Hi Bloggies! How’s your Monday so far? Mine has been busy. The gym, grocery store, Monday morning shuffle with phone calls and housework, and of course taking care of Skylar. And, of course I need to know how your weekend was? Mine turned out to be very low key, which was fine considering I was coming off a day trip to San Diego on Friday. I had plans to attend a raw vegan potluck at a park, but decided against it because it’s super windy here and I didn’t feel like making smalltalk with strangers in 45 mph winds with food blowing everywhere! I used to live oceanfront in both North Carolina and in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and have weathered plenty of hurricanes and it felt like Category 1 or 2 strength winds in the dessert over the weekend! My house was blowing and shaking all weekend, but the winds seem to have died down, thank goodness.
On Saturday, I had housework and kitchen prep work catch-up day after my trip. I went on a long power walk with Scott and Skylar, and hit the Gym to Lift. Sunday we took a nice windy family walk in the morning, more Lifting for me, and then I hit the pool, alone, in the afternoon. But my plans were foiled by the wind!
I brought my Hers but it was too windy to sit there and I lasted all of about 10 minutes.
I’m glad you enjoyed the Highlights of the Week Post. Every week I think I am not going to do another one, yet you all tell me that you like them, so hey, I aim to please.
In The Highlights I touched On….
The Post on Abs: FAQs & My Opinions. And Thank you to everyone who wrote in and commented on my Abs Post! IT WAS THE MOST POPULAR POST IN LOVE VEGGIES AND YOGA HISTORY TO DATE!
The comments are amazing to read, I responded to tons of you in the comment field, and I am so glad that the post that I cringed about publishing actually was such a “winner”!
And thanks for telling me that as bloggers, you’ve had cringe-before-hit-publish posts, too!
And in the Highlights Post Everything from…
Dark Chocolate Coconut Snowballs
To No-Bake Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Balls with Extra Protein Option
To My Signing with a Modeling Agency announcement
To Brutal Honesty vs. Sparing People’s Feelings. Do you Tell the Whole Truth? Most Everyone told me that you prefer Total Honesty.
If you Missed The Highlights Post and Want to Check that out, Click Here
And thanks to those of you who told me that you enjoy your personal space, too. Close-talkers and armrest hoggers are not cool. Nice to know I was not the only one who was creeped out by the Touchy Traveler experience. And he was kinda smelly, too, making things even worse. ugh!
Moving on…
In the mail on Friday I got some Cheribundi. Never heard of it? Me neither til I received it. It’s Tart Cherry Juice.
It comes in Tru Cherry
And Whey Cherry. It’s got added whey protein (8 grams of protein)
I’ll let you know what I think of these once I break into them. They are perfect lunch pail sized to-go drinks, too, for Scott’s lunch. He’s getting lucky this week. With the juice. haha! And of course the whey is all his. Thanks, Cheribundi!
Over the weekend, I was a busy girl in the kitchen…
I made some Raw Vegan Almond Butter Cookie Balls
Form the Cookie Balls
Garnish With Chips, Cocoa Nibs, Coconut Flakes, you name it, whatever floats your Almond Butter Cookie Boat
Green Food: an Edamame Salad with Romaine, Tomatoes, Cukes, and Broccoli that’s hiding under the romaine
Dressed With Vegan Slaw Dressing using the Reduced Fat Veganaise
Dessert Today was Vegan Mint Chocolate Chip Softserve! Props to Gena for helping us See the Softserve Light.
Previously, I’ve made Banana Vanilla Softserve
And I’ve made Peanut Butter Soft Serve
Recently, I made Mango BananaVanilla Softserve
Today’s Softserve…
Averie’s Vegan Mint Chocolate Chip Softserve
3 Previously Frozen & Chunked Bananas (freeze in chunks)
1 Tsp Mint Extract or Creme de Menthe liquor (note: mint extract is extremely powerful, much more so than vanilla or hazelnut extracts, start slowing and add 1 Tsp at a time until your desired minty-ness being careful not to overdo it, which is very easy to do when working with mint flavoring/extract)
Optional:
Splash of Water or Nut Milk only if needed for blendability/smoothness
1 Tsp Vanilla Extract
1/2 c white sugar (you can also reduce, omit, use lucama powder, stevia, agave, maple, etc. If using a liquid sweeter, do not add any other liquids to the recipe, i.e. water or nutmilk)
1/2 c Chocolate Chips (or carob chips, cocoa nibs, white chocolate chips, etc.)
Combine all Ingredients In Blending Device except chocolate chips
Note for Vita Users: Blend at a Level 2-3 for about 10 seconds just to break up the banana chunks. Then blend at a Level 8-9 for about 20-30 seconds or until incorporated. Do Not Overblend and Do Not make the mistake of blending on too slow of a gear, i.e a Level 2-3 after the first 10 seconds or so have elapsed, because you will overheat the machine.
If you’re adding Chocolate Chips, I recommend hand stirring them in after incorporating the softserve as to not pulverize them
Serve & Enjoy!
If you don’t eat it all immediately after making it, you can freeze it and eat later without taste/texture being effected too much.
I make extra on purpose because as long as I am cleaning the Vita, may as well make extra.
To answer a Few Common Questions from the Comments:
Can you Taste the Bananas?
and
Do the Bananas Compete with or Overpower the Mint?
No, the bananas do not overpower the mint. You really can’t “taste” the bananas. The ice cream base is sweet and creamy from the frozen bananas, but it doesn’t jump off the page at you as if you’re eating bananas + mint. Not at all. Which frankly is a good thing for me. I like bananas, they’re fine. I don’t “love” them. So the fact that the banana-flavor is not extremely distinguishable, to me, is a good thing. Especially in mint softserve!
Yoga Today is The Splits (or Hanumanasana, which means Monkey Pose)
Two Months Ago I posted A Hanumanasana Challenge. Well, I wouldn’t really call it a challenge, but more of a set of tips for getting into the splits.
Remember This Post? I can’t believe it’s been two months. This picture is 2 months old and to me, Skylar looks just a little bit older and bigger now than she does here.
Hanumanasana (Monkey Pose, or the full splits)
And Utthita Hasta Padangustasana, (The Standing Splits)
Gym & Weights Workout Today: Upper Body Workout from My Gym Workouts Tab
Tip of the Day: My NuNaturals Stevia Give Away for 4 Winners!!!!
A Few Updates Around the Sphere:
My friend Natasha the Voracious Vegan is Bringing Awareness to World Hunger
Mama Pea turned 18! And I’m turning 21 in a month. haha! Here’s to us (hot mamas) getting better with age! Happy Birthday, Mama Pea!
Heather’s Dry and also is Getting Her Cherry Juice On
Evan Ran a Great Half Marathon!
Questions
1. What’s your favorite Ice Cream? Dairy or otherwise? I wrote extensively about Why You Don’t Need Dairy, Why I don’t recommend it, Calcium Myths and tons of facts about dairy that may surprise you. Mucus much? Click Here for my Massive Dairy FAQs Post
But in the meantime, tell me what kind of ice cream or ice kream you like? Have you ever made your own ice cream or softserve?
Scott is a huge, huge (non-dairy) ice cream fan and I like softserve but I am more of a bite-into-a-piece-of-something person. I like biting into Raw Vegan Dessert Balls. I like to chew more than slurp…haha! However, I will say this particular batch of softserve was perhaps my best batch ever. Not to toot my own horn or anything.
2. Can You Do The Splits? Could you ever?
Doing the splits is obviously not really important in the great scheme of life, similar to what I wrote about Abs and that having abs that “pop” is not really of great important in life. Nice to do or have, but not essential. However, for those of you who write to me and say, “oh you’re so lucky to be so flexible”. Luck has nothing to do with it! I was not always this way. It took daily practice and hard work to become flexible. I definitely was not a child gymnast. I’m nearly 5’11” and I was taller than Mary Lou Retton by the time I was in 4th grade..haha! Flexibility is just one aspect of physical fitness, as are strength and endurance. You must work on all aspects and keep after it! Don’t Give Up! Consistency baby! To read about my Yoga Journey, it’s all here.
Are you Flexible?
3. Best Thing you Ate or Did Over the Weekend?
Me = The Vegan Mint Chocolate Chip Softserve and taking a few windy Walks with Scott and Skylar. It’s really the simple things that make me the happiest!
4. Have you ever sent an email to someone accidentally that they were never supposed to see? And if your luck is like mine, the email that was accidentally sent was not exactly “harmless”. Far from it. It’s never the grocery list you email yourself that gets accidentally sent to someone else. Have you ever done this? What was the fallout or the person’s reaction?
Scott is the King of doing this! He did it to my mother once and I don’t think she fully realized what transpired because it was buried in a chain of emails and I think her lack of computer skills was a blessing in this case!
However, he just did it yesterday (from his new Droid phone) to someone I am working with on some other business matters and he said that she has “No Game and That I Need to Make a Switch!” Ouch! Thankfully this woman took it as well as could be expected. Probably because she actually sent an email to another client/business associate whom she called a F—‘ing Jagoff about a month ago and that client was ticked. Nice.
I actually triple check email recipient lists to make sure that if I am forwarding one part of an email chain that is “sensitive information” that it’s being sent to the proper party. I have never been the recipient of an unintentional send, either. Have you? Or have you accidentally sent an email to someone that was a little on the sassy side? What was your Email Blunder? Do tell!
Stay Tuned For Green Food Reviews & Progress Pics…