What we're eating

I'm trying to be more type A with our food. I thought we did really well but we have been eating out  alot. I'm on weight watchers and have been for a while and seem to do really well with the structured week but terrible @ home. So, I'm trying to do all of our cooking over the weekend so I do better during the week.

Friday: We had homemade pizza with salad. Not the healthiest but it was super tasty. I used whole wheat crust.

Saturday: Sweet potato fries, green beans, and chicken fingers. This is not really all that healthy but was quick

Monday: Ribs, barbeque tofu, corn on the cob, watermelon, whole wheat rolls and salad

Wednesday: Crockpot Indian food. Indian Spinach & Tofu and Tomato Curried Potatoes. The spinach recipe is one of the only crockpot recipes that my husband ever asks for me to make.

Thursday: (i'm crockpotting 2x this week because I don't have any leftovers for lunch!) Salsa Chicken tofu & black bean soup.

Great Deal

I wrote a post this week about cooking that isn't quite finished and haven't got around to putting up yet. You wouldn't believe the amount of blogging that I do that I never finish. Anyway, I really am trying to eat healthy and save money and just talked about it in this week's unposted post. Today's living social deal is a fabulous one for this.

Living Social Whole Foods Deal



Pay $10 and get $20 to spend at Whole Foods. Works at all US locations. I am super excited because we eat LOTS of produce but really have a hard time finding deals on it.

My pledge

Without giving any details I need to tell you about a session I had that was eye opening. Let me backtrack a bit...

A couple months ago I read on an article about childhood hunger. Well, I assumed that with food stamps that most of the families that I work with are ok. Actually, no. Recently I had a session with a family and my client's mom told me that she is going hungry and only eating 1 time a day because she is barely making ends meet. Not to be too much of a social worker here but it baffles my mind that this can be happening. As president Obama said yesterday "We are Americans." But yes, she has food stamps and goes to food banks but it's still so limited that she only eats once a day.

So, I begin to question more and this is a pretty common story around here. It's a rural community with limited resources and when they're gone, they're gone. On top of that I think I recently read that 20% of food in most american households goes to waste. I think both myself and Mr C have always believed that you just shouldn't throw out food. But yes we are both guilty of it. No more. I can't solve world hunger but I can do my part.

Here is my pledge:
1. I am continuously working on only eating foods we have and buying foods that we will use.
2. I am planning on going through our pantry and if there is anything we will not eat. Lets donate it.
3. This is something I try to do and depending on the week I do better or worse about it. At the grocery store or CVS I spend about $1 extra out of our budget each week on items to donate. I'm sure you're thinking. Just $1. Well, it's what we can afford and after coupons my $1 a lot of times I think really makes a difference. So I am going to consistently spend my $1 on food and see where it gets me.

So, why don't you join me? Get a cardboard box and put it in your pantry. You can fill it each week with your finds. Go through the pantry and throw in there the raspberry chipotle barbeque sauce (guilty as charged). Next time you are at the grocery store pick up $1 worth of nonperishable food items. If you coupon pick up the stuff you don't want but is a great deal. If you don't coupon I'm sure you can find at least 1 item that is $1 or under. I know you are thinking one item isn't going to make a difference but it could if we all do it.

Meal Plan

Hello,

Everyone needs to start thier day out with a little Miss. G (the baby).

You know I work with families so I totally knew that kids changed you. But I never knew how much. I'm amazed how I am a normally social, out going person who constantly wants to be doing something and now that she's here all I ever want to do is just hang out with her. But really who wouldn't want to hang out with someone so cute? This picture is from her 4 month photos. We did them on July 3 this year. In it she was actually one very unhappy lady but thanks to our wonderful photographer she just looks like she's playing around.

 Now onto food blogging...

I'm weight watchering it and it's really working. This past week I lost 5 lbs and my boss told me she thought I looked thinner. Things like that really make me push ahead.  Now, I didn't cook much this past week because my great aunt came to visit. While she was here she bought tons of farmers market goodies, cooked for us daily, watched Miss. G (the baby), and did laundry/clean the house. Having family support makes being a working mom so much easier.

So, we are pretty well stocked on food. I won't have to do too much cooking/shopping in the upcoming week. Here is what I do have planned for us. A couple quick, relatively easy and healthy recipes.


Too Easy Peach Cobbler


Roasted Veggies and Polenta


Greek: Barley Tabbouli with falafel/chicken pitas (not 100% on the recipe yet)


Green Pepper Tofu, I've made this before and substitued the chicken for tofu and it worked really well. this is a tasty quick recipe!

Miss G in Action

So, since my blog is about food I thought I'ld show you our newest family member's eating. Here is Miss G eating for the first time, we went with oatmeal instead of rice because her poor tummy has been upset. I wish I could figure out how to put the video in the box but I just don't have that so you'll have to do it like dinosaur times and click on it.


Miss G Eats

Now that was cute but we have couple more that are cute too. Not food related but I just need to share with you.

Miss G Bounces

Miss G Rolls Over

Miss G in Battle (with a plastic bug)

Miss G Flirts

Thanks to Mr. C he figured out all of this stuff last night and loaded these videos on youtube. If it were up to me she would be old enough to teach me how to work all of these before I figured this out!

Creamy Quinoa

Have you tried Philadelphia Cooking Creme? It's kind of flavored cream cheese for cooking. On 2 different occasions Publix has had AMAZING deals on it, like free & $.25 w/ sales and coupons. So, both times I bought it. I used it tonight. I know I was really leery of it at first & no, I'm not getting any compensation for this recipe. I really just like it. We've tried all the flavors & I think the savory garlic is the best. I feel like it's so good because it has flavor but is versatile for a variety of recipes. I'm pretty sure when I buy it again I'm going to stock up on only savory garlic kind. This is another recipe that was SO good I wanted to blog so I wouldn't forget it. I didn't take a picture. I thought about it but it really wasn't that good looking. It actually looked sort of gross but tasted delish.

Ingredients:

1 packet of taco seasoning mix
1 can of rotel, undrained (if that's too hot I bet you could use any diced tomatoes)
1 can of corn, undrained
1 can of mushrooms chopped & drained
1 can of black beans, drained
3 cups of cooked quinoa
1/2 chopped onion
1 package of savory garlic Philadelphia Cooking Creme- I think you could use the Santa Fe kind and leave out the taco mix but we didn't have any.
2 TBSP of nutritional yeast

For Kyle I separately cooked 1 pound of ground beef.

This is so easy & good.

1. Cook quinoa according to package directions
2. Chop onion & cook until brown in skillet
3. Add corn, tomatoes, mushrooms, & black beans to skillet cook until warmed thoroughly
4. Add Quinoa
5. Turn off the skillet & add taco seasoning, nutritional yeast, & cooking creme. The heat from the burner previously being on will melt it.
5. Enjoy!

Panzanella

I haven't blogged in 10,000 years & I didn't even take a picture of this. I did however have a baby. Enough said. Now I'm on weight watchers. This is sort of a recipe I got off their website. I actually made this for dinner last night. It was great. It’s quick & frugal summertime dinner. All the ingredients we had in our fridge. Some even came from Mr. C's container garden. I liked it so much I thought I would put it here.


1 loaf of french or italian bread.
2 english cucumber
2 whole tomatoes
1 red bell pepper
1/2 onion
3 TBSP olive oil
3-4 TBSP of capers

Dressing:
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
2 TBSP of garlic
30ish fresh basil leaves, chopped
2 TBSP of dijon mustard


1. Cut bread into 1 inch thick cubes
2. Coat bread cubes with 3 TBSP of olive oil
3. In skillet over medium heat brown bread, usually takes about 10 min.
4. While that is cooking thinly slice onions, chop cucumbers, & tomatoes. Combine & set aside
5. Whisk together the ingredients for the dressing
6. Combine all ingredients together, making sure to coat bread cubes.
7. Eat right away. This does not stay good & the bread goes soggy if it stays out but if eating quickly it's super good.
I ate this alone as a main course but fed Mr. C fish with it.