La Vida Fresca

I went to bed last night with the best intentions of waking up at 4:30 to kick off a week of a.m. workouts because lately it has been all evening gym sessions and that kind of schedule doesn’t leave me with much time for anything else. When I got in bed around 11:30, I knew I wouldn’t get much sleep but that was okay because it would mean I’d be tired all day Monday and ready to hit the hay early and wake up early the next morning.

Wrong.

That plan would have worked fine, but once I got in bed I ended up tossing and turning for hours. It seemed like forever. That never happens to me. I’m blaming it on late afternoon/early evening caffeine but that can’t be all. Whatever it was, I didn’t sleep until very late (early?) and somewhere in the tossing and turning I reset my alarm for 7. I guess I was too tired to get up then because I didn’t wake up until 30 minutes before I was supposed to be at work.

So much for good intentions.

I had to swap my workout clothes in the bathroom for my work clothes in my gym bag, which later sat next to my desk all day so I could work out this evening. Oh well. I am particularly excited today because it is a run day. I think I’m going to try 20 minutes of running with a good 10 minutes of walking before and after.

I wanted to make a green smoothie but the air conditioning has been out at work for a whole week (yikes!) and they replaced the unit today, so I couldn’t really fire up the blender until late in the afternoon when the AC guys were gone. I’m glad that’s done because the heat index is 107 degrees today.

It was so hot today I barely drank half of my usual ginormous cup of coffee (loaded with full-fat half and half as usual). I was pretty hungry by about 12:30 and had this Morningstar Farms veggie burger on an Arnold Sandwich Thin with mustard and pickles. So tasty even though I had to microwave everything rather than toast it because I needed to head out the door with a quickness.

I also had this. Pears are so delicious and perfect for a hot day.

Later, I couldn’t wait any longer to try one of the packets in this Amazing Grass sampler that came in the mail today. I’ve been dying to try it and really wanted to use the Chocolate Superfood to see if I wanted to order a huge 2 lb. canister of one of the company’s other products, Amazing Meal Chocolate Infusion, which I have to order by Thursday to be able to use Jenna’s awesome 40 percent off coupon! The Amazing Meal also contains protein which the SuperFood doesn’t. I think I paid less than $8 (includes shipping) for three sampler packs using Jenna’s earlier coupon for 15 percent off.

I used one packet of Chocolate Green SuperFood, a frozen banana, and a few big handfuls of spinach.

The verdict? Pretty tasty! The chocolate flavor was there but it wasn’t very strong.  There was a bit of a powder consistency to it but really it wasn’t bad at all.  This would be a good pre-workout snack or breakfast on a hot day and it would be easy to sneak into a glass of chocolate milk or almond milk. I’ll have to see if I can find $50 in my budget for a 2 lb. tub.

Off to the gym in a bit!

Here, I’m sharing a recipe that I used for cupcakes with added protein powder. It’s basically the common canned pumpkin and cake mix recipe but with added protein and water to help balance out the protein. You could probably experiment using some egg whites instead or a combination of water and egg whites.

This recipe is simple. There are five ingredients: cake mix, canned pumpkin, water, protein, and some chopped up chocolate.

Take a regular box of cake mix and combine with four scoops of unflavored whey protein powder. You could use whatever kind you want here but I really can’t stand flavored protein powder with fake sweeteners so I use unflavored. I really only use protein powder in smoothies and cakes/muffins anyway.

Once they are combined, add a 15-ounce can of plain pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling). Add 3/4 cup of water. Mix with mixer just like a regular cake mix. Stir in chopped up chocolate pieces. I would’ve preferred some nice dark chocolate but all I had were Hershey miniature milk chocolate bars, so I used three (I figured in three mini bars ~45 calories each in the nutrition stats).  The texture of the batter is going to be much thicker than regular cake batter.

Next, put into muffin tins prepared with paper liners and fill to top of liners. This actually makes about 15 cupcakes. Bake at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes.

This is an alright post-workout snack both because it’s fortified with a little protein and because it’s a cupcake.

Stats for one cupcake:

~180 calories

6 grams of fat

26 grams of carbohydrates

8 grams of protein

Soup and grilled cheese sounds good. Better than “refrigerator soup” which is what I’ve been calling it all day. Okay, how’s “Garden Vegetable Soup,” or “Vegetarian Vegetable?” You can fancy it up however you like. The reason I made soup today is that I wanted to go to the farmers market for produce but I had no room in the refrigerator. I had to use up what was there before I could go and buy more groceries, so that’s what I did. I had cut up vegetables — celery, onion, broccoli, cauliflower, baby carrots — that needed to go. They were still fresh, but I was ready to move on to different food.  I also had shredded mozzarella that needed something done with it and a loaf of whole wheat bread that needs to go.

Here’s what I came up with:

(I threw in some green beans from the freezer too.)  I figured I’d calculate the nutrition info and start a page for the nutritionally-minded cooks out there on the interweb looking for meal ideas. While this meal surely could’ve been cleaner or better (depending on whose standards you’re using — more protein, less dairy, lower carb, less dead, more alive, etc. etc. etc.) you could surely do a lot worse. Here’s what I made and here’re the stats:

Grilled cheese sandwiches: two slices whole wheat bread, about 1/3 c. of shredded cheese with a little real butter on the bread and olive oil spray in the pan to prevent sticking. I used 1 tbsp. of butter and I figured about 1/2 tsp. of olive oil between the three sandwiches that I made.

The sandwich had 362 calories, 43 grams of carbs, 15 fat, and 15 protein.

The soup was made up of the vegetables I mentioned plus tomato sauce, canned diced tomatoes, spices, and fresh garlic. It was enough to almost fill a 5-quart slow cooker (The soup only cost me the first 10 minutes of my lunch break today).

Each cup of soup had 51 calories, a negligible amount of fat (.3 grams), 12 grams of carbs, and 2.5 protein. I had about 2 cups (roughly 2/3 of what I had in the bowl — I couldn’t finish it all). It was actually too much food for me, volume-wise, but I ended up with a meal that was 464 calories, 15 fat, 55 carb, and 17.5 protein. Not too bad. Plus it was quick, easy, and my fridge is much emptier!