Cabbage “Noodles” Five Spice Stir Fry

I put together this recipe based on what I had in my pantry. As usual, there’s no hard rules how to make a vegetable stir fry dish. Almost anything goes So why cabbage “noodles”? Well it sounds a hella lot cooler than shredded cabbage, don’t you think?

Cabbage “Noodles’ Five Spice Stir Fry
What I used:
1/4 of cabbage head – discard the heart and thinly sliced to resemble “noodles”
6 oz cello mushrooms – sliced
1/2 garlic cloves – minced
2 shallots – minced (I used my Magic Bullet to speed things up)
1 big Italian eggplant – peeled and diced
3 zucchinis – sliced
1 tsp five spice powder
1/2 tsp white pepper powder
1/2 tsp black pepper powder
1 Tbsp Red Boat Fish Sauce (optional but it gives that umami taste to the dish!)
3 Tbsp coconut aminos or wheat free soy sauce (tamari)
Salt to taste (use more if not using any fish sauce)
1 Tbsp avocado oil/butter/lard/ghee – never use olive oil for high heat cooking

Directions:
1. Heat 1 Tbsp oil of your choice (I used avocado oil) in high heat
2. Saute the minced garlic/shallots until fragrant
3. Mix in the chopped mushrooms, stir then put the rest of the ingredients – stirring constantly – no need to add water because mushrooms will yield lots of water
4. Season with pepper, fish sauce, coconut aminos and salt to taste
5. When all veggies are wilted and cooked, remove from the heat and serve with any of your favorite dishes

Enjoy!

 

Blogging Friday

Happy Friday, everyone! Did anyone watch the Royal Wedding? First thing I saw in the morning on the internet was pictures/coverage about the Royal Wedding! I am not too crazy about it, but the couple seems happy and just hope the best for both of them.

Anyway, I am enjoying my super long weekend, but that didn’t stop me for getting excited that today is Friday already. Wait, why am I happy that it’s already Friday? Doesn’t that mean my little “vacation” will be over soon? Yeah it’s true, but what’s the point of having a mini vacation when Hubby K wasn’t around most of the days??? In some ways, I’m happy that I could finally spend time with him.

This morning I did a very short workout and ate this breakfast/post workout snack.

Those are chicken sausages that I got from Costco couple days ago. The ingredient list seems pretty paleo friendly so I decided to give them a try. You can never have too much emergency protein in your fridge

Ingredients: chicken, roasted red pepper, spinach, chicken broth, salt, spices, paprika, celery powder, and granulated garlic in beef collagen casing.

Paired up with my usual loose leaf tea.

Then I preparing another dish for tomorrow and will post the recipe if it turns out yummy. My lunch was super boring and ugly so I won’t bother posting it here. I went to my doctor’s appointment for another check up and that was the time I finally saw some footage from the Royal Wedding. Heesh, even the radio kept advertising it on my way home.

Stopped by Trader Joe’s, grabbed some goodies, came back home and made Bacon Topped Meatloaf for dinner.

I also made Stir Fry Shredded Cabbage with Tomatoes topped with Pan Seared Zucchini Slices, seasoned with Trader Joe’s 21 Seasoning Salute.

Ok, let’s talk something that we ALL could relate to….Blogging!
I know I owe this post as part of my blogiversary. I posted some random facts about me on that post as well, as part of my birthday.

Technically speaking, this blog is my second blog (my first one is the workout blog, which mostly I used to keep track my daily workout). When I first started my workout blog, it was only meant to keep myself dedicated. By recording every single workout that I did, I will always have something to look back and see what I could do to improve.

Then I started to read more blogs and I stumbled on Jessica’s Living in the Kitchen, Gym and Mall and reading her blog inspired me to start a more personal blog.

I’ve been having ups and down with this blog – love it, hate it, love it again, then hate it, not even sure which direction I should go. There were times that I posted some that were a bit too personal and I decided to just take it down and kept it to myself. Then beginning of this year, after I switched to Primal/Paleo, I started to have more ideas what to blog about.

One thing that most bloggers like is getting LOTS of comments. Yup, I’m sure no bloggers who don’t like comments, right??? LeQuan even mentioned it as well in one of her post about blogging. I admit, I used to try so hard to get more people come and read my blog and commenting. It was discouraging whenever I hit publish and the next day I didn’t see any new comments came in. But after blogging for a while, I am not letting it bothers me too much anymore. But I won’t lie, I am still a little envious for other bloggers who always receive lots of comments, no matter how often or how rare they update their blogs.

Recently, I started to develop interest in food photography and been reading various food blog photography tips and tricks. However, since I’m using a free blogging service from WordPress, no matter how hard I tried to enhance the pictures, they always got compressed down by the system. This would be resolved if I am self hosted and have my own domain. But up to this point, I think I’ll stick to free ones. If my blog starts to get more traffic and become more popular (will it be?) I might consider it.

Lastly, one thing that I will keep doing is not posting ANY of my pictures nor any of my friends/families. I always admire other bloggers’ courage to put themselves up on their blog, but it’s just not for me. I prefer to remain a little anonymous and I feel safer that way.

Ok phew, now those are out now, I feel much better! I’ve been meaning to do this blogging post for a while but never got a chance to do it.

So any other blogging stuff that you’d like to share as well?

Have a great weekend!

 

One Pot Recipe: Baked Mixed Vegetables

There are times that I want to spice up my veggies other than steaming them but it has to be convenient, easy and no extra dishes to wash. Enter One Pot recipe: Baked Mixed Vegetables.

Ingredients (you can always come up with your own version)
1 orange colored yam-peeled
1 zucchini squash
2-3 tomatoes
2 carrots
1 Italian eggplant -peeled
1-2 Tbsp avocado oil or your favorite high heat cooking oil
Celery salt
Dried Rosemary
1-1/2 cup homemade broth or water (I used water)
Chopped onions (the amount is up to you)

Directions:
1. Chop all ingredients in similar size (I chopped mine diagonally because I liked it that way )
2. Sprinkle all the seasoning, mix until everything combined. Cover with foil.

3. Preheat oven to 400°F – bake for about 1 hour.
4. Remove the foil and bake for another 15 minutes – stir occasionally.
5. Remove the pot from the oven and let it cool.

Enjoy!

 

One Pain Gone, Another Comes Along

Good news: my stiff neck felt tons better so I could do my workout this morning.

Not so good news: I woke up today with a dry throat – not that severe yet but I felt discomfort, especially swallowing any food with strong spices.

This morning workout was quite something. I had to brave myself doing cartwheel. From what I remember, I haven’t done it before, even when I was a kid.

Picture links to the original source

So my FUGLY cartwheel looked more like this:

Picture links to its original source

Regardless in the end of the whole workout, I was covered in sweat. In fact, I could splash sweat around from my hair – gross I know..sorry.

As usual, refuel with post workout meal: one small baked sweet potato and some chicken meat from Steamed Whole Chicken

For my sore/dry/irritated throat, I packed up some Vitamin C : oranges and lemon slices


I like sour stuff, but not that much that I could eat lemon slices just like that. I dunked these slices into hot water so I could have an instant hot lemonade. Been drinking that for the whole day. The lemon soothes my throat, so good.

Guess what? Hubby K made the dinner today, which was steamed Chinese veggies and stir fry Cabbage with Cauliflower seasoned with Trader Joe’s 21 Seasoning Salute and Coconut Aminos. For the protein, just need to heat up whatever I made yesterday. So convenient to do batch cooking in advance to save time for the next meals

Tonight’s dinner/tomorrow’s lunch

Were you very active when you were a kid?
I considered myself as a timid and quiet kid (according to my mom). Vaguely, I mostly spent my time playing by myself and in grade school, I didn’t really hang out with a group of other kids that much either. I started to be more social towards junior/high school.

Alright, I gotta go to bed early so hopefully this dry/irritated throat will be gone by tomorrow. Blame it to the constant hot/cold weather of Southern California!

 

Curried Chicken Kale

Another quick and easy Paleo meal that can be prepared in less than 30 minutes.

Ingredients:
1 lb chicken meat – cube cut
A bunch of kale – discard stems
1 vine ripe tomato – chopped
1/2 white onion -chopped
Salt & Pepper to taste
Curry Powder
1/4 cup coconut milk
Coconut oil

Directions:
1. Marinate chicken meat with salt, pepper and curry powder – set aside for about 15 minutes
2. Melt 1 tsp coconut oil on medium heat – saute the chopped onions until translucent.
3. Add in the chicken meat

4. When the chicken is half cooked, add in the kale and tomatoes – stir until the kale is wilted

5. Pour in the coconut milk, add more curry powder, salt and pepper to taste – adjust accordingly

Enjoy!

 

A Simple Day

How do you start your first weekend morning?

Loose leaf tea for me

Went grocery shopping and got a new convection oven

It even has rotisserie function – I am excited to finally be able to make a rotisserie chicken

Has a super late breakfast (around 11 am)
Full fat Fage yogurt, half banana and blackberries = YUM!

A simple breakfast followed by a very simple lunch.

Steamed Fish Fillet
Ingredients:
2 wild caught Alaskan Fish Fillet or any fillet
salt and pepper for seasoning
1-2 Tbsp coconut aminos
1 Tbsp avocado oil
Ginger – julienne
2 green onions – julienne (separate the green and white part)

Directions:
1. Lightly rub salt and pepper on the fillet
2. Pour the coconut aminos and avocado oil – topped with ginger and green onions (white parts) – reserved the green part for later


3. Prepare the steamer

4. Steam on high for about 10 minutes
5. Topped with green onions

Paired up with Taiwanese spinach stir fry (3 ingredients: salt, ghee and garlic) – how much simpler can it be?

 

Use-Whatever-You-Have-Veggie Stir Fry

I love stir fry veggies of any kind. Seriously, nothing could really go wrong with stir fry. It’s simple, easy and healthy as well.

Use-Whatever-You-Have-Veggie Stir Fry
Just like the title, feel free to throw in any veggie combo based on what you have in your pantry. Measurements are approximate.
I had:

Diced tomatoes

Soaked shredded cloud fungus

Button mushrooms-diced - plus minced shallots

Half cabbage-shredded (discard the core)

Seasonings:
Salt
White pepper
Sesame oil
Coconut aminos
Coconut flour (to thicken the sauce)

Directions:
1. Heat the skillet in medium high – melt 1-2 tsp ghee
2. Saute the shallots until translucent
3. Mix in the mushroom first, then tomatoes, then the shredded cloud fungus, and lastly the shredded cabbage. The basic rule is cook the hardest veggies first (if you have carrots, put them first etc).
4. Season with salt, pepper and coconut aminos
5. In a small cup, mix 1 tsp of coconut flour with a bit of water (just like how you usually do with corn starch) then pour in the mixture to the veggies

Hmm, apparently I didn’t put enough, but I was too lazy to experiment further because it tasted good already. I was thinking to just mix the coconut flour directly to the sauce, but then I didn’t want to mess the dish.

The sauce was still watery, not thicken as I wanted it to be

Anyway, it’s still good! Simple, fast, and healthy dish in 15 minutes.

 

Sweet Savory Tangy Oatmeal

Oh how I missed oatmeal for my breakfast!! I haven’t had any oatmeal for almost a week and almost drove me crazy! So last night my husband and I made a trip to a market to get some groceries. Last time I bought 1 lb oatmeal case so this time I bought 2 lbs! That should last me for a little while.

After finishing 1 1/2 hour yoga, I had to take a quick shower, quickly cooked the oats and cut the fruits. I washed a bit too much blackberries so what the heck I just dumped those into the oatmeal. Topped with pb and 1/2 banana, I got this Sweet Savory Tangy Oatmeal! Apparently the blackberries weren’t as sweet as the banana and pb, thus gave me this tangy taste.

In the mix: 1/2 cup oats, 1 cup water, 1 tsp pb, some Kashi Cereal, 1/2 banana, couple blackberries. Delicious!

Btw, what happened to the other 1/2 of the banana? I was still a bit hungry so that joined into my belly as well!

The oatmeal didn’t hold my hunger until lunch time unfortunately, but here comes Larabar® Cashew Cookie to my rescue!

Ingredients: Cashews and dates...nothing more, nothing less! Isn't that great?

Taste was amazing! The bar has a lot of cashew chunks to bite on. Even though it was chewy and a bit sweet (from the dates, no added sugar), it didn’t sit heavily in my stomach and hold my hunger perfectly until my lunch time. I’d say I LOVE LARABARS for its simplicity and organic ingredients!

After lunch, I had cherries as my dessert but I didn’t eat my other fruit mix in mid afternoon as I usually do. Apparently, my lunch meal satisfied me for quite a while.

Finished the cherries, but not the other. It'll be for my tomorrow fruit platter

My husband prepared the dinner today because he didn’t have to go to work. Guess what? A table full of veggies with only one plate of meat (baked chicken from yesterday).

I had everything except the white rice.

I’ve been reading Jessica’s blog a bit too much today so I craved for some egg white omelet as well. Whipped up 4 egg whites, topped with organic ketchup = HEAVENLY DINNER!

After dinner, for a dessert I had a cup of plain non fat yogurt, topped with a bit of PB, and some dried apricots. So cool and refreshing having yogurt in this warm breezy So Cal weather.

 

Keep it simple

I wouldn’t consider today as my workout day because I only did X Stretch. Basically, you do all kinds of stretching for a full one hour. It was good though, considering my back and core are sore from yesterday Kenpo. Who would expect that?
Anyway, food wise today was another not too creative stuff. I had one banana after the Stretch, cut out some fruits to bring to work and showered.

I also packed yogurt with cottage cheese for my actual breakfast at work, with Cherrios and some remaining Kashi GoLean Crunch cereal.

I left this at work for my emergency snack in case I felt a bit hungry and need some fixing. Much better than getting chips from vending machine, right?

My husband prepared the dinner again this time. Similar stuff as last night, more broccoli, gai lan (Chinese broccoli), some hard boiled eggs, frozen Korean dumplings, microwaved carrots and edamame. I think I had at least 4-5 eggs (sans yolks), ate with ketchup. Delicious!

I also warmed up some of lentil brown rice I made last night. Topped with ketchup! Perfect!

After dinner, I decided to cook some meat dish for tomorrow. I felt bad for the boys not having any real meat dish for the past 2 days. This time I didn’t forget to defrost the frozen whole chicken before I went to work, so after I finished dinner I cut it up and made this star anise soy sauce chicken. Smells good! Too bad I already ate and packed my lunch (which was very similar to what I had this afternoon)

soy sauce chicken with star anise

I didn’t take a picture but earlier while waiting for the chicken to be cooked, I finished the last remaining low fat yogurt, mixed with a bit of cottage cheese and 1 tsp of peanut butter. This was my first time ate peanut butter in yogurt. It was actually not too bad.

Btw, can’t you believe tomorrow is already Friday and to top it off, it’s a LONG WEEKEND! What kind of plans do you have for long weekend? For me, NOTHING. Yeah, lame but I didn’t have time to plan for anything. Besides I have to bring my car for maintenance service on Memorial Day. Oh well, I might just improvise when the time comes.

 

More oatmeals

After my workout I made another big bow of oatmeal. This time I used soymilk instead of water. Turned out so good! Topped with some Kashi® GoLean® Crunch Cereal and some PB…yummy, savory and sweet together! Perfect after workout breakfast.

still too watery but it's still good

I brought the last piece of whole wheat toast from yesterday, thinking I’d have it for my late morning snacks, but the oatmeal kept me full until lunch time. Perfect! Lunch was just simple. More lentils and 2 baked red potatoes and some baby carrots and apples. I didn’t finish the carrots because my canker sore was very painful this afternoon. This is what I got when I had a bit too much nuts. And usually if I get canker sore, it won’t heal until 2-3 weeks later. OUCH!

And more fruits at late afternoon. I swear it took a lot of efforts to chew these fruits, except for the papaya. My canker sore was hurting really badly today

Dinner was just whatever left in the fridge. I need to do more groceries tomorrow to stack up. Usually Friday is my day looking around different supermarket ads, see what’s on sale and comparing prices around and make a list. That way I won’t overbuy anything that I don’t need. Majority of the time I stick to my shopping list, but once in a while I do slip away from it. For sure I won’t shop around if I’m hungry.

edamame, boiled bok choy, raw celery, baked carrots, 2 hard boiled egg in soy sauce and left over baby carrots from lunch

I finished the edamame, baked carrots and the eggs (minus the yolks). But guess my that wasn’t quite enough so I had a bowl of low fat cottage cheese topped with papaya and a handful of Kashi® GoLean® Crunch cereal. Enjoying this while watching Desperate Housewives Season Finale on abc.com.

Now I’m thinking if I should catch up watching FlashForward as well, but it’s already around 9:17 pm now. Need to get up early for the morning jog tomorrow. Guess FlashForward could wait until tomorrow?

Anyway, happy weekend everyone!