Cheating for a cause

I cheated. I'll admit it. It wasn't necessary, but I did it. A good friend of mine is going through a rough time. House fire, rebuilding, etc. No fun. On top of that she's an amazing artist who is in high demand. Doesn't make for simplicity in life. I've been asking her for weeks for something I can do to help. Each time she says there is too much going on to find one thing for me to help with.

Today I didn't take no for an answer. She had only a greek yogurt for lunch. So I got take out. For both of us. Not a social thing...which is my loophole, but just a way to bless her.

I hope to cook for her tomorrow. I really can't wait!

Out.

When you don't get take out, those meals at restaurants become just so much more fantastic.

Meal #1. Cara Mia

White wine, bread and olive oil, calamari, and rigatoni with chicken and sundried tomatoes in a vodka sauce. Heaven.

Meal #2 Southern Hospitality

Hush puppies, BBQ chicken sandwich, french fries and margaritas. Justin Timberlake's new restaurant. So tasty!

Thank you to Cathy Parrott and friends for making these two meals possible. You are all amazing!

Just add water...

That's exactly what I like to read on the front of the Aunt Jemima pancake mix. With a coupon I spent only $5.00 on the mix and syrup.

So I added water. And wrestled a couple of vegetarian sausages out of my freezer. Popped them on the stove for a few minutes and I could hardly see the tiny bits of freezer burn.

I made a whole batch of pancakes. And ate them for breakfast this morning as well. Still more left. And more mix left. Such a great and simple dinner....and breakfast...and well maybe even lunch:)

I've really cooked. once....

Totally for real. I'll prove it:)

For days I had been craving pasta with chicken. Funny to be craving chicken since I've pretty much been a vegetarian for the last 5 years. Anyway....while stopping by the store for ingredients I somehow came across this lovely package.

$2.99/lb! So awesome!

I took the goods back to my kitchen, and cut and sauteed half the package, while freezing the other half.

I also cooked up a vat of pasta. Threw in some sundried tomatoes and some spices (fennel is my new favorite)

and voila! Dinner. With lots of leftovers. So good.

reflective

I've noticed that eating reflects life. My meals are quick convenient and simple. Cheese and crackers for lunch. Diet Coke for breakfast. Many of my relationships are the same. They are connections of convenience. They are simple because going deep takes too much time.

The close friendships I have are due to time and effort. We eat. We drink. We cook.

Some of these people live very far away and our friendships have become quick and convenient. But we have eaten. We have cooked. Its funny how much that makes a difference. In a life where I work til I drop, those moments are priceless. I want more of them. I don't want to just cook for myself. I want to cook for people I care about. I know I need to start somewhere, and get myself to a place where I'm ready to let more people in. Slow down, work less, embrace the world around me instead of zooming so fast I don't see it as it goes by. Its hard for me to slow down. I get bored as I wait for something to fill the void. And then I get another job...and the cycle begins again...and again...and again...

incentive

Yet another reason I am anticipating time to cook. My dinner. Portion controlled, calorie conscious, relatively healthy, but also pretty disgusting.

Dreaming

All I can think about right now is a hot meal. Fresh, flavorful and satisfying

I'm still at work for a few hours.

Next year I plan to give up working overtime for Lent.

That is all.

Unsure

Thinking back on my past 20 or so days of not eating take out, I have mixed feelings.

There have been a few days that I've wanted nothing more than a hot meal that I didn't have to prepare myself.

I've been craving bagels every morning. I totally should have bought a pack and toasted them myself...but in my morning haze it always seems like too much work.

This morning I had free bagels at work. Surprisingly less satisfying than I had hoped they would be. Old stale and unfortunate...though my bagel craving is at last squelched.

I had hoped for a significant change in my life by not getting take out. I think there has been. In my stubbornness I find myself at the grocery store every couple of days. I feel like I'm cheating, buying pasta roni, Campbell's soup, and basic bread and cheese. I'm not really cooking, like I'd hoped though I am definitely saving quite a few dollars.

I guess I'm beginning to doubt the daily benefits of this challenge. When I'm run down and exhausted, eating a few carbs and some cheese doesn't quite cut it. As my vegetable intake wanes....I feel more and more unhealthy. The pounds I lost when I first started have begun to creep back, and I'm feeling as wasteful and out of touch with reality as normal.

I feel like in most challenges there is a plateau, or a wall that you just have to push through. Once you're past the rush of trying something new and different, you are back to just what you have every day, life. Life seems to so often get in the way. I plan to push through. If I make it, I will be proud of my accomplishment. A little silly I know, but to keep with something through think and thin?...I think is an accomplishment for us all....

Spoiled

This post is a long time coming.

I've been waiting on it only because it was such a blessing that I wanted to recount it accurately.

Two weeks ago, when my friend Chase was in town, we were invited out to Long Island to spend time with is Guyanese friend, Aunty Baby's family. We took Sunday afternoon to trek out to the end of the E line and then waited on a corner in Jamaica for Shammy to pick us up.

I have to tell you something about the Guyanese. They are the most generous fun loving people I've met. Since Chase knew Baby, he was instantly family. Since I was his friend, I was quickly adopted as well.

We did nothing for a whole day. We chatted, drank vodka and rum, and ate Guyanese food.

We had cookup, calilou, pumpkin, dal, and okra. Twice. So much food. Cooked so well with so much love.

And then it was time to go home. Of course we couldn't leave without a giant bag of food....and a giant bottle of El Dorado Rum:) Shammy wouldn't have it any other way. She also gave us quite a few little jars of jam...which have come in handy for my jam and goat cheese sandwiches.

Here are the spoils from our afternoon of fun. Photographed amazingly by Chase Chisholm.

It was so lovely to be so spoiled. We ate again when we got home. And it was food for still another meal. Thank you Shammy. You are the best!

Exhausted

Dealing with 14 hour days is rough. When they become longer than that, and I'm not getting a break at all...then it gets to be a test of will and really how much adrenaline I can manifest to stay awake.

I heartily apologize for being absent this week, but it has been for good reason...Giant stuffed animals. Now you may think to yourself "How fun?" "How cool is that job?" I know. When I really think about it, it is a pretty fantastic job. This week I got to make a 9 ft alligator, a crab, a snail, a turtle and five rocks. As fun as it is to watch them take shape....It is seriously a lot of work. Just one of these lovely fellows takes upwards of 30 hours to create, not including the epic amounts of time they take to make the pattern before I can begin creating them.

If this was my only job? Then I would be fine. But add to that finishing up wigs for an opera and beginning the designs for 2 plays, in my free time. I still have a full time job of running a costume shop and teaching 1 1/2 classes. So this week, 14 hour days quickly turned into 16 hour days...which even expanded to a 19 hour day as one of my stitchers and I frantically sewed leg fat onto an alligator. 19 hours is fine, if you go home and sleep...but a mere 4 hours later I was back at work for yet another 12 hours to finish a giant crab.

If you are still reading, I can guess that I've exhausted you as well.

So, What has this meant for my food intake in the last week?

First, somehow, by a will greater than my own, I was still able to eat quasi-cooked/grocery store meals every single day. I only ate out twice, but both were with friends, and fairly cost effective. Thanks to a conversation with my brother, I discovered microwavable pasta dishes, that make eating at my office immensely easier. I did find myself one day eating tortilla chips and cottage cheese for lunch....but we're not going to talk about that one...

I got a glorious 8 hours of sleep last night, and I am officially exhausted. My body said enough. So I'm sitting in my chair and blogging instead of the 20 other things I should be doing. This is good. I need a day of less. Everyone does. And now I will go for some Prosecco:) Perfect.

Is this really cooking?

So, a few things I've discovered in the last 2 weeks of not eating take out.

1) I really don't have the time to precook meals for the week, or cook dinner on a regular basis to provide easy leftovers for lunch.

2) Grazing, while easy, just isn't enough to get me through the day. I love bread and cheese, but 3 meals a day of that is just not going to work.

Solution? Easy to make, microwavable meals that I can create in my office.

This is one of my favorites!

Tomato and Feta Soup with Garlic Pita bread on the side.

The soup is from a can, mixed with water, but I do have the premixed version in my cupboard that will come to work with me tomorrow. The feta I get in a block and makes for quite a few bowls, and the pita works wonders with the soup as well as the "crust" for my other fav, Pita Pizza.

I know. These combos are far from fine dining, but convenience is definitely the name of the game for my crazy busy life, and I must either deal with repeats and some less imaginative options, or figure out how to add another hour to my day.

obsessed

I usually like a lot of variety in my food choices, but this specific concoction is becoming a love, even an obsession.

I found these lovely single serve goat cheese packs at the Morton Williams and paired them with lovely sample jars of jam from my dear friend Shammy (the best are strawberry or raspberry). Spread on bread and enjoy. Just enough tang. Just enough sweet. Delicious.

The question is; is it dessert? or is it dinner? For me, both, all of the above, lunch, dinner and second dinner(still haven't conquered my breakfast struggle). I've eaten it probably 4 times in the last 3 days.

It is joy and bliss.

Please steal this and enjoy. You won't regret it. Then we can basque in our obsession together. It will be lovely.

And then I ate ramen...

Wooed by the .40 cents it cost me to buy the pack, I ate ramen for dinner.

It hurt.

I was instantly transported to my frugal college years, when we used to buy the stuff by the case. Its so terrible for you, which I eventually realized after eating most of the bowl.

So much salt, so much processedness. Pretty disgusting.

And my body isn't happy with me either. I feel bloated and unfortunately still hungry.

I'm done. Never again. My tastebuds have thankfully evolved in the last 10 years.

My Ramen phase has officially passed. Praise the Lord!

Hungry

It seems so simple, but being hungry is an all encompassing situation. It is hard to think, concentrate or do basically anything when you desperately need a few calories to keep you moving.

Today I found myself without my trusty bag of groceries, on the other side of the world with no hope of redeeming myself.

For those of you who aren't New Yorkers, I was on the Upper East Side. I live on the Westside, which makes anything east of 5th avenue a foreign country. I really have no clue when I'm there. Groceries, deli's, restaurants, I haven't the slightest. If I didn't have a smart phone I am certain I would never find my way out.

So, every day I've found myself tossing random things into a plastic sack and dragging it where ever I go. Lately its been random cheeses (something I will talk about more very soon), bread and the occasional vegetable. Not terribly balanced, but it curbs the pangs, and gives me the energy to carry out my day.

As I ran off to job #3 today I left the bag behind. I left my dinner. Any other day that wouldn't have phased me. There is a sandwich shop around every corner. All I would need to do is run there and pick something up. Alas, I could not. For once, my stubbornness and discipline kicked in and I persevered.

My lunch of instant oatmeal wasn't cutting it, and I have to admit, I did get a little hazy as I wandered across the street to the pharmacy for a healthy snack. I found some dried fruit and consumed it in about the same amount of time it took me to purchase it.

I never imagine people who can't eat. People who have nothing, with no money to buy food, or no food to even buy.

I go hungry on principle, because I'm busy and stubborn. There are many people in this world that don't have the abundance of choice that I do. I am thankful of my choice, and even more thankful for the choice today of being hungry.

Staring at Breakfast

Although I am most excited for breakfast fare, it is the most difficult meal of the day for me. I always wake up late. Its a given, almost a ritual in life.

This week I've managed to spare about 2 and a half minutes to grab a tiny breakfast from my kitchen before I walk out the door. Truth is, even though I grab it, doesn't mean I want to eat it. Many days I am too groggy, wandering half asleep, or am feeling so raw from staying up impossibly late the night before that I can't bring myself to eat even the simplest granola bar and applesauce cup.

That brings me to 2 pm, when I am still foodless and now ready for lunch, my breakfast plans officially spoiled. In my life eating take-out that would translate itself into giant lunch from the deli across the street. Instead I snack on cheeses and crackers, carrots left in my mini-fridge from the day before. Not exciting, but rather than gorging myself, I'm taking it a little slower.

So number 1 plan for this next week? Incorporate breakfast. Somehow, someway I will do it!

Reality

So...for many of you who live life like real people, the concept of not grocery shopping and not cooking probably seems ludicrous. About a year and a half ago I would have agreed with you. Then the life of a free lancer hit. I have a full time job that pays only half time, so I end up with millions of odd jobs to make up the difference. I love all of them...so its really only a hardship on time.

My jobs are pretty cool. I get to teach college kids how to sew all day, and toss in a few hours of teaching theatre in a classroom. After that I get to build giant snails, style wigs for opera, design Alice in Wonderland, make dresses, design dance costumes, whatever comes my way.

I realize more and more that there aren't enough hours in my day for all of the things that are necessary for "real life" When you get to work at 10 am and leave at 1 am, it doesn't leave much time for meal planning, grocery shopping, working out or relaxing.

In the freelance world, its either feast or famine. So when there's work you take it. Its a game and a race. Those who play hard succeed. I have chosen to play as hard as I can.

That brings me to take out; why it has been such a giant part of each and every day. I simply decided I didn't have the time to deal with it. So much simpler to pick something off the menu than plan it ahead of time. In the past three days I've found that groceries are actually faster. I'm sure they are healthier, as I feel like I've lost 5 lbs since I started. Incentive to keep going? Yes. Just very thankful that I'm currently not in tech:)

Lost and found

Yet another morning of breakfast failure. The burrito is still on the horizon. I'm hoping tomorrow.

But in the midst of my rationalization that more sleep is infinitely better than eating, I remembered one great thing, my cupboards. I've been to the grocery store...a couple months ago or so. I had totally forgotten what was up there! Ta Da!!! Granola Bars! Oats and Honey from Nature's Valley. Hello non-cooked breakfast! Beautiful. Add in newly purchased crackers and farmers market goat cheese for lunch and yet another taco with a red pepper for dessert, and you make a great and much healthier food day.

Tomorrow a friend comes to visit from far away. I will be eating out. But hopefully cooking a little too. Can't wait for the adventures that will ensue.

To fail, and to triumph?

I had every intention of making a breakfast burrito this morning.

I brought the tortillas from my tacos yesterday home with me stuck them right next to my fresh carton of eggs I bought a week ago and haven't yet touched.

I failed. After grading papers til 3 am, I somehow didn't quite have the energy to get out pans and turn on the stove, much less actually get out of bed more than 15 minutes before I needed to be at work.

Total mess. I skipped breakfast, since I had no other plans, and finally got around to lunch around 2. Chicken taco. Again. Boring, yes, but its food, and essentially free? Yes?

After teaching a class on a great African play, building a fat suit, 1930's underwear and shleping through torrential rains to Chinatown for wig fittings, I was famished.

I decided to stop by Whole Foods for a few groceries and a lot of drooling. Whole Foods never fails to make me want to spend all of my money on fancy tasty things and become exceedingly fat and happy while doing it.

My few groceries turned into a small cart.

$51. 77 later I'm back at my office for another round of work, pleasantly munching on the spoils of my grocery adventure. I know that's a lot of money for a seemingly small amount of food. Groceries are very expensive here...and many times it is really not the cheapest option. But I am content with new breakfasty options, carrots and guac and my really tasty cheese and crackers. Yum!

40 days of creative eating

I don't cook. I can cook, but with long work hours and a tiny NY kitchen I find myself at the corner ordering a sandwich or a bagel at least 2 meals out of 3 per day. Its great. Easy, simple, and feels so luxurious. At this point in my life I can definitely afford this, but should I afford it? Maybe not. Well, definitely not. Recently I started imagining what I'm eating away each day. A trip to a crazy foreign country? A visit with family in MN? A great new purse or pair of shoes?

So for Lent this year I'm giving up take out. I will still eat meals out with friends, but no more will I casually wander to a cafeteria or fast food restaurant and watch them put my food together. I will put it together myself and hopefully my body and my pocketbook will thank me for it.

This morning I was craving that hot crispy bagel, but instead I went for the yogurt that was almost expired in my fridge. Good choice. Still hungry, but the frugalista in me is jumping up for joy.

Its going to take a lot of thought and planning to make this work; creative choices that are practical for my epic work schedule as well as interesting enough to compete with diversity of 9th ave restaurants.

Lunch today is tacos and rice pudding. Tomorrow? who knows. I hope I will be inspired, or I'm going to get really hungry. Got suggestions? I'd be grateful to hear them...

Happy Lent everybody!