Pork Roast and Roasted Winter Vegetables

I cooked my favorite way tonight, with no recipes! Well, maybe my second favorite way since I didn't throw everything in one bowl tonight. Recipes slow me down. I hate having to look back and forth and make sure I am doing things right so I really enjoy it when I am doing something simple enough to not need a recipe. Tonight we had a peppercorn and garlic sirloin pork roast. All I had to do was stick it in the oven and put my external thermometer in the center of it and set the timer for 50 minutes. Easy and delicious and a little bit of leftover for lunch tomorrow. We also ate some delicious roasted winter veggies.

I cut up one sweet potato, two small turnips, one peeled rutabaga, one small onion, and added some Brussels sprouts because it needed something green in there! I tossed them in some olive oil, pepper, and sea salt and roasted in a 425 degree oven for about 30 minutes. They were so delicious and such a nice change.

You really need to give these root veggies a chance! They are very delicious. They may seem a little strange since we don't eat them enough like we should but I think you will be surprised at how much you actually like them. I really love rutabaga!

We were also having some kale with our dinner tonight and so I decided some pomegranate seeds would be delicious on top of that. I cooked the kale in a little olive oil and pure maple syrup tonight and then topped it with the seeds and some walnuts. I think this might be Miles' favorite way to have kale.

Such yumminess! I got about 1 1/2 cups of seeds out of this pomegranate.

If you have never opened a pomegranate then check Youtube for a video on how to do it. It is best to do it in a bowl of water so the juice doesn't spray everywhere and so the seeds can drop to the bottom and the pith can float to the top and be easily separated. Beware! The juice will stain just about anything including your cutting board.

Dinner tonight! While the meat was very delicious, juicy, and tender, I totally could have eaten just the veggies and kale tonight because they were so good.

Get yourself some winter veggies ASAP!

In other news these arrived today........

These are all natural peanut butters with chia seeds and some other fun ingredients. The Manhattan Mud has peanuts, almonds, vegan chocolate, and chia seeds. The Buffalo Dirt has peanuts, cashews, coffee, chia seeds, and raw agave. The Gator Grit is just roasted unsalted peanuts and chia seeds. These are not super sweet peanut butters but that is kind of why I like them. The added benefit of chia seeds and the fact that they have such simple ingredients is the other reason. I am really looking forward to having these on my overnight oatmeal in the morning.

I purchased these Chia Chargers off a website I use called OpenSky. It is a clever little site where famous people and not so famous people like successful food bloggers, fitness experts, designers and such recommend the products they use. They each have a page of their favorite products you can purchase. You can choose all the "curators" you want to follow so it can be very specific to your interests. If you are interested in joining (it is free) let me know because I can send you an email and if you make a purchase I can get a $25 credit. You can also get that credit by sending your own email to a friend. OpenSky gave me a $15 credit just for joining and then a week later offered me another $10 credit. Just check it out for fun!

In other news.......I finally tried this handy little tool out today and boy was I impressed.

This is a $2 milk frother I had my friend Julie pick up for me at IKEA. I learned about this from another blogger I follow who has been using it almost every morning for her tea. I thought for $2 it was worth a shot. This afternoon I rewarded myself for having gone out in the cold to grocery shop with a cup of wild blueberry coffee. I heated up a little bit of my sugar free creamer in the microwave for 25 seconds and then frothed it in the cup for another 25 seconds. HOLY FOAM!

It made so much foam I had to pour some into another cup. I wish I had told Julie to get me three or four of these as gifts because it was so fun to have that frothy, foamy, cream on top of my coffee. Maybe I will pick some up next time I am at IKEA and do a blog giveaway. Who knows when that will be though!

And in even more exciting news.......

I think I have solved my foot issues and can now begin to increase my mileage once again! I got new shoes! Unfortunately I only got 250 miles out of my old shoes which is pretty low when it comes to shoes and running. Yesterday we made a trip to St. Cloud and I picked the shoe that Runner's World named "The Best Shoe in the World," Asics GT-2160. I really was a little skeptical about this recommendation and I really love Saucony, but when I put the shoe on I knew it was the right choice even if it was a little heavier than I like! Plus they were on sale and they were a fun color. Today I wore them to the gym and finally for the first time in a long time my feet and toes did not hurt when I ran! This is very encouraging for me.

Only one more piece of news even more exciting than that. Are you ready.........

It is December 5th and this is what it looks like outside my back door and my front window! I am so thrilled that we have no snow!!!!!! Everyday it doesn't snow is just one day closer to Spring thus making me much more able to endure our harsh winter. I am already feeling less depressed.  I think by this time last year we had already had like 3 snow days and there were 5 foot mounds at the end of the driveway.

That is all the news I have for today.