Mid-Week Visit

Happy Wednesday!

Yesterday we were delighted to have our cousin Marissa visit us on one of her days off! She is a flight attendant and when she isn’t spending her days working on a plane she is usually a passenger flying somewhere gorgeous. She has basically been everywhere…India, Japan, St. Thomas, Jamaica, Costa Rica, Mexico, Canada, Sri Lanka, Ireland, Scotland, Andaman Islands, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Hawaii, Panama, Peru, Argentina, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Israel…you get the picture. We’re slightly jealous but glad she found time to come visit us with her crazy schedule.

She loves to cook just like us so we had tons of fun! We spent the first half of the day grocery shopping and cooking and spent the afternoon at the matinee showing of The Great Gatsby! It is such a good movie and even better that it only cost $6.50 to see it! The price of movie theater tickets kind of disgusts us, but matinee showings are usually much more reasonable! If you haven’t seen it yet…go right now.

Here’s yesterdays eats in picture form!

Breakfast started off with coffee made with our French Press for the first time! The french press is cool but we definitely love our coffee pot more. It may be nice if you only need to make a single cup of coffee but it probably will not become a everyday kinda thing. We’re too hooked on the perfect 10 cups of coffee our pot brews.

We had a delicious breakfast of hot oats one last time before the summer heat makes eating hot oats impossible. These were made with banana + cottage cheese and topped with buckwheat + coconut + almond butter

Lunch was a salad topped with Trader Joe’s Multigrain bread + avocado + corn + peppers + carrots + cucumber + and leftover grilled chicken with cherries and pineapple on the side

We just had to share with you all how perfect our avocado was! Does anyone else get anxiety before cutting an avocado? We are alway soooooo nervous it won’t be a good one…good thing we got lucky this time! Our avocado picking skills are getting much better thanks to this Pinterest find here.

This was our cousins lunch plate: cherries + spinach + avocado + indian chickpeas + a sliced pear

The Great Gatsby was a pretty long movie so we snuck in some snacks to hold us over! A fruit smoothie + some extra pineapple and cherries to snack on held us over until dinner

Dinner was a delicious crock pot creation inspired by Kath’s recipe here! We love cooking but sometimes it is just awesome when the crock pot does all the work for you. This was made with chickpeas + sweet potato chunks + cauliflower + tons of indian spices.

We served this amazing creation over bulgar wheat with yogurt + chopped cashews + shredded coconut was added after this picture was taken!

The rest of the evening was spent doing a one hour intense yoga session, relaxing, and enjoying each others company! After an hour of sweaty yoga our late night snack was a yogurt parfait with buckwheat granola + blueberry preserves + banana slices

Along with yesterdays eats, here are a few pictures of things we are loving lately!

Snack: sugar snap peas + Trader Joe’s cilantro hummus

Smoothie: frozen banana + blueberries + grapefruit juice

Now head on over to Peas and Crayons to join the party and see what everyone else is munchin’ on today.

Marvelous Muffins

We.
Have.
Perfected.
Our.
First.
Ever.
Muffin.
Recipe.

That’s marvelous in itself.

Marvelous enough to share with all of our blog friends linking up for #MIMM over on Katie’s blog Healthy Diva Eats.

But want to know what’s even better?

Our perfect muffins over soy yogurt.

Our perfect muffins over a smoothie in a bowl.

Our perfect muffins crumbled on-top of overnight oats (with sunbutter).

Our muffins eaten plain, by themselves.

You get the idea.

Greek Yogurt Protein Muffins
Makes 12 scrumptious muffins

Ingredients:
1 cup of rolled oats
1 1/4 cup of whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp iodized salt
2 large bananas, mashed (over rip bananas work perfectly for this!)
1 tbsp blue agave nectar
1 tbsp unsweetened applesauce
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 egg white
4 oz blueberry Chobani greek yogurt (or another flavor of your choice)
1/2 cup of unsweetened almond milk
cinnamon, for sprinkling on the tops of muffins before placing in the oven

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a muffin tray with coconut oil spray or place cupcake liners into the 12 spaces. You do not want your perfect muffins to stick to the tray after they are finished baking.
First, combine whole wheat pastry flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a mixing bowl. Set aside.
Next, combine mashed bananas, agave, applesauce, and vanilla extract. Then add in the egg and the egg white to the mixture and beat using a mixer until well combined. After combined, slowly add in the almond milk and the Chobani greek yogurt.
Next, slowly combine the wet mixture to the dry mixture until mixed. Be careful not to over mix the ingredients.
Spoon the batter evenly into 12 muffin cups. We used a 1/4 measuring cup to ensure each muffin had the same amount of matter. It works out almost perfectly if you do it this way. We just added the extra batter into the muffin cups we thought needed a little extra loving.
Sprinkle cinnamon on the tops of the muffins before placing in the oven.
Bake muffins for 18-20 minutes. Stick a toothpick in the middle of a muffin to check if they are finished cooking. If complete, the toothpick will come out of the muffin bare.
Let muffins cool for 10-15 minutes before placing on a cooling rack to finish cooling. Be careful when moving them to the cooling rack. Use a knife to help cut the muffins out of the tray.

And finally, enjoy the muffins one of the ways listed above. Let us know what is your favorite way to eat a freshly baked muffin.

**The muffins can be stored in the refrigerator for 3-5 days or placed in the freezer to use at another time. Individually wrap muffins so you can grab one and quickly defrost it in the microwave on a busy morning!

Coconut Date Energy Bites

As of this morning, we have successfully competed our first full week of Body Pump classes! There is no greater feeling than getting in an awesome work out before most people have even rolled out of bed.

Body pump is a barbell class that sculpts and tones your entire body! It focuses on low weight loads with high repetition movements to help you burn fat, gain strength, and quickly produce lean body muscles.

We are loving this class and if you think it seems like something you’d enjoy too, you should check out this website to see if there is a class taught in your area!

Although 5:30 am is a little too early for our typical big breakfast we still like to at least put something nutritious in our body before our workout. Late Sunday night we were brainstorming what we could make to grab quick in the morning before our first Body Pump class. With a container of dates that needed to be used and inspiration from our favorite food bloggers Kylie from immaeatthat and Emily from the Daily Garnish these were created.

Coconut Date Energy Bites (makes 23 tablespoon sized bites)

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of almonds
1 cup of rolled oats
10 dates, pitted
1 tablespoon of hemp seeds
2 tablespoons of ground flax
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1/4 cup of textured vegetable protein (TVP)
8 tablespoons of unsweetened shredded coconut (reserve 2 tablespoons for rolling)
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1/4 cup of water

Directions:

1. Pit your dates and chop them into bite sized pieces.
2. Combine all ingredients in blender or food processor, excluding water and 2 tablespoons of shredded coconut. Allow the mixture to blend for a minute or so to break down the ingredients.
3. Once the mixture is slightly dry and crumbly slowly add in 1/4 cup of water and continue to mix or blend together until the mixture becomes sticky and wet.
4. Scoop out tablespoon sized portions and roll them into balls.
5. Roll balls in shredded coconut and place in refrigerator or freezer.

These bites are super easy to make and you can basically substitute any ingredients for ones you have on hand. Any type of nut, peanut butter, or dried fruit would be a great addition to these energy bites. These are perfect to grab on the go and average about 65 calories per bite with almost 2 grams of protein! We usually grab 2-3 bites before our work out! These are definitely a new staple in our house.

A close up shot of these babies, yum!

What is your go-to snack before you workout?

Peanut Noodle Stir Fry

Lets be honest, peanut butter rocks.

There is something about a huge spoonful of peanut butter that just seems to make life so much better.

Peanut butter on oatmeal.
Peanut butter on yogurt.
Peanut butter on toast.

You get the picture.

We decided peanut butter on noodles would probably be pretty delicious too; we were right.

Peanut Noodle Stir Fry (serves 2)

Ingredients:
2 servings of whole wheat pasta
1 12 oz. bag of stir fry vegetables
6 asparagus stalks

Peanut Sauce (serves 2)

Ingredients:
4 heaping tablespoons of PB2
1 tablespoon of soy sauce
1/2 tablespoon of lime juice
6 tablespoons of water
1/2 teaspoon of red pepper flakes

Directions
1. Cook noodles according to package directions, drain and set aside.
2. Steam asparagus in microwave wrapped in damp paper towels for 1-2 minutes.
3. Steam stir fry vegetables in microwave for 3-4 minutes, or according to package directions.
4. Wisk peanut sauce ingredients together and heat in a small saucepan on medium-low heat.
5. Once the sauce is hot, toss with cooked noodles. Then add in steamed vegetables and toss to combine.
6. Serve topped with toasted sesame seeds and extra red pepper flakes!

This looked and smelled amazing and we almost didn’t want to stop and take a picture…but we decided it was too good not to share.

Sweet Potato Pancakes & WIAW

Having all this extra time on our hands is kind of dangerous. So dangerous, we had enough time to make pancakes. And not just ordinary, plain old pancakes. We made sweet potato pancakes! No worries WIAW readers, we are here to share the details with you. Inspired by Grace over at www.wholesomeandnutritious.blogspot.com, we decided we needed to take our love for sweet potatoes to the next step. What is even better than sweet potato pancakes?! The fact that these babies are 100% vegan! We have complete respect for all those vegans out there, and if it wasn’t for our love of greek yogurt we would probably be with ya!

Sweet Potato Pancakes
Serves 1

Ingredients:
1/2 cup oat flour
2 tsp baking powder
large pinch of cinnamon
1/2 cooked sweet potato, mashed
1/2 cup milk of choice (we prefer unsweetened almond milk)
coconut oil, for cooking purposes

Directions:
1. Mix all dry ingredients together. Then add in mashed sweet potato and milk.
2. Cook pancakes on medium heat in coconut oil or other oil of choice. Then layer pancakes with fruit of choice.

Enjoyed with a large cup of coffee mixed with truvia and International Delight sugar free coffee creamer. We finally finished off our peppermint creamer, and are out of luck until we can grab another bottle when it debuts again around the holidays. We spread raspberry preserves in between the pancakes and tipped them with a sliced banana and buckwheat groats. They were good but next time we would definitely spread some sun butter or peanut butter on top instead!

They were so filling we actually did not even finish the last few bites! We will definitely be making these again soon. Although we are big Greek yogurt and oatmeal fans it is fun to change up breakfast every once in a while.

The morning was filled with a trip to the grocery store! We love grocery shopping together. The best thing about our eating habits is that we both love 99% of the same foods. It makes grocery shopping so easy because we both want the same things! Grocery shopping with a friend is a great way to make good purchases. Next time you go grocery shopping bring a long a friend to support each other with choosing healthy things to put in your grocery cart!

Another important grocery shopping tip is to never grocery shop hungry. We curbed our mid-morning hunger with a PB filled date.

If you have not tried this easy snack yet, we think you ought to give it a try!

After grocery shopping we made a huge salad with some of our grocery store purchases. This yummy salad had leftover turkey (thanks mom), cherry tomatoes, strawberries, brussels sprouts, mozzarella cheese, and Maple Grove Farms Raspberry Balsamic. This dressing is a little on the sweet side, but we love our balsamic so we thought we would give it a try.

We also re-stocked our fridge with cottage cheese! We are obsessed and were craving some ASAP. We decided our afternoon snack needed to be cottage cheese topped with a little bit of all the fresh fruit we picked up today. Mango, Grapes, Cantaloupe, Strawberries, and almonds!

Dinner was consumed on the go for Devon at work and at home for Kayla! Recently people have asked us why we always eat the same things and wondered if there was anything that one of us liked that the other did not. We usually eat the same things because it is so easy to make two of everything. Another reason we eat the same things a lot is because a lot of things come in pairs of two! Have you ever noticed that before? We do not always 100% of the time eat the same things. Kayla hates chocolate, but sometimes Devon makes her smoothies with chocolate soy milk instead of plain or vanilla. Just one example of how we mix it up without others even knowing it!

Anyways, we made a sandwich with the rest of our brussels sprouts, a slice of harvati cheese, leftover hummus, and power greens!

Paired with a bowl of our homemade soup! We cleaned out our refrigerator last night by making this soup. Making your own soup is a lot easier than you think! Just follow this simple calculation: protein + vegetables + spinach + spices = a healthy homemade soup!

You can add in whatever you want! In our soup, we had turkey, canary beans, carrots, zucchini, onion, spinach, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper! Then when people notice how good your lunch smells in the lunchroom, you can brag about how you made it, yourself, with your own recipe!

Our evening snack was whenever either of us felt hungry. More of our favorite things. Yogurt, granola, and fruit! We picked up a box of Ezekiel almond cereal at the store and are loving it on top of our yogurt parfaits! The best part is that it is a complete protein in itself!

Beautiful food is just so fun to photograph! Who agrees with us?

We love to update every Wednesday to join the fun over at Pea’s and Crayons, and hope to keep the updates going all summer long! Be sure to check out what everyone else is posting about over on Jen’s blog, located here. Last week so many different bloggers linked up to share! If you are new to the blog world, feel free to link up and join in on the fun!

Speaking of the blog world, we have some news to share with you! We have been making some few changes to improve our blog! We now have our own double take love twitter account! Be sure to keep up with all of our updates and healthy tips by following us at @doubletakelove!

Marvelous Things Lately

Summer break is going marvelous.

Especially with marvelous salads.

marvelous smoothie bowls.

marvelous hand wrapped summer rolls

marvelous half price smoothies from Desserts, Etc.

marvelous greek yogurt bowls.

And marvelous life changing bread.

Our summer is also extra marvelous thanks to finding this favorite Yoplait frozen yogurt flavor at our local Walmart.

However, the most marvelous find of them all is definitely this jar of Artisana Raw Coconut Butter we scored from TJ Maxx.

We are in heaven.

It is marvelous over smoothies.

On top of oatmeal with diced apples and cinnamon.

And we’re eager to try it on top of our beloved sweet potatoes, we are sure it is going to be marvelous.

Starting today at 5:50am, we are taking up a new fitness class at our College! We know that the timing sounds a little crazy…but we are excited to start working out again. Our personal fitness goals for this summer are to gain muscle, get stronger, and be able to run longer distances again. We are hoping to eventually run a 5k when Kayla gets back from Australia! Although a 5k is not an extremely long distance, it is a start on our ultimate goal of someday running a half marathon!

We hope you all have a marvelous Monday, we know we will! Now head on over to Katie’s blog, Healthy Diva Eats and check out how marvelous her weekend was!

Do you have any marvelous goals for this summer?

Mothers Day Celebration

“Mothers hold their children’s hands for a short while, but their hearts forever.”
- Unknown

Each year, a day is set aside to celebrate motherhood. It’s an important holiday for all mothers, grandmothers, and great grand mothers. For us, it’s an important day to make sure our mother knows just how much we love her! Words cannot begin to explain how thankful we are to have her support and her love through all of the good and the bad times in our lives.

We know everyone is bias and claims their mother to be “the best” one out there. So here we are, claiming that our mother is THE best, for numerous reasons. Lets just take a moment to recall a few reasons why she is by far the best mom we know.

1.) She always puts herself second and will seriously drop everything if we are having a melt down and need some help! (this actually just happened a few weeks ago and she went as far as to leave work to come and find us to help us out)

2.) She is the most THOUGHTFUL woman we know. She randomly shows up with our favorite things (peanut butter, Luna bars, something from her fridge she knows we’ll eat before she does, the Sunday paper, Greek yogurt, bananas….you get the idea).

3.) Have you see her outfits lately?! Not only is she the best mom but she’s by far the most stylish!!

4.) She talks to us 482619 times a day, every day, and can never run out of things to talk about.

5.) She raised us to work hard for everything we have and has taught us to never take anything for granted!

We are taking today to celebrate just how amazing our mother is and we hope you all are doing the same thing for yours!