Tasty Soup

I made soup today with veggie broth, some frozen kale I had steamed, and pearl barley. I love barley. No pictures, I ate it up, it was so good and just hit the spot on this cold day. Made some generic muffins which were very tasty as well.

Barbara

Free workouts

I use a system called Turbulence Training for a lot of my workouts. As an early Christmas present, the guy behind the system has provided a free pdf of 10 minute workouts to do when stressed for time, like now during the holidays. You can get it here and there is no need to buy anything or sign up for anything. It's a 20 page pdf and it's free!

Barbara

A few updates

Well, in the last two months I have lost 35 pounds. Not quite sure how. I haven't been working out, if anything I'm moving less due to issues with my left knee. I have been eating smaller portions or leaving food on my plate, which I never used to do. A month or so back I was getting nauseated after eating, no matter what I ate. That seems to have gone away, thank goodness.

I made some new recipes last week, but I really didn't like them. No fault of the recipes, just my personal taste.

Today I had hashbrowns with salsa, one of my favorite breakfasts. I put some spanish rice ingredients in the crock pot and have that cooking.

I've been doing some knitting, mostly dishcloths. When I finish the two I have on the needles, I plan on starting a sweater! Probably a bit ambitious for me right now, but I want to try anyway. It's the Central Park Hoodie, which is supposed to be a good first sweater. We'll see.

Barbara

Quinoa Potato Chowder

I just got the "McDougall Made Irresistible" DVD and I tried making the Quinoa Potato Chowder from it. The recipe for this is also available in the November 2006 newsletter.

It tasted wonderful and even better with some of my fresh made whole wheat bread. I've got several other recipes I'll be trying soon and posting about here.

Barbara

Moxxor Omega-3 Oils Really Work!

I've delayed posting more about Moxxor, the new product I am using and distributing, until I could give some real results. I have been using it almost two months now and I have noticed changes.

I haven't changed anything else about my supplementation routine. I've just added taking 2 tiny Moxxor gelcaps per day. I have noticed that I have more energy, my knees feel better and a gum infection that has been hanging on is slowly going away, even though I have stopped taking antibiotics. And although I can't attribute this to Moxxor specifically, I have lost weight these past two months as well.

If you are skeptical, there is a new article posted about the benefits of Moxxor's anti-inflammatory mussel oil. Moxxor can be helpful if you have arthritis or any other inflammatory disease.

And since it is such a potent source of omega-3 oils, it's a quick and easy way to enhance your health and get all the benefits of taking omega-3 oils.

So please check out the health benefits of Moxxor and if you are interested, click on the links on the side of the page for more information.

Barbara

Moxxor- an exciting new product!

I've recently become involved with a new company with an exciting new product. It's called Moxxor and it is a powerful omega 3 oil combined with antioxidants from grapes.

The supplement comes from New Zealand and the omega 3 oils come from green-lipped mussels. One gelcap of Moxxor is equal to 248 capsules of salmon oil. It has high concentrations of Omega 3 oils and it is extracted carefully to get the full benefits into the product. It also includes, in one very small gelcap, a powerful antioxidant made from grapes grown in pristine New Zealand.

There is much more to this, including an opportunity to become a distributor. This is a brand new product (with more in the pipeline) and this is an opportunity to get in early with a great product, no fillers at all, and a chance to have a safety net for you and your family. If you are interested in this, please contact me through the website, or if you want to go for it, you can click the Enroll Now link on the website.

The website (mymoxxor.com/realhealth) is also the place to go to place an order. Give it a try, I think you'll like it. It's done great things for my bad knees and ankles and I've only been using it about 3 weeks.

Barbara

Amazing knitter

I'm on Ravelry, which is a must for anyone who knits. You have to be a member to view items, so I can't link directly. But I found this amazing knitter, username Ishi. From her project notes, she is amazing fast knitter and amazingly good. I've already favorited some of her projects. One is an intarsia yoke sweater called Poeme, a lace shawl called Lattice Lace Wrap that she did in a week. Wow, when I grow up, I wanna knit like she does!

Barbara

Improv Bean and corn enchiladas

I had some leftover black bean/corn soup and some leftover refried beans. I poured out most of the liquid from the soup and put the beans and corn in a bowl. Mad some quick enchilada sauce (using Mary McDougall's recipes) and while that was cooking I mixed the refried beans into the black beans. I then added a few sliced black olives. Used small corn tortillas and made about 5 rollups in a round casserole dish. Poured the sauce on the bottom and top and baked. Came out great and tasty.

Back to work tomorrow. Two more weeks on this awful 4am-2:30pm shift. Not sure what shift I'll be on then, but I'm sure my boss will find a way to mess with me.

I've lost 4 pounds in 6 days so far eating McDougall vegan. My blood pressure is also down and I've stopped my bp meds. I'm so excited about that!

Barbara

Summer doings

Well, our trip to Victoria BC was wonderful! The weather was great, the city is sooo lovely, and the people are nice. Had great food but with all the walking we did, I actually lost weight. We went to the museum and Parliament, which was right across the street from our hotel. We stayed at a place called the Embassy Inn, about a block from the Inner Harbor of Victoria. My partner's mother came with us and she had a great time as well. The Prieus used only about 18 gallons of gas to drive up there and around the area, then back.

Now we're back and back at work. I started eating more vegan again, but not going to say much about that until it sticks for longer.

Barbara

Trying to stay cool

Had some nice days here in Portland and had some not so cool days. Staying inside, fans on, trying to stay cool. I'm cooking a bit, mostly salad type things. I'm also doind some more knitting. Did a beautiful dishcloth and using now for the dishes. My partner and I are going on vacation soon, with her mother, up to Victoria BC. None of us has ever been there, so it should be fun.

Barbara

Rice cooker and Trader Joe goodies

I bought a Zojirushi NS-LAC05 Micom 3-Cup Rice Cooker and Warmer. It wasn't cheap, but I believe it to be a frugal purchase. From my research on the web, it seems to be sturdy and makes great rice. It's also the perfect size for the two of us. I've already made steel cut oats in it, came out perfect. I also made long grain brown rice, which came out not quite perfect, but I didn't rinse the rice as directed. I bought some bulk brown basmati, which I will be making for some stir fry to take to work tomorrow.



I also wanted to show off my purchases at Trader Joe's today. Got all the things I wanted without having to go anywhere else. I picked up:

- tomatoes
- 3 cans of garbanzo beans for hummus
- 3 bananas
- a bag of stir fry veggies to go with the rice for tomorrow
- baby lettuce mix and baby spring greens mix
- red plums (they smelled sooo good!)
- bag of valencia oranges
- whole wheat pitas
- whole wheat lavash wraps

Total cost was $21.26. (no sales tax in Oregon)

I'm off to do some cooking!

Barbara

106 unread books

I don't do memes usually, but this one caught my eye.A website called Library Thing had a list of the top 106 unread books on peoples lists. I was amazed at how many I had read. So here it is.

Asterisk – I own the book
Bold – I’ve read the book - w/link if reviewed
Italics – I’ve started the book
Stricken – I hated the book
Underline – on my current TBR list

*Jonathan Strange & M. Norrell
Anna Karenina
Crime and Punishment
Catch-22
One hundred years of solitude
Wuthering Heights
The Silmarillion
Life of Pi: a novel
The Name of the Rose
Don Quixote (Read in Spanish)
Moby Dick
*Ulysses
Madame Bovary
*The Odyssey
Pride and Prejudice
Jane Eyre
A Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Guns, Germs, and Steel: the fates of human societies
War and Peace
Vanity Fair
The Time Traveler’s Wife
*The Iliad
Emma
The Blind Assassin
The Kite Runner
Mrs. Dalloway
Great Expectations
American Gods
A heartbreaking work of staggering genius
*Atlas shrugged
Reading Lolita in Tehran
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlesex
Quicksilver
Wicked : the life and times of the wicked witch of the West
The Canterbury Tales
The Historian
A portrait of the artist as a young man
Love in the time of cholera
Brave new world
The Fountainhead
Foucault’s Pendulum
Middlemarch
Frankenstein
The Count of Monte Cristo
Dracula
A clockwork orange
Anansi Boys
*The Once and Future King
The Grapes of Wrath
The Poisonwood Bible
1984
Angels & Demons
The Inferno
The Satanic Verses
*Sense and sensibility
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Mansfield Park
One flew over the cuckoo’s nest
To the Lighthouse
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Oliver Twist
Gulliver’s Travels
Les misérables
The Corrections
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time
Dune
*The Prince
The Sound and the Fury
Angela’s Ashes
The God of Small Things
*A people’s history of the United States : 1492-present
*Cryptonomicon
Neverwhere
A confederacy of dunces
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Dubliners
The unbearable lightness of being
Beloved
Slaughterhouse-five
The Scarlet Letter
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
The mists of Avalon
Oryx and Crake : a novel
Collapse : how societies choose to fail or succeed
Cloud Atlas
The Confusion
Lolita
Persuasion
Northanger Abbey
The Catcher in the Rye
On the Road
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Freakonomics
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
The Aeneid
Watership Down
Gravity’s Rainbow
The Hobbit
In Cold Blood
White teeth
Treasure Island
David Copperfield
The Three Musketeers

So I own 10. I've owned many more in my life, but have gotten rid of them since.

I’ve read 39

I’ve started 2

I’ve hated none
And none are on my TBR list
How do you fare against the 106?

Barbara

Hot, hot hot!

Today it reached 95 in Portland a new high for the day and month. Odd weather we've been having this spring. It should be back in the high 60's where it belongs by Wednesday. Even the coast got very hot, which is unusual.

I'm still plugging away at knitting and starting to have fun. I'm working on a dishcloth at present.

Barbara

First farmers market of the year

Went to my first farmer's market this year. It's the Moreland Farmer's Market and today was their opening day of the season. I got there early but it was already quite full of people. Not a lot of produce yet, of course. The Sellwood Middle School Marimba band was playing and it was fantastic. Very upbeat, cheery music.I bought some cookies and some Sensei Sauce.It's really tasty and will be a good addition to my stock of sauces.

Barbara

Yarn Harlot in Portland!

I went to the Yarn Harlot's tour and got this great button!

It was a good time and free. I've never seen so many people knitting before. And wearing such gorgeous knitted things!

Stephanie McPhee is very funny. There was laughter and a song that you had to be there to appreciate. If you ever get to listen to her speak, do so. It's well worth it.

Barbara

Little bit chili

I got the idea for this chili from Frugal Guy. I love his blog. He talks about making chili by just tossing in some of this and some of that. In other words, a 'little bit' of this and that chile! So I gave it a try.

Fried up some ground beef with spices (celery seed, onion and garlic powder, some dill weed, salt, pepper and a few shakes of some others). Put in some chopped green pepper and minced garlic. Then a can of turkey chili with beans from Trader Joes. Then a can of black beans. A little bit of V8, pace picante, lots of chili powder, some cumin and cayenne, some water and the reminder of my spanish rice. Smells and tastes good.

Barbara

Tasty breakfast

I had such a tasty breakfast this morning. First, buttered 2 slices of dill rye. I love this bread.

Then into a small frying pan, some earth balance, 2 eggs. Scramble up a little, put in some nitrite free smoked turkey, all torn up. Then about a half cup of brown rice, cooked. When it's almost done, about 1/2 cup spinach leaves mixed in. A little salt and fresh ground pepper and done! Very tasty and cheap.

Tonight I'm having a salad and making chile from some leftovers. I make this 1000 island dressing from Table For Two. It's so simple. Some Veganaise, ketchup, onion powder, dill relish, dash of salt. Mix. Soo good!

Barbara

Spring again

It's spring again in Portland. Today was 70 and sunny, blue skies. I took walks on my lunch and break. Got some sunshine on my bare skin, got the body making some Vitamin D. Tomorrow is supposed to be much the same, but 75 degress. I have already planted pansies outside and they are doing well.

I've been experimenting with recipes lately, but honestly, nothing worth mentioning. Some didn't turn out right and others just weren't appetizing. I think my body is changing too. Things I used to be able to eat now bother my stomach. Not quite sure what that is about.

Happy Spring!

Barbara

St Patrick's food, a bit early

We had a St Patrick's day potluck at work today. I found these recipes and decided to try making colcannon.

It came out fine, kept it heated in my crock pot at work. Most of it went, so I was happy about that. I enjoyed it. I used russets, kale and cabbage.

A lot of work though, my kitchen was a mess when I got done.

Barbara

Spring has arrived!

It's definitely spring in Portland. I went for a nice vegetarian breakfast at Bob's Red Mill yesterday and the weeping willows were a lovely shade of oh so pale green. The cherry trees are blooming all over the city and the daffodils are in flower already. And as I write this at 3:30pm, it's sunny, blue skies and 64 degrees here. I love living here!

Barbara

Portland in VegNews

The March-April edition of Vegnews has a great article about the vegan minimall at 12th and SE Stark in Portland. Just a heads up!

Barbara

Giving up on seitan

I know a lot of people like seitan. I have tried it boiled, baked and now steamed. They all came out fine. I just don't like the taste. I'm giving up on seitan and just using vital wheat gluten in my whole wheat bread dough. I may give tempeh another try, it wasn't my favorite the first time I made it.

I've been eating a lot of potatoes lately, and noodles in veggies stir fry. I want to try Veganomicon's chickpea soup, it's supposed to be quite tasty.

Barbara

Darn cheezy sauce

I keep trying recipes for cheezy sauce to put on noodles, potatoes, veggies, etc. I had high hopes for one I found on 'A Vegan for Dinner' (sorry at work and can't get the link). It was okay but still not right. I think I've made about 4-5 sauces with no luck.

I actually enjoy only one thing, and this is just something I do from a suggestion I read. I make noodles, put in a bunch of Earth Balance, then sprinkle nutritional yeast till all the noodles have some, then some soymilk till the yeast is all mixed and it's slightly creamy. Good for quick noodles, but not what I'm looking for.

Barbara

Veganomican, try 1

I've been trying some recipes from Veganomican. It's a great cookbook. I plan on trying a lot of the recipes in it.

I made rosemary focaccia bread. It came out fine, but didn't have much flavor. I much prefer the italian peasant bread I made off a recipe on recipezaar.com. It was much more flavorful.

I also made jelly donut cupcakes. They tasted great, but the preserves I used didn't sink down and get covered by the batter. My partner didn't like them, said there was too much nutmeg. I took a bunch to work and no one even noticed the nutmeg.

I have already made the chickpea cutlets and I plan on making more this week.

I also have a list of recommended recipes from this book that I've accumulated and will be slowly trying out.

Barbara

Happy New Year!

Well, it is 2008. It's been a good past year, I found a job and continued our frugal ways. We got a bit spendthrifty towards the end of the year, but that will be changing.

I am back to eating vegan again. I just feel better. Been busy planning and cooking food for home and work. And I'm back exercising. This should be a good new year.

Made bean soup today and tomorrow I'm having bean and rice burritos. On Dr McDougall's DVD, I got a recipe for cabbage with some rice vinegar and lime, that makes a great taco/burrito addition.

Barbara