What I Ate Wednesday #21 – The Last Anniversary

*Have you entered my Tropical Traditions coconut oil giveaway yet? It ends tomorrow and a winner is announced on Friday!*

Well, it’s not really the last anniversary, but last Thursday was our last dating anniversary until we get married! We celebrated 9 long wonderful years of dating, and while people really don’t celebrate their dating anniversary after they get married, I think we’re going to have to do something for the big 1-0!

I had some fun with my food so I couldn’t wait to share it with you today! Happy WIAW!

[Breakfast]
In the midst of my dark chocolate cherry protein pancake obsession, but to make it anniversary special, the future hubs and I made sure to cheers each other over a mimosa.

[Snack]
Blueberry greek yogurt. Yet another obsession of mine that I just can’t shake. It’s the perfect bit of sweetness and protein to get me through the morning.

[Lunch]
Salad with roasted pork tenderloin, tons of veggies, roasted red pepper sauce, and a little feta. Hey, I had to get a little fancy..

[Snack]
I’d been jonesing for a banana but seeing as how I was at work, the best I could do was a banana SOYJOY. I popped that baby in the microwave for 10 seconds and was in heaven! To my surprise, it really did satisfy my banana craving!

[Dinner]
A night out at Waterfront Kitchen was in order. We’d never been there but had heard so many good things about this new-ish farm-to-table restaurant in our hood. First question: wine or beer? We opted for beer and went straight to Unibroue! La Fin du Monde is one of our all time faves.

Looking at the menu, we immediately noticed that the dishes were not very complex. We’ve been to restaurants 100 times that have wowed us in their menu descriptions, so the simple preparation of these dishes was a nice change of pace.

As a light appetizer, we shared a warm brussel sprout salad with bacon, onion, and microgreens. It was so tasty and rich! I’m glad we split it.. I don’t know if I could have finished it on my own! What we could finish, however, was our first beer. Onto another Unibroue; next we tried Don de Dieu. This was a new one for us and we loved it, but not as much as La Fin Du Monde.

Nathan order the pork ribeye with wild mushrooms, heirloom peppers, farm fresh kale, and blackberry demi glace. I opted for the monkfish “osso bucco” with stewed cherry tomatoes, onion, sweet potato, and wilted Swiss chard. As I mentioned, the dishes seemed to have a simpler preparation which left it to execution. Spot. On. The dishes were flavorful and perfectly cooked. We couldn’t have asked for more enjoyable bites!

We finished our dinner with some coffee and the dessert special of the night: pumpkin cake with local butter pecan ice cream. Not too heavy and not too sweet; the perfect ending to a wonderful meal. (And a delicious halloween treat!)

Do you see Nathan ready to dive into dessert? 😉 Seems to always happen with dessert!

Food for Thought

Do you prefer to go out to dinner for special occasions or have a romantic meal at home?

We always go out for our anniversary but stay in for Valentine’s Day so we don’t have to deal with all of the craziness!

What I Ate Wednesday #9 – Wedding Crashers

Remember when I said I found the best part of wedding planning? Well I think in the last 2 weeks I’ve found 2 more things that rival for the best part—dress shopping and band shopping!

First and foremost, I got a dress! And I love it and I want to wear it all the time and I can’t wait to put it on again! Wanna see pictures?! You got it! On May 12, 2013  😉

After it took 5 months to find the right venue, I was worried that dress shopping was going to be a complete nightmare, but it was so much fun and it only took me 2 trips to say YES to the dress! (I had to.. really, I did.)

Secondly, band shopping has been a bit frustrating to start off. We’ve just been listening to tons of cliche demos all the while, trying not to laugh. Once we picked out a few bands we liked, we were told to go check them out. Sooooo we crashed a wedding! Yes, we were invited by the band management company, but not by the bride and groom. We got dressed up, turned it into a full on date night and had a great time!

Now onto the eats..

Breakfast
Lately, I’ve been in love with protein pancakes. I was on quite a roll for awhile with the Tone It Up pineapple protein pancakes, but decided to switch it up. Julie from Peanut Butter Fingers has a recipe for banana bread protein pancakes that I tried awhile back and absolutely fell in love with! So now, I’m on a banana bread protein pancake kick that I just can’t seem to shake. And I’m totally ok with it! Top it off with my favorite Tone It Up bombshell spell and I’m in heaven!

Lunch
A delicious spicy Asian chicken and vegetable dish with whole wheat couscous. So delicious, that I didn’t get a picture!

Snack
Strawberry yogurt bites. A little something sweet that I whipped up in no time!

Dinner
Since we had to get all dressed up anyway, we figured we might as well head to a new restaurant for an impromptu date night!

Seasons 52 was the restaurant of choice. This restaurant uses seasonally inspired ingredients with a menu that is updated weekly. (Get it? Seasonally updated.. 52 weeks in a year..)

Nathan chose it because he loves me.. aka everything on the menu is 475 calories or less. And it doesn’t hurt that the menu sounded awesome!

I ordered the organic arugula salad with watermelon, grilled golden beets, jicama, toasted pistachios, and a side of lemongrass salmon. The salad was amazingly delicious and the salmon tasted like it was totally indulgent, but it wasn’t! On the side, I enjoyed a wonderful watermelon refresher. I’m a sucker for any kind of watermelon cocktail!

Nathan got the ripe plum tomato flatbread with fresh basil, roasted garlic, and parmesan cheese, and a mixed green salad on the side. The flatbread was everything a flatbread should be. Super thin, crispy crust, not a ton of cheese, and nice and light.

And because our meals were so light and wonderful, we topped it off with their mini indulgences. I had the chocolate peanut butter mousse and Nathan ordered the mocha macchiato. Both fantastic, but I think I won the dessert round! He kept trying to sneak little bites!

My one complaint about Seasons 52 is that the closest one is an hour away. That said, we might have to visit friends in the area more so we can go back 🙂

Fitness

I’m not gonna lie, I totally killed it at the gym the other night. But my favorite part of my workout was the GNC lean leg circuit from Jess at Blonde Ponytail. If you watch the video, she tells you to do 3 rounds of this circuit, but if you’re up for the challenge, you can do it tabata style, or 8 times through.

As I got through the first 3 sets, I thought “alright, this isn’t so bad.. let’s take it to 5!” Got to 5 sets and thought “I’m doing it.. I’m going for all 8 sets!” I finished all 8 sets in 20 minutes and felt awesome! And 2 days later, I’m remembering each and every one of those moves every time I stand up. Hurts so good!

Speak Up!

Have you tried a new restaurant recently? What was the best part of your meal?