2 types of peanut butter apple pie smoothies

I rarely buy flavored yogurt because they always have SO MUCH sugar.  Instead, I buy plain yogurt and add honey and sometimes fruit.  Well, a couple of weeks ago I was up at my parents house and they had some apple cinnamon chobani yogurt.  Um, holy cow.  Pretty much the best yogurt I’d ever eaten in my life.  Except that it had 20 grams of sugar.  20 grams.

But of course, I had to buy myself some when I got home and for a week or so I was hooked on this stuff.  But finally I came to my senses and realized, while incredibly amazing, I had to say goodbye.

But before I did, I decided to try it in a smoothie and let me tell you, it did not disappoint.

Peanut Butter Apple Pie Smoothie (take 1)

• 1 container Chobani Apple Cinnamon greek yogurt
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1 cup spinach
• 1.5 cups vanilla unsweetened almond milk

Sometimes I still dream about this smoothie.  In fact, I had been dreaming about it for so long I decided to try to recreate it using whole foods without the extra sugar from the yogurt.

Here’s what I came up with.

Peanut Butter Apple Pie smoothie (take 2)

• 1/2 medium honey crisp apple (chopped)
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 1/4 cup old-fashioned oats
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon + more for garnish
• 1.5 cups vanilla unsweetened almond milk
• (I was out of spinach but I’d definitely add it in if you have some).

I’ll be completely honest with you my friends, take 1 was better.  Whatever Chobani puts in that yogurt is incredible (and I will say that Chobani adds only natural ingredients so it’s not like there’s a bunch of fake crap in there, it just has a lot of sugar from the apples, apple juice – whatever magical mixture they put in there).  But take 2 was a nice substitute and made me feel a lot better about what I drinking.  I highly recommend both versions.  You really can’t go wrong.

 

Cutting back on carbs

Not sure if my body has finally adjusted or what but this morning I got up at 5am to work out and I don’t feel like a tired zombie yet…Technically the night is still early so who knows, I may wind up in bed by 9… we shall see.  Let’s just hope my body’s not too used to early AM alarms because I’m really looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow.  At least until 8:30 or so.

Instead of going to the gym like I planned, I opted for 45 minutes of my friend Jillian :)  I did levels 1 and 2 of 30 Day Shred and felt great.  So great that I decided to add in yet another double day and went to Zumba this afternoon.  Someone will be feeling sore tomorrow.

On the food front, also a good day – breakfast was a tasty little number I whipped up involving watermelon and bananas.  I swear, frozen watermelon is so good in smoothies.

Watermelon Banana Protein Smoothie:

• 1/2 cup frozen watermelon
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 1 scoop vanilla protein powder
• 1 cup spinach
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk

Lunch involved a Larabar after the gym plus leftover chicken from last night’s fajitas mixed with some goat cheese.  Not my best effort but it got the job done.  Dinner however, was fantastic.  A random little salad beast with my new favorite dressing.

Turkey Spinach Salad

• 1 giant bowl of spinach
• 1 chopped organic tomato
• Goat cheese crumbles
• 4 slices of deli turkey meat torn into pieces
• Honey balsamic vinaigrette (1/2 c olive oil, 1/4 c honey, 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar)

That dressing makes for more than just one salad FYI.

And then washed that down with a little popcorn – air popped with a tablespoon of melted butter, cheese sprinkles and nutritional yeast.

Pretty nice little Friday I tell ya.

But let’s be honest, all that stuff above was nice but I’m sure you really want to know why the title of this post is cutting back on carbs, right?  So I had my annual physical today – not like my lady physical – I share my life but some stuff doesn’t need sharing.  This was just my physical where they do your blood work and test all your cholesterol and such.  Technically my dr said I only need to come in every couple of years but my insurance covers a full work-up every year so of course I’m going to take them up on it.

Excluding your lady physical, how many of you go in for regular, yearly physicals?  How many of you actually know what your cholesterol is?

Everything came back awesome.  The first thing my doctor asked me before he even told me my results was if I exercised :)  He said my labs were fantastic and it was very evident that I’m in shape and physically active.  Yes!  Apparently my good, bad and combined ratio of cholesterol is phenomenal.  My iron levels are good, my liver functions are good, lipids are good… basically if this was a test in school I would have gotten an A+.  Except when it came to my glucose.

I should mention that I have a family history of diabetes.  Not like my mom or dad, more like on my mom’s dad’s side (which is a side I don’t know so I can’t ask them for more details)  so my doctor has always watched my glucose numbers because unfortunately a family history of diabetes can kick your butt even if you are super healthy and follow an amazing diet.  Now, my glucose levels are not out of the “normal” range, but they did happen to fall on the absolute highest level of normal…basically I’m 10 points (?) away from being pre-diabetic.  That is no good.

And again, he was not overly concerned with this but brought it up as something to watch.  Especially because at some point Chris and I would like kids and having a family history of diabetes can sometimes make a woman more susceptible to gestational diabetes which while temporary in some women, could push my levels over the edge and turn me diabetic which is really, really scary.

So we chatted and his best advice was to “stay slim.”  He said that’s actually a “prescription” they give to patients who become pre-diabetic.  He said the best thing I could do was to keep exercising and cut back on carbs – bread, pasta, rice.  And I admit, while I’m not a big bread eater we do eat a lot of pasta in this house.  A lot.  I would say that 75% of our weekly dinners involve some type of noodle.  It’s actually super interesting to me that this is the first time my levels have been this high and this past year I’ve been eating pasta a lot more than I had in the past.  Coincidence?  I’ve been trying to cut back on the noods anyway so it’s kind of nice to have a medical reason to take it easy.  Might make it easier to actually follow through.

Wow, ok this post is super long.  I need to get out of here before I write a novel.  Hope everyone has a great Friday and has some fun weekend stuff planned.  Tomorrow my mom and I are going berry picking and then we’re going to can things.  Can’t wait.

Black, Blue & Delicious + I need a new book

It’s going to be a hot one today. We’re talking 97 degrees which rarely happens here. There’s even an extreme weather advisory. Yikes. Hope I don’t melt :) And I can already tell I’m going to need some serious sunscreen because by 7:30 we had our living room fan turned on (PS we have no AC…tonight’s gonna be fun). Chris was way better than me and got up and went for a run while I opted for some leisurely breakfast eating while listening/watching Great American’s Country. Ahhhhh Saturday’s.

And I know right now you’re just dying to know what I had for breakfast so I won’t keep you in suspense any longer.

Black & Blue Protein Smoothie

• 1/2 cup frozen blueberries
• 1/2 cup frozen blackberries
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 1/2 scoop Designer Whey French Vanilla protein powder
• 1 cup (ish) spinach
• 1 teaspoon psyllilum husk powder (fiber)
• 1 teaspoon raw maca (energy/hormone balancing)
• 1.5 cups unsweetened vanilla almond milk

Nutritional stats:

Next I was going to tell you about last night’s delicious stir-fry dinner but Chris got back and asked me if I wanted to go for a walk with he and Chance. How could I say no to that? :) And then after our 20 minute (already steamy walk) I was already in my running clothes so I decided to pop out an easy 2 miler on the treadmill. Done and done!

And now we’re off to float the river. Can’t wait to see what kind of craziness we see out there.

But before I leave you I need some help. Tomorrow I’m planning on spending some leisurely time reading a book in the shade except that I have no book :( I polished off Night Circus (so good!) during last night’s spin-bike cardio session. I’m looking for a good “beachy” type read. You know, a little summertime easy reading. Maybe with a love story thrown in?

Any recommendations?

Note – apparently this post didn’t post this morning.  We’re now back from 7 hours on the river in 100 degree weather and I did not get burned anywhere!  That makes me really happy because I always seem to miss spots with my sunscreen.  Today I applied my SPF 30 about 30 times and while I was made fun of a few times I’m glad I did.  Gotta protect your skin :)

Peanut Butter Watermelon Smoothie

So yesterday I got a little crazy. We took Chance to happy hour at Sniff (Dogs play for free humans hang at the bar) and before we headed down I made a quick protein shake so I wouldn’t eat all their delicious snacks starve. I’d tossed some watermelon in the freezer earlier in the week and decided to play around with that and ended up mixing in peanut butter and almond milk. I was a little scared about the combo, I mean the potential for grossness was big. But turns out, it was delicious! I made Chris try it (he didn’t know what was in it) and he was like, “hmmm watermelon and peanut butter. Weird but it works.”

And I loved it so much yesterday that I had it again for breakfast while Chris opted for plain peanut butter. You seriously can’t go wrong either way.

Peanut Butter Watermelon Protein Smoothie
Serves 1. Blend everything up. Enjoy.

• 1 cup frozen seedless watermelon
• 1 scoop vanilla protein powder
• 2 tablespoons peanut butter (I used Justin’s Honey PB)
• 3/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• Handful of roasted, unsalted peanuts (leftover from the time I made peanut butter)

Peanut Butter Protein Smoothie
Serves 1. Blend everything up. Enjoy

• Approx 8 ice cubes
• Handful of roasted, unsalted peanuts
• 2 tablespoons peanut butter
• 3/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1 scoop vanilla protein powder

I rounded out breakfast with 2 eggs + Frank’s Hot Sauce and coffee (black with a splash of almond milk).

I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing for a workout today. I had a great weight session at the gym yesterday involving a bosu ball, step-ups, squats, tricep dips, single leg raises and tricep extensions and now I’m sore. Thinking some spin-bike cardio or maybe a little Jillian. I haven’t seen her crazy, smiling face in a while…

What are you doing for your workout today?

And in other news. We hosted dinner club at our house on Thursday and I never got around to uploading the pics so let’s take a little trip backwards…

We did taco bar with ground turkey breast, soft/hard shells, lettuce, avocados, tomatoes, cheese, sour cream and beans. Friends brought rice, chips/salsa and the most amazing guacamole I have ever had. But because things were so delicious you only get to see my plate (and yes I put ketchup on my tacos…weird but I’ve done it my whole life).

Does anyone else do this? Or do you have weird food combos you love?

But my favorite part of dinner club was baby John. He’s grown so much since last month’s dinner club. I love his chubby little cheeks.

How cute is he asleep in his momma’s arms?

And I loved that Chance was so good with him. He’s never been around babies and he was super gentle and just wanted to lick him all over.

Alright and now we’re back to the present…Later this afternoon we’re checking out the Organic Brew Fest which is always a good time as long as the rain holds. The forecast calls for a 60% chance of showers so we’ll see.

Do you guys have any fun plans for the weekend?

If you give a mouse a cookie…

He’s going to want a glass of milk*

Except we’re not talking mice and baked goods.  We’re talking about these guys:

How beautiful is that strawberry???  I came home after work to water my plants and saw that my strawberries had finally popped.  Woo hoo!  There is just something about growing your own food in your own backyard that makes you feel good.  Like, “I did that thank-you-very-much.” Plus, it feels like a sign of summer.  June strawberries = summertime.

And what did I do promptly after seeing said berry?

Ate it.  Duh.  But like I mentioned earlier, if you give a mouse lady a cookie strawberry, she’s going to start craving a strawberry smoothie :)  Which is exactly what I made.

Strawberry Cheesecake Protein Smoothie

• 6-8 fresh strawberries (I wish I could say these came from my garden but we’re not quite there in.  These came from the organic section of Fred Meyer)
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1 scoop vanilla protein powder
• 1 tablespoon sugar-free, fat-free cheesecake pudding mix
• 6-8 ice cubes

And the outtake:

Delicious.

We’re meeting some friends for dinner at Matador which is my favorite mexican restaurant and I wanted to make sure I didn’t go there starving. Did you know a protein smoothie makes a great post-work, pre-dinner snack?  My smoothie was around 200 calories with 12 grams of protein and approx 6 grams of fiber. Much better than a handful of chips.

What about you?  Do you eat a snack before dinner?  Even though I usually have something around 3-4 I always want to eat something right when I get home.  Sometimes it’s just because I’m home and eating something after a crazy day at work relaxes me and then sometimes it is genuine hunger.  This is a big area for me to work on.  Eat when I’m hungry instead of eating because I like being snacky.

Luckily, today was true and honest hunger.  Probably because I got my boo-tay kicked this afternoon at spin & sculpt.  Spin & sculpt is a class just like it sounds – 30 minutes of a spin class plus 30 minutes of sculpting (HIIT workouts – 60 seconds at a variety of stations).  I used to go to the class pretty regularly, at least twice a week, but the sculpt tends to bug my knee depending on what we’re doing.  But now since I’m not running Hood to Coast I’m a little less concerned about how my knees feel.  I’m sure a doctor would never agree with that advice but too bad (for now).

Anyway, spin was crazy.  Lots and lots of intervals in and out of the saddle.  I actually thought I was going to puke at the end.  And then we started the sculpt portion which looked like this:

• 4 Elevated pushups (on 1 step) and 4 elevated “jacks” on the step (like the bottom half of a jumping jack, jumping your feet onto the step) – 60 seconds
• Split squats with tricep extensions (3 and then switch legs) – 60 seconds
• Donkey kicks with a squishy ball behind your knee (switch legs at 30 sec) – 60 seconds
• Squats + bicep curls on bosu ball – 60 seconds
• 3 jump backs into a shoulder press (60 seconds)
• towel slide side lateral squat – (30 seconds per leg) – 60 seconds

Run up, around, and back down the gym stairs.  repeat the circuit.  Finish with abs, including a side raise toe touch thing that I’d never done but love (and can’t find an example of anywhere so at some point I should just make a video) along with a 30 second plank where I was the only person in class who was able to take it to the next level and raise one leg.  Thank you pilates.

And now I’m actually off to foam roll my legs so that I can walk tomorrow.  Happy almost Friday my friends.

* Please tell me you all have read and love, “If you give a mouse a cookie.”  It is probably my favorite children’s book.  That, and “Love you forever.” 

No resting at the gym

Yesterday at the gym I saw 6 different people on the elliptical resting their arms during their workout.  6.  6 people.  Including a guy.  That’s crazy to me.  I get that some days you’re going to hop on a bike or elliptical with a trashy gossip magazine and leisurely pedal your way through 30 minutes of easy cardio but I just don’t believe that all 6 of these people were having that type of day.  I think these people we just phoning it in (Jillian Michaels’ term)  a little bit and not giving it all their all.  When you’re doing your cardio, do your cardio.  Work up a sweat.  Move your arms!  Do not rest them on the sides of the machine.  You’ll raise your heart rate and burn more calories.  And while we’re on the topic of cardio, please add some resistance.  It’s great if you’re pumping your arms and moving your legs but you need some resistance on there to make a difference.  Plus it will help you build muscle.  And that’s good.

Now that I’m done ranting, here’s what I did at the gym:

20 minute warm-up on the rowing machine
Leg Extension: 50 lbs. 3 sets of 20 reps
Leg/Chest circuit 3 times through:

• Deadlifts – 50 lbs.  15 reps
• Squats – 50 lbs.  15 reps
• Squats with leg lift – 15 on each side
• Chest flies (lying on a weight bench) – 15 lbs. 12 reps.
• Chest press (lying on a weight bench) – 15 bs.  12 reps
• Step ups – 20 on each leg

Tricep extension – 25lbs.  3 sets of 12.
Leg press: 160 lbs.  3 sets of 12.
20 minutes on the elliptical.  Alternating minutes of level 7 (slower) and level 4 (quick).

I got home and we had a quick protein smoothie to hold us over until dinner.

Banana Strawberry Protein smoothie (serves 2)
Blend everything and enjoy.

• 1/2 cup frozen banana
• 1/2 cup frozen strawberries
• 4 scoops vanilla protein powder (I use vitacost whey)
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1 cup non-fat organic milk

After smoothies, we headed to the driving range where I realized that all of my golf lessons from last year have been forgotten.  I was pretty bad.  More than 50% of the time I swung a club and didn’t hit a ball.  But it was still fun.  I’m going to go back this weekend.

And then after golf we headed into the village and hit up Lucky Lab where I only ate one slice of pizza.  That’s big.  I never eat just one slice.  Go me.  And then we headed to Journeys.  1st time there in 2 weeks!  I had two glasses of Rose and then we headed home.

Talk about no rest!  I was go go going until 10pm.  Sheesh.  Things are almost back to normal today.  Longer than normal morning meeting but I’m going to try to get to pilates at 1:15.  Can’t wait.

Question for you – when you’re at the gym, are you guilty of not giving your all?  Do you rest your arms on the elliptical?  Or veg out and watch TV?

 

Mind over matter

That’s what Jillian told me this morning, “mind over matter.”  She said this to me as I was doing her 30 Day Shred.  The ENTIRE DVD.  That would be all 3 levels in descending order.  See normally, you’re supposed to do 1 level for a good 20 minute workout but I wanted to kick my butt so I did them all.  Am I a crazy woman?  Maybe so.  Am I going to be sore tomorrow?  You bet.

See, I just haven’t felt like I have it together this week.  Last weekend I enjoyed myself and didn’t worry about food or fitness.  And normally I’d get everything back in order during the week – eat good, work-out etc.  But this week has been super random.  I went out with some friends for a belated bday celebration Tuesday (had Mexican food and drinks) and then the rest of the week has been spent at the photo studio, totally throwing off my normal schedule.  I’ve had to squeeze workouts in at random times and I haven’t been able to push myself as much as I normally like to.  Add that to a table full of sweet temptations at the studio (which I’ve enjoyed) and larger than normal lunches and I just feel like of blah.

I did manage to eat a pretty healthy dinner last night though.  Left-over stir fry with some kale chips.  I’d made kale chips once before and they were kind of a fail but last night I followed a recipe from Kath Eats Real Food and they were fantastic.  Highly recommend them.  I actually ended up eating my whole bunch of kale so I’m going to need to pick some more up this weekend.

Kale Chips (Recipe from Kath Eats)

• Preheat oven to about 375
• Use about 1 OXO salad spinner’s worth of kale (which was a stuffed grocery store veggie bag). Tear the leaves off the thick stems into bite size pieces. Spread out on cookie sheets.
• Drizzle with about 2 tsp of olive oil
• Sprinkle with Parmesan, Asiago or your seasonings of choice. Plus a sprinkle of kosher salt.  Note – I added some cayanne.  I like my food spicy!
• Bake for about 15 minutes, until edges are brown and kale is crispy when moved in pan.

After dinner, my random schedule continued when I went over to my friend’s house to drop off some dinner and visit with the most adorable 1 month old ever.  Can I just say that baby John is so cute???  Chris and I aren’t quite ready for kids but after holding this little guy for almost 2 hours the idea is certainly a little more tempting.  He just smelled so good and when he was all cuddled up, sleeping in my arms… kind of blissful :) Not to mention I was able to enjoy a mason jar of beer while holding him.  Multi-tasking at it’s finest.  I also learned some lessons from the new parents – apparently the Happiest Baby on the Block is the method to follow if you have a crying baby.  Good to know for the future.

When I got home, it was around 8:30 and I still hadn’t gotten a workout in and I was dying.  Just feeling a little gross.  So I hopped on the spin bike and rode for an hour while watching TV.  I’ll admit, not the hardest workout but I did get my heart rate up and worked up a sweat.  And I felt better doing something.  Plus Chance kept me company :)

And even though it was pushing 10pm when I finished, I made myself a protein shake.  Mostly because I wanted something sweet as opposed actually needing the protein.

Cherry Cheesecake Protein Shake:

• 1 cup frozen dark pitted cherries
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 2 scoops vanilla protein powder
• 2 teaspoons sugar-free/fat-free instant cheesecake pudding mix

And then as I was crawling into bed later I told myself I was going to get up in the morning and work-out.  The shoot was probably going to go long and then I had plans to meet up with friends later so I knew that getting a workout in was going to be challenging.  Plus, at least for me, I tend to make better food choices if I know I’ve already worked out.  For example, I’m much less likely to snack on peanut M&Ms when I know I can’t work them off.  Make sense?  Yesterday for example, I kept telling myself, “I’ll workout after work and work off all of this that I’m eating.”  Basically erasing the calories I’ve consumed.  But with working out at the beginning of the morning, I won’t have the chance to erase things and I’m more motivated to keep my diet clean.

But when my alarm when off at 5 am I was just not feeling it.  I seriously laid in bed, hitting the snooze for almost 45 minutes trying to talk myself into getting up.  I kept rationalizing why it would be okay to skip my morning workout…I’ll eat good, ride the spin bike after work, skip drinks with my friend.  And finally at around 5:45 I just got up and MADE myself but on my training shoes.  And I’ll be honest.  It sucked at first.  I was cold and tired and Jillian was yelling around.  Ug.  But then something happened.  By the time I was halfway through the 1st level I had found my groove.  The cobwebs were gone, the workout endorphins were starting to kick in and I was so glad I’d made myself get up.  Mind over matter.  Jillian was right.  No excuses.  Just do it.  Sometimes you just have to force yourself to get out of that bed and work up a sweat.  You’ll thank yourself later, because I honestly can’t think of a time where you’d regret it.  And then because I was enjoying (is that the right word hahah?) I made myself do all 3 levels starting with 3 and going backwards.  I’ve only done that one other time and all I remember is being super sore the next day so I’m pretty sure that’s what I’ll wake up to tomorrow.  But it will be worth it.

Allrighty, this has turned into the longest post ever and if anyone has made it this far, nice work!   Hopefully you all have some fun plans for the weekend…Until tomorrow :)

Green Smoothie Challenge Recap

Alright, here you go.  As I mentioned I was participating in the green smoothie challenge and it was delicious.  We have smoothies every day for breakfast so this wasn’t a big change-up but it did force me to try some new recipes.

Monday
Peanut Butter Blueberry Smoothie:
Mix the below together.  Pour into a mason jar. Serves 1.

• 1/2 cup frozen blueberries
• 1/2 cup plain, non fat Greek yogurt
• 1 cup vanilla unsweetened almond milk
• 1/4 c protein plus peanut flour
• 1 cup spinach
• 1 tablespoon ground flax meal

PB Blueberry smoothie

Tuesday
PB Banana Carrot Smoothie (serves 1)
Blend the below ingredients, pour in a jar, drink.

• 1 frozen banana
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1/2 non fat plain greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup shredded carrots
• 1 cup spinach
• 2 tablespoons flax meal
• 1/4 protein plus peanut flour (could also use regular peanut or almond butter)

Hurried pic on the iphone on the way out the door this morning.

Wednesday
Sweet potato, almond & banana smoothie
Mix all the ingredients together.  Serves 1

• 1 cup roasted sweet potatoes/yams
• 1 cup spinach
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 2 tablespoons flax meal
• 1 tablespoon almond butter
• 1/2 cup greek yogurt
• 2 scoops protein powder (I used this)

Thursday
Banana Almond Smoothie
Serves 1. Mix everything.  Enjoy.

• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1/2 cup non fat plain greek yogurt
• 2 tablespoons almond butter
• 2 tablespoons rice protein powder
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 tablespoon flax seed
• 1 & 1/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk

Friday
PB Banana Coffee smoothie
Serves 1.  Mix the below together and drink.

• 1/2 frozen banana
• 2 cups spinach
• 1/2 cup non fat plain Greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup coffee (I saved the leftover coffee from the day before and let it cool in the fridge overnight)
• 1/2 unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour

Saturday (Basically the same as Monday but with doubled ingredients)
PB Blueberry (green?) smoothie:
Serves 2

• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 cup non fat plain greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 2 cups unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 4 tablespoons flax meal

Sunday
(Real Peanut Butter) Banana Smoothie

We ran out of protein plus peanut flour (my fave) so I decided to make today’s smoothie with actual peanut butter.  I think I’ve forgotten how good real PB is, because I thought this smoothie was the most amazing think I’d ever had to drink.

• 3 tablespoons Adam’s natural Chunky PB
• 2 scoops brown rice protein powder
• 1 cup non fat plain greek yogurt
• 1 frozen banana
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 cup non fat milk
• 1 cup unsweetened, vanilla almond milk

And in other non smoothie news, yesterday I ran 4 miles outside with very minimal knee pain.  It was the longest run I’ve done since Hood to Coast so I’m getting cautiously optimistic that HTC # 5 might be in my future after all.  Oh and somehow my pace was 8:34.  I sort of think my Nike+ GPS app was wrong because I never run that fast.  And the best part of the whole run was that I had to wear sunscreen because it was so sunny out.  In fact, I’d even go so far as to use the word HOT to describe yesterday.  But of course, today is pouring down rain so what can you do?

Can’t beat the classics

Well hello there and happy Saturday to you.  Did you know that here in Oregon we’re about 1/2 an inch away from beating the rainfall record for March in Portland?  No bueno.  I was hoping to actually get outside and do something active this weekend but that is not going to happen. So instead, we’re spending the day here being lazy.  Protein smoothie & coffee for breakfast, CMT top 20 countdown on TV and computer time – me on the blog, Chris researching house stuff…our standard weekend morning routine.  Love.

And because I was writing on my phone last night, I’ll run though a little recap of the past two days.

Green Smoothie Challenge day 5 (Friday breakfast) – I was inspired by Jen’s recipe and decided to add some caffeine to my protein.  This one was tasty but it left a weird aftertaste in my mouth.  Probably won’t do it again.

PB Banana Coffee smoothie
Serves 1.  Mix the below together and drink.

• 1/2 frozen banana
• 2 cups spinach
• 1/2 cup non fat plain Greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup coffee (I saved the leftover coffee from the day before and let it cool in the fridge overnight)
• 1/2 unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1/4 cup protein plus peanut flour

For my weight circuit yesterday I headed back in the vault and pulled out a classic.  When I was a sophomore in college I lived at home and went to a Jr. College so that I could be around the 1st year of my baby sister’s life.  And because I really had no life that year outside of my family time, I spent a lot of time at the gym and started working out with a personal trainer named Swede.  He was awesome.  Big guy, power lifting champ.  If you life in Olympia, WA I highly recommend hunting down this guy.  Anyway, he had a workout he’d run me through which I loved then and still love to this day.  I tend to always fall back on it when I need a good all over body routine.

The Swede Classic
Using 10 pound dumbbells go through this circuit 3 times with minimal rest between each move.

• Weight bench step ups (20 on each leg)
• 15 squats
• 15 sumo squats
• 15 deadlifts
• 10 lateral raises
• 10 front raises
• 10 bent arm lateral raises
• Single arm tricep extensions (12 on each arm)
• 10 shoulder presses

And after that, I did 3 sets of leg presses with 45 lbs on each side.  And then finished up with a diamond set of low rows.  12 reps at 55 lbs, 15 reps at 40 lbs and 20 reps at 25 lbs.

I discussed lunch in yesterday’s post and dinner ended up being another classic.  I whipped up my favorite shrimp, goat cheese and broccoli pasta.  So good.

We ended up at Journey’s with some friends later in the evening and killed my second keg (such a rush).  But because they messed up somehow in the scoring one of Chris’ kills is under my name so I’m actually up on the board in 2nd place with 3 kills.  Seriously I think something is wrong with me that I get this excited about drinking the last beer in a keg.  I did pretty good only 2.5 drinks.  But I did come home and have some cinnamon toast.  There’s just something about coming home and eating when I get home from a bar.  I really need to stop that.

This morning my green smoothie wasn’t so green but it was one of my favorites.  This is pretty much our standard smoothie but because Chris and I both have it I usually make it with half almond milk and half non-fat milk (he hates almond milk).  But we were out of the NF so it was a little sweeter than normal.

PB Blueberry (green?) smoothie:
Serves 2

• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 2 cups spinach
• 1 cup non fat plain greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup protein plus peanut flour
• 2 cups unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 4 tablespoons flax meal

And there you go.  That takes me to right now.  Noon.  We’re going to head to the gym in about an hour.  I’ll probably just do straight cardio and abs.  I’m thinking 30 min on the bike + 30 min on the elliptical.  This afternoon we’ll be watching some March Madness which I’m now super invested in because if Ohio State makes it to the final game I’ll win my work pool!  Go Buckeyes! Tonight should hopefully be pretty low key.  Turns out the 2nd season of Texas Women is on CMT.  We loved it last season so it will be great to see what the ladies are up to now.  Wild night around here :)

 

Trying new things

Chris is gone this week on a work trip which means I got to be a little more experimental in the kitchen.  While Chris will always try what I make, I don’t want to make him try something gross so I like to test most new creations out before I debut it.  Glad I did.  Because nearly all of today’s concoctions were failures.

Breakfast was a green smoothie for day 3 of the green smoothie challenge.  If I thought I was crazy with the carrots yesterday then today took it to the next level with sweet potatoes.  It sounded like a great idea.  I love pumpkin in my smoothie so this felt like it would be similar, and while I liked the taste, I didn’t like the texture.  It almost reminded me of applesauce.  I think if I’d added a little more milk it would have been fine but I didn’t taste it before I poured it.  If you like thick smoothies you’d probably like this one.  I just like mine super thin, almost watery.  But on the plus side, I think it filled me up more because I didn’t get hungry once today.

Sweet potato, almond & banana smoothie
Mix all the ingredients together.  Serves 1

• 1 cup roasted sweet potatoes/yams
• 1 cup spinach
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 2 tablespoons flax meal
• 1 tablespoon almond butter
• 1/2 cup greek yogurt
• 2 scoops protein powder (I used this)

My “during the day” food was pretty normal (almonds, quinoa bean salad mix).  It was once I got home that things went downhill.

I attempted to combine 2 recipes – A black bean goat cheese burger with a quinoa burger.  I only used the black bean recipe as inspiration, thinking I’d just add black beans to the quinoa burger recipe.  I started by mashing black beans.  Easy.  Then as I got through the rest of the ingredients I saw that it called for splenda (which I don’t eat) and flour.  Perfect, I thought.  I’ll use coconut flour to bring in the sweetness.  Bad plan.  And I didn’t have cottage cheese, so I skipped it.  It couldn’t matter that much right?  I ended up with a decent consistency and scooped out 4 1/4 cup, cute little burgers and started frying them.

Cute little guys

But then they kind of fell apart.

Burger turned bowl

To be honest, they weren’t that bad.  A little dry so I mixed up some fry sauce (ketchup and light mayo) and  that helped but I threw out the rest of the mix after the first 4.  Lesson learned here?  If I want a burger get some turkey.

Then I wanted some dessert so I thought, I’d whip up something similar to this chia seed protein powder pudding.  I was suppose to let the chia seeds soak in the liquid for 20 min.  But I wanted it right away so I didn’t.  Just dumped chia seeds, almond milk, protein powder and honey in a glass.  Taste was great.  Texture was like chunky milk.  Fail.  But I actually ate it anyway.  Don’t judge.

What did I learn tonight? Recipes are written for a reason.  And I should follow them.  I also learned that I’m tired of trying new things and maybe I’ll just eat cereal for the rest of the week…