What is THIS?!!

OM NOM NOM. That is all.

Well. I’ll tell ya one thing, it’s freakin’ delicious. Yesterday, I picked up some spelt flour in an attempt to bake something that would make a nice little treat without making me feel like I’d gained about 15 pounds by the time I finished it. So, keep it simple right? I had a few bananas chillin’ out in my freezer so I thought, why not make banana bread? I figured it’d be interesting to see what a couple little substitutions could do for me. The last time I made this recipe, I made it with whole wheat flour and Splenda. I thought I might die. Tonight, I used spelt flour and real sugar, threw in a 1/4 cup of ground flax seed and some cranberries. I’ve had a couple of pieces and I feel great!

Adapted as above.. straight substitute the spelt for normal flour. It’s delicious but this one is a bit crumbly so maybe next time I’ll put an extra banana in or maybe use the flaxseed instead of 1/4 cup spelt flour. It’s a culinary work in progress. 🙂

Banana Bread Recipe (http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/banana_bread/)

Prep time: 5 minutes

• Cook time: 1 hour

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Method

No need for a mixer for this recipe.  Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).  With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl.  Mix in the sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in.  Add the flour last, mix.  Pour mixture into a buttered 4×8 inch loaf pan.  Bake for 1 hour.  Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to serve.

Just another Friday night…

Sometimes, when I’ve had a long week, I nap on Friday evenings. Sometimes those naps turn into 4 hour long sleeps that leave me waking up a starving mess at 10 oclock at night.

It happens, so I have a plan for it. Tonight, it was a Greek night. I say that in complete hindsight though. I had an apple and some Greek yogurt when I woke up starving (sleeping through the dinner hour is not a diet I recommend!), watched a solid rom-com, My Life In Ruins (totally in love with the Greek bus driver), and am now realizing that I’m wearing a blue and white hoodie from my university dorm room days.

You guys, I have the most exciting life ever. Sometimes, I wonder how you all even manage to keep up!

Taste the Rainbow.

Oh, awkward. That’s also the Skittles slogan. Well that’s sort of convenient I guess because I do love me some Skittles…. but I’m getting off topic.

I look forward to a lot of typically mundane things in life, mainly because I’m sort of  a loser  excitable. But one of the things I get most stoked about is grocery shopping. Oh, mercy. I get pathetically excited for groceries. I think maybe it’s all the delicious, nutritious possibilities that I’m hit with as I walk through the aisles. All the produce and the colours and the crispy, misty goodness. Ahhh yes. The rainbow that is the produce aisle. Welcome to my Sunday afternoon.

Tonight, I used green and red pepper (local) and some onion (not local) in a bit of a veal/kidney bean stirfry type thing. Dammnnnn. So tasty. Throw a little hot sauce up in there and boo-yah, dinnah time! It was delicious. I present you with my dinner:

 

 

 

Fuzzy hotel pic of the ensemble!

BOOM!

 

And yes, I am pale. Thank you.

And ALL my love and best wishes for the happy couple. See you both soon! xoxo

Wicked Wednesday and some random thoughts…

So here I am, sitting in my post gym shower glory. Just chillin out till I can actually get to sleep and I figured, hey, why not totally stimulate my brain and write a wee little post about the rock star workout I just did. Let’s go. Little 2.5 mile jaunt on the big E for a warm up, 3×15 dead lifts (45lbs), 3×25 weighted side ups (25lbs) *, 3×25 row lifts (35lbs), 3×15 swiss ball roll outs, 3×30 +10 elevated leg sit ups, 3×20 bicycles, 3×10 weighted leg raises, 3.5 mile elliptical. My body is in a state of “what the hell just happened here” and in my head, I’m like “That’s right, champ. Get used to it.”

I’ve been loving the results I’m seeing with the increase in my weight training, especially in my arms and my core. Who would have thought that doing a few dead lifts would make such a difference? Amaahhhhzing.

Which brings me to my first random thought – Crossfit. To try the kool-aid or not?! I’ve never really been one to subscribe to any of the latest fitness fads or diets, I’m more about what I know works for me. I had a trainer once and I fired her because she was a mean little she-devil andtried to make me do things I wasn’t comfortable with by shaming me into it based on my size. So is this going to be any different? I’ve done a bit of reading about it and the troubles it can cause people who do it improperly and with poor nutrition and it scared the living daylights out of me…. but then I see the results people have with it and I wonder “could this be change I need?” Now, I’m really lucky to have some friends who are doctors and they have all warned me against it. One of them was very passionate about it :

” Crossfit is a stupid program and will ultimately end up injuring you. Don’t do it.”

I think I’d be remiss if I asked for advice, and had a doctor tell me not to do it and then did it anyway. But what I want to know is why? What makes it so bad for you? The extremes maybe? The pylometrics? To be clear, I would not do those box jumps. just… no. So here is my plan, world. I am going to take aspects of Crossfit and incorporate them into my workout. No, I will not be flipping a tire end over end or doing 400 walking lunges (I have to be able to move on a daily basis so this is not conducive to my lifestyle), but I might do some medicine ball smashes or some chin ups or something. I dunno, I’ve got some serious Youtube/Pinterest/Google research to do yet.

Also, how awesome is autumn? It’s starting to turn a bit cooler here and this pale skinned princess is loving it! There’s something just so great about being able to get fresh apples from the farm market and make fresh roasted butternut squash soup (sooo good!). I really love the fall produce (squash, kale, beets), so keep your eyes peeled for some delish recipes using them. Oh, and some wheat free recipes as I embark on my new life without wheat. My real weakness when it comes to baked goods is a good, moist banana bread so I’m going to source out a buckwheat banana bread recipe and try it out. Pretty excited! But this journey into produce and WF baking is all going to have to wait until at LEAST next week because this is the weekend I’ll be rockin’ the red dress at the cousin’s wedding! STOKED!

A final note, while we’re discussing dresses – the sweater dress. A fall fave for many but it’s something I just don’t understand. So, I am making it my mission to find the perfect sweater dress for this bod. Thank GOODNESS one of my cousin works retail because giirrrrrlll, Imma need some help!

Tremblant, October 2010. Early morning = sweatpants

🙂

My new best friend

He’s gonna make my tummy look/feel OOOOOOO-TAAAAYYYYYYY!!

An open letter to wheat

Dear Wheat,

We’ve had some good times. Really, we have. The quick bagels on the way to class in the morning. The sandwiches at lunch (with soup, or salad). The pasta at dinner. The late night, post bar pizza… Oh my gosh, you used to make me feel so SO good. I loved you once, I really did. But I know you’ve noticed I turn to you less and less as I try to be the best me I can be. Don’t lie, you know it’s true. I go for my Green Monster smoothies in the morning, my salad and protein for lunch and dinner, my healthy snacks instead of the cookies and other tempting goodies you have to offer.

I’ve tested the waters with you lately, trying to see if we could make things work. To see if I could have you in my life…. but I can’t. I’m not sorry. It’s not me, it’s you. You used to leave me feeling satisfied and happy. Now, you just leave me feeling sick and uncomfortable and bad about myself. Why you gotta be like that? I guess what I’m trying to say is that I think I need you out of my life for good. I’ve worked too hard  and come too far to keep having you around, like a dirty secret option when I need a quick fix. So that’s that. This is over. I’m tired of how you make me feel and the bloating that comes after. But don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll have a series of really filling relationships with university girls for years. You go really well with a drunken night. I mean, I won’t call you a drunken mistake because that would be mean and we both know, I’m not like that…

And don’t say I’ll be back or that I can’t find anything better. I won’t be and I have. You might know a few of them, I think you’re sort of related… buckwheat, spelt, millet… yeah. They’re much better of a match with me than you are. I know this hurts, but you’ll manage. Here’s a pic of us in happier times.

All my love,

Erin

A conversation I had tonight..

Me:people who think that we enjoy ourselves while we do this are so so wrong hahah

Friend: its a love hate thing. while doing it, it totally sucks but afterwards… man does it ever feel good

Me: exactly. Did I hate my life tonight, you better believe it. Do I love my size 4 dress? F**k yes I do.

 

Surround yourself with like minded people and your goals are that much more attainable! Thanks, friend! 🙂

The annual check up

So I’ll be honest, I used to hate DREAD my annual physical with my doctor. It meant being weighed by a petite blonde nurse who would write that weight down in my file for my doctor to see. Forever. For everyone to see. Some people are put off by the whole peeing in the cup or having blood taken. For me it was the weight. A couple of years ago, when I showed up for my physical weighing about 175 pounds, my doctor practically had to pick his jaw up off the floor. I blew his mind! We were looking through my chart when I got in the exam room trying to figure out what my highest weight was, the file said 289. The next couple pages were blank because those were the ones that I some how managed to deke around the weigh-in and get right into the exam room (sneaky, right?).

I can remember sitting through check-ups with words like “pre-diabetic” and “insulin resistant” being tossed around…. “heart disease”, “joint problems”. When I was 17, I was diagnosed with Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome which was due in large part to my weight (no pun intended). It was a pretty horrible time with a lot of tests and specialists and I was really glad that my parents were so great, even if maybe I didn’t realize it at the time.  I’ve spent a bit of time in waiting rooms lately and I’ve been really glad that I’ve been able to BBM with my dad during them. It’s not the same as looking at magazines with him or my mom, but it’ll do.

Anyway, I digress. Annual check up 2012 was just what I’ve come to expect from my doctor in the past couple of years. I hop up on the scale, the nurse marks down the number (approvingly, I like to think), and I carry on my way to the exam room. This year, my doctor was the one to come get me from the waiting room and his words were music to my ears “Erin, are you slimmer than you were last year?!” hahahah “Well, I dunno, let’s find out?” haha The number was the same but I do have more 8s and 10s in my wardrobe than I did last year. The number isn’t as important as how I feel and well, how my clothes fit and my stomach looks to be honest. I think everyone has their “area” that they gauge themselves by. I have a couple, my collarbones and my stomach/hipbones. I like being able to be like “oh hey, hip bones, what’s up!”

Through the usual barrage of questions, and a lot of talk about my trip in January, my physical was more of a social visit than a scary event. No more talk about health ailments or frightening, impending conditions. Smiles for miles and the best words I could ever hear “You’re completely healthy. We’ll see you in a year.”

Live, love, laugh! 🙂