Double Time

Happy Friday !

Today was an Off-Friday for me, so I planned on spending some quality time at the gym and in the sun!

There was actually some time to make breakfast this morning, so I made some pancakes with a mix I had lying around:

Topped with PB, strawberry jam, Maple syrup, and a bit of granola

I still need to figure out where I have all my placemats packed…

After digesting for a while, I headed off to a Water Running class.  It was just a 45 minute interval session, but with the resistance of the water, you REALLY feel it in your body by the end.  It’s actually a great cardio workout .

Afterwards I had a Protein Bar and an apple… because I had to refuel for a Body Pump Class.  60 minute class of the new July Release!! 

Yup, I doubled up on workouts today.. mainly because the classes were fun and I had the time to do them!  Plus, I ended up having to go into work right after the body pump class for the afternoon, so it was nice to get my workout out of the way for the day!

On the way to work, I stopped at WF for a lunch/salad/explosion and a Kombucha.  Not pretty, but it was inhaled in less than 5 minutes.

Nothing too much up for tonight, but we might go and see Horrible Bosses .  It looks freaking amazing.

Have a great Friday night!

You Gotta Have Goals

And my big one today was to create an entire day of meals, (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), that were healthy AND I could get Scott to eat them .  The catch?  I was going to try and use ingredients in each dish that he despises eaten on their own. 

Scott’s “mystery ingredients” for the day were:

• Cottage Cheese
• Chia Seeds
• Hummus/Sugar Snap Peas
• Farro and a ton of veggies

First up… Breakfast!  Everything I’ve made completely on my own.. no recipes used (except the cornbread!)

Whole Wheat Cottage Cheese ‘n Chia Pancakes

Serves 2, makes 6 4” diameter pancakes

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• ~1/4 tsp salt (I used a little less than this)
• 2 tsp Chia Seeds
• 1 egg, scrambled into batter
• 1/3 cup Cottage Cheese, lowfat (adds a good protein kick!)
• 2 tsp Agave Nectar (to sweeten it up a little bit)
• 1/2 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

Directions

Start heating a pan on medium heat.  Mix dry ingredients together in a large bowl, then add in the egg, cottage cheese, agave, almond milk, and vanilla.  Whisk together and let sit for about 3-4 minutes while the chia seeds absorb some of the moisture in the batter.  Each pancake was about 2T (heaping) of batter.  Cook on one side for ~2-3 minutes, and then flip for another 2-3, until lightly browned.

I topped my pancakes with another 2 tsp Agave Nectar, 1 sliced nectarine, about 2 tsp Love Grown Foods Granola (Raisin Almond Crunch), and a sprinkle of cinnamon.

Check this out though – without the additional toppings on my pancakes.  A little high on the sodium (I didn’t need the extra salt in the batter, the cottage cheese has enough!), but 12g of protein!

(Nutritional data and images courtesy of www.NutritionData.com.)

Scott LOVED these!  They came out light, fluffy, and completely masked the cottage cheese and chia seeds.  Erin: 1, Scott: 0 . 

Next up was lunch!

Tuna Melts

serves 2

Ingredients

• 1 can chunk light tuna, in water
• 2T Hummus (I used Spicy Three Pepper from Athenos)
• 1 baby carrot, chopped
• 2 sugar snap peas, chopped
• 1T Newman’s Own Farmer’s Garden Salsa
• 1/2 tsp butter, unsalted
• 2T reduced fat cheese, shredded
• 1 whole wheat English muffin
• small handful of spinach

I mixed together the tuna, hummus, carrot, sugar snaps, and salsa separately.  Then I spread the butter on the back sides of the English muffin.  In a pan I layered the spinach, tuna mixture, and cheese on one half of the muffin and covered with a lid for about 4 minutes (melts the cheese and heats everything up).  Uncover and top the melt with the other half of the English muffin.

Chow down

Scott usually does his tuna melts with TONS of Ranch Dressing as the creamy base of the tuna (and of course without any veggies).  He couldn’t taste the hummus and actually said it was creamier than the ones he usually has.  Plus, I got a few veggies down him   Oh let’s see… Erin: 2, Scott: 0 (and still clueless!)

Dinner… less “recipe-driven” but JUST as delicious!

Farro (cooked in my rice cooker) with sautéed red pepper, red potato, zucchini, mushrooms, and Chicken Brats, Spicy Tomato Basil sauce with a Bob’s Red Mill Cornbread muffin on the side.  And of course a little bit of wine

I’m sloooooowly converting Scott to caring (somewhat) about what he eats.  I’m just hoping by the time we have kids, the kids aren’t asking why HE gets to eat Spaghettios and they can’t….

But I’ve got plenty of time before then .

Up for the rest of the night is TOTAL relaxation!  We’ve been out late every night this weekend and I’m definitely ready to just chill out before a full week of work.  I’m betting on a movie night *crosses fingers*. 

I hope you had a great weekend!!