Comforting. You make almond milk tea a la Fitnessista & HEAB

Try it — 40 calories and it will blow your mind. I heat 1 cup of water with 1 cup of almond milk, then add tea and steep as usual. Sweeten with stevia. Tastes better than Starbucks, no lie!

Heart-warming. You spend the day baking with your adorable niece. I’m still finding flour handprints across the house like little happy ghosts.

Delicious. You then enjoy the products of the baking…
Vegan chocolate chip oatmeal cookies inspired by Keri’s Cranberry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies [here] – Recipe to follow

Mind-boggling. You watch “Wonder Pets” with your niece which features a Bengal Tiger who only likes her celery with curry. You sit fixated wanting both to gouge your ears so as not to hear another song and yet transfixed, wondering where in the world Wonder Pets will go next….turns out Costa Rica! Woo-hoo! My mom’s homeland. Apparently there’s a gecko there that needs saving…
They’ve got a very vegan message, if you ask me.

Balanced. You read an 18th c. satire by Daniel Defoe to balance out the lost IQ points from Wonder Pets.

[source]

Redeeming. You hit the gym, rocking your Medusa-like afro, and find that running is getting easier on your knees, and you’re able to rock 6 miles. The strength training must be helping. Talk about a gratifying feeling!
Frightening people with my hair since 1983

Worth sharing…

Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies (Recipe based off of Keri’s vegan Cranberry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies here; referred to me by VegMuffinMan); I tried to health-ify them a bit.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 cup vegan butter
• 1/2 cup unsweetened apple sauce
• 2 tablespoons soymilk
• 3/4 cup vegan organic sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup oats
• 1 cup vegan chocolate chips

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Sift together flours, baking soda, sea salt, and cinnamon in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, cream together vegan butter, apple sauce, sugar, soy milk, and vanilla extract.  Gradually add in dry mixture until well combined. Fold in oats, and chocolate chips and evenly distribute. Spread by heaping tablespoon onto a cookie sheet, by the dozen. Bake 10-15 minutes.

• 28 Servings
  Amount Per Serving
  Calories		119.1
  Total Fat		5.2 g
  	Saturated Fat	2.1 g
  	Polyunsaturated Fat	1.1 g
  	Monounsaturated Fat	1.6 g
  Cholesterol		0.0 mg
  Sodium		35.8 mg
  Potassium		32.8 mg
  Total Carbohydrate		17.3 g
  	Dietary Fiber	1.2 g
  	Sugars	9.2 g
  Protein		1.5 g

  Vitamin A	0.2 %
  Vitamin B-12	0.2 %
  Vitamin B-6	0.3 %
  Vitamin C	0.1 %
  Vitamin D	0.0 %
  Vitamin E	0.4 %
  Calcium	0.3 %
  Copper	2.6 %
  Folate	0.4 %
  Iron	1.8 %
  Magnesium	2.1 %
  Manganese	4.3 %
  Niacin	0.5 %
  Pantothenic Acid	0.4 %
  Phosphorus	1.4 %
  Riboflavin	0.7 %
  Selenium	2.7 %
  Thiamin	1.0 %
  Zinc	0.9 %

  *Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calorie needs.

Enjoyable.

How were your weekends?! Have a Starbuck’s swap to share?

<3,

The Cranky One

Well…I did create a bite-sized bit o’ chocolate heaven, but, yea, I’ll save those gypsy days for another time. These bites are very dense due to the whole-wheat flour and oats, so there’s a lot o’ brownie in one lil’ bite!

Cranky Brownie Bits and Bites of Chocolate Heaven
16 one-bite servings; Little prep time & ingredients you most likely have already!


Ingredients

• 1 cup white whole-wheat flour
• 1 cup oats
• 3/4 cup brown sugar (I use Trader Joe’s brand of turbinado sugar)
• 2 tbsp. Earth Balance, softened
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 cup, unsweetened original almond milk (I use Almond Breeze)
• Optional: Top each bite with an almond
• Nutritional info. per bite: 130 calories, 5g fat, 31mg sodium, 3g fiber, 3g protein (estimate based on Sparkpeople recipe calculator here)

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees; spray mini-muffin tray with cooking spray.
• Mix all ingredients and spread evenly amongst 16 mini-muffin cups. Top each bite with an almond if you’d like.
• Cook about 15 minutes or until tops are no longer wet.

Enjoy!

In other news – Holy Razzle McSnazzle! I’m going to be hosting an awesome give-away tomorrow — stay tuned!

What is your favorite muffin flavor? Outside of chocolate, it’s gotta be poppy seed for me!

<3,

The Cranky One

The Heart-Healthiest Chocolate Chip Cookies in the World (Vegan)
Recipe from Vegetarian Times (Nov/Dec 09 Issue)

I made these for my band-mates for today’s practice and they are delicious! Perfect for even the pickiest, discriminate eater.


Ingredients

• 2 cups walnuts
• 3 tbsp. canola oil
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups oat flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 2 cups rolled oats
• 3 3.5-oz. bars bittersweet vegan chocolate, chopped, or 1 1/2 cups (12 oz.) vegan chocolate chips

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Coat 2 baking sheets with cooking spray.
• Blend walnuts in food processor 30 seconds, or until ground into fine meal. Add oil, and blend 2 to 3 minutes more, or until mixture has consistency of natural peanut butter. Transfer to bowl.
• Whisk together brown sugar and 1/2 cup water in saucepan, and bring to boil. Pour brown sugar mixture over walnut butter, add vanilla extract, and stir until no lumps remain.
• Whisk together oat flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon in separate bowl. Stir oat flour mixture into walnut mixture. Cool dough 10 minutes.
• Fold oats, then chocolate chips into dough. Shape into 2-inch balls, and place on prepared baking sheets. Flatten cookies with bottom of a drinking glass dipped in water. Bake 8-10 minutes, or until cookies begin to brown. Cool 3 minutes on baking sheets, then transfer to wire rack to cool completely.
• Nutritional information per cookie: 173 calories, 10g total fat (3 sat.), 3g protein, 2g fiber

Coconut Macaroon Brownies
From Allrecipes here

My boyfriend loves macaroons and brownies, so when I found this recipe I was stoked! Remember that film I was “starring” in and practicing for (see post here)? Well, the boyf had it show-cased at school and I felt “directorial debut” brownies were in order! See:

They were so good that I totally “forgot” about the near 500-calories price tag for ONE. Yep, you read right. Maybe I’m a masochist who likes to bake calorie-defying morsels of heaven to surround herself with. Or maybe I really need to re-think this whole “baking shows love” mentality and bake people squash fries to celebrate special occasions. Does that sound nearly as fun? Nope, didn’t think so!

In other news, I’ve gone blond to see if I can disprove the whole “blonds have more fun” adage. If anyone can bring an extra ounce of cynicism to her life, it would be me — the cranky one.

Or maybe going blond is my way of showing, externally, that I’m ready for change. I feel like my healthy lifestyle and I need marriage counseling. I’m just not “feeling” it anymore. I want to “test the waters,” have a mid-life crisis, act out, feel that passion and excitement again. Ya hear that healthy lifestyle? It’s time to step it up! Anyone else feel their routines need some re-vamping, some counseling, a new Porsche and tiny dog with sparkle collar?

<3,

The Cranky One

Today I’m feeling rather burnt out.  It seems like when I push through a list of activities that I’m not thrilled about, especially when there are time constraints involved, I get to the point where I really cannot force myself to do one more thing I don’t want to do.  That’s when I want nothing more thank to just sit in front of the t.v. with a bag of kettle corn.  Turns out, it’s only natural — I have “proof” proof!

According to a Science Daily piece last week, exercising will-power on one task can decrease or deplete our ability to exercise will-power on another (see article here).  The study involved tasking a group with exercising will-power by doing something that was a bit counter-intuitive (reading the name of a color listed on a card of a different color), and then tracking how much the participants literally exercised afterward.  The control group exercised more.  Now, this really doesn’t seem like a very well-rounded or academic study to me, but I think we can all agree on its conclusion:  if we have to exercise our will-power all day on one thing, we are going to feel less inclined to exercise it elsewhere later on. Why do so many people crack on diets? Probably because if a person has to practice restraint around food all day at work, lets say, by the time she gets home and is faced with a piece of pie, her will-power reservoir (and sanity) has probably dissolved into thin air like a one-hit-wonder.

We seem to view will-power as an allowance sitting in a bank from which we make withdrawals every day. At the end of the day, we’ve usually withdrawn too much. Maybe you look at your dog whose begging for walk, leash in mouth, tail wagging, and you say, “Sorry, bud, but I’ve got non-sufficient-will-power — I withdrew too much today.” Is it all in our head? Do we really get to a point where we’ve practiced so much will-power that we really have no more left?

There was a Biggest Loser episode where they aimed to mimic “real life” and had the contestants work all day at a pizza parlor to show them how hard it would be to come home and go to the gym after having spent a day at work.  Was it will-power they were testing, or the actual effects of physical exhaustion?  They’re definitely related, which is something this study doesn’t seem to take into account — it takes for granted that will-power is inevitably tied to a person’s level of physical energy. It also depends on the person’s view of what tasks are taxing (some crazy people actually look forward to exercise).  Also, does going to work automatically relate to exercising will-power (some anomalous people actually like their jobs)?  The article doesn’t clearly define “will power,” so how would you define it?

The good news, per the article, is that we can train ourselves to increase our will-power funds.  These are their recommendations:

• Listen to music (but which kind? Some music merely inspires me to have a cocktail, not get on the treadmill!)
• Make specific commitments (e.g. to exercise at 7 p.m. with a friend. Making it a concrete goal makes it harder to back out)
• Practice exerting more will-power daily in small increments.  The scientist quoted likens will-power to a muscle that can be built over time.

What do you guys think about will-power?  Is it finite, infinite, like funds you withdraw from a bank on a daily basis? A muscle you can build? Do you find it harder to work-out after you’ve had a very restrained day? Would the above listed tips really help you hit the treadmill after an exhausting day?

In the News/Spreading the Awesomeness

• Wallet Pop‘s, “Use Food Labels to Know What you’re Eating? There’s a 1 in 4 Chance they’re Wrong” (9/22/09) here
• Science Daily‘s, “”Phthalates Hard To Avoid In Food: Junk Food No Worse Than Healthful Food For These Potentially Harmful Substances” (9/27/09) here
• New York Times’, “Lifting the Veil of Mere Pixel Perfection” (9/27/09) here
• Check out the Goop newsletter here which features free vegan recipes for cookies, cake, cupcakes and frosting from Babycakes Bakery! Who cares that it’s Gwenyth Paltrow’s newsletter — did you hear my squeals when I wrote FREE + VEGAN + RECIPES?

Give-Away Round Up

• Win some Clif Nectar bars here
• Win some Clif Z Bars and PB & Co. here
• Win a Lazy Baker cookie mix here
• Win a Mile 22 marathon bag here

<3, The Cranky One