Seems like time is continuing its speeding passing. I hate that my mother was right when I was young when she told me to stop wishing my life away. She always said time goes faster the older you get, and boy was she right. Hard to believe Easter is next week and it will be summer before you know it. With that, they business of life seems to have kicked up for me lately. All good, but Sunday night shows up faster each week. I tend to get lazy about that time and sometimes say to myself…. I’ll skip prep this week…no big deal. Well, it is a big deal and my wanting to be lazy would lead me to a week of easy pickins’ and less healthy choices. I do enough of that anyway, so I went to Healthy Girl Kitchen again this week. https://healthygirlkitchen.com
Danielle Brown, aka Healthy Girl Kitchen, has a series of posts called “life changing salads.” I will admit, I thought, really? Life changing…. but I have to say I am on my third and they kind of are…. life changing. This week’s pick was SO simply and Simply Yum with great flavors and just what I needed when I was not feeling a lot like prepping. This journey of mine continues to teach me, simple can be both healthy and yummy. You don’t need to buy expensive, crazy ingredients to make fun, delicious and healthy food. I am still having fun trying new flavors and recipes I can feel good about eating. Try one new thing this week and tell me about. You may be surprised what you discover.
As we move into spring and summer, I love all the delicious fresh fruit I can easily find. Grabbed a small “personal” watermelon this week…the store actually called it “personal watermelon.” It was pretty good, not as sweet as those later in the year, but still good for a healthy snack.
This week’s menu:
- Breakfast: Veggie heavy smoothie
- Lunch/Dinner: Moroccan Inspired Couscous Salad
- Snack: Fresh Watermelon Chunks
- Dessert: Chickpea Chocolate Cookies
- Water: Of Course
Veggie Heavy Smoothie: This week I started with the base of all my smoothies – spinach, kale, ginger, turmeric, unsweetened almond milk, chia seeds and psyllium powder. Then I added, shredded carrots and broccoli florets. To that I added just a few chunks of pineapple, a handful each of fresh blueberries, black raspberries, and half a frozen banana. Then I added the fruit of one fresh mango and blended. So good.
Moroccan Inspired Couscous Salad: This salad is so light and fresh with wonderful flavors and the dressing is super simple and really tasty. Making the couscous is super simple, adding olives, apple, golden raisins, choice of nuts, fresh mint and fresh parsley topped off with feta – recipe called for vegan feta, I used fat free feta.
The dressing is a blend of olive oil, fresh lemon juice and a Moroccan spice blend combining cumin, paprika, cinnamon, ginger, coriander and turmeric. Super easy and really married all the ingredients beautifully. You can find the full recipe at @healthygirlkitchen on Instagram.
Chickpea Chocolate Chip Cookies: This recipe is also from healthy girl kitchen. I always love a one pan, or one pot recipe. This is basically that – add all the ingredients into a food processor and blend it up…. fold in the chips, roll out balls of the dough, place on a baking sheet, press and sprinkle a bit of sea salt and bake. Good for you ingredients all blended for a delicious dessert. Chickpeas, rolled oats, creamy peanut butter (I used skippy protein creamy peanut butter), dates, maple syrup, coconut sugar, vanilla, baking powder and soda and dark chocolate chips. These will be on my repeat list for sure. The full recipe may be found at: https://healthygirlkitchen.com/recipes/vegan-chickpea-chocolate-chip-cookies/
Water: This week, I added to flat water, one bottle of sparkling water, lemon, lime and grapefruit with fresh mint. Please be sure to stay properly hydrated all year long, each and every day.
#StrongisBeautiful #SweatisSexy #HealthisHappy
KINDNESS is FREE!
