Asian salmon and brocolli

So, David is away this week. He was called back to England on Monday to cover the severe flooding over there. (I should probably give some background info on him. He works for ITN a British news company. They have their US office in DC and he got that job 4 years ago so we have both been here since then.)

I do miss him when he's gone but on the upside it gives me free reign to do cook anything - as he is the strict vegetarian of the household.

He left on Monday and I went straight to the store to buy some salmon. I love salmon and its great for you as its packed full of Omega-3 fatty acids. I try to buy Wild Alaskan salmon.

This is my favorite way to cook salmon. It is gorgeous. Its a recipe from Barefoot Contessa on the food network.

Here is the link. Asian Grilled Salmon

I don't have a grill so I just fry it.

I usually have it with some sauteed swiss chard but this time I did some brocolli and brown rice. I steamed the brocolli in a colander over the pot of rice while it was cooking. I made a dressing out of the zest and juice of a lime, olive oil, chopped rosemary and some pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds. It was really tasty.

My period came today. Its quite a bad one - lots of cramps. I know I can't say for certain but it makes me wonder if it's because I have been quite lapse this month with the diet. I have been very good this week but bring on the Quinoa!

Signs

Oh dear, I have been a terrible role model the last weekend. I had a fantastic time but my poor system must be in turmoil. I think a valve popped somewhere in my brain. After almost a year of doing this diet something inside me said, "come on, live a little!"

It was my husbands birthday weekend. It was never going to be a sober affair but I decided just to let go and make up for it with lots of healthy food this week.

We started off with drinks on our roof top so I made some pimms and lemonade (for those of you who want this recipe I will provide as it is delicious, but I won't post as I don't want to encourage alcohol consumption to all my fellow endo suffers). Then we went for dinner - there was a group of about 12 of us. The thing about summer is I don't really drink wine. I kind of go off it a little bit, too heavy or something. I don't drink spirits as such, things like vodka tonic, gin and tonic - too strong - so I wanted something in between. I went for a mai thai, really its the only cocktail that I know and in absence of a menu its easy to order. So, I had a couple of them. I did have asian rice noodles to eat with tofu (no meat) so felt somewhat virtuous. Then we went to another bar and of course I didn't really care at this point, so ordered another mai thai, even though getting quite sick of them by now. The funny thing was that when it came it was a frozen margharita - the waitress said the bartender had had to look up the recipe! Not sure where he looked it up from but it wasn't a very good book he had. It really should have been a sign. But no, I persevered to try to get my Mai Thai. What came the second time was a vodka and orange cordial thing. I drank about half of it. Needless to say I should not have done that. I have not drank so much in a long long time. It was great fun but I was suffering yesterday. Not good. We had made plans to go to the vineyards of Virginia for a day of wine tasting. I was the designated driver anyway so didn't have to partake, thank goodness. It was a very badly disorganised day on my part as I had no food prepared. Someone else bought cheese and crackers so I had that because I was so hungry by lunchtime but they were obviously wheat crackers so another strike out!
That was all we had to eat the whole day. Then, when I should have been thinking about going home to a nice brown rice dish or something my head just kept telling me I wanted pizza. Then David asked me what I wanted for dinner. I said - 'I really want pizza but I know I'm not supposed to'. He is normally very good about supporting what I can and can't eat but he really, really wanted pizza too so he didn't put up much of an argument. All my willpower failed and we ordered from Dominos. The pizza took an hour and a half to turn up after 2 calls to the shop. It should have been another sign, but I was really hungry at that point. I had about 4 slices of pizza and went to bed feeling very annoyed with myself but also strangely satisfied.

On another matter, I am going for an IVF consult on friday. This will be our second attempt. I am trying a new clinic this time. I really liked my previous RE but the clinic that he uses - not so much. Its a shame. This new clinic is part of a hospital so we'll see, I really like the doctor there too. Of course it all depends on the finances too. I haven't done the sums yet and it will depend what protocol they want to use and how much the drugs will be, etc. I did not respond well the last time so the drugs this time are likely to be a higer dose therefore more expensive.
I have really enjoyed the last few months which has basically been a fertility holiday and am reluctant to start the whole process again but I know if we don't try I'll always wonder 'what if'?

Food for a day out

It has unfortuantely been a fairly unexciting food week. This week I have decided however to not cook any Quinoa as I think I have been overdosing on the stuff and am totally fed up with it.

I took my first foray into rock climbing on saturday. It had been a desire of mine to try it for a while so I enrolled in an outdoor one day course. The less said about it the better as we had a pretty bad instructor who seemed to think we were not beginners but accomplished Edmund Hillary sorts. A few tears were shed, and life flashed before me at certain points but the upshot of it is I have been offered a free day to try again with a proper instructor.


Anyway, we were going to be out all day so I wondered what to pack for food. I decided on - yes you guessed it.....Quinoa salad! I cooked it the night before. Along with that took some Boomi bars - they are gluten free and very, very tasty.

Since then it has been normal stuff: wheat free pasta, veggy curry, and chimichangas made with wheat free tortillas. I was dubious about trying the tortillas again but David cooked them this time and did a fantastic job. They almost tasted like the real thing. We make our chimichangas by putting some hummous, chilli sauce and cheese into the middle of the tortilla, then folding it into a square shape and shallow frying them until golden on both sides. It's actually a recipe from Rosamunda Richardson. It's an old book that I have and I can't find it anywhere online to give the link.

I have also had a few lunch time disasters this week. I made some polenta one day and mixed it with some salad ingredients: tomatoes, scallions, olives - not a wise choice. The texture was horrible. I much prefer firm polenta. You can buy it already firm or just make a batch as normal and them roll it up into a log shape in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm. Then you can slice it up and fry it, and top with anything - tomato sauce that you would make for pasta is good on polenta.

Mochi

I have discovered a great thing today. Mochi. I keep saying it in my head. "Mochi Mochi Mochi". Where have you been all my life, oh lovely gluten free thing that you are.
So, what is this wonder food? The best thing is to check it out on www.grainaissance.com/mochi.html for all the information.

I foresee a world of exciting possibilities with this food. I bought the sweet one by mistake and decided to try to cook it just to see what it was like. You cut the slab into about 1 inch pieces and bake. They puff up like little profiteroles and have an amazing texture when you bite into them. I had many ideas for these little puff balls. They are not that sweet on their own but imagine with a drizzle of maple syrup or honey and some dairy free ice cream or yoghurt. Oh yes!

My trip to the store this morning was prompted by me being very hungry and opening the fridge to find nothing remotely edible for lunch. There were no leftovers as we ate out last night with friends before going to see the new Harry Potter. We had asian food which I love and is so easy for an endo diet - lots of rice and not a sandwich or bowl of pasta in sight (just beware of egg noodles - I usually go for the rice noodle dishes).

Anyway for lunch I decided on a baked potato with something - didn't know what. However every potato in the organic shop was seeded - not the most appetizing - should have probably mentioned it to them, but just abandoned idea of baked potato. Ended up with mochi and a tub of hummous. Quite what I thought I could do with that I've no idea. In the end I decided on another Quinoa salad with some cucumber and cilantro that were already in the fridge so. While the quinoa was cooking I added some frozen sweetcorn. Dressing of lemon juice, olive oil and mustard. Be careful with mustard - depending on how committed you are about the wheat free as it does contain some. Anyway the dish was actually quite tasty and I even have leftovers.

Salads for summer

For me summer is all about messing around with salads and create some new things. I am feeling very virtuous this week as my diet has been a picture of health since last week when we ate out and drank far too much for my now delicate constitution. We have eaten in every night since then - mainly variations on a theme. Quinoa salads, rice salads.

There was a gorgeous chickpea salad one night from a British book I had called Good Food Magazine : 101 Veggie Dishes. I suggest buying this book if you can get hold of it - its not expensive and is full of fantastic things.

Indian Chickpea (Garbanzo bean) salad

6 tbsp olive oil
3 garlic cloves
2 red chillies, seeded and sliced
4tsp cumin seeds, lightly crushed
2 x 400g cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
3 tomatoes, halved, seeded and diced
zest and juice of a lemon

For the salad:
25g/1oz cilantro
half a cucumber cut in batons
1 medium red onion, sliced
4oz/100g baby spinach leaves

1) Fry the garlic, chillies, and cumin in 5 tbsp of the oil over a medium heat for 10 minutes taking care not to burn the garlic. Add chickpeas and heat through for 5 minutes.

2) Add tomatoes, lemon zest and juice. Season and set aside. Toss together the salad ingredients and divide between serving plates. Spoon chickpea over the top.

Serves 4.

This is not the exact recipe as it says to have it with naan bread too but obviously I left that part out and I layered some quinoa on top of the salad before spooning on the chickpeas.

Salads with a grain as a base are great for lunch the next day too, you just need to make a little extra. I always find it hard to know what to have for lunch as sandwiches are now off the menu.
Mostly I try to eat leftovers but if that is not an option, I have some of the following things:
- rice cakes with cheese and chutney
- I make a batch of say fritters, lentil burgers, that kind of thing and freeze. You can pull them out of the freezer in the morning and take to work with a salad.
- salads
- if it has to be fast food, chipotle does a great Vegetarian Burrito Bol - all the elements of a burrito without the wrap, also great because you can choose to leave out the sour cream and cheese!

My fantastic new blender arrived on Monday so smoothies are back on. Yeah! Stopped at the organic shop on the way home today to stock up on fruit. I now have a fridge full of Strawberries, blueberries, rasberries. I also got some bananas and a pineapple. Plenty for smoothies every day!

Smoothies!

My blender broke the other day, so I have not had any smoothies for a week. However, while waiting for the new one to arrive from ebay I got withdrawl symptoms and some about to go off fruit so I broke out the old hand blender which is not as good but does the job.
I have created a gorgeous smoothie with said implement.
Ingredients:
half a block of frozen acai (I found this in my local organic shop)
some blueberries
4 large strawberries
splash of OJ
splash of ice water.

Delish! I haven't named it yet, so any suggestions welcome.

Have also made carrot soup today with the remainder of a large bag of carrots which is also about to go off. I put half a large onion, one garlic clove sliced, olive oil and saute for about 5 mins. Add chopped carrots and a pint of stock. Simmer until vegetables are tender enough to be blended easily.

Birthdays!

Its been a great week so far for birthdays. It is my birthday week so some of the rules are going out the window, but if you can't break a rule on your birthday when can you? Went out to Georgia Browns on Tuesday for a friends birthday. This is a great DC restaurant featuring southern style food. I had the vegetarian sampler, which was rice and beans, succotash, fried green tomatoes. Okay, I know they're fried in batter but it was a birthday party. Food was really tasty. Had a glass or two of wine but what the hell.
Yesterday we went to a 4th July BBQ. I ate loads of salad and a couple of chicken sausages, without the bun, I just can't resist BBQ food. Then loads of fresh fruit for desert. Yummy. However, it was all I could do to resist the cake and cookies, but I did.

The local organic shop has just started selling these coconut covered dates. Bought some yesterday and they are really tasty. Great to satisfy that sweet craving.

Then yesterday was my birthday! Went to Ardeo in Cleveland Park. Lovely meal. There was nothing veggy that was wheat-free so I went for tuna with a lentil salad and leeks. Tasty.
I did succumb to panna cotta for dessert and half a bottle of wine but it was my birthday - whats a girl supposed to do?!

Today's lunch was Quinoa salad. I am trying to make up for a few bad days with something perfectly healthy. I never know what to do with Quinoa really and haven't found a really great recipe for it yet so I normally make it up. Todays was a dressing of olive oil, red wine vinegar and dijon mustard. I whisked all this together in the bottom of a salad bowl. Then added baby spinach leaves, cherry tomatoes, red onion, feta cheese. Then added the cooked quinoa and mixed it all together. It was really tasty. I used 1/2 cup of quinoa and that was plenty for lunch.

Weekend Food

I always find the weekends particulary hard. Its difficult to think of what to eat for a quick Saturday lunch that's not a sandwich. We eat out a lot at weekends and its often a challenge. This weekend, however, we stayed in for dinner on friday and I made Greek style lentil burgers. I adapted the recipe from one found in 'Vegetarian Times' magazine. I used oats, baked in the oven for about 10 minutes instead of breadcrumbs. The burgers were really tasty and substantial enough to not miss having a bun with them. Had a radish and fennel salad to go with it, a la Jamie Oliver (food network website). Really tasty, and crunchy. Saturday lunch we had some of the leftover burgers. Then went to a BBQ saturday night. They served some lamb and lots of salad and veggies which was great. As I am not a 100% vegetarian, I did eat some lamb because it looked so tasty I couldn't resist, and veggy burgers turned out slightly cardboard like and were a lot less appetizing. I am still searching for a veggy burger or sausage which cooks well on a BBQ.

I have started making my own granola. Its dead easy. Oats, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, ground flax seeds, ground nuts. Bake it all in the oven till golden - about 15 minutes. Then warm up some maple syrup about 30 secs till it takes on a more runny texture. Pour it into the oat mixture. Then into a container and refrigerate. I add some raisins at this stage too. Its really tasty. The only problem with this is that you kind of have to have milk with it and I don't like to have that much dairy, so this is not really an everyday breakfast for me.

My usual breakfast consists of oatmeal - half a cup of oatmeal to one cup of liquid. The liquid I use is mostly water with a splash of milk - I find it quite bitter with just water. I add maple syrup, some ground flax seeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and blueberries if I have them.
This is great in the fall and winter but not so appealing in the heat and humidity of a DC summer. So, in the summer what you can do is soak the oats overnight in apple or orange juice then top with whatever you like in the morning.