Random Meals – 1/16 – 1/28/22

February 2, 2022 sirisvay1 Comment

To be perfectly honest, I’m struggling to share new food photos with y’all! I’m a creature of habit, and when I like something, I stick with it. Essentially I’m eating repeated meals, which are no fun to share over and over again. But here are six more!

a homemade Chipotle bowl with a spoon, chicken, pico de gallo, corn, avocado, vegan sour cream, and brown rice — Chipotle Chicken Bowl

a bowl with a spoon, crispy tofu and brown rice — Chipotle Chicken Bowl

Homemade Chipotle Chicken Bowl
- This was very delicious, but oh my goodness it is A LOT of work. It’s mostly prepping all the sides and toppings on top of the marinating and cooking the protein. My favorite part of the dish, though, was making vegan sour cream (which I think consisted of mixing coconut yogurt, lemon juice and tapioca flour).
Crispy Tofu and Brown Rice
Salmon Crisp Chips
- The salmon is supposed to be sushi-grade fresh salmon, however, I have not been able to make it to the Asian market. What I did instead was cook regular salmon fillet to medium rare!
Shrimp Spring Rolls
Bang Bang Shrimp
- Fried shrimp is SO delicious, and I will never turn it down. This dish was also yummy, however, it’d probably be better cooking it the way it’s instructed in the recipe – with an air fryer. I fried the shrimp in vegetable oil, so it’s not the best healthy way to do it.
8g Carb (Egg White Crust) Pizza
- I wanted to like this recipe more than I did, but it’s honestly probably chef maker error because I didn’t cook the crust correctly. Trying to multitask by letting it sit on heat while I wash dishes was my mistake. The eggs got too fluffy versus thin and crispy for thin crust pizza. I’m down to try it again because of its appeal of being low carb!

Aside from these dishes, I’ve tried to bring even more plant-based and low-carb recipes onto my plate. That’s always been a focus for my diet regimen, but after all the doctors, surgeries and procedures in the last couple of years, I’ve stepped this up a notch to take care of my body even more. It’s no fun to hear bad news at all your medical appointments LOL

What are some plant-based and low-carb gems you enjoy? I’m slowly discovering there’s more and more in the food world than I ever knew!

xo
Siri

My #GlowupSessions Challenge Journey

January 18, 2022January 18, 2022 sirisvay2 Comments

It has been done! I completed the Blogilates two-week #GlowupSessions challenge, and I feel so great! How did I get here? Well, it was no picnic in the park. It was definitely a struggle and I thought about giving up early on, but I pushed myself to get through it. I’m glad I did ‘cause I haven’t felt this great bodily wise, mood wise, and mentally, and the challenge reinforced good habits of perseverance, consistency, determination and endurance.

Introducing Blogilates’ Cassey Ho
I’ve been doing Cassey’s exercise videos since I was living in LA, back in 2016, and she’s been an integral part of my workout regimen. The goal of her brand is to manifest positivity and finding joy in everything, and she’s truly inspirational, motivational, and consistent with her message and workouts. She’s hosted other challenges in the past, which I’ve completed too, but this one really kicked my booty. So, strap in, friends – here’s the story about my journey! Learn about the food, the workouts and the mental health check!

Continue reading →

food · health

Weekly Meals – Nov. 7 – 12, 2021

November 16, 2021November 16, 2021 sirisvay1 Comment

Late on posting again! No profound message here to accompany these dishes other than I’m slowly but surely working on becoming a professional hermit like Futaba Sakura from Persona 5. She’s my spirit animal, and living alone and spending time alone sounds like a great time.

Here’s what I made and ate:

a plate with three tofu rice dumplings and chopsticks

a bowl of a keto egg roll bowl with ground pork and vegetables

a small pot of kimchi soondubu jigae on a stovetop

Mapo Tofu (from My Hero Academia Season 5)
- No spoilers here but there’s an episode in My Hero Academia Season 5 where Deku, Bakugo and Todoroki eat this dish, and to be honest, it didn’t occur to me to make it myself. It wasn’t until I was down the rabbit hole of anime TikTok and someone showed a video of them making it, and it looked DELICIOUS in real life.
Tofu Rice Dumplings
- This is the third time I’ve made this, and I cannot get it right for some reason! The rice paper gets crispy on the outer layer, but the inner layer becomes gelatinous and makes it chewy. It’s probably related to the vegetables and tofu letting go of water and causing the paper to absorb it. So, lesson learned to make sure the tofu and cabbage are both completely dried out before wrapping them. (Plus, let’s be real, the anxiety of burning the rice paper and setting of the smoke alarm is real LOL)
Keto Eggroll bowl
- A great recipe to make if you’re craving egg rolls but are too lazy to wrap them all and fry them! And it’s low-carb and keto friendly! Although I did eat mine with a little bit of rice.
Kimchi Soondubu Jigae
- I forgot how I stumbled upon this one, but it’s incredibly easy to make – you put all the ingredients in a pot and let it simmer and mesh all the flavors. On top of that, because I live alone, one small pot can last me 3 – 4 meals. It’s usually made with pork shoulder, but I use beef ‘cause HEB doesn’t have the right type of pork meat to eat with it. Seldom do I go to the asian grocery store to get it, so making it with what I got!

I will say this… there was a time in Austin, TX for college where I was eating more tofu, but then I couldn’t recreate that same craving living in Los Angeles. Now, it’s found its way back onto my plate! I feel like I eat more tofu than I do red meat now, and I am not complaining one bit!

What’s on your plates?

xoxo
Siri

food · health

Weekly Meals – Oct. 24 – 29, 2021

November 9, 2021 sirisvayLeave a comment

Ahhhh, I’m behind on my weekly meal posts… I had to deal with prepping for a medical procedure last week, so I failed to carve out time to write this. But here are the meals from the week of Halloween – still continuing down the path of increased fiber intake. Here’s what I made and ate! And now I’m including recipe links in case y’all wanna try anything here (:

a plate with chicken, brown rice, broccoli and Green Goddess sauce

an overhead photo of a burrito-making station with tomatoes, red onion, lettuce, cheese, tortillas, guacamole and chicken

a Green Goddess grilled cheese chopped in half sitting on a cutting board

Chicken, broccoli and brown rice with Green Goddess sauce
- I’ve had Green Goddess sauce once at my sister’s house, and it was DELICIOUS. However, when I tried making it, I made some substitutions that I probably shouldn’t do ‘cause it changes and tastes more like a pesto sauce. Next time!
Chicken burrito wraps
Green Goddess grilled cheese
- Oh my goodness… who knew a sandwich could be so rich with flavor. This was relatively easy to make, but I didn’t use a brioche bread, like the recipe said to use. My grocery list is made with the idea of using all the items in overlapping recipes versus one-time use and wasting food. I don’t know if I would make this again only because I don’t think I made it well enough. This is something I would entrust a restaurant chef to make more decadently.
Baked chicken with kale caesar salad (made by my mom)
- So, this is a recipe I can’t share ‘cause I’ve never made it myself, but my mom makes this so well. Everything is in synergy and tastes amazing. She used to make the Caesar salad with romaine lettuce, but one random day she tried it with kale and now it’s what I request all the time. YUM!

I’m pretty proud of myself that I made healthier meals than I usually do and embraced brown rice instead of white jasmine rice. It’s definitely an adjustment, but at the end of the day it is better for me.

What are y’all eating?! Give me more ideas!

xoxo
Siri

food · health · Mental Health

Weekly Meals – Oct. 17 – 22, 2021

October 25, 2021 sirisvayLeave a comment

It… has been a hella rough week. And one of the things I exercise regularly is indulging in one of the seven sins: gluttony. Namely, I ordered myself a large pizza to eat down my feelings. It’s weird, though, because sometimes when I’m depressed, I either gorge myself with food or I go in the opposite direction and don’t eat at all. Either way, I tried to continue building my healthier eating habit, but it was a challenge.

Here’s what I ate/cooked this week:

a stove-top pan filled with yellow sauteed basmati rice with chicken, topped with cilantro — Yellow rice and chicken

a large pizza from Pizza Hut, topped with pepperoni, green bell pepper and mushroom — Yellow rice and chicken

Yellow rice and chicken
- This recipe was given to me by one of my buddies via TikTok, so… yeah LOL because I don’t have that big of a stomach, this dish lasted me three meals.
Pizza Hut $10 Tastemaker large 3-topping deal (pepperoni, green bell pepper and mushroom)
Salmon, avocado, rice
Onigiri with salmon filling
- Yo, I’m so happy I purchased the tool to make onigiri, but holy crap, it’s A LOT of rice. Essentially I ate the entire rice cooker’s worth of rice in one sitting. It feels disgusting, so lesson learned, a person should only eat one onigiri, not three. Although, I did get a smaller onigiri mold size.
Spicy shrimp vermicelli
- This was spur of the moment and a combination of two TikTok recipes I saw, and YIKES, it is super spicy. Eating only half the serving pictured here had me wanting so much water. But what else can you expect when there’s chili powder, sriracha and red pepper flakes…

Not the most exciting of meals this week, but I’m determined to continue the journey of eating much healthier.

What are y’all cooking? Share recipes with me to try!
xo
Siri