If I Dream It...

So I'm sticking with my #TryItTuesday for now... and boy oh boy did a friend of mine just introduce me to an AMAZING product!! And no, neither of us has any benefit of sharing this product other than knowing how good it is, and how good it is for you :) So we've both been trying to clean our diet up - eat healthier, less processed, and less unknown/chemical/manmade ingredients.... cleaner eating for the most part. I still have my protein powders I love as well as some supplements... but I am noticing a change from my cleaner eating. I crave less sugar, natural sugars taste sweeter, and certain foods just don't taste like they used to. The other day for example, I tried a tootsie pop... I used to love these - heck all things sweet and sugary I tend to love. It's not that anything was wrong with it, or that it was any less that it was before... but my tastebuds have changed that all I could taste was the artificial flavoring... Have you ever watched Cupcake Wars? Totall...

I wish I could explain where the thought for these tilapia tacos came from... but other than having extra cabbage I have no good excuse :) I love cabbage - thing is I buy it with one recipe in mind and then I have to come up with different ways to use it :) So with cabbage in mind and a peach that was starting to near the too ripe point, my version tilapia tacos with peach salsa was born. And wow - was I happy! To explain how much I enjoyed these - I've now had them two days in a row and I'm contemplating having them for dinner tonight :) Gotta finish off that peach salsa after all... Now I will admit, the peach salsa doesn't look the prettiest - but I made it in my mini food processor to avoid chopping everything by hand. But that aside - for my first attempt at peach salsa... I gotta say I like it! I made it spicy as the hubby generally isn't a big fan of fruity flavors for dinner - but it sounded good with tilapia... after the fact I even googled it, not ...

I've had a bag of red quinoa in my pantry for a long time. I originally got it to be part of a recipe that sounded good, but I didn't find all the ingredients at the time. I never really went back out to search and the quinoa just sat in the pantry. So finally I decided to make some and try something with it. And well, I'm going to pat myself on the back a little, this was one experiment I really liked! It came out so good that a few days later, I did made it again :) However, as a result, I honestly didn't take many pictures. Sorry about that. So here's the yummy red quinoa veggie salad... I didn't cook the quinoa exactly as the package said too - but you could and have it totally cold. Trust me, this is one dish that's yummy warm or cold :) I'm going to write it the way I made it though... not necessarily the way it should've been cooked. Red Quinoa Veggie Salad 1/2       Cup     Red Quinoa 1 1/2    Cup     Water 1 1/2 ...

Some people love it, others hate it... I must admit I've never met anyone on the fence about their feelings for it... Tapioca. Personally, I love tapioca pudding. I have to be in the mood for it, but there's something oddly comforting about it. Many people don't like it - the ones I know say it's a textual thing...  I don't know why tapioca got me thinking about the drink Oribitz, but it did... so I'm sharing my trip down memory lane too... Much like some people's take on tapioca pudding, people didn't like the texture. And understandably, it seemed odd to have something semi-solid in a drink. For some reason though, I liked it - it was an odd treat in my book. I loved the fruit flavors and the odd little floating balls in each bottle. It intrigued me because it was so different. Granted, I will admit, when I think of a drink - that wasn't my idea of anything refreshing... it was more of an odd dessert than a drink. Sadly, to me, it didn'...

Well I am a bit late in posting this, but better late than never right? :) So the other day, I was hungry and trying to think of lunch... however what came into mind was a a combo of what a friend had for dinner the other night and a recipe I had seen online... mind you I really had no clue what my friend had - just how it looked... but it looked good... so what was now stuck in my head, was something that would take some time, and would most likely be a great thing to make in the crock-pot... Since I didn't feel like putting the time in now and wanted to do it in the crock-pot - this wasn't a lunch recipe, it was a dinner recipe that I had in my head... since it sounded so good I figured I'd toss it together and then I'd figure out lunch next. I know that seems backwards - but the dinner recipe was now stuck in my head and since I wanted to do it in the crock-pot, it was time to put it together. So I pulled out the crock-pot, and started with some frozen chicken br...

I've made it! 2 whole weeks... no gluten! I can't say I notice much of a difference - granted, it was only 2 weeks. My weight didn't change, however I did lose a half inch on my waist. So while it's not a noticeable difference to me, it looks like it did do something. I've heard some people have had very noticeable changes in the two weeks. For me, I don't think I ate all that bad in the first place but I did have to work on eating fresher and not always going for the quick meal. I am proud that I did it and I did find some very yummy foods and I did learn more about paying attention to the ingredients in my food. It was a learning experience and hopefully it will help me make watching what I'm eating more of a habit. I won't lie - when I was hungry, it was hard not to just stop and grab something real quick. But really, it forced me to find healthier grab and eat foods. Granted, there are plenty of not so healthy gluten free things I could've had ...

Well, sadly I've not been very good at posting my gluten free days any sooner than before. Part of it, other than just being busy, is I've not been making much of anything. Just fruits and veggies that I don't do anything with are rather boring all in all. So they just don't make the cut. And that's really all I've been up to. Day 11 was fruits and veggies at work. A burrito bowl (no tortilla) at lunch from Chipotle as I was running around at lunch and had to have food. And a plain baked potato for dinner since we were still running around. Day 12 was an egg and peach for breakfast - spaced by my drive in so they didn't seem as odd a combo as they sound :) Sadly I skipped lunch as things were just too crazy and I didn't want to be late. I munched at my desk of the few gluten free things I had with me (a few of the apricot coconut and cranberry cherry nut balls) and some dry gluten free cereal. For dinner we went out to a Mexican restaurant that offer...

So I’ve been really bad at posting my gluten free journey lately. Needless to say life has been busy and I’ve not found much time to sit down and write. Sadly this also means I haven’t had much time to mess with photos either – but I do have some to share with you. This journey has been an interesting challenge. I cannot say I’ve noticed a huge physical change – nor felt all that different in all honesty. But I have learned to get more creative and think fresher – which, in the long run is really a better goal. I firmly believe that all things, in moderation, are ok as long as there’s not a allergy or health issue for you. I think it takes a bit to find the right balance and that it depends on your diet and lifestyle. There is no substitute for being healthy – and to me, that means putting good things in your body as well as working out to keep your body in shape. This is not to say that I do not enjoy to indulge in certain foods – I love to eat… I do not eat to live and I do not...