Bread Loaf

I decided to make garlic bread with my pasta so I decided to make up a recipe for it and it turned out great expesially for the first time! To make it into garlic bread I just used a cooking brush (those things people usually use to brush marinade on meat) and brushed some olive oil onto each piece and sprinkled with garlic salt.

Bread Loaf

Ingredients

-2 tbsp active yeast –1 1/3 cup warm water  -1 tbsp. brown sugar  -1 ½ tsp. salt  -2 tsp. olive oil  -1 tbsp. olive oil  -4 tsp. baking powder  -1 tsp. baking soda  - 2 cups of whole wheat flour and 2 cups of white flour
Instructions
-Mix 2 tbsp active yeast and 1 1/3 cups of warm water and let yeast dissolve and foam.
-Add 1 tbsp. brown sugar, 1 ½ tsp. salt, 2 tsp. olive oil, 4 tsp. baking powder and 1 tsp. baking soda.
-Add the 4 cups flour and knead on lightly flowered surface.

-Form into a ball and place in greased bowl, cover with towel and let sit for 30 minutes.

-Form dough into two  nine inch long loaves, cover with towel and let rise 20 more min.

-After loaves have risen cut a long slit down the middle and using a cooking brush brush each with the 1 tbsp. of oil.

-Preheat oven to 150 degrees Celsius or 302 degrees Fahrenheit.

-Bake for 35 minutes.

Makes 2 loaves, 13 slices each

1  slice is app. 70 calories.
Great for garlic bread or making bruschetta (which i will totally put a recipe for eventually!)

Home Made Pasta

I decided to make spaghetti with tomato sauce and garlic bread.
Here is my recipe for home made pasta.

Home Made Pasta
Ingredients

-2 1/2 cups of white flour  -1 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour -2 cup of water  -extra flour for dusting  -2 tsp salt 
Instructions
-Combine all ingredients in a bowl, mix together, then knead on lightly floured surface.
-Divide dough into 8 sections.
-Take one section and wrap up remaining sections.
-Dust the section and roll out with a rolling pin to make it thin enough to put through pasta maker.
-Lightly dust and put through the normal flat part of the pasta maker on the thickest setting, dust any sticky parts and put it through a slightly thinner setting. Dust again and cut in half (unless you want super long noodles). Put each half of the dough through the pasta maker and put your hands around the noodles that are coming out so you can easily take them and place them on a towel.

-Repeat this with each section of pasta. It might be slow at first but once you get the hang of it it will go quite fast.
-Sprinkle the noodles lightly with flour so they don’t stick and let sit for atleast 30 min.

-You can either cook the noodles immediately in boiling water, freeze, or dry by placing in the oven on the lowest heat until they are stiff and crunchy. I recommend drying them before cooking so they will not be too soft after being boiled.

Makes app. 7-8 cups
1 cup is app. 220 calories

Tea

I drink tea almost every single day. I do enjoy the flavor but one of the biggest reasons i drink it is because of how healthy it can be. Artificial sweet teas obviously are not going to be that healthy but natural teas made of tea leaves and various spices and herbs can be amazing for you.

How I like my tea. I drink my tea hot with green tea leaves, fresh ginger slices and dried chrysanthemum flowers.
Green Tea: Green tea is a leaf from the Camellia sinensis plant. All tea leaves actually come from this same plant; however, it is the way that they are prepared that makes them into the different types of tea leaves. Green tea is supposed to help boost metabolism (which is always worth a try!), help you keep a healthy immune system, it is a very powerful antioxidant, and green tea helps with cholesterol and blood sugar levels. Green tea is also believed to help with increasing your life span. Even if the effects of green tea are not enormous or significant, there are no down sides to drinking it.

Dried Chrysanthemum Flowers: These flowers help to mild out the bitterness of the green tea. Chrysanthemum flowers are known to help sore gums and mild tooth aches, it is supposed to help the "inner cooling" of your body and is often used for detoxification. This flower contains may vitamins and minerals like vitamin C, Calcium and Iron, it also helps with digestion.

Ginger: Ginger's main benefits are for easing stomach and head related pain. This makes it great for morning sickness, headaches, stomach aches and period cramps, Ginger also has known to help in preventing many types of cancers and helps prevent and treat colds. I enjoy the slight lemony flavor it gives to the tea as well. :)

All of these mixed together in a nice steaming cup of tea is not only really healthy and zero in calories but also tastes good even without sugar :). Give it a try.

Banana Bread

We have a bunch of browning bananas so I decided to make some banana bread. I changed my recipe up a bit and it turned out to be way better.  They are nice and moist but not too dense.

Banana Bread

Ingredients

-3 ripe bananas, mashed   -2 cups whole wheat flour   -1/2 cup milk  -1 cup oats -1/2 cup sugar (preferably raw)   -1/2 cup of chopped almonds   -2 tsp. cinnamon   - 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda  -1/4 tsp. salt  -1 tbsp. vanilla  -1/2 tsp. nutmeg  -4 tsp. baking powder -1 tsp. cocoa powder

Instructions

- Preheat oven to 150 degrees Celsius or 302 degrees Fahrenheit.

-Mash the 3 bananas in a bowl with a fork.
-Mix all of the ingredients thoroughly together in a bowl, add flour last so everything mixes in easier.
-Pour into 2 greased bread pans.

-Bake for 1 hour.
-Let cool completely before slicing.
Makes 2 loaves, 16 slices each.
1 piece is app 70 calories.

If you want bigger slices make each loaf have 8 slices and it will be 140 calories per slice

Jiao Zi

I cook dinner everyday at the same time as i cook lunch so all i have to do is heat it up when I come back from the gym. Today I am making Jiao Zi or Gyoza, as i have hear some call it. Jiao Zi is a chinese dish traditionally filled with pork but I filled these with vegetables and chinese style seasonings instead, making them healthier, higher in vitamins, lower in fat and calories and delicious! :).

Jiao Zi

Ingredients

Wrappers
- 3/4  cup white flour  -1/2 cup whole wheat flour  -1/2 cup water   -1/4 tsp salt  -extra w.w. flour to dust
Filling
-1/4 of a potato, grated  -1/4 of a carrot, grated  -1/2 cup broccoli, minced  -1 tsp. ginger, grated -1/4 bulb of garlic (this is about 1/2 of a garlic clove), grated  -1/2 tsp. soy sauce  -1/2 tbsp. water  -1/2 tsp. salt  
Instructions
Wrappers
-Mix 1/2 cup water and 1/4 tsp salt together, add 1 ¼ cup of flour to mixture and knead.
-Use extra flour to keep dough from being too sticky.

You want to roll the dough out a little bit so it is not too thick before putting it into the pasta maker.

-Knead until smooth and use a pasta making to roll out into thin sheets of dough. If you do not have a pasta maker, it can be done by hand but will be much harder. To use the pasta machine, roll it out as shown in the picture above and run it through the thickest setting on the pasta machine. Continue running it through, bringing the settings thinner and thinner until it gets to a fairly thin strip of dough.

-Use a 4 inch bowl to cut out the jiao zi wrappers.

Filling

-Combine all filling ingredients in a bowl
Jiao Zi
-Scoop 1 tbsp. of the filling into a wrapper

-wet your fingers, fold it in half with the filling resting in the middle and pinch the sides together tightly.

-These Jiao Zi can either be pan fried or steamed.

-Cook until the dough tastes cooked (pinch of a part of the end to taste.)

Makes app. 14 jiao zi  

1 jiao zi is app. 42 calories.

Jiao zi are traditionally dipped in vinegar and or soysauce but feel free to get creative J.

Chinese New Year

Here are some videos I took of Chinese New Year 2012

Here are some fire works that were being lit off outside of my boyfriend's house.

Here is a super loud firecracker that someone set off. You can barely hear afterwards!

Sunday Bath Time

I have gotten into the habit of taking a nice long bath once a week on Sunday. It is really great for relaxing and pampering myself and getting some relaxation time in preperation for a new week.



 Here are the things I use on bath day:
- Shower cap (can be found at almost any hotel or dollar store.)
- Aroma therapy oil and bubble bath (I bought that brown colored bottle at walmart for about 5$
- A foot exfoilator (it kind of looks like a cheese grater but works great for getting dead skin off of your feet)
- Scented bath salts (can be found at pretty much any dollar store)
- A good regular conditioner and a leave in conditioner
- A body exfoiliating scrub
- A face scrub (It has honey in it but I bought it before going vegan and decided I might as well use it up)
- A body wash
-Some olive oil

To begin I fill up my bath with nice warm/hot water. As it is filling up ,I add the bath salts, aroma therapy oil and the olive oil. Olive oil is great for softening and moisterizing your skin while you soak in the bath and makes it easier to exfoiliate.
Before I get in I like to put on some music to listen to while I take my bath :).
After I get in, I wet my hair and add the conditioner. Add only a small amount to the top of your head; then divide your hair into two parts (one on each side of your neck) and gently comb the conditioner through your hair with your fingers. After your hair is fully covered in conditioner, put it into the shower cap to let it sit. This is really good for conditioning and moisterizing your hair, expesially to heal it from damage caused by blow drying, curling, straightening or dying it. If your hair gets greasy easily, it would be better if you did not apply any to the hair around the scalp and used a plastic hair clip to clip your hair to your head instead of putting it into the shower cap.
Next I shave; if you usually wax I would recommend doing that before the bath because the warm water can help reduce redness. After shaving, I use the foot exfoilator to get all the rough dead skin off of the bottom of my feet.  Next I use the body exfoiliater to gently scrub off dead skin on my body. Doing this is really good for your skin and keeping it fresh, clean and smooth; it can also help prevent ingrown hairs. After this, I use a wash cloth to wash myself with the body wash; I have always loved scented body washes but to be completely honest most of them don't have a very large effect on how your skin smells =/ but any kind of body wash will do.
After this, I usually soak for a while then drain the bathtub and use the shower hose just to rinse out my hair.

It is good to apply lotion after a shower to lock in moisture and prevent your skin from drying out. I usually lightly dry my skin off before applying. The lotion in the picture is available at either target or walmart. I am kind of frugal and it lasts me a long time. So as long as you don't use tooo much of this stuff it will last you quite a while :).


This bath day is really good for your skin and hair as well as having some nice time to relax so I would definetely recommend trying it!