Month: November 2014

Super Easy & Delicious Fish Tacos

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As I mentioned on Instagram, I am a huge fan of fish tacos. Chances are, if they are on the menu, I’ll be ordering them. I love that they are usually pretty light and that they’re always different depending on where you go. Some use flower tortillas, some use corn tortillas… the fish can be fried, grilled or blackened… there can be slaw on them or lettuce… all different salsas and avocado toppings. You get the idea- in my mind, there’s really no wrong way to make a fish taco.

Since RM and I are trying to eat a little more clean when we can, which means eating out less, we decided to try our hand at making fish tacos. The verdict? Super easy and absolutely delicious! We “mmm’d” our way through the whole meal, going back for seconds and thirds. We even talked about it the next morning when we woke up. Can you tell we are foodies?

Super Easy & Delicious Fish Tacos

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Ingredients

Salsa:

  • 1/2 yellow pepper, chopped in small pieces
  • 2 vine ripe tomatoes, de-seeded and chopped in small pieces
  • 1/2 small red onion, chopped in small pieces
  • 14-1/2 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
  • Juice of 1/2 a lime
  • 1tbsp chopped cilantro
  • salt & pepper to taste

Fish (for 2 fillets- we cut them into smaller pieces when cooking them): RM doesn’t measure… he say’s he’s “creative” and likes to go by taste (I’m sure you can imagine how much I give him a hard time about calling himself “creative”…). With that said, he combined the following ingredients in a bowl and coated the fish fillets with them. I’d love to give you an approximate measurement for each ingredient, but unfortunately I wasn’t watching him and have no idea how much he used! Get “creative” when making these and see where it takes you 😉

  • Coconut oil, melted
  • Salt & pepper to taste
  • Ground ginger
  • Turmeric
  • Chili powder

Directions

1. Chop up your veggies for the salsa and place in a bowl. Add in about a 1/4-1/2 tbsp. of Apple Cider Vinegar (go light on this!), lime juice, salt & pepper and chopped cilantro. Let this sit while you make the rest of the meal.

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2. Pre-heat your oven to 200* and wrap your tortillas in aluminum foil. Prepare the seasoning for your fish. Coat eat piece thoroughly. Heat a pan and cook the fish lightly (few minutes each side). While the fish is cooking, heat the tortillas.

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3. Chop up your avocado, spinach and/or lettuce and set everything out. Assemble your tacos as you wish and enjoy!

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We can’t wait to try different variations of this recipe. I want to make an avocado “sauce” maybe using some of RM’s homemade yogurt. We also talked about making a pineapple salsa, too. The possibilities are endless!

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Questions for you: Do you like fish tacos? What’s your “go to” food dish you order when eating out?

Wednesday Workout: NBGNO Event- How to Stay Fit While on the Road

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Good morning! If you’ve been following B2B for a while, you know that I am a BIG fan of staying active while on the road. I don’t think I’ve ever gone away without my sneakers and workout clothes packed because it’s really important for me to find time to get in at least a little movement in while I’m away. I love the way it energizes me and helps me “earn my treats”, as I like to say. I’ve given tips to on how to stay healthy while on the road before and I’ve shared multiple hotel room workouts as a way to show you that working out and eating healthy/making healthy choices while traveling CAN happen.

So, why am I talking about this topic again? Well, the New Balance Girls Night Out (“NBGNO”) event I went to last week was all about staying healthy while on the road and how Westin Hotels make that so easy. A few years ago, New Balance and Westin teamed up to make workout while on the road very doable. I experienced this while staying at a Westin in Atlanta. I took advantage of their running map/route, as well as the gym.

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Not only does the Westin provide you with a running route, but they also have their “pack light, stay fit” program, which allows you to borrow workout clothes, socks and sneakers when you travel. They wash the clothes and shoe inserts between uses and they let you keep the socks.

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And, don’t worry- you won’t be wearing crappy old gear- look at this stuff! They always have the newest sneaker styles and current clothes.

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Pretty awesome looking stuff if you ask me!

Anyway… back to the event! Caroline and Sherri did a FANTASTIC job hosting the latest- and final- 2014 NBGNO.

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After their introduced themselves and kicked off the event, we had the choice to join the Westin Run Concierge and Caroline for a run around the city or stay with Sherri and Chris, a Westin trainer, for a bootcamp. Since I fell and scraped up my knee pretty badly during the last dark Boston run, I opted for the boot camp.

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I liked how Chris explained what we were doing, why we were doing it, how it was beneficial and right/wrong ways to do it. He was super knowledgeable and I’ve changed my form on some exercises because of his tips. We worked in a 40/20 format where we did an exercise for 40 seconds and rested for 20 seconds. We did 4 different exercises, mostly focusing on core and glutes and holy moly my glutes were sore for 3 days!

After we finished our workouts, we were able to have food, drinks (have I mentioned how much I love events that offer free wine?!) and mingle with other attendees. Shortly thereafter, Caroline and Sherri shared more about Westin’s “pack light, stay fit” program, as well as tips they follow for staying healthy while on the road. I love that they asked the audience what are some tricks we do to make sure we get a workout in. Here are some that were shared:

  • Put your workout clothes, shoes, iPod, headphones, asprin (in case you’ve been out late the night before…), etc. next to your bed so that when you get up, you see it and can get dressed and to the gym before you realize you’re even awake!
  • Workout in the morning so that the day doesn’t get away from you before you realize you haven’t worked out.
  • Bribe yourself- say if you get to the gym for 10 minutes, you can have a glass of wine. Bets are that you’ll stay for 10  minutes once you’re there!
  • Workout in your room if you don’t want to pack your sneakers. On top of offering workout gear, Westin also has a partnership with Holly Perkins and you can do one of her workouts on the TV. This way you can workout without even leaving your room.
  • Print out workouts from your favorite fitness blog or write down a workout the night before. If I have a workout planned, I’m more motivated to do it
  • Take advantage of where you are. New city? take your workout outside and go for a run or walk. This serves as not only a workout, but a tour, too!
  • Make it fun by asking friends/coworkers to join you. I’ve even lead a bootcamp on a bachelorette weekend! I threw it out there assuming everyone would laugh at me, but you know what? Everyone participated. I think part of the reason why people don’t workout while on vacation or a work trip is because they think there isn’t time or that there isn’t a gym. Once you show them that there IS time and that you don’t need a gym, they’re always really happy to join you and so happy afterwards!

What do you think? Do you guys follow any of these tips? Do you have any that you can share with us?

Again, big thank you to New Balance for giving me the chance to participate in such a fun event. And thanks for another awesome swag bag!

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Questions for you: Have you heard of Westin’s “Pack light, stay fit” program? How do you stay fit/active/healthy while on the road?

Weekending: Local Date Night, Wicked Wine Fest, Homemade Fish Tacos & Sunday Funday

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I loved every part of this past weekend! I took Friday off from work so I could attend MANIA. The day, although long, was amazing! I was able to take so many awesome classes and meet some really great fitness professionals. I’ll do a full recap on that soon.

By the time I got home and showered, I was starvingggg, so RM and I headed to Jeveli’s, which is a local favorite of ours. The prices are cheap, service is good (and funny) and the food is absolutely delicious. It’s a no-frills type of place, but we love sitting at the bar and chatting with the locals. I always get the meatballs because they are so good, and after 4 hours of physical activity, a big bowl of carb-y, meat-y deliciousness was just what I needed!

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After class on Saturday, my sister, Kate and I headed to the South End for a wine tasting at Cyclorama. I went in March and loved it, so jumped on the chance to go to the one this past weekend. Some of my SMC friends were also there and we had a blast walking around, trying various wines… and taking silly pics 😉

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Post wine fest, we made the short walk over to Stephi’s on Tremont for lunch. We were lucky and had a whole room just to ourselves… but, the more I think about it, maybe the rest of the restaurant was lucky we had a whole room to ourselves. You try being reasonably quiet with 8 girls after a 2 hour wine tasting…

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I ended up getting a burger because I was still craving red meat- must have been all the working out!

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Once we finished up, I headed back to East Boston to hang out with RM. We had plans to make fish tacos and they did NOT disappoint! The best part was they were super easy- I’m going to share our “recipe” later the week. They were unbelievable, though!

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My movie snack was a half of a paleo pumpkin banana bread muffin that I made last week. Topped with crunchy almond butter and cinnamon, courtesy of RM, it hit the spot!

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Sunday morning started with some cleaning, some breakfast and then some serious shopping. RM made some zucchini fritters… topped with an over easy egg and it made for a delicious breakfast.

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He’s also taking a stab at making his own yogurt, so we worked on that a little.

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To shop, we headed to Assembly Row since we wanted to go to Bed, Bath and Beyond and figured we could have lunch at Legal on the Mystic. I was getting hangry, so a beer and fish sandwich did the trick to fill me up! I regretted the fried food later that day, though, as it gave me a bad stomach ache 😦 Could’ve also been due to the fact I ate a lot more junk this past weekend than I normally do, including greasy, fried food.

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After we finished up, we shopped around a few more stores before calling it a day. I food shopped then had fun being in the kitchen with my sister. She made a pasta bake and I made an amped up Shepherd’s pie. Both were delicious!

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And that’s about it… before I knew it, I was hopping into bed, utterly exhausted! I love weekends like this, I just wish they could last longer 😦

Questions for you: What was the best part of your weekend? Have you been to a wine tasting before?

This Week: Workouts, Preparing for the Spartan Fenway Race & Things I’m Looking Forward To

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Good morning and happy Monday! I’m so happy that by the time this post goes up, my workout will be done. Last week was a big week of workouts and between Boston MANIA on Friday and teaching on Saturday, I’ve been REALLY sore and physically exhausted. It will be nice to have tonight off and I may even end up resting tomorrow, too, pending on how I feel. MANIA was so awesome- I can’t wait to recap it for you!

Want to know what’s not-so-awesome, though? The fact that we got our start time for the Fenway Spartan Sprint and we got placed in the 12:10 heat even though everyone on our team signed up for the 9:30am heat. Normally I wouldn’t be that upset about it, but RM had already invited me to go to a Bruins game with him and his co-workers and the game is at 1 so clearly I cannot do both. We’ve emailed to try and get into an earlier heat, but they said they are totally sold out. I really don’t want to skip the race all together because I paid around $120 for the ticket, so I’m planning on just going earlier- by myself- to race. I mean, they can’t deny me a spot if I’ve paid and they have to be able to squeeze me into an earlier heat…right?! A girl can hope….

Last Week’s Workouts

  • Monday- I did 15 minutes of cardio before subbing the cardio kickboxing class at the Watertown BSC.
  • Tuesday- I went to my second New Balance Girls Night Out event at the Westin Copley. This time, we had a choice to do a bootcamp or go for a run, and since my run in the dark the last time didn’t end so well, I opted for the bootcamp. It wasn’t the type of bootcamp you traditionally think of (no cardio), but I was very sore for the next few days since it was mostly glute/leg focused.

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  • Wednesday- I ran a 5K on the treadmill before teaching UXF Burn. We had a BIG crowd, including SIX guys- it was so fun!

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  • Thursday- Thursday’s have turned into my rest days and I’ve been enjoying having a day during the week where I don’t have to pack my gym bag and know I’m just going home after work. This past Thursday I was especially lazy- Danielle and I sat on the couch, watched tv and ordered pizza. it was awesome!
  • Friday- I did about 4 hours of working out at MANIA. I can’t wait to recap it for you guys- I learned SO MUCH and I got to workout with Chris Fretag, which was pretty cool.

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I had a sweat mark in the shape of a heart!

  • Saturday- Even though I was super sore, I was able to make it through my kickboxing class at the YMCA. We had a big crowd!
  • Sunday- Nothing! I was super sore when I got up so I was very happy it was a rest day. I did clean and RM and I went shopping, which was good because it helped release some lactic acid and alleviate some soreness.

This Week’s Workouts

  • Monday- I will have taught my Muscle Work class and have done some cardio after by the time this goes up.
  • Tuesday- I’m not sure what I’m going to do for a workout. It likely depends on how sore I am. Maybe a bootcamp, maybe some light cardio, maybe some yoga?
  • Wednesday- Probably a run before teaching UXF Burn.
  • Thursday & Friday- I’m not what I’m going to do these days. I don’t think I’ll workout on Friday since I have the Spartan race (hopefully, anyway) on Saturday and want to have fresh legs for it. I’ll probably try to get to the gym during lunch on Thursday.
  • Saturday- HOPEFULLY running the Spartan race. I will be so upset if I can’t run it 😦
  • Sunday- Rest day!

Things I’m Looking Forward To

This is a fun week for me- my dad is coming down on Tuesday to pick my mom up at the airport so he asked if he could come visit me at work since it’s on the way. I’m excited to show him around and get to hang out for a bit- it’ll be a nice change from my usual lunch break 🙂 I’m also excited to go to the Bruins game on Saturday… I haven’t been yet this year!

Questions for you: What was your best workout last week? Have you run a Spartan Race? Do you think I’ll be able to sneak my way into an earlier heat? What are you looking forward to this week?

 

Boston Restaurant Roundup: Part 3 {Back Bay/South End/Fenway}

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It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted a restaurant roundup for you. I meant to do it as a 3 or 4 week installment, but clearly the weeks got away from me and I never finished this series! I’m here today with a bunch of restaurants in the Back Bay, South End and Fenway area. I grouped these together since they are all in ‘that part’ of the city, as I usually say. Although they each have their own distinctive name and area, you get to all of them by going in the same direction, so that counts for some type of similarity, right?

Before we get to these restaurants, make sure you check out my other Boston Restaurant roundups pertaining to different areas of the city:

Boston Restaurant Roundup: Part 1 {Downtown Boston}

Boston Restaurant Roundup: Part 2 {Seaport District/Southie & East Boston}

Back Bay

    • Douzo Sushi– Here’s another great sushi restaurant. The sushi is a little pricey, but it is worth it! I’ve been for lunch and dinner and enjoyed both so much. They have a really good wine selection and they validate parking in the garage nearby- $5 for 3 hours, which means you can park, eat, shop and only pay $5!

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    • Cafeteria– My sister and I have gone here a few times for lunch and always love it. The menu is small, but there’s always something that catches our eye. They’ve got a great outdoor dining space and the whole “school” theme is really fun. The prices are reasonable for this part of the city.

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    • Back Bay Social Club– I’ve always loved this restaurant- both for brunch, dinner and just drinks. Again, they have outdoor seating, which is always on my list of “must haves” for summer dining. Brunch cocktails are tasty and the bar tenders are always really nice. I had dinner there and loved the salad and scallops. They’ve got wine on tap, too 😉
    • Sonsie– I’ve eaten at Sonsie a few times and have always enjoyed it. My sister and I went there recently and had an awesome lunch some great drinks. I love that it’s right in the heart of the Back Bay and has great windows that open up onto Newbury Street.

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South End

    • Gaslight– The first time I went to Gaslight, I hated it, however, when I went back some time after, my thoughts were completely changed. I recently went back for lunch and was again, happy with the experience. I love French cuisine, and this place does not disappoint! The Croque Madame was top-notch.

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    • The Gallows– My friend Jess and I went here and I was so thankful that she introduced me to it. It’s a dim-lit, crunchy type of restaurant with a good list of “small plates” for sharing. We ordered some tacos and a butternut squash dish and a few other things and I loved everything.

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    • Stella– I’ve only been here once, but have been dying to get back. The food is fantastic and they have 2 bar areas so you’re two times more likely to get a seat at the bar 😉 They also have a gluten free menu and everything we had from it was fantastic! This is one of RM’s favorite restaurants in the city.

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Fenway

  • Eastern Standard– This restaurant is also a favorite in Boston. The last time I went, we sat at the bar and had a great time trying new drinks, watching the bar tenders do their magic and ordering different things from the menu to try. Another thing I love about ES is the fact you can tell the bar tender that you’re waiting for a spot at the bar to eat dinner and will reserve a place for you when spaces open up. This eliminates the need to always be hovering and watching for people who look like they might get up, which makes for a much more enjoyable experience!

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  • Yard House– If you’re looking for a good bar with lots of beers on tab, Yard House is the way to go. There are always games on TV and always a good bar scene. And, out of all the sports bar restaurants in Boston, Yard House has the best food (in my opinion). There’s also a Yard House near my office in Lynnfield that’s huge and conveniently located amongst lots of shops.

By the looks of this list, I think I need to start going out to eat in the Back Bay/South End/Fenway area. My girlfriends and I are going to Stephi’s on Tremont tomorrow, so I’m sure I’ll be adding that to the list after.

Questions for you: Have you been to any of these restaurants? Do you have a favorite restaurant in this part of the city that I didn’t mention?

Also, I want to wish my parents a very happy anniversary!! I love you both so much!