RAINBOW REJECTION

I'm a little behind on food recaps. I recapped one day but then forgot about a couple of days last week...oops! Here I am getting caught up:

11th...Thursday
Breakfast was pretty awesome. I made a grape tomato egg scramble and ate that atop a bed of spring mix greens with a pear:Party in my mouth! I'm trying to stay away from carbs during first breakfast. I find myself too full for oatmeal during second breakfast but I know that I need to eat the oatmeal during my break at work, otherwise I won't last the four hours until my lunch break.
It really pays to have pre-prepared lunches. What I mean by that is that on Monday night, I had prepared lunches for the following three days. I know that seems excessive but I knew that I'd be spending the next two nights after work out, so I wouldn't have time to prepare lunch for the following morning at work. Doing all of my lunch prep on Monday work saved me a LOT of work and allowed me to enjoy full meals throughout the week without resorting to calling my dad and begging him to bring me something to eat (most likely pizza) to work.
Thursday was the last of the organic chicken drumstick with cucumber sticks and mini carrots. I also had strawberries, most of which I used for my second breakfast oatmeal:Along with that I had a giant salad of spring mix with goat cheese, sliced radishes and cucumbers: I topped it with a Blueberry St. John's Wart dressing from a Toronto company that I picked up at Whole Foods. I put my name on a Post-It note and stuck it to the dressing bottle in the work fridge in hopes that my co-workers don't throw out/steal my dressing like they did with my last bottle. Not cool.Snacks included a pear and Kashi Dark Chocolate Coconut granola bar:As well as a couple dried mango slices and some Mary's Organic Crackers (Herb flavour):I kept the crackers for the ride home from work. Around 5:30, I get really noshy. Dinner was really unappetizing but I was not in the mood to cook for myself and since dad's dinner involved mushrooms, I decided to eat some:
Basmati rice with some kind of "stew." Spare ribs with weird tofu "balls" (I only had two since I'm technically supposed to avoid all soy since it's an IBS trigger) along with bok choy, some kind of leaf-like funghus I don't know the English name for and shitake mushrooms. It was okay. I didn't finish off my small bowl.

I ended off the night with a cup of peppermint tea and a Tim's-filled bowl of kettlecornbut times the above by two. I'm a kettlecorn addict.

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12th...Friday
Vegan Failure Day, which was so epic (because of my idiocy), it needed a post of its own.

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13th...Saturday
The day started off really early. Too early in fact, but at least I started the day off right:Almond Breeze with buckwheat cereal and Optimum Slim and from what you see below, it was pretty tasty:Also, say hello to my new cereal/everything bowl--though it really is a mug from Urban Outfitters. It's a giant mug, courtesy of Sean. Thanks Sean! I love that mug. He also got a blue one, which you'll see later.
Lunch was vermicelli soup with pork, green onions and iceberg lettuce. Weirdly, iceberg lettuce is really great when cooked. It has a really lovely sweet taste.Snacks for the afternoon included this Kind Bar, which I was finally able to find at Whole Foods. I only picked up two (just in case I didn't like them), this kind being Almond & Coconut. I ate this while in the mall shopping for work clothes and a new stove. Then on the way home I stopped by a nearby Indian grocery for some naan bread and FINALLY found the elusive kulfi that I always saw the kids eating in the shop. I settled on a pistachio one:Eaten on the car ride home:
I'm really glad I don't drive because I tend to eat a LOT of things in the car.

And like I mentioned earlier...dinner was naan bread with leftover Indian food: mattar paneer and my last Vita Coco (with pineapple):
I'm already craving more Vita Coco and have already tried seeking other coconut water at Asian grocery shops with no luck--although the one I did check was a little sketchy to begin with.

Later in the evening I was craving some fruit like mad but the options were limited: apples or oranges. I decided to go with an orange since my dad's apple-picking skills leave something to be desired:This orange was a little dried out though so it's best use was probably for juicing, which I haven't done in ages since it's nearing the end of winter. Wintertime just does not bring out the juicer in me although I really should have done that when we had a bunch of spinach around when it was on sale for a $1/lb.

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This morning the orange decide to take its revenge on me for calling it dry. Out of the six times I've eaten an orange in the past 6 weeks, five of those times, I've ended up befriending the Porcelain. I don't know what's going on with my bowels since oranges are not one of my IBS triggers but the oranges just don't like me!

At first it was any kind of tomato-involving substance last summer; no matter what kind of tomato sauce I ate or where it came from or who prepared it, I ended up with the worst amount of heartburn...the kind that no amount of Rolaids or Gas X could cure. It was painful, extremely painful. Even after enjoying what was a really incredible spaghetti putanesca back in NYC last July, I really regretted my decision the next day. I was in pain all the day long. I ended up in the hotel room taking a nap for part of the afternoon while Sean scoured town for a chicken snack--apparently one that was not to be missed--except for me, who was in pain and can't eat non-organic chicken anyway.

So yeah, it looks like my body is rejecting foods in order of the colours of the rainbow. I can't remember how long the tomato rejection lasted but I figure the orange rejection will last the same amount of time. It sucks because a) I love oranges and b) I depend on oranges as my greatest source of vitamin C.

Next up on the rainbow is yellow so that probably means bananas, which I'm okay with because I don't really like bananas anyway. They're good with PB or AB or possibly CB (coconut butter, which I have yet to try) and Crofter's spread but other than that, I could forgo bananas for the rest of my life. Oh, they're good in baking though. Darn.

Now I'm waiting on my parents to get back home so we can go finish the purchase on our new stove and purchase a fridge and washer/dryer. Woo! Shiny new stainless steel appliances just waiting to be used. I can't wait for the new stove and oven. Finally a new oven that hopefully is calibrated properly so I can make macarons properly!

GO CANADA GO!

Holy crap! I can't believe it's been almost an entire week since a new post! What the heck is happening with February!? A lot has been going on. Since my return home I haven't really been able to catch up on my blog posts because I've been sick. Ever since Sunday morning, I've had a sore throat and my cold symptoms now include a slight cough, runny nose, body aches, headaches, bloody mucus, etc. It's not fun. I was paranoid that I had caught the E. Coli, Salmonella or Listeria bacteria but no diarrhea so I'm in the clear for now. I've just been feeling pretty awful and the worst part is that I look fine so when I tell people I'm sick, they probably don't believe me--though my cough, raspy voice and constant sniffling at work are probably turning a few people off by now.

Anyway, Here's an attempt at a quick recap of a week's worth of food:

Monday...the 8th

First breakfast was a slice of wheat and oat bread with peanut butter and banana slices. I also had a pear.Second breakfast was organic instant oatmeal with ground flaxseeds, chia seeds and a whole bunch of blueberries.
Lunch was fresh and light, exactly what I needed after the mega binging during the Super Bowl the night before: Romaine lettuce with mini carrots, radish slices and a can of flaked tuna in water. I also had some sweet potato balls on the side. I dressed it with a tiny bit of Kraft Aged Balsamic Vinaigrette, mostly letting the remainder of the tuna can water act as the dressing.
Snack bento consisted of grapes and blueberries (most of which I used in my oatmeal):Dinner was pretty boring:Rice with eggplant, two kinds of mushrooms and peas. I don't normally eat eggplant (I don't really like the texture and it gave me hives when I was 8) but I really wanted the mushrooms and peas and thought eating rice with just mushrooms and peas would be weird. Since my bowl of rice was pretty small, I ended up having this as some "extra" dinner:A whole wheat pita pizza with zucchini, king oyster mushrooms, red peppers, tomatoes and pear. It was basically a leftover pizza from the pizzas I was making for lunch the next day. Here's a closer look:===

Tuesday the 9th

First breakfast was a slice of toast with peanut butter and banana slices and second breakfast was the same as yesterday:Lunch was my whole wheat pita pizzas prepared the night before. Here it is on the cutting board:And here it is all packed in my bento:My snack bento container grapes, a couple clementines and blueberries, which again, I used for my second breakfast oatmeal:I wasn't really looking forward to dinner that night, my sore throat was getting the better of me, but we were having asparagus and I can't say no to asparagus:Rice with asparagus, tomatoes and beef, along with a side of brussel sprouts.
I also had an orange about four hours later for some extra vitamin C:Lastly, look at this bag of evil:But it turns out that two cups is only 140 calories so I no longer feel bad about my massive kettlecorn consumption!===

Wednesday the 10th

First breakfast was a PB&J sandwich with a small glass of orange juice. My jam this time around is special because I went to the "fancy" grocery store the night before and while looking for something I can't remember right now, I came across Crofter's Super fruit spread which everyone food blogger has been raving about lately. I checked out the Europe version that everyone seems to love but settled on the Asia since I'm not a huge fan of cranberries.Second breakfast was instant organic oatmeal with chia seeds, ground flaxseeds, peaches and strawberries that I buy frozen and are defrosted by the time I get to work and have second breakfast around 10:30.
Lunch was butternut squash ravioli in a homemade tomato sauce of mushrooms. I bought the ravioli in the fresh pre-made pasta section of the grocery store and these aren't bad!I also had my version of Laura Calder's warm goat cheese and bacon salad but mine wasn't very successful. In fact, it's not a recipe I would make again, or maybe my version was crappy because I tried to take the easy route and used the toaster oven instead. Anyway, here it is:Romaine lettuce with goat cheese wrapped in bacon.
Snack bento was what remained of my thawed-out strawberries and peaches:I also packed myself this small container of kettlecorn but never got around to eating it :)Once I came home I immediately ate this orange along with a banana and peanut butter and Crofter's Asia spread:I can't remember what the heck was really for dinner but I must have eaten a little bit of it.
I spent the rest of the evening making cake pops which I will post about later. It was a long night; I was up until 3am.

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Thursday the 11th

Breakfast and lunch from the 11th were the exact same as the day before so I didn't bother taking photos of any of it. I also still felt pretty crappy because of my sore throat and taking photos of food was the last thing on my mind--especially after only five hours of sleep. The only thing I do have a photo of is half a slice of sour cherry cheesecake that I bought from the Valentine's Day bake sale at work to benefit the Hospital for Sick Kids:I normally really dislike cheesecake but this one was really light and the cherry topping was a great contrast to the cream cheese.

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Friday the 12th--let the Games begin!

Yay to the start of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics; boo to being totally sick and miserable and having to stay an extra hour at work on a Friday night. Sean ended up having to wait for me in the lobby for 30 minutes too. Boo-urns to that.

Friday's first breakfast was a sunnyside-up egg with two slices of bacon and wheat 'n oat toast. Second breakfast was organic instant oatmeal with the usual defrosted strawberry and peaches.
Lunch was quite dismal because I ended up eating most of this:Yep, that's right...Kraft Mac 'n Cheese, which I realized, just because of the night before (because I had snuck in a taste), tastes disgusting. Seriously!! I can't eat this crap anymore. It was so gross. I can't imagine how I managed to palate that orange gunk all these years. That was definitely my last box of the blue stuff. I finally understand what the heck Sean has been talking about all these years.

Along with my Mac 'n Crap, I had sweet potato balls (unpictured) and the remainder of my strawberries and peaches:To the right of my sweet potato balls are two chocolate meringue cookies with chocolate chips. They are ridiculous light and airy and really, really addictive. Despite not having an addiction to chocolate, I ended up eating six of these the night I baked them. Good thing to recipe makes a whole bunch of them. You can check out the recipe here. I modified the recipe by splitting the batter in half and adding chopped-up dried cherries to one half and chocolate chips to the other. They were both great but I prefer the cookies with the dried cherries.
Sean and I picked me up after work and after running an errand or two, we headed to Famous Sam's for a couple of homemade burgers and fries. I forgot to take photos. I was really, really hungry and the pre-Olympics opening ceremonies were on TV in the restaurant. Sean and I headed back to his place and watched almost two hours of the opening ceremonies with his mom until we all gave up and then Sean and I watched the first two episodes of Weeds season five. I sipped on a mug of tea and ate two out of three of the following:
There was also a chocolate pretzel stick that was eating but I'll leave that up to your imagination.

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Now it's time for me to get back to watching the Olympics coverage! Oh by the way, what the hell is up with the coverage on CTV?? BRING BACK THE OLYMPICS ON CBC!! And where the heck are the mascots?!