Friday Faves 3/27/15

It's Friday and you know what that means - Favorites time.

1. Things My Sisters Say
I don't even wish I could say this is an unusual type of text to get from my sisters.

And the answer to the question "How do you nap heroically?" 

"3.5 hours." 

To which the response was:

Heroic napping. One of many talents in our family.

2. Music
Thanks to a suggestion from some of our friends, John and I have been watching Nashville since a couple weeks after it premiered. I remember the promos made it look kind of, well, not great, but actually I kind of love it and the music is great. There a lot of great covers and original songs and lately I've been listening to some of it back. This song is a Civil Wars cover from one of the first episodes and regardless of your preconceived notions I suggest you listen to it.

3. Snack or Meal
Ocean's Halo Seaweed Korean BBQ chips from my Vegan Cuts box. These are weird - let's lead with that - but if you like the taste of seaweed, they're also really good. I like this flavor better than the Sea Salt one, but I think there are a few others I haven't tried yet.

4. Lifestyle and Beauty
For Valentine's Day this year I got this North Face vest as a present from my husband, and I love it. I've never owned a vest for the purpose of actual warmth and layering, and now I can't believe I lived without it.

This picture is from last month in Los Alamos.

5. Recipe
Vegan Roast Vegetable Pasta. We made a dish similar to this last night, and it was great. This one is from the Sun Warrior website: Vegan Roasted Vegetable Pasta with Jason Wrobel.

[Photo is theirs]

Happy weekend!

Thanks for reading, see you soon.

WIAW: Care Packages and Fries

What I Ate Wednesday!

Thanks to Jenn for organizing and this week thank you to Laura for hosting.

Look at this care package my Mom sent me this week. 

If 27 is too old for care packages, well, I'll start lying about my age. It's full of tea, snacks, the headphones I left in Oregon at Christmas and malaria prophylaxis for my South America trip. Quite the box. I love when Mom sends me tea, she always has the best kinds.

And so in addition to tea, here's what I've been eating.

Breakfast: Juice from the Juicer. This one has apples, spinach, plums and cucumber.

Lunch: Salad and Fries. So the cafeteria is not the greatest at the hospital. One day a week there's a non-dairy laden vegetarian entree, but there is a salad bar, so here's an example of a fairly typical lunch. Sometimes instead of fries I get pretzels and hummus.

Snack: Nakd Bar. See my review here. I've been loving these.

Dinner: Tofu and Vegetable Vietnamese Noodle Bowl. We recently tried a new Vietnamese place called Que Huong in the International District close to where I have continuity clinic. It was really good - I definitely want to go back.

Dessert: Licorice Tea. This tea is really naturally sweet, one of my favorite flavors.

Some parts super healthy, some parts fried and indulgent. I'm pretty happy with this day of eating. Hope you had a great day too.

Thanks for reading, see you soon.

Natural Balance Nakd Bar [Vegan and Gluten Free!]

I've had the best snacks to take with me to work this week.

A little while back Natural Balance Foods contacted me about trying their Nakd bars. They're whole food cereal bars. The company is based in the UK and I'm happy to share that they've recently expanded to the US. 

For now you can order them at the website here: Natural Balance Foods, but soon they'll be available in stores as well.

Look at all those flavors!

These bars are vegan and gluten free, made up just of whole foods [nuts, fruits] and spices.

I've tried several over the past few days and they've been great for taking with me to work. Overall this is a totally positive review and I wouldn't change anything about these.

Let's take a closer look:

The Packaging

Classy, easy to read, easy to open. Important for me - I really can struggle. 

For example, Pecan Pie.

With a background of Luna.

The Ingredients

The ingredient list is obviously gorgeous. I just love when I'm eating something with only real food in it. 

The Bar

And here's the actual appearance of the bars.

Nutrition Facts

When I'm eating whole foods I consider the nutrition facts fairly unimportant - the numbers don't really measure the benefit my body is getting by eating real food - but each bar is also labelled with typical calories, macros etc. if that's something you look for. 

This is Gingerbread for example: 

Eaten with a side of prescribing medication at work. 

I wasn't kidding about these fueling my day.

If this is difficult to read it says: 

Per 35 g [the size of the bar] 157 calories, 4 g protein, 12 g carbs, 11 g of fat and 3 grams of fiber.

Most Importantly, the Flavor

I've liked all the ones I've tried and I still have a few left to go. Despite the small number of ingredients used, there's a lot of diversity of flavor. I think my favorites of the ones I've tried so far were Berry Delight and Caffe Mocha. 

You can order them here or be on the lookout as they come to a store in the US, and I hope you'll give them a try.

Thanks for reading, see you soon. 

Disclaimer: All opinions are my own. I have been provided this product free of charge for review by the company and have not been incentivized for a positive review.

Friday Faves 3/20/15

I've been skipping over Friday and missing Friday Faves the past couple weeks, so here's some favorites.

1. Things My Sisters Say
This one really just highlights me struggling both with wearing real clothes and texting, so there you go.

2. Music
I was not familiar with The Last Five Years until the movie that just came out [stars Anna Kendrick]. The music is great - a blend of funny and emotional. This is the first song from the musical. You can also listen to the whole thing on Spotify.

3. Snack or Meal
Nuttzo. There are like 7 different kinds of nut butters in here. It's from my vegan cuts box last month.

4. Lifestyle and Beauty
Hair change. I decided to go a little darker for a while. It looks a lot healthier too. This is "Dark Caramel Brown." Sorry my hair selfies always turn out creepy.

 

5. Recipe
Chocolate Covered Katie's Avocado Creme Brulee. I have several avocados from my latest bag from Costco and I think this looks so good.

[Photo is hers]

Happy weekend!

Thanks for reading, see you soon.

WIAW: Update Time!

What I Ate Wednesday!

Thanks to Jenn for organizing and this week thank you to Meghan for hosting.

Before we get to the food, I've been a little radio silent so here's a few quick updates:

A little while ago we went to Telluride for a wedding and it was just gorgeous. We took the gondola and a snowcat up to the ranch, it was beautiful, we just had a great time.

Congrats Megan and Eli!

I moved back from Los Alamos a little over a week ago - overall it was a very positive experience, I think I learned a lot both medically and about how a smaller practice in a small town would work. 

I got sick again with a cold, so that was thrilling. Lots of bloody noses.

I then started in urgent care where I've been working the past week. It's tiring, but I do like the outpatient side much more and I'm having fun now that I've started recovering from the cold. 

I only have a couple weeks left before I leave for another rotation in South America for 5 weeks. 

This is a very busy spring.

I'm trying to stay fueled, so now on the food:

Breakfast: Banana mango ice cream smoothie. The weather has turned a little warmer and for once you're not seeing another picture of my beloved avocado toast. I'm still eating plenty of that, but I've also rotated in the return of various frozen banana based blends. This one has banana, frozen mango and almond milk.

Lunch: This picture is actually from a meal we had during the wedding weekend in Telluride, but I've been eating similar pasta/salad combos this week. This one is just a simple tomato/garlic/herb based sauce and salad with balsamic.

Dinner: Cereal and a plum. There have been really busy nights in the urgent care, and the late clinic shift means I leave after 9 PM and don't usually eat before that, so sometimes some fruit and cereal is as creative as I can muster for dinner. This is the Kashi Cinnamon Harvest with a sliced plum.

I also had a couple pieces of cinnamon candy from the urgent care candy stash.

I hope you'll share what you ate this Wednesday, and look out soon for a new product review I'm really excited about. 

Thanks for reading, see you soon.

WIAW: Last Days Alone

What I Ate Wednesday!

Thanks as always to Jenn for hosting.

I'm in my final week of living here in Los Alamos and I guess I'm ready after this month to go back home to normal life. I miss my dog. Also my husband.

It's not much change this week in how I've been eating. I'm eating kind of convenient pre-packaged foods for most lunches and cooking at dinner.

Breakfast: Avocado Toast with Grape Tomatoes

I had some oatmeal and cereal this weekend, but it's really been avocado toast all the way for a couple months now. It's just so good, I can't even explain it. The bread is Dave's Killer Bread.

Lunch: Granola bar, banana and Amy's meal. Wow as I'm typing this I'm realizing it's really exactly the same as last week. The Macaroon Crunch here from Nature's Path is really good - like those Nature Valley oats and honey crunchy ones but with chocolate and coconut.

Dinner: Cauliflower Olive Pasta. This is whole wheat penne with sauteed cauliflower, onion and garlic heated with sauce and black olives. There's not much of a night life here but I've had a good time cooking and knitting and hanging out in my little apartment.

Snack: Cassava Pops. These came in my February vegan cuts box and they're sort of like pop chips, but better. Crunchy but not heavy and with a nice not-quite-potato and not-quite-popcorn taste.

Hydration: I've definitely noticed that even though it's only a couple extra thousand feet higher in elevation here, the 7500 foot elevation really requires more water than I'm used to drinking in order to not feel dehydrated. I'm still not drinking that much, but I do have to think about it and I think I'm getting at least 4 cups a day.

Hope you're having a good week.

Thanks for reading, see you soon. 

March Goals 2015

We had a big snowstorm here in New Mexico this weekend and we went skiing.

It was really pretty and I was glad to be living up here right in the middle of the mountains. 

I also had the distinct feeling that a full weekend is so long. It's crazy this month having both days of the weekend. I know I'll lose that feeling when it [hopefully] becomes a regular thing again in a couple years, so I'm just trying to appreciate it for now. 

So in light of such an "ideal life" kind of day, here are my goals for the month. 

March Goals 2015

1. Exercise 3 times a week. 

2. Contact 2 friends I haven't talked to in a while.

3. Moisturize. I'm not sure how to make this one specific enough yet realistic, so I'm going to say a goal of putting on some quality skin-friendly moisturizer (Eucerin, Cetaphil etc.) twice a week.

I gave in and set 3 instead of my usual restriction to 2 goals, but I'm hopeful it won't decrease my chances of success.

Thanks for reading, see you soon.