pina colada and peanut sauce

I went back to work today, and I genuinely love my job (I’m an intern for the American Diabetes Association—public health=<3), but I am definitely still not up to 100%.

I tried to refuel with a protein and fiberiffic snack.

 

I’ve had a bunch of the berry fruit leathers before, but this was my first time trying the pineapple. It is YUM!

I bought this on a whim from the cafe under my office. I wanted sweet and calcium and protein, and this delivered.

I know it sounds slightly insane, but I swear alternating bites of the pineapple bar with the vanilla milk was pina colada reminiscent.

Then I walked home from work. I was apprehensive about doing it, because like I said, I’m still feeling a little sick, but I was actually really glad I did it. It was nice to move and be active and get fresh air, and I felt better, not worse, when I was done.

My dinner side dish was this baby:

There’s this restaurant at home, Lighthouse Tofu (the best name for a restaurant… ever?) that’s Korean, and like many Korean restaurants serves all their dishes with a bunch of fun tangy spicy condiments on the side. They have one with cucumbers that is soooooooooo goooooooooood. I invented these, which are kind of pickles with Asian flavors, to try and duplicate it. They taste NOTHING LIKE IT.

But, I decided they’re good in their own right. Toss some cucs with rice vinegar, salt, sugar, and some chili paste. As a spicy food lover, I adore them.

I made baked tofu, which I’ve been really into lately. I started making it after reading about it in everyone’s blogs! I baked it at 375 for 40 minutes or so, flipping halfway through.

The star was supposed to be some peanut sauce that I had leftover from Thai food awhile ago—I smeared it on the tofu before I baked it. Honestly, the texture was great but it lost the peanut sauce flavor. I should’ve added it at the end. Live and learn!

I did toss some more peanut sauce (those blobs are dabs of it, this is before I topped everything with tofu) with the other components of my meal. I had a half serving of soba noodles I wanted to use up, so I made those and tossed in some fresh broccoli for the last minute and a half or so of their boiling time. Then I stir fried them with the aforementioned peanut sauce and topped them with tofu.

I ate all this good stuff with chopsticks. My technique of using them is probably not correct, but it is effective, and fun!