Wednesday, August 29, 2012

these kids are wise...


An anthropologist suggested the following game to a group of children in a tribe in Africa: He placed a basket full of fresh fruits under a tree. He then said that whoever reached the basket first in a race would be the winner of all the fruits.

As he gave the signal to begin the race, the whole group held hands, ran bonded together and then sat and enjoyed the prize together.

When he asked why
they had done such thing, when he had offered the possibility to one to be the ultimate winner.
They replied: " UBUNTU"-- how could one of us be happy (feel happiness) while the rest are in despair, unhappy?

UBUNTU in the Xhosa culture means: "I am, because we are."

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles

I'm convinced that if heaven had a taste, it would taste like truffles. I stumbled upon this recipe today, whipped some up, and they are divine. And figured this recipe is too good to not share.

RECIPE HERE

I added peanut butter to the chocolate dip, for a reese piece take on that.

Enjoy.

Saturday, August 25, 2012

my day today...





have a great day
Sunshine + barefooted + cute "new" dress = good day

Friday, August 24, 2012

listen up ladies

Saw this today, made me laugh. So true.

"Your dresses should be tight enough to show you're a woman and loose enough to show you're a lady"

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Something from "nothing"

I just want to recommend this book I just finished to you...

    
It's a biography of Ben Carson, and his journey from being what the world saw as a "nobody"- a colored boy from the ghetto of Detroit, into being a sought-after neurosurgeon. I love it because he's super humble and relational. I imagine it would be easy to get proud in that position, but he simply explains he's just using the gifts God gave him.

And he talks about an important value his mama taught him growing up - people are people. Meaning classes, color, gender, status in the workplace doesn't matter, we're all people. And you can see that in how he talks about his work. His accounts of amazing near-impossible surgeries he's done are not credited to him, but first and foremost to God, and then to the whole team he works with - from top surgeons to administrative staff.

Check it out, let me know what you think.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

fitness blog up and running...

I've started a new blog, solely for all things fitness. Check it out HERE

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

for those needing to laugh...

Deceptively Delicious brownies

Well. It is my great pleasure to inform you that healthy brownies do indeed, exist. I just love food, especially dessert. So much so that I am unwilling to give it up. Rather, I decided to do a bit of research and see if a brownie existed that wasn't all that bad. After all, I'd heard of zucchini brownies and figured surely there must be something else. Came across this recipe with carrots and spinach. I'll repeat that as you're probably sure you read it wrong...carrots and spinach. In brownie. It sounds weird I know...fortunately I am the type of person that does not like to write off strange recipes without first giving them a shot. So I tested it out this afternoon and they're absolutely delicious. Possibly more delicious than a normal brownie - I think because having vegetables in it gives it more depth and some actual nutrients, rather than simply sugar and processed rubbish. And you can't actually even taste or really see the carrots or spinach (perfect way to sneak veggies into those you can't get to eat them - the snowboard school falls under that category. I can't wait for them to try these...:D) Without further adieu...the recipe that (even if you didn't know it), you've been waiting for most of your life...

Deceptively Delicious Brownies
  
  • 3 oz semisweet/bittersweet chocolate
  • 1/2 cup carrot puree* (steam/boil 10-12 minutes until soft and then puree in food processor)
  • 1/2 cup spinach puree* (steam 2 minutes and puree in food processor)
  • 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2 Tbsp margarine or butter
  • 2 tsp vanilla
  • 2 egg whites
  • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour (I used whole wheat, but white will also work)
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Coat a baking pan with cooking spray.
  2. Melt chocolate in double boiler or microwave on low heat so as not to burn.
  3. In large bowl, combine melted chocolate, vegetable purees, sugar, cocoa powder, margarine, and vanilla, and whisk until smooth and creamy.
  4. Whisk in egg whites. Stir in flour, baking powder, and salt with a spoon.
  5. Pour into pan and bake 35-40 minutes. Cool completely before cutting.
*the second time I made it I used raspberry puree instead of spinach, which also worked. Feel free to experiment and let me know if you come across an amazing combination!
 The recipe claims this gives 12 pieces, but I think they must mean child-size pieces. For me it would give 6 Rebecca-size pieces. Which is a nice sized piece of dessert.
 

Those of you who dig nutritional info, here's all I know...recipe claims 133 calories per brownie, 3 grams of fiber (crazy in a brownie), plus amazing antioxidant due to vegetable goodness.

Enjoy! Let me know how it works for you.

Bless you!

Saturday, August 11, 2012

kitchen miracles

I have an funny story for you. Long but worth the read... So I'm on weekend warriors this weekend which means myself and 3 students have the privilege of serving the base by cooking/cleaning. Well yesterday I decided we'd cook Indian and started talking it up alot because I have, in fact, somewhat decent skills when it comes to Indian cuisine - there's nothing like cranking Indian music, hiding the cutlery, and getting your roll on - rolling out naan bread that is.

Anyway, the kitchen didn't have all the ingredients I needed so I figured, no worries, I'll work with what I have and where better to find something phenomenal to whip up than my good friend google? And so I decided to make 2 curries - a lentil one and a potato pumpkin one. Well, the potato pumpkin one was...I'm just trying to think of a word that could possibly contain how awful it was. As in I spit it out. Refused to swallow something so disgusting. As in I-can't-possibly-serve-this disgusting. The recipe called for alot of onions which we found strange, but we figured, well, the recipe says so, it must be so. Well, it was not so. I couldn't even taste pumpkin and potato, all I could taste was onion. We tried adding sugar, which did nothing, and then called it a write-off for the night and hoped inspiration would hit as to how to prevent this "food" (when I think of "food", I think of edible goodness, so it's quite questionable that this can be called "food") from going to waste. Anyway, we ended up having the lentil curry and pasta, but that's not of importance in this story. Step 1 to fixing this problem was obviously throwing out the abomination google referred to as a "recipe".

Step 2 to fixing this problem was getting a good night's sleep. And this morning, the mission was on. After taking some serious time to pray I dove in - rinsing onion grossness off the pumpkin and potato, processing this and other miscellaneous veggies, totally guessing on spices and vegetable stock amounts....laying hands on the pot not once but multiple times and crying a simple prayer "Please God, make this taste awesome. Somehow." It was funny cuz the other day I watched Ratatouille and as I was praying and taste testing and still not satisfied I was reminded of the scene where the garbage boy is cooking and the soup tastes terrible and then when he's not looking Remy (the little rat) goes to the soup and works a miracle and it ends up being bomb-diggity. And I was like "God please do that. Add some of your divine spices or something while I'm not looking." Anyway, after alot of prayer and a hint of spices the soup ended up delicious and something I can definitely serve.

Even though I was a bit frustrated yesterday at how disgusting it was (possibly the worst thing I've ever made), now I'm laughing really hard because honestly, this is what happens (though generally not this extreme) when I follow recipes - they never turn out.

I am born to cook without recipes - this morning was so fun just praying lots and hoping for the best. I cannot recreate what I made this morning. And I can't give you the exact recipe for it.

Any, after all this I figured I should give you all some cooking advice. To save you from what I went thru yesterday. So brace yourselves, your life is about to be changed. The one recipe you need for successful cooking....

  • First, throw away the recipe you think will work. It will most likely be a huge disappointment.
  • Pray. Pray. Pray some more.
  • Relax.
  • Throw in heaps of love, heaps of prayer, a pinch of this, a dash of that, and a handful of that.
  • Lay your hands and bless your masterpiece.
  • Serve it up with a smile.
I'll leave you with a quote I love: Cooking is like love - it should be entered into with complete abandon, or not at all.

Ok, enough reading my blog. Go toss some recipes in the rubbish and create. Have a lovely day!



Thursday, August 9, 2012