A light Pina Colada is a dessert drink just like a regular Pina Colada with coconut cream that is usually a star ingredient.
And if you want to save the heavy calories… and still have a delicious copycat tropical drink, you can make my Light Pina Colada version. Recipe below. 💕
I think this is a drink dream come true.💭
And a deliciously light tropical smoothie is a great add-on drink for staying cool in hot weather. 🧉
Actually, any Pina Colada is cooling. This one comes to mind as was one sweet drink that gave tropical vacation vibes. 🏖️
The problem with this drink is classic… as in a classic Pina Colada version ishigh calories and sugar.
It’s heavy like a meal. And not a good one.
But, the good news is…
Instead, you can make a healthy, frozen light coconut water tropical smoothie version at home that’s delicious and easy to make.
…And it has no added sugar as fruit will serve as the sugar. Sometimes with all our variety choices, we forget coconuts are fruit too. 🥥
And from the fruits (like pineapple), this is a Vitamin C loaded drink that’s good for boosting the immune system. C is also an antioxidant (aka anti-cancer) that’s water-soluble, so it’s unlikely you’ll take too much. 😊
So this vitamin powerful drink, you can make for everyday healthy drinks. And if you want, add your ginger for a punchy smoothie digestif.
It’s your drink!
…And it’s cool triple layered one if you dare make the American flag colors 🇺🇸 or another (your) country’s flag colors. You can make any color palette with your taste palate and fruit rainbow polyphenol colors. 🌈
Btw, this red, white, and blue one is good anytime of year and especially July 4th Independence Day celebrations. I got a sparkler window show. 🎇
…And then after you’ve made the frozen flag, you’ll end up with this changing colors cool drink as you witness time passing. You may want to make two drinks at a time for yourself.
…One light Pina Colada tropical smoothie you can watch, and another one you can enjoy in the moment. 🍍🍍 Gotta love healthy and happy!
Add first layer of blueberries and blue matcha tea to your drinking glass. Freeze.
After the first layer is solidly frozen, add coconut water layer. Freeze.
Add red juice layer. Freeze.
Add pineapple juice on top. Tip: use fresh pineapple chunks and blend up so there's a thicker juice pulp puree that makes this drink good food drama and taste. Add your pineapple wedge. Enjoy and watch the drink melt like moving colored sand!
Healthy protein foods are a priority at the top of healthy eating and weight loss. They go hand in hand with healthy fats.
And plant based foods are fun to plant into your overall diet because they add color, textures and flavor.
In catering, we always leaned into plant based foods for the color like in a Crudite dish with raw crunchy veggies and the rainbow effects from the anti-inflammatory polyphenols.
…which makes them wildly nutritious and can be the healthy rainbow food on your plate! 🌈
Making them delicious in dishes from their natural bland-boring taste and out of their whole identity or grocery packaging is what makes the tasty edible difference.
Well… when it’s reframed that way, then we can embrace adding more plant-based foods to our healthy diets. They’re sustainable.
But the real problem with veggies if there is one, is that they’re not filling to our bellies.
Most are low calories leaving us feeling hungry. And that can be good for weight loss when balanced in our lives…
Plus adding healthy protein foods to fill in the gaps for us.
Like these examples:
A plant-based tofu “chorizo” healthy protein foods dish doused with balancing Ayurvedic spices.
Tofu chorizo recipe below. 🌱
You can add alliums like onion and garlic that are fiber and good for immunity. Plus green veggies like green bell peppers, and plenty of spices make this a balanced healthy meal.
You can save tomato for your Italian dishes and lean in on the sweet potato in this dish. 🍠
The spices add the flavor and this one has paprika, turmeric, 5 spices, garlic powder, and cumin.
And for healthy proteins, while sausage is usually high in saturated fats, tofu has healthy fats (Omega-3 and unsaturated fat types) and nutrients like magnesium and calcium so it can be a chorizo substitute.
Three Sisters is a corn, bean, and squash trifecta.
Other healthy protein foods include a 3 Sisters dish that celebrates beans at the heart of plant-based healthy protein foods.
This is a complete meal. If you have a corn, beans, and squash trifecta, and also add olive oil or avocado to the meal, then you have all your macros in one. That’s tasty and healthy smart eating.
The stuff I get wildly excited about, plus playing with food. 😊
…Like a plant-based homemade pizza that can bemade with wholesome healthy whole wheat, and in as much time as it takes to place a pizza order and have it delivered… and it’s funny I would know because for 4 teenage years, I was a pizza maker for Domino’s Pizza.
That would be a long time for a teen in today’s working world… but I had fun working. People at all ages stay put when they’re happy.
Back then, like most my age I leaned into the carefree happy over healthy.
These days, wiser having tried more food experiences, we can make better choices.
And we can bake and make our own meals where we get to choose ingredients.
Whole wheat flour is slightly higher in protein and fiber than everyday white flour. And that reminder can help move us closer to healthy desires.
Each step starting with food thoughts make us intentional about what we manifest in this Life.
If we source healthy ingredients and foods, then that’s what ends up on our plates and in our bodies.
And the choice of healthy protein foods is a healthy leader for us and our meals especially when we choose the protein foods first.
Too often we have healthy intentions but end up with the happy for any number of reasons. 😋
So balance or a happy medium I like to say is the best approach… and in my world, I lean into the happy tastes and end up doing the healthy without compromising taste…. and happy to give healthy friend advice.
It’s simple when there’s no pressure to eat healthy, so then it’s easier to make the healthy choice most the time because the freedom of choice…
And we can do that when we go out also. There are plenty of healthy and tasty places to eat these days.
Intentional good foods is what happened when I planned events for American restaurants serving Mediterranean cuisines.
Those experiences made me appreciate small plates and family style foods with healthy flavors.
At a Spanish tapas place, small appetizer plates were the only plates they had.
They also had gigantic paella pans (that could’ve held all the small plates inside).
One was the Friday happy hour pan fit for as big as a dining room table.
I remember back when I would blog every day and the people I worked for didn’t even know what a blog was. I just told them it’s marketing and they let me do my thing, haha.
But the people that were coming to the blog, got it.
You all get it. 😀
I shared recipes and special happenings that’s still the way things are today.
And in the Italian, Spanish, and Lebanese restaurants where I was a food insider, one common ingredient used was tomatoes. Often it was a subtle hint as part of a mixture of flavors we call a relish.
Like Meshi Bel Zeit stuffed veggies that was the vegetarian option for Lebanese events.
For home meals, a dish like that would pair well with a common tomato dish that goes well with many healthy protein foods including peas.
Green peas are a good source of healthy protein as are chickpeas. That makes us hap-pea! 🫛
And quinoa is good to add to our healthy protein foods list. It’s another complete meal.
Quinoa has 9 essential amino acids that our bodies can’t make, so you can definitely feel full after a bowl. It’s a food illusion because you’re eating what looks like a cooked grain (starch), but as a pseudo-grain it’s acts more like a protein super food when it lands in your body.
Frozen peas cooked in with quinoa. Hold the salt.
And even more of an illusion when you add quinoa as a breakfast cereal. This would’ve been a great way to start the back-to-school days if we knew about the super grain way back then.
3 Tips for Cooking Quinoa – Healthy Protein food
1. Use a pan (instead of a pot) for more even cooking.
2. Toast your quinoa on the stovetop before cooking.
3. Don’t salt your dish until the end if you use peas so they don’t dehydrate.
You can make a quinoa paella like this one made of quinoa instead or rice, and then add other healthy protein foods on top. This way you can get all your protein grams in that day with a bottomless quinoa dish.
If gram numbers count for you… the easy way to remember is to take your weight and divide by two for a rough idea of how many pr0tein grams you’re looking for.
Quinoa paella would also be deliciously paired with a za’atar cracker.
Fish and Chips with Cod is a recipe toshare because it’s easy, filling for a family, and made healthy light when baked… that’s a tasty way to make food count and enjoy the calories.
This one is accompanied with healthy waffle chips with a salty and tangy sour dip that has balanced tasty notes (…what’s not to love?). The recipe is below. 🧡
…But first, I wanted to share my inspiration. Making fish and chips takes me back to travel and one special place memory of my time in U.K. 🇬🇧 hoppin’ in and out of London Cabs after dramatically being re-routed from visiting the Mediterranean south.
I didn’t mind as I had worked in food party planning for Mediterranean (Lebanese, Spanish, and Italian) restaurants for years, so that felt a little like home.
And, re-route is part of adventure.
Oh and travel is always an adventure… and GOOD times…
…even if it’s serious business getting history (Stone Henge) downloads.
…And then getting my bearings back up to food familiarities like with these small BUT mighty food bites at Covent Garden near Westminster where I stayed…
Covent Garden salmon lox.…and scallops. I see a smile on this plate. 😋
…Even as big as London is, somehow I found the comfort food. What a memory! 💕
And one memory dish that U.K. is famous for and you don’t have to look long and hard for there is Fish and Chips.🐟 … it’s as common as U.S. served crab cakes, corn on the cob, and potato chips.
That’s a mouthful of “c’s” to say.
Saying Fish and Chips is much easier…
The common U.K. fishes sourced for the dish are salmon, cod, and haddock.
The healthiest fish are wild fish anywhere you source because the fish eat what they would in the wild… makes sense.
And cod is the best choice.
Why cod?
It’s easy to source and that means affordable groceries .
Most U.K. fish come from the shared seas in the North Atlantic and Norway I learned working with chefs and travel.
Fresh salmon at the Bergen, Norway fish market.
My last fishy travel tale was in the Bergen, Norway fish market as I’m going down memory lane 🐟
…And in the U.S., we have our own fish markets. it’s common we source wild fish from the Northwest Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.
But anywhere you are and anytime of the year, you can make your light (aka healthy) baked Fish and Chips.
And this lighter version pairs great for Wimbledon time 🎾
If you’re a fan, as you’re maybe catching points you can decide how you want to serve up your taters. An unsexy 5 lb bag of potatoes makes up points by being long lasting in your fridge and versatile for any spud dish…
And this healthy baked fish is served with waffle potato fries that doesn’t compromise taste or health… and is so simple to make.
Potato waffle fries are made with a little extra virgin oil love that’s healthy. You can use a waffle iron if you have one or you use a skillet and make potato hash or flat pancake potato shapes.
And if potatoes are not on your menu choice and you want a different style with the same basic ingredients in baked fish and chips, alternatively you can cook your fish with boiled potatoes.
This fish and potato dish is inspired from my hotel catering days as a food service professional. It has a French bistro vibe with capers and lemon sauce.
But if you just want to stick with the traditional fish and chips fare made healthy, enjoy this one recipe with no guilt.
Brush fish with olive oil to keep from drying. Add to oven at 325℉/165°C until fully baked.
For bread crumb topping, toast panko crumbs in a separate pan from fish. Set bread crumbs on the top oven shelf so they don't burn. They will toast brown in about 5 minutes or less on the top shelf.
Cook/soften your potatoes until they are mashable. Scoop out small balls about the same size and flatten. You can make the "chips" in a waffle iron or on a sautee pan with olive oil.
For the tartar sauce, mince the pickles and add to a blender with cottage cheese. Add a tiny bit of pickle juice for stronger flavor. You can do this in a Magic Bullet or similar easy blender.
Balance Your Body Type – Based on your score, you can find better health, balance, and passion-purpose work
In 2008, I went through Deepak Chopra’s Perfect Health Program in Carlsbad, California that cost me more than any vacation I can remember. My reward has been a life changer, as I’ve used some of the life skills every day and still to this day, over a decade later (and you can use to help balance your body type).
I believe everyone can use this helpful information for their whole life in several ways, including better health to slow aging, whole balance, and finding passionate work.
HOW I DISCOVERED THE PROGRAM
I was personally struggling with remaining angry emotions from a stressful, uninspiring management position I had just left.
Some roles aren’t the right fit, and there was one in particular I held after a line of unsatisfying work that mildly put was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
You could be good at your job and hate your job, which is how I felt, so I left that position (but my story had a good ending as a new role was created for me at the same company). Continue reading…
Either avocado smoothie way, an avocado super fruit is one good healthy fat food to eat first thing because of its profile. 🥑
An avocado has fiber, protein and healthy fat that will help your muscles, and prevent blood sugar spikes that’s easier to do on an empty stomach before you’ve had your first meal.
And all that helps prevent weight gain from cravings.
And on those missions, you can add one more healthy step intention.
You can make your avocado smoothie more of a savory experience with a little vinegar, leaning into its veggie appearance. Yes, adding a little vinegar like in a salad but in your smoothie.
I recommend drinking this with the simple avocado smoothie only, but up to you or not if you add to your avocado coffee as a healthy smoothie enhancement.
Vinegar with acetic acid is a natural probiotic and can help balance gut, improve digestion, and lower bloating and gas.
As food as medicine goes, ACV can be your remedy for heartburn symptoms taken before or with your meals. No more popping pills.
A good way is to add a few ACV eye dropper drops full or a teaspoon of vinegar to your avocado smoothie that you’ll barely taste.
And one last easy step for your healthy balanced living is growing an avocado seed to a plant.
This way you keep all the avocado parts, in sustainability efforts.
An avocado plant from a seed adds life-giving greenery to a room in just weeks.
The plant can serve as a daily reminder that an avocado could be your healthy change today.
For healthy inspiration and other delicious anti-inflammatory smoothie recipes 🌈 , get the free 7-day Healthy Smoothie Recipe Guide while it’s available.
Avocado is one of the healthiest ways to break the fast in the morning. It's high in glutathione antioxidant that's raised with coffee in research studies.
