Fav Links of the Week!

Happy Sunday friends!!!

And happy much needed rest day for me! Phew was last week an intense/ tiring/ full-to-the-brim week of 5:30am wake ups, sweaty workouts, full school days and then homework/ study thrown in there too! (as well as all the other commitments that come with my roles in the school!)

So, yes, when I woke up naturally this morning to the sound of nothing more than the windy howl of a winter's day in Aus, it was so nice to just lie for a few extra minutes, smile gratefully at the extra rest and recovery my body deserves and then slowly make my way about my morning to tick off some random errands here and there- waking up, making breakfast, showering, blogging, Instagramming, off to a uni open day and then finishing off my study for the weekend... pretty  cruise-y! :)

If you're anything like me, the very mention of eating breakfast is the first thing to spark my attention in that long-winded paragraph, on account of I want to know what the breakfast was, see the beautiful, nourishing food and witness the very image of what was consumed.

Well, here you go:

Exactly what I wanted when I woke up this morning; hit the spot and definitely filled my body with loads of the good stuff to rest and repair properly for the week to come (definitely don't think I ate enough yesterday after a tough hills session and was ravenous all day!!).

A deliciously creamy green smoothie with warm, crunchy home-made almond butter and peanut butter granola :) Eaten separately because sometimes I like to enjoy each of the textures and tastes separately- you know, the soggy cereal thing??

The smoothie was simply 1 frozen banana, 1 handful frozen persimmons, 1 handful kale, 1 handful spinach, 3 scoops greek yoghurt, splash of water et, voila!

The granola was extra special as the almond butter half was made with freshly made almond butter I whipped up the night before in the Vitamix- so, so good! You can find almost identical recipes for my granola here, here and here!

Yum!

Now, onto some of the links I've been loving in the small pockets of time when I actually get to chill-out and blog read during the whirlwind of the weekdays!

Food:

23 Meal Prep Photos That Are Almost Too Perfect

10 snacks with 10 (or more!) grams of protein

HEALTHY HIGH PROTEIN ROCKY ROAD BLENDER ICE CREAM

fudgy double chocolate mug cake

Fitness:

What Makes Running Memorable?

Health:

Gaining Weight Is Hard.

are you addicted to food?

Good reads:

Is The Five-Second Rule Legit Or Nah?

I DIDN’T WORKOUT FOR HALF A YEAR + THOUGHTS ON FLEXIBILITY

My Body (And Her Body) is Not Your Measuring Stick

Alrighty, I hope you found some interesting/ inspiring/ delicious reads in there and now I have to rush off to the uni open day! Quite excited- life is starting soooooon!

Your turn:
What day is your designated rest day/ does it change from week to week or how you're feeling?
Breakfast today?
Favourite way to eat granola? Generally I'm a big fan of smoothie bowls, but every now and then I just love to separate the two and enjoy them both equally :D

As always; EAT SOMETHING DELICIOUS, and get ready for some more posts coming at ya through the week! bye for now friendly friends!! :D

Back...again and foods that fix me up!

Happy Saturday everyone!!
Phew- another night away, and back again!

This 'camp' was my year 12 study retreat in which we learned about our brains, various study techniques, did some activities, caught up with those we hadn't seen for the entire Summer and spent the night.

I think I've finally figured out why I'm always starving on camps for teens. See they give us heaps and heaps of carbs (I was so over rice and pasta!!) and yet no healthy fats at all. I ate my usual large servings of food and found that merely an hour later I was starving. And also, snack times revolved around brown fried foods (think sausage rolls, samosas etc.) and when I asked them for a piece of fruit they looked at me as though I was crazy.

I guess it is safe to say that I am glad I am home now for good for the time being as I've been missing on my nut butters, smoothies and large amounts of veg.

This is how I celebrated coming home after yesterdays return:

Two soft boiled eggs with multigrain hommus and avocado soldiers, sauteed mushrooms, tomatoes and capsicum and some nutritional yeast kale chips (wash kale, rub in nutritional yeast, bake at 180 degrees celsius for 10-15 mins until crispy.) with a glass of soy milk.

This helped ease the painful food baby/ bloat a little bit but I'm still hanging onto some nausea that's sprung up over the past few days. For some reason I feel like it was the overload of acidity in all of the dishes they served us and now whenever I think of lemon juice, or vinegar or something like that I feel quite queesy!

I also very much enjoyed preparing my own delicious breakfast in which I could add all the healthy fats and filling protein and veggies I desired!

That my friends is a black berry not-so-green green smoothie with a side cup of warm cashew butter granola :)

Into the Vitamix went 1 sliced banana (didn't have any frozen ones :() 1 handful chopped frozen zucchini, 1 massive handful spinach, 1 handful frozen blackberries, 3 scoops of greek yoghurt and 1/2 cup water- whazzed up until smooth!

When I woke up this morning I realised- to my utter disbelief- that I didn't have any nut butter in the house!!! So I grabbed about 2-3 handfuls of cashews, chucked them in a mini food processor and processed for around 15 mins (scraping down edges occasionally) until smooth and creamy. Voila! Single serving cashew butter!

To make the granola I mixed together around 3/4-1 cup rolled oats, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, sprinkle chia seeds, 1 tablespoon oat bran and 2 tablespoons cashew butter and almond milk warmed together in microwave, and rubbed until combined. Popped in the oven on a tray lined with baking paper at 180 degrees celsius and baked for around 15-20 mins until golden brown and fragrant and DONE! Delicious, cookie-like granola chunks for brekky!

Smoothie + cashew butter granola bites= Happy, happy Steph :)

And I most definitely need to keep my strength up today as tonight is....

MY BALL!!

Crazy stuff! I definitely do not feel like a year 12 student and have no idea where this ball came from (out of nowhere perhaps??) but I am super excited and can't wait to see the rest of my year group looking utterly amazing and beautiful! It's going to be great!

Your turn:
Do you find that when you go away there is a lacking of healthy fats on offer?
Favourite fix-me-up dinner you make when you haven't been eating your usual foods?
Any funny ball/ prom stories??


I hope you all have a great rest of your weekend, doing something you love, treating your body kindly and as always; eating something delicious! Bye for now friendly friends!! :D

WIAW #61 A few strange ones ;)

Happy Wednesday friends!!
I must admit I have been enjoying these few days after exams and am literally doing nothing (except of course attending school... because, you know, for some reason I still have 3 weeks left until term break!) other than that I've been giving my brain a break, enjoying delicious food and getting my life back together (you know how un-important organisation becomes when you are going through a stressful/busy part of life!)

What delicious food you ask? Well it's a good thing it's WIAW! Below features a full day of eats from Tuesday, a rest day filled with all the yum! Thanks as always to Peas and Crayons for hosting this awesome link-up each week and gifting me with so much meal inspo!! Now- FOOD.

Breakfast: 7:15am
For breakfast I was in the mood for something cooling and refreshing (because it's winter. And I am strange) However I wanted to change things up from the typical smoothie I've been loving on lately. I decided to add in something warm and crunchy as well as chewy and fudge-y. Home-made granola!

Smoothie bowl topped with cashew butter granola

In my smoothie was 1 chopped frozen banana + 1 massive handful of spinach + 3 big spoons greek yoghurt + one handful frozen blackberries + 14 cup water- whazzed until smooth.

The delicious granola was a large handful of rolled oats + sprinkle chia seeds + sprinkle pepita seeds +  dash cinnamon +1-2 tablespoons cashew butter warmed with 1/3 cup almond milk in the microwave for 30 seconds- mixed together with a spoon until combined.

Sooo good! Perfect combo of refreshing, sweet, nutty, chewy, gaaaah!

Happy days :)

Snack: 11:00am
The usual snack for today:

Nothing beats a pot of peas

I'm usually still full from breakfast by the time recess rolls around but I also know I will be starving by 4th period (period before lunch) if I don't eat a little something. Peas to the rescue.
Lunch: 1:40pm
Brilliant salad for lunch featuring tri-coloured quinoa, carrot, cucumber, capsicum, spianch and avocado.

I didn't have too much time in the morning as I head to school earlier for period 0 (period before school starts) so this was a 'chop everything up and throw it in a tupper ware' kind of lunch. It was pretty good!

The quinoa made it ;)

Snack: 4:00pm
Again the usual snack. I feel like my snacks work for me, so why change them?

Delicious fruit (both the fuji apple and strawberries were perfectly ripe) with a mug of soy milk.

Nom.

Dinner: 6:15pm
I had a meeting that night at school so dinner was slightly earlier (but still mighty tasty!)

Under those two delicious fried eggs were some oven roasted sweet potatoes and potato, roasted with olive oil + cumin + oregano + basil, along with some steamed and roasted brussels sprouts and baked beans stirred through:

I was in a weird mood and didn't know what I felt like for dinner, hence the random collection of foods. It tasted pretty good though (and weirdly enough exactly what I wanted!)

So much yum in one bowl :)

Aaaand that's what I ate!

Your turn:
Do you make your own granola? What do you throw into yours?
Favourite fast throw together lunch?
Weirdest dinner you've put together lately that has totally satisfied?

That's all from me today folks, I hope you all have a lovely day, eat something delicious and smile :) Bye for now! :D

WIAW

Hello, hello! It is Wednesday again and I am just excited for this Wednesday as I am every week.
I don't see it as only half way through the week, I see it more as- Wow! It's already half way through the week.
And that I am thankful for. But don't worry, to all of you out there who hate Wednesdays and feel like crying right now, you can also be thankful! Be thankful for your tears, because in space, astronauts cannot cry because of gravity :) You feel better now, right? No? Ok... moving on!

So that was an intro.
Now onto the eats! Thanks Peas and Crayons for the link-up.

Breakfast!
I have had a very long-lasting relationship with home-made granola. Here, here, here and here are seriously just a teeny few of the many pics I have of my granola. So I made some more:

 What is new to me, however, is freezing grapes and using them in smoothies! So underneath my granola went a frozen grape green smoothie! (thick enough for a spoon:)

 1 chopped frozen banana + a big handful of frozen grapes + a big handful of kale + a sprinkle of chia seeds + a dash of oat milk:

 Baked granola:

 Finished product:

 Yum!

 Yeh, the smoothie colour looked gross, but blame that on the kale :)

Lunch:
Grilled sammy! I also seem to really like these too. They seem to be a Wednesday tradition :)

 With wholemeal spelt bread, a curried veggie patty, grilled capsicum, mushrooms and zucchini, hommus, salsa, spinach and top of bread... toasted!

 It really does make my day at school. Especially when said day is filled with tests and assignments :) Last day tomorrow!
Snack:
A super crunchy green apple, some red grapes and soy milk :)

Fruit is my favourite candy.

Dinner:
Not the prettiest dinner, but quite tasty. Mashed veggies (beetroot, potato, sweet potato, carrot and parsnip) with steamed greens, garlic tofu, kale and topped off with some globs of hommus :)

I love beetroot. It makes everything pink.

And that was that :)
Food-glorious-food.. what did you eat Wednesday?
Don't forget to check out what everyone else was nom-ing!

de-constructed cheesecake

Phew! 2 purely twins workouts and cleaning of the house ( having friends over) down and I am finally here to talk to you guys about my favourite subject! Food!
I am still in a day-dreamy haze over my breakfast, because it was simply. that. good.
I call it the deconstructed cheesecake:

However all you can see is the nutty granola on top :)
Underneath is a silky smooth and soft vanilla cheesecakey ice cream (can be easily vegan)
It's super healthy, (taste can be very deceiving) full of fibre and chock full of protein to keep you full until next week!
De-constructed breakfast cheesecake:
Ingredients:
For the cheesecake ice cream:
1 chopped, frozen banana
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
3 large spoons of greek yoghurt (simply omit this if you are vegan- to get the cheesecakey taste add in 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast)

For the nutty granola topping: (which would usually be the base:)
3/4 cup muesli
1 teaspoon chia seeds
1 large tablespoon of nut butter (today I chose peanut butter)
1/3 cup milk of choice (I used oat milk)
I also added in a bit of chopped dried fig (optional)

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius (350 F) and line a tray with baking paper
2. Place the nut buttere and milk in a small bowl and microwave for 30 seconds, (more or less depending on strength of microwave) until it's melted and you can mix together:

3. Rub into muesli and chia seeds until combined, then place on tray to bake for 15 minutes:

4. Meanwhile make the cheesecake ice cream by placing all of the ingredients in a large food processor and whazzing until smooth and soft-servey (you may need to stop a few times to scrape down the sides)

5. Pour into bowl/mug/jar and place in freezer until required:

6. Once the granola is ready and golden brown,

remove from oven and place on another plate to cool for 5 mins (It's so hard to wait- but you do have a bit of this leftover... no wasting going on here!)

7. Remove ice cream from freezer and top with granola:
Sprinkle sprinkle:

8. Enjoy! I know you will!

 Just like eating an upside down cheesecake :)

 Nom

You all know that pretty pictures do lie sometimes- the only way to truly enjoy this dessert breakfast is to moosh:

Nom nom nom!
Coming up tomorrow? A how-to on home-made coconut butter (it's so simple I feel silly doing a how-to!
Have a fab Monday friends!