Recipes, Amelies French Bakery, and A Pretty Darn Good Incentive

Hello Beautiful People,

I have quite a few things to tell you about.  Hmm...should I start with the last two weeks of recipes or tell you about my comings and goings that last couple of weeks or do I tell you about my exciting incentives coming up?  I think I'll start with my recipes. I'm pretty proud of those. You'll just have to stick around to find out the rest.

I have 4 recipes to tell you about. YAY!

The first is the "Best-Ever Beefless Stew"


Oh it was sooooooo good. I cut up carrots, potatoes, and celery in big chunks. I added peas rosemary, garlic, onions, and tomato paste. I seem to continue to have the portion control issues. I put so much more vegetables in it than it calls for. This recipe called for one can of tomato paste, but I added so many more vegetables that I needed more water so I could have used a larger portion of tomato paste.

I feel like every soup I make is my new favorite, but since this is really a "stew" it definitely gets my Favorite Stew title. Oh it's so yummy.

*****

My second recipe was a little lighter. Technically it's a recipe, but to me it's a jazzed up snack. I made "Chili Lime Popcorn"


I made some air popped popcorn and added lime juice and chili powder.  I forgot to add the fresh cilantro, but I think that is okay. It had quite a lot of flavor. The good part is that it slowed me down. I could eat an entire vat of air popped popcorn on it's own.  This was zesty and fun.

*****

The third recipe was for a Middle Eastern Pita.



I was excited about this one. It was very similar to my Hummus Pita Pizza that I love so much. I was even willing to take on Eggplant again. At first I cooked some garlic, onions, peppers, eggplant, and zucchini together. There was a little cumin added. It smelled amazing. The pita was the problem. I went with a smaller one for portion control, but it made it difficult to stuff. I added roasted red peppers, spinach, and feta. I skipped a sauce to add to it. It was a little messy and looked NOTHING like the picture. I was sad, but I made it work with my leftovers. You guessed it. I made a Hummus pita pizza out of it. I loved the vegetable mix and will definitely do this again. I will just make sure to use a larger pita.



*****

The fourth recipe was a little adventurous for me. I made "Peanut Butter-Cocoa-Banana-Oatmeal".



I love oatmeal, but I love instant oatmeal. I try to limit it because what makes it yummy is the sugar. This recipe called for rolled oats, cocoa powder, bananas, peanut butter, milk, and cinnamon. My first take wasn't this pretty. My peanut butter/milk drizzle was not very drizzly. It was pretty chunky. Also, I felt like it could have used a little more peanut butter for flavor. The oatmeal was cooked with a mashed banana, cocoa powder, and cinnamon. It was better than plain, but it still lacked flavor. That's where the topping came in.

My second round was much more successful. This is definitely going into the rotation. Who doesn't love cocoa in the morning?

*****

So those were my new recipes. Pretty good right? I'm doing really well with it. I may cut it down to 1 new recipe a week though because I'm starting to stress out over it. I want to go back and make previous ones.

Alright so new recipes aren't the only things going on. Last Saturday was nice and busy for me. I was helping with an event at church. The Girl Scouts were hosting "Scout for a Day". They were going to be serving Hot Dogs for lunch so I was just planning on bringing my own. But, I got a message that they would get something for me: Vegetarian Corndogs!  Yay!  I had wanted to try them. They were yummy.



My day didn't end there. Oh no, a spontaneous trip to Amelie's occured. I will not apologize. LoL. This time I had a chai macaroon, that was so amazing I can't stand it, and the spinach feta danish. I talked about it with the Manager. They are hoping to make the danish a regular item. It's not the most popular, but everyone who has it LOVES it.  I hope they do because I LOVED it.


It was hard to leave and so we got back in line. As we were at the register earlier I had noticed a special drink. I had to have it to go.  It was either going to be amazing or bad. It was Amazing. I need it again. But, I have to not nurse it. I missed that it had espresso in it and I couldn't fall asleep that night. 



This week I found the perfect cart for me when I was shopping. I don't always know what aisle to find things in. I love when it's right in front of me. It's also something I will note in the journal that I take with me when I go shopping.



Might I add that it would be a nice thing to put in cookbooks. I know not every grocery store is the same, but they follow a pretty similar pattern. I often call people and ask "what area will I find this in?"  I'm just gonna put that out there in the Universe and let's see what happens.

This week I went to see "Isn't It Romantic". GO SEE IT. First of all it's funny. Second of all, it was so wonderful to see an actress that we can all relate to in the leading romantic role. She is gorgeous. Did I mention that it was so funny? Grab your girls and go!



So anyway, I really like the Forks over Knives magazine. And I had seen a Vegetarian Magazine. So I got it this week. I'll start picking recipes from it soon.


Okay, I'm getting tired. If you only know how long my day was between when I started writing this morning and as I finish it now.  I took a 7 hour/10,000 step break to go with my Meet Up group to feed the Homeless in Charlotte and then run over to Church for the tutoring program with the neighborhood kids. I didn't even eat dinner until I got home a couple hours ago.

I will say that yesterday I had a long travel day, but this time I wasn't driving. So I used my free drink reward on a Venti White Chocolate Mocha with Raspberry. I relaxed and read in the backseat and it was glorious.



*****

Don't worry, I'm not going to leave without sharing my big news:

THE CRUISE IS ON!  We are booked and scheduled for November 30th. Only 278 dayd to go. So there's my incentive. I want to rock it in Jamaica. #HowJennieGotHerGrooveBack

Oh and we got tickets for New Kids on the Block (SQUEEEEEEEEE)


Have a Blessed Evening,

Jennie
xoxo


****Please note****


 If you feel like you are alone on your journey and you just need some encouragement I am here for you! Shoot me an email and I will do my best to check in on you or give you the words of support you need several times a week. The journey is so much easier if you have support.

jhendersonfit@gmail.com 
Check out my Facebook Page for Confessions (there are before and work-in-progress pictures):

http://www.
facebook.com/ConfessionsOfAFormerFatGir

yeah, sorry, I messed up and the "l" is missing....I need an assistant :-)

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