Farmer's Market + Culinary Concoctions - Erin's Inside Job
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Farmer’s Market + Culinary Concoctions

Today has been pretty eventful so far and it is only 2pm 🙂

I skipped going to the gym this morning because my neck wasn’t feeling too great after getting dry needled at work yesterday.  It is similar to acupuncture but the needles are inserted in the trigger points of the muscles to force them to contract and then release.  It helps loosen me up (my neck had been hurt for 2 days with a constant headache), but it is definitely sore before it gets better.  This is actually what helped speed my hip problem along after I hurt myself in June.

Neil and I still woke up early and had our morning smoothie with breakfast before we set out for the farmer’s market.  It was shopping day so I was out of most ingredients for the typical green smoothie I make for us. Therefore, today’s smoothie was a Frankenstein of ingredients we had in the fridge:

Today’s “Green” Smoothie

2 leaves of kale
handful of spinach
half a lemon
1 cup blueberries
1/3 cup grapes
2 Tbsp chia seeds
coconut water (didn’t measure, just poured)

I put “green” in parentheses because it actually turned out pretty dark purple/blue from all the blueberries.  Definitely could have used some more coconut water since the end result was more of a gelatinous blob than a smoothie.  Chia seeds will do that to you.  Maybe I will write a post on chia seeds later (they rock!).

After breakfast, we went to the farmer’s market near our house.  We had been to some in the area before, but because I only recently started making a majority of meals at home, we didn’t really have a need for all the produce that they were selling.  I found that we would often get inspired to make things at home and buy a lot of fresh produce, only to have it go bad once we lost motivation.

We stocked up on peaches (a normal ingredient in my morning smoothies), zucchini (for my new VEGETABLE SPIRALIZER), apples, and I got a spaghetti squash to make for dinner tomorrow.  I am PUMPED!  I love shopping for healthy foods to make!

We even saw a pig! (I tried to get a solo picture of the pig, but he was too popular!)

I needed some hot peppers for our taco dinner tonight, so we took a trip across the street to Lotte, the asian/indian market that opened up last year.  This place also rocks!  It’s a great place to get cheap (and uncommon) produce and bulk foods. Also a great store for all things Indian.  I’m sure Asian as well, but since I am married to an Indian, I tend to focus more on that side 🙂  I have been saying that I need to make an Indian dinner and have Neil’s parent’s over sometime…
We then took a trip to the mall and had to make YET ANOTHER stop for groceries since there were still some more items on my list.  We went to Wegman’s to stock up on more chia seeds, bananas, pineapple, almonds (for homemade almond butter!), etc, etc.  Then we were definitely ready to come home!
Neil got a new video game at the store today, so he will be occupied by that for the next few hours.  This leaves me time to CREATE in the kitchen.  On my list for today to make are:
1. Super Seed Chocolate Protein Bites 
2. Homemade Almond Butter
3. Spicy Black Bean Tacos
I have gotten these recipes from two of my favorite clean eating websites: ohsheglows.com and thenakedkitchen.com.  I have made numerous recipes from these sites and credit them for taking the time to create such delicious foods and provide me with simple recipes to follow (I’m great at following directions).  If you haven’t been to these sites, you should check them out.  They’ll change your life!!
I will be back later to let you know how these turn out.  I am most excited about the almond butter because if I can save myself $10 a jar, I’m all over it!  Check out local farmer’s markets in your area for great selections of organic produce (and pigs apparently).  If you’ve never been to one, they look like this:
Be on the lookout!

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