Posts tagged ‘sunshine’

April 25, 2011

Easter Weekend

Ohh, what a weekend. Where should I begin? How about with food?? 😉

Friday night  when my boyfriend finalllllly arrived we sat down and made pulled pork sandwiches. I have 2 things to say about this. 1.) This is the easiest recipe ever. 2.) Have you ever had bone suckin sauce? You must go buy this RIGHT NOW.

Obsessed. This was my first time making pulled pork even though I order it every time I eat out if it’s on the menu. Who knew it was so easy to make?

Pulled Pork

  • 1 sliced onion
  • 3 lbs pork shoulder
  • 1 can of vegetable broth
Place it all in the crock pot on Low for 9 hours. Remove pork and shred (remove fat). Place back in the crock pot. Serve on Whole Wheat Buns. Clearly I like BBQ sauce,so my sandwich is drenched in it… But whatever you choose to do with yours, PLEASE use the bone suckin sauce. You won’t regret it.
Since I made 3 pounds there were plenty of leftovers… We could’ve easily made these sandwiches again. But I have a.d.d. and a new  pan
so it must be put to good use. Cuban panini’s sounded like a good plan to me 🙂
and they were. Whole wheat bread, honey mustard, leftover pulled pork, deli turkey, Muenster cheese and of course pickles! Sorry about the bad picture :/
Saturday was rainy so we dyed some easter eggs in the morning.
Don’t mind the clorox bottle… My boyfriend’s a little messy.
Since it was raining we needed a comforting, warm breakfast. So we had a “healthier” version of my Overnight French Toast Casserole.
The “healthier” version included whole wheat bread, egg whites, unsweetened almond milk, earth balance “butter” and sugar-free maple syrup. Still JUST as good as the regular version, so save the calories if you can 🙂
The sun magically appeared and we headed to Camden Yards to try to scalp tickets to the Baltimore vs Yankees game. My boyfriend is a HUGE baseball (yankees) fan so being the great girlfriend I am 😉 I agreed to give up my dreams of trying out the new Vegan restaurant to have blue moons and hot dogs.
Best part about it? We got FREE tickets 20 rows behind home plate!
Worst part about it?? My car was towed…To the tune of almost $400!!!!! Baltimore city is THE worst.
So annoying.
That left us a good 4 hours of sleep before Church the next day.. Somehow we managed to look presentable.
It turned out to be a BEAUTIFUL day so after taking a million pictures outside we headed to my mom’s for Easter linner.
The Easter Bunny had dropped off a basket for me – Sprinkles cupcake mix (dark chocolate), pretty cupcake liners, sugar-free peeps, jelly beans, lindt chocolates, a notepad, hand made note cards and of course REESE’S EGGS! I politely asked the Easter Bunny to go easy on the Eggs this year because I knew I would eat all of them. So there were 2… I approved.
Aren’t these notecards GORGEOUS? Every detail is hand-made… I’m saving them for a something special!
NOW, for the food. We easily ate ourselves into a food coma… But, that was the plan.
Honey Baked Ham

Spinach Salad w/ feta, dried cranberries & sunflower seeds

Grilled Corn salad with cheese, tomatoes and avocados

Homemade mac & cheese

Grandma's Mashed Potatoes

Unpictured: Turkey, Sweet Potatoes, and rolls.
My plate went like this:

Carb Loader

My boyfriend and I were in charge of dessert and I’d like to think we succeeded.

Strawberries & Cream Cake

Crumb Cake from Carlos Bakery in Hoboken

My plate:
I had to try everything 😉
It really was an AMAZING weekend (minus the car being towed) with surprisingly beautiful weather. I went to bed at 745 pm to catch up on sleep from the night before in hopes of feeling normal today. It didn’t work. BUT, I am hoping to be back on track by tomorrow. I have a little confession…
I’ve been eating horribly, not going to the gym and I’m really starting to feel gross. So, tomorrow I need to get back on track… I need to get to the gym, I need to pack healthy food and I need to get out of this funk!! Give me some motivation 🙂
Let’s make this week a good one!!

Questions: What do you do for motivation? Send me some!! 🙂 What’s your favorite memory from the weekend?

March 17, 2011

Listen to the Local’s

I’m back from The Keys…and not so happy about it. Although I have missed you all 🙂 We went from this:

To this:

Whomp. Whomp. Whomp.

I’m not going to complain anymore though because we had a great time, ate delicious food, even better desserts and soaked up every ray of sunshine possible.

We rented bikes as our mode of transportation, so i used the excuse that since I was riding at least 12 miles a day I was “earning” my desserts. Yeahh…I’m ridiculous.

Every restaurant we ate at was recommended by a local – Here is the recap aka an insane amount of Food Porn

Day 1

First stop: Flamingo Crossing – Homemade Ice Cream

Ordered: Mint Chocolate Chip & Cookies n Cream in a waffle cone

Grade: A+ – Perfect way to kick off the trip!

Day 1

Dinner: Ibis Bay Lighthouse

Ordered: Old Bay (lie, only MD serves Old bay apparently) Shrimp – Special of the Day: Blackened Yellow tail snapper with black beans and yellow rice – Seared sesame tuna with spanish rice

Grade: A+

Day 1: After dinner treat

Ordered: “Serendipity’s” Frozen Hot Chocolate

Grade: F for FAILURE. Hands down, the WORST dessert I’ve ever had. They claimed they follow serendipity’s recipe to the tee – but it’s a lie. This was basically icy water made to look like chocolate. Huge disappointment is an understatement.

Day 2:

Dinner: Conch Republic – huge restaurant on the water w/ great service and zero disappointments

Ordered: Appetizer: Cracked Conch (SEA SNAIL!?!?!?!) Dinner: Grilled Shrimp w/ Yellow Rice and Chef’s Veggies (which were the best veggies I’ve ever had at a restaurant) and Blackened Swordfish w/ yellow rice & veggies.

Grade: A+ – still can’t believe I ate a slithering sea-snail.

Day 2:

After Dinner Treat: Tempura fried strawberries rolled in cinnamon and sugar, drizzled with dark chocolate in a white chocolate cream sauce with a side of vanilla bean ice cream.

Grade: I. die. for. this. A++++++


Day 3:

Breakfast: Blue Heaven – Heaven on a fork and Sin in a glass.

Ordered: Eggs over easy with homemade wheat bread, bacon, potatoes, 1 blueberry pancake and 1 strawberry pancake with real maple syrup and a glass of chocolate milk.

Grade: If there was a grade higher than an A, this would take it. If you are ever in Key West – GO HERE. There will be a wait, but it’s worth it.


Day 3

Linner: Sloppy Joe’s

Ordered: Pulled pork sandwich, Sloppy Joe sandwich, Bacon cheese fries

Grade: C+ – service..horrible, fries…cold, pulled pork was better than the famous sloppy joe. Wasn’t expecting gourmet food but still expected to enjoy my time there.


Day 3

Post Sunrise Cruise Treat: Better than Sex Desserts

Ordered: Peanut Butter Perversion & Between the Red Velvet sheets Cheesecake

Grade: A. I loved the atmosphere – it was pitch black and they hand you a flashlight to review the menu, the waitresses are actresses and there are fun games at the table – The cheesecake was SO red and velvety it was a true treat. It takes their chef 9 hours to make and it just won a crazy amount of awards. Of course i loved the peanut butter pie as well because we all know peanut butter + chocolate = amazeballs.

Day 4

Lunch: Green Republic – Regular, Vegetarian and Vegan Meals

Ordered: Mango Green Monster, Berry Good Smoothie, Vegan Avocado and swiss burger and steak and goat cheese sub

Grade: B – I thought everything was delicious but overpriced. It was $40 for the 2 sandwiches and 2 drinks. They also didn’t have any tables and you ate over your tray… I think they just opened so I’m sure they will pull it together!

**FORGOT PICS OF DINNER – THAI FOOD AT FLOATING RESTAURANT**




Day 4

Cold dessert after spicy thai food: Mattheessen’s Eats, Sweets and Treats

Ordered: 1/2 pound chocolate chip cookie w/ Cookie Dough and Cookies n cream ice cream with pretty sprinkles (mine), 1/2 pound chocolate chip cookie w/ cake batter ice cream (Adam’s)

Grade: A+ – this was the FIRST dessert to ever defeat me. I’ve never not been able to finish a dessert….ever. No lie that I laid down in a booth for at least 10 minutes before my boyfriend had to pull me out of the restaurant because it was time to go. We should’ve shared one fo sho.

 

Dessert Coma

 


Day 5

What I love most: Ice Cream – Polar Bear Homemade Ice Cream

Ordered: Strawberry Cheesecake and Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream in a chocolate dipped waffle cone

Grade: A+ – Key West clearly makes the best ice cream. I’m never going to be able to have ice cream anywhere ever again because it will never live up to this! I was so excited to eat this that my glasses became crooked.

We also had Key Lime Pie, various breakfasts/lunches we made from our grocery store visit, pizza and managed to polish off this baby:

Who wants to start placing bets on how much weight I gained during the trip? I did manage to get three 4.5 mile runs in, some weight lifting and all of the bike riding/swimming we did added into my daily routine but I’m still counting our eats as overindulging. As i sit here in the biggest pair of sweatpants I own, promising to get back to being healthy tomorrow, I’ve decided to start lent a week late. I’m giving up sweets… I know this isn’t going to be easy but that’s the point (in my mind). This means no ice cream, no cheesecake, no brownies/cookies/cupcakes/cake, fro-yo, etc. I can still have yogurt, granola bars, fruit, peanut butter etc (whew) but I haven’t decided if my frozen banana should be counted as dessert?? This is going to be a HUGE challenge for me but an extremely fulfilling one if I succeed. So, wish me luck!

It may be hard to believe but we did other things besides eat on our trip!

Laid out

Went on a Sunset Cruise

Went Snorkeling

Saw Dolphins!

Watched every sunrise and sunset possible

Made lots of funny faces & had the best time ever 🙂

We will definitely be back to visit Key West again (hopefully sooner than later) and highly suggest taking a vacation there if you haven’t.

You can find me at the gym working off the millions of calories i took in on vaca or in the kitchen creating recipes that will include anything BUT sweets for the next 33 days. I do have a couple of healthy dinner recipes I hope to post tomorrow… But for now I’ll be catching up on reading blogs! Hope everyone has a wonderful week 🙂

QUESTIONS: Any advice for giving up sweets? When you go on vacation are you more food or activity oriented?

Some sunrise/sunset favorites from Key West


Sorry for the picture overload!! I have about 50 more – if you want to see them you can check out my facebook page .