Hurry Up Rice!

Today didn’t feel like a Wednesday.  Probably because Jack and I got back from Thanksgiving vacation on Monday.  I started off the day with a breakfast cake which I totally failed to take a picture of before I wolfed it down following my 35 minute elliptical session.  I spent the rest of the morning running around getting my mandatory flu shot (ugh, I predict soreness tomorrow!) and being the patient for first year role plays.

By the time lunch rolled around I had already made some decent progress on my second patient letter from yesterday’s counseling sessions.  I even got my evaluation back from one of the appointments and I was happily surprised to see this –>

Talk about one awesome feeling.  No improvement comments!  I shouldn’t let this go to my head though as I have another patient tomorrow and there is always room for little tweaks here and there.  Anyways, I got hungry around noon and pulled out my variety lunch.  Last night when I was packing I was really, really indecisive so I just grabbed whatever I felt like in the moment.  Part one: two hard-baked eggs with homemade curry spice blend to sprinkle.  Part two: celery and green pepper slices with BBQ sauce.  Part three: an apple.

Needless to say I munched my way through everything as I continued to work on my patient letter.  That sucker ended up being three pages, size 10 font, single spaced.  Large and in charge my friends!  The whole afternoon was a blur of studying and more letter writing and editing.  I swear my fingers get such a workout in this program!!  By the time I got home I was hungering for some mandarins so I peeled two and quickly sucked them down.  More school work ensued (I’m boring, I know!) and then at six o’clock I decided I wanted something marinated and I wanted rice.  Oh good, it is already dinner time and I’m wanting stuff that takes quite a few minutes to prepare.  There isn’t really a way to hurry up rice…but I wanted to honor my desires though so I had some pretzels to tide me over while I made dinner.

I started off by mixing a 1/4 cup of soy cause, a tablespoon of honey, a tablespoon of rice vinegar, a 1/2 tsp of five spice, and a tsp of minced garlic together.  Then I poured that over a Trader Joe’s tempeh block cut into four thin “steaks”.  Thankfully tempeh soaks up marinade super quickly so the fact that it only marinated for half an hour didn’t matter much.  I baked it at 350* for 25 minutes, flipping halfway through.  I also roasted some onions tossed in olive oil, basil, and garlic.  My rice cooker did all the hard work while I baked.  I didn’t soak the rice, obviously, because of my lack of foresight but it worked perfectly.  Plus I made more for leftovers!  Also steamed the last of my frozen broccoli.

A nice well rounded meal I must say.  The butter in the rice really did it though.  I forgot how sultry butter on starch can be!  A bit later I wanted something sweet so I grabbed a caramel rice cake and smeared it with some peanut butter (a natural brand from Aldi for super cheap and its actually really great, score!) and pressed some mini marshmallows on top.  It was heavenly.

Please ignore the utterly full and dirty sink in the background.  I promise I washed them all before I sat down to blog.  Now I’m off to sleep.  I have to lift in the morning (still on stage three of NROLFW) as long as my left arm is actually functional given that it was assaulted by a needle today.  Here’s hoping.  Sleep well blog world!

Questions: Did you get a flu shot this year?
Are you a fan of mini marshmallows?