Former blogger Deborah Hayes has her Cooking Day and so do I! Every weekend I blanch a bunch of kale to use in lunches for the coming week. I LOVE the crunchy, fluffy texture of blanched kale, so I eat it at least once a day all week. I mix it up by buying different kinds of kale (green, black, red) or adding other greens like spinach, collards, or chard. For protein at lunch, I buy a rotisserie chicken and/or cook meatballs every few weeks, which I divide into individual portions and freeze in Ziploc snack bags. I definitely need protein at lunch to feel satisfied and it is nice to have something warm, especially in the winter!

Today was an especially busy cooking day, as I did the kale, beef meatballs, and (for the first time) turkey meatballs. There is a wonderful butcher up the street from me who carries a wide variety of organic meats, including beef that is grass-fed until a few weeks before slaughter. I haven’t worked much with ground turkey, but today when I went to get my ground beef he had both ground turkey and chicken available. Here are the recipes I used:

Beef Meatballs (Makes 30 meatballs)

Ingredients:

2 pounds ground beef

2 cloves garlic, crushed

3 tsp onion powder

1 ½ tsp ginger powder

½ tsp cayenne pepper

½ tsp freshly ground black pepper

½ tsp sea salt

1 egg

Turkey Meatballs (Makes 30 meatballs)

Ingredients:

2 pounds ground turkey

1 clove garlic

3 tsp onion powder

2 tsp ginger powder

½ tsp sea salt

½ tsp parsley

1 egg

Directions (same for both):

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2) Beat egg together with spices.

3) Add egg mixture to ground meat and mix thoroughly.

4) Refrigerate for 10-15 minutes, for easier shaping.

5) Using an ice cream scoop, make balls and lay out on baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

6) Bake uncovered until lightly browned, about 20 minutes, turning once.

7) Cut one open to be sure it's done on the inside.

I found the ground turkey to be quite wet, which made it hard to shape into balls, so next time I would probably omit the egg. It helps to hold the beef meatballs together, but is a bit of overkill with the turkey. I would also like to try some more adventurous spices with the turkey in the future.

So now that I have tons of food stored away for lunches, it is time for me to take a rest!

So, here I am writing my first blog and I am sick! Great example of living a healthy lifestyle, eh? *cough cough*

There has been a nasty cough going around my office over the last couple of months and a few people in my area have been coughing for that ENTIRE time! There are a couple of people in particular that have that phlegmy, uncontrollable cough which makes me cringe every time I hear it. This also worries me, because they have had this cough for so long and don’t seem to be improving… My boss is one of these.

She is a busy, energetic woman who either doesn’t want to (or feels that she can’t) take time off work to get better. Now that I think about it, it has been many months since I last saw her entirely healthy, but she has only missed work one or two days. I have urged her to stay home/go home many times, but it isn’t up to me in the end.

And now I am sick too! I am definitely not as bad as other people in my office (thank you, BTD!), but between going to work with sick people everyday, being coughed all over by a couple of kids two weeks ago, and sitting in a waiting room with another hacker, here I am. I guess I am not invincible like I thought…

I stayed home from work on Tuesday in the hopes of getting better and I did indeed improve. Then back to work Wednesday and Thursday and today I still have this cough! I am working from home today so I could sleep in a bit. I’ve been pounding back the Proberry, ARA Plus, Quercetin, and Scorbatate. I have also resorted to wearing my toque (Canadian for hat) around the house and using a humidifier at night.

So, this brings me to my pet peeve: people who drag themselves to work, no matter how sick they feel or who else they might infect. It’s not so much that they bring their germs to work with them - I consider it my own responsibility to keep myself healthy and my immune system strong. It is the mentality that one’s health needs can be ignored or put off because it interferes with the almighty work! When did work become so important? God forbid you miss a meeting or don’t return one of your 50 emails within 24 hours…

I believe in staying home and getting well when you are sick, but I also feel guilty if I stay home, since there are other (sicker) people showing up for work everyday. And, since my boss is one of these “troupers”, she sets what I think is an unhealthy example that I don’t want to follow.