My Beautifully Relaxing Weekend

Although Labor Day weekend isn’t technically over for me yet, I am still going to give you a quick little recap of my wonderfully relaxing weekend so far.

It has involved lots of great food…nummy BBQ food spread

 

cereal bowl

 

lunch at dangerfields

 

dessert at dangerfields

 

Puppies and babies…

 

 

 

emmy leo

 

Lots of time with family and friends…

mom dad melanie

Shopping…(no I didn’t buy this dress but after seeing this photo, I kinda wish I would have. It’s cute!)

melanie dress shopping

 

Walks and some light jogging!

I actually went for a light and slow jog yesterday for about two miles. I cannot even begin to explain how good it felt. I am still needing to take it slow in the name of healing, but my jog was only slightly faster than walking pace so I am still taking it easy. I know better than to push myself at this point in the game.

Now that the weather has cooled off a bit and we are in the 70’s versus the 90’s, it makes outdoor running a lot more enjoyable. I may even get out for a jog this morning again!

I plan to finish off the long weekend with some more shopping. I have a super amazing event coming up so I am shopping for an outfit. More to come on that soon!

Also, I may work on a little bit of food prep. I have big plans for dinner with my lovely lady friend Kalley tomorrow. Get excited!

How was your weekend?! Any good eats I should know about?

Continue Reading My Beautifully Relaxing Weekend

WIAW: Sweet and Salty

Well I was all set to write out a nice post to contribute to WIAW (What I Ate Wednesday) hosted by Jenn over at Peas and Crayons, but guess what? My body was needing some extra sleep this morning and I gave it what it wanted. Therefore, I don’t have any much time to blog this morning, so here is a quick version of WIAW (actually a combination of eats from Monday AND Tuesday)!

First, what is WIAW?

According to Jenn…

“—What WIAW isn’t about—-
Comparison – Judgement – Restriction – Guilt
—-What WIAW is about—-
Celebrating one of the glorious things we all have in common: We all eat!
WIAW is about food and fun! It’s about making new friends, breaking out of a food rut, noting changes in your diet/lifestyle, inspiring yourself & others, embracing fruit & vegetables, nourishing your body with the foods that work for you, finding new ways to eat your favorite foods, and so. much. more.
Celebrate Food.  Celebrate blogging.  Celebrate Individuality.”

WIAWbutton

I also want to mention that I absolutely did not photograph everything I ate! Here’s what I have got for ya!

Berries with brown rice puffs and almond milk.

brown rice cereal with fruit

Spinach salad with tuna and veggies!

spinach salad with tuna

Caribou coffee with mom (no picture): caramel soy latte! My new favorite! my adorable mom and abbie

Spoonfuls of this stuff…

peanut butter coconut spread

My amazing dinner I shared with you yesterday: quinoa with sautéed veggies and hummus!

quinoa sauteed veggies

And I will not lie to you, I consumed a lot of this stuff over the past couple of days. Trail mix is my weakness! The sweet and salty combo gets me every time. So darn delicious!

trail mix

Thanks Jenn for hosting WIAW! Happy Hump Day!

Do you prefer sweet or salty foods? 
Continue Reading WIAW: Sweet and Salty

Clean Eating Food Menu For Camping

Happy 4th of July to all of my fellow Americans! I hope your day is full of celebrating with loved ones and BBQ! In case you missed it, yesterday I compiled a list of 10 patriotic recipes that would be perfect for a picnic or BBQ today.

Kitchen Mayhem

Over the past few days I have spent many hours preparing food for our camping weekend. Typical camping food for us is usually kabobs, burgers, chex mix, and s’mores, or something close to that, but this time around we will be eating a little differently. With my hopes to keep up with the clean eating while I am away, I planned out a whole clean menu for us. I don’t even want to know how many total hours I truly spent in the kitchen. All I know is it is a lot more time than what I usually spend when preparing food for a camping trip. I knew it would be a lot of work to plan a “clean” menu, but also knew it would be so worth it! I enlisted the help of some clean eating recipes that I found online to help ease the process. In case you are interested, I thought I would share with you my clean eating food menu for camping.

On the menu for the weekend:

Breakfasts:

  • Cooked buckwheat with cinnamon, a touch of stevia, almond butter and dried fruit. I am incredibly excited for this. I taste tested it after I made it and it’s awesome! To prepare it, I cooked it per directions after letting it soak for 24 hours to aid in digestion. I then added coconut milk, cinnamon, and stevia. I let it cool and then packaged it in a canning jar to bring along with us. We can either eat it cold, or warm it up at the campsite for breakfasts.

buckwheat buckwheat

Lunches:

  • Baked Falafel with salad and homemade (dairy-free) ranch dressing. I used my falafel recipe and also added carrots, red onion, and flaxseed. I baked them at home so that they would be all ready to go when needed. I’m excited to see how they turned out! I used Healthy Blender Recipe’s recipe for the ranch dressing. It’s pretty tangy and should be really good on a salad with the falafel.
  • Lunch out somewhere
  • Leftovers

falafel

falafel

ranch dressing homemade vegan

Dinners: 

  • Asian turkey meatballs over sesame spaghetti squash. I mixed and formed the meatballs and then froze them raw. We will cook them once we get to our campsite most likely on the first night so that we can have them for leftovers for lunch the next day. I got the meatball recipe from Queen of Quinoa but also added garlic and coconut aminos. I used a recipe from Family Fresh Cooking as my inspiration for the spaghetti squash but made a couple of tweaks to it as well. I used coconut aminos instead of wheat-free tamari paste and red wine vinegar instead of rice vinegar. Trying sandwiches from a very famous joint by Jimmy John Owner is also a good idea.
  • Black bean quinoa burgers with roasted veggies. I also formed these patties and froze them uncooked. I used a recipe I found online but am not super happy with them. I taste tested one and they tasted okay but they are pretty crumbly. I like my version better but couldn’t make them this time around because they have tomatoes and eggs in the recipe which are not allowed on the clean program. *Remember this is VERY short term!* For the roasted veggies, I roasted them halfway to start the process and will finish toasting them up at the campsite.
  • Leftovers or out

Spaghetti squash…

spaghetti squash

Raw turkey meatballs…

turkey meatballs

Uncooked black bean quinoa burgers…

black bean quinoa burgers

black bean quinoa burgers

Halfway roasted veggies (zucchini, onions, garlic, kohlrabi, and turnips)…

roasted veggies

Snacks:

  • Raw veggies: snap peas, carrots
  • Raw fruit: watermelon, cherries, apples
  • Dried fruit: no-sugar added dried cranberries, mango, and pineapple
  • Mixed Nuts
  • Brown Rice Cakes
  • Rice Crackers
  • Homemade sugar-free dark chocolate (lightly sweetened with stevia)

I made insane amounts of the burgers, meatballs, and falafel which is why I am planning on having leftovers for 1-2 meals. As you can see, I was a busy, busy bee. I even have callouses on my hands to show for it. I can’t wait to go relax and enjoy all of this wonderful food now!

I hope you all have a fabulous holiday weekend! Catch up with you later gators!

Continue Reading Clean Eating Food Menu For Camping

Sweet Potato with Honey Cinnamon Almond Butter & Beautiful Blooms

To all you dog-lovers out there. A friend of mine is needing to find a home for Shelby, an intact female 7 1/2-year old AKC German Shepherd Dog.

She has her AKC papers, most recent vet records from early 2013, and microchip information available. She was trained as a puppy by a specialist in military and police dogs 6 years ago. She would NOT be good in a family with kids younger than teens or with cats. Any person with her will need to be comfortable being firm with her – anyone who has had Shepherds understands that that is a breed trait and not necessarily a personality trait. She has been socialized and is generally good with all other dogs – although large dogs are better – as long as introduced properly.

Shelby needs to find a home before June 27th or she will be placed into the humane society. Please email me at beautifullynutty@gmail.com if you are interested!!

********************

It’s Wednesday, you know it, it’s Wednesday and I’ll show it! I’m feeling a little cooky this Wednesday. I blame it on the sunshine. 😉 I LOVE it!

I’ve been taking the doctor’s advice and sticking to lower intensity workouts for now, mostly in the form of walks outside with Moose. It has been so beautiful outside lately and I enjoy the fact that when I go outside for a walk with Moose I am benefited in three ways:

  1. I get to move my body and feel great
  2. Moose gets to move his body and feel great
  3. I get to soak in some much-needed Vitamin D.

Triple whammy!

Lunch

Part of my lunch yesterday was baked sweet potato slices with honey cinnamon almond butter.

I baked the sweet potato slices in coconut oil the night before, covered them when they were done baking, and put them in the fridge for later. When I was ready to eat the slices, I stuck them in the microwave for a short time and they were good to go.

For the almond butter, I mixed together almond butter, honey, and cinnamon and then tried adding water to thin it out but it actually made the mixture thicken. My original plan was to make a pretty drizzle over the top of the sweet potatoes, but instead I had to plop it into the center. It was really probably thin enough, I should have just left it. Oh well, next time.

sweet potato with almond butter

What failed in presentation made up for in taste. This combo was spectacular. I have tried sweet potato and peanut butter but I don’t think I have ever had sweet potato with almond butter. I seriously think I prefer the almond butter on it! Who would have thought.

Changing gears…our yard is in full bloom. We have these beautiful pink peonies that I swear only last for a couple of days, so when they bloom, I make it a must to snap a couple of photos because they are absolutely beautiful.

peony

I called in Moose to model in the yard and add an extra point of interest. He put up with me happily obliged and did an excellent job posing for the photos. 😉

moose

Please excuse my poor photography skills. I couldn’t seem to exclude my shadow from most of the photos.

moose

Moose enjoying the fragrant lilacs…

moose

Moose

And the blinding sun…

Moose

If dogs could talk I don’t think I would want to know what Moose was saying to me in that last photo.

I am truly enjoying nature’s beauty in our backyard (and so is Moose)!

Random side note: I cannot for the life of me remember how to spell German Shepherd. I don’t know how many times I have probably spelled it wrong on the blog, on twitter, etc. Forgive me Moose if your mom embarrassed you.

Dinner

After one failed attempt at an over-easy egg, my second attempt was a partial fail as well. I could not seem to keep the yolk from breaking last night. I settled with my second attempt and served my “over-easy” egg on top of sautéed red bell peppers, onions, and quinoa. sauteed onions with egg

Then topped it with salsa and cilantro!

sauteed onions with egg

It was absolutely delicious and very satisfying.

Happy hump day my friends. Do something that makes you happy today.

Continue Reading Sweet Potato with Honey Cinnamon Almond Butter & Beautiful Blooms

Memorial Weekend: Productive Yet Relaxing

 

Long time no see! How was everyone’s Memorial Weekend? Mine was very productive but also relaxing. That seems to be a common theme around our house on the weekends. We got so much done around the house and spent the majority of our weekend working outside in the yard.

I want to give HUGE shout-out thank you to the guys who came over on Sunday to help Dana dig the egress window well. THANK YOU times a million! They plowed through that job so fast I couldn’t believe it.

After the window was dug, I helped Dana lay the bricks in for the walls of the well. I felt pretty tough as I carried those bricks around the yard, and my arms are definitely feeling it today! One more trip to Menards for our last batch of brick and the egress window well will be nearly complete. The next step will be putting the windows in, but we’re going to have that done professionally. Then we can start finishing our basement! I’m just waiting for that money tree to start growing in the yard. It all adds up real fast.

Besides getting muddy in the yard this weekend, I also hung out with family, friends, and ate some delicious food. I was hoping to get a bike ride in with Dana but the weather wasn’t really cooperating. The sun hasn’t shown us its beautiful face around here since Thursday if I’m not mistaken. Our poor plants haven’t seen sun since we planted them in the ground on Thursday! We could all use a little Vitamin D around here. Soon enough though. Think positive thoughts, right? Maybe I’ll do a little sun dance later.

Alright, I’m planning on keeping it short today. I don’t have a ton of photos to share to recap the weekend, but I do have a few. So, I’m going to finish off today’s post with the collection of my photos from the weekend. And here we go…

Chipotle loaded with veggies! Proof that you can chose healthy fast food decisions; just go light on the cheese, sour cream, and guac, ditch the tortilla, and go heavy on the veggies and you have yourself an extremely delicious and healthy veggie-packed Chipotle bowl.

 

chipotle

Almond banana muffin with almond butter and sliced bananas…

almond bread

The Egress window well…

dana

Salad: mixed greens, tomato, carrots, peas, avocado, olives, sunflower seeds, and Newman’s Own honey mustard dressing.

salad

 

One of many trips to Menards…11% off everything right now really adds up when you’re there everyday. Spend money to save money, right?

menards

 

Cherry Berry…with no skimping on frozen yogurt OR toppings. I meant business.

cherry berry

Homemade MAH bites, fauxtmeal raisin cookie style.

mah bites

 

And the Bachelorette…

 

 

 

bachelorette

 

I had to throw that last one in there because I am super excited that the Bachelorette is back on again. I spent a good 5-miles on the treadmill watching the season premiere last night. It should be a good one! No favorites yet, though.

I have a nummy vegetarian meal planned for tonight that I am anxious to share with you all (inspiration from Denise). This is actually the only meal I planned for the week because I’m thinking there will be leftovers. Do you have any meals planned for the week?

I hope you all had a FANTASTIC weekend.

Did you do anything fun this weekend? Were you productive around the house? Did you relax with family and friends?

Continue Reading Memorial Weekend: Productive Yet Relaxing

Nummy Leftovers & Puppy Dental Work

Only in Minnesota can it snow one day, and then two weeks later reach 90 plus degrees. I guess it keeps us on our toes right? All I can say is the winter coat and boots have officially retired to the basement for the summer and they are not making a return for a loooong time. I am pretty excited for the warm weather and the thunderstorms too!

Yesterday was a fairly quiet one around here. The pooch had a rough day–I’ll get into that in a second.

Lunch yesterday was one of my favorites. I kept it very simple and did a slightly modified version of my sweet and creamy salad. In the mix was baby spring lettuce, fresh mozzarella, strawberries, avocado, black beans, and Newman’s Own Lite honey mustard dressing.

salad

I also munched on a bunch of trail mix.

For dinner I threw together a plate of leftover taco salad from our Mother’s Day lunch. Why I don’t make large batches of food at all times and have leftovers frequently, I am not sure? Who doesn’t love a meal that comes together in a matter of minutes? Leftovers are the best! I think it tasted better this time around actually. Seriously so good.

IMG_2701

taco salad

After I snapped these photos I realized I forgot to add shredded cheese and a couple of crumpled up whole grain chips.

I may have to get creative with the rest of the chicken leftovers though—I do get tired of the same meal if I have it more than 2-3 times in a row. I may freeze it for another time too. We’ll see if I catch any creative vibes later on and that will be my deciding factor.


Moose’s Dental Work

Anyway, let’s talk about the pup. Last Friday, we were cleaning Moose’s teeth and noticed that one of his molars was completely cracked all the way up to his gums. My stomach turned when I saw it because it looked so painful, yet Moose wasn’t giving us one single sign that he was in discomfort or pain. After agreeing that we needed to call the vet asap, we first continued on to the other side of his mouth and noticed ANOTHER tooth that was cracked. What had this dog gotten in to?! Again, he had given no signs that anything was wrong meaning he probably was feeling just fine. However, you can’t just leave these two huge cracked molars sitting in his mouth because the risk of infection, abscesses and other dental related issues are sky-high. So, we called the vet and made an appointment for him for yesterday.

First of all, dropping him off at his appointment yesterday was heart breaking. As I handed him over to the vet and started to leave, he looked back at me with his puppy eyes that said, “Mom, where are you going? No, don’t leave.” My heart broke and I had to turn away. I know some of you are thinking come on, he’s just a dog, but he is my little man, he’s my child and his pain is my pain! I can only imagine how tough it’s going to be when I actually have a human child. Geez louise! I’m such a sap.

Going in to the appointment, we knew that they were for sure going to have to extract one tooth and possibly two, but for some reason I was thinking positively and thinking they would really only need to pull one. Well, at about 8:30 yesterday morning they called us and gave us the news that they would definitely need to be pulling both teeth. My heart fell to my stomach. My poor guy!

I didn’t hear anything after that until about noon when the vet called me to tell me how the procedure had gone. Unfortunately, they were only able to pull the one tooth yesterday because of his size (he’s 95 lbs again!), and because of the size of the tooth. They were having a hard time getting all of the roots of the tooth and the one tooth had taken 2 1/2 hours which means he was under anesthesia for 2 1/2 hours. The vet didn’t want to risk the same thing happening on the other side that day, because that is a long time to be under anesthesia, so we had to schedule the other extraction for next Monday. He has to go through all of this again. 🙁

He was so groggy when we got him home last night. He is on a lot of pain medication and he seems to be doing fine. He does have a little swelling this morning but again, he shows no signs of pain and doesn’t wince or whine when I look at his mouth. The vet is so kind and told me to bring him by this afternoon if I feel it isn’t going down and they can take a peak at it. I know he is probably just fine but I’d rather be safe than sorry and I will probably bring him in.

You can see a little swelling in this photo on his right side…

moose

Needless to say, after we picked him up last night he did a whole lot of lying around.

moose

 

Despite being a little groggy, I was actually surprised at how coherent he really was. He wanted to be outside, and he wanted to play, but I had to keep him inside for the most part and make sure he continued to rest. Oh my little baby!

Anyway, that’s what is going on around here!

Questions of the day:

  • Have you ever had to deal with any health issues with your pets? Does it break your heart as much as it does mine?!
  • What is your favorite “leftover” food? 

I enjoy leftover tacos, and meatloaf always seems to taste better the second day for some reason!

Continue Reading Nummy Leftovers & Puppy Dental Work

Scenes from My Fun Weekend

I had such an insanely amazing weekend full of so much fun. Here’s a quick little recap for all ya’ll!

On Friday I got to see two of my fav girlies, Kate and Jules, who were both in town for a little while!

(Photo Circa Summer 2012)

kate and melanie

Friday night was date night at Piccolo with my honey. In case you missed it, you can read all about our fancy experience here!

Piccolo

 

Saturday I had lunch with my mom and dad, grandpa, and my great aunt and uncle who were in town!

Saturday afternoon we went to the Twins game. The Twins won and we got neat hats!

 

 

 

dana and melanie twins game

 

On Sunday, my mom and I completed our 6th Race for the Cure at Mall of America!

Mom and Melanie

mom and melanie race for the cure

 

Afterwards I had the family over to celebrate Mother’s Day and my grandpa’s birthday. I made pulled taco chicken and set out all of the fixin’s for Nacho Bar: chips, salsa, black beans, corn, tomatoes, lettuce, black olives, jalepenos, guacamole, sour cream. So delicious!

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you wonderful mamas out there by the way!

nacho bar Nacho bar nacho salad

 

By the time Sunday afternoon rolled around, I was spent. We ran one errand but besides that I spent the majority of the evening on the couch and then called it an early night.

It was one of those weekends where you look back and can’t believe how much fun you packed into such a short amount of time. I loved every second of it.

I’m going to leave it short and sweet for you all today. I have taken a four-day hiatus from Insanity and it’s time to get back in gear!

How was your weekend? Did you do anything fun?! Were you able to relax?

Continue Reading Scenes from My Fun Weekend

Quinoa Tabouli Recipe & Switching to Raw Honey

Oh happy day! Who’s doing their Friday happy dance? I am.

Yesterday was a day of great eats. Although I didn’t get too creative with breakfast and went with my fav; banana with peanut butter, cinnamon, and a touch of honey, I did change it up just a bit. I am now using raw honey instead of the good old honey bear and this stuff rocks my socks for multiple reasons.

honey

Why I switched to raw organic honey

  1. It tastes incredible.
  2. I bought it locally and could tell you exactly what farm in MN it came from.
  3. It has health benefits such as: wound healing, boosts immunity, traditionally has been used to heal ulcers, diarrhea, and other gastrointestinal issues.
  4. Rich in B vitamins and vitamin C and contains healthy minerals too!
  5. In the processing of your everyday honey bear squeeze bottle honey, beneficial enzymes, nutrients, and antioxidants are often destroyed. Instead of reaping the wonderful health benefits of honey, you are really stripping away the goodies.
  6. I love it.

some information was gathered from this source

The only downside is it is definitely a little more expensive than the traditional honey bear, but you can see why right? It’s worth it! Another FYI, buy organic if you can.

A friendly reminder: children under the age of one should not consume any type of honey as it has the potential of causing botulism.

Lunch

Anyway, moving on. After my Insanity workout, I was craving nutrients in a huge way. Usually I hedge toward smoothies post workout, but today I went the salad route. I must say this turned out to be one pretty darn beautiful salad.

What’s in it: mixed spring lettuce, grated carrot, grated pepper cheese, peas, red bell pepper, sunflower seeds, Applegate roasted turkey from the deli, and homemade mustard dressing.

Dressing: deli mustard, red wine vinegar, dash of garlic powder and black pepper, and a touch of water.

salad salad

Yum-o.

Mediterranean Feast

For dinner, we had my mom and dad and brother Kevin over for a Mediterranean themed dinner.

On the menu: chicken and veggie kabobs, hummus, veggies, fresh fruit, and quinoa tabouli!

carrots and hummus

Quinoa Tabouli!!

quinoa tabouli quinoa tabouli greek dinner kabobs hummus tabouli greek dinner kabobs hummus tabouli

Oh my goodness I love this food so much. I especially love making it at home because I can control EVERYTHING that goes into it–including the salt content.

This was my first ever attempt at making tabouli. Traditional tabouli uses bulgar wheat, but I wanted to make mine with protein-rich quinoa, and am THRILLED with the result. If you are a tabouli fan, this is a recipe you are absolutely going to want to try! It’s truly so easy too!

Quinoa Tabouli
Print
Ingredients
  • juice from ¾ of a large lemon
  • 2 Tbsp. olive oil
  • ½ tsp. dried oregano
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • 2 cups cooked quinoa, cooled
  • 2 cups parsley, chopped
  • ¼ cup mint, chopped
  • ½ cup cucumber, diced
  • ½ cup onion, diced
  • 1 Roma tomato, diced
  • salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
  1. In a large bowl, combine lemon juice, olive oil, oregano, and use a fine cheese grater to grate garlic cloves into juice mixture.
  2. Add remaining ingredients into bowl, stir to combine.
  3. Cover and refrigerate overnight if possible to let flavors blend together.
  4. Serve cold on a bed of lettuce (optional). Great with chicken kabobs and hummus.

 

Happy Friday to all of you beautiful people. Catch up with you later!

What are your favorite ways to enjoy honey?

My favorite ways are of course drizzled over pb toast or pb and banana with a touch of cinnamon, or in a mug of hot water with fresh ginger.

Continue Reading Quinoa Tabouli Recipe & Switching to Raw Honey

Chicken Curry Salad in Endive Boats

Happy MAY day! 

tulips

 

This is obviously not a MN scene but I think this is such a gorgeous photo and it makes me smile looking at this photo and thinking about the day when flowers will be popping up around here. Hopefully soon. For now, we are in a Winter Storm Warning. Yup…but anyway!

Some exciting news! Today is the last day you will see the old butcher block countertops in my photos because today we are getting NEW KITCHEN COUNTERTOPS! You know you are grown up when you get so incredibly excited about home improvements.

The butcher block countertops have been in the house for goodness knows how long, and they are terrible when it comes to stains and I don’t want to even think about any possible bacteria in the crevices.

banana pb

After much price shopping, stone shopping, and style shopping, we have decided on granite countertops. We went with a gray with specks of gold and red. It will be done by the time I get home this afternoon and I am ecstatic. I can’t wait to show you the refurbished kitchen later this week!

Lunch yesterday was a bunch of small meals throughout the span of 11:00 and 2:00. Here’s one of them…

egg

The afternoon included a lot of food prep time. In the morning I started two large chicken breasts (thawed) in the crock pot, seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder, and a cup or so of homemade chicken bone broth. I covered the pot, set it on low and the chicken was done in three hours.

On the dinner menu: Chicken Curry Salad in Endive Boats!

Once the chicken was cooled I pulled it apart and set it aside. I got started on my curry sauce experiment; adding a sprinkle of this, a touch of that, and tasting along the way. This was part of my other small lunch meal. After some time, I came up with what I think is a VERY delicious Chicken Curry Salad recipe!

The chicken and the curry sauce before it was mixed together (not the most appetizing photo). Later I mixed in cilantro, green onions, and raisins too.

curry chicken

The kitchen sure took a beating with all of this food prep!

Note the white backsplash next to the yellow paint–we removed the wooden backsplash to prepare for our new counters and the new backsplash of course. Also, Dana loosened the countertop in preparation of removal so that all we had to do last night was pull it up and out of there. This ended up being a bigger task than we were expecting, but we got it out of there nonetheless.

kitchen mess

After the chicken was mixed with the sauce, I covered the bowl with plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge for 4-5 hours. This helps the flavors blend together and “get to know each other.”

Once dinner rolled around, I gave the chicken one last stir, added in the celery and almonds at the last minute because I didn’t want to risk them getting soggy, taste tested it one more time, and scooped it on to some beautiful endive leaves. We went super classy with the Dixie paper plates last night because of the kitchen demolition.

curry chicken salad curry chicken salad

You could enjoy this chicken salad on a whole grain wrap, in a lettuce cup, with endive boats, celery, zucchini, or on a lettuce salad. It was a really nice change of pace dinner!

Chicken Curry Salad
Print
Ingredients
  • 3 cups cooked chicken breast, shredded
  • 2 Tbsp. cilantro, chopped
  • 3 Tbsp. green onions, diced
  • ⅓ cup raisins
  • juice from ½ a lime
  • ¾ cup Greek yogurt
  • 3 Tbsp. Light Mayo
  • 2 tsp. apple cider vinegar
  • 1 tsp. mustard
  • 1½ tsp. honey
  • 1½ Tbsp. curry powder
  • ¼ tsp. garlic powder
  • ½ tsp. ginger powder
  • salt and pepper
  • ¼ cup celery, diced
  • 3 Tbsp. almonds, sliced
Instructions
  1. In a large bowl combine chicken, cilantro, onion, and raisins. Set aside
  2. In a small bowl mix together lime juice, yogurt, mayo, vinegar, mustard, honey, curry, garlic powder, ginger, and salt and pepper.
  3. Pour over chicken and stir until chicken is evenly covered in sauce. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 3-5 hours.
  4. Remove from fridge, add almonds and celery, stir, and test for seasonings. Adjust if needed.
  5. Serve in endive leaves, in a whole grain or gluten-free wrap, whole grain or gluten-free bread, in lettuce cups, or on top of a lettuce salad.

 

This was super tasty and what’s great about it is all of the prep can be done ahead of time so that once dinner rolls around, all you need to do is throw it on a wrap and eat it up! Also, research is showing that curry (namely the main ingredient turmeric) may have some health benefits such as aiding in alzheimer’s prevention, reducing inflammation, easing digestion, boosting immunity, and more.

Have a happy Wednesday my friends!

Do you ever cook with curry? How do you usually use it?

Continue Reading Chicken Curry Salad in Endive Boats

Chicken Marbella & Weekend Scenes

Mother Nature is seriously testing my positivity and patience. It is ridiculous here. It has been consistently cold and rainy/snowy. Enough to make me want to crawl into hibernation again.

snow

We weren’t able to get our normal weekend run in due to schedule conflicts and freezing rain conflicts, and today isn’t too much better. Although, it isn’t raining or snowing yet. The treadmill has my name on it today unfortunately. It sounds like we’re going to have a week and a half or so of not so nice weather and then it’s supposed to turnaround. We can only hope!

Okay, enough of the downer talk. How about some photos from this weekend?

Mom and dad and Abbie time…

abbie

Morning coffee with coconut milk and a fruit and veggie smoothie…

smoothie coffee

Saturday night steak dinner!

steak

Moose shares my same love for peanut butter…

pb banana moose pb

Leftover steak salad with red bell peppers, tomato, olives, avocado, and Annie’s Green Goddess dressing…

steak salad

We planted some of the veggies for our vegetable garden which we will start off indoors and eventually move to our outdoor garden! These are the things we need to be doing to keep our spirits lifted.

dana garden

A batch of homemade gluten-free almond flour bread

almond bread

And the grand finale of the weekend is a recipe inspired from epicurious and introduced to me by Dana’s mom…CHICKEN MARBELLA. 

chicken marbella

Chicken breasts, olives, dried apricots, prunes, capers, red wine vinegar, oregano, garlic, red wine, honey, olive oil, bay leaves, and salt and pepper were combined in an oven-safe dish….

chicken marbella

And baked for an hour at 350°F…

chicken marbella

The result was pure perfection.

chicken marbella chicken marbella

I am a huge sweet and salty fan and this was the perfect dish to satisfy that taste combination.

Chicken Marbella
Print
Ingredients
  • 2 large chicken breast, cut into 10 large pieces
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced finely
  • 2 Tbsp dried oregano
  • ¼ cup red wine vinegar
  • 3 Tbsp olive oil
  • ½ cup prunes, quartered
  • ¼ cup dried apricots, halved
  • ½ cup large green olives, rough chopped
  • ¼ cup capers and some juice
  • 3 bay leaves
  • ¼ cup honey
  • ½ cup red wine
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
  2. Arrange chicken in a shallow baking pan; set aside.
  3. In a small bowl combine all remaining ingredients; mix well; pour over chicken.
  4. If time allows, let marinade in the fridge for a few hours, otherwise place in oven right away.
  5. Bake for 1 hour, basting chicken with juices frequently, until chicken is cooked through.

 

It is such an easy recipe that looks fancy but it is really so simple, and it tastes AWESOME. I highly recommend you make this one night this week. You won’t be disappointed.

I hope you all had a fabulous weekend and that your Monday is off to a great start!

Question of the day: Do you prefer salty or sweet?

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