Staying Positive!

Today can be a day to cozy up inside and I am doing just that! Even though I am in need of some warm sunny weather, I have plenty of things to do on my list! As some of you may have noticed I was following a cleanse (The Elimination Diet) and decided to move it along at a quicker pace. The diet is 28 days long and involves eliminating everything that could irritate ones system and then slowly adding it back in to see if one has any allergies or intolerance. To say the least, my body didn't like it. Having a clean organic diet free of milk, meat and eggs I found I was taking away all of the vital nutrients it needed. I can see and recommend this cleanse to someone who is heavily dependent on processed sugary foods, meat and dairy! I did come up with some tasty recipes which I will share with you over the next few weeks!

I must admit it cut down on my love for trying new recipes so I apologise for my absence! I spent more of my time working on my first ever garden! (check out the organic gardening tab to see more) I am so excited to share this recipe because I picked the fresh basil from my new plants!

Before I give you the amazing recipe I want to share some of my learning's from school! (Institute for Integrative Nutrition)

Health is more than just eating well.
Below you will find lifestyle suggestions designed to help you live a healthy, happy life!
How many can you fill your life with this week?!

1.) Give generously of yourself to others

2.) View everything and everyone you meet with gratitude

3.) Live each day happily without FOCUSING on your problems

4.) Hum or sing a happy song everyday

5.) Foster a sense of humor

6.) Treat yourself to regular daily quiet time - study, pray, meditate - RECHARGE YOURSELF!

7.) Include exercise as part of your daily life. Try something new!

8.) Keep your home in good order. You are your home!

9.) Offer thanks before/after meals

10.) Do your best to be on good terms with people, especially those closest to you.

Most of all, create a positive attitude and wonderful environment around you, and enjoy the process of becoming healthier and happier every step of the way!

Okay...so here it is! The recipe I have been searching for!!! As a vegetarian I have had to give up some things I adore, or my pallette adores. Yogurt, ice cream (that contains milk) cheese...and my favorite, Alfredo pasta!!! I have eaten these, don't get me wrong, but I do my best to avoid them. Not only for environmental/inhumane reasons, but because my body does not do well with them. I feel heavy, bloated, sluggish, BAD.

So when I came across this recipe on my FAV blog I new I had to make it! Even better I had fresh basil outside in my garden calling my name.

Creamy Avocado Alfredo Pasta

Ingredients

1 box of spaghetti pasta (choose your serving)

1 ripe avocado

2 tbsp olive oil

1/2 lemon juice (fresh lemon)

3 cloves of garlic

Fresh Basil (at least 1/4 cup)

*1 cup of mushrooms (Optional. The recipe didn't call for this but I added it in there!)

This recipe is SOO easy and burst with flavor! It is very garlicky so if you desire it not to be add less, maybe one clove.

1.) Cook pasta according to directions (About 10 minutes) Drain and set aside. If adding mushrooms, saute in olive oil 3-6 minutes. Set aside.

2.) In the meantime, add in garlic and oil to a food processor and blend until garlic is chopped. (Mine didn't mix too well)

3.) Add in avocado, juice of 1/2 a lemon and fresh basil. Process until creamy!

4.) Pour the sauce over the pasta and mix well. This sauce is very think so you have to work it into the pasta!

5.) Serve immediately and enjoy!

My fresh basil plant, organic!

Fresh picked basil, lavender and parsley. Time to cook!

Olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, avocado and basil. How much more flavor can you get?!

I added some cashews for an added crunch!

This dish was hands down incredible! I do not eat pasta very much because it makes me feel heavy and it definitely did the trick, but it was evening and the perfect time to eat a meal that is heavy and filling. The avocado was so creamy and delicious I will be making this again very soon! Enjoy!

Where Does Your Happiness Come From?

I hope you had a great week! I am still going strong on the Elimination diet and will share some of my great recipes I have come up with tomorrow!

Yesterday for yoga I set the intention for class to focus on SANTOSHA the 2nd of the Niyamas (guidelines to interact with ourselves and our internal world).

***SANTOSHA***
Evenness of mind, through all that life offers. Contentment, accepting what is, and making the best of everything. Exhibit gratitude and joyfulness, remain calm with success and failure, let go of attachment and any external status, remain focused in the face of adversity and choose love over fear!

I found this brought great happiness to me after class! Later to find out in the evening something did not go the way I wanted or had it planned, and I quickly let go of this intention and let my emotions take control of my happiness.

Doing some school work this morning, I was instructed to watch this video about happiness and I must say it was really interesting! Only 6 minutes long, it gets to the point that we have the ability to CHOOSE if we are happy by our intentions.

It also has a short clip on meditating and how it can increase your mood in up to 2 weeks!

Take some time for yourself today, BE INSPIRED!!!

Have a great Day!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv6xYmh4Y-w&eurl=http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=sonja+lyubomirsky&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official

Spring Cleanse!

My friends from lululemon and I have been battling the effects of a cleanse (massive sugar cravings and lack of energy) but I am still alive, and feeling great!

I chose to go with the elimination diet, which I briefly went over in my last post. Two days of just green smoothies left me feeling like a zomby so I decided to end the second day with the food suggested to start off day 3 or phase 1.

Phase 1:

Phase 1 is about consuming hypo-allergenic foods such as fruits (excluding strawberries, citrus, kiwis, bananas, and pinapple) steamed veggies, raw salads with avocados, roasted yams (with olive oil) steamed sweet potatoes, squash, lentils, adzuki bean, mung beans, quinoa, teff, and brown rice. All of the foods are very light in calories, stating to eat frequently to keep hunger at bay. It also recommends snacking on organic sun flower seeds, raw pumpkin seeds, and dried figs. Green smoothies are still a large part of the diet as well!

Elimination diet or not these meals are a great way to enjoy the benefits of cleansing foods while not embracing the entire diet. I must admit as tough as it was to eat nothing but green smoothies for 2 days I had such an appreciation for the food I got to eat. I have never been so pleased or thankful which made me think how often I took my food for granted. Give thanks for what you have been given!

Here are some of the dishes I came up with!

1.) Quinoa with steamed yams, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, brussel sprouts and sprouts. I must admit, the sprouts were....HORRIBLE! But, I will work on acquiring the taste, someday!

2.) More quinoa and veggies! I topped it off with spinach this time.

Snack and lunch. Smaller portions are required after drinking smoothies for 2 days your stomach cannot handle much more.

3.) Keeping up with the green smoothies! Although I turned this one more pink with the blackberries and carrots! This is one of my new favorite smoothies, who would of thougt carrots would be good with fruit?!

Ingredients:

1 apple

1 pear

8-10 Blackberries

handful of shredded carrots

1-2 collard green leaves

1 cup of water

4-6 ice cubes

4.) Brown rice, shelled hemp seeds, broccoli, cauliflower, shredded carrots, spinach, avocado and sprouts. SOO delicious (other than the sprouts!) I handed one to Graham and said "Try these, they are SO good!!" I must say it was a great joke, they taste somewhere along the lines of rotten toasted cheese, I think?

Try out some if these dishes, a great start to spring!

Cravings. Sweet-Salty-Spicy-Creamy. Sound Familiar?

I apologize for the lack of post. I have been so busy with school, teaching yoga, and organizing my Japan community challenge that I have put blogging on the back burner. But that is not the only thing I have let my guard down on, my diet has been suffering too.

I am a busy person, I like work. When I am not busy I tend to be lazy so keeping myself productive is a must! But these past few weeks have caught up with me and I have been asking myself

 "Why am I eating THIS?!"

This weekend my body was fed up, done, not going any further without the nutrients it needed and it let me know this by craving certain foods. Friday I went straight to Smoothie King (my FAVorite place to be!) and ordered the the most amazing smoothie on this earth. In fact, it is more like a milk shake, with 45 grams of protein, chocolate, and butter pecan ice cream. Amazing to say the least. My gaze then rested on the "Pepper and Salt" chips. Looking at Graham I said, "I'm getting those" he gave me an unpleasant look and said, "No you're not".

I got them (period).

Six months ago I would of felt like the weakest person on this earth. "I gave into my cravings AGAIN! What a vicious cycle I cannot get out of!" But now, after learning so much from school I reflected back on my actions and what my body was craving to learn what it was really wanting.

So I turned to the chapter I had recently studied, CRAVINGS.

Our body really knows what it wants and it will go to great measures to get it.

 I won't get to deep into the subject but want to cover some of the basic.

SWEET CRAVINGS

We mainly crave sweet because as a society are addicted to processed foods. At first I disagreed. I don't eat processed foods. After my denial faded, I realized how much I rely on foods that are processed.

 How can you work to remove these from your diet? I try to make my meals the night before.

SALT CRAVINGS

The number one reason we crave salty things are because we are not getting enough minerals in our diet. This hit home with me this weekend when I shoved salt and pepper chips down my throat. Mainly vegan, I have not been giving my body the minerals it needed. Note to self!

SPICY CRAVINGS

If someone is eating the standard American diet (processed foods high in chemicals and artificial sweeteners) and has little to no whole foods (a lot of fat) there blood tends to thicken and slow. Therefore the body will crave spicy food to help prevent this (pizza, Mexican food, etc)

CREAMY CRAVINGS
We crave creamy things like peanut butter or a ridiculous ice cream smoothie in my case when we are highly stressed in our lives. Most of the time we just need a hug, or someone in our life to tell us how much they appreciate and love us. Take a break! Second note to self.

Which one of these craving do you have in your life? What steps can you take to slowly ease these out of your life?

The next time you have a craving, BE THANKFUL for it! Stop. Listen. Think. And feed your body what it needs, not necessarily what it wants!

Here is a great recipe to leave you grounded and craving free! Its crunchy, salty, cooling, and filling!

STIR FRY

Ingredients

1/2 cup carrots

1/2 cup red bell peppers

1/2 cup broccoli

1/2 cup cauliflower

Brown Rice (cook according to box)

Peanut Sauce

3 tbsp organic Peanut butter

2-4 tbsp Almond  Milk

1 tsp Paprika

2 tbsp shelled hemp seeds

1.) Cook carrots and red bell peppers in 1 tbsp of olive oil for 3-4 minutes over medium heat.

2.) Then add in the other vegetables and cook 2-4 minutes.

3.) In the meantime, make your peanut sauce. I used peanut sauce because it is creamy and delicious!

I added in some paprika to add in some spice and shelled hemp seeds to get my protein and essential amino acids!

4.) Add in cooked rice and add desired soy sauce. Mix in with the veggies!

Serve with peanut sauce!

This dish was the perfect mix to satisfy all of my cravings! It has vegetables in it that kept me grounded but also gave my palette a spicy kick with the soy sauce and paprika! The creamy texture of the sauce left me more that satisfied!

Tomorrow I start the Elimination Diet!

Stay tuned for my day to day updates :)

Are Your Thoughts Empowering or Dis-empowering You?

Many of us operate on autopilot, often relying on ingrained thinking patterns and self-talk to direct our day-to-day lives. The problem with that is that these patterns may not be serving us very well. The way we think about things may be sabotaging our happiness, effectiveness, and sense of fulfillment, yet we persist in thinking the same thoughts because they are familiar and comfortable.

We can help snap ourselves out of ingrained thought patterns by first identifying them and then asking,
"Is this thought empowering or dis-empowering me?"

For example, say you regularly experience "blame thoughts" when your spouse leaves something out all of the time (frustrating to say the least!) When you isolate your thought (It's all HIS fault!) you will find that what you initially take for empowerment (I'm right and he's wrong!) is, in fact, a dis-empowering, self-victimizing thought. The thought only isolates you further (me vs. Spouse), deepens your resentment (He's thoughtless and doesn't care about me!) and leaves you mired in frustration because you're no closer to finding a real, workable solution.

If you can shift your thinking away from blame and instead focus on solutions, you will feel - and be - infinitely more empowered!

With that I want to leave you with an empowering recipe! It is right along with my "Green" theme for Spring! Greens are full of phytochemicals, vitamins, fiber and minerals, empowering to say the least!

QUINOA PESTO WITH GREEN VEGGIES

Ingredients:

1 cup of cooked Quinoa (Takes about 15 minutes)

1/2-1 cup of Broccoli

1/2 cup of Green Bell Peppers

1/2 cup Red Bell Peppers (to add a little color!)

1/2-1 cup of Cucumbers

Pesto Ingredients:

*So I want to start off by saying I went to the store with the intention of bringing home basil, but of course there was none (which sparked a gush of frustration leading to me now planting and growing my own veggies!) so I decided to use spinach instead. Hey, sometimes you have to compromise!

2-3 cups of Spinach

2-4 tbsp of Olive Oil

1-2 Lemons

salt/pepper to taste

Chop veggies into desired portion. I love mine small and love to chop!

Cook broccoli until tender. I like mine still crunchy! Do not over cook, you want to have some life left in these greens!

In the meantime, make your pesto! Add in spinach (I through in a few almonds) and slowly add in oil and lemon juice until well combined in a food processor or blender.

Add pesto to the quinoa and stir!

Now that is GREEN! I also added in some shelled hemp seeds for more protein (11g every 2 tbsp).

Add in other veggies and cook for 3-5 minutes. Cucumbers don't take long all, so be careful not to over cook them! I like the crispness of the peppers so I left them a little raw.

Add your favorite nut for some extra crunch, I added cashews!

Some extra pesto left over to use for the rest of the week!

I hope you enjoy this meal!



Without inspiration the best powers of the mind remain dormant. There is a fuel in us which needs to be ignited with sparks.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore,
is not an act but a habit.

Power Smoothies!

I have been drinking a lot more smoothies lately. But more than just a regular fruit smoothie, GREEN POWER smoothies! In a rut of eating my normal breakfast of Oatmeal with peanut butter and blueberries, I was feeling more sluggish than energized! It was a great breakfast for the winter months to warm me up and keep me full, but now I need something light and rich, full of antioxidants and phytochemicals to give me ENERGY!

Next week, some of my closest friends and I will be do a 10 day cleanse together. We are going to include yoga everyday (my favorite part) and 10 minutes of mediation! And I must say, if you ever do a cleanse, check your calenders first because you never want to plan it around important dates!

We are all choosing our own cleanse and I have chosen the Elimination Diet. I have been wanting to try this cleanse forever but it takes a ton of dedication, so why not now! In true, this cleanse is really 28 days long but it is so much more convenient because you get to eat actual FOOD, and not just fruits and veggies for a whole month. The purpose of the diet is to first cleanse your system (green smoothies for 3 days) and then slowly add foods back in to see if you have an intolerance for any of them like oats, gluten, dairy, meat, and so on.

To learn more about the Elimination Diet visit: http://www.wholelifenutrition.net/id16.html

I bought the book on amazon for about $20 bucks and it is full of amazing recipes and more that I cannot wait to share with you all!

I must admit, I have never actually enjoyed a "Green Smoothie" because I have always been so intimidated by the abundance of green spinach, kale, and collard greens in them I have shyed away. But if I am  going to be drinking them for 3 days straight (along with water and tea) I have to get used to them and find a way to make them delicious!

So I am going to share with you some I have found to be AMAZING!! You wouldn't even think they have ANY greens in the AT ALL, that is unless the bright green color didn't give it away ;)

GREEN SMOOTHIE #1 (KALE)

1 Very Ripe Banana

1 Nectarine

1 Orange (peeled)

1 Very Ripe Pear

1 cup of Almond Milk

3-4 Kale Leaves (stripped of the center stem)

Throw in a few ice cubes if you like! I love mine to be more like a shake, so I stuck with fresh fruit instead of frozen.

Kale is now recognized as providing comprehensive support for the body's detoxification system. New research has shown that the ITCs made from kale's glucosinolates can help regulate detox at a genetic level.

Researchers can now identify over 45 different flavonoids in kale. With kaempferol and quercetin heading the list, kale's flavonoids combine both antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits in way that gives kale a leading dietary role with respect to avoidance of chronic inflammation and oxidative stress.

So green but the tatse is sweet with no bitter after taste!

SMOOTHIE #2

1 Ripe Banana

1 Ripe Pear

1 Apricot

1 Kiwi

4 Large Strawberries

1 cup Almond Milk

2-4 Kale or Spinach Leaves

Mix together and add ice if you like! This smoothie has more of a citrus taste so if you are a fan of fruity then you will love this one!

Stayed tuned for more Green smoothies and my progress and updates on the Elimination Diet!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies!

 I came up with this recipe after looking through my cabinets and finding nothing to satisfy my sweet tooth one weekend. I have cravings ALL the time and they tend to come out more often on the weekends. So I have been really working on satisfying myself with little treats here and there throughout the week so I do not crash and burn on the weekend. It is all about finding a balance in your diet. Crushing a whole box of girl scout cookies at once can be harmful, but enjoying 3 or 4 here and there won't have a huge impact on your diet.

We are surrounded by delicious desserts everywhere we go. Depriving yourself of indulgences is completely absurd no matter how strong your will-power is! What most people miss to realize is the healthy alternative to making these scrumptious desserts!

So here is a great recipe you can try out with just a few ingredients and feel good about indulging in! Although this recipe does not fall into my "healthy" category it is a TREAT! Enjoy the sweet moments!

 "Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.”

 “The good Lord gave me a brain that works so fast that in one moment I can worry as much as it would take others a whole year to achieve"

-I am working on this :)

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup of butter (I used a butter made of olive oil which has a lighter taste and is a ton better for your health)

1/2 cup of brown sugar

1/4 cup of Turbinado

1-1/2 cup (s) of Almond Milk

1/2 cup Whole Wheat Flour

1 tbsp Cinnamon

1/2 cup Old Fashion Oats

1/4-1/2 cup Peanut Butter Chocolate Chips

In a medium bowl, mix together butter, brown sugar and turbinado until creamy.

Then, add in Almond milk, whole wheat flour and cinnamon. Mix until smooth but do not over mix!

Then fold in the oats and peanut butter chocolate chips!

Pour evenly into a muffin pan. I greased mine lightly so I didn't have to use the cupcake wrappers. Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. I like mine a little bit crispy! And since these were cookies in a cupcake dish they might need a little longer to bake!

I must say I ate about 3 of these and was extremely full and my sweet tooth was totally satisfied! I love adding oats to any cookie recipe because it adds fiber and bulk! Enjoy these crispy, creamy cookie cupcakes!!!