Dinner time!

As usual, I’ve been a terrible blogger, but here is what I had for dinner tonight!

My internet has been down for the past few days, it has been terrible. Honestly, I wouldn’t care if I did not have so much school work that requires blackboard and other methods of reading/ communicating and passing things in online. Plus not getting to check my email is maddening.

So of course I have been taking trips to Starbucks, Gourmet, and other places with free wi-fi. The dilemma is then that I have to buy something (usually coffee), which then makes me have to pee a lot. Having had my purse stolen at a dining establishment before, I am very wary about leaving anything out, so every time I go to the bathroom I take my computer/ purse etc, which can become quite an annoyance.

Plus, the fact that it feels like it is -10* outside certainly is not motivating me to make any extra trips outside than I have to.

Salmon: Marinated in low sodium soy sauce and chili and garlic paste, and lemon juice broiled on low. 

Tofu: Extra firm, marinated in: soy sauce, chili and garlic paste, toasted sesame seed oil, honey. Baked. 

Spinach: Fresh bagged spinach cooked in the microwave.  No seasoning. 

Onion: Stir fried with olive oil and garlic powder. Mixed in with spinach.

Carrots: Whole, unpeeled, well-washed, steamed on the stove top. Seasoned with a little lemon juice.

Brown rice: (an afterthought) I decided maybe a grain would be nice at the last minute so I just threw in a bag of brown Minute Rice.

I actually ate dinner before the rice was done, but everything else was delicious! 

I ate by myself, but Jordan is usually starving when he comes home from work, and if I do not specifically put something out for him, he usually winds up eating cheese and crackers or cereal, so I took all of the work out of it for him and plated the food and everything.

Antioxidants

You know how antioxidants as super foods has been a hot topic now for quite a few years now? Well, do you really even know what an antioxidant is?

An antioxidant is a molecule that can prevents oxidation from occurring in your body. But, that sounds counterintuitive to some, since Oxygen is generally a good thing, why would we want ANTI-oxidants??

Oxidants are also known as “free radicals,” which are molecules with an unpaired electron... which means they are not happy, and they want to steal an electron from one of your happy complete cells! For the sake of it, lets call the electrons the ‘cells identity,’ so stealing an electron is like stealing someones social security card and ruining their credit. Free Radicals are basically like bullies that want to steal your cell’s identity! which would make your cells unhappy :( Also, once the your cell has its identity stolen - it becomes a free radical, and steals an identity from another cell- and the vicious cycle continues.

That is until an antioxidant steps in an saves the day! The antioxidant gives one of its own electrons to the new ‘free radical’ and stops the cycle, so no more cells have their identities stolen.

So why is all of this electron stealing so bad anyway?

Well obviously no one enjoys having their identity stolen, or their credit ruined. Likewise, your cells, and your body as a whole gets pretty angry about this, and it starts an immune reaction and creates inflammation in your body. In general, inflammation in the body is negative, and correlates with a lot of diseases.

For example, in heart disease your macrophages - which are kind of like your pac man cells that go around gobbling things up, are sent out to gobble up your identity-stolen-newly-free-radical cells. If you have a lot of cells that have been oxidized/ identity stolen, the macrophages have a lot to do. They eventually get filled up with confused identity stole cells, so they cannot gobble up any more, and they become a foam cell, and then become plaque in your arteries, which correlates with heart disease.

Thus, If you have antioxidants to STOP the reaction of identity stealing, your Macrophages will not get filled up excessively fast, and this process will not occur. Your cells can keep their own identities and live blissfully happy lives, with their own social security cards.

So, where do you get these antioxidants?? Mostly in your fruits, veggies, whole grains, and healthy sources of fat!

Vitamin C is an antioxidant, which is found in most fruits and many vegetables, such as oranges, strawberries, bell peppers, broccoli and cauliflower.

Vitamin E, another antioxidant, is basically Vitamin C’s compliment (they work as a tag-teaming pair of antioxidants) is found in nuts, peanuts, vegetable oil, spinach, and broccoli.

I am going to posting about a few of my favorite other sources of antioxidants soon- so check back and help protect your cells from identity theft!

Ghreylin would just like to remind you to keep living, and eating, abundantly.

Unfortunately for Ghrey, cork is not a good source of antioxidants.

Satisfying a Sweet Craving

"I have had an absurd craving for maple syrup for a good week now," I confessed.
"Why don't you put it in oatmeal?" Jessica suggested,

... and this is one of the many reasons why I love her: for her brilliant ideas.

I refused to buy or make pancakes or waffles, because they are just one of those foods that I cannot eat in moderation no matter how hard I try. Furthermore, my binge eating has been particularily bad lately. I blame it partially on the change of season and over all depression setting in.

I generally love oatmeal, but lately I haven't had it. I have been on a fruit and yogurt kick for breakfast for quite a while now.


This was partially because during the summer I wanted something cold. Also, now that I have been working pretty much every day its easiest for me to bring something I can pack up and bring along with me. I have had some bad experiences trying to travel with oatmeal, plus it requires heating it up.

I do keep oatmeal in my locker at work though, for a convenient. healthy meal when I do not have time or motivation to bring something with me.

So today, I decided to finally conquer my syrup craving! I cooked up a bowl of oats, then added in pancake syrup and cinnamon.

Success! I got a nice serving of warm, wholesome whole grains in, and I kicked my craving, finally, without even having to bust out the pancakes which I would have inevitably regretted.