Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution LA

Yesterday afternoon, I went on a 40 minute bike ride on the city streets to the Oak Leaf trail.

I got as far as Root River parkway and turned around. I probably rode around 6 miles roundtrip, maybe more.

My helmet is a Nutcase one that I received from my brother and sister-in-law for my b-day last year. They got me a different print in a size too big, so I exchanged it at REI for this cute one. It protects my head better than my old bike helmet and it’s super comfy to wear. It also allows me to wear my normal sunglasses with the helmet, where my old one didn’t do that.

During times like these, I wish I had a garmin to wear or a bike computer. My husband has a bike computer, so I usually just rely on him to tell me how far we’ve gone. Anyway, it was a nice ride on such a beautiful day! I am glad I took advantage of it.

My heart was racing when I got home and plopped in an outdoor chair to drink water and read magazines in the sun. I didn’t stay out long because I fear getting burned. It felt good to soak up the sun for a bit.

One of the magazines I paged through was the April 2011 edition of Rachel Ray’s Everyday and I found this recipe, which sounds delicious. I hope to make it soon and report back on how it is!

I kind of snacked my way through dinner–a bowl of raspberries, some Food Should Taste Good cheddar chips, some pieces of french baguette, a tofutti cutie. Later on, I enjoyed a Woodchuck Cider and a blueberry chobani while watching Food Revolution.

Craig and I went on a 35 minute walk around a different neighborhood not far from our house. We kept noticing strange things around this particular area, like a lit up flamingo in the window! A couple of blocks away from our house, I managed to have a typical Lisa moment. A bug flew in my eye, stuck to my contact lense (Craig could see it and was telling me he could, which almost made it worse), and I had to take out my lense. I carried it home like it was an injured bird, cupping it in my hand. Gross. Why do those strange things always seem to happen to me!?

After our walk, it was Jamie Oliver time! Turns out his TV show will be canceled probably after the next episode airs. Yes, folks. That means no more Food Revolution, for now at least. I hope he continues onto another city and tries to make an impact there. Jamie, come to Milwaukee! We need your help and I would love to meet you! 🙂

Here are my Food Revolution takeaways for the week:
-Jamie visited a high school in Santa Barbara. They changed their food program from junk to healthy foods successfully and it was clear that many whole foods were prevalent in their school kitchen! It also helped that they receive some of their produce from the school garden. One of the girls on the show said that she appreciated learning how her food was grown through the school garden.
-Jamie visited the family that he met with last week–the one who ate all of the fast food before meeting Jamie. Turns out that the dad lost 16 lbs. already, he cooks a lot more, and the older kid in the family said he feels better in general. They also started growing a small garden, which impressed Jamie.

And onto today…we slept in a bit, I meditated and then hopped on Craig’s mac mini to get my e-mail and google reader under control!

I ate this while reading blogs. Chobani with raspberries and blueberries.

Around lunch time, we headed out to have the buffet at Royal India restaurant. I didn’t take a pic, but the meal was the standard one I usually have when I go there–paneer tikka masala, naan, veggies (cooked and fresh), mango ice cream, and today we got to enjoy tea as well. I had some kind of dessert that was new to me–carrots cooked with butter, cinnamon and something else I can’t remember. It was really good and you could not even tell it was carrots!

My food baby needed a good walk, so we headed over to the Best Food store on 13th and Holt to check it out. This is the grocery store my Indian class cooking teacher recommended for a good selection and great prices. She was right. I came with my recipes in hand, but didn’t feel like buying anything and searching for ingredients. My stomach was so full that I just felt icky.

Next door was Bombay Sweets, but we didn’t go in. They have a Vegetarian restaurant and my teacher said they had snacks (which are called chaat I believe) in Bombay Sweets.

Then it was time to go to Craig’s grandma’s house, which has a pending offer on it. It’s on the southside of Milwaukee in a typical Milwaukee bungalow neighborhood. Craig’s dad had rented it for the last 5 years, but now the renters are out and he has had a lot of cleaning/fixing up to do. The renters really trashed the place. So, if you are a renter, take care of your place for the sake of landlords like my father-in-law who had to take care of the place because his mom had a stroke and was put in a nursing home.

Seeing the inside brought back memories of the bungalow I grew up in for half of my life in Wauwatosa.

I always loved the built-in cabinets, fireplaces, and larger closets in the house I grew up in.

On the way home, we picked up a free photo collage at Walgreens. Ok, it was supposed to be a “Father’s Day” deal, but I always take advantage of these free collages when I can, which is usually during random Hallmark holidays. I made one of our trip to Florida. If you live near a Walgreens, get their photo e-mail updates and you’ll know when these freebies are available.

And finally, I got myself to the gym this evening. I went during dinner time because my food baby was still very big. The gym was dead, which was great.

I planned out what I was going to do ahead of time in terms of free weights. I used this book I checked out from the library.

I looked up some tricep exercises, some of which I do already. This book lays out the moves in such a nice way and as a visual learner, I appreciate being able to picture the correct form in my head while at the gym.