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Honey Garlic Shrimp with Quinoa
I grew up on seafood, every summer we would trek to Oregon to visit grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. More often than not, we would spend some time on the coast, usually bouncing between Newport, Florence, and the sand dunes. Grandpa Harold taught me how to fish, we would spend the whole week playing on the beach, fishing, catching crabs and clams. I loved every minute of it. Mr. Man, on the other hand, his version of seafood is…well, it’s steak. He tolerates some seafood, but mostly if it isn’t battered in coconut and deep-fried, he doesn’t like it. Still, we are trying to be mostly heart-healthy, and frankly,…
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Chocolate Banana Protein Muffins
One problem I have on a weekly basis is overly ripe bananas. I will not eat them once they are completely yellow. And unfortunately, the amigos are the exact same way. So each week, we have 2-3 bananas that are too ripe for anyone to eat. I quickly grew tired of banana bread and the amount of frozen banana bits in our freezer is rather embarrassing. A few weeks ago I noticed a recipe at the bottom of the Kodiak Pancake mix. Since then, the ripe banana epidemic has been abolished. I did make a few changes to the original recipe to make it a little more heart healthy. Also,…
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Chicken Fried Quinoa
I’ve been wanting to incorporate quinoa into my diet, but I was afraid because the last time I tried to make something with it the taste was awful. I even soaked the quinoa before I cooked it and it still tasted like bug spray. That was several years ago, and now there are a lot more options when it comes to quinoa. Quite a few of them don’t require presoaking before cooking which is a huge win for me. Tonight I decided to do chicken fried rice, but with quinoa instead, and guess what…it was SO SO yummy. I will say, although I love me some cauliflower rice, I think I…
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Health Fads
I began struggling with my weight in my early 20s. I gained 50 or so pounds within a year. I hadn’t made any major lifestyle changes, but the weight was not going anywhere. Then my menstrual cycle stopped, so I sought medical help. I received the diagnosis of PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome). PCOS is a disorder that attacks the ovaries. The pancreas works in overdrive producing too much insulin which then, in turn, creates little cysts on the ovaries that look like a strand of pearls have been wrapped around them. This causes the ovaries to behave abnormally and don’t always ovulate on a regular basis. While PCOS can be…
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Summertime Avocado and Corn Salad
I have a major addiction…to avocados. Just about anything with avocados in the recipe, I will dive in head first no questions asked. We go through 1-2 bags of avocados from Sam’s Club or Costco in a week. I think we end up going through more avocado bags than gallons of milk. So when a friend posted this recipe link on her facebook, I just had to run out and get all of the ingredients immediately. SO YUMMY! So satisfying, so easy! I omitted the hard boiled eggs the first time I made it because I was going to be taking it to a Fourth of July BBQ and I didn’t want…
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Chocolate PB Chia Seed Pudding
I am not the most adventurous foodie. It’s not that I’m afraid to try new things, it’s that I hate spending money on food that I end up not liking. It’s perfectly acceptable to me for Mr. Man to purchase from the store or order a meal that is new and different and then I will try it. I know, it’s super odd, especially since the money to pay for the food comes from the same place whether he purchased it or I did. It’s just something I’ve always had a hard time overcoming. So for a long time, I pinned and oogled over various chia seed pudding recipes, but…
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Grilled Steak & Veggie Rolls
I am a carnivore at heart. I love a yummy salad, but not much can beat a really good steak. After dad’s heart attack and surgery, I was on the hunt for foods and recipes that still had the familiar flavors my dad loves but were heart healthy. While red meat isn’t the most heart-healthy protein out there, I wanted to show my dad that he didn’t have to give up everything he loved…that if prepared right and consumed in moderation he could still enjoy and indulge occasionally. I found some sirloin side tip steak, which happens to be one of the leanest cuts of beef, for a good price at the…
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Instapot Heart-Healthy Sweet and Sour Chicken
Dad is beginning his 3rd week in the hospital. He’s now in the cardiac rehab unit and learning all sorts of ways to function without putting pressure on his arms. I had no inkling all that entailed recovering from a heart attack and bypass surgery. TV and movies definitely gloss over the intense parts. Not only his he recovering from double bypass surgery, he also has his sternum and ribs healing, as well as several incisions on his lower leg. The ribs and sternum were sawed through so the surgeon could get to dad’s heart, and the leg incisions are from the surgeon searching for a viable vessel for the bypass. …
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Heart Healthy Fried Cauliflower Rice
My family has made a very conscious decision to begin a more heart-healthy lifestyle. Mr. Man and the 4 amigos as well as my parents, siblings and their families; we’ve all decided it is time to make a permanent change together. As I have been researching heart-healthy foods and recipes, I’ve noticed it isn’t as hard as I assumed it would be. The recommendations from the American Heart Association as well as the CDC and Mayo Clinic all suggest low sodium, low-fat diet with complex carbs and plenty of fruits and vegetables. For an individual who has hypertension, high cholesterol, and/or heart disease (especially if they’ve had a cardiac event) the…
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Instapot Mongolian Beef
Meal planning this week has pretty much been non-existent. We have so much going on with this being the last week of school, that I don’t know when or where we will be every night around dinnertime. I have my staples like marinara, pasta, meatballs, hashbrowns, eggs etc. So we do have food I can throw together in a pinch. Tonight is the only night we have where I planned instead of whipping something up. This Mongolian Beef was a huge hit tonight. It only took me 10 minutes to assemble, and then another 20 minutes in the instapot to cook. In fact, it took the rice longer to cook…
