Missy Maintains » banana

The Perfect Monday

MissyMaintains — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 11:35:12 +0000

Hope everyone had a nice week! Mine was super busy but also very fun. Let’s recap back to Monday night…

I originally had plans with Jackie, my roommate, to meet at home after work and go for an outdoor run. As I was about to leave work, I saw a text from her asking if I wanted to meet her and her friend for a pitcher of beer. Of course my answer was, “YES!” I had already gone to two gym classes that morning so missing my run was no big deal. The weather was also perfect for a nice, cold beer! We met at a Japanese restaurant called Oh! Taisho on St. Marks Place.

As soon as I arrived, there was already a pitcher of Sapporo and a ton of food waiting for me. This made me very happy.

Jackie handed me a plate with a bunch of different appetizers on a stick.

The Yakitori plate included bacon wrapped asparagus (yum!), chicken, pork, and squid. I also saw a big bowl of fries with a cheese dip sitting on the table. I asked Jackie if we were really at a Japanese restaurant! I was expecting to see your typical sushi and edamame! They do serve all of that at Oh! Taisho but also serve totally different Japanese foods that I’ve never tried before!

The fries and meats on a stick were both very delicious. I also tried out some fried shrimp over cabbage. The shrimp was also awesome, although I don’t think I’ve ever disliked a fried food before! I really liked that they were cooking all of the food right in front of us. It is always good to know that no one is spitting on your food. The chefs were very entertaining and kept yelling fun things out every time they made a new dish.

We decided to order some more food because everything on the menu sounded amazing.

Next up, a heart attack on a stick!

I don’t think there is anything better in this world than bacon wrapped shitake mushroom. Wow. That is all. I would have been satisfied with just that but Jackie insisted that we order two more dishes. I insisted that we order another pitcher with hot sake! Very nice compromise!

After taking a few sake bombs, we ordered a salmon-noodle type dish.

This was so flavorful! It was like a fancy Ramen Noodles bowl with an awesome sauce and fresh salmon.

We also tried a soup with tofu, mushrooms, and scallion.

I can’t figure out the name of it but it was also really good!

I am always open to trying new foods and really enjoyed every dish that we ordered. The prices at Oh! Taisho are very reasonable and the service was great.

The night did not end there. St. Marks Place is known for having a ton of piercing and tattoo shops. Jackie’s friend Fan never had her ears pierced before so we decided that she needed to do it that night! We found a place that only charged $7.00 for a piercing. Normally we would have been skeptical but we had a ton of beer and sake in our system so we just went with it.

I decided that I wanted one too! Piercing number ten- done! I got a random spot in my right cartlidge. OW! Good thing I was tipsy!

Fan and I both agreed that we needed some fro-yo to make ourselves feel better. We headed to Red Mango and made our own yummy concoctions.

I made Dark Chocolate and Banana fro-yo topped with Oreos.

And that my friends, is how to spend a Monday night. Have a nice weekend!

What is the most unique food you’ve ever tried?

Coconut Peanut Butter Giveaway!

MissyMaintains — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:41:24 +0000

A few weeks ago I reviewed Tropical Traditions Coconut Oil and have been cooking with it and using it on my skin ever since! Tropical Traditions recently offered to send me another product to try out and giveaway! I chose the Organic Coconut Peanut Butter.

About (source):

Tropical Traditions Organic Coconut Peanut Butter is made from organic peanuts and organic coconut. Two ingredients: nothing else! No fillers, no binders, no sweeteners, and no preservatives. The peanuts are 100% organic Valencia peanuts grown organically by family farmers in New Mexico and Texas. Grown in the dry climate of the southwestern United States, these peanuts are certified organic and free from aflatoxins. The dried coconut is certified organic coconut meat from the Philippines from coconuts that are grown with no fertilizers or pesticides. This premium dried coconut contains no additives or preservatives, and is not sweetened. Unlike most dried coconut on the market, our dried coconut products are nottreated with sulfites to keep them white. Together, these premium organic roasted peanuts and the premium organic dried coconut are ground together to make a delicious and nutritious spread!

I love that this peanut butter only contains 2 ingredients (organic peanut and organic coconut). It only contains 32 calories per teaspoon!

I’ve used this peanut butter in my oatmeal and to make banana sandwiches.

I am not usually a huge fan of coconut but I really enjoyed this. It has a very creamy texture and a slightly sweet taste. If I knew how to bake, I would use it to make peanut buttter coconut cookies or brownies! The website also has recipes for Coconut Peanut Butter Meltaways, Sweet Potato Peanut Butter Coconut Soup, Inside Out Coconut Peanut Butter Cups, and more!

Coconut Peanut Butter Meltaways

(Prepared by Sarah Shilhavy, Photos by Jeremiah Shilhavy)

Giveaway!

Want to win your own jar of Tropical Traditions Coconut Peanut Butter? Here’s how:

1) Leave me a comment telling me how you would use the peanut butter.

2) Subscribe to the Tropical Traditions Email Sales Newsletter

3) Tweet this giveaway. “Win @troptraditions Coconut Peanut Butter from @MissyMaintains! Enter here: http://bit.ly/9GyAdS”

I will choose a winner this Friday, August 27th. Good Luck!

*This giveaway is open to US and Canada residents only.
* Disclaimer: Tropical Traditions provided me with a free sample of this product to review, and I was under no obligation to review it if I so chose. Nor was I under any obligation to write a positive review or sponsor a product giveaway in return for the free product.
*Note for Canadian bloggers: Tropical Traditions is not responsible for customs or duties that Canada may charge if you decide to participate in this Tropical Traditions sponsored blog giveaway.

Bollywood Boogie Winner and Exciting Monday Announcement!

MissyMaintains — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 15:12:52 +0000

Happy Friday! It is time to announce the winner of the Bollywood Boogie Workout DVD!

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random integers, generated with replacement:

Timestamp: 2010-08-20 14:12:03 UTC

3- Erin from A Girl and Her Mutt! Congrats Erin! Please send me an email with your address and I will ship out your DVD!

Week in Review

Let’s start with some food talk. I am happy to say that I brought both breakfast and lunch every day this week! I only ate dinner at home once but a girl’s gotta start somewhere right? It’s been months since I’ve had oatmeal at work but it really is the most affordable breakfast. I forgot how much I missed it!

I added banana, Navita’s Naturals Trail Mix, and Justin’s Chocolate Hazelnut Butter. Thank you to Amie for sending me so many packets of this stuff! Amazing!

For lunch I brought turkey sandwiches, veggie burger wraps, and tuna in a pita! I also always brought some popchips to munch on.

Dinner included a wonderful Whole Foods salad:

Of course I went to Friday’s one night for cheap drinks! I got a usual salad for dinner so that I could enjoy this:

That thing is an entire day’s worth of calories but sometimes a dessert like that is just necessary. I had about half of it and enjoyed every single bite. I don’t know how people can eat one bite of a real dessert and feel satisfied. If something is good, I’m not stopping after one taste! Props to anyone who can have a warm, soft cookie topped with ice cream, Oreo’s, hot fudge, and whipped cream and feel satisfied after a spoonful! That’s just not me. You only live once!

As far as exericse goes, I went to intenSati Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and today! I took a nice rest day on Wednesday since I hadn’t taken one in about 10 days! I told you I love Equinox. Today’s class was amazing. Patricia (the creator) is due to have her baby in 2 weeks and was there at 6:30 am to sub for Natalia! She was still able to do so many of the dance movements!! Love it!

Monday Announcement!

In other news, I have a really exciting Monday coming up! In the morning I am going to be filmed doing intenSati! Natalia (the teacher I mentioned above) is a Lululemon Ambassador and will be the star of their promotional musical! They will be filming her teaching intenSati so I get to be one of 10 people in the background! I also get this free Lululemon tank out of it!

After that I will be heading to Philly for the Phillies game! My mom got invited to do Zumba with the Philly Phanatic at the game that night!! My mom got to choose a few Zumba instructors to dance with her. I am going to learn the routine and dance too! Scary but exciting! I just want to meet Chase Utley and Cole Hamel (maybe sneak them kisses too). I will try to get some nice pictures and video!

1) Can you eat one bite of a dessert and feel satisfied?
2) What baseball player would you love to kiss?

Have a nice weekend!

Pizza and Beer!

MissyMaintains — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 15:10:55 +0000

Happy Friday! Let’s start things off by choosing the winner of the Omron GoSmart Pace/Distance Tracker Giveaway!

Random Integer Generator
Here are your random numbers:

11
Timestamp: 2010-07-16 13:36:40 UTC

The winner is….Mari! Congrats girl! Hope you enjoy your new pace/distance tracker!! Just in time for your birthday!!

Back to yesterday….

I was craving cereal in the morning so I stopped at the nearby deli for some breakfast ingredients.

I can’t be trusted with large boxes of cereal so the single serving Kashi bowls are perfect! I made a delicious yogurt mess!

The deli has a new kitten! So cute!

I’ve been bringing lunch every day this week. I made a turkey and cheese wrap with Food Should Taste Good chips and cucumbers on the side.

After work I had another intenSati class! The class was actually a special event hosted by Well+GoodNYC. Anyone who is a subscriber to their newsletter was invited to attend intenSati for free last night! It was perfect for me since I am not allowed to do the Warrior Challenge! The class was really fun and led by Natalia, my favorite teacher. She always has so much energy and keeps letting me on her guest list! Love her! The Well+Good girls gave away a Lululemon gift bag at the end but unfortunately I did not win. One of my blog readers was at the event too so she came up to me to introduce herself. That always makes me feel special! I think the Well+Good girls took a lot of pictures during the class so I will be sure to let you know when they are posted (unless they are extremely embarrassing)!

**Edited to add: Here is the link to the article! You can see me in the 2nd picture!

After class Mari and I walked over to Whole Foods for some dinner! I made an awesome salad!

It contained avocado kale salad, seaweed salad, broccoli, beets, peppers, eggplant, tofu, and more! We sat outside and people watched while eating. We got some very weird looks while taking pictures of our food!

I probably should have went home and went to bed after that because I had another 6:30 am intenSati class planned! I got invited to the W Hotel so I ended up going out for some drinks instead! I had 3 Stellas by the end of the night. I totally planned on just having 2 drinks but the bartender brought me out a free one. No complaints here!

Next thing I know, it is 1:30 in the morning and everyone decided they wanted some pizza! I could not resist a slice when I saw this:

So good!! Probably not the best idea to eat that at 2:00 am when I had plans to wake up at 5:00 am for a workout! I obviously woke up feeling dehydrated and nauseous so I decided it would be smart to sleep for another 3 hours and skip intenSati for the morning! There is a free outdoor intenSati class at 5:30 tonight so maybe I will take that one instead! I definitely still want to work out at some point today after all the pizza and beer last night! I’m not sure what else is going on this weekend but I do have an 8-mile hike on Sunday! The best part is that there will be a wine tasting at the end of the hike! Talk about a motivator! Can’t wait!

1) What are you looking forward to this weekend?

2) What was your favorite workout this week?

The Chocolate Banana Burger

MissyMaintains — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 14:39:59 +0000

Happy July! I wanted to let you guys in on a little deal before I get started! A few of you have emailed me expressing interest in attending my school, Institute for Integrative Nutrition. They are holding an Independence Day special where if you enroll by Tuesday, July 5, you will receive a $300 tuition scholarship plus a “Let Freedom Ring” gift bag .

Here’s what’s in the “Let Freedom Ring” gift bag:

7 Habits of Highly Effective People 50 Card Deck
Achieve Everyday Journal
EnviroSax MiniSax
Goji Cranberry Cacao superfood bars by graduate Moria Felber
How to Find the Work You Love book
Strengths Finder book
Write it Down Make it Happen book
IIN logo goodies

Just call (877) 730-5444 to speak with an Admissions Advisor about enrolling. You don’t have to live in New York to attend because they have a distance learning program. Feel free to e-mail me with any questions about the school! Also, if you mention my name when enrolling, I will personally send you an extra $50.00 check! Let me know if you are interested

Yesterday’s Eats

I’ve been having the same breakfast every single morning this week: a Chocolate Banana Burger!

It doesn’t get much better than that! I finally ran out of the Nature’s Pride wheat buns so looks like I’ll have to move on! Dark Chocolate Dreams peanut butter is dangerous in my apartment anyway. I will explain later. The tub is almost gone just after 1 week. Oy.

I brought a lovely lunch to work! I made a salad with a Morningstar Farms Mushroom Lovers burger, avocado, hard boiled egg, and grilled mushrooms.

Delicious lunch! I also brought a snack to munch on for the side. The folks over at Smile.ly sent me Snikiddy Cheddar Cheese baked fries to try out.

About the fries:

50% less fat than regular potato chips
Gluten and wheat free
No preservatives
No corn syrup
No trans fats
Low in saturated fats
No hydrogenated oils

I liked that there were a ton of fries in the bag for just 130 calories. I don’t think I would buy them because the ingredient list is just way too long and they don’t really have any nutritional value. They were fun to munch on though! I guess they are a better option than french fries!

After work I went to the gym and did 30 minutes on the elliptical and some hand weights. I also walked outside for another half hour to pick up a package at my sister’s. I made up for not going to the gym in the morning!

I made another fun salad for dinner!

It contained salmon cake bites, edamame, mushrooms, avocado, and hard boiled eggs. I used my cool egg slicer that I got at the Eggland’s Best event!

So fun! It made slicing my eggs much easier. Daisy spotted the hummus on my plate.

One more…

I had an intense chocolate craving after dinner, like always. I searched my fridge and freezer and found a Chocolate Heart Thrive bar. I heated it up in the microwave for 30 seconds and then went a little dessert crazy….

Apparently just the bar itself was not enough. I wanted more chocolate for dipping! Then I saw a banana and decided that it would be fun to dip in the chocolate peanut butter. Then I saw whipped cream and decided to make it like a sundae! It was delicious! That was all fine until I went in the fridge again. I made myself another banana chocolate burger earlier in the evening to bring for breakfast today and just could not let it sit there. I ate half of that too. Blah. I guess I can’t make such a good breakfast that involves chocolate the night before because it is too tempting! Maybe it is just a bad time of month. I don’t know. I didn’t let it get to me. Instead I just set my alarm for 5:45 am and hit up the gym this morning. I knocked out 45 minutes of cardio plus some arm weights. Good to go. I was just sad this morning when I only had half of a breakfast left! I ate it as my pre-gym snack. Perfect. I will try to be a better intuitive eater today. It was just one of those nights!

1) Do you struggle with intuitive eating? Can you stop when you are full even if you are craving something?

2) Are there any foods you crave after a meal? Chocolate and fruit for me!