Book Update Sept/October

I really have not been very good about keeping up with this blog but life has been SUPER crazy and exhausting lately. That said, I did manage to finish 3 books and now on to my 4th. I have a hard time falling asleep without reading for pleasure. I need something to inhibit the noise from the day and get me in an organized thought process such as a plot line.  That said, here is what I've been reading.

I finished Gifted Hands by Ben Carson in September. It was a very inspiring story of a boy who realized God's calling early and rose up against the odds becoming one of the most famous pediatric neurosurgeons. Carson gives credit and thanks to God throughout his entire journey. This was a very nice change from the stereotypical surgeons who accomplish such amazing medical feats and take credit themselves. I would recommend this book to any middle/high school student who has not found their calling yet or may be struggling to find good role models.

Next, I read Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. I read the full translated version which is very different than several others in one very big way, Anna is not the sole protagonist. I was motivated by the movie trailer but just learned that the movie is using a specific adaptation that almost completely leaves out major story lines, mainly Kitty and Levin. The novel is over 900pgs but is beautifully written. I was amazed at how seamlessly you are carried from one character's psyche to another's. The stories are all entangled and the underlying search for God for several characters is wonderful. Particularly, as these characters are the ones who find fulfillment while Anna who started off head of the curve, slowly digresses over time until I wasn't sorry when her story ended.  I have never disliked a protagonist more than Anna.

After completing Anna Karenina, I read Ultramarathon Man by Dean Karnazes. If you ever wanted motivation to run a few miles, read Karnazes's account of running 200+miles in a single run. At times the book is very inspiring. Other times I wanted to stop reading such as when Karnazes tries to play humble about his accomplishments which only makes him seem the reverse. All in All, the book did its job getting me excited to run. Now the question is how far can I run?


I've started my next book, Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer. It's about an Everest expedition that goes wrong. We'll see how that one makes me feel about mountain climbing,

Vegetable Lasagna

I love lasagna but they always leave me feeling heavy with all of the cheese and meat. Several of the vegetable lasagnas I've tried used cream in the sauce also leaving a very heavy feeling. I decided to take the basic concept of lasagna and create a more colorful version with my favorite vegetables with just enough pasta and cheese. As I wanted this to be a relatively simple dish, I used a tomato basil sauce from a jar. No time to make that stuff from scratch today.
Suggestions to change things up: Add more layers, more cheese and make the tomato sauce from scratch.

Vegetable filling
1 medium onion, chopped
1/2 crown of broccoli
1.5c mushrooms, chopped (I used baby bella)
1.5c eggplant, chopped
1 medium zucchini, sliced then quartered
1c bell peppers, chopped (I used small sweet peppers)
2tsp minced garlic

Cheese filling
1c Ricotta cheese (I used reduced fat)
1/4c shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4c shredded Mozzarella cheese
1 large egg

Jarred tomato sauce and 6 lasagna pasta sheets (or as many as needed)

1. Wash and chop the vegetables. Fill large pot with water and bring to a boil.

 

2. In a large skillet heat 1Tbs extra virgin olive oil. Add onion, cook 4 minutes. Add broccoli, cook 3 minutes. Add eggplant, cook 3minutes.  Add zucchini, cook 4minutes. Add pepper, cook 2minutes then add mushrooms. Cook until all vegetables reach a desired tenderness. I prefer mine a little crunchy so I only continued cooking about 5 more minutes then set the mixture to the side.

3.Add pasta to water. While pasta cooks, combine Ricotta, Parmesan and Mozzarella and egg.  Spray 13x9 or 9x9 glass pan (smaller will make more layers. I was afraid of overflowing so I used larger glassware.) Add a thin layer of tomato sauce to the pan.

4. Once pasta has cooked, place a layer of pasta on the bottom of the pan. Then layer cheese, vegetables and some tomato sauce. As I used a large pan, I created another layer of vegetables and tomato sauce. Then add another layer of pasta and continue layering until complete. I finished with a layer of pasta, marinara sauce and then 1.5c Mozzarella cheese on top.
So my final product ended up with these layers: pasta, cheese mixture, vegetable mixture, tomato sauce, vegetable mixture, tomato sauce, pasta, tomato sauce, cheese. I used the whole jar of tomato sauce.

5. Cover with foil, bake for 15minutes at 350degrees. Remove foil and bake uncovered for 10minutes or until cheese is melted.
6. Let it cool a bit and then Enjoy!

A little speech production for you

Check out my glog, a virtual poster I created as an example for my Intro to Cognitive Psyc class. It is my version of the individual project I am requiring for the class. It's not the best and I mainly copied and pasted some of my thesis into it, but it's still kinda cool. My thesis is on novel speech production acquisition or how our brains learn to produce sounds that do not exist in our native language.
http://vewagner.edu.glogster.com/glog-8244/

To run or not to run

I've been feeling kinda funny today and not sure if I should run. I've been feeling body aches, tight chest, stuffy/runny nose, slightly nauseous. All symptoms of a cold or flu, or a combination of really bad allergies and an asthma attack.

According to this Runnersworld article, you should use the "neck rule" when deciding to run sick. Meaning if symptoms are above the neck (stuffy nose) then it's okay to run. If symptoms are below (chest, body ache), then you should take time off.
That helps my decision but only so much.  I've been exposed to lots of new germs this week while dealing with addition stress from school. I also know my body pretty well and a light jog could really benefit most of these symptoms if it's just allergies and asthma. I also took yesterday off.

 So what to do? How would you make this decision?

Vegetable "Carbonara": My new comfort food

This week was hectic. The start of the school year left me dealing with a student who decided  that since it was my first time teaching an undergraduate level course, she could tell me how to do it. This did not go over well with me and I eventually told her while I appreciate her concern for the class, I know what I'm doing. Thank you very much.
Then while heading out for church, I noticed glass and a huge dent in the left rear bumper of our car. The individual drives a large red truck or SUV and doesn't leave notes, according to the very nice and prompt HPD officer who to our report.

 Needless to say it was a rough week.

The bright spot so far has been finding this wonderful recipe in the September 2012 issue of Cooking Light (pg 140) or can be found here. As usual, I changed things up a bit.

Motivation: looking for a new pasta recipe with lots of vegetables
Changes: The original recipe calls for regular pasta and pecorino Romano cheese. I chose to use whole wheat for added fiber and I use Parmesan cheese since that what I had in the fridge already. I didn't have any fresh basil so that got left out.  I also added mushrooms as the magazine suggested.
Next time: I will add fresh basil and sun-dried tomatoes.

The sauce turns out to be incredible creamy and comforting. I will be making this much more often.

Vegetable "Carbonara"

Adapted from Tomato and Asparagus "Carbonara" from Cooking Light Sept 2012  

3 quarts water

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 pound (1-inch) diagonally cut trimmed asparagus
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
1/2 cup slice mushrooms
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, finely grated
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 large egg
8 ounces uncooked whole wheat penne pasta

1. Bring water to a boil in a large pot

2. Chop all the veggies

3. Heat a LARGE skillet over medium-high heat. My stove runs hot so I used medium heat. Once the skillet it hot , add 1Tbs olive oil and swirl around to coat the skillet.

4. Add asparagus, cook 3minutes. then add garlic, cook for 1min. Make sure to stir a lot at this point so the garlic doesn't burn. Then add mushrooms and tomatoes. cook until tender about 7minutes

 5. In a small bowl, whisk together egg, cheese and salt and pepper. Mine turned out to be very thick.

6. Next, drain pasta and place in a large bowl. Then toss with sauce mixture. The sauce will melt from the heat of the pasta.

7. Then add vegetable mixture to pasta and toss to coat.

8. Enjoy!

The most important meal of the day

My first food post!
A note about how I cook: I tend to modify recipes. I rarely use a recipe straight from the book or website. This is mainly because my husband can be a picky eater and I'm only cooking for two. So sometimes I reduce excess fat or add more veggies, cut recipes in half or by 1/3 etc. I also try to buy only ingredients I'm going to use. Nothing super fancy for a single meal that will result in throwing away unused amounts. If I buy 3lbs of potatoes or a large eggplant, you bet we're going to be eating several meals with those ingredients in the next week.
I apologize now for the horrible photos. I'm not a food photographer and my kitchen has very bad lighting. BUT I'm not going to let that stop me since I have so many recipes I either love or want to try and share even with my bad photos.

Recipe: Make ahead breakfast burritos
Origin: Pinterest
Modification: No hashbrowns, not the full recipe
Motivation behind trying this recipe: My husband eats breakfast at school every morning after cross country practice.  During the summer, I make either scrambled eggs, omelettes, burritos or oatmeal for breakfast every morning. Since I can't do that at school, I think this might be a good substitute for our busy schedule while still being filling and decently healthy.

What I used:
5 eggs
2TBS milk
1cup HEBs frozen fajita veggies (onion, green and red bell peppers)
4 slices Turkey Bacon
6 soft taco size flour tortillas (I like HEB original style)
1/3c cheddar cheese

Step 1. Cook the bacon

Step 2. While bacon cooks, beat the eggs and milk together and defrost the veggies.

Step 3. Cook veggies until onions are transparent.

Step 4. Add eggs to veggies and scramble. At this point, I broke the bacon into pieces and added it to the eggs near the end of cooking. I let the eggs cool before filling the tortillas

Step 5: Fill tortillas, sprinkle a little cheddar cheese and wrap in plastic warp. I over filled my tortillas so they didn't want to close on the ends. 

Step 6: For the burritos I wanted to freeze, I wrapped a layer of foil over the plastic wrap and popped them in the freezer.

To reheat, take the burrito out of the foil and plastic wrap. Place in moist paper towel and defrost for 30sec-1min. Then microwave for 1min flipping the burrito over after 30sec.  Enjoy.

Future modifications: Whole Wheat tortillas

Book Update 13-Aug

I try to read for fun every night before bed. Sometimes I finish books in a few days, others take me weeks or months. But since my bedtime routine is habit, the nights blur and I can't remember WHEN I read a book. A book I read last summer might still feel new to me. This isn't helpful when you have a reading goal such as finish 20 book this year. So below is a list of the books I KNOW I read this year.

The Hunger Game trilogy. Don't get me started I have far to many opinions about these books.

The Zookeeper's Wife: a War Story by Diane Ackerman

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood by Oliver Sacks

reread Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History by Penny LeCouteur and Jay Burreson

The Medici Giraffe and Other Tales of Exotic Animals and Power by Marina Belozerskaya This was an awesome find at Half Price Books.

So that makes 9 book I know I've finished only 11 more to go.

Currently reading: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat: and Other Clinical Tales by Dr. Oliver Sacks