A little about Pesto and Life.

Do you ever feel like someone is trying to rip your head off while your heart threatens to explode?  It's been a little like that over on this end.  I'm trying so desperately to balance the precarious lives I hold.  Sometimes it takes a whole lot more focus and elbow grease than I can really muster.  I'm trying.  The scales tilt and throw me into a whirlwind of catchup.  Who knew school would make life crazier.  Well, it has.  That's okay.  It's life, it's wild and crazy.  I like it.

Here's an amazing pesto recipe.

1 1/2 cups fresh basil
1 cup fresh spinach
1/2 cup walnuts
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
5 garlic cloves
salt and pepper to taste
blend.

It's amazing.  You will love it.

It's raw, it's vegan, I'm sure even Paleo can get behind it.


You can eat it on salads.

You can brown some chicken, add in some sundried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, and kalamata olives and mix it all together with rice noodles, real noodles, zucchini noodles, butternut squash noodles, whatever you feel like.

Hope you are resting somewhere with a cocktail.  I'm going now.  To play chase at the park for an hour or so.  Then to work.  Life.  It's constant.

Good Morning. Muffin Recipe.

A few of the glorious things about waking up at 4:30AM.

Lying in bed until 5:00AM to see if there is any chance that you are going back to sleep.

nope.

Write a blog on why diets suck.

Send parents a list of places they can use a senior discount.  Point out that they are eligible for senior discounts.

Lie in bed wondering if you should exercise.

Get up and go on a 3.5 mile run.

Dry brush.  Remember you have a sunburn and that it was a bad idea to dry brush.

Shower, dress, put on lotion and makeup and deodorant, straighten hair.

Feel outrageously accomplished!

Go in the kitchen and create an awesome gluten free strawberry muffin recipe.

Here you go.  The benefits of my early rising.

2 1/2 cups Bob's Red Mill All Purpose Flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum
1/2 cup coconut sugar
2 tablespoons coconut oil
2 eggs
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup vanilla coconut milk
1/4 cup ground flaxseeds
4 dates
either 1 1/2 cup fresh strawberries or 1 cup dark chocolate chips

bake at 350 for 30 min.

I mixed the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, xanthan gum.
Blend the flaxseeds for about 15 seconds.  Throw in the dates and blend for just a second, you want some texture in them.  I have a vitamin which makes this super easy.  If your blender can't handle the dates just chop them up.
I mix the coconut oil with the coconut sugar, then mix in the applesauce.
Add flax, dates, coconut oil, coconut sugar, and applesauce to dry mixture.
Mix eggs, coconut milk, and vanilla, then add to the rest of the ingredients until everything is well combined.
Add your strawberries, chocolate, or whatever mix in you feel like.

Bake and enjoy.

Amazing Spaghetti Sauce.

Desperate for an awesome, easy, healthy dinner that will thrill everyone in your family?  Kid's included?

I am happy to announce that this is not just wishful thinking.  

First, this is my mom's spaghetti.  Not my mother in law's.   My amazing mother in law is the only one with the true Italian touch, and Uncle Jim, and Auntie Sue, and Lori.  It also wouldn't be called spaghetti.  It would be roni's or gravy or cavatellis.  When I'm looking for comfort food, however, I want something from my Californian childhood




.

It amazes me that my kids will eat this with zucchini noodles.  Since I have yet to order a spiralizer, I simply use my vegetable peeler.  It works great.  

~Recipe

1 red bell pepper

1 small yellow onion

4 cloves garlic

2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 1/2 lbs ground beef

1 can diced tomatoes 

1 can tomato sauce

1 can tomato paste

8oz water

3teaspoons salt

3teaspoons garlic powder

1teaspoon cracked pepper

1 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon dried basil

handful of fresh Italian parsley

Chop.  Mince the garlic, yellow onion, bell pepper, and parsley.  

In a larger pan, sauté the garlic, bell pepper, and onion in 2T olive oil, on high heat, for about two minutes until veggies are just starting to get tender. 

Mix in the ground beef, stir to incorporate.  Lower heat to medium/high and cook beef until there is no pink, about 5-7 minutes.

Add salt, pepper, oregano, basil, and garlic.

Then add canned tomatoes, sauce, paste, and water.  Let everything boil on medium/low for about five minutes.  Throw in your parsley.  Mix together.

Lower the temp to lo, so that it barely simmers and leave it alone.  :)

After a few hours, you can skim off any fat.

I like to make this in the morning and leave it just barely simmering all day long.  It's an easy meal for Eric to put together when he's home with the kids.

The sauce is great with pasta.

However, we have found that our whole family loves it over zucchini noodles.  With this recipe, I will usually shred about 6 zucchinis.  If you aren't used to raw zucchini noodles with a hot sauce, you should know that they will sweat and your plate or bowl will get a little soupy.  

Living with sugar. or without.

We all know that I love sugar.  I do, I do, I do.  

I wish my husband shared my addiction.  

I wish I could eat one cupcake.  (not all the cupcakes)

I wish vanilla cream and chocolate did not have a voice.

I wish that snickers were health food.

I wish that donuts grew on trees.  I would be sure to eat only the organic ones. 

I wish that sugar didn't override my 'off' switch.

I wish that sugar could be banned, not sold at stores, not sitting in my pantry, not wafting through the air at the fair.

If only my wishes could be reality.

Unfortunately, I am one of millions of people who live fully addicted to sugar and sweets.

About a year ago I wrote a post, confessions of a sugar addict.  I have to admit I've been shocked at the amount of views that one post gets.  Since so many of us seem to struggle with this, I thought I'd share more about what I am doing to free myself of this addiction.

Last year, I tried ridding my diet of all sugars/sweets.  I managed to do so for about 2-3 weeks, but then fell into a bowl of ice cream and just had to take a bite.

After being off of sugar, reintroducing it to my diet, at first, is met with complete rejection.  I usually can't eat much and it makes me feel pretty sick.  Then, slowly it begins to build -  the need for more.  Until I'm once more groaning on the floor, pulling one more powdered sugar coated eclair into my mouth, barely finding the strength to chew.  Not even tasting it's delicious sweetness.

Have you seen Something About Mary?  No?  Well, I won't recommend it, but there's a sub story about a guy who was off of coke and his friend gets him to take a drink of a beer, telling him of course this won't restart your addiction.  Which it does, because we are all just a moment away from being coke heads - duh!  (Don't do drugs - you will be addicted to heroin if you smoke pot!  yes, I believe this.  It's kept me drug free.)  

Anyway, back to the coke guy - who is also one of my favorite actors - he eventually gets eaten by his python.  

And that, folks, is what sugar will do to you.  It's just one bite between you and python crushing death.

I'd rather live! and be beautiful while doing it.  There is nothing more toxic for my complexion than sweets.  Even knowing this and just imagining what it must be doing on a cellular level, it's been incredibly difficult to keep away from them.

As of today I have been off of refined sugar for 5 days.  Yay for me!!  However, unlike last year I am not doing a complete ban of all sweets.  I will happily indulge in any treat made with honey, grade B maple syrup, molasses, sucanot, rhapadura, or agave.   (I am careful with agave and maple syrup, because both of these tend to cause me to overeat - just not quite to the caramel dripping off my chin - eyes glazed over - state.)

I think we need treats.  They're like medicine to a long day or a special splurge for a job well done.  However, choosing to eat only the best sweets helps hold them in higher regard and keeps us from those very embarrassing moments, such as when you're husband comes downstairs at 2am only to find you in the middle of the kitchen, pie tin in hand with the whole carton of ice cream in the middle.  Oh, that hasn't happened to you?  

Here's to my quest for a healthy body, beautiful skin, organic energy, and invitations to more events - now that everyone knows I won't be writhing ecstatically in the middle of the dessert table.  It's always a little awkward when that happens.

And. . . yesterday at our small group get together - I didn't eat a brownie or lick the pan or sneak one when no one was looking or come home and have a giant bowl of ice cream or take a bite of the whipped cream and chocolate on my husband's frappaccino.  Can you believe my level of self control?!  I am amazing.   If only I knew I were invincible.  But I know I'm really just a sip away from that python's stomach.