Comfort Food Tuesday with a Healthy Twist

I've had one of those starts to a week when everything seems to go wrong and nothing works out. Instead of one inflamed eye I now have two and look horrible, Mr Patu decided to bite me at the veterinary yesterday, I overslept my nap yesterday and missed physiotherapy and woke up to bad neck pain this morning, next year's plans are wide open and I need to decide on some big things this week. I feel homesick and have a million things on my to do list this week. This would be a perfect time for some comfort food, pasta perhaps?

I had nothing in my fridge and had to head to grocery right after work. Not a good idea when you're hungry, angry and tired. But against all odds I managed to just buy healthy eats and avoid my usual "I know I'm on a diet but one little chocolate doesn't count" or "I've deserved a little garlic bread after what I've been through" yep, emotional eater's favorite phrases... Instead I came home with these:

Three bags of healthy foods! Even if I eat healthy most of the time, I have two weak points: carbs and sugar. Both of those I eat for emotions, mostly stress. Even if most of my carbs are healthy carbs, too much is too much. As I have rheumatism, an autoimmune disease, I have an inflammation in my body most of the time. Sugar and white flour are known for their effects on increasing inflammation values in our bodies so for someone like myself, it's really not a good thing to rely on these when stressed, which is pretty much all the time.

I decided to try to limit my carb and sugar intake gradually. A strict "no" right away doesn't work with me as after a little harder set back I'll just eat twice as much bread or goodies. I found a great replacement for pasta in my grocery store today, soybean pasta. This is fast to make, only takes 5min to boil and tastes great! I made a delicious chicken/cabbage wok to go with and have to say - yummy!

Easy Chicken Wok with Soybean Pasta

Serves 4, time 25min

2 chicken breasts

1 yellow bell pepper

1/2 a small cabbage (whatever type you like)

4 leafs of kale (according to taste)

1 bag of Santa Maria Chicken Thai Wok spice mix

1 bag of black soybean spaghetti

salt

Slice all ingredients for the wok and bring water to boil in a pasta kettle. Heat up a little oil on a wok pan and add chicken in. When lightly golden, add cabbage in, throw in the spices and mix up. Add bell pepper and kale and a little water. Boil the pasta according to the instructions on the package. Enjoy!

Time to go catch up on some ZzzzZ, lets hope for a more cheerful day tomorrow! 

Good night!

Happy Hippie's Green Smoothie

A perfect snack for a busy day! I've been running from one thing to another this week and haven't had any time for a proper grocery :( Luckily I normally always have some kale, banana and other fruit around for a yummy smoothie.

I love green smoothies and different variations of green juice. One of my favorite spots in Krakow for a leisurely drink and snack is Frankie's, they do the best fresh juices in town. At home I don't have a juicer so I settle for smoothies. The good thing about these is, they fill you up quite nicely while you also get your daily doze of vitamins :)

Happy Hippie's Green Smoothie

serves 1, time 5-10min

2-3 dl washed kale leafs

1 small banana

1 small pear

1/2 avocado

0,5dl pineapple juice 

fresh mint

Put all ingredients to blender and mix until smooth. You can add the amount of liquid to get thinner smoothie if that's what you prefer. For a breakfast version add 1dl of quark or yoghurt in. 

Enjoy!

Hockey wife's hockey night (one of the many)...

Spring, that beautiful time of the year when you can stroll around the city with your fiancé and have a relaxed coffee and just enjoy. Or alternatively you can have that coffee by yourself either at the rink or at home watching your fiancé chase the pock on TV. 

Hockey life has it's own climax each year when the playoffs start. It's an intense finale for another intense year of training, games, sweat, stress and joy. A bunch of mixed emotions while still loving each second of it. It's not only intense to the players but to their families as well but if you love the game, you learn to love the hockey life as well. 

When the clubs change, so do the social circles around them. You meet new people every year, some you make friends with for a season, some for life. These are the people who understand what the hockey life gives and takes and how things roll around the game. There has been many seasons when together with the partners of the players we've been watching the playoffs and finals keeping our fingers and toes crossed for our team till the very last minute. 

This year I have been cheering for our team on my own as I've been pursuing my career this past year which has meant living in different cities. I love watching ice hockey and can get pretty loud when commenting the game especially if at home (usually at this time our dog gives me "the look") so in that sense perhaps it's for the best I have nobody around to hear. It's a great sport and a lot of fun to watch.

Our team made it to finals and for today's game I made some healthy kale chips to keep my nerves down while watching the game. There's two games left after tonight so it's safe to say that the rest of the week's plan is based on these :)

Nerve Cooling Kale Chips

serves 1, time 10 min

a couple branches of kale

2 table spoons of oil

salt

lemon pepper

garlic powder

piment d'espelette (or chili)

Set oven to heat up to 160C. Wash the kale branches and dry with paper. Rip the branches to pieces (throw the central, "wooden" bit out). Mix oil with the spices on a large bowl and throw in the kale pieces. Mix until all the kale pieces have some oil and spices to them (not too much so they don't burn). Spread on a paper covered oven plate so that chips are not attached to each other. Let cook in the oven for 10-15 minutes until crisp.