Thursday, August 22, 2013

Some More Food to Show Off! Smoothies, Stir-fry, breads, and Spaghetti Squash Galore


 Although I seem to be cooking all the time now, I now need to work on taking actual, aesthetically pleasing pictures before I devour all of it.  This seems to be a serious issue for me, but it just shows my impatience to eat all the time.  For now, you'll have to deal with some hastily snapped pictures, but now my new goal is to improve my food photos!




 Keep reading to follow my food adventures!


For the first picture, I made a Thai inspired stir-fry using coconut oil to get that coconut flavor, and lots and lots of basil.  It's quite simple, as I just threw in whatever I had in the fridge (the beauty of stir frys).

Here's what I used for 4 servings:
2 chicken breasts (total about 10 oz)
1 small floret of broccoli, chopped
1/2 green pepper, diced
1/2 orange pepper, diced
1/4 c. diced white onion
2 c. fresh basil
3 cloves garlic
about 3 T coconut oil, adding more as needed
about 2 T soy sauce (tamari if GF)

The great thing about stir frys is that I am never very exact with my measurements, but the combination of flavors never ceases to amaze me.

Next, I made some more banana bread, but added a plantain to it just to mix things up.  I followed this recipe from the Purely Twins fitness blog.  I cut the recipe in half, and really liked how it turned out!  It's moist, sweet, and amazingly healthy since it doesn't have any added sugars.  I just made sure that my bananas and plantain were very ripe before making this recipe.





It was absolutely delicious and wonderfully healthy! No guilt here in eating it.

Union Market here in DC s some great foodie heaven.  It features an oyster bar, several butchers, gelato, Korean tacos, a Mediterranean stand, and many more!  I could easily spend a whole day just eating the food from here, but I just stuck with some Korean tacos (pictured below) with some kimchi on it.








Next up was a quick fish and vegetables recipe that I threw together in an effort to clean out my fridge.  I put some tilapia in a pan with soy sauce, ginger, and garlic or a great Asian-inspired meal.  I can't remember the exact amounts that I used, but it's really all to your preference and taste!  I also sauteed some edamame, peppers, and onion.  I've been on a huge vegetable kick recently (not a bad thing), and just can't get enough of them! 


I also have recently loved making these 2-ingredient pancakes, using only 2 eggs and one mashed banana.  It makes 4-5 pancakes, and although they're a little spongier than traditional pancakes, it's all worth it to reduce the amount of carbs!





A recent snack that I've also been loving is a trail mix I made myself with a crushed granola bar, crushed almonds, blueberries, raisins, and a drizzle of honey.  I brought it with me as a homework break snack one day, and it kept me satisfied and focused as I wrote my paper.  It's definitely something I know I'll be doing more as school starts!





 My smoothie addiction continues with as many green smoothies as I can make.  For this delicious, not too sweet smoothie, I used:

2 c. baby spinach
2 c. chopped honeydew
1 T. hemp seeds
1/2 banana
1.5 c. unsweetened almond milk

This made two refreshing and cleansing servings.



Although I didn't manage to take a picture of it, I also tried out a spinach-romaine lettuce-pear-almond milk smoothie, and it was also delicious!  I was a little nervous about adding romaine lettuce to it, but the flavor was mild enough where I didn't taste too much of it.


And most recently, I made another spaghetti squash recipe, this time make it more "spaghetti" rather than just squash mixed with vegetables.  For two large servings, I used:

1/2 spaghetti squash, roasted
1/2 jar of tomato-basil sauce
2 links sausage (any kind will do)
12 artichoke quarters
10 olives
lots of parmesean cheese - I meant to just use a light sprinkling, but that obviously didn't happen!

I ended up having a little too much sauce, so I could have probably roasted the whole squash.  Either way, it was delicious and tasted just like spaghetti that I used to make!




How's my cooking getting?  Slowly getting better, I think!  I'm starting to rely less on recipes and more on my own personal preferences and tastes.  Hopefully, I can start creating my own unique recipes soon!  Cooking is becoming something I'm passionate about, especially creating healthy, low carb recipes since they seem to agree with my stomach better.  Keep checking back to see what I've created next!

1 comment:

  1. I've been thinking about using this Target gift card I got for Christmas to buy a blender, because I want to eat more vegetables and I've generally liked every green smoothie I've tried. Sort of related question: where do you buy your produce?

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