MEAL ADAPTATION

Sometimes it's hard to eat food served by other people. Sometimes I don't know what it is a dish made by someone else or sometimes it's just downright boring. I know that sounds kind of cruel but look at the evidence:The lack of colours (ie: veggies) was rather dismal and very disconcerting to me so I spent about 5 minutes chopping up just about every veggie in the fridge and stir-frying them up. Five minutes later I had a giant bowl of this:
Noodles and beef + veggies =
What an improvement, don't you think? I used mushrooms, cucumber, tomatoes and an orange bell pepper. The addition of veggies with the penne and sliced beef made the meal so much better. Now I had some veggies in my life and we all know, I enjoy my veggies!

FOOD RECAP!

Let's get to it, shall we?

26th...Saturday
Can you believe that I actually got up at 6:45 on a Saturday morning to go check out interlocking? Ugh, what a morning. But at least I had oatmeal in a mug to eat on the ride to Pickering:And check out my awesome mug:

These mugs were a steal at $18 for a pair. Sean and I thought it was actually a steal at $18 for one but then the cashier tried to explain to us that it was $18 for a pair of mugs. It was kind of difficult since she barely spoke English and I know zero Cantonese/Mandarin.

I tried to go back to bed once my parents and I came back home from interlock shopping (no dice, the light-coloured interlock we want apparently does not exist), but I couldn't so I puttered about the internetz and then had second breakfast:Two eggs sunnyside-up with sauteed mushrooms, tomato slices and a whole wheat sandwich thin. It was delish! And kept me full all afternoon...but that's mainly because I took a nap, a 3.5 hour nap! It was pretty crazy!! After my nap, I made myself a snack:strawberries and an Altufo mango and then had dinner a few hours later:roast asparagus and mushrooms with pasta salad containing Catelli macaroni, kidney beans, red and yellow pepper and canned salmon. It was just what I was craving--yum!
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27th...Sunday
Not too many photos from Sunday...just two worth showing. Afternoon snackage of mango, blueberries and strawberries:Dinner was mom's turnip and pork "meatballs" drizzled with soy sauce and garlic with basmati rice:This is one of my mom's favourite dishes. It's a LOT of prep work but so delicious in the end. You first have to peel the turnips, then grate them, then steam them, then squeeze all the liquid out (or strain it over cheesecloth), then mix it with minced pork (along with cornstarch and other things) and then form into little balls and steam. A lot of work but totally yum in the end.
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28th...Happy Birthday Jessie!
Check out first breakfast, in a bowl:There must be some weird psychological thing going on where I am compelled to finish eating my oatmeal when consumed in a bowl. Or maybe it's because the co-worker I normally chat with during my first break wasn't there. Yknow, come to think of it, that could really have something to do with it. Normally if there is any kind of talk during my second breakfast break, I won't have enough time to finish my breakfast. She's going to be there tomorrow and if we end up on break at the same time, I guess I'll be able to solve the mystery!

Lunch was pasta salad (Catelli elbow macaroni, red kidney beans, red/orange bell pepper and canned salmon) and I "beefed" it up with a hard-boiled egg:along with a few hasselback potatoes that I had made the night before:and for fruit I had an Altufo mango and blueberries:Dinner was dad's beef curry with carrots, peas and chayote. I ate that with a whole wheat English muffin instead of the basmati rice that it was originally paired with. I'm not really crazy with the basmati rice currently stocked in our house as it's a less fine-grain than the one reserved for my brother's biryani. This rougher grain one helps my dad's blood sugar though he doesn't actually have diabetes; he's just checking up on his blood sugar so it doesn't get out of whack. That's kind of what happens when you have a MASSIVE sweet tooth.

Almost immediately after dinner, I indulged in a serving (1/2 cup) of Cold Stone Creamery's Coffee Lover's Only ice cream. It's coffee ice cream with pieces of Skor, roasted almonds and caramel. I'm not crazy about caramel or fudge or any sort of liquidy, ripply type thing in my ice cream so I kind of wish it wasn't there. Oh well, it's still amazing! The American version comes with Heath bar pieces, not Skor bar but we don't have Heath in Canada. It was also a good and bad thing that Sean convinced me to get the 32oz. container to-go. It is a WAY better deal at $8.99, however now I have 32oz. worth of rich and delicious ice cream in my freezer. Oh well...I guess I'll just have to eat it ;)

I'm now stuffed to the brim! And waiting for my homemade whole wheat pizza dough to rise. The options in the fridge are really slim so I have no clue what I'm going to top my pizza with. All we've got are cloves of pre-peeled garlic, carrots, a few sweet potatoes and a couple of avocados.
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29th...Tuesday
Lunch was homemade pizza (with a homemade crust!) with mozzarella, tomatoes, Sean's homemade bacon and mushroom:along with a whole lotta fruit:I spent the evening with Sean. We went to the mall after work to do some shopping and then grabbed some dumplings for dinner. No photos of the dumplings (pork and chive ones) but Sean also made me an egg and cheese sandwich:I also had a chocolate chip muffin from Tim Horton's that was 430 calories! Can you believe it?! Holy crap!!!! I almost had a hard attack when I checked it out. Sean told me later on that it was almost the same as eating a Big Mac but still, holy crap!
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30th...Wednesday
Lunch was more homemade pizza, this time with Sean's homemade bacon, mozz and mushrooms:along with leftover pasta salad:and tons of fruit. You see blueberries and kiwis on top:
but I've also got layers of mango and strawberries:Delicious way to end off June's lunches.

BAKED PENNE? MMM MMM GOOD.

I hope there isn't a copyright on the "Mmm mmm good" part because if there is, I'm in trouble. Earlier this evening I was reading my usual list of blogs and came across Soap & Chocolate's latest post. Oh heck, who am I kidding...I knew it was Sunday night and that Diana would be posting something new since I know her regular posting schedule runs from Sunday-Thursday.

Aaaanyhoo, I checked out S&D and wouldn'tcha know it, there was a fresh new post--yay! So...long story short, with no eggplant to make the recipe that Diana provided, I decided to improvise! Here is the result of my baked penne with "crap I found in the fridge that I really needed to use up":

I really had no intention of blogging about this in length. It wasn't until about halfway through, when I mixed the par-boiled veggies with the sausage did I realize that hey, this is looking and smelling kind of good. When I added in the garlic powder and Mrs. Dash and then finally the 365 Organics Roasted Garlic tomato sauce, I realized I should have taken in-process photos. Oh well!

What I do have are photos of the baked mess pre-oven:And after 20 minutes baking and 5 minutes under the broiler:I cannot tell you how happy I am with how this turned out. It was a great way to use random veggies in my fridge and a bunch of cheese that I just had around. (It's very rare that I have cheese in my house. We're not big cheese eaters...unless it's brie and then I eat it as if the world's about to end.)

Anyway, since I was making this pasta bake casserole rather haphazardly, the amount of ingredients is rather dubious but I'll list 'em anyway:

Use-It-Up Penne Pasta Bake (inspired by Diana's Bad Ass Baked Ziti from Soap & Chocolate)
- 1/2 box of Catelli Smart penne rigate (I don't have the box handy so I don't know how much that amounts to but whatever amount you think will fit a medium-to-large casserole dish will do. Wow, that direction is just awesome. Not.)
- 3/4 of a head of broccoli, peeled and cut into bite-size pieces
- couple handfuls of baby carrots, cut into thirds
- 5 maple pork breakfast sausages with the casing removed (I know this sounds really excessive but these had been in the fridge for far too long so instead of just using two or three, I just went with all)
- 1 organic pork patty (again, I know this is a lot of meat but it was in the fridge defrosting for a few days and I didn't think it would last much longer)
- 1/2 jar of 365 Organics Roasted Garlic tomato sauce (or whatever your favourite tomato sauce is. I used this one because I had it on hand and it doesn't contain evil sulphites.)
- parmesan cheese
- 1/2 large ball of fresh Buffalo mozzarella (this may seem really excessive and fancy but I only used this specific type of cheese because again, it was in the fridge and it's Best Before date was coming up)
- garlic powder, to taste
- Mrs. Dash, to taste (or other seasoning powder)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350F. My oven is faster at preheating than I am at cooking so I tend to preheat my oven later down the line. You can do this now or do it later like me :)
   
2. Boil pasta according to directions on box. Mine said to boil for 11 minutes for al dente. If you have more than one working burner, halfway through your pasta would be a good time to boil/steam your broccoli and carrots for about 3-5 minutes. (I currently only have one working burner so I waited until after the pasta was done. A waste of time but I had no other choice.) Once cooked, set veggies and pasta aside.
   
3. Heat up some olive oil (I always use extra virgin olive oil for my cooking but that's rather long to type out so I always type olive oil.) Add in sausage sans casing and pork patty. Cook until well done though you don't have to cook it all the way through since you'll be sticking it in the oven. I'm paranoid so I cooked it until brown anyway. This took about...7 to 8 minutes?
4. Add in veggies and stir.
5. Add in garlic powder and Mrs. Dash and stir.
   
6. Add in tomato sauce and stir.
   
7. Add in pasta and stir.
8. Add in cheeses and stir. At this point your arm will be tired but do not give up--the results will be worth it.
9. Dump everything into a 9x13" casserole dish and bake for 20 minutes. Then broil for another five minutes.
10. Dump a huge piece on a plate. Grab a fork and dig in!

Now go make some for yourself, whether you use eggplant or not!

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?!

iPHONE-IRIFIC

I have no food photos for today except for my dinner, which was pretty awesome:Baked salmon with lemon and crumbled feta, baked potato with extra virgin olive oil, pepper and crumbled feta, broccoli and red peppers. Delicious but way too much food at 10pm.

The rest of the day's eats were equally delicious but I had no time to take photos in the morning because I left the house at 9:23 (holy mackerel!) and swiped in at work at EXACTLY 9:30. There was actually a bit of traffic in the morning so it took longer than usual to get to work. I'm laughing inside because taking two minutes longer than usual to work is what I consider traffic. Hoo-ha, I love my new workplace.

And when I say, I really do. Besides the tedium of triaging (is that a word? Blogger doesn't think so) and logging in samples, it's a great environment. The people are friendly and make me want to have conversations despite being ridiculously shy around new people. The work is new and challenging but wanting to make this job work is what makes me want to learn and not give up. This is definitely a job where I will never say I know anything and it's nice being able to say I have a job in a completely unrelated field because at least I'm learning new things everyday. The only thing I'm not so happy about is being surrounded by pathogens all day long, especially when I have the most inane fear of contracted E. Coli. I avoid eggnog and chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream in fear of contracting E. Coli! I don't even care if the eggs are pasteurized or if no eggs are included as an ingredient; I'm not taking any chances.

Anywaaaaaaaaay, back in food land...I forgot to post about Monday's! How could I forget all about the first day of February!? Here was yesterday's food at work:Second breakfast of mushroom omelet with two slices of rye bread. I ran out of breakfast time and only ate half of what you see above).

Then for lunch I had Sunday's leftovers:Tagliatelle with tomato, zucchini and leftover honey garlic ribs.

My fruit bento consisted of a couple clementines, mini carrots and grapes:No photos from dinner because apparently I was hungry and eating was more important than photographing.

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Oh yeah, I totally forgot to mention the title of my post! As you may have guessed, I got an iPhone! It was a good deal and my new awesome rate plan is only $5 more than my previous one. So all in all, I'm still impressed with Telus even after al these years. Heck, they did remove $165 worth of charges on three previous months' worth of bills.

Anyway, I'm still getting used to using my iPhone. I haven't had a chance to check out the manual yet--does it even come with one?--so I basically know how to make/answer calls, send/receive text messages, browse/download apps, access Facebook and I guess that's all that matters, just kidding! In time I'll figure out what the heck the rest of those buttons are for.