Breakfast fried rice

I was running a good streak with having kibble in the house.

And then I woke up this morning - open the food bin and there are only 3 lonely pieces of kibble. I shake the bin because maybe more kibble will magically appear????

No such luck. So, this morning the dogs and I had the same thing for breakfast. Breakfast fried rice.

The title of fried rice is not really accurate since there was no frying involved and I did not add in any green onions which are typically included in fried rice. (Remember onions are bad, bad things for dogs 'cause anemia is kind of a bad thing - or so I hear...)

I started with 1 cup of rice in two cups of water, one cup of frozen peas and several pieces of seasoned nori torn into small pieces in a sauce pan. I set everything to simmer away.

While the rice cooked I scrambled 3 whole eggs, 2 egg whites and 1 Tbsp. of soy milk in a pan.

I had some defrosted pineapple so I gave that a rough chop.

I layered the pineapple in the bottom of the bowls.

After the rice finished cooking, I added in 1 Tbsp. of soy sauce and 1/2 Tbsp. of oyster sauce. Then I portioned out the rice mixture into the bowls.

The next layer was the scrambled eggs and I mixed everything together.

The sweet and saltiness of this dish was a great combination.


The dogs were great fans of this dish - they gobbled down everything including the pineapple.

I also had a cup of tea but per usual I forgot to take a picture of it - because some trends are too good to break :-)

Happy Friday!!

How to be productive while not focusing

I was reading an article this morning about how to accomplish anything. Most of the article discussed the importance of focus and how that was the key to success.

I disagree. I have been very productive lately and it is due to the fact that I haven't been spending a lot of time thinking about what I needed to do.

But before I say more about that - here is my breakfast:

Spinach and turkey scramble with 1/2 an English muffin.

The English muffin looked lonely without any jam:

 
So, I dug this out of the fridge - 

Raspberry and rhubarb jam.

 If you like rhubarb pie you will love this one.

Tea and an orange rounded out the meal.

So, back to my topic of the day. I suppose being focused works for some people but for me it would send me into a hyper aware feedback loop. That cycle ends with me getting nothing done because I thought about it too much and end up paralyzed by too much information.

At the moment I am approaching work by seeing it as just something I get done each day - like brushing my teeth. 

This tact has resulted in lots of cooking, lots of writing and daily gym visits. A rousing success in my opinion. 


So if you are anything like me - you should give it a shot. 


Being productive while not focusing - I think it is a good thing.
 

Cabin fever

As I am embracing this writing endeavor I am quickly realizing one thing - the need to stave off cabin fever.

Too many days in a row (I walk the dogs so I am not a complete shut in, lol) spent bent over the keyboard trying to get pages out? My productivity goes down the tubes.

And my cooking gets bizarre - check out this mornings breakfast:

The ugly breakfast: Quinoa with spinach and garlic stuffed olives topped with herbed egg whites.

Yeah, the garlic olives were not a great addition in this dish. I love the garlic stuffed olives - just not for breakfast.

Garlic stuffed olives.

But I am sure the people at the Y (when I stop in later today to re-activate my membership) will appreciate the garlic breath:-)

So I think I need to have a daily routine (not that I am much of a routine person) that includes 1-2 activities that get me out of the house (aka. cabin fever prevention).

You probably guessed the first one I picked (see above) - yup, exercising at the Y.


Other activities? I haven't decided yet but it has to be something that increases my productivity but isn't a complete waste of time...


My breakfast, although being not the cutest thing on the block, was very filling.

The bit players:

A mug of tea and an apple.

There really is tea in that mug - 

And my apple had these cool green swirls on the top but I think it is kind of hard to see them in this photo.

Time to start the day!

Vegan Johnny Cakes

I brought this back from my Easter weekend in Monterey:

Raw honey is another food item I have been wanting to include in my diet. 

The benefits of raw honey are many (and seemingly limitless if you believe everything that is posted on the internet) but I am mostly interested in its ability to boost the immune system and help with allergies.


Today I decided to do a vegan version of Johnny Cakes.

Vegan Johnny Cakes with wild raspberry honey and pine nuts.

I used soy milk instead of regular milk. They turned out really mouthwatering.

I had a little too much fun drizzling the honey.

These turned out crunchy on the outside but just a touch moist on the inside. The pine nuts added a wonderful burst of creaminess. The honey has an amazing flavor, earthy with a hint of raspberry and a nice but not overpowering amount of sweetness. 

A big thumbs up for the Virgin California Wild Raspberry Honey.

Here is a look at the Johnny Cakes pre-toppings:

And I had a drink that I thought would pair well with the honey - Chamomile tea.

Vegan Johnny Cakes

Serves 1

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of corn meal (I used quick cooking grits)

1/2 cup of soy milk

1/2 a cup of water

a pinch of salt

Directions:

Put the soy milk and water in a pan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. When the liquid begins to simmer turn the heat down to medium low and slowly whisk in the corn meal and stir until thick.

If you want this to thicken up quickly just add less liquid.

When the corn meal is thick - take it off the heat. Put a small amount of coconut oil in a saute pan over medium heat. Spoon in 2 Tbsp. of the corn meal into the skillet. Use a spatula to press down the corn meal to make a patty. Cook until golden brown on both sides.

Top with syrup or honey or just about anything.

Enjoy!

I am having lunch out with my sister today - Have a great Monday everyone!

A breakfast present - salmon onigiri

In my usual trend of only occasionally eating breakfast foods for breakfast, I pulled out the one treat I had left over from my trip to Nijiya.

Salmon onigiri!

If you haven't eaten this before - I am going to give you the walkthrough.

The sheet of nori is actually packaged separately from the rice.

The rice ball is stuffed with delicious cooked salmon.

If your rice ball is cold from sitting in the fridge like mine was, you can pop it in the microwave for a few seconds to bring it up to room temperature. It is much tastier when it isn't cold IMO.

Then you need to take the nori out of the package.

And wrap up the rice ball with the nori - almost like you were wrapping a present.

Ta da! A lovely breakfast present:-)

I also had tea and a packet of blueberries. *warning* the picture came out blurry ((

Here is a better picture of the blueberries if you are curious.

Happy May Day everyone!

Feel free to frolic around the Maypole if you have one handy in your back yard :-)

Cheesy grits with fluffy scrambled eggs

In case you missed it - I put up an About page. It is a work in progress (read: endless editing to occur for the foreseeable future) but I took everyone's advice and stopped thinking so much about it (ha ha!) and just put something up there.

The ensemble for this morning's breakfast:

Eggs, quick cooking grits and nutritional yeast.

You may be wondering why nutritional yeast is making an appearance so often lately. Well, the reason is that I finally found some Red Star nutritional yeast which (if online reviews are to be believed) has the best flavor.

So, I have been trying it out in different recipes. And this morning it was going into the grits.

I cooked 1 serving of grits according to the package directions - I don't like my grits thick so I added in a bit more water.

When the grits finished cooking I stirred in 2 Tbsp. of nutritional yeast for a cheesy finish.

They are a bit hard to see but there are cheesy grits under there.

Then I whisked 1 whole egg and 1 egg white in a bowl with dried parsley, dried basil and salt and pepper. The eggs cooked on low and pulled off the heat while they were still a bit undercooked. 

At this point I get out chopsticks (for some reason a fork just doesn't work as well) and scramble/fluff the eggs while they finish cooking from the residual heat in the pan. 

The meal was rounded out with a bowl of blueberries and some tea with soy milk.

What do I think of the Red Star nutritional yeast? I can see why people prefer it - It definitely has a stronger cheddar flavor and if you are using nutritional yeast to replace cheese? The extra cheddar flavor is a big plus.

I am planning on making a homemade version of my favorite take out dish tonight - Time to go shopping for the ingredients!

Endless experiments

This is the one salad I keep experimenting with and I still haven't created a version I really love.

Chinese Chicken Salad Take 2:

Red leaf lettuce.

Shredded green cabbage.

Shredded carrot and chopped green onion.

Next, I pan roasted a chicken breast:

The chicken turned out very juicy!

I chopped the chicken into large chunks.

I tossed some almond slivers into a dry, hot pan and let them cook till nicely brown.

And do yourself a favor and don't step away from the stove while they cook (like I did) because you will end up with a pan of burnt almonds (like I did). They really only take about 20 - 30 seconds to toast.

Did the salad turn out pretty? Sure.

Did I love the dressing? Not so much.

I mixed soy sauce, sugar, rice wine vinegar, sesame oil and ground black pepper.

It was ok - but not great. 

Does anyone have a recipe for homemade Chinese Chicken Salad dressing that they LOVE?

Oops, I almost forgot my drink:

Cold Chamomile tea.

 

Stuffed french toast

What I really wanted this morning was french toast stuffed with ricotta and peanut butter.

But when I opened the container of ricotta, it was clear it had gone bad :-((


So, as usual, I made a change of plans and made this:

French toast stuffed with greek yogurt and raspberry jam topped with maple syrup.

 The tartness of the greek yogurt did a great job of cutting the sweetness of the jam.

I didn't feel like coffee this morning so I made some chamomile tea.

I apologize for the dull pictures this morning - it is overcast here today so the lighting is not the best.

Happy Tuesday everyone!