Another delicious meal...Lunch!

I have found my new favorite egg dish...and it includes kale.

I first saw the recipe that was my inspiration on my favorite foodie website...tastespotting.com. Said recipe itself was taken from Martha Stewart and modified, and when I did it myself I modified it in a few more ways.

Martha's original recipe called for kale, and though the recipe I looked at used different greens I was more than happy to use my beloved kale in this recipe. I also omitted several of the spices and cut it down from a 4-egg recipe to a 2-egg recipe.

First wash it up and tear it from the stocks. Martha calls for "slicing it from the stalks in ribbons" but that's for much less aggressive people, I guess.

Pop that kale in a skillet (coated with olive oil) over medium heat. 

This is where it calls for mushrooms, but to my dismay we didn't have any in our fridge and the -30-degree temps deterred me from running over to the grocery store.

Meanwhile get your eggs ready so you can pop them in at a moments notice, when the kale is just reaching perfection.

When the kale gets wilty enough, make little wells and pour the eggs in (or just dump them, as I did). 

Put a lid on the skillet and let the eggs cook while covered - this takes 3-5 minutes (depending on how you prefer your eggs). The lid also helps prevent the splattery olive oil from spraying everywhere.

When it's done as you like it, serve it up! You may want to add pepper and salt as you prefer. I thought a sprinkle of salt tasted really nice with the kale...and I don't think I've ever enjoyed olive oil quite so much as paired with my crispy, favorite dark green veggie.

I set my plate up at the table with the paper and A Year in Provence...but don't be fooled, I inhaled this lunch in -2 minutes because it was so delicious.

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Just prior to my delicious lunch I got back in the groove after my day off by doing my spin workout and 8-minute abs. At first I was really dragging and didn't want to do it - I would much rather be outside running but that's impossible with our temperatures and wind chills right now... As stir crazy as I might be I'd rather make it through the day with all of my fingers and toes. 

Kept things festive with the shoe/sock combo.

Post-workout I had one of my favorite drinks...hot chocolate (made with real cocoa powder). For the first time I used my new dairy alternative, (vanilla) almond milk, to make this concoction and it was even more yummy than I remember with real cow's milk. I did had a dollop of real whipped cream and that did not seem to bother me.

Will definitely be back to hitting the roads tomorrow when it's a balmy 20 degrees. Cannot wait!

Book Review: Flat Water Tuesday (& sub-zero temps).

Yesterday I had to babysit which meant once the kids were in bed...power-reading time! Remember the rowing book Flat Water Tuesday that I mentioned on Saturday? (I just about jumped up and down when I found this in the library wedged on the bottom shelf in the new books section.) Well, I plowed through all 353 pages of that in the four hours I had during babysitting while the kiddos were asleep. It.Was.Good. 

The book talks a lot about rowing in a way that I figure might be difficult to understand if you're not at least quasi-familiar with the sport. However, it flip-flops back and forth between the main character's experience while rowing in high school and his present-day non-rowing life. So, I think it can appeal to all readers - but especially rowers because when has there EVER been a rowing novel out there???

The book was a little dark - some not-so-good things happen and it is very sad. If you're like me and start to feel like all books, movies, and dreams are real, you might want to break it up a little bit so as not to feel heavy-hearted. (Fortunately I opened a new book right after finishing and that cheered me right up.)

After so long of not being on the water (and even longer since I've been able to rowing on a competitive team) reading this made me miss rowing so much! Even the bad parts, like erging all winter and like losing an important race by 1 second after months of hard work.

Definitely, definitely READ THIS if rowing is or was at one point important to you. SO GOOD and it will read quickly even if you aren't a books-fanatic like me :)

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Today was a day off. This was partially because it was between -10 and 3 degrees today and also because it's been about 2.5 weeks (or 3?) since I've done a day off. I also slept in v. late. 

Today's activities included errands, sister time, and practicing packing (i.e. packing everything and unpacking everything) for when I go to Luxembourg in 2 weeks. 

When we did errands it was 0.

I also picked out the cake I'm going to make for my birthday cake. 

For me the most fun in this is actually getting to bake this. I love spending the day cooking :)

Now I am having a movie night with my mom. We're watching "The Way Way Back." It's very good.

I think I'll have to skip the running again tomorrow (-4*) but hopefully some spinning or even better hot yoga if I can snag a ride!

Stay warm!

Sweet potato apple stew and practice being European.

Today I took Live-Laugh-Eat's "Apple Stoup" Recipe and turned it into my own apple stew. We had the perfect weather for it - crazy things are happening out there!

You can refer to her website for the full exact recipe but I will do a quick run-through of it all here :)

First you start by chopping all of the veggies - onion, garlic, celery, carrot, and apple (I know this is a fruit not a veggie). If you have old rotting or mealy apples, this is a good use for them because they get cooked anyways. Dice all those veggies up!

While this was happening, I had some sweet potatoes cooking, which I later mashed into my own puree. So odd-loooking, but so delicious!

Dump all those veggies into a pot to simmer with some vegetable or chicken stock!

Then you get to puree it - the fun part. I wanted my stew to have more of a thick consistency, so I pureed it enough to give it a thick texture but left some apple and veggies chunks in there. Afterwards, I added some quick-cook faro (her recipe calls for barley but we like faro!) and let it simmer for another 15 minutes to let it turn into a nice, thick stew. 

Serve it up! I made some toast out of a nice, thick sourdough for my parents. I skipped the bread and added my beloved kale on the side. The results=super yum. 

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Today after I ran for 30-minutes in the balmy (36-degree) weather, I rehydrated with some... CHOCOLATE ALMOND MILK. Dairy has been rough on my digestive system lately and this is the best replacement I've found YET. Just a tad thinner-seeming than my favorite 1% Chocolate Milk and just as delicious. I hope they have this in Europe, seriously. 

I also tried some coconut water, which I did not love as much.

Early this afternoon I made the 30-minute drive to go visit one of my sweetest friends from college - convenient that she lives so close! 

She took me to Giant Eagle's "Market District" which is a super-fancy grocery store... sort of like Whole Foods!

She specifically wanted me to try the gelato... and even though I JUST mentioned my dairy-aversion above I still caved and tried some. Luckily they serve it in very tiny cups so it was really just a taste - and SO worth it.

I told her I hope I go to some gelato places similar to this when I visit Italy in the next few months! She said this was probably good practice for that :)

I tried some of the sea-salt caramel! 

Wrapping up the evening with some books and some clean-up from the stew. Happy hibernating, everyone!