Sunday, September 12, 2010

The State of Food (at my house)



School has started, that is my excuse for not updating (oops), but I have been taking pictures! Every time I start a new semester, my diet suffers from it greatly. Pizza starts to show up a lot more. So do random spoonfuls of straight peanut butter and pre-class candy bars. Brian and I both agreed last night over an unneeded Dairy Queen Blizzard that we have been eating like, well, college students minus the cheese curls and 4am ice cream sandwiches. It also seems to happen when I come home from being on vacation. Before going to England at Christmas 2008 I was on a roll with cleaning up my diet, but 4 bags of fish and chips and countless ciders later it really just got thrown out the window and since we've been back twice since then, it's taken a bit longer to recover than I'd like. I know I shouldn't spend my life worrying about everything I put in my mouth (that's what she said), but I really do need to get back to where I was before that Christmas trip. A day or two before school started I had a serious fat-attack and made something I haven't made since high school: crepes! I was watching Amelie and just got the urge to make something French. I made them with whole wheat flour and topped them with nutella and So Delicious Coconut Milk Green Tea Ice Cream. Needless to say they were amazing and Brian was pissed that he didn't get any.

Not all of our meals have been bad since school has started. Over Labor Day weekend Brian and I set out on our first backpacking trip at Fridley Gap in the Shenandoah mountains. The hike was 10.5 miles up and down three mountains. The weather was beautiful, but the hike was tough. We brought 4 litres of water each on top of a 40oz. bottle per person and food, clothes etc. Brian's pack weighed about 40 lbs and mine was a little over 30. There were some steep bits and for most of the time were surrounded by a cloud of bugs. My first attempt at cooking with limited, unrefrigerated food options turned out ok. We had prepackaged Uncle Ben's brown rice with a chana masala packet and some chicken chicken breast. Because we were far away from a water source everything came out kind of crunchy, but it was edible. Breakfast was just some instant oatmeal and we ate a lot of chocolate and beef jerky along the trail on the way back to the car. After running out of water on the last mile and a half seeing the car was the greatest thing ever. We rewarded ourselves with slurpees and a giant burger later that night.

I've been experimenting with warm salads since we've been back from the UK. I'm always trying to find ways to incorporate more vegetables in our meals and putting things on a "bed" of something usually helps a lot. I created this warm salad with kale sauteed in olive oil, lemon juice and red pepper flakes. I topped it off with some leftover salmon and declared it my super-food warm salad.
It was very tasty and stayed with me for a long time. I've also been making a lot of Larb (or Laab) since it's so easy and so delicious. It's a Thai chicken salad made with ground chicken and fresh herbs and shallots and it is a-m-a-z-i-n-g. I made it for my mfa back to school party and there was almost nothing left of it once it was time to go. I like that I can make a lot of it and keep it in the fridge for a quick meal that is really light, but still satisfying.

As for right now, I'm simply vegetating. It's nice to just not do anything of importance for a little while, though during the school year I feel guilty having "free time". I feel as though I'm not passionate enough about my program because I wish to have a life outside of school, but then I realize that letting it become your life isn't healthy and I don't feel so bad about watching Stargate SG-1 and taking a 2 hour nap (jealous?). That is all for this post and I hope to update this a bit more frequently...like always. Until next time, have good eats!

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