vicious sweet tooth

Hey y’all!  Hope you’ve had a great Tuesday!  Mine has been pretty good!  Today’s title kind of sums up the day for me.  

I have been on a Quinoa kick today and we have a lot left over from Saturday’s meal.  So, I’m trying to think of ways to enjoy it so it doesn’t get wasted.   

Breakfast: I have an idea I said to myself this morning, what if I tried to eat the quinoa like oatmeal. So I heated about 3/4 cup in a bowl, splashed some light soy milk over it and added a little bit of pumpkin spice to it.  I am out of nut butter, but I think that would’ve made it sooo much better – creamier.  Overall, not too bad.  Nice hearty breakfast with a lot of good nutrients.   

Sweet Quinoa

Snack: Soy Joy – 130 cals   

Raisin + Almond

Lunch: 1.5 spiralized zucchini noodles, beets, 1.5 Tbsp Avocado,  (75 cals) – isn’t this so pretty, how could you not want to eat this!    

Spiralized Zucchini, Beets & Avocado

Zucchini & Beat Salad

1/2 Quinoa w/ Coconut Chickpea Curry from Saturday night – yay! more quinoa.   

Quinoa & Coconut Chickpea Curry

Snack: 1/2 Cranberry Orange Vegan Cookie – amazing flavor!  (230 cals!!!!)   

Vegan cookie

Today I needed some kitchen therapy…I really love getting in the kitchen and trying out new recipes, that is actually one of my top favorite things to do – somehow it’s my therapy and helps me relieve stress from the day and turn my focus and attention on happier things…is that weird?  Exercise does that as well, but to me this is much more fun because it gives way to a creative environment that lets you think outside the box or just try something new and see what happens, it might bomb or it might produce something awesome!  

Originally, I had planned on just having leftovers for dinner tonight, but then I decided since we didn’t have a lot going on tonight and would be busy later in the week, that I’d try a new recipe or two. Tonight I thought I’d try to make this recipe that I found over at Healthy Tipping Point.  I saw these a few weeks ago and they looked really yummy and simple to make.   

Flax-Encrusted Sweet Potato Balls   

Mixture: 1 can of black beans, 1 large sweet potato, & 1/4 cup salsa   

Mashed Black Beans

Sweet Potato Added

Salsa added to mixture

After the mixture is combined, I rolled into balls and rolled around in the flax meal. I only have regular flax seeds, so I ground them up into a meal to roll the bean and potato mixture in.   

Ground Flax Seeds

 All rolled up and ready to bake.  Bake @ 350 degrees for 15 mins, rotate pan and then cook for another 15 mins.   

Baked Flax-Encrusted Sweet potato Balls

The inside w/ mustard

 I decided to add in some green veggies to balance it out.  

Broccoli + Sweet Potato Balls

These were really good and pretty filling.  I can’t wait to have these for lunch tomorrow.    

And my kitchen therapy wouldn’t be complete without a sweet treat – right?  About a week and a half ago, I bought some Blanched Almond Flour from Honeyville Food Products.  I have been reading Elana’s Pantry for over a year and enjoy all of her creations.  Recently, after coming to the conclusion that the hubby had a gluten intolerance, I have been turning to her blog more and more for some GF items.  Tonight, I was itching to use my newly acquired flour and made up a 1/2 batch of her GF Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies.   

Gluten Free, Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies   

Dry + Wet Ingredients

Mixing Dry + Wet Ingredients

Ready to be baked

1 Dozen

Baked

 These were so delicious and I think one of the best chocolate chip cookies I’ve made in a long time.  The hubby said they were really good!  I will definitely be making these again soon!  

Workout:  

The hubby and I are watching another documentary called King Corn – which is very interesting and scary!  

“King Corn is a feature documentary about two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation. In King Corn, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, best friends from college on the east coast, move to the heartland to learn where their food comes from. With the help of friendly neighbors, genetically modified seeds, and powerful herbicides, they plant and grow a bumper crop of America’s most-productive, most-subsidized grain on one acre of Iowa soil. But when they try to follow their pile of corn into the food system, what they find raises troubling questions about how we eat-and how we farm.” 

This definitely brings to light lots of issues and why we should eat less processed junk food and more whole grains/foods. 

Have a wonderful night!  

Peace out y’all…