Last Night in DC

Hiya! Happy Tuesday (!?) night. I am running around like a crazy lady trying to get my life in order/ready for a business trip tomorrow. I didn’t get a work out in today because I had too much packing and random other things to do before my trip tomorrow morning, but my eating and water consumption has been very on track. Plus, I get to the hotel tomorrow and am by myself until Friday, when my other coworkers arrive, so I plan to try to get a workout in both tomorrow and Thursday.

Afternoon snack today was watermelon chunks (1 pt) leftover from the party yesterday.

I loove watermelon – it completely reminds me of summer and I love that its so juicy and messy. Not the cutest fruit to eat at your desk but as long as no one’s looking, it’s fine. 🙂 I also had 3 Wasa Crackers when I got home (1 pt)

I just ate them plain because I was hungry before dinner was ready, and 3 of these is only 1 pt. They are crunchy but a little on the bland side – but I like them.

Wil made us dinner for my last night – Lemongrass Bok choy soup. It was sooo good and so healthy! First, he chopped up some lemongrass. Have you seen lemongrass before?

I hadn’t! We actually got it a few weeks ago at the Asian Market, but as long as you peel the outside parts of, it has a long shelf life. He put it into a mix of water and veggie broth and cooked it for 20 minutes or so.

While we had a glass of wine on the balcony.

I know I said cutting out unnecessary drinks is one of my goals for the month – but tonight was necessary – its my last night with him until Monday! 🙂 I ended up having 2 glasses of wine, one before and one with dinner (total 4 points). It was actually quite good – Garganegna, a leftover bottle from the party yesterday.

Once the lemongrass had infused in the liquid for 20 minutes or so, he strained it out of the water/broth, and added in chopped bok choy, a fresh ear of corn, 1 package of Nasoya pre-cubed tofu, and 2 servings of rice noodles. It made an awesome, super flavorful soup that was so delicious.

The lemongrass really flavored the broth, but we decided it probably would have been better to leave it a bit longer to let out even more flavor. The entire recipe had 14 points, so half of it (what’s pictured x2) was 7 points. Very worth it and something I will definitely make again – though next time I would probably add even more veggies to bulk it up a bit.

So overall today’s eating was really good, though it does feel a bit weird to be counting points! My daily target is 24, and the break down is like this:

Breakfast – Oats w/Vitatop – 5

Lunch – Huge Salad + Grapes 5

Afternoon Snacks – Watermelon + Wasa Crackers – 2

Wine – 2 Glasses – 4

Dinner – Lemongrass Bok Choy Soup – 7

I still have one left so I’ll probably have a snack in a little bit. I still have a bunch of random things to do before tomorrow – finish packing toiletries and other random things I need (phone charger, camera charger…) so I have to get back to it!

What are your best tips for staying on track during business travel?

Dangerous Dr. Krackers

Hiya! They were saying mid 70s and sunny today but it is looking pretty gloomy outside… pretty sad. That might not stop me from a later afternoon frozen yogurt stop though. 🙂

For lunch today I had a mix of leftovers and things I’m trying to use up since I’ll be going out of town tomorrow. I used almost all of the baby kale I had left to make a massaged kale salad with 2 tsp olive oil and some salt. With the salad I had ~ 1/2 cup rice noodles (leftover from Tuesday’s Lettuce Wraps) and the baked tempeh from last night. I also put a squirt of BBQ sauce on the plate for good measure.

On the side, I had the rest of the roasted parsnips and sweet potatoes, also left over from last night.

So simple, but so good. I love how roasted veggies get so sweet that you can just eat them plain and they have so much flavor.

But then came the best/worst thing to happen… Dr Krackers Pumpkin Seed Cheddar Snackers.

From the website, “We toast this cracker while it’s baking to coax the “wow” out of those delicious organic pumpkin seeds, and to get that the most out of that unique, extra-crispy toasted cheddar flavor. Absolutely delicious.” And delicious they were. Do you see how each kracker (I absolutely love writing cracker with a k) has cheese baked on top?

Oh.my.god. Seriously, these are like nothing I’ve ever tasted before. If you see these anywhere, BUY THEM. What made them the worst thing is I could not stop eating them. Luckily I ran around my office and made everyone who would talk to me try one, so I didn’t eat them ALL myself, but I made a pretty hefty dent and now the box is empty. These krackers (awesome) are really crunchy, which again takes a little getting used to during your first bite, but then they are like heaven. Everyone in my office agreed just in case you don’t believe me. 😉

Hope Friday is being good to you!

Unwrapped Lettuce Wraps

Hey! Those Chia Seeds seriously kept me full until after 1pm.. unheard of. I’m excited to experiment with them in different ways because there are a ton of ideas all over the place!

For lunch today, I used leftovers from last night’s lettuce wraps to make a salad.

Onto my plate went:

• torn organic green leaf lettuce
• bean sprouts
• 1/2 cup rice noodles
• mango chunks
• marinated tofu
• pickled red onions for garnish

There was so much going on in this salad and the flavors were awesome. It was easier to eat than the wraps last night because the lettuce didn’t work well to hold everything together.. so throwing it all together and diving in with a fork worked well. With the salad, I had some red grapes (on sale at Whole Foods!)

And a serving of Dr. Krackers Seedlander Snackers.

I had commented on Kath’s blog about how I had never tried these crackers before but they look so good, so someone from Dr. Kracker reached out to me and asked if I’d like to sample some. They sent me a box with all the flavors, so I’m really excited to make my way through them. According to the Dr. Kracker website, “Millet-crunchy and molasses-sweet, our Seedlander Kracker is baked with our specially milled, 100% whole grain organic spelt flour, combined with organic pumpkin seeds, millet, sesame, flax, and poppy seeds. Its sturdy texture and nutty, slightly sweet flavor make it the perfect cracker for cheese and fruit plates and creamy dips and spreads.”

As you can see from looking at these up close, they are LOADED with different kinds of seeds. They are very crunchy – in fact, I was a little taken aback by how hard they were at first – but once I got used to them, I was in love! They taste so good, and have just a hint of sweetness. They went great with my sandwich and I’m looking forward to figuring out new ways to use them and try the other flavors!

As I was eating my lunch, I noticed that I ate my whole salad first, then moved onto the crackers, and then finished with the grapes. I never really noticed before that I finish one thing before moving onto the next.. strange!

Question for today: Do you eat a little bit of everything in your meal and finish it all together, or do you finish one item at a time (like I do apparently!) when you’re eating?

Happy Cinco de Mayo! Anyone have any fun plans?

Lettuce Wraps

Hey! Today was one of the busiest days at work that I’ve had in a loooong time. I decided against taking a picture of my lunch because it was a business lunch. Not gonna lie though, it felt a little weird not to take a picture. When I first started the blog, I felt weird taking pictures and kept forgetting, and now it feels like somethings missing if I don’t! We ended up going to Old Ebbitt Grill and there were 5 of us total. We got an order of fried calamari to share to start and I had one piece of sourdough bread with real butter. So good! For my main course, I ordered the Salmon Nicoise Salad (no dressing). It was a piece of seared salmon on top of a bed of greens with kalamata olives, boiled potatoes, a hard boiled egg, green beens, chopped tomatoes, and red onions. So good, and I ate the entire thing.

For an afternoon snack, a bunch of coworkers and I headed over to Yogen Fruz. Today I changed it up and got the nonfat plain mixed with frozen cherries. I had it topped with dark chocolate shavings…

It was sooo good. I love how this place will stir in whatever frozen fruit or flavor you want to make the yogurt actually change flavors. Mmmm.

The greatest part of being so busy at work is that the days have been FLYING by. When 5 o’clock came I could honestly barely believe it. Once I stepped outside, it was still SO nice out. I think it was still around 80 degrees and sunny, but not humid at all. That’s rare for DC! I decided to take the night off completely from working out just to give my body a break. Three days of Bikram in a row plus an 8 mile bike ride thrown in there called for a day off.

My boyfriend had the night off too, so we ran to heaven Whole Foods to pick up a few things and got ingredients for Lettuce Wraps! The perfect warm weather dinner in my opinion. 🙂

I marinated some tofu right in the container with fish sauce, soy sauce, and sweet chili sauce for about 30  minutes while I put the rest of the groceries away and unloaded the dishwasher.

I also boiled the rice noodles, which only took 2 minutes and then ran them under cold water to get them cold. The boyfriend was in charge of everything else, including cooking the tofu in the wok after it had marinated. Here was the spread:

The tofu, chicken thighs in a similar marinade (for him), mango, rice noodles, bean sprouts, pickled kale and red onions (!!!), sliced red onions and cilantro, and organic green leaf lettuce. I put together 4 lettuce wraps and piled them high with bean sprouts, rice noodles, pickled onions, mango, and the marinated tofu.

They were sooooo good, but definitely a little messy.

Everything was so fresh and the textures, flavors, and colors worked perfectly together. The tofu was so flavorful from sitting in the marinade for longer than I usually let it – I have to work on my patience and give the tofu time to soak up the marinade more often! I love lettuce wraps and these were perfect.

I’m off to watch a movie and relax – be back tomorrow!