Happy Election Day

It felt so good to vote. I think this is the first election I've voted in that made me feel good. For once, I'm not voting for the lesser of two evils.

Is it boggling anyone else's mind though, that they still haven't quite managed to figure out this voting debacle? I mean how many years have we been doing this and yet they still aren't prepared for voters? There are already rumors spreading about ridiculously long lines, librarians that overslept and created lines of cranky voters, use of paper ballots, and god knows what else. I've heard several people comment on how they've managed to perfect voting for American Idol, but have yet to figure out fool proof voting for the presidential election. You would think ESPECIALLY after the complete messes that encapsulated the past two presidential elections, they would have devised some sort of solution to prevent chaos from forming.

Anyways, I just hope, no matter what the outcome, that it is a clean, fair, and scandal free win.

When One Has Coconuts...

I had about half a can of coconut milk in my fridge and I was determined not to waste it. After quickly scanning the internet, I came up with the idea of making tilapia with a coconut curry sauce.

Thai Coconut Tilapia, Garlic Green Beans, and Purple Sticky Rice

Ingredients (1 serving)

1 4-6oz tilapia fillet

1 cup green beans

1/2 cup dry purple sticky rice

1 tbs garlic (I used pre-minced in jar)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp curry

1/2 tsp cumin

1/4 cup white onion chopped

2 tsp grated ginger

1 tbs low sodium soy sauce

splash of lime juice (I used bottled)

1/2 tbs agave (or 1 tbs brown sugar)

2 tbs chopped cilantro (or dry equal)

1) Sticky Rice-I just followed the directions on the package-1/2 cup of rice in about 1 1/2 cups water and boiled until rice was tender (about 20 minutes)

2) Cook the tilapia with your prefered method. I use my George Foreman grill for EVERYTHING. I drizzle the fillet with olive oil, some Borsari Seasoned Salt (thanks mom), and a sprinkling of panko bread crumbs to give it a little crunch. I just pop in on the grill until it's done, which is only a couple minutes

3) Green beans-I place the green beans in a sautee pan and fill with enough water so that they are covered. Sprinkle with salt and bring water to a boil. After about 2 minutes in a boil I pour off the water, drizzle olive oil on the beans and add the garlic. Sautee until tender

4) Coconut Curry Sauce

-drizzle olive oil in a saucepan and add about onions->saute until translucent

-add garlic and ginger and continue cooking 1 minute, stirring often

-add curry powder and cumin and stir

-add soy sauce, coconut milk, agave, and salt

-bring to a simmer but do not boil

-take off heat and stir in cilantro and a splash of lime juice

I got fancy and stacked the the fish and beans over the rice. I ladled the curry sauce over the whole plate. Use your own discretion when deciding how much sauce to top with. There was definitely more sauce then I needed for this one portion as well as rice, but that just means leftovers for me!

Harley

I can't wait anymore. I have to introduce the love of my life:

Hehe...this is Harley. He always comes out looking goofy in pictures (kind of like his mom). He's a stray I adopted in the end of June and I'm pretending that his 1st birthday will be in January. He's actually played a good role in motivating me to live life to the fullest. There are many times I wish I could live life with the wild abandonment and contentment that a dog does.

One Glorious Hour

I LOVE daylight saving. I know it's just one hour but it always feels like so much more. I purposefully put off changing my clocks as long as possible just so I can keeping telling myself, wait! it's really an hour earlier! It makes it seem like the day goes on forever. Knowing that I had some extra time, I set out to accomplish as much as possible. I made a large to do list on my mini whiteboard located on my fridge and woke up after 10 hrs of sleep (that NEVER happens) ready to begin tackling each task. I'm happy to say that it is 8pm and I have 2 items left on the whiteboard. I'm putting them off though to blog instead :)

I did take the time to create 3 lovely meals for myself. I love the weekends because I can take time to cook what I'm craving. Fall is my favorite season and I didn't waste any time utilizing fall food for breakfast.

Pumpkin Waffles with Maple Walnut Apples

I make my own waffles and keep them in the freezer. The recipe I usually use is for wholegrain waffles and it is out of my Moosewood Restaurant New Classics cookbook. For these seasonal waffles, I used my normal waffle recipe with a few tweaks borrowed from Karina's Kitchen to incorporate the pumpkin. I was inspired to include the apples after seeing a recipe on Foodnetwork.com

Waffles (yields 8-10 waffles)

1 1/4 cups unbleached white flour

1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour

1 tbs baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg (to taste)

1/4 cup ground flax seed

1/4 cup cornmeal

3/4 cup pumpkin puree

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

4 tablespoons raw agave nectar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 eggs

1 1/2-2 cups Silk Light Vanilla Soy milk (regular milk would be fine)

Sift together the flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the ground flax and cornmeal and mix well. Add cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice. In a separate bowl lightly beat the eggs and add the pumpkin, oil, agave, vanilla, and about 1 cup of the milk. Combine with the dry indredients. At this point you need to decide if you need more milk. You want a batter that is a cakelike consistency. I kept adding milk little by little until it was the right consistency. This ended up being 1 1/2 cups of the soymilk for me. Use about 1/3 cup batter for each waffle.

Maple Walnut Apples (1 serving)

1 apple (I used Cortland)

1-2 tbs of real maple syrup

2 tbs of smart balance (or real butter if you swing that way)

Handful of walnuts

Cinnamon

Peel and slice the apple. Melt smart balance/butter spread in a pan. When the "butter" has melted add the apples, sprinkle with the cinnamon and toss them around to coat each one with the "butter" and the cinnamon. Continue to cook over medium heat until the apples start to become tender. Stir in the maple syrup and cook for another minute. The maple syrup will become almost caramely. Add the walnuts in and stir to incorporate. Remove from heat and enjoy!

I use a dinky $10 waffle maker but it seems to do the job. It makes 2 waffles at a time and I'm realizing that I might be pouring too much batter into it. My waffles come out rather thick. If you prefer thinner waffles, spread the batter out and you will also get more waffles!

As soon as the waffles cool, I place them in a plastic bag and into the freezer. Whenever I want a waffle, I just pop it into the toaster. Nothing like homemade waffles on a weekday morning to start your day right.

I didn't even need syrup on the waffles, I just scooped up apples with every bite of my waffle. Delightful!

Introduction

The title of this blog is taken from lyrics by the amazing Ben Taylor. The song is basically about losing someone and the reflection on one's life that often is a natural reaction after suffering loss of any kind. In 2004 I was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease. I spent a good two years feeling awful and wasting away. After having surgery 2 years ago and feeling consistently healthy ever since, I have slowly realized, that through this sickness, I suffered a loss of my own-the loss of myself.

Through this blog I hope to achieve several things:

1) Hold myself accountable to living my life-I remember this line from a movie (although I cannot rememeber the movie) where a character is being chastized for always waiting for their life to begin. The protaganist urges the character to realize that there is only one life-the life that he is living right now. I think about this scene often and feel like it describes me. Too often I feel like I’m waiting for the life that I believe is coming to me in the future, rather than living to the fullest the life that is mine right now. My goal is to live and be happy each and every day that I have.

2) Provide my thoughts and practices on food and a healthy lifestyle-this actually will cover several bases. To all those who have asked for recipes of the concoctions I come up with, I will start posting pictures and recipes of the delightful(at least I think so) things I cook. Along with this, I will be able to keep track of what I am eating, which will comply with my Gastro’s wishes that I keep a food journal. Also, maybe I can provide suggestions or support to anyone that is suffering from Crohn’s or any other illness.

"Another run around the sun" basically marks the passing of time. Typically January 1st is a perfect time to reflect and take action, but if the mood strikes me to do so in November, well, I'm not going to deny myself this privilege.