Sunday, October 19, 2008

Mexican food + more baking

Another excellent day today. I wish every day was a weekend day. Oh well, back to the grind tomorrow. Today was super relaxing, but somehow I still got a lot accomplished.

After breakfast, I did a lot of blog reading. It was really nice to catch up on all random features the bloggers have... it was very relaxing and informative. I did this while finishing up my cup of coffee. Not a bad way to start the day. After a few hours of this, my husband woke up and we decided to relax on the coach and watch some tv. He tried one of my bagels, by the way, and loved them! Yay! He was also originally a bit disappointed by their size (they are small) but they are quite dense and by the time he finished it, he said he was very satisfied. I believe he didn't have anything until lunch which was almost 4 hours later. Not bad!

So we decided to catch up on some "Phantom Gourmet" episodes. And the new episode was all on desserts. After drooling over everything for almost an hour, I grabbed one of my brownies.



It did the trick! :D

And then a few hours later we met my parents for lunch at La Verdad, an authentic mexican restaurant a few minutes from our place. La Verdad is one my absolute favorite mexican restaurants. Their tacos are amazing and rival any tacos in California (I've only been to California once and tried their awesome tacos, but a few people from CA confirmed this too)! I keep forgetting which taco is my favorite, so I always get a mix of 3 different ones. Today I ordered Pollo Pibil (Achiote and sour orange BBQ chicken), Carnitas (Confit pork, cilantro, onions, salsa verde, chicharrone) and Benny Lengua (Braised tongue, Salsa Arbol, ciantro and onion):



I said no onions on anything (I hate onions with a passion!!!!) but the tongue one had some cooked onions in it, so I only had a taste and didn't finish it. Today the chicken taco was the best one. I also had a bite of of the wings appetizer we got for the table and a bite of my mom's chicken mushroom quesadilla. So good! I think I did quite well for eating out!

A few hours later I munched on a small apple (not pictured) and had an Adora calcium chocolate:



These little chocolate disks are great! They taste like the real thing and provide 50% of daily calcium and 25% of Vitamin D. Awesome stuff!

And then for dinner I was craving a yogurt parfait. I think I missed it since I haven't had it in a few days. I went to TJ's yesterday and they were out of the TJ's greek yogurt I always get, so I got the European style yogurt. OMG, this stuff is so good. It tasted exactly like the yogurt I ate for breakfast every morning on my honeymoon in Italy. The first bite brought me right back! It's also twise as cheap as the greek yogurt and almost 4 times cheaper than fage. So yeah, I'm a covert :) I had the usual combo: yogurt, 1/2 banana, a serving of TJ's nutty american trailmix and some kashi golean cereal. Yum!



And one for close-up...



Ooey, gooey yumminess! And then I prepped a bunch of stuff for tomorrow....

I cooked up some turkey burgers for dinner tomorrow (I'm coming home late so I wanted it to be prepared already), made my lunch, and then yup, I baked some more cookies. I had some pumpkin left in the fridge and I didn't want it to go bad. So I baked. Apparently I just can't stop baking this weekend. I used this recipe from Cookie Madness, except I used a little less oil and substituted half of the sugar with splenda (I'm trying to use up the last of the box... I won't be purchasing it again). Here are the crops of the day cooling on a cooling rack:



Gotta give you a close-up of these too...



And of course I couldn't go without tasting them, so I shared one with my husband. Here is my half:



They were pretty yummy but slightly dry. You really need all the oil, heh?

And now it's a little after 10:30pm and I still haven't gone to the gym. I have a lot of energy, so I may still have to swing by there for a quick one.

See you tomorrow!

7 comments:

Kelly said...

Did you use anything in the oil's place? I like to substitute silken tofu or apple sauce. Both add in a lot of moisture.
I'll have to check out La Veradad. I will admit our Mexican food is no where near as good as what is in CA! Around here I really like Tu Y Yo in Somerville and Ole! in Cambridge. Both are quite tasty.

Anonymous said...

those pumpkin cookies look so cute... i want

Caitlin at Healthy Tipping Point said...

YAY thanks for letting me know bloglines were working again! i emailed them so i guess they resolved the issue!

i do make the pan hot (7 out of 10) and a scoop the batter out with a spoon, so that might help it "round."

HangryPants said...

All of your baked goods look great!

Oh, and of course you can add me to your blogroll! That's so sweet. :)

Elina said...

Kelly, I didn't add anything to replace the oil. I was thinking of subbing some with apple sauce but I thought the pumpkin would keep it moist enough. I don't learn with this oil stuff. Next time I'll try it for sure! Your blog is great, btw!

Innz, come to Boston. I'll make you some :)

Thanks Caitlin and Heather!

Anonymous said...

i'm on my way :D
well not exactly but i'll hold you to your word when i come

Elina said...

Deal!