Healthy Recipes

The end of finals brought me more time to try to get back into healthy eating habits, and I'm doing well so far (one week later). I thought I'd share some of the recipes I've tried out lately in case you're looking for some healthy, flavorful inspiration.

Superfood Salad with Lemon Vinaigrette by Iowa Girl Eats [picture from her site]

I will definitely be making this salad again. I'm always looking for yummy ways to eat quinoa, and this fits the bill. The lemon vinaigrette adds a nice zip, and blends so well with all the other flavors. I did leave out pomegranate arils (couldn't find them easily, or a pomegranate), and added some edamame. I also added shrimp to the salad, which is pictured but also listed as optional. I'm glad I did, as I do love shrimp! I would definitely recommend this recipe. 

Mango-licious Tilapia from Allrecipes [My photo]

I still have leftovers of this one, and I'm glad! This recipe also includes avocado (YUM), and the salsa just bursts with flavor. This recipe is also really easy, because all you need to do is chop up the ingredients, mix the salsa, and bake the fish in the oven. Another winner. 

Pina Colada Smoothie by Paula Deen* [My photo, with Today Show in the background]

This was pretty good too! I especially enjoyed being able to use a fresh pineapple from the grocery store. I did also increase the ratio of banana, using 1 full banana for 1 serving. I threw in some flaxseed as well, which I like to do with all smoothies.

Update: I made this smoothie again today (Sunday), and it tastes even better when I use a frozen banana and no ice. It was a lot thicker and the flavors were more concentrated. 

Whole Grain Pancakes on Allrecipes [Photo from the site]

I made these just this morning and I have leftovers for the week. I love this recipe because it includes whole wheat flour, oatmeal, flaxseed, and cornmeal (realized I didn't have any and subbed cornbread mix...). No white flour! The pancakes turned out really light and yummy. For me there's nothing better than a guilt-free pancake. I ate mine with honey drizzled on top this morning but I look forward to experimenting with other toppings in the future. I also added some applesauce and a little bit of salt. I let the batter sit for a while after mixing to thicken, as recommended by many of the reviews. 

There's a little sampling of what's been happening in my kitchen during my week off. I love being mindful about food again. Please share any of your favorite healthy recipes that you want to share!


*I just feel the need to share that lately especially, I am far from PD's biggest fan. I wish she would use her diagnosis as a platform to promote healthy eating and exercise as a way to mitigate diabetes symptoms, but I suppose there's more money in promoting a drug. Okay, stepping off my soapbox now. :-)

Garden Update

Now that finals are over, I have more time to think about, and take photos of, my garden again! Luckily, I did manage to keep all the plants alive during finals, and I got some help in that because we got some rain this past week.

Here is a cell phone picture of the backyard garden - the tomato plants have grown like crazy! Only the one on the far right has baby tomatoes right now, but I'm hoping some more pop up later.

Most of my herbs look good these days. The rosemary and thyme plants that I bought as transplants look great, and the chives and basil I planted from seed look good too. I'm going to harvest the first basil from the plants I grew from seed later this week. As a bonus, I planted some cilantro seeds a while back, and had relatively low expectations when I heard from others and read that it can sometimes be hard to grow. That notwithstanding, my cilantro looks pretty good for now.

Cilantro

The basil in the container out on my front porch. Hopefully this means there will be homemade pesto in my future! 

So there's my garden update. Overall it's going pretty well, and it's definitely still fun. More in the coming weeks, and I'll definitely be sure to share if/when I make homemade pesto!

1L Year - Check!

Well, I wouldn't exactly say it went by super quickly, but in some ways, it seems like I just started my 1L year, and now it's over! To be honest, it wasn't always as awful as it's made out to be. The finals aspect, sure, but during the rest of the semester it was relatively manageable. It probably helps that I genuinely like learning and I'm pretty much a nerd.

For now (I finished with exams Friday) I am just taking some time to relax without the constant feeling that I should possibly be studying, and shaking off the constant stress that accompanies the end of the semester. I have a week off before I start my first internship, which is probably the perfect amount of time. I'll be doing a few little things here and there, but most of my time will be flexible, which will be nice indeed.

So, it's a turning point, and I'm relieved and excited for the summer. A lot of my school friends will still be in town, and hopefully I'll see them relatively often during evenings and weekends. But the thing I'm most excited for now? Probably not hard to guess that it's hubby's return! It's not super soon, but it's also not really that far away. The latter part of the summer (when he'll be back here) is shaping up to be pretty fantastic, I'd say!

I can't come up with much else super interesting to post today. I caught up with my mom, appropriately, and got to chat with Kristen as well. I look forward to hopefully reconnecting with other out-of-town friends too now that I'm back to hopefully having a more balanced life!

Still Alive!

Hello friends, if anyone happens to read this, given that I've been quiet for so long! As is predictable for me, I've not had the mental space to write good blog posts recently, what with this pesky thing called finals going on. I'm definitely not out of the woods yet, but I'm happy to report that I got one out of the way yesterday! The other two are well-spaced, one on Tuesday and one a week from today. It's amazing to know that in just one week I'll be done with my 1L year! I would say time has flown... but that hasn't always been true. :-) It definitely feels surreal regardless, to have almost reached that milestone.

Luckily, I'm also in the home stretch when it comes to hubby's absence! There is a light at the end of the tunnel, and though I do think time will drag when it's even closer, it's still nice to feel like it's somewhat soon. As long as things work out, we should even be able to go on a vacation at the end of the summer, which would be beyond amazing!

So there's an update. There's a possibility that after finals, I'll actually post some kind of political thoughts I've been having. The combination of Constitutional Law, watching the news, and all those types of things leads to a lot of thinking!

And because I like to have photos in blog posts whenever possible, here's a photo representation of my night earlier this week - sushi dinner followed by an Ingrid Michaelson concert, both with a lovely friend of mine. :-)