Local Food

      This is my favorite time of year because all the farmer’s markets start to open and our home garden has something to give us each day! One of my favorite Sunday traditions is to head to the Chester Farmers Market. I love the atmosphere of this farmer’s market and it is one of my favorites. I went around lunch time so I could eat lunch at the market. I had a locally made cheese danish and a smoothie that was made with all local ingredients. I love walking about and looking what everyone has. 

Farmer's Market Smoothie!!

Todays buys: kale, strawberries, raspberries, strawberry rhubarb jam, and yogurt!!!

      One of my summer/fall goals is to every week go to the farmer’s market and buy a new in season vegetable that I have never cooked with before and learn a recipe that incorporates this vegetable in it. I’m excited for this new challenge and to try some new vegetables and maybe even some fruits!! I think this week I am going to tackle beets!! If anyone has any recipes I should try with beets let me know. 

Carrots from our garden!!

Happy Fathers Day!!!

I have the most amazing Dad and Poppy ever and I wanted to wish them both the best Father's Day ever!! They are two of the most selfless, giving, amazing men I know and I would never be where I am today without there love and support. My dad has always gone above and beyond doing what a Dad does and I am forever grateful that I have him in my life. I wanted to post a recipe for a special breakfast that everyone can make for the special Dads in their lives. I hope everyone has a relaxing enjoyable Sunday full of fun and family and a little relaxation. I am off to the farmers market and then celebrating Father's Day with a cookout later on with my family =)!!!! 

Vegan Spelt Banana Pancakes 

I like experimenting with different flours when I'm baking and this was my first time using spelt flour. It is a great alternative as a whole grain and a way to mix it up. These pancakes turned out super good!! 

Ingredients (makes 9 pancakes): 

1 cup spelt flour 

a few dashes cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup unsweetened almond milk

2 Tbs pure maple syrup

1 ripe banana mashed

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon chia seeds

3 tablespoons water

Directions:

1- Make the chia egg first by combining the chia seeds with the water and set aside for a few minutes

2- Heat skillet and spray with nonstick cooking spray

3- Combine dry ingredients and wet ingredients in separate bowls

4- Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients slowly, add chia egg and mix batter throughly 

5- Pour batter on skillet and cook on one side until bubbles form then flip and cook on other side until golden brown

Enjoy with some coconut oil and warm maple syrup!!

YUM!!! 

Single Serve Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

         The other night I came up with this recipe in desperation. We have rhubarb from our garden coming in everyday and I was dying for strawberry rhubarb crisp. I wanted to come up with a quick one serving recipe that would satisfy my craving. Both of these fruits are in season so it is the perfect time to make this dessert. This is my favorite time of the year right when local produce starts to arrive. We have already been able to enjoy spinach, rhubarb and chives out of our garden and its only the beginning.
         I of course added my healthy spin on the dessert so not only does it taste good its good for you. One cup of rhubarb has 10% of your daily needs of calcium. Rhubarb is also full of antioxident’s that promote good health and prevent disease. Its interesting that raw rhubarb supplies the body with no lycopene but by cooking the fruit you get a good does of lycopene. All the more reason to eat lots of it while it's in season!!

Ingredients:

5 Organic Strawberries (one of the dirty dozen fruits so its really important to choose organic)

1 stalk rhubarb

1/8 cup date sugar

1/2 cup rolled oats

1 tablespoon coconut oil

Directions: 

1- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and stray a small glass baking dish

2- Cut up strawberries and rhubarb and pour into dish

3- Mix together in a bowl date sugar, rolled oats, and melted coconut oil

4- Spread the mixture over the fruit 

5- Bake for 30 minutes until bubbly and crispy

6- ENJOY!!

Wheat Grass Smoothie

          What I have been trying to concentrate on regarding my diet is getting the most nutrition for everything that I eat. I am eating with a purpose in mind instead of just to relieve hunger. Before I choose everything I eat I  think about that choice and the nutrition that goes along with that food choice. I was doing some research during my cleanse and I came across wheatgrass. I have to do more research about growing it for myself so I decided instead to buy Amazing Grass Wheat Grass Powder. Its in a powder form and you can mix it with water or into your favorite smoothies like this one. I am not to the point yet where I can mix it with water so I am trying to incorporate it into smoothies where I can mask the flavor and still get all of the benefits out of it.

source

        Wheatgrass does amazing things for the body including providing you with increased and sustained energy naturally, it detoxifies and cleanses your body, it has a high alkalinity which helps you balance high acidic pH levels in the body which can promote disease, it strengthens the immune system, it is full of enzymes and contains all the essential amino acids,  and it is a natural source of antioxidants. A 1oz shot of wheatgrass juice is equivalent to eating 2 1/2 pounds of vegetables. The overall message is that individuals need to be more aware of the healing powers of food instead of just turning to medications.
     This smoothie recipe will give you all the benefits of the wheatgrass and it does a good job of masking the taste.

Recipe

Ingredients:

1 frozen banana

1 cup organic frozen cherries

1 scoop of Amazing Grass wheatgrass powder

1 cup almond milk

Directions:

Blend all ingredients in a blender and enjoy the benefits =) 

Protein Packed Overnight Oats

Chocolate Walnut Overnight Oats

Overnight oats are totally my new obsession. This is going to be perfect for the summer when you don’t want to eat hot oatmeal and you can still get all the nutrition. Also perfect this morning because in Connecticut its going to get to 80 today!! Oatmeal is such a blank canvas and you can add anything that you want to it. I love being able to have oatmeal in the morning for breakfast but I don’t always have the time to make it so this recipe is the perfect solution. It’s all ready for you in the morning. This recipe is super packed with protein and healthy fats to help you stay full all the way until lunch.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup organic rolled oats

1 cup almond milk

3 tablespoons vegan chocolate protein powder

1 tablespoon chia seeds

1 tablespoon shredded coconut

2 tablespoons walnuts

banana

Directions:

1- Mix oats, almond milk, protein powder, chia seeds, and coconut all together in a bowl, cover and put in the fridge overnight.

2- In the morning add the walnuts and dice the banana and add to the oats.

3- If the oats are too thick add a few splashes of almond milk

4- Eat cold or heat through

What is everyones favorite thing to have for breakfast? Does anyone else love overnight oats as much as me? 

Protein Smoothie!

 

Sorry everyone that I have been MIA for so long so much has been going on in my life all great things =). Most of you know that I did the 21 Day wellness cleanse and after doing that my entire outlook on my diet has changed drastically. I thought I had a super healthy diet compared to most people and I did but there were a ton of things that I needed to improve upon. That is my new project I am working on. Becoming as healthy as I possibly can be. Especially now that I got officially accepted to graduate school to get my masters in nutrition and become a clinical nutritionist. It is extremely important to me to be an example to other people and show then what can happen if you have a healthy diet. I am now focusing on making my diet extremely clean and nutrient dense. I have eliminated added sugar and dairy from my diet. I am eating eggs and focusing on making sure I get a ton of vegetables, fruits, and plant based proteins. I have learned so much new information and want to share it with everyone. I have also started to work out a lot more. I have always exercised but I really want to get in super good shape and tone up a lot. This forced me to take a closer look at the amount of protein that I was eating and I was consuming no where near enough. I wanted to share a recipe for a super healthy protein smoothie that is full of nutrients.

Purple protein smoothie

Ingredients:

1.5 cups non diary milk (I used almond)

1 tablespoon chia seeds 

1 packet vega vanilla chia protein powder (my new obsession its amazingly good)

1 cup frozen cherries

1 frozen banana

2 handfuls of spinach

Directions:

Blend all your ingredients in a blender and enjoy either after a hard workout or for a meal. I had this today for lunch with cut of red peppers and hummus. 

This was my first time trying the vega protein powder. The other day I was at Whole Foods and decided to get one packet of it to try it. The flavor of the protein powder made the whole smoothie taste amazing. You don't even taste the spinach but you still get to sneak in that extra nutrition. Hope everyone enjoys this and let me know if you try it and what you think! What is everyones favorite protein powder? More posts coming soon!!

The Red Lentil

I am always looking for a new vegetarian restaurant to try out. Recently I found a poster on a bulletin board at Southern advertising for a new vegetarian restaurant in New Haven called The Red Lentil. They recently opened in July of 2011. There is another Red Lentil restaurant in Watertown, Massachusetts. They are open for lunch and dinner seven days a week and for brunch on Sundays. The restaurant is located on Temple Street in downtown New Haven. It is a little hard to find parking but it was totally worth the trouble. We went at a perfect time because by the time we were leaving there was a line of people waiting to get a table. The restaurant has an open floor plan which can cause it to be a little loud. But other than that the restaurant was extremely cute with a green and red theme. The food was the more important part. I took my friend Ali along because she is always willing to try new vegan/vegetarian restaurants with me. We started off with the hummus platter as an appetizer. This came with pita slices and three different types of hummus. Each one was amazing and I couldn’t pick my favorite because they were all good in their own way. 

Hummus Platter

Pita slices topped with chipotle hummus and accompanied with baba ganoush (flame-broiled eggplant), red pepper dip, and olives.

For our entree’s we decided to choose two options and split them because we had so many that we wanted to try. After taking forever to decide we settled on the Shepherd’s Pie and the Moussaka pizza. My description would not even do them justice because they were that good. The shepherd’s pie was not your typical vegetarian shepherd’s pie but the flavor combinations worked so well together that it was so much better than the traditional. The best part was the savory flavors mixed with the sweet flavor of the sweet potato. 

Shepherd’s Pie

Layered mashed yukon gold potatoes and sweet potato, soy sausage, corn kernel, onion, seasonal vegetables, spinach, baked and served with vegan cashew gravy and maple balsamic. Drizzled with cilantro sunflower pesto.
$16.00

I can’t say enough about the Moussaka Pizza. The goat cheese was a perfect addition to this pizza. You could also make this gluten free and vegan if you wanted. 

Moussaka Pizza

Grilled eggplant, grilled onion, roasted red pepper, goat cheese and mozzarella cheese topped with fresh basil.
$12.50 (substitute gluten-free crust for $3.00. Substitute vegan cheese for $2.00)

Overall this was an amazing restaurant and I highly recommend checking it out if your are in the New Haven area. We were so full from all that we ate that we skipped dessert but they had many vegan options.  

Ali at our pretty table =)