Vegetarian Tortilla Soup

It's been getting pretty chilly around here and I've been in a soup mood.

I won't lie, I've never had tortilla soup before and Michael and I were having a Mexican quinoa casserole and I just wanted some soup to go with it. So behold my crazy googling to figure out what was in tortilla soup and then I made my own version.

Vegetarian Tortilla Soup

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 medium yellow onion, diced

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 large zucchini, chopped

1 large potato, diced

1 bag of frozen yellow corn

15 ounce cans diced fire-roasted tomatoes, drained

1 small can of diced green chiles

1 can low-sodium black beans, drained and rinsed

About 6 cups of low-sodium vegetable broth

1.5 teaspoon chile powder

1.5 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

Unsalted corn tortilla chips

1. Heat the oil over medium high heat in a large stock pot,  add the onion, zucchini, and potato and saute until soft, about 5-10 minutes. Add the garlic and saute for a minute.

2. Add the corn, tomatoes, chiles, beans, vegetable broth, and spices. The broth should just cover the vegetable mix, if need be supplement with water.

3. Bring to a boil and then lower to a simmer for 35 minutes. Ladle into bowls and top with crushed tortilla chips, sour cream, and cheese.

It's warm with a little kick from the spices and chiles and packed with veggies and beans. Definitely a quick soup to put together and enjoy on the cold nights!

Enjoy!

An Example of Strength

I watch the Biggest Loser every week for multiple reasons.

One, and this may sound crude, it motivates me to move so I don't end up obese like the people on the show. Two, I want to be a personal trainer, not Jillian Michaels level, but it's fun to watch. Three, it's entertainment, I mean come on. Finally, because it's just downright inspirational.

This week they had one of the teams visit this fitness group together that just brought me to tears. 

It's called Beat Cancer Boot Camp

These people are cancer survivors, going through cancer, have been touched by cancer, you name it and they're there. Men and women. And they're working out! Even the people who are going through chemotherapy and lemme say, I know the toll it takes on someone to go through that, I watched my dad suffer through chemo recently and he was just dog tired constantly. 

source

These people absolutely astound me. I complain and give up on going to the gym because of a headache or a little mouth pain and here these people are fighting through cancer to be there to work out. It's just so inspirational to see this drive these people have to live.

So I'll ask this question

What's your excuse?

WIAW: 22 Going on 80

Happy Wednesday everyone!

Fall has decided to poke its head up every once in awhile around here. Some days it's warm (like low 70's) and some days it's pretty chilly where I have to wear leggings and thick fuzzy socks all day. I definitely prefer the latter as we're heading into mid-November and I already have Christmas music playing every now and then (more like every night but who counts?).

Thankfully Monday was a colder day and I even got to stay home with my awesome mama since she had the day off.

Thanks Jenn for the awesome party!

This theme makes me laugh now that I've gotten all my WIAW pictures because I have a few foods in here that are definitely not good habits. Maybe next week?

Breakfast:

Plain Malt-O-Meal with a little brown sugar and unsweetened almond milk

I don't know why, but I'm still in this kick of eating Malt-O-Meal every morning. I really gotta work on mixing it up around here.

  Morning "Snack"

Bad habit of the day #1. I didn't record the other candies that I ate throughout the day either. Don't follow my example, eat fruits and veggies

  Lunch:

Bean & cheese nachos with sour cream

I decided before I step foot in Whole Foods again I need to start cleaning out what food I have in my kitchen. My side of the fridge is filled with tubs of something that had a spoonful or two eaten and I'm working on finally just eating everything.

Mom and I spent the rest of the day watching Harry Potter movies while I acted like an 80 year old

  2 pots of apple cider in my beautiful little tea cup/pot 

And knitting...I'm only 22 I swear! I'm making Michael a scarf that he'll desperately need while he's out of the state for work so I'm trying to get it finished ASAP

Dinner:

Annie's mac & cheese, smashed potatoes w/ a little sour cream & pepper, and loads of veggies

After I knitted some more I curled into bed to video chat with Michael and then read a book until 9 when I passed out. Am I old or what?

Have a good week everyone!

Anyone else feeling decades older than normal? 

Thank You

Happy Monday everyone!

Today is a pretty awesome day. For one, I get the day off school which means an extra day to catch up on homework. And secondly, it's Veteran's Day and it's definitely a day that's pretty big around here.

My family is incredibly military-centric. My grandpa was in the Navy, my dad was in the Navy, uncles and cousins have been in the Navy, and my big brother is a Marine, serving our country for 14 years. And I have so so many friends that are in the military. Hell, I myself was considering joining the Marines after high school.

It's a big deal around here for my family and for me. I am so incredibly thankful to all who have served and are currently serving. You do so much to protect this country and I'll forever be grateful we have some amazing people on our front lines. 

So go out and thank a veteran today and Happy Veteran's Day!

The one on the right is the Marine, if you can't tell by that haircut ;)

 

Halloween 2013

So I realized after posting my What I Ate Wednesday post yesterday that I forgot I had planned to make it a recap of my Halloween. Instead you get a separate post telling how I spent my Halloween.

Michael and I decided to skip the gym in the morning in lieu of a relaxing one with some pumpkin waffles made by moi

And some matcha & a green smoothie (hey, it's creepy to some people!)

I ended up spending a good portion of my day in my two fitness classes and we had a "Trick or Treat" workout. Lemme say, there was no treat involved in the whole process. We did one of those work outs where it's all by chance from a deck of cards. In the end we did like 72 burpees, 80 something weighted squats, 50 something kettlebell swings, and 40 something crunches. The class after that was thankfully easier than the first, but god I was exhausted.

After class I swung by Target and Whole Foods to pick up a pumpkin and Darth Vader press in stuff. He was beyond excited

We headed over to Starbucks so I could enjoy pumpkin spice one last time

Then we headed home to relax before grabbing dinner. My costume was insanely basic. If I'm just hanging out at home I don't feel that I need to dress up in anything special

Cat ears, the most basic costume ever

For dinner we both decided we wanted pizza so we went to the Papa Murphy's around the corner from my house

A little jack-o-lantern pizza! How cute.

For the rest of the night Michael and I relaxed and watched some of my all-time favorite Halloween movies

Did anyone else watch the Halloweentown movies when you were younger? I loved these movies and have to watch them every year.

And of course we had to have some dessert

Mini pumpkin pies and a mini pecan pie split between Michael and I.

I had intended to make a pumpkin bread pudding, but it just wouldn't cook right so I had to give up on the idea and we ran out to save my night with Whole Foods desserts.

We stayed in because my poor little cat can't handle people constantly ringing the doorbell and I felt it was best to hermit ourselves in my room and try to have a quiet night. I ended up being annoyed by the doorbell more than my cat haha!

How was your Halloween?

WIAW: Eating Challenges

Happy Wednesday everyone!

Hope you're all having a good week so far.

Unfortunately mine hasn't been so wonderful. I had some dental work done on Saturday and still can't eat solid foods all that easily (or at all) and it's been a definite challenge trying to find stuff I can eat that keeps me full. Slowly but surely I'm figuring out what I can eat since then will be my diet for a few weeks so let's join Jenn with the food party!

Breakfast:

Malt of Meal with brown sugar and a little milk

Chai tea with unsweetened almond milk & stevia

Lunch:

Vegan stuffing from Whole Foods

Snacks:

Jar of baby food (I know, it's the only way I can get fruit in right now)

Fun size Three Musketeers bar (my mom has the Halloween candy still)

Hummus chips w/ garlic hummus

Unpictured chocolate coconut Larabar

Dinner:
Garlic mashed potatoes

Starbucks run:
Pumpkin cream cheese loaf
Gingerbread steamed milk

By the end of the day my poor mouth was aching and I was still pretty hungry from the non-so-filling food I ate all day. Thankfully now I'm figuring out some good things I can eat that keep me fuller.

Hope you all have a great week!

Letting Loose the Nerd in Me

Happy Monday everyone!

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend.

Mine didn't start out very wonderfully, I had to get some dental work done so as of late I've been surviving off these yummy things

Soft food is my friend until I can start eating really solid food again.

Thankfully I have an awesome boyfriend who takes care of me when I need it. So we ended up spending our day sleeping and watching Star Wars.

Sunday was a much better day. Michael's parents took us to a Star Wars exhibit that is going on in San Jose and lemme just say, it was pretty adorable seeing my 24 year old boyfriend act like a little kid. He was so freaking excited.

They had some familiar props from the movies

And some familiar characters

Michael just about peed himself he was so excited to see Darth Vader

Darth Vader is his all-time favorite character, and I'm pretty sure favorite movie character period.

After we walked around the exhibit we got to wait in this incredibly long line for the Millennium Falcon experience, which turned out to be a 5 minute movie you watched in a replica of the ship. Personally I felt like it wasn't worth the long wait, but it was pretty cool to see.

Us with Michael's sister and her boyfriend in front of the entrance to the ship.

It was pretty awesome to see the props and costumes used during the movies.