Things I love…

Week of: 7-25-11

These are my most craved foods this summer.

1. Easy Lunchboxes: Okay so not really a food, but a food delivery system if think about it. I spoke of these yesterday, but I love these lunchboxes. I discovered these on Lauren’s blog earlier in the summer and bought a set on Amazon. I’ve mostly been filling them with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, along with various veggies on the side.

The lunchboxes are great! They are dishwasher safe, are instantly portion controlled and won’t leak. I love that you can pack an entire lunch in here without dirtying three separate tupperwares.

I also bought the lunch box that fits these perfectly. You can load three easy lunchbox plastic sets in each bag, or you can do like I do – place your ice packs, water and a snack for later.

2. Central Market Soup: Call me crazy, because I am. It’s 100+ degrees outside, and I’m eating soup most days. WHY? I have no idea. When I don’t pack my lunch in one of the easy lunchboxs above, I normally stop at Central Market and eat lunch there. My standard lunch is a cup of soup, a container of raw veggies + a few mozzarella cheese balls (for extra protein) and a cup of fruit.

I love raw veggies and would frankly rather eat veggies raw than cooked and a bowl of plain raw veggies over a salad. I’ve always been this way! My favorite veggies I’ve been putting in my cups are: cabbage, cucumbers, mushrooms (only raw!), tomatoes, broccoli and sometimes baby carrots. It’s a delicious lunch! I’m loving Central Market’s black bean soup and their green chicken chile soup this summer.

3. Tex-Mex food: I’m still loving on refried beans, but it’s gone to a general love for anything tex-mex right now. Burritos and tacos have been the most common dishes this summer, but I’ll literally do just about anything I can for some beans and hot sauce. In fact, it’s been so bad – my dinner looked like this twice this week and twice last week.

Two crispy bean tacos with cheese, hot sauce and tomatoes. With the leftover beans and tomatoes on the side – plus two mini cucumbers peeled and diced. I can’t get enough tacos right now! Normally I stuff my tacos and burritos with tomatoes AND spinach, but as I mentioned yesterday – I’ve been low on groceries this week.

4. Nature’s Path Optimum Slim Cereal: I mentioned this yesterday as well, but I am seriously hooked on this cereal. Robin gave me a box of this one day because she said she wouldn’t eat it. I was skeptical, seeing as I normally just eat off brand cheerios every morning for breakfast. However, I tried this cereal and loved it instantly. It is superb nutritionally. 1 cup has ~200 calories, and 9 grams of both fiber and protein. If I eat a cup of this along with a cup of skim milk and fruit, I’m full for at least 4 hours and I find myself not as snacky in the afternoons. It’s amazing and I love it!

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My favorite part is it isn’t overly sweet or flavored. As you all know, I’m not a sweets fan – so I love the touch of sugar and vanilla this cereal has. It’s so much better than the other optimum cereal I tried and I definitely recommend you try it!

On the short list of other foods that almost made it: beef (which is super weird), trail mix and nectarines.

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