More FOOD

Yesterday was freezing cold. I'm not talking about -20.C or even -30.C, here with the windchill it was a blistering -45.C!!! Being a stay-at-home mom and having the school 14 houses away, I could not with a conscious drive my kids to school..... alas, we walked (bundled up to the max!)... brrrrrrr. What you need to understand with a cold that COLD, is that it is really really hard to warm up after wards. You should also know that I'm the kind of person who hates (HATES!) being cold, I think it's the worst torture around. Usually I'm wearing a sweater, slippers, and have a little heater going even when the house is a balmy 73.F!

anyways....

now that you know how cold it really was, and how much of a wimp I am you'll understand why I wanted to turn my oven on and keep it that way all day! The only way I could do this was to bake and cook all day. Great timing too because I had been reading a bunch of blogs with amazing sounding treats on it that I just needed to try! Here it goes.....

Recipe #1 from iheartwellness is a wicked salt and vinegar guilt free tv munching snack!

Just as the site says: Mix together sunflower seeds, apple cider vinegar and sea salt!
I used 3 cups sunflower seeds,
3Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar and 3Tbsp of Sea Salt
Mix
Place in an oven for 250 (I turned it up to 325) and bake for 1-2 hours (stirring every 20 minutes).

I'm glad I did these first cause they were so delish to munch on while making the rest of my goodies!!

 While snacking on these yummy treats, I was also making some AMAZING granola bars... This recipe is also from iheartwellness, On the site Kris makes them into 'clusters', but I ended up changing it up a bit , and adding / subtracting parts to suit my ingredients.  Here is what I did...

1 cup raw sunflower seeds

1 cup crushed walnuts
1 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut

1 cup cranberries

3 Tbsp Chia seeds
1tsp vanilla
1 cup melted coconut oil

Mix well together, put on cookie sheet and flatten. Place in freezer to set. While there make your chocolate sauce. I mixed together in a pot on the stove the following...

2 Tbsp butter (or coconut oil)
1 Tbsp cocoa
1 1/2 Tbsp Brown Sugar

Once the bars are set, take them out of the freezer, cut into desired sizes (bars or squares, etc), and drizzle still hot chocolate sauce. Put back into freezer to set chocolate and store in the fridge. Now, I've never made granola bars before, but these turned out so amazing, that even my hubby and kids were sneaking into the kitchen to wolf some more down!

So, I have now put away my cooled and flavoured sunflower seeds into a nice glass jar in the fridge. The bars are staying safe away from my fingers in a container in the fridge. And I'm starting to make some mint chocolate covered peanut butter balls. I found this recipe here on all day I dream about food so yum!!
I tweaked it a bit with half rice flour and half regular flour, and used a mint chocolate for some of them, and the rest I made chocolate with the cocoa powder....

Here is what they turned into..
This is the Chunky peanut butter, butter, vanilla, and flour mixed together (I used maple syrup instead of the sugar substitutes shes had listed) all rolled into cute little balls.

Put these into the freezer while you melt your chocolate....

Then dip each peanut butter ball into the melted chocolate, and place back into the freezer to set. Store in the fridge if you have any left! Yum!!

 Mine have little holes in the tops from the toothpicks I put in them to help me with dipping!

While I was making all these, I also made a few dozen (ok, 5 dozen), of my kids fav flour free totally chocolate and peanut butter cookies....

you can find the recipe here from last time, and made some yummy gluten and dairy free butter chicken for dinner!

and so, after all this, I was tired, and worn out, and full of chocolate.... but best of all,

I WASN'T COLD!!!!!!!
(and better yet, my fridge was full of yummy healthy treats for the rest of the week!)

Later!
T

My name is Tamara and it's been 2 days since...

I have been a mess the last few days. Short tempered, grumpy and just not a pleasure to be around. Emotions fueling emotions, this grumpiness has made me sad and angry as well. I hate being grumpy (I also hate being sad and angry). With the new fallen snow I've been waiting for finally here, the Christmas spirit was what I have been looking forward to, not this! Removing myself from my family (for their sake), I rack my brain trying to find out where this is all coming from.  I have been feeling a little stressed out lately, but not enough to be this grumpy. It's not the weather, or something that's happened, nothing unexpected has come in the mail, we're all still healthy and here. A few hours go by and still no solution. By this time I'm driving to the mall to get some retail therapy (you never know what could help). On my way I realize that Starbucks is still having their 2 for 1 holiday drinks. Quickly my thoughts turn to finding the nearest coffee shop. I'm not in this part of town very often, so it's not too easy to remember where one could be, after all I only go to starbucks once every few months or so.... Coming up with nothing, I find myself getting frustrated. Where could one be? My eyes dart back and forth. Oh forget it I think, I'll just backtrack to where I know there is one.

SCREEETCH!!!!

WHAT????

I will backtrack in this blizzard to get 2 overpriced coffee's for the price of one? (I'm by myself you know...) Huh? I barely drink coffee, let alone latte's with cream and sugar!(** I cut out 90% of my sugar 2 years ago, dropped my coffee consumption from 3 cups a day to 2 cups a week back in the summer**).... and now I'm willing to back track across town to buy sugar-filled-overpriced-coffee.... something was wrong.

I pulled over.

I nearly started crying.

I knew what was wrong.

I was addicted to sugar (again).

It hadn't taken long, and I didn't even really see it happen. I go back in time and think of what I did wrong.....

Thursday we heard about the deal and I went in for a 2 for 1 holiday drink with my youngest son (he got a hot chocolate), my gingerbread latte was surprisingly yummy, a little sweet, but it would do. I told my hubby about the sale, and mentioned that I would bring him one later when my oldest got out of school as a treat for working so much overtime lately. He usually says no to these kinds of things, so when he said yes, I was over the moon... Maybe I would get another when we got his? When we got there 2 hours later to get his coffee, thinking the deal was 'so amazing' I bought all four of us a round! (that's 2 coffee's no, make that 2 sugar filled latte's in 2 hours instead of my usual week).

Can you say TREATS!!

Friday was another snowy day. I'm not 100% sure, but I think I may have woken up thinking about gingerbread latte's. Needless to say I was there after lunch with my youngest again getting our 2 for 1. It was good, but it wasn't Great. I was hooked!

While thinking back through the last few days images crept into my mind of cookies, cookies that I don't usually eat, but have been 'craving' lately. Why didn't I notice this sooner? How many did I eat?

It's now Monday, and I've been off 'sugar' for 2 entire days now. I feel terrible, and happy at the same time. I still feel the 'pull' for sugar, but I know it will pass. When I first quit sugar a few years ago it was a terrifying struggle that lasted a few weeks. This is not as bad. I can do it. I guess it's better now then on January 1st!