this week's tip | eat veggies for breakfast

Ok, we're all super busy: working, travelling, taking care of our families (whatever shape they may take), trying to stay fit and meet personal goals as well!  There often just aren't enough hours in the day to fit everything and if you're like me, you're also plagued by that little voice in the back of your head telling you that you need to eat better while relaying your vegetable count for the day!

I used to feel the pressure every night having to fit the 7 vegetable/ 2 cup count into dinner because I ate oatmeal in the mornings and a variation of either a quick-snack, or nothing at all lunch!  Sometimes (especially in a rush) it was impossible to come up with a meal idea that incorporated veggies AND didn't take long to prepare, so I would cave and make a pasta dish without any veggies at all!  (spaghetti bolognese anyone?).  After a few close calls with my  head almost exploding, I decided to start my day with vegetables - making my usual quick-snack lunch easier to forgive and taking the pressure off dinner.

It's actually quite easy to eat veggies for breakfast. There are so many highly nutritional, quick and simple breakfast ideas around that keep you as full as oatmeal.  Here are a few:

1. an omelette: you can mix just about any vegetable into an omelette.  My faves are asparagus, zucchini, capsicum (red pepper), spinach and mushrooms!  
2. avocado toast: I like to lightly sprinkle mine with salt and pepper, yum yum yum! 
• It's easy to add more veggies to this - I like green capsicum (peppers), watercress and tomatoes (although technically not a veg).    
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3. hash browns: these don't have to be oily and horrible!  Shred some potatoes (or sweet potatoes) into a frying pan of coconut oil, fry until brown and enjoy a healthy, guilt-free, trans-fat free treat!  One that you probably haven't had in ages! 
4. mushroom melt: if you work from home, or give yourself plenty of time to get ready in the mornings, you'll lurve this one!  It takes about half an hour to prepare but it's worth it.  I like to make this as a weekend breakfast for Will and I: it keeps us FULL! 
• You just need to preheat the oven, prep the mushroom (wash it, remove the stalk), fill it with whatever veggies (ham or other meat) you like, crack a small egg into it, sprinkle with cheese (opional) and bake for 15-20 mins. 
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5. veggie smoothie: no better way to get all 7 veggies and two cups straight away than mixing a juice or smoothie.  The one pictured with this post is the Citrus Veggie Smoothie  from Santa Cruz Organic, where you can find many more delicious recipes! 
• Of course, smoothies don't keep you full very long so make sure to put a nut bar into your handbag on your way out of the door!

If you don't like the idea of being nontraditional, why not try a savoury oatmeal? Just grate in some carrots, cucumbers and add some nuts instead of the usual sweet cinnamon and fruit or whatever.  It's very tasty and you can find plenty of recipes online!

spring, Austin-style

If you're in the U.S (or anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere) you're rejoicing at the long anticipated arrival of spring!  For most of us this winter was especially brutal and while many northern yards are still covered in snow - it seems less daunting now that spring is the official season at last.  Here in Austin flowers are blooming, bees are buzzing, birds chirping and warm weather clothes are emerging once more.  I think it's so nice to be able to capture a little bit of that wonder and contain it within the house.  Bouquets are divine but they die so quickly :(

As I write this next part, I know my friends from Atlanta are going to laugh because they warned Will and I before we moved here that Austin was a town for hippies; it is known for it's quirkiness, environmentally-friendliness, organic/ local farming, relaxed and holistic approach to life.  After I wrote about Eastern medicine, some of them thought I'd been 'sipping the cool-aide' and now ... this spring, in the spirit of rejuvenation, new years resolutions and doing my part for the circulation of Austin's quirky reputation: I'm planting! hehehe (enter comments below :P).

Anyway, I say planting and not gardening because we're in a rental so all my plants will be in pots.  I love decorative flower pots (called planters in the US) and the idea of having them neatly arranged in my herb window.  Did I mention that our rental has a herb window in the kitchen?  Oh yes, it's one of my favourite things about this place!  (and another definite ode to Austin's unique-ness, considering you'd be hard pressed to find herb windows anywhere else in America but it's really common here).

Once I'd made my mind up about planting, I became quite taken with these flower pots from anthropologie:

and loved the idea of them sitting happily inside my herb window so I went on down to the store, money in hand and smile on face, picturing all the while how I would arrange them, only to be disappointed by their lack of drainage holes :(  Of course avid gardeners already know the solution is drilling holes using a masonry drill but that wasn't something either Will or I fancied doing.  It all turned out for the best though, when I found this (very Austin) herb growing kit at my local pharmacy (I know, weird right?)

That made my decision easy, I would replant all of my herbs into matching terracotta pots and save any decorative ones I come across later for my other plants.  I think having them uniformed will look equally as nice:

My prickly pear cactus and prized souvenir from our Christmas in the Texas desert got a very beautiful, one of a kind pot of his own.  As you know after said desert trip, I became obsessed with southwestern decorating and knew from the moment we got this lil prickly pear that he needed to be planted in a bright, southwestern themed pot to achieve maximum memory-jogging-of-time-spent-in-desert affect.  All this time I've searched for a pot that would do just that and worried my little cactus would start to die because he desperately needed a bigger pot; then last weekend when Will and I grabbed a taco lunch next to an authentic Mexican pottery shop where I happened to find the peice de resistance to my herb window!

'handmade in Mexico'

isn't it splendid?

I read somewhere that when re-potting a cactus, tongs should always be used.
Definitely came in handy 'cause I was would have been quite perplexed
about this process otherwise...

Voila!
He's a little small but will soon look perfect in his brand new pot.
PS: replanting using tongs was a breeze