Losing weight with taste!

I think Kale is the only vegetable I prefer cooked than raw. Kale chips are the easiest to cook and they taste amazing. Here is the simplest recipe I’ll ever post, and it’s still one of my favorites:

Buy Kale as much as you want, wash it and let it dry (remove as much as possible the moisture), Tear the leaves in pieces, sprinkle them with olive oil and salt and toss them in the oven for 8-10 minutes at 500. I love them and they’re healthy! they’re family of broccoli so they’re full in nutrition.

Another food I love are lentils, I think if they’re cooked right they can be a great plus they last long in the fridge so, as long as you warm them up, they can taste almost as if you had just made them.

You can’t go wrong with lentils… I swear!!!

So in this recipe, I diced some bacon and cooked it, meanwhile dice some onions, green onions, tomatoes, Habanero peppers, tomatoes and put them in the pan with the bacon (if you don’t like bacon, or can’t eat them… that’s fine….don’t use it. Cook everything until they get brown and through the lentils, let them cook for a little, when you don’t feel like standing there watching the lentils cook… add water. (I’d say 4 times the amount of lentils – so if you added 1 cup of lentils, then add 4 cups of water.) Cover the pot and let them cook at medium fire and keep trying them until the lentils have the texture you like. and DONE! A great healthy meal.

(The reason I don’t add amounts it’s because in this recipe, the more you add the more the lentils will taste. Think of the vegetables you like, and add them to the recipe, why not? )

I eat this before going swimming. I’m sure I’ll be sore tomorrow. 

Razor Clams, 2 kinds of Ravioli

Razor Clams 

Vegetable Ravioli

Proscuitto Ravioli in Pancetta Tomato/Cream Sauce

One year- Part II

Let me tell you the other side of what happened yesterday, Pete had organized for me to leave the house with my cousin Alci while he would prepare everything with Philippe. I left the house around noon and came back at 3. He organized the menu, picked up flowers, choose a bottle (or 2) of magnificent wine, bought me a gift, and asked my brothers to help him with the cleaning of the house, so everything was in order from when I came back.

Fortunately or not, Pete has a great temper, so my brother felt like he was more than invited. He was talking to Philippe about his french classes, how he likes his veal cooked, that he doesn’t enjoy vegetables, etc…. while Pete was pouring a glass of wine, I was looking at him thinking, oh god! why is my brother here!? I wanted to be with Pete… !

Of course I’m telling my friend Ana about my surprise and she tells me she’s eating with everyone in Shake Shack. And that she might stop by and say hi. I told her, that thanks! that would be fun, but she might ruin the moment…. well… her battery died. Yes, everyone came upstairs. I looked at Pete and he was smiling, I looked at Philippe and he went, Merd! I don’t have enough shrimps… when Philippe was ready to serve, my friends where comfortably sitting in the couch with beers in hands. This was our first year anniversary.

I kept drinking wine thinking… THANK GOD I have him by my side.

Petecitas

There are couple of things I can’t pronounce, like for example words in english with “Y” and “J.” It takes me some effort to say jogging or yellow, this is because I grew up with strong sounds like Jesus, Jose, Yaracuy, Yoyo, instead of soft Joseph, Jello, You, Young… I think its understandable and you can blame it in the ESL. However, its funny when I can’t pronounce words that are the same in English and Spanish: Pizza, or Pepsi.

Here comes my little story, I often speak some Spanish to Pete, to see if he gets some words… and I’ll usually add the suffix ita, ito, cita, cito… to make it spanish-ier. this time I was telling him I wanted to make pizzitas and he understood I wanted to make Petecitas…. sometimes you hear what you want to hear right?!

In this attempt to make pizzas, I tried using pizza dough. They were delicious!

Here my Petecitas colors

Bomb Burgers

This was the meal  Zain and Tusar cooked for us when we went on a road trip! It was delicious and plenty. Chorizo burgers are intense, in fact, the whole plate was intense. I had never had them…. and if you’ve never had them… try them. Those bomb burgers are ridiculously good, we each had one and we were done easting for the day.

The sauce that accompanied the burger was great too, find the recipe they used here

Meal Colors

Here is a picture of the making of the BB!

Zain and Tusar Burger preparation colors

Colorful Meals

Lately, I’ve been eating awful because I’ve been sitting in front of the computer for ever so I decided to reward myself with one of my favorite dishes: this one- I don’t know how to call it.

Its tuna with mango, onions and peppers on the top. Its a great meal because you’re eating your vegetables, fruit and proteins all in one! and no carbs- ha! And its suppppper easy to make, slice the mango, onions, ajies, and green onions… sautee them and them put them on top of the grilled tuna. Done, a beautiful meal in less than 10 minutes.

While I was eating eat, I thought of 2 great ideas….one: this would be a great appetizer. Slice the tuna, cook it fast on both sides, so its still raw-ish in the middle and top it with the mango and onions. Make them bite-size, wouldn’t they be great? Who wants to come over so I can try it?!

The second idea I had came from what my mom use to tell me, the more colorful your food the more nutritious it is, here are my lunch colors:

It looks great right?! I’m going to do this from now on.

I love sandwiches

Pete and I like to be spontaneous and make meals that we usually don’t have. I’m grateful to have someone like that by my side because I love trying new things and experimenting with ingredients… if things go wrong, oh well…. we eat something else.

We went to whole foods and discovered some interesting sausages…. artichoke veal sausage and pepper chicken sausage.  We grilled them and made this:

Each one got half of the sausages, grilled onion, tomatoes and guacamole.

We’re training and starving! 🙂

Exercise + lots of food = Gain weight.

I completely over ate this weekend. Since the day I started “training” I have done nothing but eating. Its terrible, because my mind thinks I can eat more than usual because I’m burning calories, but its not true. I’m still not burning enough. That is what always happens when I start training, I gain weight and then… I start getting PUMPED! haha jk.

Check out my new bike:

Her name is Mandhi. What do you think? So far its been fun riding it! We did 30 min in the hills. It was so hard! Little by little everyday and I know we will get far!

Here is what we cooked for dinner:

Spicy Mango and Caramelized onions

Baked potatoes with Rosemary

I had a grilled fish. I dont think Pete has ever had it, he was completely grossed out. The fish and the mango/onion thing, went perfectly together.

Pete had a huge steak, and he also topped it with the mango/onion thing!

And a most in all of our barbecues, grilled onions…

The other things…

Pete and I have officially started our triathlon training. I don’t know if I mentioned this before, but we are doing it for the Tuesday’s Children Foundation.

Last night we were fixing our schedules to fit the training and I realized I was tired just from  typing everything we had to do. It’s a 15-week training program. (if anyone knows anything about triathlons, let me know please!! We need advice! Check my plan below) I remember when I started training for my first half marathon; I was breathless after my first 3-mile run. Thank God, I had Megan by my side because she helped me become strong-minded. Anyways, I’m not concerned for the training and the hard-work, that’s the least actually… what aggravates me the most is swimming in the pool….PUBLIC pool! I hate them. They gross me out more than anything in the world. In fact, I need to stop it here, because my mind is so dark that goes to weird places when I think of the other things that could be inside a pool.

I need to change the subject….Mmmm… Food: that pleases me.

I live by this quote: “The more you exercise, the more you can eat.”

So we have to wake up at 6 tomorrow for our second training day. Here is what we cooked:

For me: Portobello Mushroom Hamburger with prosciutto, Lettuce and Pepper Jack Cheese

For Pete: Beef Hamburger (made with onions, hot pepper, beef, eggs and scallions), tomatoes, Jack Cheese and Tomatoes.

Wedges: Romaine Lettuce, Blue Cheese, Walnuts and Bacon

Mash potatoes with Scallions and Bacon.

It’s the first time I’ve ever made a hamburger. I was extremely pleased with the results! 🙂

If you have any idea about triathlons, my training is here (TriathlonPlan) ! What do you think!?

WHY?!?! why does it stink?!

Why? I want to know why is it that everything that tastes great, Stinks! WHY?!??!?!

I love garlic, onions, green onions, etc … and they all stink! Anyone has a recipe to rose breathe after you’ve had any of these? PLEASE Advice! I have one solution, but doesn’t cure garlic scent. You should make sure that anyone you’re hanging around with eats the same as you. If they eat pesto, you eat pesto and both will be happy 🙂

Tonight it was Pasta with pesto sauce and garlic bread night, it was so amazing that I had way too much.

Pesto sauce its delicious and nutritive, at least mine was:

this is how I made it:

– A Bunch of Arugula

– A Bunch of Basil

– Some dill

– Salt and Pepper

– Lots of Oil.

Blend them. And done!

Total takes 10 minutes to make, just because thats what it takes the pasta to cook. The pesto sauce takes as long as your palate is pleased, mine took 3 minutes.

Home Smelly Home

I moved to New York to follow my dreams 2 years ago. As cheesy as it sounds, its true. Remember that movie “The Secret“, well I discovered it in 2008. I watched it and did the vision board, I wrote: I want to move to NYC and be happy. Like they say in the movie, it was like I had said it out loud and “the universe responded: your wishes are my command.” So a year later, I moved to New York and I was happy (wait… its not like in movies though, not like puff! and all of the sudden I’m having a great life. No. It took me a while to get adjusted, to understand the city, the rudeness and later friendliness of its people, to find real friends… it all takes time, but I’m here and I love it.)

For me, “I want to move to NYC and be happy” sounded normal at the time, but it wasn’t until I found my vision board again that I started wondering why I had written “to be happy”. At that time I wasn’t having the best days of my life, but we all go through that at some point, so that didn’t count. I wanted to know, why did I have to ask God, the universe, the spirits, whatever you want to call it , that I wanted to be happy. After lot of thinking, I realized that what I was missing the most was my family. They are the most important part of my life so I was happy that a year after I moved here, 3 of my siblings moved here too, now New York feels like home.

(Vancouver was Caracas-Miami, Miami-Dallas, Dallas-Vancouver away (around 25h trip), now New York is 5h away, so people visit more often. That also makes me happy)

I insist in calling the youngest boys: niñitos (kids) because thats what I feel they are, obviously if you saw them you’d think other wise… anyways… I always get distracted! The kids came back from spring break and I wanted to welcome them with some of their favorites:

Dani loves mushrooms, so I made chicken topped with creamed mushrooms accompanied with rice.

Pichi doesn’t like vegetables, so I made his favorite: Gambas al ajillo -or Shrimps and Garlic. I love making this, because my hair, the house, everything stinks like garlic after. No, seriously, this is the easiest recipe and its delicious, tons of chopped garlic, lots of butter, shrimps, salt and pepper! Done!

You’ve seen this before here, I made too much, so I gave them some to see if it can be over soon.

PS: Pete and all my friends make me very happy too. 🙂 I love New York.

Open Grilled Cheese Sandwich

After doing my daily 20-min blog-reading, I was starving. I decided to try this recipe and give it a little twist. I added onions and some greens on the side. After you read my blog a couple of times, I think you start to see a pattern, salt, pepper and LOTS of greens. Here’s my lunch

Couple of summers ago, I went to an greek restaurant and for dessert they were serving Yogurt and Honey, I was in heaven. It was a huge plate of natural, creamy yogurt and honey; we ordered 3 servings. I think I was craving a healthy dessert after having a bomb, so I had yogurt, honey, and a little cinnamon! mmmm!

Master Creations of an 11 year old

I grew up in Venezuela, and this was one of the dishes we used to have for breakfast over and over again. When I was young, around 11 y/o, I remember believing that my Perico was unbeatable. I was THE BEST… Perico maker, so I would wake up early on mother’s day to show Mom some of my talents. I’m glad I had an “army” of sous chefs by my side, so they would all line up and follow orders. Me, the master chef would make The Perico. Fico, Sous-chef One would take care of the orange juice. Caro, Sous-Chef Two would set the tray to take it to mom’s bed and prepare toast. And lastly, Dani, The Run Boy, would be in charge of 2 things, one picking up the most beautiful flower in the garden and make sure mom stayed in bed. (We’ve have a genetic malformation… as soon as we open eyes, we have to get off bed.)

I remember it always being great. 🙂

I want to excuse my picture but unless you are an amazing photographer, there is no way you can photograph Perico or  eggs in general and make them look good. At least, I can’t.

This is a quick recipe full of flavor and nutrition.

Dice 1/3 of an onion and sauté it, add 4 eggs and lastly when the eggs are almost done, add the diced tomatoes (1/2 of a large tomato or 6 cherry tomatoes. Salt and Pepper and DONE!

–

On another note, I recently rediscovered eggs. I had had a phobia for a while, but its gone! thank god!

Have a good weekend everyone!

Pasta

I have to be honest, I grew up thinking pasta was extremely fatting. So as a teenager and skinny body addict, I never ate pasta. It wasn’t until I started running marathons that pasta became a must in my meals. I’d have them the night before almost every long run (you multiply 4 months of saturday dinners… lets just say I ate a lot of pasta). Now even when I’m not training I crave pasta, especially since my boyfriend loves it (he made me say this.)

Anyhow….. this is one of my favorite and quickest recipe I always do. Its super easy and even my brother that doesn’t like any type of vegetables enjoys eating it.

In this bowl I have,

5 Cherry tomatoes sliced in half

1/4 of fresh mozzarella

4 black olives sliced in half

1/4 of a  red pepper cut into cubes

At last then I sprinkled with olive oil, salt and pepper. You’re DONE!

The best part of it is that you can eat it hot or cold and take it to work. It takes 10 minutes to make: while you cook the pasta, you slice the ingredients and mix them all together after draining the water, y LISTO! Fresh meal in minutes!

PS: if you want to spice it up a bit more, add corn, chicken, onions…. be creative, pasta goes with almost everything! Just keep in mind the fresher the vegetables the better.

My coping methods.

Last night, I received a message that I wasn’t expecting and didn’t want to hear. Before I used to go out for a long run, and discard all my sadness/madness in the miles and miles of pavement. But since January the doctor advised me to stop running completely until my knees are healed. So… going back to my story, I had to discard my anger and I decided to use food as my coping method. I went for a walk and decided to cook something different…. Veal! 🙂 I never crave veal, but for some reason, I felt like it… Here is what we had, Veal Chop, Asparagus, and Sweet potatoes. I never use recipes, so I’m not used to writing my own. I just grab ingredients I have at home and mix them together.

Let me give recipes a try… For the lamb chops: Salt and Pepper and Olive oil. I seared it first in a very hot pan and then placed it in the oven for 12 minutes at 500 degrees. For the asparagus: roasted some chopped garlic in olive oil, tossed the asparagus, added some salt and pepper and done. I leave it in the pan for very little, because I like my asparagus to be crispy. For the sweet potatoes, boil them for 10 minutes (or until you can stick a fork in one of them), cut them into squares. In a pan, roast some green onions, garlic, salt and pepper and add the sweet potatoes. After its done, add some dill to give them some flavor!

How did I do? with that recipe?!

THE (untraditional) Egg Sandwich

We have to leave soon, but before I left I wanted to get a quick bite. This sandwich is delicious and a quick fix.

Pita Bread, Arugula, Hummus, Egg Sunny Side up and truffle Salt. You be the judge, try it!

Once you go black you never go back

I’m kidding, but after I learnt how to cook this rice, it always remind me of the first sayings I learnt when I moved to NYC. Black Rice has become one of me favorite dishes.

Here its our meal. Garlic Bread, Asparagus, and Black Rice. If you we wondering, it was all less than $7/per person.

Veggie Sandwich

Here is a veggie sandwich I did this morning due to my lack of ingredients! It turned out delicious! I just ate it!

Arugula, Peppers, Goat Cheese, Cranberries and Dijon Mustard.

 

Have a good weekend all!!

Mango Appetizers

There’s 2 ways I shop groceries: one, I know exactly what I want to cook and I get everything I need for my recipe. The second one, I go grocery shopping because there is no food at home. This last one, is not the most ideal nor convenient because I shop what I like at the moment, and then I end up with no proper food to cook.

This was my dinner – no proper dinner… but hey! I could work as an appetizer, right?

Baby Yellow Peppers filled with Creamed Goat cheese, Basil and Dried Mango. Exotic Beauty!

8 Friends + 8 Sandwichs = A lot of Happiness

I love having friends over, they make me cook which makes me happy;  so friends make me happy.

Pizza for appetizers

Salami, Mushrooms, Prosciutto and Gouda in a Baguette

Vegetables, Prosciutto and Mozzarella in Olive Bread.

2-min salad

One of my new year’s resolution: cooking more and with that, eating less out. I’ve been doing alright so far…. here is a 2-minute salad I made for work!

Arugula, Goat Cheese, Pomegranate and Nuts.

The mix of colors in this salad makes me happy, I eat by the rule: “the more colorful your food the more nutrients it has.”

Both will have chicken.

I told Dani, “you choose: pasta or salad? both will have chicken.”

Mixed green Salad, Parmesan Cheese and Chicken with Ginger Dressing

Tomato Sauce, Chicken cooked with dill and other herbs, Pasta with fresh Parmesan and Basil

Mmmm… What should I have…

There are many times,  I just don’t know what I feel like. Last night I had that problem, so I called a couple friends, opened the fridge and made a little something with the ingredients I had… this is what came out!

Lettuce Wraps: Shrimps and Apples with peanut and pepper dipping sauce

Chicken Fried Rice with Pineapple

Our lovely table!