Did you have that book when you were little? 

Well, if you give a blogger a cookie…she’s gonna ask for some for her readers…

Especially when they are delicious and full of healthy ingredients.  I mean, Erin Baker’s “cookies” may as well be a bowl of oats based on the ingredients listed.  They best part is that they taste like dessert.  Chewy, oaty, yummy dessert. 

I’m a raisin oatmeal girl myself, so the chocolate chunk raisin was my favorite.  I like the fact that the entire cookie is one serving (I hate when they think you’re going to stop half way through!).  The big one is 300 kcals total.

I also like that there are minis, which are perfect for work days when you want an easy to grab mid-day treat that won’t bomb your nutrition plan or ruin your appetite for a real meal.

The minis are 100 kcals.  I thought the peanut butter was fine, but it wasn’t quite as peanutty as I was expecting.  The oatmeal raisin was really good, but reminded me of an oaty gingersnap with raisins.  I think that’s the molasses.  I love molasses.  Molasses doesn’t always love me back. 

But like I said, the chocolate chunk raisin was definitely my favorite of all.

They also have granola.

Official granola of Ironman?  Pretty sweet. 

Even sweeter?  Sharing the yum.

I was so pleased with all the Erin Baker’s products I tried I want to give you guys a chance to try them too!

To win a sample kit similar to mine you can enter two ways:

1. Check out Erin Baker’s website and leave a comment telling me which item you’d like to try.
2. Tweet Erin Baker’s (@erinbakers) and me (@elisehippie) about this giveaway (and/or which treat you want to try). Then leave a comment here telling me you did.

I’ll announce the random winner on Tuesday February 28, 2012.

*Entrants must have a shipping address within the continental USA (Erin Baker’s currently does not ship outside of the USA).

**I received the sample products shown above free of charge from the company, but all opinions are my own.  I’m not being compensated for this in any way, I just thought you all would like to try some yummy and healthy desserts, too.

These past few days my appetite has been ravenous.  [I haven’t done any form of exercise, though, so it’s definitely odd.  But my body is far from normal, so I just went with it.]

Take breakfast for instance, usually a tupperware of oatmeal with the fixins will hold me over pretty well.

But I had this before I left for the hospital and was already hungry for my next meal by the time my shift started at 7 am.  WTF?

I had a banana and breakfast cookie and praised the Lord when I saw my boss had gotten bagels for us all too.  I had a cinnamon raisin one and that helped my hunger until noon. 

My lunch break wasn’t actually until 4 pm, but obviously that wasn’t happening. 

I squeezed in bites of lunch between random patient care (not ideal, but you gotta do what you gotta do).

The problem with my lunch was the “slim” nutrition of the noodles.

Wildwood makes good tofu, so that’s how I was lured into buying these vegan, gluten free, tofu-based noodles.  Damn you impulse buy!  They’ve been in the fridge for 6 months and I finally got around to eating them now because of the whole moving-clean-out-the-fridge thing. 

I boiled them with kale and topped them with two fried eggs.  You don’t have to be a rocket science to deduce how much staying power this meal had. 

Enter cinnamon raisin bagel number two.

Afternoon snacking barely held me over.  But I do like these dark chocolate Adora calcium disks.  I’m all for dessert disguised as vitamins. 

I had millet, tofu and salad for dinner with an avocado coated roll on the side.

This entire meal left me feeling satisfied but uncomfortable.  FODMAPs fail.

The fact that I had two bagels from Costco (with who knows what additives) and several different FODMAPs groups (in the same meal no less) just reinforced what I already knew about my new diet. 

I hate that I sacrificed my well being for the sake of finishing off the fridge contents.  And I hate that I didn’t give my hungry hungry body what it wanted (real food). 

I learned some real lessons here.  Too bad I learned them the hard way. 

1. Being frugal with food leads to failure.  I’ve never skimped when it comes to providing myself with nutritious whole foods, I have no idea what I was thinking bringing such inadequate amounts of food to work.

2. Poor nutrition in the AM creates a pile up.  It’s like pain management with my patients…playing catch up with your appetite is hard to do.  You need so much more than you would have had you just started out with the proper amount.  It’s important to start off with a solid base and then keep a good plateau. 

My next day’s work meals were similar…but supplemented. 

Breakfast was big (although you can’t tell from the photo).

Blueberry quinoa porridge with maple syrup up the yin yang.  I also had a banana and greek yogurt on the side.

Lunch was a different kind of pasta “slim”…this time with way more oomph on top.

Spinach fettuccini with tofu ricotta and nutritional yeast.  Much better (but I still won’t buy these again).

Candied nuts, carrots, millet, greek yogurt, and Adora chocolate.

In typical Elise fashion, I had a “normal” “healthy” dinner and then went balls to the wall for dessert, polishing off a few cups of salty cashews.  I have a hard time when I already feel crappy not using it as an excuse to totally disregard my IBS friendly eating habits. 

You see, even though the quantity and quality of packed food was better on my second day of work, I still felt pretty blah because I was dealing with lingering GI issues from the previous day.  After my nut attack, I was definitely frustrated, but I tried not to dwell on it and instead focused on the next day.  It’s wasn’t as easy at it sounds, and I’m not as zen as I seem (remember this is all written in hindsight). 

I have been dealing with IBS long enough to know there are going to be bumps in the road.  I just have to make sure the bumps don’t cause me to steer completely off course…a quick detour is fine, but days of off-roading is miserable.  Sorry for the lengthy analogy, but it seems to fit. 

What do you do when your hunger won’t quit?  Or when your eating habits get off track?

This week’s grain was millet.

It’s small, gluten free, and has a cornbread like taste.

I make it in the rice cooker, like I do with everything else, using the same water to grain ratio as rice, quinoa, and couscous.  Honestly, it’s impossible to mess things up in a rice cooker.

This one just so happened to be especially on the money…because when I went to scoop it into a tupperware it came out as easy as could be, no spoon required.  Literally.

This is from flipping the bowl upside down.  I actually attempted to slowly turn it to the side but the transfer got away from me and the entire thing just popped out and landed in the tupperware as perfectly as if I had intended for it to do that all along.  Even the Russian judges were impressed that I stuck the landing.

Since millet has a tendency to dry out, I don’t make batches as massive as say quinoa.  But shoot, the stuff is yummy, one cup of dry grains doesn’t last longer than a couple of days.

Dinner: Millet with soy sesame tofu and spinach avocado salad (tamari, tahini, apple cider vinegar dressing for all components).

Dinner: Millet, kale, carrots, seitan, avocado (Bragg’s liquid aminos dressing).

Lunch: Millet, butternut squash, soft boiled eggs, kale, carrots, mustard.

Lunch: Millet, corn grits, eggs, avocado (plus salt and nutritional yeast). 

His & hers cheesy millet cornbread (topped in cheddar for him, nutritional yeast for me). 

Millet is good stuff.  I need to remember to expand my diet more…amaranth and buckwheat, I’m looking at you.  Name the last grain you had that wasn’t quinoa, oats, or rice. 

By day 4 of our vacation we had officially adopted the meal times.  Sleeping in late, relaxing on the balcony with coffee and basking in the sun until well after noon.

Laziness suits me.

b Blue is a cute little cafe in Palermo SoHo.

Eventually we got the touristy part of the day under way and hit up the San Telmo Market.  You have to go on a Sunday.

The streets were crowded with random vendors selling anything and everything.  And then there was an indoor market with more stuff.  It reminded me of La Rambla in Barcelona. 

How do you feel about creepy recycled baby dolls?

Baby bananas or monster avocados?  Both.

We walked miles and miles and miles trying to pick a decent place for lunch. 

And wound up at Torre Paris, a French cafe.

I was in the mood for bread and tortilla espanola, both of which they had.

I tried each kind of bread, which I was regretting once I saw the size of my tortilla. 

I was expecting a slice, not an entire pan!  So content. 

Kyle got vegetarian empanadas, one of Buenos Aires’ most famed foods.  He was so-so on them.

Back to exploring. 

Somehow we managed to waste so much time wandering around that the cemetery closed before we found our way to the entrance.  Woops!  Here I thought schedules were irrelevant in BsAs!?

We had literally covered miles of the city on foot (half marathon range), but we still managed to drag ourselves home. 

Later we went to a new part of town (Palermo Hollywood) for a vegan dinner at Bio. 

The restaurant isn’t exclusively vegan, but it is entirely organic and vegetarian with several vegan dishes.  They also sell organic teas and grocery items.  And they offer cooking classes.  And the staff is super sweet.  I nearly applied for a job there. 

While browsing the menu, we shared fresh bread and a mustardy hummus dip.  Mmmm…

In the lower left corner you can see they note which items on the menu are vegan and gluten free.

To drink, Kyle got beer and I got tea. 

How cute is that tea serving set?!

Blinis de quinoa con espinacas salteadas, crema de calabaza y requesón de cabra con lluvia de nueces. [In English: quinoa blinis with sautéed spinach, pumpkin cream and goat cheese with nut sprinkle]

I worked my way around the goat cheese.  I loved how these tasted like quinoa but were fluffy like little cakes.

Kyle’s main dish was arroz indiano con coriandro, masala, pasas de uva y castañas de cajú acompañado de chutney de peras.  [In English: Indian rice with coriander, masala, raisins and Cajun chestnuts and chutney pears on the side]

I chose the curry fresco de seitán con verduras y bolitas de arroz motti a la crema de coco.  [In English: curry seitan with vegetables and motti rice balls topped with coconut cream]

The seitan was delightful!  Savory perfection.  But it was even better when eaten in combination with the coconut cream sauce and the sweet rice balls. 

The flavors all melded together in a uniquely awesome way.

I wish this restaurant was in LA. 

Have you ever taken cooking classes?  Would you if your favorite restaurant offered them? 

I’ve been eyeing these courses for a while but they are really pricey. 

Peek-a-boo!

Breakfast, lunch or dinner…it doesn’t really matter…some things are good at any time of the day.

Like grains and beans with a fried egg on top.

Or savory oats with tofu ricotta.

Having leftovers makes waking up easy delicious. 

It’s as easy as one, two, three…

Making the meal only takes as long as it takes to boil water. 

1 cup whole rolled oats + 1 1/2 cups water + pinch of salt

1 fried egg + 1 scoop tofu ricotta

If you’re wondering, yes, it tasted as awesome as it looks.

I liked it even better than this grain mix to be honest.  I chose oats over quinoa, can you even believe it!?

I’m as shocked as you are (unless you aren’t shocked…in which case, I’m more shocked than you are).

Who’s to say when sweet meals will return…

Have you tried savory oats yet?  What’s your favorite non-sweet way to eat them? 

Maybe it’s because I’m a nut job myself.  Or maybe it’s because I prefer things that are based on formulas and bound by rules.  But whatever the reason, I have a very hard time with crazy people.*

*I’m using this term in the clinical sense.

I truly think psych nurses are 10% human and 90% saints.  I don’t know how they do it. 

In case you couldn’t guess, there have been some real characters in the hospital lately.

Anyway.  I’m so behind in posting my work meals, I’m just gonna photo bomb you all and hope you can figure it out.

Snacks: candied ginger and Greek yogurt with grapes and bananas (I didn’t end up eating the grapes though because I was feeling iffy and didn’t want to aggravate my GI system with excess fructose).

Blueberry quinoa porridge (this bulk crock pot meal will not go away…obviously I underestimated how much 2 cups of quinoa would yield once combined with liquids).

Kale and leftover pasta casserole.

Did I forget to post this recipe?

It was basically a version of this recipe, but with different noodles and corn instead of peas.

Snacks: carrots and nut & chocolate trail mix.

Mostly almonds and cashews, but a few soy nuts and dark chocolate chips too.

Next!

No close up on breakfast necessary, it was blueberry porridge (take 10), so just look at the previous photo of the dish.

Egg salad with kale, butternut squash, mustard and nutritional yeast.  Make this now! 

I had it with an Udi’s GF bagel.  I warmed the bagel in the microwave and used it as a spoon for part of the salad. 

Snacks: PopCorners sea salt chips, almonds, and carrots

These “chips” are fantastic.  They taste like the offspring of popcorn and rice cakes – flattened into chip form.  The portion size is perfect because it doesn’t ruin your appetite but it isn’t like eating air either.

That’s all I have time for now.  Gotta go pack my work eats…

What profession do you look at in awe?  Is there a job that you know you could never ever do? 

I think teachers are on par with psych nurses in terms of requiring the most patience ever.  I think they are amazing. 

Worst job ever in my eyes is cleaning or emptying portable toilets.  Sick.  I’d sooner die. 

Sorry I am a little behind with this one…

Congrats to Kayla who said “my goal to meals when i’m sick are usually protein muffins, cereal, yogurts and things that aren’t too hard to digest like tons of vegetables and meats.”

Hope you have a healthy year!  Email me with your mailing address so I can get your herbal supplement on it’s way.

As luck would have it, the Argentinean holiday provided us with an excuse to start the day off late (again).  Cool with me!

We rented bikes and took a nice self guided tour of the city.  Being the type A punctual freaks that we are, Kyle and I arrived back at the designated meeting point (some random plaza) to return our bikes a few minutes early…aaaand there was nobody to be found.  [???] 

We were slightly concerned because (a) they had our credit card number, (b) they were supposedly closing down for the rest of the weekend in 10 minutes, and (c) we had no interest in schlepping the bikes around with us for the remainder of the day (we had a schedule!).  What the hell!?!  My mind went from confusion to panic in 5 minutes flat [note: I kept a poker face the entire time because Kyle was really freaking out, but inside I was far from calm].  First I began brainstorming ways to avoid storing the bikes in our apartment for the weekend.  Then I started to wonder if the whole rental thing was a scam.

To be fair, my sister had warned us about how laid back they are in Buenos Aires, but it’s hard to completely ignore the clock when it comes to things like bus schedules and flight times.  Would you even believe me if I said I was trying to ditch my uptight American ways?  Well anyway.  To cut to the end of the story, we finally got some random guy to help us use a nearby pay phone to call the bike rental number we had written down earlier in the day to ask them if they were coming back to the fountain.

Picture me, standing by myself in the middle of a park with two bikes (no wallet, no ID, no money) and Kyle off with some random guy completely out of my sights.  This is typically when things turn very bad in the movies.  Luckily, my fate wasn’t written by Hollywood. 

30 minutes later the rental peeps came back to retrieve the bikes and all was well.  I have no clue if they would have returned if we hadn’t called them, but I was trying not to think of all the shady things that were going on around us at the time.

If nothing else, my racing heart worked up quite an appetite for lunch.

Picnic.  Another recommended eatery.  Florida 102, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

There were cookies on the counter which I sampled as we waited in line to order.

The fact that there were lots of vegan options on the menu excited me.

Unfortunately, they were out of everything.  Literally.  I couldn’t get my first, second, or third choice.  The staff was really nice and felt bad that they had nothing left, but it was pretty disappointing.  Why bother having a menu at all?  It’s not like it was a super extensive one either…there were a handful of sandwiches and salads…not too hard to manage in my opinion. 

Kyle got the “clasico” veggie burger (they were out of the “big bang” one he wanted) with a mustard sauce on the side (they were out of the BBQ sauce he wanted). 

Meh.  They also messed up the sides we got.  His plate had my “salad” (a heap of lettuce, no toppings, no dressing).

I got a falafel pita (with his fries on the side).

Four falafel balls and a sh!t ton of veg.  No sauce. 

This was so dry it left a lump in my throat with each bite. 

I ate the tiny falafel balls and some of the pita, but the raw radishes and lettuce was so unappealing to me. 

At least we had a nice view?  The restaurant has three levels with a cute decor.  We sat on the second level overlooking Calle Florida.

The good news about my mediocre lunch was it left a lot of room for dessert.  I “sampled” liberally and then got a napkin to take even more for the road. 

Good flavor, but a little hard. 

After our day of adventures, we were in the mood for a mellow evening in.

And that’s exactly what we did.

Have you ever been scammed on vacation?  Do you know anyone else who has been?

It’s impossible for me to forget about our weekly cooking dates because Kyle entered them in our joint google calendar.  So I get reminders emailed and texted to me when it’s time.  He’s almost as type A as I am…

[Fact: I’m only pretending I don’t find it attractive.  In reality, I love his nerdy traits more than anything – I just don’t want it to go to his head.]

So anyway…Kyle’s parents came to visit and I cooked them dinner. 

Happy Birthday Kevin!

The (vegan, gluten free) menu:

Stuffed Bell Peppers

Creamed Corn

Tomato & Avocado salad

Chocolate Coconut Macaroons

And wine (of course).

Ready for some recipes?

Disclaimer: I didn’t measure anything because I wasn’t planning on posting the meal…but then it got such rave reviews…and I did take photos…

So I’ll guestimate the amounts of things, starting with the star of the night.

Vegan Creamed Corn

[vegan, gluten free, soy free]

Ingredients:

• 1 (16 oz.) bag frozen corn
• 1/4 cup raw cashews
• 2 tbsp roasted sunflower seeds
• 1/2 cup plain almond milk
• 1/2 cup water
• salt (to taste)

Directions:

Let frozen corn thaw to room temp (or just rinse with warm water and drain).

In food processor (or bullet or whatever), pulse cashews and sunflower seeds with almond milk until they are smooth and creamy. 

Add to glassware.

Then pulse half the corn (8 oz.) with the water until it’s mostly pureed.  Don’t stress over the consistency, just get it to a slightly lumpy but mostly mashed state.

Then add it to the nut/seed/milk blend.

Mix them together.

Then add the rest of the whole corn kernels to the mix. 

Feel free to adjust the amount of liquid (with more/less almond milk) as you want, there’s really no wrong consistency.  Add salt if you want.

Bake on 350 for 35 minutes.

When you take it out of the oven it will be HOT.  Really hot. 

Basically you don’t have to worry about serving this right away.  You also don’t have to worry about there being leftovers.  Kyle licked the serving spoon clean after the rest of the dish was gone, if that gives you any idea of how much he liked it.

It was my favorite too.  So in addition to becoming a hippie household regular, it has also been deemed a new Thanksgiving necessity.  I’m pretty proud of it.

Next up, the main course.

Stuffed Bell Peppers

[vegan, gluten free]

• 3 bell peppers

Bean & Grain Stuffing:

• 1 cup brown rice
• 1 cup quinoa
• 1/2 cup (dried) black beans
• 1/2 tomato
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp onion powder
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp lime juice
• 1 tsp salt

Tofu Ricotta:

• 1 package extra firm tofu
• 1/2 cup nutritional yeast
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp salt

Directions:

Cook brown rice, quinoa, and black beans.  I used dried beans, so I had to cook them, but you could easily use canned beans and add them to the grains after they’ve cooked.  Whether or not you cook the ingredients separately or together is up to you.

I used my rice cooker and added everything in the morning, pushed go and forgot about them.  Later on I had a big pot of cooked beans and grains. 

Combine rice, quinoa, and beans with chopped tomato and spices.  If you want a shortcut, just add salsa in place of tomato and spices.

Store in fridge until ready to stuff peppers.

For the tofu cheese, just mash the tofu with a fork and blend in nutritional yeast, lemon juice, and salt.

Once it has a ricotta-like texture it’s good to go. 

With the amounts above you will have extras of both the cheese and stuffing so feel free to either (a) stuff more bell peppers than I did or (b) save the leftovers for other meals. 

Note that making less of the mixture is not an option. 

Why pass up leftovers?  It makes meals for the rest of the week even easier.  The tofu cheese goes well in and on everything (especially these) and the bean/grain mix is a perfectly good meal on it’s own. 

Back to the meal at hand.

Split the peppers and remove the stems, seeds and white pith. 

Place in sprayed pan and stuff.

I alternated stuffing the grain and bean mix and the tofu mix but you could just combine the two prior to stuffing.  Your call.

Bake for 40 minutes on 350.

The tops get nice and toasty while the bell peppers get all warm and soft.  It’s just a neat little package. 

The crispy grains with the soft “cheesy” ‘fu…yeah, it’s good stuff.  Actually, mixing the creamed corn in with it would probably rock too.  Hell, I’d pour that creamed corn on my shoe and still lick it clean. 

The last component to the meal was the tomato and avocado salad, which really doesn’t require a recipe at all.

Avocado and Tomato Salad

Ingredients:

• 2 avocados
• 4 tomatoes
• 1 tbsp lime juice
• 1 tsp salt

I think lime juice and avocados are a match made in heaven and since the meal was already Mexi-themed, this just added an extra boost to the rest of the flavors.

Happy weekend!

Kyle and I are really bad when it comes to seeing movies.  We mean to see things and then we just never end up following through.  Last month we finally got our act together and went to see My Week with Marilyn.  Well, the theatre randomly had a power outage, so after walking all the way down to the Promenade, we just turned back around and walked back home.  I’m very embarrassed to reveal what we ended up watching instead.

[source]

Ummm yeah.  We watched a documentary about Justin Bieber.

It gets worse.

I had never actually heard a song by the Biebs (except for one they covered on Glee), but since then I’ve found myself whistling his songs.  Often.

I’m seriously 13 going on 30.

Fried quinoa brunch.

Tofu.  Peas.  Carrots.  Egg.  Quinoa.  Garlic infused olive oil.

Infusing oils is the FODMAPs loophole.  Garlic and onion are no-no ingredients on their own, but if you infuse them in oil (then ditch the actual veggies) you get the flavors without the FODMAPs.  As an FYI, I’ve read this trick works in oil but not water (something to do with the solubility of the carbohydrates).

The quinoa, tofu, and veggies were actually leftovers, so they were already mixed and good to go.  I heated them with a touch of oil, then fried up an egg.

And BAM!

This is one of two servings I had.

Since I’m still nursing a cold, I skipped exercise for the 4th day in a row (not that I’m counting or anything…grrrr).

Instead Kyle and I went for a walk.

First, to pick our new place to pick out paint colors (!!).

Then to the beach.

And then to Abbot Kinney.

We didn’t have any agenda, but I got hungry along the way so we stopped in for a bite at Seed Bistro.

I got an almond milk latte and a blueberry scone.  The scone was vegan and made with maple syrup (not agave).  I know because I asked.

It was delightful.  The blueberries were clearly fresh because they were plump and juicy, like real fruit.  Kyle said the same thing about his raspberry muffin.

On our way home we stopped into Whole Foods where I had planned on getting carrots and ended up buying bread, millet, and this face lotion too.

I’m pretty religious when it comes to face wash (I love Alba Botanica papaya cleanser), but I’m still looking for a good face lotion for daily use.  It’s not that it’s hard to find one that meets my hippie standards, it’s that it’s hard to find one that’s inexpensive and still meets my standards [formulated without parabens, phthalates, artificial colors, propylene glycol, aluminum, mineral oil, petrolatum, oxybenzone, PABA, or GMOs…you get the idea].  So far, Avalon Organics seems to be the winner I’ve been looking for (for 7 fl oz it cost $18 at WF), but I’ll let you know if I break out in hives in the next 48 hours.

Quinoa, roasted butternut squash and seitan dinner.

Maple roasted nuts for dessert.