I’m sharing recent snacks & food from the kitchen! I haven’t talked food & groceries in a long time, so I thought it would be appropriate to pepper your life with some healthy snacks to feed yourself in between the holiday treats.
Surprisingly, this is a common question I get asked when people know I drastically changed my diet. Pretty quickly, someone will ask how I eat the way I do, when Wafiq can eat anything he wants.
Back at it today with another BASICS post! Have you guys made Basic Turkey Burgers yet? Hmmmm?! Or Basic Crispy Chickpeas? They’re both so easy, it’s a great first step to getting comfortable in your kitchen. Today, we’re baking yummy, crispy, sweet potato wedges. Again, sticking to a super basic recipe here, but if you master a few food basics, it’ll help you build & become a professional chef! (lollollol)
Let me start by explaining a sweet potato.
I decided I’m going to start a “BASICS” part of MissBassmaster where I’ll share really simple things that some people might not know how to do or have forgotten about. Last week I shared my 5 Ingredient Turkey Burgers (so good), & this week I’m sharing roasted chickpeas.
Now that I’ve been honest about my ongoing allergy status I feel like I can talk! I’ve been hesitant to share what I’ve been eating, without an explanation, because I thought you would wonder what the hell I was doing. Why aren’t you adding GARLIC!?
Now I can be freeeeee!
Here’s a funny discovery – I’ve been eating what I consider boring, bland, basic foods. I easily get full & I eat a lot of food, but it’s nothing spectacular or complicated.
HOWEVER, every single time I eat & someone is around – they’re wanting to eat my food. And not just a bite, they want it. All of it, as their meal. That came as a huge surprise to me – why would anyone want in on my Veggie Rice when they can eat french fries, pizza, hamburgers, or spaghetti?
At first I was annoyed, I was making my personalized foods & bringing my meal with me everywhere I went in order to make sure I would be comfortable eating. When everyone else wanted in on the ONE thing I could eat at the table, I was left a little… hangry.
I quickly learned. Now, I make a lot of whatever I’m eating & share it with everyone – rather than assume they won’t like it. This has also proven how willing people are to eat healthy when it’s in front of them. As much as everyone wants to deny it, simple & healthy foods can also be delicious! Sharing my food & knowing people actually like it? Makes me feel relieved about my diet situation.
{Wafiq’s the worst ever because I ask him if he wants to eat what I’m having & he always says no. Like, he would never touch it. Then I make my meal & he literally wants to trade what he’s having for mine. Highly annoying.}
All this leads me to turkey burgers!
I’ve been using ground turkey as a way to add variety into my diet. Rather than beef everyday, I mix in turkey. If you’ve ever cooked with ground turkey before you know it’s a lot harder to make into burgers than beef, because it’s ‘wet’. I knew in order to make it work for me, I’d have to add something to soak up the moisture, but I can’t do bread crumbs. So I went for my bestie – Hot Rice Cereal. Mix turkey, egg, cereal, salt + pepper and you have yourself some delicious, simple turkey burgers!
The day has come to talk, Beautycounter. A lot of you know the bits & pieces of my allergy struggle the past few months. Unfortunately, it’s snowballed into more than a pesky lil mosquito. I decided I’ll open up more about that subject soon! I have to think about exactly how & what I want to explain, as it’s a pretty sensitive subject…
One thing I always thought would be an overwhelming task, was to change out all of my foods + all my products to be safer. It’s intimidating! Not to mention expensive & a bit dramatic. I thought I did better than a lot of others, as far as safe food & safe products go, so that was enough. Likeee, I eat organic carrots mmmkay? I’m good.
But recently I’ve become uber aware of everything that’s going into my body (because allergies, boo) & a side effect of that has been my increased awareness of what I’m putting ON my body. What I put IN my body & ON my body organically became equally important.
Before I had a chance to overthink or stress over safe products, I found myself naturally being cautious of what was going on my skin & subtly making changes. With barely a hiccup. That’s the long story for why I finally wound up shopping at Beautycounter. For those that aren’t yet aware, Beautycounter’s Mission is “to get safer products into the hands of everyone.” Here’s some scary information for you to digest: “Over the past two decades, the European Union has banned close to 1,400 chemicals in the product formulas of personal care products and restricted the levels of over 250 more in such products. The United States has only partially banned 30 to date.” (via)
Super chill, right?
But my point here is not to scare you, because that doesn’t necessarily work. Like I said, I wanted to try a few products because of my allergies & it’s taken off from there.
I’m sharing the products I’ve been using for a month or more so you can get an honest opinion on whether or not you decide to start rotating a few of them through your beauty routines.
Well here’s a little known fact about myself to chipper you up on your Thursday – I prefer/can only write a blog post when I’m listening to the Kygo station on Pandora. It has that perfect mix of vocals & instrumentals, inspiring me to get my deepest words out to the world! It can also take a turn for the worst & get me too emo, when I go back & read posts I can always tell. Ha!
TODAY is one of the best days for you guys because I’m forcing you to listen to me rave about these fucking incredible knives that I’ve ONLY cut my fingers on ONE time. And that may or may not been because I was under the influence.. of something other than wine.
ALL HAIL IKEA $2 KNIVES!
I’ve tried other knife sets & knives from different companies that claim they have the baddest, bestest, sharpest knives in the world! Not because I’ve owned many of them, but because I’ve gone to other homes & asked to use their knives. And as predicted, they fucking suck! They either have to be sharpened, be polished, or go through some other bull shit procedure in order to cut a tomato… BUT THESE IKEA BEAUTIES REQUIRE NOTHING BUT LOVE. And they slice through a tomato like butter! Are they the prettiest knives with their bright yellow & red handles? Depends if you like ketchup & mustard. I have no shame, I proudly set them at the table, especially with guests over. I’ve thrown out the other prettier knives Wafiq inherited, no more pretending Ikea knives aren’t the only things in our kitchen that matter.
I’m doing a throwback post today. I’ve been editing prior posts & came across this Olive Oil + Hair story. I died laughing because I vividly remember smelling like a kitchen & trying desperately to convince myself that I could NOT walk around all day/w olive oil in my hair. Way too much alone time. But the post made me laugh so I figured I’d repost it today & hopefully enhance your day w/a little humor – Enjoy!
I saved my life. More like my hair’s life. I have super long, thick, blonde hair that has been severely neglected since my move to Dubai.
I rarely wash it. I try to go as many days as possible in the most extreme ways not to wash my hair. (The key is finding different ways to wear your hair the second & third/fourth/fifth day without a wash.)
The problem happens on the days I choose to wash my locks. I’ve been using shampoo that I believe physically assaults my hair. I’m nearly positive my hair is crying when I put the shampoo through it & it continues to cry until it gets oily again. In truth, my hair has probably been crying since I landed in Dubai.
I used to buy expensive shampoo + conditioner because I spend a lot of money highlighting & want to stretch the color as long as possible. I don’t want to waste the money I spent highlighting, by ruing my hair with bad product. Miss High Maintenance, Hiiii
That all went out the window when I got to Dubai. I RARELY do my hair. And when I do put in effort, it means half blow drying it & leaving it down. Most often I braid it or put it up in a bun.
The neglect started when I ran out of my good ol American shampoo & couldn’t find the one I was previously using. Shortly after that, I found a few pieces of my hair that I think missed my last trim, so I cut them myself..? I’ve never done that before. Between nasty shampoo and a self trim, I thought my hair was treacherous. I started putting it in a ponytail every single day, which again I don’t think is good for your hair. The color started fading (probably just in my head) and it turned into Rapunzel length. In a bad, ratty way.
So I booked an appointment to get my hair cut & highlighted. BUT, I was completely terrified to show up to a nice salon with my hair being dried out, self cut & brassy. I went to Pinterest in last minute efforts to find a solution that could fake maintained looking hair until it was fixed.
Olive Oil.
I’m back w/a few other kitchen favorites! I’m all about trying new flavors, doing new things, and not getting too comfortable with -anything! Including food. I keep these 5 ingredients in my kitchen most of the time, and think it’s worth a try if you haven’t. Sometimes, when they’re sitting there starring at you, you’re more likely to make use of them. I might not cook w/these guys every day, but they’re common enough ingredients to keep around
You know what they say, you can’t change a guy? Don’t even try. Well folks, I’ve done it, I’ve changed Wafiq. From the guy that knew the name of the person working drive-thru at McDonald’s to the guy asking for Brussel Sprouts at dinner.
I’m not a huge climate change advocate but it does break my heart to see what mother earth is going through, especially with some of our wasteful decisions – so I try my best to do little things that will hopefully make a difference. Creating less trash sounds like a good start.
I used to be afraid of recipes that had ingredients I didn’t use or have in my kitchen. I thought it took too much energy to find them & the unknown price & flavors… But over time & the use of bravery, I’ve stalked my kitchen with all kinds of interesting ingredients & end up using them more than I expected.
