If you go to Denny’s or any other diner, you will start to see calorie counts on the menu and it is an eye opener!  Rarely can you find something under 700 calories.  So, when I calculated my dinner tonight to be around 500 calories, I was very relieved.  I know I am eating healthy, but rarely take the time to count calories.  It is time consuming.

Tip:  If you try to eat the same foods, then you only have to add up your calories for that meal once.  In fact, Spark People has a Grouping Feature so if you eat the same thing for breakfast or lunch or whatever, you can just go to Groupings and choose which one it is and the calories are already added for you.  This is very time saving!

Dinner:

1/2 Chicken Breast Sauteed w/ red onions

Massaged Kale Salad (w/ 2 types of Kale – Portuguese and Russian Kale)  w/ Raspberries, Baked Chioggia Beets, Slivered Almonds in Honey Mustard Dressing (honey, mustard, vinegar, and olive oil)

Organic Whole Grain Brown Rice

Japanese Turnips

Sauteed w/ Garlic and Onion

Turnips have never tasted so good!   Calorie count:  500

This chart is offset, carbs are 67, fats 11, protein, 35.

I generally start cooking at 4 pm and I finish at 6:30.  This is a rough estimate of my prep/cook time and I do have some down time in there that I am doing dishes and cleaning.  So, after I eat and then do the dishes again, it is hard to then try and calculate calories of what I just ate.  It is worth it though.  I am doing this to track and get a good idea where I am.  However, I am learning that I am in my calorie zone without having to journal it.

Oh, and one last thing.  When I was a kid, my father made mushed turnips.  I believe it is like mashed potatoes, but they were mush and gross.  It probably was the worst thing my father ever cooked.  My children ate these turnips first.  They loved them.  Whether mushed turnips are just gross or my kids have exotic tastes for veggies that I never had as a kid, I am happy that they liked them.

I believe this is week 11 or 12 on my farm pickup.  Picture is clickable if you want to see the purslane closer.

Starting at the top clockwise we have Raspberries and Strawberries, our fruit staple.  Then there is Arugula, Green Beans, Lettuce, Purslane*, Yellow Squash, Red Radishes, Basil, Peppers, Radicchio, Potatoes (Yellow Finn,) Cucumbers, and small Leeks.

I linked Purslane to some info on it.  Don’t get it mixed up with spurge….white sap = bad.  However, Purslane has the highest in Omega 3′s than any other leafy vegetable.

Now, I want to like purslane.  I love arugula, when a lot of people don’t.  I was hoping the purslane would taste like arugula as it is suppose to have a nutty like taste.  However, I found it to taste more lemony and I don’t particularly care for it raw.  I might try and sautee it.   It also makes me nervous that purslane grows near a look alike, spurge that is poisonous.  Do I trust that the farmworker didn’t get spurge in my mix?  Do I need to break every stalk to look for white sap?  Hmmm…

Around the Corner:  In the upcoming weeks I am going to change the structure of my blog.   I will talk about the farm veggies on Tuesday and Friday, do a cooking/food post on Wednesday.  Then on Thursday will highlight something fitness related.  On the bottom of every post I will keep a running tab of calories inputed and calories burned.  Monday I will leave open to either cooking/fitness related/update on the weekend/ or a weigh in post.  I will do a weigh in at the beginning of the month.  I will probably do all of this in a week or so after my house company has left and I have time for the blog.

Also, if you are looking for me on facebook, I have taken a short hiatus.

This is called Tatsoi.  It is an Asian green.  They are high in vit. C, vit. K, antioxidants and beta carotene. 

I made this salad:  Wilted Tatsoi Salad  I pretty much followed the recipe.  I didn’t have ginger, so omitted it, which is fine as my husband isn’t fond of ginger.  I also used honey in lieu of sugar.  My husband loved this salad.  He said it reminded him of Korean side dishes.

I put the salad in the fridge to chill and I started on the Asian Cabbage Rolls.   I used this recipe as a guideline.  I decided to precook my ground turkey, just put it in a pan and cooked it on the stove with a spatula, like I was making taco or spaghetti sauce meat.  The reason I did this is that I have had problems waiting for the turkey to cook in the oven and figured this would ensure it was cooked.

I took garlic, onions, carrots, leeks, and cilantro and sauteed them lightly.  Then I added them to the soy sauce/sesame oil/egg mixture.

I added the precooked ground turkey and the black japonica rice  that I cooked.  I added the cabbage to it that I soaked and the pepper.  I didn’t have mushrooms, those would have been great in this.

I then precooked the cabbage leaves for about 10 minutes in boiling water.  I didn’t time them.  I just guessed.  I also didn’t have Napa Cabbage.  It would be better as they are larger, but this worked okay.  I got these small cabbage heads in my farm share.

I spooned them in the leaves and then closed the leaves shut and placed the seam down in the pan.  There wasn’t enough cabbage to fold them up.

Here they are in the pan.  Some of the contents spilled out during the cooking.  We eat that, too. 

Kind of homey.  It works for us.

My dinner.  It was so good.  This must be in my top 5 dishes.  I will definitely be making this again.  The nice thing is you can prepare the cabbage rolls the night before and then cook them the next day.  I think you can even freeze them, it just suggest doing so without the sauce.

Finally, our dessert.  Yes, we have dessert.  It is called fresh organic fruit.  Tonight we each had a Santa Rosa Plum.

Okay…this is Finally, I don’t think I put too many photos of myself on here.  I got a hair cut today.  It feels great.  I feel great.

Today I went over to Santa Cruz to their Farmer’s Market.  Their market is a decent sized market.  I love that it is on Wednesday ans sometimes we need veggies and have run out from our Friday farm share.  I still have lots of veggies from our share since we were out of town this weekend.  I just didn’t get any lettuce in our share and really was craving a wonderful salad with my dinner.  I want greens and salad more than anything.

I have changed for sure.  Nothing seems as satisfying as a nice green salad with lots of veggies in it.  I just use a vinegar/olive oil dressing and sometimes will change it up by adding some mustard or honey, depending on what is in the salad.
I also bought some blueberries, shown in the brown paper bag and black berries, Tony has been wanting those.  Oh, and a few onions as Tony asked for onions for the salad and they did taste great in them.

This seems to be our usual weekly dinner.  It is either tacos or tostadas.  These are ground turkey.  Calorie wise each tostad is under 200 calories.  Our salad had raspberries, carrots, red onions, radishes, and 3 different types of lettuces.  Our dessert was a mixed fruit salad.  It was blueberries, black berries, and strawberries.  All of the veggies are from either my local farm share or the farmer’s market.  The only processed food is our tostada shell and then the lean ground turkey.

I do have my feelings against turkey meat, but am not going to go vegetarian.  It is just one of those things at the moment.  I think I try my best, but know it could be better and a lot of that has to do with the cost of food.  It is like pastured eggs, trying to afford a dozen eggs for $7.  I really digressed there, sorry.  I am looking for organic taco shells.  I think they have those at Trader Joe’s.  It is nice to not have to depend so much on the grocery store for my food and more for the farmers in my area.  It really just makes me want to be a farmer and have my own chickens.  I know it is a lot of hard work, we had a large garden when I was a kid and so I understand the concept of it, I just want it.  If I could go back in life and start over I think I would strive to have my own farm.

Finally, this was my dinner at the Green Valley Grill.  It is one of the nicer restaurants in town.  I can’t remember what this is called, but it has Ahi Tuna and Shrimp with Fettuccine.  The weird part, and really what made the flavors of this taste so good is that it had cilantro in it, Parmesan cheese, basil/pine-nut pesto, garlic, and I think soy sauce.  It was Asian and also Italian and then with the cilantro…just very interesting.  I loved it.  Sadly, the glutton in me tried to drink the broth with my fork, but I really just wanted to pick up the bowl and drink it.  I didn’t, but I wanted to.  I tried to remember every flavor to one day go home and make it.  I guess it is considered a fusion dish.  I love it.  It probably is a million calories.

I wanted to get out and exercise today, but I still have a bad sunburn and a cut on my foot.  I realize these are all excuses.  I guess I am in that phase.  I am not without exercise, I just am not in a routine and I haven’t been doing weightlifting or running.  Being without kids for a couple of weeks, I should look into the exercise classes in my gym and go there not just to get fit, but perhaps to meet a few people.

We ate outside today on the back patio.  We had tacos, can you tell?  I just can’t get enough green!   We had a great salad with Carrots and French English Radishes, lightly sauteed Beet Greens and Dino Kale, and ground Turkey tacos.

It rained yesterday.  It is the end of June and we had rain.  I could chalk it up to coastal living, but it seemed most of California got it.  There is nothing like rain and a bowl of hot soup.  I had just what I needed for Broccoli Soup with Potato and Cheddar Cheese.  I used a Cheddar/Jack mix.  

I served with a side of fresh strawberries and artisan garlic olive bread.  My family loved it.  It took me a little bit of time to make it as I made the vegetable broth from scratch.  The flavors in the soup were amazing.

I can’t believe I am already thinking of what is in the box on Friday.  I still have quite a few veggies left of the box I just picked up, which is good.

On Friday, I will be getting Arugula, Asian stir-fry mix (Mizuna/Tatsoi), Red Beets, Brocolli, Carrots, Kale, Onions, Potatoes, Radishes, Spinach, Strawberries, and Raspberries or Blackberries.

Oh, this Wilted Tatsoi Salad looks good!  I think we will be trying it.

Not a whole lot to report.  I stepped on glass yesterday in my kitchen which made for a late dinner.  I didn’t do a lot of cooking today, due to not wanting to be on my foot, though I did eat a Massaged Kale Salad tonight.  Yum!  I love Kale!

I think tomorrow I am going to try some Yoga at home with the girls.  We will see how that goes.  Happy Monday!  (so glad you are over, ha ha!)

Couscous, Quinoa, Collard Greens, Feta, Kidney Beans, and Pesto

I made this with our dinner tonight.  I roughly followed this recipe: Couscous with Pesto, Spinach and Feta Cheese but I made a lot of substitutes.  I added Quinoa and Kidney Beans.  I used Collard Greens that I steamed instead of Spinach and I made my own Pesto.  I liked the Collard Greens in it.  They aren’t overly cooked, since I steamed them, so it works.  I do want to try the fresh Spinach with something like this.  I think it will be a lot fresher and not hearty.

I followed a basic Pesto recipe, as it was the first time I had made Pesto.  I didn’t have any Parmesan or Romano Cheese.  So I substituted that with Garbanzo Beans and it was really good.  In fact, the kids will be eating that tomorrow as a snack with some veggies and whole grain crackers.

My family liked the recipe.  It could be eaten as a main dish or a hearty side dish.  We used it as a side dish and I have leftovers in the refrigerator that my youngest wants to eat for breakfast.

It is amazing the things kids will like and want to eat when you just start feeding them good whole food.

Here is our CSA share from Live Earth Farms!

6 baskets of Strawberries, 1 basket of Raspberries, Green Cabbage, Onions, Green Lettuce (in bag),Radicchio, Beets w/ greens, French Breakfast Radishes, Red Potatoes, Red Lettuce, Broccoli, Basil, Collard Greens, Carrots (one purple one), Carrot Greens, Green Garlic

I look forward to this day.  This is my 7th week of joining the farm.  Joining the CSA has changed my life, my families, how we eat, how I cook, how I shop, and we view food.

I have always hated grocery shopping.  It has become more tolerable now because I don’t have to do a lot of shopping, just get some basics.  Funny though how I hated shopping, but love farm day.

There is a little bit of work once I get get home with my loot.  I sort through the strawberries.  I pick out the ones that need to be eaten right away and then they all go in tupperware containers with paper towels in them to absorb moisture.  I have learned that all the baskets of strawberries will last an entire week using this method.  Of course we eat them and sometimes fast on the weekends, so they never last an entire week.  Just putting the baskets in the fridge, they will start to go bad within a few days.

The other thing I have done is bought these stay fresh bags for veggies.  I don’t know what they do, but with the veggies in the bags they do stay fresher.  They are bigger than regular ziplock bags.  Even a salad mix will last an entire week in these bags.

Speaking of salad mix, I wash all of the lettuce, spin them with the salad spinner, and then make a mix of the different lettuces.  While it takes time to do it when I get home from the farm, it saves me time during the week.  Then, I can have my daughter make the salad and she just has to pull out how much of the salad mix to use.

The other veggies go into the bags unwashed.  I could wash and spin dry them all, but it is more time consuming and some of that stays a bit longer when it isn’t wet.  I should make a note that all of the vegetables have been washed at the farm.  I just do a second wash because sometimes there is still dirt on them or a few dead bugs.  For most veggies I just fill the salad spinner up with water and soak the veggies.  Then I pull the basket out and all of the dirt is on the bottom.  I dump it and then will spin the veggies dry.  Root vegetables I will scrub more, though I don’t have a scrubber.  I have seen those, though.

I didn’t know what to do with the potatoes, so they are sitting in a couple of strawberry baskets on my counter.  Do I refrigerate them or not?

So, you would think this loot would be enough, right?  No, I had to go down to the farmer’s market and look for Kale.  I love Kale.  I also got a couple of peaches, some more lettuce, some more basil, and cherries!  I know we have a lot of fruit, but I was talked into this huge container of cherries for $4.  We have been eating them tonight for our dessert.