Some New Treats - Including a Juicer

Friday was a really great day.  The weather was beautiful and I had two deliveries.  My monthly treat box came from Bestowed.com and my new juicer arrived.  The juicer had me so excited I ran outside to meet the Fed Ex lady (and startled her, unfortunately).  What can I say?  I am nothing if not enthusiastic!

My box had a few things that I'm really excited about:

Sharkies Organic Energy Sports Chews - a good alternative to my Honey Stingers Gel.  I am not a fan of gels and chews filled with ingredients I don't understand or that contain high fructose corn syrup.  These taste good and I knew what the ingredients were.

Artisana Organic Raw Cacao Bliss - it's chocolate coconut butter sweetened with nectar rather than sugar.  It's vegan and it's raw.  Mostly, it's darn delicious.  I've had it on toast, crackers, bananas and right off the spoon.

Al Dente BonaChia Fettuccine pasta - It's made with chia grains, it has a good texture and taste.  It's high fiber/low carb and it has protein, calcium, iron and antioxidants.  It also cooks in 3 minutes.  My husband said yum when we ate this last night.

There were also fiber sprinkles, which I've tasted but not really used.  They taste like a rye cracker and I'm going to try them in place of bread crumbs later in the week.  I'll let you know how that goes.  I've also not tried the Kookie Karma Holistic Chocolate Chip Cookie yet, mainly because I baked up a batch of Nikki's Healthy Cookies and I want to finish those before opening something else.

My juicer probably deserves it's own blog.  I got a deal through Good Morning America and it was a little more than half off the regular price.  It's an Omega 8005 Nutrition Center.  It makes pasta and nut butters, grinds coffee beans, minces and chops as well as juicing.

I'd also like to say that Omega was a pleasure to deal with.  After waiting a few weeks I inquired to see when I was to receive my juicer and I got an immediate response back from them.  My order didn't print out and they would send it Fed Ex 2 day service without any extra charge.  It came in 2 days as promised.

I have only used it for juicing so far.  It's quiet, easy to clean and doesn't take up more room than the Juiceman Jr. that I had.  I can also put citrus fruits it, which I couldn't do with the other juicer.  The con is the shoot is very small so fruits and vegetables need to be cut fairly small.  That's not a big deal to me but I can see if time was tight I might stick to foods that fit right in:  carrots, greens, celery.

I am loving the fresh juice and knowing that the sugar content of what I'm making isn't through the roof.  Bottled green juices tend to have a lot of fruit and the sugar content is pretty high and there's not a lot of fiber to slow the sugar's entry into your bloodstream.

Are your snack habits getting the best of you?  Do you need some new ideas?  Send me an email, janinemchale@empoweredplate.com, and together we can come up with a plan that works best for you and your lifestyle.  You can also visit my website, http://empoweredplate.com/, for inspiration.