Tamari? Check. Tahini? Hrmmmm....

Yesterday was the first module of the wonderful online workshop Whole Food Kitchen and I was ready!! Since my huge weight loss in 2006, I have been constantly reading, researching, and updating my way of living and eating. Now that I am a wife and mother of two, this has become one of the main focuses in my life. When I learned of this workshop and asked for it for Christmas I was excited. This past weekend I was even more excited. Yesterday felt like the first day of school!  Last night I sat down and went through the entire module - the posts, the recipes, the video, the recipes ;), and took it all in.

Then, I made a grocery list! For some reason, I greatly enjoy making grocery lists and organizing them as if I am walking through the store. The only stores that we tend to shop at are Whole Foods and Trader Joe's.  I am somewhat proud of this fact - partially because we have cut out mainstream stores and their junk. However, I wish I had the time to shop around for local stores and markets. We love our Farmer's Markets and all the local goodies they offer.  In the colder months I struggle with insulating and transporting two wee girls for the small winter markets in the area.  As the girls grow older I plan on exploring more markets and cold weather options. But we are grateful to have a little rhythm that works for us.

This morning, with list in tow, Miss Moo and I went to Whole Foods to gather ingredients for a few recipes and some staples. (Miss Roo stayed at home and enjoyed a brief snooze.) Once inside the store Miss Moo, naturally, wanted a snack. What type of snack you ask? Why, CHEESE, of course! To the back we go for the organic string cheese singles. Check. Onto the list.

Moo and I breeze around the store.  Produce for berries, bananas, veggies, and herbs. Bulk foods for nuts and seeds and non-wheat whole grains.  Whole Body for hemp seed. Bay leaves from the baking isle. Frozen pineapple and mango. I glance at the list - check. check. check. Oh, wait. Tahini. Hrmmmm tahini.

Tahini is a paste made from ground sesame seeds. It's used in a lot of Mediterranean and Asian foods. Ever had hummus? Then you've have tahini. Off we trot to the ethnic isle. We scour it. Nothing. Okay so let's check with the olives. Nope. Tomato sauces? Nuh-uh. Perhaps the mayonnaise? Not there either. *sigh* We locate a very friendly young man who doesn't know where the tahini is but will find someone who does. The next guy? He doesn't either. We all went to the same three places. Three times we struck out. So, next point of escalation- the shift manager.

Any guesses where the tahini lives?? With the peanut butter! I would never have thought of that! Ahhh tahini!

This evening I cleaned up and gathered my ingredients for the first new recipe. I took pictures all the way through and the end result was a GORGEOUS dish that was equally as delicious. Served alongside a bowl of mixed berries and some broiled, seasoned chicken we delighted in the first of many new high protein feasts to come over the next 12 weeks.

Laid out and ready to go!

 Red onion in.

 Quinoa going.

 Prepping while the onions and quinoa do their thing.

 Cutting pineapple a little smaller.

Voila!

Seasoning some chicken with Bangarang!

Sauteed the kale.

Almost yummy time.

And there it is! Sauteed kale with pineapple and caramelized onions. Served with quinoa and garnished with pumpkin seeds. 

Tomorrow I have big plans for another dinner feast as well as a breakfast switch up - smoothies!

Purple Scissors and the Beginning of Homeschooling

One of Miss Moo's favorite new activities is to cut coupons with her purple scissors.  Every Sunday we sit down with the paper and cut out any coupons that we MIGHT use. I emphasize might here because we generally eat local and organic when we can. Our standard Sunday paper doesn't tend to cater to our needs. We do, however, cut out the coupons that Whole Foods puts out every month and keep them in the kitchen for our shopping trips.

This morning Moo, Roo, and I were enjoying a lively breakfast with songs, books, and banana phones. Moo turned around and saw our pile of coupons on the counter top. She asked for her purple scissors to cut them. I explained to her that we had cut these already and were going to use them for our shopping trip to Whole Foods. The announcement that we were planning an outing to WF was very exciting because not only do they have cheese samples there but they also have little carts!! Moo loves to push her little cart around and help me gather things but we haven't quite mastered the art of how to do that successfully. Until today.

I sat down next to her and spread out the coupons, choosing those we would be using and making note of them on my grocery list. She then asked to make a list, too. While she was busy making her list, I began working on an idea.

I grabbed a pen and a sheet of paper from my weekly planning sheet. (That pad needs to be used for something if I'm not going to be planning with it, right??) I turned it over and drew a small picture. I then showed it to Moo.

"What's this?" I asked her.

"Bandanda!" she replied.

"Right!" I drew another picture and pointed. "And this?"

"Stawberrdies!" she beamed.

"Right!!"

I continued to draw pictures of the non coupon items we needed with their name beside their picture. I then was sure to make my list just what I had coupons for so I wouldn't get confused. Shortly we were off.

Once we arrived and grabbed her little cart, we started in the produce section. I showed Moo the list. She went to the strawberries and grabbed a pint. She began to push her cart. I asked where we were going and she replied "Bandandas!" which  were on the list just above the berries. After gathering a bunch for her to place in her cart she asked to see the list.

"What's this? With the cow on the front?" I asked.

"Yoyurt! Dis way! To the refriderater, Mommy!" She marched off and went to the dairy case and gathered the correct brand and type of yogurt.

This game continued for her list and then by looking at the picture on my coupons. We were able to get all of our items with Moo leading the way. We checked out, put away her cart, and loaded back into the van. Moo was all smiles.

On the ride home I asked what we had purchased. She listed her entire list in the order we had gathered the items, not the order it was written,.

If I was on the fence about homeschooling before, I'm not now. In one trip to the store we followed directions, "read" her list, mapped around the store,  used gross motor to push the cart and fine motor gather to our goods. We counted. We identified colors. We identified foods we passed.

We had fun.

Now I must learn to draw a little better to make her lists in the future and do this for not only our grocery trips but our other errands, too. I bought a single week dry erase board that is also magnetic. We are going to begin taking pictures of the places we go the most so that we can put those pictures up on the board and plan our weeks. We will also need to get more coupons because she's already asked for her purple scissors.