Trader Joe's Does it Again!

Anyone who has read my blog knows I'm a big Trader Joe's fan. If we ever do get to go on the road, our Alfa will be well stocked with Joe's goodies, and we are very encouraged to see new locations around the country being added.


I particularly like their vacuum packed  items, both frozen and refrigerated because they can be kept for future meals.  Although I have given up all wine, their Charles Shaw $2.00 wines were a good buy.

The other day as we were checking out at our local Trader Joe's I spotted a display of FIBERFUL fruit bars.  In the mood for a little snack I read the label and immediately bought a couple.


 I thought "If these things tasted at all good they were a real find!"  And they did, just a little something to counter that urge to get a candy bar or if at home reach for the cookies.


FIBERFUL bars are a 7 oz. fruit "leather" made with unsweetened dried fruit, psyllium, flax seed and inulin.  Having never heard of inulin before I Googled it.  It seems there are pluses and minuses to it, and absolute food purists may say no.  Best to read about it yourself.


But for me, they are a find.  60 calories, 14 g carbs, 6 g fiber, tasty, and only $.59 each.


On the RV front.  We have decided to cancelled our trip next week because of some unexpected material costs on the home improvement projects.  Skipping the trip was my idea.  The weather is "iffy" next week anyway. 


On the subject of a towed:  I think we are just going to get new tires for the Prius.  Craig is too busy to think about car shopping right now, and he was encouraged by the fact that Annie said she heard Prius batteries rarely need replacement.

Craig said something very encouraging today ...

While I am not expecting the work on the house to get done any time soon so we can get it on the market, we are planning a few trips. 


Now that the taxes are done and paid, we are planning on going to the Sierra foothills, aka the Gold Country for a few days next week.  I am not a fan of hot weather, and I think it will be far more pleasant to hike and visit the Columbia Historic Park now rather than in summer when it will be crowded with families.


We also have plans for a three or four week trip at the end of June, thru mid-July to Northern California and Oregon.


For both trips I had planned on driving the Prius while Craig drove the Alfa.  We had talked about using a dolly for the Prius, but have decided against that for a lot of reasons.  


Today, as Craig made his list of errands he needed to do, I suggested he stop and buy new front tires for the Prius.  They are getting very worn, and although we will probably be OK next week, I think it would be best to get them before we go in June.


His response was "Or maybe we should just trade it in on something that can be towed." 


 There are a lot of good reasons to do that now instead of waiting until later.  


The Prius is a 2007, which makes the batteries five years old and possibly heading for full replacement.  It is also due for the 80K mile service, which can be very pricey.  As it is now, it looks and runs fine, and if RVing weren't in our life, we would probably just keep it and put money into it rather than trade it in.  


I know I'd love to have a towed.  It's the next logical step, but I always thought that if we weren't on the verge of getting out of here, we wouldn't get one unless my van died.  But we need the  van for trips to the lumber yard, Goodwill, the dump, and probably a storage place!


It's up to Craig to make this decision.  He has always been the car buyer.  (I did buy the little red MG Midget because it was cute, and a few $200 junkers for grocery runs in the 70's, but never a serious car.)


We shall see. 


 Craig said he would do some research on towables.  He also has to be able to drive it daily for the next year or so until the house is on the market.  He goes to town for one reason or another almost every day, and the Prius gets very good mileage!


I find this a very exciting step!


Do you tow?

Followers found ...

From Craig:


OK, it was my fault that Merikay couldn't see her followers' thumbnail images on her blog any more.  I downloaded a browser extension called "Do Not Track Plus" into our various browsers in the last day or two, and it interacts with Google's JavaScript code for displaying followers, so that their thumbnails disappear.  Turns out that it's easy to disable DNTP for particular sites, and I've done so for her blog under Safari, Firefox, and Chrome, so she can see her followers' thumbnails again.


Today we decided to drive up to our foodie heaven, Berkeley Bowl.  As an example of the wonderful things we found, they had a 2 pound tray of French green beans from Guatemala for about $3.40, which for non-math readers is $1.70 per pound.  French green beans are often offered up to $6 per pound in supermarkets in Central California.  We don't buy them at such prices, but obviously some folks do.


The best part was when Merikay stepped up to their deli case and bought two slices of their house meatloaf.  Sensible people don't get excited about things like this, but for dinner tonight it was the best meatloaf I've ever had!


These are good examples of why we like to go to Berkeley Bowl.  For about $140, we got more than a week's worth of wonderful vegetables, some decent meat[!], and a 1.5L bottle of white wine for old backsliding me.  How can we go gallivanting across the country and get thousands of miles from Berkeley Bowl?


From Merikay:
A slow cooker ratatouille, spring vegetable soup, tabouli, and several giant salads are all on the menu this week!  Meat?  Just a little chicken, some ground turkey for lettuce wraps, and a couple of smoked pork chops.  Aside from the meatloaf Craig mentioned for dinner tonight. (Only one slice each, with healthy sides!)

For the Good Luck Ducks, I found the boxed tofu.  I don't have my register slip but I think it was about $1.15 for a 12 oz. box. " Use by" date is July 2012, so it doesn't keep forever. It says "Airtight package requires no refrigeration until opened.  No Preseratives. No Irradiation." I bought a couple of boxes and will try them in the coming days.  It seems like a very convent product.  They also had "firm."

Speaking of tofu, it has a very interesting history.  Before WWII each village in Japan would make tofu as a community.  The duties rotating between families and the product shared.  After the war it was given over to the war widows as a way they could make a living.  I had a book about it years ago and remember this little factoid..

Happy Easter everyone, or happy whatever your Spring celebration may be in honor of.

May we all have a New Beginning in the sun.

Followers?

All of my followers have just disappeared.  I assume this is a temporary glitch.

Are you still out there?

It Looks Like Spring

But it's still pretty cold outside up here in the Mountains!  We are still enjoying evening fires and Craig says it has to get warmer before he is ready to start the "outside" work!


On the "inside" work, he has completed work on one of three bathrooms.  The other two will come after a long summer of outside jobs.  


Not much happening with the RV.  I did firm up our plans for the Crater lake trip, and made reservations at the Shingletown KOA for the week we will be down near Lassen National Park. 


 I first made a mistake in booking a one night stop over at the Burney Falls State park. I had looked at the reservation sight several times and was under the impression there were no sites big enough for the Alfa, but then I found one. Unfortunately it was a handicap site and I didn't notice that until after I had confirmed the reservation.  OOPS, I called right away, but still got stuck with a cancellation fee.  Lesson learned.  Look at everything twice when you find something to good to be true! 


 I guess we will just be driving up to Burney Falls one of the days we are at Shingletown.  We will have the Prius with us.


On the food front, I've slipped a couple of times.  I remind myself no one is perfect and building new habits that will be good for me for the rest of my life.
I just get so bummed when I hit a plateau like I have for the last week or so.


I am excited about a new dressing/dip recipe that I have been making.  I'm sure all my Vegan  friends know all about silken tofu, but it was new to me.  Silken tofu is sold in water packages next to the firm tofu in the cold case of the grocery stores. I see that it is also sold in "shelf stable" boxes which would be great to have along in the RV when you can't get to a grocery!


The following is a recipe for a very basic salad dressing.  I made half at a time because I don't like to keep things mixed in the refrigerator for very long. It is a "basic" recipe and you could easily add more or other spices or even add tomato and relish for a Thousand Island style dressing.

Ingredients

• Ingredients:
• 6 ounces silken tofu (or soft tofu, drained) (comes in 
• a box)
• 
  
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 
  
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• 
  
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 
  
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 
  
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh Italian parsley (I used dried)
• 
  
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 
  
• 1 1/2 tablespoons cider vinegar

Directions

1. Instructions:
2. Combine all ingredients in a blender container. Blend until well mixed.

The first time I made it we tried it as a veggie dip.  I guess we were hungry, because between Craig and I we did in a whole small head of fresh cauliflower! At that time I thought the dressing was a bit thin and would have been better as a salad dressing than as a dipping dressing.  I did save the little that was left over and used it on a salad a few days later and it was still good.

I made a second batch with the remaining tofu a few days later.  This time I added a Tablespoon of Chia seeds and put it in the refrigerator over night. The dressing became a nice thick dip!

I had never heard of Chia Seeds before last week, except for when they are spread over a funny sculpture to grow a "Cha- Cha -Cha- Chia pet!  


They are very high in fiber, 5 grams per tablespoon, and can be added to things like breads or smoothies.  If you mix them into a liquid, and let them stand for awhile, they expand into a jelly like substance with  little seeds inside.  This is what thickened the dressing.


By the way, do not mix Chia seeds, almond milk and blueberries in a blender and pour it into little cups, expecting to get a  nice "Chia pudding."  The resulting concoction is not visually pleasing. The blueberries turn gray.  

RV Grill

If you have an RV, you have to have a grill, right?


One of the features of the Alfa is a propane connection on the side where you can hook up your gas grill.  Not having to cary a tank does save some room in the basement!


So our daughter and her husband bought us a Weber Q for Christmas.  But we didn't have the right kind of hose connection for it.  It has been a search to find the right one.  Neither Camping World nor Weber itself has a hose that would work with the Alfa.  We finally got one thru Alfateers, and as soon as it stopped raining we gave it a try.

Mostly vegetable kabobs

  I have told Craig that RV BBQing is man's work!   We shall see how long that lasts!  Actually I won't mind doing the cooking if he takes over cleaning and storing the grill!

The cook enjoys  a glass of wine while watching over the grill. 


My diet doesn't allow me to drink wine, but Craig still can.

Mostly 
veggie kabobs.


I used  3 ounces of shrimp for each of us.  Plus lots of tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, mushrooms and fresh pineapple. 


 I used a Catalina dressing that I had on hand.  It's not a "low fat" dressing because you need a little oil for the grilling.  


Next time I might experiment with mixing up something myself.


To me grilling has almost always meant "meat."  Steaks, whole chicken, hamburgers.  But with our new outlook on food I'm going to have to explore a more vegetarian, or at least a non red meat approach.  


Our kabobs in the past were always about half lamb and half veggies.  These were so good we probably didn't even need the shrimp.  Craig said he really like the pineapple and so did I.


Later today we will have to clean the grill and stow it back in the Alfa.  That is one thing I'm a bit concerned about.  With our deck grill we just burn off the grates, and change the drip pan from time to time.  I don't want a greasy grill in the Alfa basement.  I think it would attract mice and rats.


How thoroughly do you clean your grill?

Review of "The Blood Sugar Solution"

Because Laurie mentioned she was starting "The Blood Sugar Solution" program this week I decided to read the book. 
It is really quite popular, there are over 50 people on the library waiting list, so I bought it on the Kindle.


I guess I have always been a new diet book junkie.  I have probably read just about every one that has come out in the last 45 years!


I have come to the conclusion that I am hoping for a miracle diet that will help me lose lots of weight, overnight, without any sacrifices.


Well, I'm still looking!  "The Blood Sugar Solution" offers very little new information.  In fact many of   points Dr. Hyman makes have been around since the 80's.  


Please don't get me wrong.  I'm not disagreeing with the message of eat less and exercise more.  Most of his food recommendations are exactly what I have been eating for the last two months.  I am slowly losing weight and almost never hungry.


But I feel his regime would be very hard to follow, and very difficult to stick with for a lifetime, which is what I need to do. 

In the book he repeatedly recommends a variety of supplements, which of course he sells on his web site. 

(For example for a little over $100 you can get the basic starter kit of supplements for women.) 

He also has a 12 week on-line course he will sell you if you"are not getting the results you want" after reading the book and trying to follow the program on your own.  You can try it "free for 7 days" here. (I wonder how much it costs?)

I also question  his advice to not use the microwave, not drink bottled water, keep the cell phone six to eight inches from your head, and avoid WiFi, waterbeds, computer screens, and clock radios.  


Aluminum foil hats anyone?


 The book does offer a few interesting recipes.   I may try a few. 


In conclusion, some good, but old, ideas, some wacky points of view, but not a miracle diet.