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Recipes

Top Ten THIH Thanksgiving Recipes

Looking for some last-minute healthy Thanksgiving recipes? Look no further! I’ve gathered the ten best THIH Thanksgiving recipes right here. Happy Thanksgiving! Pomegranate Roasted Cornish HensHoney Lavender Pork Loin with Caramelized BananasMushroom Farro with Roasted Tomatoes and MarjoramRoasted Cauliflower and Carrot Salad with Spiced Chickpeas Twice-Baked Sweet Potatoes with RicottaSteamed Brussels Sprouts with Orange ReductionRoasted…

Q&A | Jessie @ The Happiness in Health
Baby | Life

Q&A on THIH, Part 4

As promised in my last post, I’ve written a Q&A about our recent move, with an added bonus of answering some of the “what in blazes have you been up to?” questions I frequently ask myself. Like, Q: Where has the time gone, oh wonderful Jessie? A: Haven’t a clue. One minute I was standing…

Baby

Natural Baby Food Book Tour

Baby J is now 7+ months old. I’m not sure where the past half-year has gone (probably the same place to which his miniature socks disappear at an alarming rate), but time marches on heedless of desire for just one more day of fitting into his 9-month-size onesies. Delirium is dissipating; schedules are semi-predictable; discoveries…

Recipes

Vegan Mini Muffins with Lime and Toasted Coconut {Recipe Redux}

You all know how much I love my mini muffin pan. Decadent bite-sized desserts with built-in portion control? Yes, please! This pan has made all of the following: *Vegan cinnamon doughnuts *Pumpkin zucchini muffins *Spiced carrot cake fondue *Orange cardamom tea cakes *Dan tat (Egg custard tart) *Vegan pumpkin bread with cinnamon cashew cream *Gluten-free…

Recipes

Farro ‘n’ Lentil Stuffed Pepper Slices with Toasted Almonds {Recipe Redux}

Lately, I’ve been bringing a tasting bowl of farro or brown rice, lentils, carrots, hummus, and guacamole for lunch every day. Oh, and cheese. Because there’s always cheese. The combination of whole grains, lean protein, vegetables, and healthy fats keep me and baby going all afternoon. One of the ways I amuse myself (which tells…

Life

The Chainsaw Carving Master

Peter has a lot of hobbies. Since I started THIH eons ago, he has taken up or continued practicing the following: (1) Making kitchen knives. (2) Playing obscure German-made board games (among others). (3) Elaborate chocolate-making using a 45-pound single-purpose chocolate tempering machine. (4) Wiring his own sous vide machines and making large quantities of…

Back to School Cool
Cartoon | Recipes | School

Back to School Cool

is the dorkiest post title possible; yet, I share it with you, dear reader, because you are that special. As I’ve mentioned, I recently began an MBA program. To describe what the first few weeks of school and learning have been like, imagine meeting a particularly energetic monkey. After meeting MOE, you’re strolling along, minding…

Life

Q&A on THIH, Part 2

I still haven’t found my camera wire, and the ominous crunching sounds coming from my camera after spending three hours in a whirling sandstorm (more on that later) suggest I may have a problem with my future photography. No matter. Cell phone pictures can be high-quality, can they not? What? You can’t tell that’s Maddie…

Life

New Places, New Foods, Part 2

Why, hello there! As with the last first-post-after-hiatus, this post will be short and shiny. (Not short and sweet. Registered dietitian here, remember?) Peter and I have been on many adventures over the past few months, adventures of which I will relay in an somewhat cursory fashion in the near future. To give away the…

Life

Our Bonnie Lass

The first time I met Bonnie, I was seventeen and Peter and I had known each other only a few weeks. Although we weren’t yet dating, Peter introduced me to his parents and his special pup during Parents’ Weekend at our school. I still remember the moment Bonnie ran to Peter, her new Amherst College…

Recipes

Whole Grain Herbed Flatbread

On principle, Peter gravitates towards dishes packed with as much fat and sugar as can fit in a mouthful. Is there an equivalent for supersaturation of empty calories? Because Peter would be there, pushing the boundaries of space and time to MacGuyver a super SUPER saturation concoction. Need proof? Um, yeah. Not that Peter necessarily…

Life | New Foods | Nutrition Info

Five Things with which I am Moderately Pleased, Part 2

1. The FDA’s proposed changes to the Nutrition Facts label. This tidbit has been all over the news this past week. The FDA’s proposed changes to the Nutrition Facts label would be the first major modification since 2006 when the administration added trans fat. The changes reflect the latest research into diet and chronic disease…

Recipes

Spicy Mango Lime Salsa

Now that the holidays are over and the grey of Winter has set its sharp teeth into the landscape, our meals need more color than ever. These kitchen rainbows can be accomplished one of three ways: (1) Layer those fruits and vegetables and layer ’em thick. (2) Red Dye No. 40 and its ilk. (3)…

Recipes | Update Your Plate

Crispy Roast Duck with Wild Blueberry Sauce and Blueberry Hazelnut Quinoa

By posting this recipe I am entering a recipe contest sponsored by the Wild Blueberry Association of North America and am eligible to win prizes associated with the contest. I was not compensated for my time. When I was in my oatmeal phase, I ate frozen blueberries with my breakfast every morning. Each steaming hot…

Life

Throwing Off the Bowlines

Well. Unlike an international art thief fleeing with the largest score of all time, I didn’t anticipate disappearing off the face of the earth. I haven’t gone so long without posting since I restarted THIH in August 2012. This holiday season has been stressful, and not just because of our pup. Anyone who says your…

Life | Recipes

Holiday Recipes and Lately

It’s arrived. Hexagonal lattices of hydrogen and oxygen polar covalent bond-ing it up. I knew I took chemistry for something. Bonnie and Maddie demonstrate snow pollination: I mentioned starting as the new registered dietitian at the awesome one-stop-shop for healthy living, Mettler Center. I kicked off my tenure by setting up a tasting table packed…

Life

Brief Update

Dear Reader, I apologize for my absence. When the dog who has been your husband’s loyal companion for literally half that husband’s lifetime and who you’ve known since you were a gawky teenager and she was barely out of puppyhood has only a few weeks left, it’s hard to think about food and nutrition. I’ll…

Life

The Life List

The 29th Birthday Life List* ** *** Edit: Last updated May 4, 2021, and gosh, I was optimistic as a gal in my 20s. After three kids, some of these items will take a little longer to complete than I originally thought. + [1] Run a half marathon. [2] Knit and donate 25 scarves and…

Favorites | Recipes

The BEGG

You guys. I’ve discovered my new favorite everyday meal. It’s a revelation. I have Courtney to thank for it. While we were visiting California, she told me about a meal she and her boyfriend prepare at least once a week. They call it “begg”, but I prefer to think of it as “The BEGG”. Once…

Life

Why I Knit

Because … in the midst of never-ending life projects and indeterminate finish lines, knitting gives me a sense of accomplishment. Because … knitting shows me utility and beauty can co-exist. Because … knitting teaches me how to make fast choices and stick with them for the long haul. Because … knitting shows me I can…

Recipes

Why I Love My Mini-Muffin Pan {Vegan Cinnamon Doughnuts}

Mini desserts. Bite-sized “sometimes” foods. Travel-sized snacks. All great reasons to love your mini-muffin pan. You’ve seen me use one before to make these gluten-free chocolate muffins, these orange cardamom tea cakes, and my personal favorite, dan tat. One thing’s for sure: You’ll be seeing this mini muffin pan again. Like next week. Perhaps even…

Life

I Have Sunflower Envy

Illinois, we have a problem. Remember my last sunflower update? Well, . That would be our 11.5 foot-tall sunflower. We’ll have to zoom out to see the full effect. Apparently, having stalks thicker than my arm is not enough to keep the larger sunflowers from drooping over like Peter when it’s past his bedtime. I’m…

Recipes

Herbed Summer Squash Saute

This past weekend, I held my open hours at Strawberry Fields during a special event welcoming students back to town. The store was packed. Like, lines across the store and oops-sorry-I-knocked-over-that-stack-of-goji-berries crowded. You know what else was packed? The shelves I typically use to help juggle my various papers, samples, and other sundries. I had…

Life | Recipes

Ground Cherry Pudding Pie

Life is moving so fast. Summer draws to a close. Although I don’t work at the local university (except for one of my consulting gigs), parts of my schedule are dictated by the school year. That’s what happens when returning students increase your town population several-fold. I’ve been working on several projects related to the…

Life | Menu Planning

The Weekend Brunch

Last weekend, we invited some friends and their kiddies to our home for a mid-morning brunch. I had planned to share a recipe for one of the dishes I made, but it turned out so blah that I can’t possibly subject you to it. Still, I’ll show you what we served at this kid-friendly brunch….

Recipes

Coconut Almond Date Balls

Peter and I have taken a few road trips lately – for example, this trip to Nashville where I’m pretty sure Peter secretly decided to erase all my “Wait, Wait” podcasts and replace them with board game- and economics-related podcasts (and if you’re thinking, “hey, that doesn’t sound too bad!”, then you haven’t heard these…

Recipes

Cilantro-Lime Fish Tacos

Why, hello there! We had a visitor over the weekend: Peter’s brother, “Death Sauce” Dave, came to sample all Eastern-Central Illinois had to offer.  We enjoyed Golden Harbor and Papa Del’s pizza, checked out Allerton Park, played a ridiculous number of board games, and had a great time hanging out. We also paid a visit…

Recipes

The Gingerbread of Summer

If you’ve read this blog for a while, you will know I’ll eat just about anything. Goat stew? Bring it on. Thinly-sliced pig ear? Had it last week. Deep-fried milk and stinky tofu? But of course. In fact, there’s only one food I refuse to eat. That wasn’t always the case. It seems impossible to…

Recipes

The Farro and the Storm

We’ve been having some wacky weather the past few days. Por ejemplo: Besides looking like something out of The Day After Tomorrow, the sky split repeatedly as lightning hit the ground not far away.  I tried to capture a picture using a tripod and a long exposure, yet the clouds remained stubbornly blank during every…

Favorites | Recipes | Video

Chickpea Curry with Warm Tortillas

I like fast dinners. Not in the “I’ll get a fries with that, and how about some of that special sauce?” sense, but rather in the throw-everything-in-the-same-pot-and-it-still-turns-out-delicious sense. Sometimes this preference drives Peter nuts (“a stir-fry again?”). Of course, he’s the one whistling over his sous vide machine for two hours while simultaneously baking Parmesan…

Recipes

The Sunflower Destroyer

About a month ago, Peter mentioned a strange thing to me. He’d been weeding in the garden and noticed melons randomly sprouted among his tomatoes and peppers.  Assuming they had grown from thinned melon seedlings thrown into the garden to biodegrade, he unceremoniously yanked them from the ground. I didn’t think anything of this incident…

Favorites | Life

The Scuba Diaries

Last week, Peter and I went scuba diving with his parents in Bonaire, an island in the Caribbean which is a municipality of the Netherlands. I’ve described previous trips to Bonaire here: Welcome to Bonaire and A Day in the Life of a Scuba Diver. Check out these posts to read what it’s like to…

Recipes

A Poem about Apricots

A Poem for My Beloved Apricots by The Bard of J-Town I never thought I’d find a fruit, That more than berries would me suit, Until your sweetness hit the spot, Of you I speak, my apricot! Fresh or dried, jelly or jam, Your versatility’s not a sham, Dried with cheese is def my thing,…

Monday Munchies

Monday Munchies, Part 21: The Passionfruit Flower

Yesterday, while I was rearranging the spices in alphabetical order, Peter called out from the next room. “Jessie! It’s opening! Over here! Over HERE!” Since last year’s single passion fruit flower bloomed, I’ve anticipated the opening of our passion fruit plant’s DOZEN buds. That’s right: we’ve duodecupled our passion fruit crop. I expect a gross…

Life | Nutrition Tips

A Weighty Matter

Today, I’d like to talk about a subject I’ve never discussed on THIH: weight. I hesitated writing this post because there’s a lot of sensitivity surrounding the subject. As I wrote in my FAQ, I feel our society has too much of a fixation on weight. For both women AND men, there exist strong external…

Recipes

Easter Eggless Egg Salad

Egg salad has never been one of my favorite foods. Poorly made, it can be alternately mushy from too much mayo or mashing or crumbly from hard-boiled egg yolks (which you couldn’t get me to touch as a kid. Seriously, what other food had that texture?) Egg “salad” was made worse when sandwiched between two…

Recipes

Vegan Spiced Pumpkin Ice Cream

Imagine you’re hosting a dinner party. The lights are soft, the conversation bright, the food scrumptious. You’ve just finished a rich veggie lasagna and are eagerly looking forward to dessert: vegan spiced pumpkin ice cream, fresh from the ice cream maker a few short hours ago. Having tasted it upon completion, you already know it’ll…

Recipes

Handmade Coconut Noodles

I’ve never decorated for the holidays. I suppose living in a constant state of transition has something to do with it – after moving our stuff from our second-to-last apartment to our last apartment bit-by-bit in Peter’s station wagon, I vowed I would pare down our stuff as much as possible. Then I saw how…

Favorites | Life

Tribute to a Husband

Happy Birthday, Peter! (See Peter’s previous birthday tribute here.) On the menu for tonight: Fried chicken (as featured in the above linked post) Some kind of vegetable (Peter: “You can handle it, oh gracious wife, RD.”) I’m leaning against fried eggplant (i.e. oil sponges) Fantasy Fudge Cake (as featured in this post) Have a great…

Life

A Christmas Collage

Hello, everyone! I hope you had a wonderful holiday full of the four F‘s (family, friends, food, and fun)! Before I bombard you with a collection of pictures likely of interest to approximately 0.0000001% of the Internet-using population, I want to thank you for your kind and encouraging feedback on last Friday‘s post. I appreciate…

Life | Recipes

Butternut Apple Soup with Cauliflower “Cream” {recipe redux}

Greetings, dear reader! I meant to post this recipe at my usual time – around midday – but, then THIS happened: What’s that, you say? Why, it’s a real reindeer, living right here in Illinois! Peter and I took the afternoon off and visited Hardy’s Reindeer Ranch in Rantoul, IL. Some friends mentioned how cute the reindeer…

Recipes

Festive Quinoa

Hello, everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend! Mine was super busy with work, a fantastic concert, singing at service, and seeing an awesome movie. Peter worked on grading his students’ final exams, so we didn’t see each other much all weekend. Another reason why I’m looking forward to the holidays! One of…

Monday Munchies

Monday Munchies, Part 13

Hello, everyone! Welcome to Monday Munchies, where I showcase everything this dietitian eats over the course of one day. The day in question? Last Thursday, i.e. the first day last week I remembered to take pictures. Commencing … now. Breakfast, 7:30 am: Greek yogurt, frozen strawberries and blueberries, 1/2 banana, raw oats, a handful of…

Life | Recipes

Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

G’day! No Monday Munchies today – after my sister told me she thought Monday Munchies meant I showed everything I ate each Monday (rather than a random day), I decided I should rethink the concept of the big MM. Instead, I have a recipe … and a warning. Let’s start with the warning, shall we?…

Life | Recipes

A Thanksgiving Feast

Happy day after Thanksgiving, everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving with good eats and family ‘n’ friends. Peter and I have been running around like mad since last Wednesday. After returning from Colorado on Monday, we hopped over to Saint Louis for an overnight trip Tuesday/Wednesday (will share details later) and spent…

Recipes

The After Party: Baked Beans

Whenever Peter makes pulled pork, baked beans inevitably follow later in the week. We make huge batches of these baked beans so that we can freeze leftovers. On days we don’t feel like cooking, there’s nothing better on a cold winter night than slowly heating leftover baked beans and serving with crusty bread. Except perhaps…

Recipes

The Home Run Appetizer

Despite the fact that there are only two of us, Peter and I buy food in bulk. One of his favorite places to shop is a little store called Restaurant Depot. Oh, I’m sorry, did I say little? I meant absolutely enormous. Fortunately, we have a chest freezer to supplement the fridge/freezer combo in the…

Favorites | Life

The Chocolate Master

Peter loves his chocolate tempering machine. We now have so many kind types of truffles, dipped candies, and nut barks in the house, there’s no possible way even I could eat them all. Not that I’m complaining. Initially, Peter had difficulty dipping truffle centers because the tempered chocolate was too stiff. We even snuck into…

Monday Munchies

Monday Munchies, Part 7

A continuation of the series where I document everything I ate over the course of one day (last Friday). The deets: Breakfast, 8:30 am: Smoothie with yogurt, frozen berries, 1/2 banana, raw oats, chia seeds, spinach, and water. Green tea in in a NEVER BEFORE SEEN mug. Creepy hulking puppa in the background. Unpictured: Brazil…

Recipes

All Good Things …

… must come to an end. Ricotta Week is no exception. In retrospect, I’m grateful I accidentally bought too much ricotta for a single recipe last week. If I hadn’t, I might not have tried some new recipes that I’d typically not look twice at. I’m kind of tempted to try this experiment again with…

Recipes

Pillows of Deliciousness

I thought about calling today’s recipe “Pillows of Deliciousness“, but then decided no one would have any idea what that meant. So here it is instead, as the world’s most confusing post title. Welcome to Day 2 of Ricotta Week on THIH! I plan to make something fairly traditional with ricotta later on in the…

Recipes

Jessie, NW

That stands for “Jessie, Non-Wasteroo“. Welcome to Ricotta Week on THIH! After my inadvertent bulk purchase of ricotta last week, I vowed to not waste this versatile ingredient. This week, I’ll be featuring recipes that have ricotta as a starring ingredient — despite the fact that I have very little experience cooking with ricotta. All…

Monday Munchies

Monday Munchies, Part 6

The frost has arrived! The temperature was somewhere around freezing last night, yielding a carpet of diamonds this morning. I don’t anticipate snow quite yet, but this frost reminds me that winter isn’t too far away. There’s also the fact that Peter and I went to a Home Depot yesterday and was bombarded by Christmas…

Recipes

The Wasteroo

When I was a kid, I watched Sesame Street obsessively. I learned so much about the essentials of life from its episodes. Like how to count from 1 to 10 in Spanish (in fact, that’s still all the Spanish I know). Now that I’m an adult, I see that their cute cartoons with catchy theme…

Monday Munchies

monday munchies, part 5

After last week’s beautiful wedding, we didn’t get a chance to go grocery shopping right away. Therefore, last Monday’s eats were less-planned and more “hmm, will these foods go together?”. Breakfast, 8 am: Breakfast is a no-brainer because we usually have the ingredients for smoothies, oatmeal, and/or a yogurt-bowl-of-goodness lying around. Today was no exception….

Life

“I am not impressed”

A sampling of events and eats from over the weekend: On Saturday, Peter and I went to Curtis Orchard, which is something like the number 1 or 2 thing to do around here. Sadly, due to early frost and drought, the orchard is low on produce this year, so there was no pick-your-own option. That…

Eating Out | Life

A Beautiful Wedding

Unexpected post is unexpected! I usually post an Update Your Plate on Fridays, but this week I wanted to share the beautiful wedding that took place last weekend of my best friend Amy. Hi Amy! 😀 The wedding was at Mohonk Mountain House in New Paltz, New York, and boy, I wish I had taken…

Recipes

Down for the Count

This morning, I woke with a nasty cold. I won’t show you what I look like now, but I promise I clean up nice! Needless to say, I’m staying home today. This is one of those days where I’m glad I work from home. For now. So while I’ve been napping and nursing a cold,…

Recipes

A Poem About Bean Burgers

A Poem for My Beloved Bean Burgers Tasty, filling, spice, yet meek, I planned you for a night last week, when tummy rumbling left you cold, to wait until the week grew old. Please don’t think I’d leave you dry, You’re healthy and my best ally. When hunger strikes, you’re always there, You’re perfect, yes,…

Exercise | Favorites

It’s All Peachy

First off, thanks for your suggestions in my last post on how to keep pizza crusts from sticking to the Big Green Egg. We’ll give them a try and report back! Second off, an update on my weekly planning attempt: If you recall, I had assigned particular meals to particular days of the week. I…

Life

The Disorganized RD

I have a confession to make. Unlike many of my Type-A, super organized colleagues in the nutrition field, I am much more the laid-back, throw-stuff-together, where-did-all-these-piles-of-papers-around-my-desk-come-from? type of dietitian. That’s not to say I wait until the last minute. I have a system to get important tasks done on time, or done early. It’s the…

Recipes

Chia Later!

I planned to bring you along as I went for a run in our new home, but pop-up showers mean no running for this gal! That may sound rather wimpy — and it is — but I used to run in the rain all the time in high school, and the feeling of stagnant water…

Monday Munchies

Monday Munchies

I must admit something right off the bat — this post is a lie. Below is a photographic record of what I ate over the course of one day. While I don’t plan to do this often, I understand many people are curious about how dietitians eat. I know this because invariably when I meet…

Life

Q&A on THIH

I’m not one to launch into rambling and visually unpleasing excuses for monologues concerning prolonged absences, so I thought I’d begin with a little Q & A session. My hope is that by breaking the updates into organized pieces, you, dear reader, will believe me sane. Of course, I’ve taken the identities of both “Q”…

Life

New Places, New Foods

Oh, hello. It’s nice to see you again. Let me dust off a little in here. Please, take a seat. I won’t be long. There! Got the motor running on this blog. I think we’re back in business. First off, let me apologize for my owner/writer Happy Jessie‘s absence. She and Peter just moved halfway…

Favorites | Life | New Foods

Scotland the Great

Before we get to the greatness that is Scotland, I’d like to thank all of you for your insightful comments in my last post about eating “real” food. I enjoyed reading about your food philosophies – a selection of comments (bold by me): While I am a huge fan of many processed foods (ahem, peanut…

Jessie, RD
Favorites | Life | School

Jessie, RD

That’s right, folks! Just call me: Jessie, RD. When I mentioned in this post that I would be taking the registered dietitian exam later this summer, I didn’t realize how SOON I would be taking it. The graduates of my dietetics program and I were told that we wouldn’t be eligible to take the RD…