collards in my smoothie and spring cleaning!

I've got a little smorgasbord of food to post here that we've had over the past few days or so.
As the winter has gone on I've found that I was drinking fewer green smoothies and hadn't realized it until now, so here they go back in the front of my diet.  This one had a gorgeous color and was the first time for collards in my smooothie.  I used nearly all of a bunch of collard greens, whole navel orange (minus the peel), whole fresh mango, 3 dates, and water.  It was delish, one of my recent favs for sure.  I find I always love them when I add an orange. 
With none other than a Glass Dharma straw, it really does make them more fun!



There are the most delicious organic whole trade pineapples right now at WF, I ate this one all by myself in like 3 sittings, yum.



For breakfast this morning I had my first chia gel.  I've previously made them with nut milks and other ingredients, but this time just chia and water.  In a jar with a tight lid I used the ratio of 1/3 cup chias to 2 cups of water, but my jar was little so I halved it. 



shake them up a bit, wait a little bit (like 15 mins), shake them again, and maybe do it again if you've got the time.  I then put them in the fridge overnight to gel.



Chias are crazy nutritious, you can read about that here.  This is the gel that was ready for me this morning. 



In a bowl I ate about half of the gel, a whole fresh mango, a lil dribble of raw agave, and some vanilla powder.  It was awesome, and I really think that they are energizing, I got a lot of the little loose end things done around the house today and enjoyed doing it ;)  also enjoyed some sunshine, woo hoo, it's still cold, but pretty!



Next time I'm going to do without the agave, it wasn't too sweet, but I think just the vanilla will be perfect.
Up close of the gelatinous guys.



On to something a little less nutritious are these cookies I've been eating a lot of ;)  They're the Peppermint Oatmeal Carob Cookies from Extraveganza and are totally yummy and minty =D  This batch was about half chocolate half carob, kind of fun, I like them both.



ok, so one night last week I ate three bowls of this dish after I had already eaten a huge salad!  It was like I couldn't eat enough, anyone have those times when you swear you have a hollow leg??? it helped that it was so good and comforting ;)  It's Vegan Yum Yum's Hurry Up Alfredo with an almond for soymilk swapover organic brown rice noodles.  The link will take you to the recipe.  If you're thinking that there can't be a good vegan dish that resembles mac and cheese, this should sell you.  We added a bunch of thawed frozen peas.



We got a healthy dose of greens and sea veggies in the Sesame Kale Soba from Get It Ripe.  I forgot the sesames, oops.



and more greens with a salad of fridge finds



and Balsamic Vinaigrette from Living Cuisine.  It's made with miso, and you all know how I love anything with miso.



A recipe from that magazine at WF (january/february 10), not the whole deal, the other one, it's just called WF on the front for Sweet Potato Salad with Apple and Avocado did not impress my husband, so I ate it all and loved it, awesome and simple.  It's basically a salad of cooked swts, corn, apple, avocado, pumpkin seeds with lime juice.



Last night we had Broccoli Creem Soup from Get It Ripe again.  Broccoli's been on sale here so obviously we're having soup ;)  We had a drizzle of our favorite flax and I tried to float chopped red pepper and zucchini, but they sank ;)  and of course some homemade Parma. 



Have you all been cleaning and purging unused things lately.  I think I'm gettting the spring cleaning fever early!  We've been donating tons of items to the local thrift store, posting on Craigslist, and working on passing some things along on freecycle.  I've just signed up and still waiting to be accepted I guess.  I just love only having around the possessions that you use often, we've got a little ways to go yet, but it's progress.  I've also been unsubscribing to so much e-stuff, deleted my myspace account, cleaned out my inbox, all the e-clutter clouds the mind too.  We use Catalog Choice to stop unwanted catalogs being sent.  so are you all having spring cleaning fever too???