Have a Tomato

Unfortunately, I will not have access to a kitchen until this summer. Thus, Tuesday's posts will be a little lacking as far as content goes. My apologies!

Here are a couple snack recipes that incorporate fresh tomatoes. I didn't include exact amounts, so you can add however much of each ingredient you want. It shouldn't be too difficult to eyeball it!

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A Traditional Antipasto Dish

• sliced tomatoes
• fresh mozzarella
• fresh basil
• drizzle of balsamic

Mediterranean Vegetable Salad

• tomatoes
• green bell peppers
• cucumbers
• Kalamata olives
• feta cheese
• balsamic vinaigrette

Quick Open-Faced Sandwich

• sliced tomato
• hummus
• whole-wheat English muffin

French Sandwich

• French bread
• tomatoes
• goat cheese spread
• fresh basil
• olive oil
• salt and pepper

Now that summer is quickly approaching, these fresh and tasty treats will be the perfect complement to a hot afternoon spent relaxing at the pool. Enjoy!

A Dark Indulgence

As a delicious luxury for those of us who are weight-conscious, it’s hard to believe that something as decadent and seemingly sinful as chocolate can be beneficial to our health. Of course we’re going to be skeptical. It’s the thing we cut out of our diet when we’re counting calories, what we allow ourselves to have only on special occasions, what we give up for lent (it’s over, eat up!). Luckily, we don’t always have to spare ourselves the pleasure of consuming the creamy delectable treat. In fact, chocolate can actually be beneficial to your health.

There are two caveats that you need to keep in mind with this little tidbit of information: dark chocolate and moderation. For it to be most effective, the chocolate needs to be at least 70% cacao and have as few ingredients as possible. The Ghirardelli variety pictured fits this mold perfectly. For those of you who aren’t huge fans of dark chocolate like myself, try biting off small pieces and letting it melt in your mouth. This undercuts the intensity and makes it very manageable. Make sure that you eat only one square a day, which equates to about 11 grams and 60 calories.

So what about the health benefits? A number of studies have shown that dark chocolate’s special antioxidant properties help protect the cardiovascular system, including:

• Widening blood vessels
• Modest effect on lowering blood pressure
• Reduces platelet action- reduces blood clotting

While these revelations may seem like excellent news to your cardiovascular health, remember not to get too carried away. Over-consumption of both of these can decrease their beneficial effects and also cause weight gain. Yet, in a way, you can have your cake and eat it too. 

The Art of Cork

My dad is an avid wine connoisseur and has a number of wine cork corkboards around the house that he's made from his favorite wines. I was going through a closet in my parents' house and found two large Ziploc bags filled with wine corks. So of course, I went to Pinterest for a little bit of inspiration, and found this lovely little craft. It's so simple and unique and I knew it was something I just had to make.

What you will need:

• USED wine corks (I used about 150)
• cardboard or stiff posterboard
• scissors or Exacto-Knife
• hot glue gun

It's important to have used wine corks (yes, I know) because the natural color of the wine is stained on the bottom of the cork and that gives it a fun colorful aspect that makes it really easy to create the ombre effect. So drink up!

Making this is so easy that I could do a good job! Here are the steps:

1. Trace a heart shape on your cardboard and make sure all the dimensions are correct so it's balanced and symmetrical
2. Carefully cut out the traced heart with the Exacto-Knife.
3. Arrange the wine corks in sections of color. I had about four sections- deepest color, middle color, light color, and no color at all (the natural side, or with white wine).
4. Start at the bottom of the heart, and begin gluing with the hot glue gun whatever color section you wish to be at the bottom, either deepest color or natural color.
5. Make your way up the heart with the ombre effect of colors.

There you have it! Here are a few additional tips for making it look the best:

• Before you start you might want to spread your corks on the cardboard in a heart shape so you know you won't run out of corks and can create the right size heart.
• Glue the corks on the edge of the heart slightly over the edge so it hides the cardboard underneath.
• Don't worry if the corks don't line up exactly next to each other. Mine did not and it looks perfectly fine.

Please ask me any questions if you have any and good luck!

Listening to: Vienna by Billy Joel

Dream a Little Dream

It's finally becoming that time of the year again. My favorite time. The weather is starting to warm up, and the trees are starting to bloom with the first blossoms longing for spring. It may be over a month away (March 20 is when spring officially begins), but I would say that here in the South the advent of spring has certainly inched its way in. I for one cannot wait. Who, after all, doesn't look forward to warm afternoons relaxing in the sun?

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Listening to: Dream a Little Dream by Zooey Deschanel

Go Your Own Way

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Passionate

One of my favorite warm-weather drinks at Starbucks is the Tazo passion tea-lemonade (Venti, please). For such a brightly-colored concoction, it has relatively few calories, only 70 if unsweetened or with Splenda. Of course, it's not financially logical as a college student for me to buy a four dollar drink that I can down in ten minutes a couple times a week. So today, I did a little experimenting and found a way to replicate it and make it (almost) as good!

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What you will need:

• 1 Tazo Passion Tea bag
• 1/2 Crystal Light To-Go in Natural Lemonade (the size for water bottles)
• 1/2 packet of Splenda
• 12 oz water (give or take)

There is really no exact science to this. You can adjust the amounts if you like more lemonade or if you want it to be sweeter. First, steep the tea for about 5-6 minutes as the directions say. It does not need to be hot. Like I said before, you can steep it as long as you like, but be careful about leaving it in too long as it often turns bitter after a point. Next, add about half (or all, if you like) of the lemonade mix to the tea. Then add the Splenda and you're done! Not only is this much cheaper than the Starbucks version, but it has essentially no calories!

It you're absolutely not concerned about cutting calories, here's the full sugar homemade version. It sounds delicious and would be a wonderful party drink (if you feel like doing a lot of steeping)!

Now playing: Piano Man by Billy Joel

Raindrops on Roses

Where I am, it's been raining on and off for about two weeks. Miserable to walk to class in, to say the least. I'm always very negative about the rain, especially during a fifteen minute walk, but thanks to my new glossy Hunter rainboots I got for Christmas, I almost look forward to it! Here's some cheery inspiration to bring you out of the rainy day blues.

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