Sunday, October 23, 2011

Facebook Ennui

Yes I am busting out the word Ennui, because it is the only word I can think of to describe how I am feeling about Facebook. It also makes me think of a berets, a baguette, and Parisian cafe, even though I know that it really isn't a french word. Like bourgeois, that is another one of those pretentious words.

Anyway back to the point, 
For those of you who don't know the exact definition (I had to look it up too) here is a little word of the day action:
ennui\on-WEE\ , noun;
1. A feeling of weariness and dissatisfaction arising from lack of interest; boredom

If I was in a relationship with Facebook this would be the point where we would have to sit down and have a serious chat:

Dear Facebook
I know we have been together since 2006, and you have gotten me through so much. I don't know what I would have done during exam times without your constant support. Your popularity made me make friends in 1st year. You even met my extended family. You changed over the years, but I still loved you. I even looked past the farmville incident. But now, something has changed. 

I remember back to about a year ago when I was pretty much addicted to you. I wanted to see what was going on with friends, people had clever posts and statuses, and it was actually fun to pay attention to the news feed. But you changed on me, Facebook. You started posting more statuses from people who aren't really my friends, you started having a really wired newsfeed. But I gave you a chance, and I thought I could change with you.

But there is still something that is bothering me. It has to do with I don't really care any more. I don't care that so and so went to so and so's party and took pictures with whatisname. I don't care that so and so thinks the current news event is stupid. I don't even care about the silly cat video that people post..and that is saying something. 

I have to admit, I am spending more time with e-mails, texts, and blogs. If someone calls me and or texts me and tells me so and so went to so and so's party I am all over that gossip. If someone starts talking about the current news event in person I would love to have that discussion. If someone msgs me a funny cat video I will laugh my butt off. I love reading about people I don't even know in real life via their blogs. It's not that I am sick of social media, technology or gossip, I just don't want it from you, Facebook, any more. I have to be honest, I have even considered using twitter.


Maybe it is because of the new format, it could be because I am now more interested in the blog world. But overall I think there was a time and a place for us, Facebook. I think I may have out grown you. I don't need you as a distraction any more like I did when I was in school. And I have to come clean. I am cheating on you with my blog. I use that to share with the world what I have been up to. I am using you Facebook, as a way to showcase my relationship with my blog. I am sorry.  

Maybe my love for you Facebook will come back, but maybe it won't. Now don't get me wrong, I still use you daily, and still read through all the statuses, and laugh at some of the funny videos people post. But the true excitement is gone. 

Sorry, Facebook, its not you it's me. 


Monday, October 17, 2011

Insert clever food and fitness related title here

The hardest part of blogging is coming up with a clever blog post.

So before I dive into what I want to talk about, I want to share with you the song that was playing when I was driving home from work today this GEM was on the radio station...tots brings me back to middle school dances.
Sweet Sweet N'Sync. I may or may not have been singing very loudly. It was dark, no one could see me I swear. 

The reason why it was so dark out was because I went to Body Pump and Zumba back to back. Ohhh yahhh. Yes I am blogging about food and fitness today (yes I am the queen of the sweet segways)!

After the end of the totally typical diet I took a full week off from exercise. I just needed a break. But last Tuesday, I went back to Body Pump and realized how much I missed it.  I then went to Body flow on Thursday and added Body Attack on Thursday before Body flow. Body Attack is a SUPER HIGH CARDIO class that makes you want to die in a good way. Apparently if you really exert yourself, you can burn up to 900 calories. It is that intense. So I am back to exercise and upping my cardio!

I started using a little app called MyFitness on my phone to see how many calories I am eating. Mostly because I am on weight plateau and want to make sure I am on track. I am not obsessing about calories or anything, just more watching my average calorie intake. It tracks my nutrients, and how many calories I should eat if I want to loose 1 pound a week. So on days that I go to the gym, I am WAY below my limit, but then on days I don't, or if I eat at a restaurant I am way over. My hope is that over a whole week I will balance out. Last week, which included two sushi meals, and a gyro in all I was 100 calories over my limit. Meaning I loose most of my 1 pound per week if real life was as simple as number crunching (it isn't by the way).

HOWEVER, that does not mean I am a perfect kid all the time. Today there were timbits and cake for lunch, and I may have had way too many rice crispers on Sunday. I find I am getting bored with the food I am making. I need something interesting to eat, but I am not sure what I want to eat. It's kind of like my clothes, I have a full wardrobe full of clothes, but I don't want to wear any of it. I think it may be time to do some food and fashion research...aka reading magazine time.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Happy Belated Thanks Givers!

Hope you all had a good thanksgiving!!

My thanksgiving was awesome sauce, and I am not just talking about the gravy! 

Mike and I met up with a super duper friend of mine, T, at my extended family's cottage north of Toronto. (They were away for the long weekend and offered it to us, which was awesome) The weather was amazing, as those of you in Ontario and the East Coast may have noticed. I was really tempted to jump in the lake at one point on Saturday, but I resisted. 
Look at that gorgeousness
T is a dietitian, and with me being a mildly food/nutrition obsessed part time food blogger, we may have talked about food and nutrition a lot! Worked for me. Don't get me wrong, we didn't skimp on the eating, because after talking about food a lot, we certainly worked up our appetites! 

On Sunday we made a chicken dinner with all the trimmings (a 20lb turkey for 3 people seemed like overkill).  It was my first attempt at cooking a stuffed chicken (T had some experience so we were good to go). I was convinced something was going to go wrong...but much to my surprise, everything was done at the same time and it was DELICIOUS!!!

And it looked amazing if I do say so myself.
Crispy and delicious

The stuffing was a hit, and it is so easy to make:
Stuffing business
All you do is fry up some bacon (3 pieces or so), and with some of the grease cook onion, celery, garlic, and mushrooms, add some walnuts or pecans, stale bread, and fresh cranberries. Insert into chicken/turkey. We had leftovers, so we cooked it in some tinfoil (to kill the gross chicken bacteria) for about 45 minutes. The dryer outside stuffing is a nice side dish, and the inside chicken stuffing is a great addition to the turkey!


Another tip is to make homemade cranberry sauce. It is so easy. On the back of a cranberry package it has instructions but basically all that needs to be done is boil some water with sugar (or splenda) added, and then boil the cranberries for 10 minutes. So much better than canned cranberry sauce!

Other highlights of the weekend were dealing with some creepy crawlers inside the cottage, and moving the little sail boat back under the cottage since Mike and I had used it earlier this summer. It involved a lot of heavy lifting, and me being in the crawl space with bugs, and bats and who knows what else...shudder.

On the way back from the cottage we stopped at the Holland Marsh market and got a weeks worth of veggies for 15 dollars. Man I love that place!

We got this bad boy for a buck fifty.

Pen is for reference
Biggest Zucchini ever. Not sure what I am going to do with it but I guess we will be eating zucchini for the rest of the week!

When we got home Mike and I went out for Sushi (we were sick of leftovers) and went to visit our friends in our building, who were supposed to join us for thanksgiving, but had a last minute change of plans. They had leftover apple pie and vanilla ice cream to share!  Like I said this weekend was full of awesome sauce! 

I can't believe it is already Wednesday, hope everyone is enjoying their short week!

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Food for Thought

I like food. I like cooking food, I like shopping for food, I especially like eating food, that is the best part. As I mentioned before I am not so much a fan of baking as cooking, and I am not sure why. Perhaps I am channeling a little Hannah Hart? (If you have no idea what genius I am talking about please check it out, ps NSFW there may be swearing, and drunkenness involved).

But cooking, we are besties. Back in the day, when I was 17ish, I decided to cook a big fancy smancy meal for my parents just to prove I could do it. I snuck all these cook books up to my room the night before, planned my meal, listed the ingredients, made a Gantt chart to schedule the food making process (Seriously made a Gantt chart without even knowing what it was until much later.) I got up early in the morning, bought the ingredients and started to cook.

The menu that day was Zucchini and cream cheese appetizer things, ribs with a Hoisin sauce, greek roasted potatoes, carrots, and an triple layer pastry dessert. So me (and the little brother) started cooking, and cooking and cooking. The meal turned out amazingly even though the zucchini was actually cucumber, and the pastry thing was cooked on wax paper not parchment paper, everything was edible and finished on time.
I still make that rib recipe, it is my go to "impressive meal option." It hasn't let me down yet.

When I moved into my own place, I really started liking cooking more so to cook every day meals than create fancy smacy ones all the time. I really like taking recipes and creating something good out of basic ingredients. I like to mix things up, go off recipe and substitute things that I have on hand. I had been pretty lucky to make some delicious food...until Saturday.

I had the ingredients to make a shrimp/sausage/pasta dish with veggies and hotness. Everything was going well until I decided to add some sauce for flavour. Unfortunately, the sweet flavours of the BBQ sauce mixed with the thai chillies, and the salty shrimp flavours tasted (to me) had a slightly acidic taste...like vomit. Literally like vomit. Bleehhh. Not good at all. Luckily, Mike seemed to like it fine enough, and he ate it with some cheese which he promised hid the flavour. What a good boyfriend.

So that was my first really bad meal I have made. Ever. Boo.

So I redeemed myself tonight by following actual recipes, and creating this:


Green thing: Perfectly ripe avocado. Nomm.
Red thing: Tomato and Lentil Salad modified from SOS Cusine which is a awesome website for budget food shopping and creates meal plans based on what is on sale in your area!

Ingredients:
1 cup of lentils (I used red lentils)
2 tomatos
2 cloves of garlic
2 green onions
2 tsp Dried dill
Salt/Pepper

Dressing:
1 tsp dijon mustard
2 tsp red wine vinegar
2 tbsp of olive oil

1. Rise and drain lentils. Add the lentils and diced garlic to a pan. Add enough water to cover the lentils, and a few shakes of salt. Bring to a boil, then bring down to simmer (uncovered) until the lentils are cooked (20 minutes). Stir often.
2. While that is cooking dice the tomatoes, add them to a bowl. Add the onions (chopped) and dill and some salt and pepper.
3. Mix the dressing together well to emulsify the oil and vinegar, add to tomatoes.
4. Once the lentils are done drain any excess water and add to salad.
5. Mix and serve and enjoy!

Orange thing: I also made a sweet dumpling squash (cut, seeded and slightly margerined, cooked for 45 minutes at 350) and I could barely finish the meal! It was so filling, and flavorful, and delicious!

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

A Smattering of Things

Now that the totally typical weight loss challenge has come to an end (you can relive the glory here) it is time to focus on the pink hard hat. Not the actual pink hard hat, that is sitting in my closet, I mean this blog.

So today, because I am feeling random, I am going to let you into my brain.

These are the kinds of things I think about/observe while I am waiting for an elevator, stuck in traffic, making dinner, whenever my mind wanders. Seriously this is all over the place, there are no segways whatsoever.
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Something that makes me shake my head, the people who come into the elevator on the phone, in an obviously important phone call, and then get REALLY upset when they loose a signal. Seriously, you didn't see that coming??

Also to do with elevators, I once had a piece of toast with PB on it with me, and I felt like I was breaking some sort of no food rule, so I never did it again. The other day a chicky had A BOWL OF COOKED OATMEAL. And was eating it in the elevator. My first thought: "where is she going to put the dirty bowl?"
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Food related: I think bringing fish related leftovers to work is gross. It makes the entire office smell like fish. Not that I personally mind the smell of fish, but some people really do! No fish for me for lunch.
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Driving stories time! Driving to work lately has been ridiculous. The roads are full any time after 7:20am, and then again after 5:00pm. So if I go to work early, it takes me 15 minutes each way. If I go to work later, it takes me 30 minutes on a good day. This would mean to a logical person that I should go to work early...but no, I am full of lazy in the morning. 

A while ago, I was driving to work and a cop car was near by so everyone was following the rules. Then the cop car started following a mini van. It was pretty much tailing the van, so when the cop car got right on the van, the van sped up. I am not sure why it just didn't change lanes, but eventually the cop car "made" the van go over the speed limit, and then the cop turned on the lights, and pulled over the van. I really hope there was more to the story than I saw but if not it was pretty ridiculous. 

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Mike did something pretty funny the other day, and maybe this was a you had to be there kind of thing, but I will try to do it justice. We went out for dinner on Friday, and I ate half my sandwich and got the rest packed up. Right before we left the restaurant I went to the restroom, and when I came back, Mike had this look on his face. He has a goofy "I did something bad" face, like a child. So I start blabbing on about something, and he stops me and says all serious he says "By the way, there may be a bite out of your sandwich when you eat it for lunch tomorrow." Then I proceeded to die laughing because sure enough, I opened the container and there was the smallest of bites gone from it. Super sneaky, that boyfriend is. 
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Was that random enough for you? 

Tonight I had homemade beef stew and it was AMAZING! I followed this really simple recipe, but used the modifications the reviewer Corinne suggests. I also added 2 extra cloves of garlic because I love garlic. 

It was delicious, and so easy.
I cooked the meat and onions and put them in a container last night, I also did the Worcestershire sauce/wine/beef stock deglaze mixture and put that in another container and put it in the fridge. I then chopped...well Mike chopped..all the veggies and we put those in the slow cooker with the spices to have a scandelous party over night, and then added the rest in the morning, and when I came home it was READY TO NOM!!

Soo good. 

And with that I bid you adieu with this classic that Mike is now blasting from his phone: