sans une cuisine

The kitchen in ma chambre de bonne = a mini-fridge, microwave, one hot plate, and a shelf. Yep, even the kitchen in my NYC apartment was more impressive.

So, I'm required to get somewhat creative. Breakfasts thus far have featured tea and muesli/multigrain flakes with yogurt/fromage blanc topped with market fruit.

Since I'm only shopping for one, occasionally I run out of one or all of the above ingredients. This time last week that meant I strolled up the street to my closest boulangerie for a fresh croissant and café crême. It was a delicious treat. You'll notice above that homework tends to join me at the table...

I'm often on campus for lunch and thus have been exploring the boulangeries in the 7th arrodissement, too. Sandwiches (like this one) are the perfect mid-day meal. On occasion though, I do have the chance to really sit down and dine. I usually take the opportunity to fill up on vegetables with a salad, but I've admittingly discovered a croque madame better than the one I ate in Strasbourg.

Adopting a French-style of eating has meant that I hardly ever have an afternoon snack. With that said, last weekend following our visit to Ikea, Marie and I were starving at 4pm. We each enjoyed a pain aux raisin and iced tea as a result. Fun fact about the beer that my iced tea resembles: it's swiftly becoming an even more popular happy hour drink than wine here; mostly because of the price point.

Lunches out mean dinners at home. The meal above was one of my favorites: garlic-pepper eggs, a fresh piece of baguette with hummus, and sliced market cucumbers topped with olive oil and salt. I haven't minded that few p.m. meals have strayed from this standard vegetarian protein, fresh vegetable, and bread with cheese or hummus equation though. I tend to "cook" simply anyway.

And when it comes to baking without an oven, I've embraced No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies. It's a good thing they turned out well on my first try, too! They were my contribution to my friend's potluck dinner party last weekend, along with a bottle of champagne.

Speaking of wine :) I'm fortunate enough to have another friend from school that lives in my neighborhood. Her and I have appointed Wednesday as our date night. A shared  carafe of vin rouge or ice cream cones paired with lots of girl talk is just enough to make up for any and all kitchen (or lack there of) frustrations.

happy banana bread day muffins

I've been dog-sitting for the past few days and noticed more than a few of these:

Since reading this book, I no longer mix a banana into my every morning oatmeal. I even hardly ever buy them. Why? Barbara Kingsolver's words got to me. 

"Should I overlook the suffering of victims of hurricanes, famines, and wars brought on this world by profligate fuel consumption? Bananas that coast a rain forest, refrigerator-trucked soymilk, and prewashed spinach shipped two thousand miles in plastic containers do not seem cruelty-free, in this context. Giving up meet is one path; giving up bananas is another."

But, this is my parents' house, and they happened to purchase a bunch of bananas before they went away, so I thought I'd make banana muffins... then I found out today is National Banana Bread Day. Two fun, festive facts: 

• Bananas arrived in the United States in the 1870s and quickly became one of the most popular fruits on the market. 
• The first cookbooks mentioning banana bread were published during the Great Depression. Culinary historians believe that a resourceful housewife (who didn't want to throw away over-ripe bananas) may have invented the original recipe. 

And in the spirit of the holiday, I banana-bread-muffin-baked this morning :).

Banana Bread Muffins

2 cups whole grain pancake & baking mix

1 tsp baking powder

1 egg

1/4 cup agave nectar

1/4 cup water

1/4 cup plain yogurt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup melted butter

Ground cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. 
2. In medium mixing bowl, blend dry mix with baking powder.
3. In small mixing bowl, combine all remaining ingredients.
4. Add liquids to dry ingredients, stirring only until lumps are gone.
5. Place cupcake liners in muffin pan. Fill until 3/4 full and sprinkle each one with cinnamon.
6. Bake for 15 minutes or until done.
7. Remove from oven and allow muffins to cool for about 10 minutes.
8. Choose one, remove the cupcake liner, place on a plate, add a smear of almond butter, cream cheese, or butter. Finally, enjoy!

the good life

I sense winter. Yesterday, as I was taking a walk through the park, I inhaled, deeply, and felt the cool air sweep into my body. The trees are losing their leaves, my wool coat has taken precedence in my wardrobe. It's not freezing yet, just cool, and it felt good. It's comforting to know that quiet snow and ridiculous winds (courtesy of Syracuse, NY) are only weeks away. I prefer the in-between seasons usually, but I appreciate the change right about now.

I'm such a nature buff ;). It makes me smile, though, to know that I'm in as good of a place to notice such things... I think I've finally readjusted. I'm currently reading the Geography of Bliss and it's really quite wonderful for happiness through a cultural perspective. Looking forward to reviewing it!  My attitude and my efforts in my classes have improved. My relationships with my friends have deepened. I even find myself "going out" more often, enjoying being a senior. 

Last Tuesday night, for example, I went to out to dinner with the girls. We had no more of a special occasion than being together, right before Thanksgiving, and were dying to go to Phoebe's.

To continue with our spontaneity ;) we also ordered drinks upon our arrival. One got a Blue Moon, another cranberry juice with seltzer (she's obviously the crazy one), a glass of wine for me, and a very strong Rum & Coke for my roommate.

We talked and talked and talked and each helped ourselves to a piece of rosemary bread with homemade butter. This stuff is out of the world, honestly, best bread I have had in a long time!

Phoebe's has such a warm atmosphere and an exquisite menu. It took me a while to choose what I wanted! Everything sounded so delicious. Eventually, however, I ordered the seared scallops from the appetizer section as my meal. It sounded like it would be the perfect portion to fill me up since I wasn't actually that hungry. Well, in case you didn't realize, micro greens does not equate a salad. Yep, I didn't realize it either.

Even if I wasn't at my utmost appetite capacity this small serving could never have filled me up. Luckily, my roommate is very generous and doesn't eat vegetables (trust me, I'm working on it). 

I loaded up on her roasted brussels sprouts and pan-seared mushrooms. By the way did I mention that those scallops are stacked on a slice of homemade pumpkin bread? Oh yummy ;).

To continue our girls night, we went back to Liana's apartment to bake cookies. Don't these look like we made them from scratch? Ha, that's funny. We did a quick supermarket run to buy dough and I discovered the amazing products from the Immaculate Baking Co. Their motto? Bake well, be creative, have fun and give back. And their Chocolate Chunk cookie dough  that is all organic and made with whole ingredient made scrumptious little treats.

We brought the cookies back to the house and then joined the crowd at Faegan's for the world beer tour. I think I can happily live this life :)... at least for the remaining 180 days 'til graduation.

P.S. Ready for the holiday festivities? Join the Bloggie Secret Santa today, before it's too late!

the betty crocker route

As I've mentioned before, my summer internships have wrapped up. I feel as though I've learned and experienced so much through two amazing opportunities at both Fitness magazine and Modelinia. Please trust me when I say that the two platforms are run by an wonderfully talented and hardworking individuals that I am so happy to know. So, in my appreciation, I baked.

For Modelinia I made "soft and chewy" Oatmeal Cookies,

bursting with the "rich sweet-tart flavors of dark chocolate, almonds, and cranberries."

They were a hit! The President even said that they should have added baking to my responsibilities ;).

As for Fitness, I whipped up some Whole Wheat Banana Berry Muffins,

with a sweet banana base chock full of fresh blueberries and toasted almonds.

I don't have any staff feedback quite yet, since I'm bringing them in tomorrow for my thank you lunch with my boss, but I'll keep you posted. The tiny taste I had was yummy :).

Both recipes are from the new Moosewood Restaurant Cooking for Health cookbook that should be available this November. Speaking of, I'm hoping to visit the venue behind this masterpiece and many others this year as it's only a short drive from my university and I'll definitely let you know when I do! In the mean time, an optimistic push from the MTA and me: "Act as if it were impossible to fail."

snowed in...

...and busy baking! What else would I be doing? :) But we'll get there, first an overview of our snow day so far. Welcome to my front yard.

Once the snow started coming down we let our dogs out to play around. They were so excited about the snow, plus, it's Colby's first winter!

Since mostly everything is closed in the area most of my mom's "kids" didn't come today but we did have Tiernan, so I bundled him up and out he went with the puppies and my little sister. He's so cute.

It ended up being the perfect soup day as I had predicted so I broke out my mom's beef stew from Wednesday for a hearty and filling lunch.

Stew gets better with every day. Scrumptious.

And during the blizzard, Mi mama y yo were busy in the kitchen making our Butterscotch & Walnut Oatmeal cookies.

They look yummy and I'm not going to have one. Does anyone like butterscotch? Ha, I obviously don't but it was still fun making them and now the house smells delish. I would get back to reading like I was this morning but I really should do some of my French exercises. N'est pas?

monsoon

So. Much. Rain. It's unbelievable! It has been down-pouring since about 11 o'clock this morning, and when I say hard, I mean h-a-r-d. Well, now that you got the daily weather report :). The second go at the gym was great, I ran there, spent 45 minutes on treadmill and then walked back. My jogging intervals on an incline really kicked my butt so it took me longer to get home. It was a nice cool-down walk though, in every way possible. I didn't layer as much as I had on the way there because I had been so warm and not only did I look ridiculous in my thin rain coat, thin sweatpants and big red rain boots but I was completely soaked when I walked through the door! So smart ;).

Here's breakfast from earlier in the day, 7:15 am to be exact: Green Tea and a Peanut Butter, Banana, Flax, and Marmalade sandwich. Ten minutes after the photo I toasted up another piece of bread and spread it with more peanut butter and the other half of a banana too. I don't know how other people work out or do anything for that matter before eating breakfast in the morning. I always wake up absolutely starving! By the time I really got to go the gym it was already 11 and I should have eaten a snack before because I was basically hungry the entire time. It may have helped though, you should've seen me go! Once I was home and showered I snacked on a Granny Smith Apple and a handful of walnuts to hold me over until lunchtime at 2. It must have been that one time of the month that the family eats beef so of course I had a special plate :) a Lettuce, Corn, Carrot, and Avocado salad with Tuna... and Rice. I had about 3 more scoops of tuna as I ate my way down until I was finally satisfecho in the best way possible. A few hours later I was itching for something more but what? I walked into the kitchen to find my answer, my cookies. There were only 4 left on the plate, haha, they were definitely a hit last night and throughout the day. I ate one with another cup of Green Tea to keep my energy up. The gloomy weather had me sleepy all day! By the way, my celebratory sweet of choice was four of these bad boys during the course of the party last night. Not only is that totally okay with me because of the fact that it was a special occasion but their nutritional stats aren't half bad.

I started with the ingredients Veganomicon listed- flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt, canola oil, sugar, flaxseed, vanilla extract, almond extract chocolate chips, walnuts and then made a few adjustments, the largest of which was using skim milk instead of soy. Next I decreased the one and a half cups of sugar to one and used an extra tbsp of vanilla extract to compensate (3 as opposed to 2), replaced half of the all-purpose flour (1 cup) with whole-wheat flour (1 cup minus 2 tbsp), and upped the amount of ground flaxseeds (4 tsp to 2 tbsp) for added fiber. As for oil, the recipe didn't call for much to begin with, and obviously there were no eggs. Gotta love vegan cookbooks.

Nope, not bad at all, although they tasted like they should've been. "Deep, dark, chocolatey, nutty." Only thing they forgot was, yummy. Omg, I adore chocolate, maybe a little bit too much, eh well :). Speaking of, I think I'm going to grab another one for dessert soon! But before I go here's dinner, a veggie plate almost as those of my talented friend, Em. Almost :). There's some leftover Lunch Salad in the middle, one tomato, Celery salad, and a hard-boiled Egg. So good, so fresh, so clean. And, now for that cookie I was talking about... Haha, wishing you all a great Friday night and upcoming weekend!

m&m madness

What happened to Wednesday?! I apologize not posting like I said I would... I was literally going and going and going until 10 when I crashed into my bed, missing the review of the long-awaited debates. No worries, I'm catching up now :). Here's the foodie recap:

Yesterday's lunch, Salmon patties and a salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, and onions. Scrumptious combination and fuel for the afternoon. Btw, I finished my Campus France al fin, what a relief... if only that was it!

This is last night's dinner... I don't remember what it was called, ha, sorry. I was so tired it's all kind of a blur. Looking back, it consisted of white beans, kale, tomatoes, celery, potatoes, and onions in a tomato-based broth. Sound yummy? That it was, my dear, that it was.

By the time I got around to baking yesterday evening it was too late. Not time-wise but considering that everyone was home and the idea was to eat the cookies tomorrow night, haha, it was basically impossible. So! I made them this morning instead, using M&Ms because there was no chocolate chips anywhere (?) and everything else you see in the spread, plus some ground flax seed (don't mind her, she's a little camera shy.)

I measured, and sifted, and whisked, and mixed, and baked and came out with these pretty little babies in my first batch. As I was photographing them like I proud parent I realized how hungry I was... so I made some brekkie while the second group was in the oven.

I had a large coffee with milk and PB Banana and Flax sammie. I wasn't kidding when I said my stomach wanted food, haha, I practically ate half of it before, couldn't wait. P.S. delicious as usual :).

After all had cooled they came together to create a plate of chocolatey goodness, m&mm&mm&mm&m. So creative ;) I can't wait to have some for dessert tonight. And on the note: ¡Feliz Cumpleaños mi hermana Isidora! She turned the big 11 today, a new pretty little Chilean pre-teen on the scene. See you tonight for a lunch and celebratory dinner overview! Enjoy your Thursday everyone, great weekend up ahead!

Last but certainly not least, HAPPY BELATED LOVE YOUR BODY DAY! It's too often that we don't give our bodies enough credit for being as beautiful, able, and strong as they are, and they deserve to be appreciated! Today, tomorrow, and every day to come, be proud of not only everything you are, but every single thing you're made of. Sure it's not easy, but I pledge to try my very best... for my body's sake :).

c is for cookie...

...and calm, and content, and centered. Which is exactly how I felt after Body Balance this morning. It's just such a spectacular class and a wonderful combination: tai-chi, power yoga, tai-chi, pilates, yoga. Could you imagine a better way to start your day? I know I can't. I am definitely recharged and have been non-stop since then. Even now, I'm literally on my way out the door to my Chile, Chileans, and their Culture class (yes, even more c's!), and thus have no time to post. I leave you with this, a picture diary, a day in the life :).

Cookie, cookie, cookie, cookie cookieee. 

(Coming soon! La cena de cumpleaños!)

confianza

Don't worry, that's the last of my c alliterations ;). Confianza is the English equivalent of it's cognate, confidence. Most often I think of confidence in reference to oneself, a quality that people are constantly struggling to obtain, or, at the very least, to appear as though they already have. What get's me though, is that confianza also translates to faith and trust, and are used frequently in that sense. Now, I'm sure you didn't wake up with intentions of brushing up on your Spanish nor do you care to read as I do so, but I promise I do have a point. A couple of posts ago, in response to my request for fitness tips, the insightful Caroline commented, 

"Wow, looks like you've gotten a lot of great advice already. My advice would just to be have confidence in yourself. After thinking that I could not be a runner, I finally tried it one day--and ran for 4 miles, no problem. You'd be surprised at what the human body can do." 

What she exactly meant by that and how I interpreted it may be two different things, however, I got a quite a lot of out of it, so I though it'd be worth sharing :). Confianza en sí mismo, or confidence in yourself, is more than believing that you can... it's trusting yourself to go ahead and do it, having faith that you will do it. I'm not anywhere near being overweight but I am definitely out of shape, and have been for too long. For me, the hardest part about getting back to an exercise routine, although it was unknown to me before, was believing  the mantra "I can and I will." I had allowed myself to become intimidated by others around me who were already regular gym-goers and because I hadn't gotten into the habit early on in my life, I thought it was too late for me. In other words, I was letting my head get in the way of my goals.

I say "was" because, as of today, I've proved to myself that having a mindset like that is crazy. Last night, as I was looking at the gym class schedule I saw that there was a Body Balance class at 8 a.k.a if I wanted to go I had to be up by 7 a.k.a. wake up much earlier than I had planned. I considered going, but basically decided I couldn't, no matter that I should, I simply would not be able to drag myself out the door at that hour. Then I thought: I love that class, I've had such a great time and workout when I've went, and I know that if I go tomorrow not only am I going to feel good but I'll be proud of my dedication. Ultimately, I needed to let myself get out of my own way. 

So I did. This morning I woke up to a silent house, eat a quick breakfast in a dark kitchen, and walked the rainy 20 minutes to the gym... to find it closed. Today marks a Roman Catholic holiday, the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, and Chile, like numerous other South American countries, views it as a public holiday. Thus, Club Arena, is on their holiday schedule, won't open until 9, and most likely is not going to have the same classes available. After all my revelation, self-reflection, and finally defiance of my own self-doubt, turns out that fate had other plans in mind for me. Haha, it's funny really, and as much as I felt disappointed, I don't mind anymore. Just by demonstrating that I had the willpower to go to the gym, first thing in the morning, extra early on my day off, simply because I wanted to, made it, well, worth it.

Wow, that was a lot :) I hope someone other than me got something out of it. Anywho, here's a recap from last night's celebratory dinner. As much as you and I suspected another one of my host-mom's fantastic meals, the real food part turned out to be rather plain for convenience purposes. In addition to "our family" of 5 we hosted about 7 other people so oven-toasted Tomato, Oregano, (Ham) & Cheese Sandwiches were quick and easy. I had my two made without meat and they turned out quite tasty. Nonetheless, dessert was still my obvious favorite.

The bakery-bought Torta Panqueque Naranja alongside my Chocolate-Chocolate Chip-Walnut Cookies, inspired by Veganomicon.

The birthday girl, in deep concentration, as she attempts to blow out the birthday candle and mark the beginning of a new year. She is being propped up by her mother, Carmen Gloria, while receiving encouragement from her siblings, Tomás and Isadora.

Teresa cuts the birthday cake. In the mean time, check out the delectable Chocolate & Almond Bon-Bons she brought! Julieta tries the first bite of the Torta Panqueque Naranja. Verdict? Not only was it the first of many pieces she enjoyed but she's already looking forward to the cakes to come!

And last, but certainly not least, I formally present to you, the beautiful, the incredible, the one and only, Chilean host-mom! I wish I could go into more detail about my first fiesta de familia but I'm afraid I've gotta run... it's gym time... go me ;). Have a wonderful Friday!