Beef and Sweet Potato Tagine

This recipe comes from Quinoa 365 – The Everyday Superfood.

It is supposed to be “served on a bed of quinoa” but I am making just the Tagine to put in the fridge for meals for my boys for the week!

Recipe –

• 1 Tbsp Olive Oil                                               
• 1 cup finely chopped onion                           
• 2 tsp minced fresh ginger                              
• 2 lb diced stewing beef                                  
• 2 1/2 cup canned tomatoes, with liquid       
• 1/2 cup water        
• 1 tsp ground cumin    
• 1 tsp ground coriander    
• 1 tsp paprika       
• 1 cinnamon stick          
• 1 1/4 cup peeled and diced sweet potatoes
• 1 1/2 cup pitted, chopped dates

Preheat a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the olive oil and saute the onion until softened and opaque, about 4 minutes. Add the ginger and beef chunks and brown the meat thoroughly.

Add the tomatoes, water, cumin, coriander, paprika and cinnamon stick. Bring to a boil.

 

Add the sweet potatoes and cook uncovered for 12 to 15 minutes, until the sweet potatoes are slightly tender.

 

Reduce the heat and add the chopped dates to the mixture. Continue to simmer uncovered for 5 minutes. And voila!

I think the next time that I make it, I am going to do it in the slow cooker! This would make a great slow cooker recipe. Serve over quinoa, rice, or even with pasta. Enjoy!

 

 

Cauliflower Crust Pizza

I made this recipe from Against All Grain and it turned out amazing! I didn’t follow the toppings as per the post, mine has pesto for the base and then chicken and kale and cheese of course! This has too much cheese, the next time I made it I used a little less. But play around with it – the base of it was what I was looking for. Enjoy!

Meat Lovers Pizza with Cauliflower Crust

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Bodyspace Workouts

If you go to my BodySpace account

http://bodyspace.bodybuilding.com/Slawson82/

you will find my workouts, I track them all on there. It is a very easy to use mobile app. I have been tracking since the beginning of January.

Check it out!!

Bodyspace – the challenge

I have signed myself up for the 100K Transformation Challenge. It started on Monday January 13th and runs until April.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/100k-challenge.html

I figure that I am out of work right now, so why not make this my job!

I am slowly but surely getting into it. I have created a BodySpace account…

http://bodyspace.bodybuilding.com/Slawson82/

And I have 41 friends (and counting) and 12 loyal followers! So, it keeps me motivated to post things and update.

Check it out!!

Coconut Flour Pancakes

I had a craving for pancakes, I don’t have flour in my house only coconut flour right now (all out of almond flour). So, I found this beauty recipe!

Coconut Flour Pancakes (Light and Fluffy)

Here is how mine turned out…

Motivation – What is it? How do you get it?

Well according to Wikipedia – “Motivation is a psychological feature that induces an organism to act towards a desired goal and elicits, controls, and sustains certain goal-directed behaviors. It can be considered a driving force; a psychological one that compels or reinforces an action toward a desired goal. For example, hunger is a motivation that elicits a desire to eat.”

I am in desperate need of this psychological feature!

I am out of my comfort zone right now. I am trying to be a little of everything; stay-at-home mom, wife, gym goer, job seeker and there has to be time for me in there as well.

I am finding that I start out good 6/7 days, get up early hit the gym, come home have a good breakfast but then as soon as my day starts to go sideways I go to food. And then, I think “ah, I will just start again tomorrow!” But tomorrow could be 21lbs+ or 28lbs+ every day I stall or use an excuse I am further away from becoming a happy, healthy me.

Healthy Cookies from Quinoa 365

I made these cookies for my son and they are so good! He is 17 months and I wanted to make sure if he was eating a cookie I knew what was in them!

2/3 cup water
1/3 cup quinoa
1 cup butter, softened (I used 1/2 applesauce, 1/2 butter)
1 1/3 cup packed brown sugar (I used coconut sugar)
2 large eggs
1-1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups whole wheat flour (I used coconut flour – 1/3 cup for every cup of flour and dbl the eggs)
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1-1/4 cup quick-cooking rolled oats
1 cup flaked unsweetened coconut
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1/3 cup flax (ground or whole)
1/3 cup sesame seeds

Cook quinoa, set aside to cool.
Preheat oven to 350 F
Cream butter with the brown sugar in a large bowl. Add the eggs and vanilla and mix thoroughly.
Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt in a medium bowl. Add the oats, cooked quinoa, coconut, sunflower seeds, flax and sesame seeds to the flour mixture and stir until well blended. Combine with the butter mixture and stir until well blended. Roll the dough into 1-1/2in balls. Place 2 inches apart on a baking sheet. Flatten each cookie slightly with the palm of your hand. Bake on the center oven rack for 8 to 10 minutes, until the bottoms are light brown. Allow the cookies to cool completely on the baking sheet. Store the cookies in a sealed container in the fridge for up to 1 week.

I stopped making them because they are so good, I kept stealing them out of the fridge! Bad Momma!

I’m Baaaaaack!

Hmm, let’s see what have I figured out in the last 3 months – not much! I am confused and I am stressed and I have gained 20lbs. Wow! Well, I can say that a lot has happened in the last 3 months.

In September I traveled to Nicaragua for 4 days, 2 of those days were sitting at the Dallas airport. And I find it very difficult to stay on track on the road, let alone airports where you can pretty much eat everything! Then I went to Montreal for 3 days and it was a lot of travel for one day of meetings. And in November I went to Barbados for 10 days – WAIT – this is for work I swear! So, from not thinking I would have to travel at all from September to December, I ended up taking 3 trips with another one booked for December 10+ days.

All, in all, I did not compete in the November Sandra Wickham Fall Classic. And I was OK with that!

But what I didn’t expect was to totally fall off the wagon for two months. I kept trying to start again, every Monday or every other morning. I tried to start back on the food plan but I just couldn’t stick to it?!? I equate it to a cleanse, have you ever done one? Well you only do one, because when you think about doing it again – you DON’T! You know how hard it is, you know what a sacrifice it is and you constantly question, is this worth it?

On top of my crazy work schedule, my busy family life, and trying to find a good balance, I lost my job. Yes, December 2nd I was blindsided – I lost my job of nearly 10 years and to make matters worse it was “with cause” so pay stopped December 2nd and no severance package. I won’t get into the why – let’s just say it is now in the hands of my lawyers. But on top of fighting this, my husband took a new job for a start-up company back in October, quitting his paying job to try something new because well my job was secure right? LOL

It has been a little over 5 weeks with no income and two very stressed out individuals! And light at the end of the tunnel – honestly, not yet.

But I needed to come back to you, whoever you are reading this. I need someone other than my husband, mother, father or friends to talk to. I guess because with you, I feel I can be honest. So, thank you and I hope you welcome me back into your life with open arms!

Get ready this is going to be an interesting ride!