Birthday, bananas,burgers and beets

   Yesterday was James' birthday. I started the day early, early making banana pancakes with fresh berries and agave nectar and smoky tempeh strips:

    After a super delicious breakfast and dropping E off at school we ran some errands (including taking his birthday shoes back to the Vans store), then went to a burger place in Denver called Park Burger (http://parkburger.com/). Friggin' awesome. I had the turkey burger with bacon and guacamole... One of the best burgers I've ever had. James had the buffalo burger with brie and slices jalapenos which he said was also pretty killer. We split a side of sweet potato fries too, which were perfectly crispy and salty. After lunch we headed downtown to see a daytime showing of Sucker Punch which was a pretty good flick, then headed home to pick up E from school and start on the birthday cake.

    So this cake we made (which came out really good), I saw on an episode of Christina Cooks on PBS. This woman has amazing recipes all of which are wholesome and great for you, but an even more amazing story. She was diagnosed with terminal leukemia at the age of 26, she met with a whole foods advocate, radically changed her diet and lifestyle and overcame her diagnosis. This particular recipe was a chocolate red velvet cake, instead of using food coloring like most recipes would call for to get that rich red color, she used beets.
(you can find her recipe and read her story here:
http://www.christinacooks.com/_webapp_3121462/Chocolate_Red_Velvet_Cake)

  

 It came out really good. There is a definite interesting flavor from the beets, but it all blended together super nice. I added vanilla gelato in between the two layers and drizzled the chocolate icing (which is included in her recipe) all over the top. It was definitely a cake you don't have to feel bad about enjoying :)


    Also last night I was able to watch the premier of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution which I missed Tuesday night because I was in class. Again I want to say how amazing this man is for what he is trying to do for the youth and future of America. I can not believe that he would be denied access to public schools in California. It is an absolute shame that his help wouldn't be accepted, and probably for no other reason than that the school board is ashamed of what they are feeding their kids, they should be even more ashamed of not allowing change to happen. The information he presented about beef and "pink sludge" I believe he called it was sickening. I can not wait to see how much progress he is able to make this year.


Birthday, bananas, burgers and beets :)
Valley

Spring Planting

     So E is so excited to start planting a garden this year, we already picked up all of our seed packs from the store and put down the little wire fencing stuff around where we are going to plant, but I think it's still too early for anything to survive the cold nights.. Plus just when you think the weather is starting to get nice here it seems to snow soooo :). Anyway, to help curb her excitement in the meantime we planted a strawberry plant in a big terra cotta pot we can bring in at night:

     The little guy looks so lonely in the big pot, hopefully it will take root in its new home and turn into a pretty (producing) plant.. How great would it be for her to pick fresh berries this summer while she's playing outside- all those great nutrients :).
     Tonight's dinner was a little lazy, but really good...MorningStar Farms spicy black bean burgers (just one of their veggie burgers for E) on whole wheat buns and corn on the cob:

       On a side note, I'm super excited about the premier of Jamie Oliver's second season of Food Revolution starting next week! He also has a link on his food revolution website to send an email to the USDA regarding better food in school lunches, which you can sign up for too here:

http://www.jamieoliver.com/us/foundation/jamies-food-revolution/usda

Here's to blossoming strawberry plants and food revolutions ♥

Valley

Spring Break and Spring Cleaning

So spring break had me cleaning out my house and kitchen. I decided to trash the microwave- sure it's more convenient but, it isn't really a necessity, plus, since the space where it was was free-d, I was able to fill it with these beautiful fresh herbs :). Not only are they super pretty to look at, but they smell amazing, like a natural potpourri. Also, an unanticipated bonus, Esther couldn't be more excited about popping popcorn on the stove in our glass lid pot where she can see each kernal pop. She finds it extremely entertaining :)

This week I made these super yummy personal size pizzas:



 I used pre-packaged whole wheat pizza crusts we found at Sunflower Market, pesto, mozzarella flavored rice shreds, tomato and artichoke. They came out really great and E had tons of fun 'decorating' her own pizza, she threw sliced black olives on hers and made a smiley face :).

Although yesterday was unseasonably warm (we saw record breaking high temps) and we slept with the windows opened for the first time this year (which is always refreshing), today we woke up to dropping temps and now- snow :(. So E and I made a trip to the local Ace hardware and picked up all of our seed packets for the garden we're going to plant as the temperatures normalize. We got lots of veggie seeds, and we're very excited to see if they take :).