In an effort to maintain healthy lives, we both have made conscious decisions to put better things in our bodies, so we both rarely treat ourselves to a soda anymore! BUT, sometimes we still have that craving for something more tasty than water. After lots of trials, we have both found some drinks we can enjoy instead with less guilt!



Cascade Ice Sparkling Water - Coconut Flavor

Although it may be slightly deceiving, this is not coconut water, but rather coconut-flavored sparkling water. My favorite thing about these guys is - they're: 0 calories, 0 grams of sugar, 0 carbs, sodium free, caffeine free, gluten free, AND there is no aspartame! They have a very mild taste, so they are incredibly refreshing and not too sweet. My husband LOVES the coconut-mango and peach-mango flavors, and while I love all that I have tried, I am stuck on the coconut flavor. They typically go for $1.49/ea at my local grocery, but go on sale a ton for $0.99/ea so we stock UP when that happens. Thanks to our friend Linsey for bringing this to Lo's wedding and getting us hooked. You rock.

San Pellegrino Sparking Water - Blood Orange

While I do love all of the flavors of San Pellegrino, and certainly won't say no to any of them, my fave by far is the blood orange. San Pellegrino has a fantastic reputation for their sparkling waters, their health benefits, and have helped a lot of people turn the page from their soda-soaked pasts. It also makes a great cocktail mixer - just saying! They are a bit pricier than sodas *womp womp* but are worth it if you're just going to enjoy them as a treat.

Sparkling ICE - Black Raspberry

I am absolutely obsessed with these, my favorite flavor is black raspberry and the cherry limeade is a close second! I have had most of the flavors and they are all pretty good, the hubby loves them too. What is also nice about these is they add vitamins and antioxidants to them and who doesn't like that?! They are great for a soda fix because they have the carbonation aspect of soda and are packed full of flavor, without the guilt of all the sugar, as they are 0 calories. Yes, you read that right and with how good they taste, it is hard to believe! They are sweetened with Splenda, which is a sugar substitute. Like anything else, these are good in moderation but definitely a great go-to when you are craving soda but don't want the "empty calories". Random but they come in both can and bottle, I usually buy the cans in packs at Target because it's just the right amount of drink for me.



Crystal Light Pure - Lemonade

Some days you just need a lemonade, you know? And on those days, I recommend you take yourself to Chick-fil-a because holy guac, dudes, they are TO DIE (for those of you who haven't indulged in one). And there is a good reason for it, they are loaded with tons of delicious sugar. While I sure do love them, I treat them as a dessert and rarely get them. So these Crystal Light Pure powder mixes are made with Stevia, which is a natural plant sugar and you get a lot bang for your buck in many ways. They are only 15 calories (which is rad, rad, rad) and they have tons of flavor (I also recommend the Raspberry Lemonade), and they are pretty easy on the wallet, coming in at $2.61 at Target for a pack of 7.



At the end of the day, we each tend to reach for water more than anything but let's be honest, sometimes water just ain't gonna cut it and these substitutes have been great for meeting our sweet tooth needs. Let us know if you guys have any good drinks we should try and if you have tried these before.

Until next time!

xoxo, your sweetums

Hey Pals! In honor of National Tequila Day this week (Sunday, for those of you who don't have this glorious holiday marked on your calendars), we thought it would be apropos to share with you our mutual love for tequila, and rather than just rambling about our love affair with this spirit, we thought we would instead give you some of our favorite, fun margarita recipes to give a spin whenever you want to feel festive, because hey - it doesn't have to be a National Holiday for you to show your love for tequila right?!

We KNOW tequila can be a touchy subject for some; some people love to hate it, some hate to love it, and some just hate it, often because of a bad experience in the past which usually involves drinking a bit too much, maybe some table dancing, and always hugging the porcelain throne at the end of the night. BUT, we are 2 of the lucky ones who *knock on wood* have never had a bad run-in with her. She (tequila) is our liquid courage, our drink of choice, our social drink, our date night drink - you name the occasion, tequila is always right for us.

And one way we loooooove our tequila is - you guessed it - in a margarita! We know its nothing to brag about, but we are both margarita snobs, connoisseurs if you will. We love a good, fresh margarita. From traditional to adventurous and spicy, to classically blended - you've gotta try them all! (at least we do).

We have compiled here our 3 favorite recipes of margaritas to share with you people - share the love, you know? We have one traditional, one blended, and one adventurous, and we are here to share those recipes with our pals!

Traditional
Traditional Lime Margarita 

Cheers to Mal's cousin, Anna, for providing us with THE best margarita recipe on earth - no joke. We can always appreciate a fellow margarita aficionado!

Makes 1-2 margaritas

Ingredients:
2 shots tequila of choice
2 shots orange liqueur of choice
1 shot agave nectar
Juice of 4 limes
Salt, for rimming the glass

Instructions:
1. Add all ingredients except salt to a shaker.
2. Shake
3. With a lime, wet the rim of the glass and dip in the salt
4. Pour over ice and enjoy!




Blended
Coconut Lime Frozen Margarita

Makes 4 margaritas

Ingredients:
15oz cream of coconut (this is usually in your grocery store in the drink mixers section - took us a while to figure that one out)
3/4 cup tequila of choice
1/4 cup orange liqueur of choice
Juice of 4 limes
3 cups ice cubes
Salt and lime zest for rimming the glass

Instructions:
1. Add cream of coconut, tequila, orange liqueur, and ice to a blender; blend until smooth.
2. With a lime, wet the rim of the glass and dip in the salt mixture
3. Pour and enjoy!




Fun & Adventurous
Grapefruit Jalapeño Margarita

Makes 4 margaritas

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups tequila of choice
2 cups grapefruit juice
Juice of 6-8 limes
4 Tbsp agave nectar 
1-2 jalapeños, sliced and seeded
Granulated sugar and cracked pepper for rimming the glass

Instructions:
1. Add all ingredients, except sugar and pepper, to a pitcher and stir well.
2. Keep refrigerated for 30 minutes or more, depending an your desired level of kick (remove the jalapeño slices once it is at your preferred spice level)
3. With a lime, wet the rim of the glass and dip into the sugar mixture
4. Pour over ice and serve




We hope you enjoyed our round up of a few tasty tequila treats! Let us know what you guys are enjoying (tequila or not), we are always excited to try any new cocktails. Until next time folks, it's 5 o'clock somewhere.


xoxo, your festive pals

If you know me, even barely, you know my unapologetic love affair with Mexican/Tex-Mex food. I could literally eat it every day for the rest of my life and be just as happy as I am - right now - writing a blog post about it.

This right here is easily one of my most favorite meals of all time, and can so easily transform into anything you want to make it. What I truly love about this, and why I have literally been running around sharing it with everyone I can possibly get to listen to me ramble for 4 minutes - it is totally customizable based on your diet and what you are looking for in a meal.

Keep it vegetarian, like we do, or add some meat in there to get some more protein - fish, chicken, pork, beef, whatever your heart desires

Swap the rice for another grain of your choice, like quinoa if, again, you want some extra protein

Add any herbs you want, like cilantro (which I can't stand, so I leave that out of basically every recipe known to man)

Add or subtract any veggies or legumes that you love and hate

Swap the amounts of rice and greens and easily transform it into a southwestern salad

MAKE IT ALL A BURRITO FILLING

... you get the picture

It has very quickly become a staple in our house - literally, we usually have it once a week. It is inexpensive, quick, and SO easy to make. It is hearty, but not so filling that you want to take a nap right afterwards. It is so good, even our pup, Hok'ee, wants a bite (ok, so I am pretty sure he would accept any human food if we were to give it to him, but he just looked so cute begging for it I had to snap a picture).

Yield: 3-4 servings (unless you have a Travis living with you, then 2 servings is all you get!)
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Ready Time: 45 minutes

INGREDIENTS
Bowl:
1 cup uncooked rice
2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup salsa
3 cups spinach, or green of your choice, sliced into strips
1 can whole kernel corn, drained
1 can black beans, or legume of your choice, drained and rinsed
2 tomatoes, seeded and diced
1-2 avocados, diced

Chipotle Sauce:
1 cup sour cream
2 Tablespoons chipotle peppers in adobo sauce
1 clove of garlic, minced (I eyeball this from a pre-minced jar)
Juice of 1 lime
1/4 teaspoon salt

Site note, we use Himalayan salt in our house rather than plain table salt, which is why you see pink stuff in a jar here - that's our salt!

INSTRUCTIONS
1. Add the rice, water, and 1/2 teaspoon salt to a pot and cook (about 30 minutes usually).

While the rice is cooking, I like to go ahead and do my prep work!

2. To make the chipotle sauce, combine all ingredients into a bowl and whisk together until completely mixed. Set the bowl in the fridge until you're ready to serve.

3. Chop your spinach (or alternate greens) into slices, and dice your tomatoes and avocados as large or small as you like. Set aside.

4. In 2 small pots or pans, give the beans and corn a little warmth on the stove (since they are already cooked coming out of a can, you just need to heat 'em up).

5. Once rice is done, fluff with a fork. Then add the salsa and stir together.

6. Fold the rice into a bowl. Then top with spinach, beans, corn, tomatoes, and avocados.

7. Drizzle with chipotle sauce and serve!

**A note of caution to you guys - something my husband unfortunately learned by trial and error - this chipotle sauce can be overwhelming in flavor and in heat for some people. Don't go too crazy with it until you figure out how much you like on there, then go wild. But for anyone who has a sensitive palette, it can ruin the whole meal for you if you go overboard. trust. **

I hope you guys enjoy this, and let us know if you decide to give this a go yourself - did you go verbatim by our recipe? If not, what did you add/remove to make it your own?! We would love to hear how creative you get!

Also, let us know if you want to hear more recipes that both Lo and I live for - because you knowwww we love to eat, and have so much we could share with you!

Later pals!
xoxo, your amiga, Mal

First off, I have to just go ahead and let you guys know I am not a nutritionist. Please do not take any nutritional advice from this post - this is simply to let you guys know why I made this decision (I certainly have gotten this question a lot so far). If you are interested in making a life change like I did, definitely talk to your nutritionist or doctor so you can make the best choice possible! Healthy doesn't always have to be black-and-white; there are plenty of people out there with healthy diets that include meat. All the meat. This post is solely discussing my personal health and moral decision to give it up!

Secondly, technically, I am pescatarian (I still eat some fish/shrimp), but not many people know that term off-hand, so I just lead with the vegetarian bit to make life more simple.


Ok, phew, enough with the technicalities. Let me just begin with the question I have been asked the most - don't you miss bacon?! Answer: YES. Ok, now to start from the beginning. My entire 27 years of my life, up to about a month ago, I had no dietary restrictions (medical or choice) - excluding that 2 months I went cold-turkey vegan; man that was rough, but that's a-whole-nother story. I grew up on North Carolina BBQ, fried chicken, TACOS, steaks - the works, and I never thought twice about it until my college years. I have always been a total mush when it comes to animals (remember, I am devastated when even bugs are killed), but when it came to eating them, I was dismissive of the thought of where the meat actually came from; it made me too sad. I think it was easy to ignore because I had been eating it my whole life, and frankly, have never had to kill anything to eat myself.

Right after college, I started paying attention to my body, how I treated it, and what I put into it. I started making healthy and responsible decisions for my life - regular gym visits, yoga, taking better care of myself, the works (don't get me wrong, I still had my love affair with Taco Bell, and have been known to pass on the gym and yoga a time or two). Around that time, I heard about these books - Skinny Bitch - and so I gave them a try. Immediately after finishing the book, I became cold-turkey vegan (not realistic for a cheese-lover, like me, people). It. Was. Hard. I missed cheese so much, and milk, surprisingly. Needless to say, after 2 months of it (and honestly feeling the best I've ever felt), I caved. I gave up the vegan lifestyle - it was too "inconvenient" for 21-year-old Mallory - and expensive.

Since then, I thought I could never give up animal products again. Bacon, man! It was too hard. And its expensive to eat right, right? (Side note - why is it that a 2L soda is 99 cents, but a gallon of milk is $2.50-$4.00?!) Eating healthy is a drag on my wallet.

Then, our trip to Colorado happened ...

My cousin, Beth, has been vegetarian for a long time now. Because of the dietary restrictions she has, we ate so much healthier out there than Travis and I are used to - and it was awesome! We were sitting at the island one morning and I asked her - "What made you become a vegetarian?" (Aside from the fact that she is just as much of an animal lover as me). She simply said she watched a film on Netflix called Forks Over Knives. So, naturally, when we got home, we watched. it. It was seriously eye-opening, and not in the gruesome, bloody way that the Skinny Bitch books portray, but in a simple, medical and scientific way.

After that, I knew I was ready to make the life change. not only did the movie open my eyes to a whole world of health without meats, but it made me completely aware of my feelings about eating animals. I no longer wanted to be a hypocrite. If I were to continue to eat meat, I would make myself go to a local farm and watch the animals get killed. And I was NOT about to do that. So why, then, could I so easily go to the grocery store and buy that same meat, wrapped in plastic? I was not going to do it anymore. Not once. So I shared my feelings with my husband (who also watched Forks Over Knives), and much to my surprise, he said he wanted to give it a shot too! What?! I explained, "Trav, this means no wings, no burgers, no steaks, no sausage biscuits, no meat ... " and he still wanted to, which made me extra happy, because that obviously could pose an issue with meals cooked at home!

Now, to make life easier, and not feel so "cold turkey" as I did with the vegan experiment, we became pescatarian. I love shrimp, people. And salmon. And I am not quite ready to give that up. Maybe one day we will taper down our fish consumption, but for now, we are loving this diet. LOVING.

And I finally have faced my "fear" of healthy eating being expensive head-on. Much to my surprise, I was wrong! We are actually saving money. Not necessarily just because of our decision to give up meat, but because we are buying smarter, planning out our meals, and shopping at the right places! Don't get me wrong, I love a good Whole Foods or Fresh Market run, but those places are not cheap. I have been able to find local markets that sell fresh, mostly local, organic produce for insanely cheap! Which makes me so happy!

"But how do you get protein?!" - this is another question we find ourselves answering a lot! Aside from the ample protein in fish, we can get lots of protein in unexpected places, although it does take more thought than just throwing a meat into the meal, which we could so easily do not long ago. Eggs, oatmeal, Greek yogurt, nuts, beans, broccoli, spinach, and cauliflower just to name a few! Those are some of the top meatless proteins for us non meat-eaters, and I can't say I'm disappointed. I will happily eat all of those things any day of the week! (Well, maybe not cauliflower, but it's growing on me.) But it does prompt a whole new train of thought while at the supermarket. Call it a challenge!

And my husband swears that he feels better already (whether it is mental or not) - he said he feels less groggy in the morning, he feels more full after meals, but less tired and "heavy". Boom! Revelations!

I will say I haven't ventured out and tried tofu yet ... I don't know, I just don't think I'm ready for that endeavor; chalk it up to being skeptical at this point. 

Luckily, my amazing and dear friends Sarah (vegetarian her whole life) & Brianne (pescatarian for 2 years) are also #veglife with me and Trav, and that has been such a blessing; they are (obviously) so supportive of our life change, and have been amazing at sharing tips, tricks, and recipes! And as Sarah said to me when I broke the news to her, "You are going to be so proud of being a vegetarian; I know I am."

And to be honest, I already am! I feel better, I am eating better, and I am enjoying food on a level I never thought possible (and I LOVE food, people).


xoxo, your newfound veggie-lovin pal