Dr. Michael Greger & Quinoa Leftovers

I miss the long weekend, it was fabulous. We had a lovely Valentine’s day with roses, sweet cards, and gifts.

I got hubby books, a new game, nice watch, and this insane limited edition signed Blair’s 2am Reserve extract hot sauce since he’s into hot sauces. I like spicy too, but that’s too insane for me! He got me the Haiku Jaunt purse that I’ve been hinting at, Haiku is one of my favorite purse brands made from recycled water bottles and super tough. Plus they go through the washer easily. And a new smoothie tumbler from Meaningful Paws with my favorite vegan saying.

We also saw Dr. Michael Greger give a great presentation promoting his new book – How Not to Die!

I was lucky to get tickets to this event – it was free, but booked up shortly after it was posted through the vegan meetup group! And so glad we went because it was an engaging presentation highlighting many studies and publications proving the benefits of a plant based diet, many shocking. And you can watch a similar presentation he did for Google recently here! He runs through the list of top killers, such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, etc. and all the studies and evidence that a whole foods plant diet can reverse and/or prevent most of them. Some interesting points:

• The body can dissolve plaque in the arteries if we’re not constantly adding to it through diet.
• And it can heal itself efficiently with the right, nutrient dense diet.
• Artery hardening can begin at a very young age and progress through a diet rich in animal fats and proteins.
• Plant based diets can improve blood allowing it to be hostile to cancer cells.
• Exercise helps, but not as much as a whole foods plant based diet.
• Most Americans are potassium deficient.
• Animal proteins and fats can actually change the kidney vein structure and fuel kidney disease with plaque.

Watch his presentation, it’s worth it!

After we headed to Il Fornaio for Valentine’s Dinner.

Where I had a simple vegan pizza loaded with eggplant and mushrooms.

It was a great day, but a little exhausting since my sister and I did a 10-mile run together that morning – whew! Having Monday off to relax was nice, I made a simple romaine salad with leftover quinoa and a ginger avocado dressing for lunch.

Then took hubby to see Deadpool.

Surprisingly it was not super crowded and whew, it was action packed and just a wee bit gory. Also funny and well paced with Ryan Reynolds eye candy.

I was in full relax mode for dinner and still had leftover quinoa in the fridge to use up, so I baked acorn squash halves for 40 minutes at 375 degrees, flipped and stuffed the halves with the quinoa mixture, and baked for 15 minutes to heat the quinoa and crisp the edges.

Yum, the savory Cajun seasoned quinoa was great with the squash complementing the texture and sweetish flavor for a simple dinner of remixed leftovers.

Back to it this week grocery shopping tomorrow and more recipe fun. Hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day!