Recipe Category: Slow cooker

Black Bean Pumpkin Chili

Sweet yet spicy black bean chili with everybody’s fall favorite: pumkpin!

Enchilada Quinoa Chili

Beans, quinoa, and spinach make this an easy-to-make superfood that tastes great!

Mushroom Chicken with Quinoa

It doesn’t get quicker than this! Five minutes and you have a savory, protein-rich meal.

I love data! Or, how activity-tracking apps motivate me.

I was dragging my butt up the mountain one day and thought, “I wonder how far I’ve gone today.” I had only been out 25 minutes so I knew it wasn’t that far. Nonetheless I was curious for a number. Then I thought, “I wonder how fast, or more accurately, how slow I’m going.” I was sweating like crazy and huffing and puffing, so I was thinking I was probably going Superman-fast. I realized that I needed to collect some data during my excursions. Later at home, I found an app that promised to track my location on a map, create routes, and save stats while I ran these routes. I learned I could do the same routes repeatedly and compare my pace from run to run. That’s a certifiable progress report! It’s like a mini challenge every time I go out. Fun! Sure, I don’t need something like this to know whether or not I’m improving. Seeing a…

One day I decided to lose a little weight.

I had an event to attend and wanted a new dress. I didn’t need a new dress, but I really like new dresses. So I went online to do a little shopping and there it was…the most beautiful cocktail dress designed by one of my favorite designers. As an added bonus it was an unheard of 75% off! It was meant to be. I went to make the purchase then bam! They only had one size left and it was a size (or two) too small. I closed the browser window and tried to forget about the dress. A couple days passed and I couldn’t forget the dress. I began thinking, what’s one or two dress sizes in terms of pounds? 10? 15? Maybe 20? With six weeks to the event, I figured I could drop those “few” extra pounds. Surely, there’s a lot of water weight that can go quickly, right? I…

All flours aren’t created equally.

As a semi-vegetarian (that’s a thing, right?) I’m always looking for ways to add protein to my meals. Recipe trial and error is common in our kitchen. Unfortunately there’s more error than trial but that’s OK – live and learn. After a few attempts I learned the hard way that substituting one type of flour for another is not an automatic win. For example, coconut flour, which smells heavenly and is great for your health, is super absorbent and has a tendency to feel grainy on the tongue when used in baked good. Pancakes, crepes, and cookies crumble just by looking at them. My husband had to give himself the Heimlich Maneuver over the kitchen sink late one night after a cookie-eating binge (sorry honey). I’ve read a bunch about this online and some folks suggest abandoning the effort of flour substitution altogether. A defeatist attitude if you ask me. I’m not trying to be gluten-free…

This site contains *mostly* healthy recipes made without processed ingredients that fuel my second passion: trail running, which accommodates my first passion: eating cake.

I’m not a trained chef, baker, or nutritionist but I am a flexitarian who recently shed 75+ pounds while learning to love to cook – and eat – again.

Note: I live at 6,200′ elevation so my recipes are adjusted to either bake longer, use less liquid or use more flour than folks living at 3,000′ or below.