WIAW: workload wednesday.

Oh how I love me some alliteration… Here’s a rather brief WIAW, because I want to procrastinate just a little longer.

Before we get started… everybody check out Kate’s raffle over here where you can bid on delicious desserts and support a fabulous cause (she’s fundraising for a hospice she’s running the Chicago Marathon for!)! My cookies are up for bids too. :)

Breakfast

Okay, so I made cooked overnight oats with peanut flour. I am newly obsessed with the stuff and may or may not have gone through a bag in about a week. These oats were SO creamy and peanutty and protein-filled and delicious!

Peanut-Flour Overnight/Voluminous Oats

1/3 cup oats
1 teaspoon chia seeds
2 tablespoons peanut flour
sweetener to taste
a few dashes of cinnamon
~2/3 cup of water or almond milk (possibly more)

Nuke for about two and a half minutes and stir well; cover and leave in fridge overnight. Stir in more liquid in the morning if desired! :)

Lunch

I had me a salad. With some of this salsa on top…

I bought it at the little market my school has and it’s kind of awesome, definitely has a kick to it. But now I have to work on using it all up! So I’m putting it pretty much on everything… Though I’ve always loved salsa on salads. :)

Snack

I went for a run on this day (last Friday)… 3.1 miles! That would be my second run in 6 months. I’m not, however, sharing how fast it was because it was incredibly slow… And my shins are still a little tender which is making me freak out a little bit but we’ll see. I pulled a Matt and refueled with (my very first!) Kombucha and Fage 2%

Um, yeah, this was pre-shower… And the posters in the background are my roommate’s. Just sayin’.

Dinner

I had soup at the lunch room but was hungry again about an hour later (silly running!) so I made some savory oats. Just added some nutritional yeast into the oats and some salsa on top per Heather‘s suggestion.

Oh, and I bought these. They were ridiculously hot and kind of made me cry, so I washed them off a bit which helped… I did like the crunch they added!

**I had more snacks throughout the day that were not photographed!! Just a disclaimer! :) **

Hope you’re all having lovely days… I’m back to hitting the books & learning about the occipital and parietal lobes. Three tests in two days… Oh and a term paper in a week. Whoops.

Eat anything delicious recently? Tell me about it! :) Or go check out my post from yesterday with lots of random facts about me and tell me something about yourself ;)

study snack: chai-chia oats

The word of the day today: unkempt.

oh hi… given the bags under my eyes I really cannot believe I’m posting this picture on the internet…

Let’s just say I have a million and one parts of the brain to memorize by Monday… And ironically, my brain doesn’t seem to want to function. I’m peeking out from behind my neuropsych textbook to show you the anatomy of a successful (well, kind of) study session.

Ordinarily, my dear friend coffee would make a prominent appearance. But I have given him up for a little while… We needed some space. Instead, I’m stayin’ hydrated!

With plain old water and also Hansen’s Fruit Drink Stix. I know it’s not the best thing in the world, but it’s better than diet soda, sweetened with stevia, and it makes my Mickey cup look even cooler.

I got this for free when I pre-ordered Tangled… You’re jealous, don’t lie.

Of course I’m also eating a ridiculous amount of carrots, because that’s what I do when I’m stressed.

Here’s the overall spread…

However, as much as I love carrots, they don’t tend to satisfy me for the long term. So I broke out my oatmeal bowl for something comforting that would keep me full for more than five minutes. I also decided to take this opportunity to try out something new: CHIA SEEDS! I realize these are usually used in overnight oats, but I wanted oats now. I’m a little instant gratification. I’m sorry.

I made this bowl of goodness with left-over chai tea instead of water, to make chai-chia oats (say that five times fast…)

Chai-Chia Oats

1/3 cup oats
dash of salt
dash of cinnamon
1/2 tablespoon chia seeds
~3/4 cup pre-brewed chai tea
1 packet stevia
1 scoop vanilla protein powder

Combine all ingredients except protein powder and microwave for about 1:45.  Stir and let sit for a few minutes, preferably covered. Add more water to thin as necessary. Microwave for about another minute, then stir in protein powder. Add peanut butter on top if you desire (I used my new bff, Peanut Butter & Co’s Cinnamon Raisin Swirl. Holy yum.) Voila! Delicious, spicy, healthy oats.

I liked the little bits of crunch the chia seeds provided as well as the added thickness… Definitely need to get on that overnight oats bandwagon in the near future.

Now that my belly is full I have no excuse… back to the books for me! (brainstem, brainstem!)

What are your favorite study snacks?

what i ate wednesday… & bell pepper deliciousness

**Notice: For some reason a lot of the comments I make on other people’s blogs are going to spam. I think it’s the WordPress gods telling me to get off of blogs and start studying developmental psychology… but it’s still obnoxious. Check your spam folder!

Also, I love you guys for liking my grandma & Harry Potter references… :)

So this is my first “What I ate Wednesday”. And I don’t intend to post everything I ate, because a) I’m too lazy to photograph my snacks b) I don’t want any judgment about the exact quantities I eat. BUT I will post my major meals. :)

Here’s how my morning started:

I straightened my hair. Because I could. And because I felt like actually putting some semblance of effort into my attire…

Look ma, NO JEANS!

I actually generally prefer my hair wavy, but it’s fun to switch things up a bit. And after wearing jeans + a t-shirt for the past… oh, month and a half?… it was fun to actually put on real clothes. Everyone kept complimenting me for looking cute… Clearly I set the bar pretty low for myself…

Some myspace shots ensued.

 

I promise I am capable of making normal faces…

There’s a smile!

Then ’twas time for breakfast!

Breakfast: PB-Nana-Java Oats

Basically take Java Oats and add in 1/2 of a banana “whipped” into it and 1/2 sliced on top… along with 2 tbsp of peanut flour (some of it made into paste), because everybody LOVES peanut flour! I ended up adding some real peanut butter on top but was too lazy to photograph.

Do excuse the state of my bowls. I eat oatmeal so frequently that I don’t always wash it thoroughly in between…

Lunch: Eggplant Hummus Wrap! And lots o’ broccoli

Oh no all gone! :(

Ingredients: Whole wheat tortilla, salad bar salad, lots of Trader Joe’s eggplant hummus, alongside steamed broccoli (and more salad, which I ate before photographing…)

Sometimes when they have certain specials at my school the side is steamed vegetables. I discovered on Sunday that I can get just the steamed vegetables sans the main meat dish. This to me is heaven. I also discovered that when they run out of the main meat dish, they will happily give me free refills of bowls of steamed broccoli… Because otherwise it would be thrown away. Needless to say I took it and put it in my fridge.

Then after hours of studying/procrastinating it was FINALLY dinner time. I’ve been planning to try this dinner for at least a week…

Dinner: Stuffed Peppers!

Stuffed peppers are SO in right now. Gotta love those roasted red bell peppers…

Here’s my “recipe”. All the veggies came from the salad bar, except the whole pepper which I bought at Safeway. I forgot mushrooms on my first round so I had to go back to the salad bar for just mushrooms… Good thing the lunch lady already thinks I’m insane… You could really vary it up on the veggies, this recipe has LOTS of room for variation!

1 red bell pepper
1/2 cup black beans
1/4 cup couscous
3 tablespoons salsa
~1/4 cup spinach leaves, chopped
2 ounces mushrooms, chopped
1/4 cup onion, chopped
1/4 cup zucchini, chopped
1/4 cup Daiya vegan cheese (optional)

Cut pepper in half lengthwise and remove stem. Set oven on broil. Place pepper on lightly sprayed cookie sheet and broil for 5-10 minutes (and try not to set the fire alarm off… nearly happened…) or until it has just a few black spots (or as much as you’d like). Meanwhile, mix together everything else for your filling.

If you’re not in a dorm kitchen with super finicky smoke detectors, just plop the filling in and broil it for a bit until the cheese is melty and the insides are warm. It could also be roasted for a  bit longer at maybe 350 or 400… It’s really up to you. My veggies weren’t entirely cooked but I was being paranoid about aforementioned smoke detector…

Dig in and enjoy!

Also, this was my first time really trying Daiya. It didn’t melt quite enough because I didn’t get to leave the pepper in there long enough, but when it DID melt it was definitely stretchy. Kind of oily when you take it out of the bag, though, and not super rich nutritionally, but definitely a good vegan cheese substitute!

Dessert: Cookies.

I baked cookies. Go figure, right? I’m gonna blog about them another day though… Because now I need to go back to learning about inhibited children and how they become anxious adults (story of my life?…)

And I will probably have more oatmeal later. I’m kind of predictable like that.

What’s the best thing you ate today?

vegan for a week.

NEWS #1: I’m on Twitter! Follow me and I’ll love you forever (which I might anyways, but that’s a different story)

NEWS #2: Vegan Week!

I love a good challenge. So when I saw that Morgan over at Life After Bagels was doing a “7-day-vegan challenge,” I jumped at the opportunity to play around a bit with my food choices.

I was actually vegan for a full year in high school… which is when I started to bake. I felt the need to convert everyone, one by one, via vegan cookies. Or at least make them appreciate that vegan food can be completely delicious!

I don’t anticipate this being particularly difficult. Except for my protein powder and the occasional Fage yogurt, I actually don’t rely on dairy or eggs that much in my day-t0-day eating. And since I go to school in California, land of the hippies, my school food is generally fairly accommodating of different diets, and have a plethora of vegan options.

But regardless, here is my “plan” for the week (rather, some ideas for breakfast lunch & dinner on a daily basis here in college-land!)

Breakfast

Oatmeal.
I’m obsessed, in case you weren’t aware. I’m a big fan of adding coffee into my oats… Like these java oats!

I topped these with an elegant “macchiato-style” bit of Justin’s almond butter… I’m soooo fancy!

Um, this stuff is lethally delicious…

But regular ole peanut butter, and my new friend peanut flour, will also likely be making appearances.

Cereal.
I’m not on much a cereal kick right now, but I know my school has basics like Cheerios, or Peanut Butter Bumpers (which are absolutely delicious, by the way) should I decide I want to change things up! And I’m a huge fan of almond milk.

Toast with peanut butter.
I think I ate that for breakfast every day for a good year or so of my life in middle school… always a good choice.

Or, you know, peanut butter with a spoon is good too…

Lunch
Salad!
I love my school’s salad bar. Love, love, love it.

I start with lettuce and add a ton of bell peppers and cucumbers and a wide variety of other vegetables.

Add in kidney beans, black beans, garbanzo beans, even straight-up tofu for some extra protein… Drizzle with vinegar and/or olive oil and voila! Delicious, easily vegan meal.

Instant soups
I love Dr. McDougall’s Instant Tamale Soup. Perhaps not the most unprocessed, whole food I could eat, but not as bad as some…

I also sometimes eat Amy’s frozen meals, which they offer in the market at my school. I prefer to eat “real” food, but sometimes the options might not be great (they always offer a vegetarian soup, but not necessarily a vegan one) so it’s nice to have some fallbacks.

Dinner
Pasta
Along with the salad bar, you can also build-your-own pasta, by putting a bunch of veggies in a bowl and handing them to the fabulous chef who will cook them up in some vegan marinara and then add your choice of regular, whole wheat, or gluten-free pasta. The portions tend to be way too big, but it’s good for a once-in-awhile food!

Sandwiches
These are equally good at lunch, but we have a whole bunch of different breads to choose from (including Udi’s gluten-free bread) and I love to just put hummus and veggies on a sandwich and call it a day.

Snacks
Fruit.
The oranges here are amazing. I also love bananas and peanut butter (classic combo!)

Bars.
I try not to rely TOO much on them, but in a pinch…

More oatmeal.
I usually have a bowl of oatmeal before bed. Yes, I start and end my day with oatmeal…

Carrots & hummus.

I may or may not have already finished the eggplant hummus and 1.5 pound bag of carrots I bought at Trader Joe’s on Thursday… shhhh!

Low-Sugar Cookies

Because they’re delicious. And I’m working on experimenting with making them totally sugar-free (just adapting the base recipe, though, so if anyone else wants to give it a try I’m sure it’ll work pretty well!)

So there you have it. Some vegan staples for my week as a vegan… I may also try out the nondairy yogurt and Daiya cheese they sell at my school, just for kicks. :)

What non-vegan food would be hardest for you to give up? I’m probably gonna miss my greek yogurt, but…

lazy days & java oats

Most nights, I go to sleep at midnight, after poring over food blogs and recipes. (Shout out to Namaste Gurl, whose blog I have read in its entirety, and whose food looks absolutely phenomenal day in and day out!)

Some nights, though… Some nights, I’m a “normal” college student.

So much love…

Most mornings, I wake up with a huge smile on my face ready to greet the day.
(Okay, maybe not, but close enough).

Some mornings, though… Some mornings, I awaken to a deep pounding in my skull like there’s some animal trying to get out.

So I just lay in bed. And all the exercise I do is a few curls with my roommate’s weights. Organization & productivity be damned.

Regardless, my morning is usually accompanied by coffee. And oatmeal.

So being the picture of efficiency that I am, I decided to combine both.

Java Oats

½ cup oats
½-1 packet instant coffee (maybe a tablespoon? Depends how strong you like it)
sweetener to taste (I used a packet of stevia!)
¼ tsp cinnamon, or to taste (seeing a theme? ;) )

Make oats as you would normally (for me, this means a microwave…) and add in your mix-ins! This would also be good with chocolate chips melted in… Mmm…

I have also added my favorite vanilla protein powder, for a “vanilla latte” type bowl.

While I would prefer pumpkin oats, I currently do not have access to pumpkin (well, I’m too cheap to buy it when I can get all of these ingredients with meal points on campus…). Plus, it just saves me from having to brew coffee ;)

What’s your favorite oatmeal flavor??! Alternatively, what do you like to do with your lazy days?