Soul Food

Being from the South, I LOVE soul food. Lucky for us pescatarians near the Gulf of Mexico, soul food loves us back! As much as I love bagels and lox, I think the rest of the U.S. needs to try shrimp and grits or catfish and grits!

Recently, my boyfriend and I went to The Breakfast Klub in Houston, Texas. This place is known for it's amazing southern comfort food and their ridiculously long lines. We waited for an hour and half the other Sunday and it was SO worth it.

I could not believe that I found a place that made catfish (or Katfish as they call it) and grits as good as my moms! Their coffee was on point too. Here's some photos of the Katfish and Grits that I had:

This weekend, shake up your typical breakfast and try a southern classic instead!

P.S. I got a new camera for my birthday so hopefully I'll up the quality of my food pictures. However, a cell phone is just so convenient sometimes!

VegOut! Challenge

For this challenge, I have 30 days to eat 30 different vegetables, but I don't think it will take me that long! Today is day 5 of the VegOut! Challenge and I've already had 12 different vegetables. Here's what I've had so far:

I started on Saturday, March 1st with a  healthy breakfast. One fried egg over easy topped with salsa and served with avocado (Veggie #1) and grilled Tomatoes (Veggie #2) and White Onions (Veggie #3).

I went to Mardi Gras the rest of the weekend so didn't worry about the VegOut! Challenge. On Monday, I was back at it:

For lunch on March 3, I made Okra Stew served over rice. In it I pan cooked Okra (Veggie #4), Chives (Veggie #5), Celery (Veggie #6), Green Bell Peppers (Veggie #7), Garlic (Veggie # 8), Eggplant (Veggie #9) and a few other vegetables that I've already counted like White Onion and canned Tomatoes.

For a snack that afternoon, I had more vegetables!

I love eating vegetables with either ranch, peanut butter or hummus. On Monday, I added Cucumbers (Veggie #10) to my veggie log.

For dinner on Tuesday, March 4, I made one of our favorite meals:

This is wasabi and soy marinated tuna steaks, cooked with tomatoes and onions and topped with avocado. For sides, we had wasabi and soy mashed Russet Potatoes (Veggie #11) and fish sauce Brussels Sprouts (Veggie #12).

All in all, this VegOut! Challenge has been fairly easy. It has challenged me to be more creative and more complex. I'm a very simple cook, meaning I can make a meal with anything I find in my kitchen. This has caused me to add more ingredients to normal meals and grocery shop more frequently.

So far, I've been sticking with the veggies that I know and love. But, I can't wait to add a few new vegetables that I don't cook or eat very often like: Bean Sprouts, Cabbage, Edamame, Daikon, Mustard Greens, Kale, Turnips and more!

Practice Makes Perfect

Okay, I have a confession. I hit the diet SUPER hard in January, but have been semi bad after my first cheat day (Super Bowl!). Nothing crazy, but definitely not as strict as I should have been. It was so hard with Valentine's Day and celebrating a new job:(

Now that I've had a month off, I'm ready to get back in to it. My boyfriend and I are both going full force next month. To keep us on track, we're doing a 30 day veggie challenge. No we're not just going to eat veggies. We're going to take the VegOut! challenge, which has you trying 30 DIFFERENT vegetables in 30 days for March, which is National Nutrition Month by the way!

Today's lunch was practiced for my challenge:

 

 

All I did was pack a few of my left over sides from dinner earlier this week and I knocked out 5 veggies in one meal! I had:

• Steamed Asparagus with a little (I mean LITTLE) Butter
• Okra with Onions pan cooked in Olive Oil and topped with Tony's and Black Pepper
• Zucchini and Squash pan cooked in Olive Oil and topped with Tony's and Black Pepper

It was delicious, light and filling. Often times I eat too big of a breakfast or lunch that I don't even want to eat my snacks. I'm trying to stay consistent with three small meals and at least two small snacks. I've been eating snacks from Nature Box. They are AWESOME! You should definitely give them a try and this 30 day veggie challenge. To sign up for the challenge visit: VegOutHouston.org

 

A few more FAQs for ya:

• Do I have to live in Houston to participate? NO
• Do I have to eat only veggies? DID YOU NOT READ MY BLOG? NO!
• Can I eat meat? YES, YOU CAN EAT WHATEVER YOU WANT. YOU JUST HAVE TO EAT YOUR VEGGIES TOO!
• Can I eat the same veggie 30 times? SURE IF YOU WANT, BUT IT WON'T COUNT. YOU HAVE TO TRY 30 VEGGIES!
• Eat 30 veggies--all of them? NO, YOU JUST HAVE TO TRY IT! IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT NO ONE IS FORCING YOU TO EAT IT.
• Why would I sign up for this? BESIDES IT BEING HEALTHY, FREE, EASY--YOU'RE ENTERED TO WIN GREAT PRIZES IF YOU SUBMIT YOUR VEGGIE LOG BY 4/4!
• Do I have to participate in March? NO, YOU CAN DO IT WHENEVER BUT IN ORDER TO WIN PRIZES YOUR 30 DAY VEGGIE LOG MUST BE SUBMITTED BY 4/4.
• How do I get a veggie log? ONCE YOU REGISTER ON VEGOUTHOUSTON.ORG YOU'LL BE GIVEN ONE. IF YOU LOSE IT YOU CAN GO BACK ONLINE AND DL ONE.
• Does it have to be 30 consecutive days? NO, NO ONE IS SPYING ON YOU. IT DOESN'T EVEN HAVE TO BE 30 DAYS IN MARCH. JUST SUBMIT YOUR LOG BY 4/4.
• I don't have a team and I feel like a loser, what should I do? JOIN MY TEAM: AD 2 HOUSTON
• You didn't answer my question what do I do now? LEAVE A COMMENT AND I'LL RESPOND! 

VegOut!

I'm the president of a non-profit, professional organization for those 32 and under in the advertising and communications industry. Each year, we select one non-profit from our community and give them a FREE pro-bono campaign. It feels so great to give back to your city with your talent! Anyone can donate time or money, but to be able to utilize your God given skills for the greater good feels awesome.

This year, Ad 2 Houston selected Recipe for Success Foundation. Their goal is to reduce childhood obesity. Did you know this generation is the first expected to not outlive their parents? Let that sink in! How scary!! All because of poor diet and diabetes. In most cases, diabetes is a disease that we can cure by healthy eating. My very own Grandmother was put on a special diet at her assisted living home and reversed diabetes. She has been free of insulin shots for nearly 2 years now! I love knowing that my sweet Maw Maw does not have to prick her finger ever day and then give herself a shot.

Obviously, we were passionate about selecting Recipe for Success. Once they were selected, they asked for us to help with a specific campaign, VegOut! VegOut! challenges Houstonians to eat 30 different veggies in 30 days. Ideally, everyone would participate during March, which is National Nutrition Month. But, your veggie logs are not due until April 4, 2014 so you can have a little late start or even an early start. You actually don't even have to be from Houston to participate!

The Houston advertising community has been great to us and our campaign. We have had several billboards, radio spots, eblast and more donated to our campaign. We even got Miss Houston on as a spokesperson. But, we need people to actually sign up to participant in VegOut! Our goal is to quadruple last year's results of 500 participants. We've already exceeded them, but could use your help! Please check out the website and register today: VegOutHouston.org

Be sure to follow my blog for the month of March. I'll be posting (hopefully daily) about my diet on the challenge!

Thanks for the support.

Hide ya kids, hide ya wife

Today was supposed to be a very exciting day, because I was starting my new job. I was so anxious I couldn't sleep last night. My morning went downhill rather fast though. All dressed up for my first day, I walk out of the garage to our adjacent driveway and saw a towel over my passenger window. I thought, "Hmm...this is strange. Maybe I somehow left my window down and Andy covered it for me in case it rained." As I got closer, I realized this was NOT the case. My car had been broken in to.

Since I was starting a new job right away I left all of my old office supplies and decorations in my car. That, on top of my normal load, made my car looked semi-packed.  Anyone that knows me knows that I live out of my car. I keep my yoga supplies in there, my non-profit documents and whatever items didn't get unpacked from my last trip.

Luckily, they didn't take much; just a new backpack ($30), a new notebook ($7), a new binder ($3)  and possibly some other random items. The binder and notebook were purchased last night and the backpack was less than 2 months old. I'm just so glad that they didn't steal my social security card. I know it's dumb to keep it in your car, but I had my car packed for my first day on the new job. I'm also so glad that I had taken my Michael Kors purse out the night before and my Bose noise canceling headphones a few days prior. All in all the entire event cost me two hours, $200 (known stolen items plus repair cost) and a new window tint (cost TBD).

Long story short, keep your car clean. Keep items (no matter how valuable!) out of sight. If this happens to you, I recommend doing the following steps:

1. Don't touch anything. Call the cops first and foremost. They might (doubtful ) want to dust for fingerprints.
2. Call your insurance agent to determine your deductive and receive a quote from their recommended service provider.
3. Don't go with the first price quoted. Call around! I saved over $100 by making one more phone call. 
4. Schedule a mobile appointment so that you can go about your day and not let those thieves steal any more of your time!

At the end of the day (and beginning!), I'm at peace. I'm just hoping the stolen "school supplies" were given to a child who had none. I'm also lucky that only my car was damaged. Two others cars in our gated community were also broken into. And, even worse, a house was broken into too! The thief was smart and wore gloves so no finger prints were found. It's so sad when someone uses their intelligence for evil. Tonight, I'm praying for him. ( Not being sexist-the cops said a witness spotted a five foot male escaping). 

Do good and be good, friends. 

"This is for all the grown women out there."

At midnight on Friday, December 13th Queen Bey released a surprise album with 14 songs and 17 music videos. Of course, I bought it! Apparently, I was not the only one. In 48 hours it sold over 500,000 copies. It is offically the fastest selling album on iTunes ever--selling 828,773 copies in only three days. That record was broken with very little marketing. She released a press release and purchased a banner at the top of the digital-music store. To put this in perspective, Lady Gaga's record label spent $25 million for marketing her new album, ARTPOP. Once again, Beyonce proves to us why she is the queen.

A few thoughts I have on the new record:

• It's good. Okay, okay. It's great!
• Several songs on this record will be hit singles
• The videos are awesome
• I think my favorite is Partition--part 1 and part 2. I haven't listened to the entire album 20 times, though. I'm sure this answer will change, weekly!
• It's different
• Beyonce has always been sexy and confident, but not like this! The new mom really does have a new found confidence and sexiness about her.
• This new album is DIRTY! Think slow jam Sundays.

If curiousity hasn't gotten to you, yet, do yourself a favor and buy it! I think I'll get Britney Jean next.