Tasty Truffles and Links You'll Love!

Happiest of Sundays friendly friends!

I hope you've got something nice planned for today (if not... plan something nice :P) and are enjoying the brilliance that is Sundays.

In true Sunday form I woke up, moved a little (a more technical description of exercise, wouldn't you agree?) and then proceeded into the kitchen to whip up a gloriously delicious breakfast!

 On the cards today were some utterly amazing lemon coconut truffles with a mixed berry not-so-green green smoothie :)

 The truffles were a simple mix of rolled oats, chia seeds, lemon rind and melted coconut butter mixed with almond milk (microwaved together to warm and combine- then added to dry mix), left to firm in the freezer for around 30 mins.

 The smoothie was a simple-pimple concoction of frozen banana, mixed frozen berries, big handful of spinach, greek yoghurt and water. Plus a vitamix blender which took the smoothness factor to the next level!!

 I love the combination of the coconut and lemon flavours and then the fudge-iness these truffles offer... this truly is a worthwhile brekky!

 This is also very much allowed. ;)

Happy, happy days!

Now, as it is Sunday, I have some links for you that I have been loving from the past week!

Food:

Healthy 4 Ingredient Cake Batter Rice Crispy Treats

Chocolate covered dates with brazil nuts 

Vegan Chocolate Cake

Lime & Coconut Cake

Vegan Peanut Butter Hot Chocolate {GF, Paleo, Vegan, Low Cal}

Spelt and Olive Oil Foccacia with Braised Fennel, Pine nuts + Rosemary Za’atar

 Superfood Pumpkin Pie Green Smoothie (Vegan)

Gluten-free, grain-free, dairy-free pumpkin fudge cookie dough chocolate recipe

Fitness:

Fitting the Long Run into a Busy Life

Swap Your Prerun Banana With This Food

Snowbunny Blast!

Peak in the life of a Long Run

Health:

23 Little Choices That Can Make You Healthier

Juice Cleanses: Do They Work?

How This Blogger's "Healthy" Habits Became The Most Unhealthy Part Of Her Life

Happiness:

12 Glorious Things You Should Waffle Right Now

1 Look at This Foodspo Is All You Need to Make Today Your Healthiest

I hope you found some good reads in that basket of links!

Enjoy the remainder of your Sunday, do something you enjoy and as always; eat something delicious!! Bye for now friendly friends! :D

What we need to STOP saying

Hello folks! Or should I say strangers!

Well, it has only been a couple of days, but the amount of stuff that has been packed into these past few days has made them feel like a couple of weeks!!

I'm not sure if I have mentioned this yet on the blog, but because we are all so super close (and, come one, you basically know my daily eating habits!) I'll let you in.

So for my senior year at highschool I've fortuitously earned the title of Head Girl. This means next year will be even more hectic than this one!! So this last Tuesday and Wednesday I have been on a prefect camp with the other 20 or so prefects (all heads of different sections of the school- eg, art, music etc.) packed full of team work exercises, leadership tasks and problem solving games.

Anywho, that's not what this post is about- I just thought I'd get you all caught up on what was happening in life currently (feel free to let me know what's happening in your life currently in the comments below!).

No. This post is about something else. This post is about something that gets to me more than it should.

Other people's words.

As a kid, I always took the things my brother or sister said to me too personally and took a long time to get over it. As a growing child I would easily get hurt by what other people said to me if it were in the least bit harsh. I never asked for a teacher to look over my work because I was afraid of criticism-feeling as though they were critisising me personally.

Of course, as I've gotten older and wiser :P I've come to realise that people usually don't mean to hurt you and not to take those comments too close to heart.

However, in saying that, there are certain comments that could simply be left unsaid. Here are a few that come to mine from either hearing someone say it to someone else, or having someone say it to me.

1. How are you so skinny when you eat that much!

First of all- can you imagine if you said this to someone recovery from an eating disorder/ exercise addiction etc? They might have only just come to terms with being ok with the amount of food they now have to eat to become healthy once again and are now slammed in the face with that.

But really, saying that to anyone is quite hurtful. It would replay in most people's minds as they look down at what they're eating and start to obsess over how much is too much? Do they overeat? If they are at a healthy weight for their bodies, have the energy to complete all their daily tasks and feel happy and energised, how can we assume that they are eating so much for their bodies?

 A delicious veggie filled roll! :)

2. Running really? Why do you torture yourself?

Like any outlet, running could be a person's way to release any build up of stress, disconnect from a busy world they live in, or simply be with their own mind for a short period of their day. Dissing running to a runner is like dissing science straight to a scientist. It's just hurtful.

On that point, everyone has their own fasvourite ways of working up a sweat and in that we should all be grateful that we can in fact move our bodies in a way that feels good for us. WE SHOULD BE CELEBRATING those who have found their outlets.

3. You're so healthy- you eat perfect, you exercise perfect- you are perfect.

This one. Written down it may come across as a compliment. But that's in the way it is read. You see, when I've heard this said it is always riddled with a slight undercurrent of jealousy and malice. Said not to encourage the person, but to bring them down and make them feel bad.

No body really wants to be called perfect because then they're automatically isolated. Marginalised from everyone else. If you are in a group and someone tells you you're perfect it's as if it is the group against you. The group bonds on their 'similarity' of not being perfect and you stand there, knowing full well that you are not perfect either, but anything you say will go unheard.

I wasn't expecting this post to get so long and detailed (these things happen when I am passionate about something) and there are many, many more scenarios and comments that hold more negativity than positivity to the receiver.

Your turn:
Have you ever had any of these things said to you?
How do you combat other people's negativity towards you?
Any others that should be mentioned?

This was just me Thinking Out Loud today. Be sure to head on over to Spoons to see what random thoughts everyone else is having this fine Thursday!

Have a fabulous day, do something you enjoy and EAT SOMETHING DELICIOUS!! Bye for now friendly friends!

A breakfast Papaya!

Happy Monday friendly friends!!

You know, I can't think of anything better than starting off my week with a nice, easy run in the cool Sunny, Summers morning, followed by the prospect of not having to go to school and papayas.

Papayas?

Yes, papayas :)

When I was out grocery shopping on Saturday, I was perusing around all the glorious fruits coming onto the fresh sections shelves and couldn't help myself when I saw the large number of beautiful whole papayas at quite the low price!

So ofcourse I jumped on that, took my precious little fruit baby home and come this morning...

Enjoyed a glorious breakfast treat!

After slicing my papaya in half I filled it with banana cheesecaek ice cream and topped it all off with peanut butter granola.

And for your enjoyment too, here is the recipe!!

Ingredients:
Banana cheesecake ice cream: This one is completely up to you, I stuck pretty plain with simply banana and yoghurt, but feel free to add in some berries, cacao powder, protein powder or any other flavouring/ add-ins you would like!

1 large chopped, frozen banana
2 heaped tablespoons greek yoghurt (optional- adds cheesecake flavour)

Peanut butter granola:
3/4 cup rolled oats (I used rolled oats and a rolled barley and oat mix)
1 teaspoon chia seeds
optional- pinch cinnamon- to taste
1 heaped tablespoon peanut butter
1/3 cup almond milk (or any other milk)

Other ingredients:
1/2 papaya

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius. Line a tray with baking paper
2.Make the banana ice cream by throwing ingredients in a food processor/ blender and blending until smooth (may need to scrape down sides). Spoon into papaya and place in freezer to harden up slightly until required.

3. Place the oats, chia seeds and cinnamon in a bowl and stir to combine. Place the peanut butter and almond milk in a small bowl and microwave for 30 seconds.
4. Rub warm peanut butter mixture into oats
5. Place raw granola onto tray and bake in oven for 15-20 mins until golden brown (and smelling amazing!!)
6. Remove granola from oven and leave to cool for 10 mins or so

 7. Once granola is cooled place on top of banana ice cream and ENJOY!

Leftover granola never goes to waste- eaten out of the almost empty greek yoghurt container! :P

This was such a lovely refreshing breakfast filled with all the beautiful flavours of fruit and Summer and peanut butter granola!!!

 Which is why it was eaten with a yellow spoon :)

It's funny how people either love or hate papaya... I get that it has a kind of funky taste, but I just love the sweet and almost creamy texture- I'm a fan papaya- good job nature!

 It didn't last too long...

Your turn:
What would be included in the best morning for you?
Do you ever stuff your breakfast into another fruit/ veg?
Papaya- yay/nay?

Well, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I enjoyed eating it (which would be quite impressive!!) and I hope you have a wonderful day! Eat something delicious!! Bye!!! :D

Sunday smoothie bowls and links :)

Hello friends!! And a big happy Sunday to you all!

I know I've been a little less present than usual on the blog lately, but things have been B.U.S.Y. (End of the year is crammed with so much stuff, am I right?). So I'll continue to pop in when I can (things should calm down a bit by the second half of this week)! In the mean time, I will leave you with some pics of my food (because that's what we do here!) and some lovely links to get you through a bored/ can't be bothered doing anything section of your day (we all have them!).

Say hello to breakfast!!

 Deliciously vibrant green smoothie (banana, big handful frozen mango, greek yoghurt, spinach, water)

Topped with some mixed nut butter and peanut butter granola (with cheerios!!)

And utterly devoured:

 Nom.

And that was breakfast!

Now I'm curious, what did you have for brekky? Comment below!

Now onto the links from the week!


Food:

Vegan Beast Burger & Cucumber Dill Salad 

Paleo Peppermint Chocolate No-Bake Bites

Thanksgiving Vegan Mini Pot Pie Jars

23 Healthier Versions Of Your Favorite Holiday Treats

Snickerdoodle Vegan Overnight Oats {Gluten Free + 6 Ingredients}

Fiesta Sweet Potato Nachos

Fitness:

Voices in My Head

3 Brutal Truths No One Tells You About Being A Fitness Instructor

Dorm Friendly Workouts Every Student Should do

Exercise is Not Punishment for Eating and You Do Not Have to Earn Your Food.

9 Ways to Make Fitness a Priority

Health:

The Health and Fitness Trends You'll Be Following in 2016

12 Signs Your Unrealistic Diet Is Making You Unhappy

7 Easy Ways To Eat Healthier This Week

Happiness:

21 Genius Ways To Eat Peanut Butter And Jelly

12 Insanely Easy DIY Christmas Treats That’ll Spread Some Holiday Cheer



That's all from me today folks, I hope you all have a fabulous, restful and rejuvenating Sunday, do something you love and eat something delicious!! Bye for now! :D

WIAW #81 A great day of eats!

Hello, hello to you beautiful people!

One more exam to go guys!! Yay!! And, fittingly for this blog, it is a Food Science and Technology exam- happy days!

Yep, the tough, traumatic ones (maths, chem, literature etc. etc.) are all over now and soon I will be enjoying the freedom that is Summer break!!

Ok, that's probably more than enough exclamation marks for one post! Instead, let us move on to something just as awesome as upcoming holidays- FOOOD. WIAW style :) A link-up detailing a full day of eats with no judgement or comparison, created by the awesome Peas and Crayons.

Here it is:

Breakfast: 7:30am
 
This particular What I Ate Wednesday is actually a What I Ate Tuesday beginning with an early wake up (it is the sun's fault. It decides to rise at 5 am now that it is basically Summer!) and one of my last fitness challenge days!!

That was all I chose to do this morning as I did a beach run the day before and was still kind of worn out from it!!

So after that little sweat session, I pranced into the kitchen and whipped up some brekky:

 That, my friends is a big mug full of choc protein cheesecake oats topped with melty coconut butter! Alongside a pink jar that was filled with water.

 Eaten in a sunshine yellow mug to make me feel sunshine yellow happy (it really is the best colour :)

 Rich, decadent, coconut-y, fudgey chocolate oats for brekky. Happy, happy days! :D

Lunch: 12:00pm

I was nice and hungry for lunch come 12 (on the dot) so I steamed up some veg, heated up some satay tofu and popped in some spinach and lettuce to the bowl for good measure:

 In the mix of steamed veg was potato, sweet potato, swede, pumpkin parsnip, peas, corn and capsicum:

 If you've read my blog for a while you would have picked on my love of fairly plain foods, which is why I happily sit down to a meal like this (plain steamed veg) and fell 100% satisfied afterwards :)

 And no, I did not peel anything- so much goodness going to waste when you do!

Snack: 5:00pm

After lunch I headed up to the shops for a secret Santa present and then meeting up with a friend to see Mocking jay Part 2!! Yes, I am a major Hunger Games fan and no, it did not disappoint. I just don't know what I'm going to do with my life now that it is over!

But that's ok, because at least there will always be fruit:

 A chopped up, blood red, snow white, red gala apple with some rockmelon.

 YUM!
Dinner: 7:00pm

For dinner, I was feeling something easy and simple and delicious!

 So I boiled two eggs, toasted up some multi-grain toast, topped it with hommus, oven roasted some eggplant, capsicum and tomato and threw in a small bowl of raw mixed nuts:

 Just what I wanted!

 Not the most creative but definitely filled with so many great flavours and foods I love!!

 After dinner I rounded out the day with a small handful of pitted dates :)

And that was Tuesday!

So tell me:
Do you have structured exercise plns for the week, or do you go with how you're feeling when you wake up? I used to be the latter (back in the unhealthy days) but now I'm definitely the former!
Are you a fan of plain foods some times? I love plain brown rice but then I know so many people who would gag at the thought of eating brown rice plain. Give me a bowl any day!
Favourite easy throw-together meal?

That's it from me today folks, I hope you all have a lovely day, spend time with friends and family, and as always; eat something delicious!! Bye for now! :D