Spicy Fries

The fact of the matter is that people get cravings, and last night, while watching True Blood, I had an inexplicable craving for french fries. Dedicated to healthy eating, I realize that the last thing I should consuming is a plate full of greasy, fried potato slices.

Determined to satiate my craving, I immediately went into the kitchen and cut several potatoes into long, skinny slices. I knew I should probably roast them, so I pulled out two glass pans, sprayed them with oil, and then put in the potatoes. After spraying the potatoes themselves with a little oil, I looked into the spice cabinet to see what I could find.

I blindly mixed together salt and pepper (obviously), basil, white pepper, cayenne pepper, and paprika (yea, my sister and I decided to opt for spicy fries!) and some mixtures designated as "cajun" and "grill spices".

I poured the mixture over the fries and placed both pans in a 425 degree oven for 18 minutes. Time was up, and with a spatula I sifted the fries a little bit to ensure they cooked evenly. I let them bake for another 25 minutes.

The fries were still a little soft, so I set the oven to broil for 4 minutes, and then took them out.

Basically, 47 minutes later I had a plate full of spicy, roasted french fries. They were delicious, SPICY, and healthy =], but trust me when I say that they should NO QUESTION be served with a cold drink, because my mouth was on fire!

Making Decisions

From experience, I would say that one of the greatest factors affecting a healthy lifestyle is decision making. When presented with many options, or not so many options, it becomes important to pick and choose the right foods in order to maintain a health-optimistic approach to eating.

What I mean by this is resonated, for example, by family vacations. Currently my family and I are, well, on vacation. This afternoon we ate at a laid-back, young-crowd-attracting Mexican restaurant. In this day in age, many restaurants offer healthier options to their diners. Today the menu was plentiful with super-sized-twice-fried-coated-in-heavy-sauce meals, but on the back of the menu, in much smaller print, unfortunately, was a list of meals that promoted healthy lifestyles. In these situations, it is key to take advantage of such opportunities.

However, my parents and sisters and I are very much Mexican-food-junkies. So, last night we also enjoyed a Mexican food dinner. This time there were no available health-conscious options. Yet, on the menu, many items could be adjusted to increase their health-appeal. For instance, the typical burrito usually contains about enough calories to provide for an entire day's worth of food. But, I decided to order a grilled chicken burrito on a whole wheat tortilla, with lettuce and tomato instead of rice, and no sour cream. Not only did my meal satisfy my hunger, but it also made me feel good about my dietary choices.

Try it out! Let me know what you think!

Squash Cups

My mom and my sister were watching reality television, following the lives of the countries most elite housewives, when they asked me to bring them something to snack on. My sister is a lightweight rower, and in my opinion it's very important to control not the quantity (because there are certain foods you can eat as much as you want of -- take celery, carrots, lettuce, cucumbers...) but the quality of the snack food.

I remembered seeing a recipe on the Food Network about Zucchini cups, and when I saw the yellow zucchini squash in the fridge I decided to heat up the oven and start cooking. The recipe I saw on T.V. had meat inside the cups, and as a snack, I wanted to the cups to provide my sister [and mom] an oppurtunity to eat guilt-free as they focused on their shows.

So I cut the yellow zucchini into big cylinders, and scooped out the inside to make them into cups. Inside each I layered chopped scallions and vidalia onions. I found a box of grape tomatoes and added a layer of diced tomatoes to each zucchini cup. I put them in the oven for about half an hour, and then I added mozzarela cheese to seal off the top of the cups, and put them back in the oven for 2 minutes.

I carried the plate to my sister, poured myself a glass of water, came back into the family room, and saw an empty plate on the coffee table. BOOYAHH! Another successful and healthy recipe complementing an athletic lifestyle. Try these!! They were phenomenally delicious! ;)

Fingerling Potatoes

After a long practice in the sun, it's nice to sit down, relax, and watch a little T.V. Of course, when watching T.V., it's always very convenient to start snacking, and, after expending so much energy, the body naturally feels the need for some replenishing. So as usual, I walk into the kitchen opening the fridge and the cabinets searching for the perfect snack food. Has anyone else ever opened the fridge, walked away, and then opened the fridge again 40 seconds later hoping some magic snack will appear that wasn't there before? Well finally I decided to take my own advice, and cook something guilt-free to snack on while watching the season finale of Glee.

I found a bag of fingerling potatoes and figured I could season them, roast them, and in no time start snacking away. I mixed some olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, basil, salt and pepper, and some spicy Cajun seasoning I found in the spice cabinet. I poured the mixture over the potatoes and baked them for 30 minutes.

The potatoes came out of the oven and were crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. The seasonings were completely absorbed by the potatoes, and they proved to be a beyond satisfying snack food: all natural ingredients, low in fat, the only real calories coming from the potatoes and the olive oil, and ridiculously delicious. Also, the fingerling potatoes came in different colors, so they not only tasted good and were good for you, but they looked amazing.

Moroccan Roasted Veggies

So I was in the mood to impress my parents, and I set out on tackling a much larger culinary challenge. I found a recipe in a cookbook by Susie Fishbein called "Moroccan Spiced Vegetables." Knowing that my dad has been a big fan of Moroccan flavors before, I decided to give it a shot. All the ingredients were natural, nothing was fried, so I figured it would be a smart and healthy vegetarian option.

The recipe called for zucchini, onion, leeks, and carrots. To make it more colorful I used green and yellow zucchini, red and white onion, and orange and white carrot (or parsnip). Each vegetable was chopped up into pretty large chunks, and then coated in a mixture of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, paprika, garlic, cumin, ginger, and cilantro.

The vegetables literally had to cook for 90 minutes, which feels like FOREVER while the aromas fill your house and make you sooo anxious to just open the oven and inhale the scent.

Absolutely phenomenal. The taste was exotic and totally unique. They were a little soft, so they probably could have baked a little longer, but trust me, they were delicious.

Turns out that my decision to add some color was a good one! My mom swears that her favorite vegetable in the dish was the parsnip! Yay spur-of-the-moment ideas!!!

The Perfect Breakfast - The Egg Sandwich

I am most definitely one of those people who wakes up in the morning without an appetite. The thought of food when I first get out of bed nauseates me. However, I'm pretty health-conscious, and I know that it's important to start your metabolism by eating well within the first hour of getting out of bed.

Several years ago my family purchased a microwave egg-poacher, so as to get all the nutrients from an egg without having to fry it and make it greasy. I started this morning by poaching well an egg (I find that the key to preventing egg-poacher explosions in the microwave is adding a teaspoon of water into it first), and then creating a small incision on the top to carefully remove all the yolk. I have never been a big yolk person -- egg-whites are totally my thing: a lot of protein, and pretty much nothing else. I seasoned the poached egg-white with some salt and pepper, and then I toasted a thin slice of rye bread.

When the bread came out of the microwave, I decided to be a little creative, and I folded the bread in half and inserted my poached egg and a thin slice of american cheese. After another 12 seconds in the microwave, I had created my first egg sandwich. I washed a hand-full of blueberrries and I sliced up a peach to eat along with it.

It honestly tasted incredible, especially knowing that the egg-white, american cheese, and rye bread all summed up to under 150 calories, and the typical fast-food egg sandwich is 400+ calories. A miracle, I know. I suggest you invest in an egg poacher, because creative poaching moments like this prove to be very rewarding =]. Try this at home, you'll love it!!

Zucchini Chips

I made the decision to start simply, so I found a few large zucchinis in the fridge and began to experiment. In the mood for snacking food, I decided it would be best to slice the zucchini thin, and make chips! However, I am a coxswain, and I owe it to my rowers not to fry the chips...I guess... hah

ANYWAY, so I sliced the zucchini thin and dipped each sliced into a bowl of egg-whites. I lightly coated each slice in bread-crumbs, paprika, salt, pepper, and garlic powder, and then baked the slices on each side for a few minutes.

WHA-LAH!!! My first adventure in the kitchen was a success! I made healthy, non-fattening zucchini chips that were crispy, but just thick enough to really exhibit the delicious zucchini quality.

The zucchini chips were so good that when my parents tasted them, they walked away with the bowl...leaving me without my snack... The good news is that my mom had me make them for company when she made dinner for some family friends, and the chips were a huge hit!

They took less than 20 minutes to make, and were not too messy. Also, they ended up DELICIOUS. I suggest to you, reader, that you try them: especially you coxswains out there!

WELCOME

According to dictionary.com, a coxswain is the person who steers a racing shell and is in charge of a ship's crew. The job of a coxswain entails more than just steering, however. We also motivate our crews and coach them on the water. For people unfamiliar with the sport of rowing, racing shells will have several rowers, facing the stern, with a coxswain in the back of the boat, the only man facing forward. Because a coxswain is the only one not rowing and carrying his or her weight, it is important to manage weight, and not sit in the stern with unnecessary "poundage" and weigh down the crew. In a sport where race results are measured three decimal places passed the second, it is important for a coxswain to not weigh excessively much.

After over three years of coxswaining, I've struggled and watched other coxswains struggle with weight, trying diets and physical activity. While there is no immediate problem with physical activity, dieting can cause serious problems and malnutrition.

My whole life I have been kicked out of the kitchen by my family, as they joke that I am incapable of cooking. Well, I have pushed my way back into the kitchen, and I have started a journey to creating meals that are DELICIOUS, yet are good for your system, easy to make, and are no threat to weight-gain.

WELCOME and ENJOY