Booch Beer + Sledgehammer

Hi there, friends! Sorry to leave you high and dry last week. Seems like my crazy schedule from the past 2 weeks finally caught up to me and my brain just said “no more!” Luckily, I had a nice, relaxing weekend to recoop [before another crazy week.. such is life!] First things first, congrats to Brittney for winning my She’s Losing It! giveaway!

Our weekend mostly began on Friday; Nathan took the day off and I only had a 7 a.m. client. It was amazing to be done by 8 a.m., be able to hit the gym, run a few errands, and then just kick back. We had to make a Costco run and thought it would be a much better idea to do that on a Friday afternoon than Saturday. When we first moved out here, someone said to me “people in San Francisco have jobs, but no one ever works.” Man, did that ring true. Costco was still crazy! Luckily, we had gone out to lunch before and had a little liquid stress-relief.

Mine came in the form of 50/50 citrus ginger kombucha & Sierra Nevada Kellerweis. I’m not sure why I’ve never thought of mixing my own kombucha with beer at home but it’s definitely going to happen now! Easiest way to make beer healthy, right?

We had a few quiet nights including a little wine + movie night action.

I’ve been singing Sledgehammer since I got the bottle..

We watched Nightcrawler on Friday and Birdman on Saturday. I’d definitely recommend both.

Sunday was for work and meal prep. I’ve been having a hell of a time trying to figure out how to create a meal plan that can work for both of us. This vegan thing is totally throwing me through a loop, but I’m hoping this week goes a little smoother. That said, Nathan took some of it into his own hands and made a beautiful porchetta.

I’m making him save me some 😉 In the meantime, I have a few vegan options planned out for myself this week.

Weekly Meal Plan

Sunday – Roasted potato and asparagus lentil salad with tangy mustard-lemon dressing

Monday – Mushroom, lemon, & lentil salad
Tuesday – Plantain bean salad
Wednesday – Sweet potato & lentil salad
Thursday – Vegan cuban bowl
Friday – Lentils + roasted acorn squash & mushrooms
Saturday – Valentine’s Day!

Food for Thought

Did you do anything exciting over the weekend?

Liquid Diet

Hi friends! Hope you had a great weekend. We certainly did over here.. it started out a little like this:

We hit up a new-to-us restaurant for happy hour called Eureka! I planned on sticking with the 1 glass of wine but when I saw they had a Bear Republic Racer 5 with a shot of rye, I couldn’t pass it up. And I’m so glad I didn’t.. what a great combo! After dinner, we made our way over to another bar where a little more beer, a shared slice of pizza, and gelato happened. So much for sticking with 1 glass of wine, huh? 😉 It had been quite some time since Nathan and I went bar hopping and it was a really fun night.

That night that subsequently resulted in a nice, quiet Saturday morning.

Got myself all snuggled up on the couch before hitting up the farmers’ market, wandering Berkeley, and having a relaxing Saturday that ended in our favorite Indian food.

And if we didn’t get enough on Friday, we had a nice Sunday Funday. We made our way into the city and grabbed brunch at Pork Store Cafe.

The mimosa was a surprise.. Nathan decided to order them and I put up no fight at all. Besides, it paired perfectly with the fabulous benedict with avocado and grilled tomato. Yesssss! We took to some more relaxing, this time in Dolores Park.

Never forgetting our sunglasses again! Haha. The day started a bit gray, as usual these days, but turned out to be perfect weather. It was so nice to just sit in a park and enjoy the day and people watch. It was a really great weekend and I’m sorry to see it end. But it just means we’re that much closer to heading home again! 🙂

Weekly Meal Plan

Sunday – Grilled balsamic chicken thighs, roasted brussels sprouts, & balsamic basil heirloom tomato salad
Monday – Smokey Peruvian chicken with roasted carrots
Tuesday – Char siu pork bowl
Wednesday – Greek chicken souvlaki with side salad
Thursday – My birthday! Going out!
Friday – Leftovers
Saturday – Big birthday dinner at NOPA!

Food for Thought

What fun things did you do over the weekend?

What I Ate Wednesday #96: #FuelYourBetter

Haaappy hump day, friends! Hope your week is going well. I’m currently enjoying my couple of mid-week days off before I have lots of shifts coming up. It’s going to be a busy week and a half so you know I’m loving the down time and getting things done around this place!

Monday’s meals started off a bit on a different foot from my norm. For whatever reason, I was looking for another way to fuel my morning and the Vega team did just that for me with their #FuelYourBetter campaign.

[Breakfast]

A breakfast smoothie is so strange of me. I almost always go for a hot breakfast of oats or pancakes with lots of nut butter. I guess when you really think about it though, I just swapped the oats for Vega Sport vanilla protein powder; the rest that went into the blender is banana, peanut flour, almond milk, and ice.

This is the first time I’ve had the Vega Sport protein powder and having tasted a little before making the plantain protein bread on Sunday, I knew I really enjoyed the flavor so I didn’t want to add too much to my smoothie. I was pleasantly surprised that this smoothie bowl held me over as long as it did. It was super light but very satisfying which was perfect for post-workout. I might have found my new favorite protein powder!

[Morning Snack]

I had to get a little nut butter in before work so I warmed up a plantain protein bread and topped it with half almond butter and half peanut butter. I got the recipe for these little guys from Taylor and it’s so easy and delicious.

Ingredients
– 3 plantains
– 2 eggs
– 2 scoops protein powder

Directions
Mix all of the ingredients well and bake in muffin tins at 350°F for about 15 minutes.

I only had 2 plantains but it still worked great. I also really like the vanilla flavor in these because my plantains were so ripe that they were extra sweet!

[Lunch]

Lap lunch at work. Nathan brought home a huge salad that was leftover from a lunch at his office and I’ve been using that for lunches this week. It’s been nice to have everything thrown together already. There are mung bean sprouts, cabbage, kidney and garbanzo beans, carrots. I’ve just been adding protein [Monday’s was spinach, fontina, roasted garlic chicken sausage from Trader Joe’s], avocado, and a little dressing.

[Afternoon Snack]

After work I was really in the mood for something a little crunchy, but obviously needing more nut butter. I’ve been trying to get my sweet tooth to take a chill pill this week after too much my brownie brittle obsession last week, so I opted for the carrots for dipping and another plantain protein bread. Again, I couldn’t choose between almond or peanut, but they have different benefits so technically I needed both of them.

When Nathan got home, we popped open this Sierra Nevada / Oskar Blues Beer Camp collab. It was so delicious! You really can’t go wrong with a rye bock though, am I right? Look at that color!

[Dinner]

I’ve decided we’re the worst at meatless Monday. Last week I made 3 lbs worth of turkey meatballs and this week we roasted a whole chicken. That said, the whole chickens were $.99/lb so not only did we roast this baby up, Nathan also cut up a second chicken that I threw in the freezer. So thrifty!

This was an awesome dinner. The piri-piri chicken had great flavor [though I’m not sure I’d consider it piri-piri..] and the brussels were roasted oh so perfectly. Look at that char. Mmm!

[Evening Snack]
I finished off my night with an apple. Like I said, I’m trying to kill the brownie brittle beast that I was last week so a simple apple hit the spot.

Food for Thought

What is your favorite way to fuel post-workout?

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary shipment of the Vega Sport Recovery Protein as a Sweat Pink Ambassador. All thoughts and opinions of the product are my own.

What I Ate Wednesday #85: Pre-Retoxing

I mentioned on Monday that this week has been deemed “detox before retox” because when you have a week like I did full of cheese..

..fried chicken..

..barbecue..

..and plenty of beer..

..I needed a break. Before we go away to wine country for our anniversary. So this week has been very lean, clean, and green!

Breakfasts have looked a little like this:

Egg whites, banana, cinnamon, and coconut cashew butter.

Snacks have been especially green!

Still smuicing it up!

Lunches have been salad-filled.

Dinners are protein- and veg-happy.

And because there is always dessert:

A new-to-me ice cream with peanut fluff.

Personally, I know that when I eat foods like grains and starches, even starchy vegetables, my stomach isn’t always happy. And even though I seriously love them, sometimes I just need to give my body a break. I’ve been binging on kabocha and sweet potatoes recently and kabocha-belly is definitely real! My carbs these days are primarily coming from fruits and I’ve also cut back on random snacking. Overall, I’m feeling better after a few days so I’m calling this detox a success thus far.

Food for Thought

What foods are your go-to for detoxing?

The Great Peanut Butter Cup Debate

Have you entered my LÄRABAR giveaway yet?

Another relaxing weekend is in the books. Friday night involved some serious curly fry consumption and it really hit the spot!

Except I took a picture after we were 75% through them..

We had dinner at Barney’s and since I’m not a burger gal, I went with the salmon burger. Unfortunately this might be one of the only places that I’ve come across a frozen patty since moving to California. That didn’t stop me from eating the whole thing, but it made the curly fries that much better!

Saturday was super slow. We started our day at the Oakland farmers’ market and took a nice long stroll around the city. We ended up at Ike’s for lunch; they’re known for their huge sandwiches and it was no joke. We both could only finish half of our sandwiches before heading to the Sierra Nevada Torpedo Room. Because as I said before, it’s not a weekend without beer!

Sunshine and beer. What more do we need?

Tastings are always the best when we want to try everything on tap! This might also have something to do with our demolishing of the sandwiches after we got home. And my nap. It was a good nap!

Yesterday was also pretty slow; we took a little run over to Farley’s for breakfast. Nathan is just starting to run so of course my thought for distance goals involves different places we can run to for breakfast. Always thinking about the food! Post-breakfast I went to the grocery store to stock up for the week and made a pretty exciting find.

PEANUT BUTTER CUP SHOWDOWN!

I’d heard about the Butterfinger Peanut Butter Cups a few months ago but hadn’t seen them before. We already had some Reese’s at home so I figured we needed to do the taste test. The obvious differences are that the Reese’s comes in a wrapper and the Butterfinger is more squared off. I also noticed that the Butterfinger cup is a little thinner.

Team Reese’s or Team Butterfinger?

The results are in. I’m still 100% Reese’s and Nathan votes Butterfinger. Honestly, I feel like the Butterfinger cup was pretty darn similar to a regular Butterfinger bar. I wasn’t a fan of the crunch and much prefer the creamier texture of the Reese’s. Nathan’s always been a Butterfinger guy so that’s his excuse. I guess I’ll accept it. I also took a poll on Instagram 🙂

I washed my peanut butter cups down with my favorite vegan salad around—the wilted kale salad from Source. The salad comes with sauteed mushrooms, caramelized onions, avocado, & house dressing. I also added “cluck” on top to make it even more filling.

Holy cluck!

And we finished off the weekend with more caramelized onions. This time on a killer cauliflower crust pizza with pesto, balsamic onions, ground turkey, and smoked mozzarella. Holy. Cannoli. We win!

Best. Combo. Ever.

Weekly Meal Plan

There weren’t many sales this week and since we’ve been stocking up on leftovers, we’re going to be cashing in. If you’re looking for meal plan help, shoot me an email.

Monday – Vietnamese Chicken, Avocado + Lemongrass Spring Roll Salad With Hoisin Crackers
Tuesday – Pork Tenderloin with Chipotle-Cranberry Sauce & Brussels Sprouts with Quinoa & Cranberries
Wednesday – Leftovers
Thursday – Shish Tawook (Grilled Chicken Skewers) with Roasted Garlic Avocado Mayo, Garlic Parmesan Fries, & roasted asparagus
Friday – Out!
Saturday – Leftovers
Sunday – Leftovers

Food for Thought

Regular or curly fries?
Team Reese’s or Team Butterfinger?

A Weekend Escape

Did you know that wine country is right around the corner from me now? Yea, that’s going to be dangerous.. but do you see where this past weekend’s trip is going..

As I mentioned last week, we have been taking advantage of our surroundings as much as possible and going on road trips on the weekends. It was only a matter of time until we made our way to wine country!

But first..

Buckwheat crepe with cheese, tomato, and mushrooms

..a quick trip to our new local farmers’ market for breakfast. Did I tell you that we got a place to live?! Well, we actually got 2 places to live. After putting down a deposit on an apartment, I heard back from someone on Craigslist with a place that looked even better [and cheaper..] so I figured it couldn’t hurt to go take a look. Turns out, it was better and we signed a new lease! We had to check out the closest market to see what we got ourselves into 😉 We were quite pleased and will definitely be returning! [Thank goodness for year-round markets in California!]

After breakfast, we made our way out to St. Helena, just north of Napa. The first stop on the trip was Beaulieu Vineyard. It was such a beautiful day and this place was so cute.

Beaulieu Vineyard

We each went for the red wine tasting which consisted of a pinot noir, merlot, red blend, and a cabernet sauvignon. The merlot and cab were my favorites until we got a couple extra free tastings of two of their other cabernets. Of course, the more expensive, special cab was our favorite!

Since it was about an hour and a half drive out to the first tasting, we didn’t get to the first tasting until close to noon so we decided to grab lunch before another winery. When we saw a stand with outdoor seating and a huge line of people waiting to order, we knew we had to pull over! Gott’s Roadside was one of the places recommended to us and we couldn’t pass up the idea of sitting outside for lunch in December!

Dungeness crab sandwich on a fresh acme roll

Green chile turkey burger & garlic fries in the background!

The west coast has it’s dungeness crab which is pretty darn tasty so I couldn’t turn down the special sandwich.. I have to admit, though, it’s no blue crab! Nathan got the green chile turkey burger and we shared an order of garlic fries and spicy tomato soup. It was all fantastic and I’m so glad we stopped.

After refueling, it was time for more wine! The next stop was St. Clement Vineyards. Their most popular wine is the Oroppas which is a cabernet. Fun fact: Oroppas spelled backward is Sapporo.. the owners of the vineyards!

The fabulous hilltop view [thanks for the picture, Nath!]

I can’t wait to go back there with friends when it gets warmer to do the hilltop tasting!

Our final stop in wine country was Heitz Cellar. They are one of the originals in that area and one of the only wineries to offer a free tasting. They had about 4 or 5 wines out to try but grabbed a few extras from the back for us to sneak a few tastes, including a bottle of cabernet that sells for $200! This was also about the time that I forgot to take pictures.. whoops!

On our way back, we stopped at V Marketplace in Yountville. We noticed it on our way out and it looked so nice that we wanted to check it out. We happened to get there right as the live music started 🙂

I enjoy a little Christmas music every now and then 😉

And what would a weekend trip be without a little beer?! There was a ton of traffic heading back into Oakland so we decided to pull off and make a pit stop to the Torpedo Room. This place just recently opened about a month or so ago and we were so excited to see some new Sierra Nevada beer on tap that we’d never tried before!

Our flight of newbies!

Of course we couldn’t get anything that we’d already had. From left to right, we had the Weizenbock, French Style Saison, Beer Camp Imperial Red Ale, and Audition Pumpkin Ale. They were all great, as usual, but my favorite was definitely the pumpkin. It wasn’t heavily spiced but had a nice, round pumpkin flavor to it. Nathan’s top picks were the saison and red. He couldn’t just choose one.. the saison is an all-around easy-drinking beer and the red had a nice amount of hop flavor. It really depends on your mood.

And the perfect ending of a day full of wine? Chocolate! [And peanut butter..]

Homemade peanut butter cup

Well, that’s really the best way to end any day, right? 😉

Food for Thought

Have you ever been to wine country?
What is your favorite type of wine?

What I Ate Wednesday #23 – Catching Up & Thanksgiving Brews

Holy slacker, it’s been a while since we’ve chatted! It’s been a crazy week and a half that unfortunately included a back injury. I subsequently dubbed last week the week of eating everything in site, which makes this week the week of getting back on track. I must be crazy thinking now is a good time to plan on getting back on track with Thanksgiving being Thursday, but hey, no time like the present, right?!

And speaking of Thanksgiving, as the resident “beer snobs” of the family, Nathan and I are always asked for beer pairings. We’ve been doing our Thanksgiving beer pairing research and I’m happy to share with you our top 5 finds! But first.. the eats.

[Breakfast]
Back to basics. My Tone It Up pumpkin protein pancake with banana slices and peanut fluff [2 tbsp peanut flour*, 1 packet stevia, & water to reach desired consistency]

[Lunch]
Kale salad with spaghetti squash, lots of veggies, and Powercakes Tahini Nooch sauce. This has been my favorite go-to dressing as of late. It’s packed with tons of protein and flavor.. think garlicky kale from Whole Foods. YUM!

[Dinner]
Roasted salmon with honey almond spaghetti squash. Simple but full of flavor!

[Snacks]
Grapefruit. (Not pictured)
Green Protein Piña Colada.. a Greeña Colada, if you will 😉

Quick recipe! Protein Greeña Colada
– 1 Premier Protein vanilla shake
– 1/2 frozen banana
– 1/4 cup pineapple chunks
– 2 tbsp unsweetened shredded coconut
– 1 cup spinach
– 2-4 ice cubes

Throw everything in your blender and froth up! This baby packs a 32g protein punch! Perfect for your workout days.

Apple and peanut fluff*.

*Peanut flour can be found on iHerb.com. Use code ZAF482 to receive $5 off of your first order.

Thanksgiving Brews

When pairing beverages with food, most people immediately consider wine. Beer is often an afterthought, but not in our house! I’ve been researching the top beers to pair with a traditional Thanksgiving dinner and I think I’ve found the list that’ll make even your pickiest beer-drinker happy!

1. Ayinger Oktober Fest-Märzen
   

   Ayinger Oktoberfest-Marzen

   This is an easy-drinking, copper-colored beer that isn’t overpowering. It will compliment everything on your table from sweet potatoes to a hearty sausage stuffing, with its notes of caramel and smooth, subtle hops. At 5.8% ABV, this will be an all-around crowd-pleaser.

   Can’t find Ayinger? Look for Paulaner or Sam Adams!

2. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale
   

   Sierra Nevada Pale Ale

   If you’re looking for a beer with a little more punch to stand up to your stuffing, SNPA is the way to go. A touch of citrus flavor and a slightly bitter, but balanced, taste provides a crisp, clean finish.

   Can’t find Sierra Nevada? Look for Flying Dog or Lagunitas!

3. Sierra Nevada Kellerweis
   

   Sierra Nevada Kellerweis

   A beer that’s always found in our house, Kellerweis will satisfy any drinker’s taste. This fresh, crisp beer is a great way to start the evening paired with a creamy goat cheese or brie (which should definitely be on any list of appetizers!) It’s also the perfect way to end the night; with its subtle notes of banana and clove, you have the perfect companion to spiced desserts like pumpkin pie.

   Can’t find Sierra Nevada? Look for Paulaner or Victory!

4. Ommegang Abbey Ale
   

   Ommegang Abbey Ale

   You can’t go wrong with a Belgian-style beer; especially if you’re talking Ommegang Abbey Dubbel. Another beer that can stand up to the lighter dishes as well as heavier, this well-balanced beer with notes of fruits and molasses will pack a punch at 8.2% ABV.

   Can’t find Ommegang? Look for New Belgium or Chimay!

5. Rogue Chocolate Stout
   
   

   Rogue Chocolate Stout

   For those guests looking to go to the dark side, this chocolate stout is the way to go! It’s a silky, smooth beer with notes of chocolate and espresso. It is a perfect compliment to dessert, but can also stand up to the heavier dishes.

   Can’t find Rogue? Look for Evolution or Sam Adams!

Food for Thought

What is your favorite part of Thanksgiving? Do you prefer beer or wine paired with your dinner? What is your favorite beer?