stanton Holly Trail in Stanton, NJ.  We lucked out with a picture perfect day and some SPECTACULAR homes to tour...

My favorite. 

Commence drooling now...

...don't even get me STARTED on their kitchen...J

And what was awesome & unique about this tour was that all of the house had a "decorating committee" that worked from JANUARY until the first weekend in December to HAND MAKE all of the ornaments & decorations in each home!  So as spectacular as the SETTINGS were, the decorations weren't anything you couldn't make for your own home!  It was AMAZING to see the ideas people came up with, starting with handmade luminaries up all of the driveways.... 

Not sure if you can see these, but this row of jars were made out to look like ANGELS!

How cute are these 'all edible' ornaments made of WAFFLES... 

...and bird seed (perfect for outdoors!)...

...and even Fruity Pebbles!

I also LOVED the wreath (in the window) made of cookie cutters...

Needless to say, we were charmed...

 

...at every turn...

It was amazing what a little time, creativity & 94 hot glue guns could produceJ  These folks did a SPECTACULAR job! 

Even the school buses that took us around from house to house were each uniquely decorated.  It was IMPOSSIBLE not to be in the holiday spiritJ 

But the HANDS DOWN favorite of our group was the village made of PEANUTS!!! 

Peanuts roasting marshmallows, anyone??

They were just so fun & cheerful! 

We even got some yummy treats along the way... 

Can you BELIEVE that someone would open their home to serve tea & cookies to over 1,000 people??  Yep...that's what happened here...

There were cozy seats by the fire and elaborately decorated kitchen tables for us to rest our feet & warm up... 

Not to mention the most YUMMY homemade cookies!  My pack had ROSEMARY OLIVE OIL cookies (too die for!) & a Salted Chocolate Molasses.  Oh man, so happy I got the 'salty & sweet' pack! 

And we even tea & coffee:  SERVED IN ACTUAL TEA CUPS!  I wouldn't want to do all of THOSE dishesJ 

Nice touchJ

Our homemade dinner was a cup of Asparagus soup, a slice of cheddar & leeks strata, salad & rice pudding...yum 

It was such a fun and JOLLY dayJ....of course until my car got stuck on the side of the road in the pitch black when we were on our way home and about 1 exit from my house.  But THAT's ANOTHER story...hehehehehehehehe

Sunday saw even MORE holiday funJ  As it was our day to pick out the CHRISTMAS TREE!!!  Wohoooo!  And of course, that called for an EXTRA special "Sunday Morning breakfast"... 

What says 'go get a CHRISTMAS tree' more then chocolate & cinnamon, right??  And I just knew I wanted to make a Chocolate Babka to 'celebrate'.. 

OK, OK...so mine didn't even make REMOTELY discernible "swirls" like the recipe's picture...but WHO CARES???  A mess of chocolate & cinnamon was A-OK with us... 

We're saving the rest for dessert...can't wait to have a slice tonightJ

After that, it was off to gather the goods... 

Scott says it should only take 10 minutes to pick out a tree...and this year, I had to agree with him.  Last year I tried to 'buck the system' and wanted to check out 'just a few more trees' before we secured the first one we loved.  And what happened?  We ended up wandering around for over an hour and COULDN'T find that first tree that we both loved & all the others paled in comparison. 

Soooo...this year, in 10 minutes:  We came... 

...we 'saw'... 

...we conquered!

Now just to magically levitate all of the ornaments right onto those branchesJ hahahahaha... 

And we had a cozy little dinner to round out our day... 

After a nearly SIX MONTH reprieve....chicken is SLOWLY making its return to our kitchen.  I still can't eat it grilled or roasted...butttttt shredded & mixed with this savory onion-y sauce from the Chicken & Leeks pie?  That, I can handleJ 

(ps-I used some of the leeks that I had cleaned & frozen and they worked like a charm!)

For our side, I made some roasted potatoes.  I let these babies crisp up for about an hour in a 400 degree oven... 

When the potatoes had about 5 minutes left to cook, I heated up a small pan with a little olive oil & tossed in about 7 cloves of thinly sliced garlic and let them cook on LOWWW... 

I let the garlic slowly toast...making sure NOT to burn the garlic.  Garlic turns SUPER bitter when burned... 

Once the potatoes were out of the oven & the garlic was toasty brown, I tossed em with all of that yummy garlic & now garlic scented oil...

This made for CRUNCHY on the outside/soft on the inside potatoes coated in all of that glorious garlic.  Is  there ANYTHING to complain about??J 

So that about wraps up my CHRISTMAS weekend of holiday fun!  Not a bad way to start of December, if I do say so myselfJ

And since it's Monday, here's my workout schedule from this week:

Monday:  Weight Loss Yoga-Level 1 & 3 (with 8 pound weights)

Tuesday:  40 minute Bethenny Yoga

Friday:  2 hour CHRISTMAS yoga

Not an awesome schedule...and unlike the week before, last week I have NO excuse...other than laziness and THIS: 

The culprit of so many "eehhh...do I feel like working out, or do I feel like kicking my feet up and reading??"  Can NOT put this book down...and thankfully, I'm almost done!  It is FASCINATING, although definitely the most ANTI-Christmas thing I've done this week.  Not much could be more Anti-Christmas than reading about North Korean hard labor camps.  Horrifying.

ANYWAYSSSS...on THAT note, you've heard enough from me!  Hope you guys enjoyed your weekend & have a good MondayJ

Here & There...

Morning everyone!  So I've been a busy bee the last few days...hope you are as SURPRISED as I am that it's FRIDAY already!

So on Wednesday I had visited a friend up in North Jersey and we had quite the feast for lunch!  We had visited the lovely little Ridgewood (home of HUGE pancakes & Cupcakes by Carousel), but this time sampled something with a little Mediterranean flair at "It's Greek to Me" which served...well, one wild guessJ hehehehehehehe...

I pretty much wanted to sample the ENTIRE appetizer menu, but we managed to narrow it down to the "Revithosalata"....or what I think was hummusJ  It was sooooo smooth, creamy & olive oil-y that I could NOT stop going back for more with the fresh, warm pita...yum!

And, again, while it was TERRIBLY tough to narrow down an entree selection, I figured since I never had actually have TRIED a gyro before, what better place to give it a whirl??  (me thinks a slight step up from the street carts in NYC, no?J) 

mmmm...so good!  The meat was super tender and served along with MORE fresh pita & my absolute FAVORITE part: the Tzatziki sauce!  I didn't leave ONE DROP of that yogurt, garlic & cucumber dip...it just makes everything taste BETTER.  I even got my 'french fry fix' from some "Greek" (aka-lemon & oregano) fries.  I loved how FRESH & vibrant everything tasted.

My friend had tried the Mousaka (eggplant, potato & ground beef pie) and enjoyed that...

...although I don't think EITHER of us enjoyed our lunch as much as her one-year old!!!  He chowed RIGHT down on that Mousaka and could not get ENOUGH of the Revithosalata!  I was cracking up!J  

What a sweetie pieJ

And while our tiny dining companion split some rice pudding with his Momma for dessert, I HAD to try the baklava...causeee...when in Rome a Greek restaurant... 

A sweet way to end a REALLY yummy lunch...I already can't wait to go back, and I'm sure my friend's little peanut would say the same!J hehehehhehee...

Yesterday I spent a nice afternoon sharing crabs & macaroni with my Aunt for lunch, but was pretty stumped as to what to make for dinner.  Thankfully, we had this little awesome number in our fridge... 

My Mom got this TOASTED COCONUT BREAD from an Amish stand at a Farmer's Market and I had been nibbling on it's coconut trimmed slices for breakfast & lunch ever since.... 

And last night we had JUST ENOUGH left to KICK IT UP a notch and turn that coconut loaf into some French Toast!  Complete with a little extra coconut kick from.... 

MMMMMmmmmmm....coconut-y & fabulous!  I could hardly bear to use ANY syrup on here in fear of ruining it's lovely coconut taste.  French & Fabulous! hahahahhahaha 

Well, that about sums up my last few days.  What are we having for dinner tonight??  NO CLUE!  But it has to be something on the LIGHTER side as my friend & I will need to scoot off to CHRISTMAS YOGA TONIGHT!!!!!!!!  SSOOOOOOOO excited!  I went last year and it was PROBABLY one of my favorite things I did the ENTIRE CHRISTMAS season.  So excited to 'kick off the season' on a 'centered' note to REALLY enjoy what the season is aboutJ hehehehehehe...Hope you guys have a great Friday!  I'll have LOTS of other CHRISTMAS-Y things to show you from this weekendJ

Until Then: 

Namaste...

photo source

Putting on the brakes...

OK, OK...so remember yesterday when I was all like "Can you believe we didn't want to order pizza??"

Yeah...around 3:30pm on Monday afternoon, that whimsical feeling of 'nah, I don't even want it' passed with a VENGEANCE and I COULD. NOT stop thinking about...well, not pizza, but FRENCH FRIES.  Hot, salty FRENCH FRIES.  Now I'm ALL about giving into the occasional craving, but coming off a weekend of cinnamon buns, pie & THANKSGIVING dinner and I knew there are just some times where you have to put the breaks on.  That being said...that doesn't mean it didn't PISS ME OFF to have to say "NO."  If Scott had batted ONE eyelash towards 'maybe'...I would have probably been on that phone ordering french fries (with cheese, for good measure!) in a heartbeat.

And I tell you all of this because if dinner hadn't been an absolute HOME RUN, the rest of my night would have been spent in an oblivion of salt-craving anger.  Mostly directed at Scott...cause that's just how it goesJ  (sorry, Scott!J)  But THANKFULLY...this dinner was SOOOOOOOOOOOO good that it spared Scott a night of sulking and finger pointingJ hahahhahahaa....

And BELIEVE ME: I did NOT think a recipe called Gnocchi with Squash & Kale was going to be the thing to pull me out of my 'french fry tunnel vision'.  But by some miraculous feat...it was!  And I'll tell you why:  Cause it was SO. DAMN. GOOD!!!!!!!

And what made this recipe even MORE awesome?  It was all made in ONE POT!  (which basically means it wasn't a Rachel Ray recipe...who requires you to use just about every pot in your arsenal to cook up a full meal in 30 minutesJ) 

Anyways....so into the ONE POT goes a tablespoon of butter & a small peeled and diced butternut squash.  You let that cook until it becomes tender & golden brown...around 10 minutes on medium heat...

Then it was time to add the 'aromatics'...and this just happened to be two of my FAVORITES:  Garlic & SAGE!!!  swooooooon.... 

Add both of those to the squash and let them cook for about 2 minutes...all while taking in the absolute intoxicating aromasJ   

Next, you add 1 1/4 cups of chicken broth and bring it to a simmer before adding in your kale.  You can either use a fresh, diced up bunch and let it wilt down OR you can just break out a bag of frozen kale and let it defrost right in the chicken broth for a few minutes!

Once the kale is wilted or defrosted, you add in your gnocchi... 

Make sure all of the gnocchi are somewhat in the chicken broth, cover and let simmer for 5 minutes or until the gnocchi are tender.  

I REALLY didn't think this would work, since it seemed there wasn't enough chicken broth to cook the whole pack of gnocchi...but once I lifted the lid, they were cooked to perfection.

Finally, you stir in 1/4 cup of grated cheese & 1 tablespoon of butter before topping with another sprinkle of grated cheese  and popping it in the broiler to toast up for a few minutes... 

Like I said:  ABSOLUTE KNOCKOUT!!!!!!  All of the starches from the gnocchi & squash combined with the chicken broth and cheese made an absolutely luscious sauce and everything just melted into a pool of flavorful comfort food.... 

This was one dish where I just WISH you could almost 'hide' the kale...because if it wasn't for its PROMINENT green leaves...I'm TELLING YOU:  You could get this by even the PICKIEST of eaters.  The sauce just blanketed all of the veggies and made them all 'perfectly hidden,' yet so very healthy.  This was an awesome & quick meal...OH, and by my estimation, thanks to the farmer's market & Trader Joe's: it cost about $5 to make!  Couldn't even order cheese fries for ONE for that cheapJ hahahahahhahaa.... 

So anyways...that's all I got for you today.  We'll see what today brings on the 'cravings horizon'...however, there ARE potatoes in my near future today, so hopefully that will help 'tide me over' againJ  hahahahhaa...

Have a great Tuesday, everyoneJ