Wanaka's Fitness Spot

I wasn’t sure my first time making maid rites would turn out great, but it did!  I’m biased of course, but others told me so at the party 🙂  And these Iowans would know! For our Father’s Day potluck, I wanted to make something simple and easy so I picked sloppy joes.  But not ever […]

Ok, which of you empty nesters like pie?  C’mon, don’t be shy to admit it.  Even if you aren’t an empty nester, I bet you like pie!  They are one of the easiest things to bake and the easiest to disappear around our house!   That’s why I don’t bake it very often.  Mister is the […]

So this easy-to-make chinese chicken salad is a popular one at our family potlucks.  It’s got an asian flair to it and I think pretty healthy.  It’s rare when I have any left to bring back home after one of our parties.   The recipe calls for these three ingredients – Noodles.  The original recipe […]

My homemade taco is the best in the world – really.  At least Mister and I think so 🙂 I had my first taco when I was 17 and had moved from Maui to Washington to go to college.  I had never seen one before (I don’t think they existed on Maui back then; nor […]

I start this Thankful Thursday post with a sad “highlight”.   My mother in law passed away today.  I’m sad for her descendants. 1.  We knew this was coming someday.  She’s had alzheimers for I really don’t know how long, but she’s been in the nursing home 14 months.  She stopped eating solid food several […]

I’ve been decluttering for some time now and this week I tackled some of my books.  I found a few recipe books that I don’t use so those will be going to Goodwill.  But there are several that I have collected over the years from my visits home to Maui.  I decided to try a […]

How many of you have ever had salmon patties?  I love that stuff but did not have any canned salmon here yesterday.  I did however have canned mackerel so I used that instead to make our last meatless Lenten meal I call easy canned mackerel patties. Yum!  A nutritious dish full of protein 🙂 Easy […]

Here’s another food post for Asian cuisine lovers like moi involving my favorite – noodles 😀  I’ve always made Pad Thai from the box – where you get the rice noodles, the liquid sauce and then you add your meat, vegetables and nuts.  I decided to go one step further and make it from scratch […]

Healthy eating is always on my mind even if I don’t eat clean 100% of the time.  I look for an alternative way to make dishes I like that I’ve eaten in restaurants or purchased in the store and feel I can make just as well.  Since it’s been winter weather – aka soup weather […]

I love healthy eating and now have a new favorite salad I wanted to share with other cucumber and tomato lovers.  I did not grow up liking tomatoes at all.  In fact, I remember when I was 13, my mom bribed me with a pair of dress shoes that I wanted.  But being the bull-headed […]

  The other day a Twitter friend said he was having this healthy dish for dinner.  He called it Broccoli & Shiitake Stir Fry with Black Bean Sauce.  As much as stir fry is one of my (many) favorite dishes, I thought it sounded great and figured I could throw those 3 ingredients together, add […]

This is the season for zucchini squash, a very healthy vegetable that we have growing in our garden and love to eat.  I’ve been doing a ‘garden workout’ I simply call “harvesting” 🙂 over the last week or so and we have been enjoying the healthful benefits of this summer squash.  Today I am posting […]

  I had the opportunity of harvesting more asparagus so I had to make another short video right away.  Here is the recipe for the dish I referred to that I found on Pinterest.  I had to do it from memory becos I had trouble getting to the original recipe.  I’m kinda new to Pinterest, […]

For years I tried to make this dish and it just wouldn’t taste the same as when Mom made it or when I would buy it (a lot!) while visiting my  Maui home.  Finally on one of my trips home, I asked Mom to show me how she made it.  I found the secret!  And […]

Lent is here (and almost over).  Being Catholic, I practice the fast/abstinence-from-meat thing on Fridays during this time.  I love seafood anyway so it’s not a very difficult thing for me.  These are two of my favorite healthy low carb-lunches – the first since I’ve discovered multigrain bread (altho I don’t eat a lot of […]

Sometimes I just want to eat something different – healthy, but different – so I’m always on the lookout for a good looking (sounding) recipe to try.  I bought this book – Foods That Cause You to Lose Weight – The Negative Calorie Effect by Neal Barnard, M.D. which promotes Vegan eating.  My husband loves […]

How often do we read suggestions to eat lean meat?  Pretty often I’d say. One of the leanest, therefore healthiest meat I know of that I am fortunate enough to be able to incorporate into our healthy lifestyle is rabbit.  No, not the wild stuff you see in cowboy movies or cartoons lol but I’m […]

I like simple.  And I like ‘tastes good’.  I know salads and raw veggies are healthy for our bodies.  I love spinach.  In fact, I’ve made up a salad of some of my favorite salad edibles.  This is the salad that I’ve been eating lately.  It’s made up of leaf lettuce (sometimes I buy Boston), […]

Here is another simple Asian recipe – soup.  This is my healthy version of saimin, a soup I grew up eating in Hawaii.  It ALWAYS makes me feel good all over – not sure if it’s the heat on a cold Iowa winter day, or that my cells remember the feelings of growing up in […]

I love to cook but I don’t especially love taking hours and hours doing it.  I also like to use up leftovers.  So here is another Asian dish –  simple, healthy easy fried rice – I’d like to share and how I basically do it.  I use olive oil, brown sweet cooked rice, egg(s), chopped […]

I think Asian food equals stir fry.  I am Asian.  I love Asian food.  One of the easiest dishes to make is stir fry.  It has protein, carbs and oils in it.  Perfect simple healthy dish.  I am not one to use measuring devices when it comes to cooking meals.  Yes, if I’m making something […]