What a Weekend!

Monday came way too fast this week. After a weekend packed with family activities, I'm exhausted and not ready to face a full week at work. The good news is, I finished my first class! One down, six to go. 

Saturday we were at a wedding for my aunt and uncle, who had a very cute ceremony in their backyard, only to tell us afterwards that they actually got married last September in Maui on the beach! Everyone had a great time, but being up until 3:00am made for a rough start on Sunday, even though I was the DD!

Before the ceremony at my parent's house.

On Sunday morning I woke up to a power outage. I wasn't too upset about sitting down to read until it came back on, but I wasn't happy about my lack of coffee. Once it came back on, about an hour later, I headed right to the kitchen for some very intense food prep. Lee almost never asks me to make him anything in particular, so when he requested I made him granola, I jumped on the request.

Out of the oven

Cooled and with cranberries added :)

I also made some banana protein muffins, half with blueberries and half with chocolate chips. I'm still not sure how much I love these, so the recipe may not surface for a while. Stay tuned though!

Of course, this was intense food prep day, so it didn't stop there. One of my very good friends was in need of some comfort food, so I also made a batch of brownies. I think I nailed them this time. I used a cup of oats, but didn't blend the dry ingredients in the blender. I blended the beans with the liquids, and then mixed the rest of the ingredients with a whisk. I set a bunch of these aside for Lee's family too since they're very curious. His sister and her husband are moving into their new house this week, so I may have to make a batch of real cookies to bring over. Hopefully I don't end up eating too many!
I also boiled 14 eggs, and chopped up veggies for my eggs. I was too hot and tired after all of the baking to make sweet potatoes as well, so my eggs are featuring black beans this week for the carbs!

Sunday afternoon we had two family events; we stopped by my aunt and uncle's for a bit to say goodbye to my Dutch cousin, who is heading back home this week, and then went to Lee's family reunion for the rest of the afternoon.
I brought a salad to the reunion, and decided to try a new recipe that Colleen had sent me last week. It was absolutely DELICIOUS!

Broccoli Salad: 

1 1/2 bunches of broccoli, blanched for one or two minutes, chopped

This was my first time blanching anything, so I had to google it. This is what I did:

- Boiled water, added the broccoli in large chunks and let boil for about 90 seconds. I then drained it and immediately put the broccoli in a large bowl of cold water for about 45 seconds, then drained it again and put it in the fridge to cool further while I got everything else ready. Once it was cool I chopped it up smaller.  

Small zucchini cut lengthwise in quarters and sliced thin

½ small Red onion, finely chopped

½ cup sunflower seeds

1/2 package chicken bacon

You can use regular bacon as well, which is what the original recipe called for. I chopped the bacon up before cooking it to make it a bit easier. It worked really well!

1 cup grapes, halved

Dressing:

1/3 cup veg oil

1 tbsp sesame oil

2 tbsp frozen orange juice concentrate

4 tbsp soy sauce

4 tbsp rice vinegar

¼ tsp each ginger and cayenne

Drizzle of honey to taste

(I didn't need all of the dressing)

 

Before the sunflower seeds and bacon were added