WIAW #32

It's the age old question isn't it?

Perplexes us all.
Not to fear though, it's Wednesday! A day nice and centered in between everything! It also happenes to be WIAW! Woot! A day of food lovin' and sharing! Let's hop to it!
Thanks as always Peas and Crayons for this amazing link-up:)

Breakfast:
After a dried fig and a dried date I set off at round 6:00am for a lovely long run before returning to make myself a delicious big bowl of green smoothie and almond butter granola:

The green smoothie was 1 chopped frozen banana + half a big juicy mango + 3 scoops greek yoghurt + 2 big handfuls (spinach and kale) + sprinkle of chia seeds + dash of almond milk- whazzed!

The awesome nutty granola on top was 1/2 cup muesli (plus some wholegrain cheerios) mixed with some milk and almond butter (which was slightly heated in the microwave) and baked at 180 degrees celsius for 15 mins:

Perfectly refreshing and unbelievably delicious!

Snack:
For my snacky snack at 11:00am at school was PEAS! Love peas :)

Lunch: 1:40pm (thanks school!)
Yes, this is a recycled photo, but I forgot to snap a pic and it was quite similar. (except for quinoa and eggplant) It was a salad with capsicum, tomato and spinach etc. with two hard boiled eggs:

Snack:
To keep me going at 4:00pm I cut up a granny smith apple, tossed on some grapes and washed it down with a glass of soy milk- happy Steph!

Why is fruit so yummy?

Same goes for soy milk- although it is a taste that had to grow on me.

Dinner:
At 6:45pm I sat down to this magnificent bowl of goodness:

Whole wheat pasta, steamed veggies (pumpkin, parsnip, sweet potato and swede) sauteed mushrooms and spinach, with some hommus and nutritional yeast stirred in for a delicious 'cheezy' sauce :)

Close up:

I was still a little hungry (yes, even after that big bowl!) I blame thank my run, so had a small handful of raw mixed nuts and then made my way upstairs, before running back down to grab my camera and snap a pic of the sky:

So pink and so lovely!

How about you?
What did you eat this Wednesday?
Is 1:40pm a ridiculous time for lunch or what?
Do you ever get blown away by magnificent sunsets/ rises? (I seriously have bucket loads of pics of sunsets on my memory card... I think I'll do a post on them later ;)

Don't forget to suss out what everyone else has been nom-ing over at Peas and Crayons!

Catch ya later! :D

Winners in dinners

Hi there! What's crack-a-lacking? Ok I'll stop with the Madagascar quotes :) and maybe start on this post...
Lunches may come in plastic containers full of deliciousness, but dinners appear on plates and bowls, full of even more deliciousness!
This past week I've wanted simple. I've wanted healthy. I've wanted veggie-filled. Most of all I've wanted YUM!
So that's what I made:

I was feeling the plain wholemeal pasta (does anyone else like plain jane pasta?) and decided some roast veggies would pair quite nicely with it. Also some added peas and spinach couldn't hurt, right?

I just like all the pretty colours in true honesty:)

Wednesday I was cr-aaaaaaving a veggie burger. Not so much the bun and lettuce and tomato sauce.. but the patty nonetheless! So I steamed up some pumpkin, parsnip, sweet potato, potato and swede along with roasting some broccoli and brussels sprouts, fried up a mild curry veggie patty and mixed it altogether with a few spoons of hommus on top for good measure:

Craving satisfied!

Thursday night being yoga night, means a dinner that's filling, fast and delicious... enter breakfast for dinner: (seeing as I don't actually eat stuff like this for brekky!)

  Wholemeal spelt toast, pumpkin seed whole wheat toast topped with vegemite, avocado and a poached egg with a side of baked beans and sauteed mushrooms atop spinach.
Can you tell there's two different breads? ;)
Pile it all on!

Of course I saved the best til last... the best being my favourite dinner ever.
Can you guess?

Clue #1 It involved pesto:

Clue #2 It involved vegan cheese:

Clue # 3 It was topped with steamed beetroot, parsnip and sweet potato, along with chopped red onion, capsicum, tomato, mushrooms and olives

Got it? Ok the last one may have been a bit of a throw off because I top my pizza with weird things.

Well, now you know what it is.

I didn't even show you clue #5 yet! Pumpkin pizza dough!

All rolled out and topped to the max!

Then baked to perfection (about 25 mins at 180 degrees celsius) and claiming the position of last weeks best dinner! :)

 Yum! I love doughy pizza! I mean thin crust... what's the point?

 Pizza makes me smile.

Nom.

Talk to me!
What's your favourite dinner. Ever. ?
What was the best dinner you had last week?
What did you/ have you had for dinner today?

Bye for now folks! :D

My thoughts on juice

Hi friendly friends!
Who here likes juice? A fair few of you right?
I used to L.O.V.E juice. I would drink glasses upon glasses of orange juice every day and if it wasn't orange juice it was peach ice tea. Like what even is water? (it makes me cringe to think of the masses of sugar I would have drunk each day)
When I had to pull back on added sugars, the only drinks I drank were water (Now I love water!) and soy milk and I just sort of forgot about juice. Then one day I found an old friend sitting idly in the fridge section of the supermarket.

Nudie juices!

No added sugar and all natural ingredients- it's seriously just fruit and veg... the way juice should be!
So I've been enjoying these on occasion when I feel the urge for juice.

Where am I going with this? Well the other day this guy crossed my line of vision and I went over to go check him out...

The front of him impressed, as did the back:

 So I threw him into the trolley.
A few days ago I was feeling the juice vibe and also chocolate (because when am I not feeling chocolate?) I put some rolled oats, raw cacao powder, chia seeds, cinnamon, choc protein powder and a banana into a saucepan with some oat milk and let that cook and cool for 10mins and then took my bowl of oats (topped generously with some almond butter) and new find up to my breakfast spot outside.

 Whilst checking out the back (well, photographing it for you guys) I noticed it said:
Servings per package: 2
Does this not bug anyone else? Who's going to buy a small juice bottle that size and go- boy, there is definitely 2 serves in this guy!
Silly serving sizes. I think I may ignore this one... or so I thought.

This is how much I could manage.
On first gulp, I was like 'Hmm, this is interesting.' Then it slid down my throat and left it's interesting after taste for my taste buds to fully consider.
Long story short- it was gross.
It tasted way too green (I know it's a green juice!) and seriously hurt my taste buds. My entire mission in life is to create ridiculously healthy foods that taste even more ridiculously yummy. This guy didn't fit the bill.

I was just thankful I had big spoonfuls of warm, gooey chocolatey oatmeal to help me out. :)

Moral of the story? I really like oatmeal.

That and I think I'll stick to nudie juice on the rare occasions the want for juice strikes.

Also green smoothies taste 1000x better than green juices in my opinion. Check out this one I made recently:

Most awkward hand positioning ever, I know- I didn't want to make a shadow :)

This was a green rhubarb smoothie- idea from this post.

It was one stick of chopped frozen rhubarb, 1 chopped frozen banana, a handful of kale, a handful of spinach, 3 scoops of greek yoghurt and a splash of oat milk all whazzed up until smooth.

What's that peeking in on the side?

Yes I drank my green smoothie along with a side of whipped banana oats ;)

What about you?
Do you like juice?
Do you make your own juice?
Do you pay attention to ridiculous serving sizes?

Until next time...
Bye! :D

 

Blueberry cake :)

Well hello there beautiful people!
Have I got a treat for you! And boy you better enjoy it because I made this treat, put it in the oven, took my memory card out of my camera to work on some posts, forgot to put it back and then didn't get any pics of the final product.. so I had to make it again! Yes, I suffered through two:
BLUEBERRY BREAKFAST CAKES! It was pretty good :)

 Blueberry muffins may just about be my all-time favourite treat. I've tried health-i-fying them before and they're just not the same.

This cake however, is pretty darn close!
Vegan, wheat free, dairy free, added sugar free, all natural ingredients- and it tastes great too!

Blueberry breakfast cake:
Ingredients:
20g wholemeal spelt flour
15g rolled oats
10g oatbran
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon chia seeds + 2 tablespoons milk of choice (I used oat milk) mixed together and sit for 5 mins
2 pitted medjool dates
1 teaspoon coconut oil (optional- I just wanted a bit of coconut flavour)
1/4 banana
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence (I actually scarped a few seeds off a vanilla pod because I had some lying around)
handful of blueberries
extra milk of choice

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius and grease a small ramekin/ mini loaf pan/ mini cake pan (whatever mini pan you have on hand) with some oil (I used spray coconut oil)
Look how cute it is:

2. Place the dates, banana, vanilla, optional coconut oil and chia gel into a small food processor and process until smooth:

 3. Stir together the rest of the ingredients (all the dry ingredients) in a bowl and then whisk in the date mixture:

 4. Add in some milk until batter reaches a thick pancake consistency (I added about 1/2 cup oat milk)

 5. Toss in some blueberries! Fold in to mixture:

 6. Place in greased pan and bake in oven for around 30 mins or until inserted skewer comes out clean
Pre-cooked:

Pre-cooked #2 (today's batch)

 Batch #2 cooked (this is where I forgot to put my memory card back in)

 Nice and golden brown on top:

7. Remove from pan/ tin/ ramekin and place on wire rack to cool for 5-10 mins.
8. Top with anything you like/ keep it plain (yesterday I smothered almond butter over the top) and enjoy!

But wait. Where's all the blueberries?!?

 Found em'

Warm, spongey, marbled with bluberry juice... does it get better than this?

Definitely brought back memories of my favourite blueberry muffins of my childhood!
Yes, I went a bit nuts with the pics... but at least this time I remembered to have a memory card in the camera!

Mmmmm.
Seriously try stop yourself from face planting your computer screen, thank you ;)

Relax with a warm drink and picture yourself sitting in a little coffee shop. :)

Food really is the best subject for visualization and meditation.

How about you? 
Favourite childhood cake flavour?
Blueberry cake/ muffins- like/ hate?
Does food ever take you to a different place when eating it/ smelling it? It happens to me a lot!

Any who, that's it from me to you and always remember that... 'Today you are you, that is truer than truer. There is no one alive who is youer than you!' (Dr Seuss in the house!)

Seeya guys :D