Going Green for 2012

I've always cared about the environment, I like playing outside!! This post, however is about making smoothies...GREEN ones...
As mentioned in my last post, I am loving all the interesting, amazing stuff you can find on PINTEREST. In 2012 I'm going to be getting lots "pinned" and updating you guys on what I find that I actually make & love!
I'll do my best to keep it interesting & add my own recipes too, as I have in the past (can you believe this blog will be FIVE years old this year?!? I can't)
So I figure, what's the use of all my pretty pinboards if I'm not actually MAKING the stuff?? This seemed like a good place to start;
A smoothie.
With spinach! Easy enough to make in less than 15 minutes (a must with a very energetic 4mo old over here) and its goooood for ya! Nice.
My dear friend Naomi always rocked the green smoothies so I knew it be good tasting too.

Via pinterest here's the recipe:
2 bananas, peeled & cut into pieces
1c. Pineapple*
1c. Nonfat plain Greek yogurt
1c. Filtered water
2 big handfuls of baby leaf spinach
Blend & serve- makes TWO 8oz smoothies

I like this because I can make them the night before each blender full makes breakfast for me and for Nate that's just waiting for us in te frige the next morning!

The second week I made em I added a handful of blueberries!
Got a new recipe to try for next week, with a super easy time saving tip that make it possible to whip these up in less than FIVE minutes! Stay tuned & follow my findings on pinterest

Good Stuff- Easy Chicken Noodle Soup & Pintrest!

Well, our little dude is officially THREE MONTHS OLD! How did that happen? Everyone tells you how fast it will all go- and once you get into it, it's more than true- time = ZOOM.
Of course it's also the armpit of cold & flu season which is EXTRA magical when you have a newborn. We're staying well and relentlessly washing hands over here, but the other night my husband was a little congested and using stuff I had on hand I made us chicken noodle soup for dinner - it was so freakin quick, easy and good that I had to post it!
You can use rotisserie chicken from the grocery store OR any leftover turkey you may have on hand after a holiday meal!

In a big stock pot melt 1-2 T butter.
Add 1/2 a white or yellow onion (chopped), 2-3 stalks of celery (chopped), 2 carrots (chopped).
Saute until the onions are opaque- like 5 minutes.
Add 32oz low-sodium chicken broth, 1 tsp oregano, 1 tsp basil (aprox measurements- just shake some in!) a pinch of chili flakes, salt & pepper.... and cook, stirring occasionaly on med-high heat for about 10 minutes- until it boils....meanwhile- boil water in a medium sauce pot and add 2 cups uncooked corkscrew pasta to boiling water to par-boil. Only let it boil for about 6 minutes- so you can finish cooking it in the soup and it can absorb the chicken broth goodness.
Drain the pasta and add it and 2 cooked grocery-store rotisserie chicken breasts (shredded)- to the boiling soup pot, let boil about 4 minutes- until pasta is tender.
Ladle into bowls to cool, serve with some yummy crusty bread and feel better SOON!!

As my updates are a little few and far between these days, you can also find me on PINTEREST now for daily ideas and inspiration! (It's easier to do that with one hand while nursing a bebe!) I'll add this little reminder to my updates through December so you can click the link below to find me and follow along! If you are not on Pinterest but would like to be feel free to email me your email and I will send you an invite!

Sweet Life Kitchen (Beth Griffin/ Our Sweet Life) on Pintrest

HAPPY THANKSGIVING- Butternut Squash & Potato Goodness

We are thankful for SO much this year- especially THIS:

Our son Logan will be 3 months old in a few weeks and has been keeping me VERY busy. We've still been cooking though, thank goodness Nate is amazing in the kitchen and also a diaper changing wiz!

Here is a fabulous Fall/Thanksgiving side dish that is easy, inexpensive and incredibly delicious!!!

Combine 2lbs fingerling potatoes (we used the tri-color, but had eaten all the purple ones before I snapped a pic!), 1 peeled, seeded, diced butternut squash, 2  chopped bulbs of fennel, 4-6 chopped cloves of garlic, 1 small chopped shallot & a small bunch of green onion chopped on a baking sheet covered in foil. Drizzle with olive oil and add a 2 T of butter diced up into little bits.
Bake at 400 for 30-40 minutes until potatoes & squash are cooked through.

Hope you had a FABULOUS Thanksgiving!!

We sure did....

Cold Cous Cous Salad

So clearly being in the final 4 weeks of my first pregnancy has made me a little obsessed with making cold side dishes...and eating Popsicles.
I'd wanted to try some sort of cous cous, veggie, feta combo for a while and this actually came out exactly as I was hoping!
Just like the White Bean Salad, this was very, very easy to make- and also like the white bean salad this made enough to make it a great "take-to-BBQ" or general entertaining recipe. It'd be really yummy alongside grilled salmon.

2 boxes cous cous, prep according to package directions (they have it next to the Rice-A-Roni & such...or if you have a large dry goods container of it make enough for 8 servings- very easy...)
Let cooked cous cous cool.

In a large bowl combine;
1 cucumber, chopped
1/2 a red onion, chopped
1 small-med red bell pepper, chopped
1 small yellow bell pepper, chopped
12-15 pitted kalamata olives, sliced
add a few handfuls (probably about 3/4 of a cup) crumbled fat-free feta cheese
Drizzle with olive oil
Squeeze the juice of 1/2 a lemon
Toss in the cous cous, add salt & pepper to taste

Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours to overnight, serve cold.

Any guesses as to when the little guy is coming? Yours is as good as mine.....
:o)

Summer-y White Bean Salad

It's HOT!!! ....and our baby is due in 4 days....I didn't realize how antsy I'd be in this "home stretch". My pregnancy has been AWESOME, time flew, I didn't even notice the weeks screamin' by! Now, I'm so excited to meet our son, it's hard not to count the minutes. Also, I'm startin' to FEEL it, can't tie a shoe, sleep is laughable, and it takes me a million years to do stuff!
However, the best thing for me has been to keep busy, so I gotta keep that up right up till go-time (which is SOON, I hope...)
We made some fun plans to eat with friends last Friday night. They've been amazing and keep inviting us over for dinner, which has been such a blessing for us- I still always want to bring something, but with the temps sizzlin and the extra lbs I'm hauling around these days, baking is out of the question for a bit.

I decided to make my version of this white bean salad to keep it cool, budget-friendly and SUPER EASY to make (standing in the kitchen with my puffy feet is no bueno, so I have to make stuff that has sitting breaks, or make stuff that I can bust out FAST, I prefer the latter)


In a large bowl combine
2 15oz cans white beans (drained, rinsed and patted dry)
1 15oz can sweet corn (drained & rinsed)
1/2 a red onion, chopped
1/2-3/4 of a cucumber chopped (you can peel it or not- totally up to you, I did not...)
a couple handfuls of arugula
Drizzle with olive oil and squeeze the juice o12/ to 3/4 of a lemon
Sprinkle w/ salt, add some cracked black pepper and stir up with a big spoon.

Cover and refrigerate for 4-6 hours, serve cold.

HAPPY SUMMER :o)

Since I'm not baking- go to (fonuts)!!

With the baby due in just a week and the temps topping 90 degrees outside, I have no desire to turn on my oven these days.
Lucky for me a new sweet-stop opened just in the nick of time!
(fonuts) are steam-baked donuts, the delicious creation Waylynn Lucas, genius pastry chef. She and business partner Nancy Truman opened the shop last week on 3rd street in West Hollywood...right near Bar Method, so I knew I'd have to get over and try it before the baby came!
Following along on twitter I'd been reading the buzz and it sounded like it was going to be awesome, then the first day they sold out- FAST. So I made sure to get there on the second day as early as I could, which due to a doctor's appointment was about an hour and a half after they opened.

The space is inviting and beautiful- a little vintage stove sits to the side for a coffee fixin's station and there's plenty of room for the long lines they are sure to have going forward.
The ONLY downside to my visit was that they were already out of Hawaiian, P.B. & J, chorizo, Maple Bacon and Glazed- all flavors I'm very excited to try on my next trip there.
I got a strawberry, a lemon, a rosemary, a gluten free chocolate-hazelnut, a banana chocolate and a cinnamon-sugar. I'm on maternity leave but still taking class, so I took the box down to Bar Method to share with my fellow teachers so we could all have a fun taste-test and compare favorites. Also, so I wouldn't eat the whole box on my own after I took class.

I also got an iced decaf latte- they've got great coffee...one note- I'm so used to going to Coffee Bean or making it myself, I ordered just like that "iced, decaf, late." didn't make any milk indication and it was WHOLE milk- so I couldn't really drink it because that is INTENSE. Totally my bad though, I'll be sure to be specific next time.
The overall favorite was the lemon- it's super zingy, REAL lemon flavor and the glaze is delicious. I also loved the chocolate hazelnut- it was super moist and had a deep, rich chocolate yumminess.
The strawberry was the sleeper/surprise. I wasn't sure I'd like that one and wish I'd ordered three of them- again REAL strawberries, freshness, oh, so delicious.
We didn't meet a (fonut) we didn't like, so I am very excited to go back and try their other flavors.
I got a little flyer/menu to add to our "take-to-the-hospital" folder so I can send someone for coffee & (fonuts) next week (or the week after) when I'm snuggled up with my newborn son.

Wishing (fonuts) all the best and sold-out success for a long time to come! Welcome to the fabulous 3rd Street area, I'm thrilled you're there and glad I can always go burn it off with a Bar Method class.

(fonuts) is located at 8104 West 3rd Street Los Angeles, CA 90048
I believe their hours next week will be 7am-7pm
Follow along @fonuts on twitter for all the latest info!!

Bad Blog Mommy!!

Oh, my sweet dear little blog, how I've forsaken you!!!
Apparently being pregnant and baking up sweets and teaching and enjoying every second of this gorgeous summer have left me little time to blog it up. Shame on me!!

The pregnancy has been going great, but with 6 1/2 weeks left until baby is due, I'm definitely feeling a little more tired & achy than usual. BUT, we're still in full-on fun-food mode and I should try to get here more often to share that with you guys!!

Lately, it's allllll about quick & easy. I pretty much get stuck on a simple snack that I make myself every day for a week or two, then move on to my new favorite.
These aren't "recipes" but more little inspiration posts that I'll try to get done more than every 3 months, lol, let's hope.
I know I'm gonna need some quick, easy, healthy ideas for when I've not slept at all but need to eat, right?

This is so easy it's crazy, it's delicious and really good for you!!

Piece of whole wheat toast, topped with low-fat or non-fat cottage cheese & a sliced avocado (1/2).
Add cracked black pepper or balsamic vinegar if you want to.