Sunday, July 4, 2010

Not Bad…I Can Live With This….

The phrase that was music to my ears tonight after I fed FabHubs this:DSCF4257THIS being a totally vegan, organic meal consisting of kale sauteed in EVOO with some garlic and sliced onions; baked sweet potato fries AND a portobello mushroom “burger” (portobello mushroom marinated in EVOO and balsamic, cooked on the Foreman grill).  Ole’ George was thrilled to be pulled out and put into use again!

The ‘shroom burger was topped with homemade guac (avocado, cilantro, onion, tomato, and lemon since I was out of lime juice) and a thick slice each of tomato and onion.  I  served it on one of FabHubs  homemade vegan English muffins!  (yes..he figured out how to make them vegan  and still quite delicious!

Truly I sure wasn’t expecting that…yes, I was expecting The Look!

Leftover guac…I found out that putting the pit in when you store it is not an old wives’ tale…IT REALLY WORKS!!!

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FabHubs had two burgers, I had one…and I piled on the kale  and sweet potato fries for both of us.  He wasn’t thrilled with the kale but said (another happy dance from me!) “I will probably get used to it.”

OH YEAH!!!!!!!!!

This  follows up a pretty amazing weekend of fruits and veggies for us. 

FabHubs and I were all alone this holiday weekend…he worked on Friday but  was off Saturday and most  of the day today (all Fabkids are off with their other parents’ for the weekend).  So I  warned him that it was up to he and I to make sure the tons of organic produce from Monday’s box didn’t go bad and we would be spending the weekend pounding the produce!

Saturday FabHubs and I slept in until nearly noon….and then woke up to this yumminess as I strived to use up the berries in the fridge:

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After breakfast I plopped him on the couch and popped the DVD Eating in so we could watch it together.  I have already seen it, but I wanted him to see it!

I expected a lot of skepticism from him….but he actually enjoyed it and learned from it, enough to even email his parents info about it!

After the DVD I made us both  Green Monsters to try and stave off the hunger monsters…but soon we were both FAMISHED!

I knew I had to make something really satisfying for him if I am going to keep him close to this healthy pathway…so I whipped out all the salad type veggies I could manage to find in the fridge and made this:

HIS:

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MINE:DSCF4253

Both had organic romaine, carrots, daikon, tomatoes, cukes, and scallions.  I made these salads HUGE!  (FabHubs commented that we weren’t eating from bowls, they were troughs, and indeed I served these in huge tupperware-like containers!)  To add a filling factor, I opened a can of kidney beans and put at least a cup on his…only about one-third cup on mine!  I was determined that there was no way he was going to walk away from this salad complaining he was still hungry!

I topped both with nutritional yeast…and gave him hummus on the side.  We used my lemon/garlic dressing on top. I also added some cilantro dressing and crumbled some Mary’s Gone Crackers on top of mine.

It really did the trick and he was satisfied for hours!  We ended up actually just snacking through the night, never being hungry enough to eat the grilled mushrooms, which were originally planned for dinner last night!

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After dinner we watched Morgan Spurlock’s SuperSize Me, which further added fuel to our Eat Healthy fires!

I am so glad to see FabHubs alongside me on this!

Today we continued on the fruit theme, eating unpictured mango, crenshaw melon, and other fruits all from the box, all day until dinner time when we had the kale/potatoe/portobello dinner.

Now I am sad because FabHubs has to go off and work at a fireworks shoot and I can’t be with him! 

I will be off in the audience with some friends though, watching.

 

WISHING EVERYBODY A WONDERFUL HOLIDAY!!!!

Saturday, July 3, 2010

No Lights, No Phone, No Motorcar…Not A Single Luxury!!!!!!

For those of you too young to recognize it…that would be from the theme from Gilligan’s Island…and except for the island surrounded by water part, that is exactly how I lived for a few weeks while I was off in Virginia with FabTeen, being mountain men!

We lived in a camp, learned 17th century crafts and even had to dress the part or we were considered “naked” and couldn’t participate!

DSCF4013 This was my home away from home:DSCF4143

My cot is the one on the right without the mosquito netting!

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See how the walls of the tent don’t go all the way to the floor…and the slats in my wooden pallet floor?  These were welcoming open doors for my multiple roommates!

DSCF4161 DSCF4156  DSCF4158 DSCF4049 DSCF4047YES!   They are as big and scary as they look!  I HATED them!!!  and I HATED going to bed! 

Susanna (my human roommate and much preferred to the spidery ones) and I had a nightly bedtime ritual that sadly did not include hot cocoa and bedtime stories.  Instead we would call in one of the nonspider fearing men to remove by hand a dozen or so spiders from our tent….no matter…every single night, by the middle of the night, new ones had moved in! 

The closeup is the back of my tent…the little structure up hill is the bathroom!  No running water…and I always did spider and snake checks before I sat down!DSCF4146

This was our little “village” in the woods, with the fire in the center and the tents all around it:DSCF4142DSCF4141

We built fires and cooked all of our meals over it…DSCF4012

DSCF4015 DSCF4008DSCF4001 DSCF4002 DSCF4003Showers were also very primitive…and were a 25 minute hike there and back into “town” which translates to base camp (where FabHubs and FabStepson were!)DSCF4060 I even had company in the shower!DSCF4061Sounds like a lot of work and struggles…but still I had a lot of fun and did a lot of firsts…I learned how to blacksmith! DSCF4029 DSCF4030  Like Mother, Like Son… DSCF4023  I learned how to start a fire without matches…using flint and steel!DSCF4038DSCF4042 DSCF4043 DSCF4044 DSCF4045 I filled my water bottle from this pump….I was surprised the water tasted really good..I am very picky about my water too!DSCF4046Learned some old-fashioned games:DSCF4074Learned to weave…and I am much better at weaving than blacksmithing!   DSCF4078 DSCF4079  Made a sheath, and then made a knife to put in the sheath: DSCF4056DSCF4133 DSCF4130   Learned how to load and shoot a black powder rifle (and it turns out I am a pretty good shot too!)

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DSCF4096        DSCF4094While I did dread the nights, in spite of the spiders I had such a great time! 

There is so much more that I did…but this post is getting long!  And since this is a food blog I know you are curious how I handled the food part!

So  I will be writing another post about how I managed too eat while I was in totally meat-based environment with no access to my yummy organics or grocery!