Pub Food & Pokies

Last night James and I headed to the local pub across the street to have some dinner. I had the hummus & bread appetizer as my main. James had chicken schnitzel w/ chips which he eats for almost all of his meals.

Then we played the pokies (slot machines) & drank some beer (I had Stella my favorite).

By the end of the night I had won $20 bucks : ) I was really happy since I never play the pokies & only do 20 cent hits when I do, never expecting to win. That hummus appetizer was not enough for dinner so James & I gave into our cravings & ordered a bowl of chips. It was enormous! We almost split the whole thing though because we are such piglets. French fries are my one of my biggest vices.

This morning James went into the city and brought me back a Starbucks. I was soo stoked, I have been craving an ice coffee like no other. I think they have switched the Australian sizes around though because there was no way that this was a venti, and they didn't have sugar free hazelnut either. Tsk tsk Australia, you should know us Americans need ridiculous amount of coffee to get through the day.

With my coffee I had a big hunk of fruit bread from a loaf that our friend who works at a bakery gave us the other day. Mmm there is nothing like fresh bread, I have been slowly working on this loaf. Of course I topped mine with lots of vegemite.

We studied all day at the UNSW library & went to the cafeteria to grab a bite to eat. Their cafeteria is so much better than the one at my University. There are so many more options. I decided on a vegetable wrap w/ spinach, grilled capiscum (bell pepper), pumpkin, and eggplant.

I needed some more caffeine to get my through the day so I had a soy latte a bit later.

For dinner I finally ate at home for once, can you believe it? I have been eating out for every meal since I have arrived. I heated up some organic pumpkin soup w/ ginger....

& more fruit bread. I finished off the rest of the loaf after I finished the soup. How could I resist that carbage?

Honaaay

This morning I grabbed my usual coffee from Starbucks (venti iced coffee w/ sugar free hazlenut) along with...

a cranberry almond Kind Bar. I usually just get these bars out of convenience because they have them at Starbucks when you check out. Even though they are good they don't compare to Luna Bars which will always be my #1 choice.

My original plan was to spend all day packing and getting ready for my trip tomorrow since I will be gone for the next month. My friend Jared texted me though and told me that I had to come up to his friend's Memorial Day party in West Hollywood. I wasn't that hard to convince, and drove up to Marina Del Rey asap to go pick up Cami. How could I resist a day full of sunshine, great music, and tons of gorgeous gay boys in a beautiful house overlooking all of LA?

I packed a lunch for the drive up-

Sandwich w/ avocado, heaps of arugula, tofurky, & hummus on whole wheat bread, and some bagged veggie straws.

Cami & Me

Bryan & Me

Memorial Day Party

After Party

My friend Britton brought me my second coffee of the day to keep me going, somewhere in there I also munched some cheeseless pizza.

For dinner Cami and I decided to stop by Real Food Daily in West Hollywood. This is the first time that I had gone to this location, normally I go to the one in Santa Monica, but when Cami & I saw it on our drive to the party we knew that we would have to stop by on our way home. This location is just as nice, maybe even better because It is not as split up as the one in Santa Monica which has an upstairs and downstairs.

Cami ordered her usual (above), the grilled veggie wrap with squash, onions, sun-dried tomato pesto, lettuce, tomato, avocado, spinach tortilla w/ portabella mushroom and cashew cheese and a side Caesar salad.

I had one of their weekly specials, Buddha's Belly. Udon noodles, sweet rice croquettes, orange glazed tofu, Thai peanut sauce, napa cabbage, carrots, golden miso dressing. This tasted like a much healthier and more satisfying version of regular Thai food, plus the croquettes were seasoned heavily w/ curry which is one of my favorite spices.

Today was a great way to finish off Memorial Day Weekend, and to celebrate my last day in the States before I take off tomorrow. I even got home in time to watch Nurse Jackie & United States of Tara. Now all I have to do tomorrow is pack, pack, and pack!

Memorial Day Weekend

Coffee!!!

Breakfast- Smoothie w/ strawberries, 1/2 banana, almond milk, ice

Memorial Day Weekend = lots of beach time. I'll be black by Tuesday.

Kettle cooked potato chips, the nutritional info on these was pretty good surprisingly.

Rather than eating a 'real' lunch I just decided to keep on snacking once I got home. I had some garden veggies straw from Costco w/...

some red pepper hummus & humguac from TJ's. Humguac is equal parts guacamole and chickpeas w/ seasoning, I know it's brilliant idea. All I need now is BBQ hummus and i'll be set for life.

My mom had some friends over & had the below amazing spread, so once again I snacked for dinner. Mostly hummus & stacy's pita chips, dates, and lime & chili cashews.

Afterwards I headed out for a night on the town in Laguna, we went to the Royale Hawaiian where there was an 80's cover band playing and then down to the Marine Room.

Ari, Raveena, and Me

Showing my affection for Rav.

Today I skipped breakfast and just went straight to lunch. I had a tofurky & arugula sandwich w/ hummus, avocado, and soy cheese on a 100 calorie whole wheat roll.

Open Wide!

This did not fill me up so I had some soy nuggets w/ ketchup too.

I shopped all day & got clothes for my upcoming trip, and picked up a GRE study guide from Barnes and Noble.... time to crack down and study soon : ( I was also able to visit my grandma who is finally out of the hospital yey!

We brought home this enormous edible arrangement for Issy because she took a pretty bad fall earlier in the day and bumped her noggin on the pavement. She had to go to the hospital and get a CAT scan. She's okay though, just a minor concussion.

Milk chocolate dipped strawberries & pineapple, white chocolate & milk chocolate dipped banana and marshmallows. Craziness- I nippled on some strawberries & grapes, I'm not a fan of chocolate plus it has dairy in it.

Issy loved the chocolate though!

For dinner I dipped slices of tempeh first in TJ's Island soyaki and then dredged them in flour and baked them in the oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.

Then I added the tempeh to a big bowl of arugula w/ 1/2 avocado & raw broccoli.

This was the first time that I had marinated the tempeh in soyaki and it ended up being delicious.

118 Degrees

It has been soo long since I've gotten my usual Starbucks drink. Venti ice coffee w/ sugar free hazelnut syrup. I forgot just how quickly I slurp these drinks down. I swear it always seems like ice coffee has more caffeine than regular coffee. Even though that doesn't really make sense, I always seem to get a buzz after drinking ice coffee whereas w/ regular hot coffee I don't. Weird.

Late last night as I browsed blogs I read about this restaurant 118 degrees on quarry girl, and I realized that it was the same restaurant I have seen a million times while eating at Native Foods and visiting the tattoo shop at The Camp in Costa Mesa. I have always admired the cool wood exterior but I had never ventured inside. I had to go check it out when I heard that it wall all organic, dairy-free, raw, and eco-friendly.

After picking my sis Isabella up from school we decided to venture out to Costa Mesa to check out 118 degrees. The three of us sat at the bar and were immediately impressed by the large selection of drinks ranging from fresh juices & smoothies to coffee & tea. Issy had the Mango Madness 6 with fresh mango, banana, maca root, bee pollen, and orange juice topped w/ a rasberry puree.

OMG this was delicious. It tasted like a tropical cocktail minus the alcohol and much healthier. My mom and I both had the electrolyte lemonade 5 which was reminiscent of the lemonade you drink during the master cleanse except much yummier. It was made w/ coconut water, lemon juice, and agave (you can have it w/ cayenne pepper too). So refreshing, I want to make my own version at home sometime.

We started out with fried avocado mini-tostada 6.

Crispy buckwheat shell, spicy peppita sauce, chopped spinach, cilantro, corn, and fried avocado. The fried avocado was deliciously breaded and the sauce was super creamy.

For my main I had the lemon pesto pasta 10 with lemon pesto sauce, grape tomatoes, mushrooms, and fresh basil. This was my first time every having zucchini pasta and once again I was surprised how creamy the sauce was. I really need to buy a spiraler so I can make some zucchini pasta of my own.

My mom had the baja burrito 12 with marinated mushrooms, spinach, corn, red bell pepper, cilantro, salsa and spicy cheese topped w/ sour cream, and guacamole. I stole a few bites & it was great (almost as good as my pasta!)

While the food tasted insane there were a few let downs. Firstly they forgot to bring out the appetizer and it didn't arrive until after our main courses. Secondly the service was really slow. Both of these first 2 issues were excusable because the food was so good, but the main problem was that both my mom and I have felt really sick all day long afterwards : ( My stomach has ben killing me, and is still grumbling as I write this (and we ate like 10 hours ago).

Trying to calm down my upset stomach I munched on a couple of simple carbs...

peanut butter filled pretzels & ...

a 100 calorie whole wheat roll.

My stomach stopped bugging me for a bit so I was able to enjoy some vegan margarita pizza from Z Pizza. This soy cheese is so deceiving it really tastes like the real deal.

I had this below pieces plus too many more pieces Just to give you an idea of how much pizza I ate my mom and I almost split this entire medium pizza! Ahh I could almost kill my friend Tara for introducing me to this pizza, it just tastes way to good.

I'm going to go much on a few Tums now and hopefully get rid of this stomachache!