Feta Makes It Betta

This week I made my mom’s version of Tabbouleh.  It's a veggie-filled Mediterranean dish that is perfect for the sauna like summers in Birmingham.  I bought enough of the ingredients to make several batches so that we will have plenty of food for lunches and post-yoga meals, but the recipe included is for one batch (which still makes quite a bit).

We have done fairly well the past 3 classes about eating at home after yoga class during the week.  We did make one exception though…

You see, I have a small obsession with Groupons and Groupon-type sites.  I’m signed up for about 6 different deal sites.  We essentially use Groupons as our restaurant budget.  I’m only going to go to a restaurant if we have purchased a Groupon or if we are going with friends.  It means we miss out on a lot of our go-to favorites, but we get to try a lot of new places, and we are usually paying 50% of the cost…for at least a portion of the meal.  Paying so little for a meal really messes with how you view the money you spend on going out to eat.  It’s a neat little trick really.  Let’s say I purchase a deal for $12 and get a $25 certificate to a restaurant.  When I get to the restaurant, I pay the 2 dollars plus a tip on the full amount, and feel like I just got a huge meal for almost free.  You forget the amount you originally paid for the certificate because it was probably purchased several weeks, if not months, ago.  After a while you have to start looking at it as, “I paid 12 dollars for this meal 2 months ago,” or, “I saved 13 dollars on this meal,” otherwise the $4.30 meals will really go to your head.  Bottom line, it is still money saved, but you have to be careful because the cost of the Groupons will sneak up on you just as easily as the costs of going out to eat. 

That being said, I refuse to let a Groupon expire before I can use it.  Last week one of them snuck up on me.  We had a Groupon for PinchesTacos through Sharing Spree that was expiring on Tuesday, and I realized it Tuesday.  Needless to say, we went to Pinches after yoga that day, but Thursday we were back on track.  I made some more Greek Pasta Salad on Wednesday so it was ready for us when we got home from class Thursday.  Now on to this week and tabbouleh...

Tabbouleh

1-1 ½ bunch parsley, removed from stems, finely chopped

1-2 cucumbers, finely chopped (I do not recommend using a food processor for the cucumbers.  I may be doing it wrong, but they never come out at the right consistency for this dish.)

1-2 large tomatoes, seeded, finely chopped

1 bunch green onion, finely chopped

½ cup wheat germ

¼ cup olive oil

¼ cup lemon juice (or the juice of 2-3 lemons)

Garlic salt, to taste

Whole wheat pitas or lettuce leaves for serving (I like to make little pita pockets for my tabbouleh, but Sean prefers the lettuce leaves.  Romaine or iceburg lettuce works, but we prefer romaine.)

Just mix all of the ingredients together.  You may prefer to adjust the amount of oil, juice, or wheat germ depending on your preferences.  This dish is always better the second day once the veggies have all had some time to marinate.  It is also tasty with a little bit of feta on top, but I’m of the opinion that, in regards to everything, feta makes it betta.  It somehow ends up making an appearance in almost every recipe.

This recipe takes a little longer to prep if you don’t own a food processor.  We have a Cuisinart Prep 9.  If you are struggling with the idea of dropping $150 on a kitchen appliance, I can tell you that ours has been worth its weight in gold.  Last weekend we made homemade peanut butter as well (thanks to my friend, Becca).  If you have ever looked at your peanut butter jar, you will be surprised by how many non-peanut ingredients it contains.  All you really need for peanut butter is peanuts and a good food processor.  We added salt, honey and brown sugar to ours, and it was AMAZING.  

Sweati Yogi

I sweat. A lot. I'm the guy that has to do full body wipe down with a towel after a practice. After talking to another guy after the Ashtanga class last Tuesday, I realized that I'm not the only guy with this problem. As a result, I thought I'd post up my solution to my sweaty mat problem.



Now, I think of it as a good thing (toxin flush), but it can be kinda dangerous when you're rocking a Wide-Legged Forward Bend (Prasarita Padottanasana) and your foot slips. As a result of pulling a groin one particularly sweaty practice on my old mat, I decided to go ahead and take the plunge and bought myself (and my lovely wife/co-blogger) a Lululemon The Mat. It was an AMAZING purchase. It absorbed a ton of sweat, stuck to the floor AND my feet, and was generally one of the best purchases I've had in any hobby of mine to date. This set up worked well for about 2 or 3 months, until it started getting pretty warm outside, then I started to really really sweat. I started to sweat puddles. I literally soaked THROUGH the mat. It got to the point where I would soak through the mat and make the floor slick underneath the mat where it no longer had any traction. See what I mean when I say I sweat a lot?

Head over Heels for Yoga

Photo by valeyoshino

I love high heels.  I want nothing more than to one day own a pair of Christian Louboutin black leather pumps.  I even visited the store in Dallas a few years ago just to try them on and dream.  I have a closet full of high heels in a variety of colors: black, brown, nude, silver, and even purple (no Louboutins yet, though).  In my opinion, nothing completes an outfit like a great pair of heels.  I wore heels every chance I got…until yoga came into my life. 

Anger Management in Practice

“Come on, hurry up! (Clap, clap, clap) Move your ass bro, I’m in a hurry!” I can feel my face beginning to flush and my heart rate quicken. As I feel my body prepare for a fight, I make sure to take a few moments to breathe deep and hold it long enough until it causes my heart rate to slow. As I watch the pudgy, balding man with obvious issues wave his arms around like an idiot, I can tell that my body is amping up for a confrontation. However, my mind is calm, clear, and ever so slightly bored.

The Yoga-Food Conundrum

Today we start the Birmingham Yoga Beginner's Level 1 Ashtanga Workshop. It seems a bit intimidating, but, ultimately, I think we are ready. It will certainly be a challenge.

The physical aspect alone is daunting. The classes are scheduled for an hour and a half. We are used to mostly hour long classes... The biggest challenge, however, will be the time commitment. We both work full time and Sean is still in school. The classes are scheduled on the days that Sean is out of class, and neither of us should have much of an issue getting to the downtown studio after work. The real problem is what I like to call the Yoga-Food Conundrum. The more yoga classes we attend, the less likely we are to cook. We end up going to a restaurant because by the end of class it's 7:30 or 8:00 and we are exhausted and starving. Even if there is a full meal waiting on us at home, we are always drawn to restaurants. It is almost a hobby for us. I don't eat fast food, so our choices are semi-healthy, but I know that we can make healthier and cheaper meals at home. We have agreed to only go out to eat after class if it is with a group, but we will both have to resist the urge to be the cheerleaders for the restaurant crew.

A white boy's intro to yoga

Like Danielle said, she pretty much had to drag me to my first class. I did the typical newbie guy thing: wore basketball shorts and a cotton t-shirt, expected incense and chanting, and I got completely surprised by how tough it was, even though it was a "girl's exercise." I wasn't hooked, but I could see that it was a serious workout, even if I was the least flexible while also being the sweatiest.

On a related note: yoga is VERY intimidating for guys. Understand that going into a room full of ridiculously flexible and strong women, who are sporting nothing but Lululemon and rocking Manduka Pro mats, is like that dream where you're naked in front of a room of your peers while speaking in public. The biggest difference, however, is that the people are ridiculously better than you and appear to have neon signs that say "you're not from around here, are you?"


If you are a serious yoga girl, the best thing you can do is to introduce yourself and try to start up some light conversation like "what do you do for a living?" or "geez, it's hot outside." Avoid, especially with the uncomfortable new guys, the following: "my 4th chakra has a blockage that I'm working on," "my spirit animal is the chihuahua," "I studied at the Sri Sri Swami Baba Guru YogaDawg ashram in Punjab for 6 months," or anything the girl in this video says. We're trying to make the tent more inviting, not make it like a redux of the 1960's.

Old Purple Mats

When I forced Sean to go to his first yoga class in January, it was for entirely selfish reasons.  I had been practicing yoga at home with various DVDs off and on for about 10 years, but I had never been to a real class. A new studio opened just a few minutes from work and was offering free classes for their first week.