nutritious junk

Now that i am back at my culinary school's main campus this term, this leaves me easy access to good old TJ's.  As i was stocking up on my eggs (because have you noticed how EXPENSIVE eggs are recently! even at costco! most sell for 3.99 a dozen where at TJ's they sell for only 1.49!), i noticed the lovely new vanilla marshmallows! now, ok, i am not touting this as health food by anymeans, its obviously just sugar and eggwhites and each two have 70 calories, no fat, less than 1g protein, and 19g carbs and sugar.  These are nutritionally void, but can i just say how precious these are!

I love berries, let me just get that out there. I prefer them to most candy, I love all berries, stawberries, blueberries, raspberries, boysenberries, shnozberries (you know, from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory). I know that its very trendy to make berry-inspired dressings as well.

I am not a water person, in general. I know its healthy to drink good ol fashioned water but i was never a big chugger unless under extreme heat and sports.  Mostly because at summer camp, we needed to drink two glasses (big glasses too!) before we were allowed seconds at meals, and if we wanted snacks, they mades us to the same (thats what you get for going to summer camp in the california desert). So when flavored waters started coming, they were a nice stepping stone, for me anyhow.

for those who dont read my culinary school blog, i am currently in an international culinary class this term where we do a bunch od dishes from different countries every day. Yesterday was Morocco and we prepared a lovely chicken tagine. Tagine is a classic Moroccan dish that takes its name from the uniquely shaped vessel; its basically a conical lid is designed to trap juices as they evaporate, causing them to condense and trickle back into the stew, keeping it moist and tender.

happy memorial day to the US peeps (i looked at my stats and apparently people in africa read this site, thats so cool!).  anyhow, lately lots of new trends and news has been bugging me and i feel the urge to let them out, here they are...

My lovely friend Mizfit recently wrote an open letter to hungry girl about touting adults eating baby food and hungry-girl’s yahoo blog has been getting a lot of flak for trying to push products she gets promotional moolah from. So to be fair, I will ALWAYS let you guys know when a company has approached me with free loot so even if you suspect I am being to easy on a product, you’ll know in the back of your mind I got it for free. Ok now onto the review…

Mmmm bread. I love bread, I could never do atkins, although I love most proteins, but still, giving up bread is the death of me.  Bread is strange, it can be a healthful bounty or whole grain goodness or a refined, dense caloric catastrophe (didja know the average starbucks bagel is about 500 calories, without the cream cheese and shmear of your choice).  By all means, understand I like GOOD bread, that wonder crap is not real bread.

I just started my new term in culinary school and its an international cuisine class. Everyday we do about three specialty dishes from different countries.  Today we are doing provincial french dishes and i get to do a bouillabaisse (a fish stew, of sorts). Anyhow, this can actullly be super easy, healthy, and crowd pleasing. so here's a lightened up version, enjoy!

I think its funny how my gym sells vitamin water and dorritos.

leslie (our dear friend from the weighting game) contacted me about her newfound obsession with fiber one bars. Rightfully so, they are indeed delicious and fiber full, but i've read many people concerned about the hydrogenated oil and hfcs that's in them. Hmm, so why not make your own! we made florentine bars in my baking II class and its fairly simple to adapt it to any filling you desire. So heres a DYI for your own fiber one bar (plus, no wrapper! eco friendly)

(btw, you can sub any cereal, i like kashi go lean, even plain puffed corn!)