Wok This Way

Today, I did what everyone pictures you doing when you tell them you're going to health food cooking school: I deep fried stuff.

Really though, whoever thinks that people who eat healthy never have fried food is crazy. I mean, I love raw vegetables, but there's even more to love when they're covered in tempura batter and fried in coconut oil.

We learned how to make tempura vegetables and cornmeal-crusted pan-fried tofu, both of which were amazing. In the tempura department, there were onions, carrots, broccoli and parsley, all cooked in the wok.

And for the tofu, we just coated it in cornmeal, salt and pepper before cooking. So freaking good though- I need to see if I can make this at home and have it taste the same. Then none of my friends or family would ever turn their noses up at it again.

Of everything, I think the carrots and tofu were my favorite. And I got to bring home a Tupperware full of it for dinner, too. Pretty sure I've fulfilled my fried foods quota for the month...

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After class, I headed to happy hour with several of my classmates at Greensquare Tavern, a local, organic restaurant right by NGI.

Their specials included draft beer, so I ordered a Ramstein wheat ale, their version of a hefeweizen.

It was very mild, smooth and almost sweet. Good stuff.

Though none of us ordered any food, I perused the menu and decided I definitely want to come back for a meal sometime. Apparently their veggie burger is amazing!

It's 8:20 and almost dark out right now. This makes me both happy and sad: happy, because it means I can start going to sleep early enough to justify my crack-of-dawn wake up calls, and sad, because it means the longest days of summer are over...

What's your favorite fried food? I'm more of a sweet than salty girl myself, but who doesn't love fries? And chicken fingers are the one meat-based food I miss.

Things I'm Loving Right Now

1. The current weather.

It's supposed to go up to 89 today, but after last week's high-90s/100s range, this practically feel like fall. I'm not complaining.

2. Zico chocolate coconut water.

I'm not a huge fan of coconut water in general, so I was kind of skeptical to try out a chocolate version of the stuff. However, it turns out that as with most things, adding chocolate to coconut water makes it very good indeed. It's kind of like a lighter version of chocolate milk, with a slight coconut taste. I've had it with breakfast for the past two days, since even the 80s isn't exactly tea weather!

3. Beyonce's video for "Best Thing I Never Had."

Amazing lyrics, amazing voice, just an amazing song in general. I kind of want to be her.

4. Strength training. This morning's workout:

I think I finally drank the water. After giving up running for the most part a few months ago, the thing I struggled with most was not having anything I felt I was improving at. (You can only ellipticize so hard, after all.) With weight lifting you're constantly feeling results and seeing how far you can go, but in a completely different way than running. It's awesome.

5. Protein cereal.

Yep, still.

What are you loving lately?

Left Brain, Right Brain

Back from another day at school!

Today's schedule started off with a lecture on selecting basic quality ingredients. The class seemed to be pretty familiar with most of the concepts mentioned- local, organic, whole foods- but the instructor also spent some time talking about using your "right brain" in food selection, which was really interesting to me.

Most people are either categorized as left or right brain thinkers. Left brainers are more logical and rational, and tend to use math and science to make choices. Right brainers, on the other hand, are more emotional and visual, and tend to follow their instincts more often than others.

How does this apply to food? This idea essentially holds that Americans have been taught to use their left brains to do all the food thinking. If I'm not allergic to something, I can eat it regardless of how my body reacts to it, right? Is X food group bad for me? How many calories and fat grams should I eat in a day? And while those left brain thoughts are undoubtedly a pretty important part of nutrition, it's not that black and white. Just as science can't explain the ins and outs of the universe, it can't explain some aspects of food science, either. That's where intuition comes in: sometimes it's better to make our own choices regarding food, rather than listening to what's "okay."

Seriously, how many times have we all heard that things are "bad" or "good" for you? Some people swear against meat, and some people swear that it's necessary. Too many vegetables can leave people's stomachs hurting. There is no "right" or "wrong" approach to nutrition...it's all about taking the information you find and applying your own intuition to it. So, you have to use both sides of your brain to make food choices, just like with any other decisions. Interesting stuff, right?

Anyway, in the afternoon we moved on to the hands-on stuff: basic cooking techniques! We learned how to blanch and shock vegetables, parboil potatoes, poach pears and steam artichokes, among other things.

And then we got to eat it all! I was still full from lunch a few hours before, so I tried a bite of everything and brought the rest home for dinner, with extra potatoes, vegetables and creamy miso-tahini sauce.

Yum. I could get used to perfectly cooked piles of produce for dinner...

Are you more of a left brain thinker, or a right brain one? What are your thoughts on it relating to eating? I'm definitely more right brain for most things, except I have a ridiculous memory, which is usually a more left brain trait.