Tag: florida

Grocery Shopping

Posted on by Samantha Dedea

Being a Florida girl, I shop at Publix and Publix only. I have dabbled with Sprouts, Fresh Market, and of course Whole Foods, but nothing gets the job done like Publix does. I used to do a lot of time consuming cooking because I genuinely love to cook. It’s my happy place. But when I started law school, I no longer have the time to put in chopping, prepping, and then cleaning. So my grocery list has changed along with my meals. I’ve never been much of a meal prepping person but I love to food prep and keep it all separately because I like to assemble my meals right before I eat them. Rule of thumb for us “health conscious” shoppers, shop on the outskirts of the store because the aisles are where you find the processed stuff that gets you in trouble. What are some of your favorite grocery stores?

Exam Diet

Posted on by Samantha Dedea

I did one year of law school before realizing that I didn’t actually want to be a lawyer. The truth is, I don’t know what I want to be, but that’s for another time. For now, I’d like to talk about exam dieting. Going to Stetson Law meant that there were A LOT of wonderful options to choose from on Uber Eats. With being so busy reading, briefing cases, or outlining for exams, my friends and I often found ourselves having food like what’s pictured above being delivered to the library. I had a love hate relationship with my eating habits during law school. I tried the best I could to eat “healthy” and made sure that I had good sources of proteins, fats, carbs, blah blah. But I also indulged in the good stuff. Maybe even a little too much. I definitely gained the freshman 15 my 1L year. Now that I’m out of school I’ve had a chance to reflect on how my body’s changed over the last year. There is not one part of me that regrets eating six doughnuts in a 5 minute period. They were DELICIOUS!!!! Moving forward into work life, I’d like to be able to take the lessons I’ve learned about stress eating and mindless eating and keep myself a little more together than I did around exams. What are some of your study/work eating habits?

Are Salads Basic?

Posted on by Samantha Dedea

It doesn’t matter where you go, salads are everywhere. I love salads and eat them every day, but, I’ll admit that restaurant salads have always been super basic to me. When you think of salad, you probably think of a bed of lettuce with some tomatoes, croutons, and cucumbers right? I’d like to talk about the way I assemble my salads at home to be the most NOT BASIC SALADS EVER. So let’s start with what everyone knows to be the base of a salad… the greens! I personally do not like romaine lettuce for my salads, but prefer arugula, radicchio, spinach, or a 50/50 blend. Arugula is my favorite because of the nice and spicy bite that it has so I feel like theres some flavor to my greens before even having to put a dressing on it. Next, comes the crunch. I hate croutons with a passion and think they’re way too salty, so crunchy vegetables it is. Yes, I put cucumbers in my salads but I also put bell peppers, onions, and sometimes even green beans. I almost always put roasted sweet potato and roasted butternut squash in my salads because carbs are life and it adds a really nice sweet flavor. Then, I’ll add some cherry tomatoes and if I’m looking for my salad to be more of a meal, I’ll add some protein. A few common examples for me are chicken, salmon (smoked or seared), steak, or tuna. I usually add half of an avocado but that really depends on if Publix has good avocados on the shelf. My final step to making a really non-basic salad is my dressing. When I have the time, I like to make my dressings from scratch. I am all about eating my medicine so I try to always incorporate anti-inflammatories into my food so my staple dressing is a homemade ginger and turmeric dressing. I finely chop fresh ginger root and fresh turmeric root (and when I say finely I mean FINELY), then I chop some garlic, shallot, and sometimes cilantro. I then juice either lemons or limes or both depending on if they need to be used and then add some honey and I’m done. I give it a good whisk and pour it over my salad. I make vinaigrettes too but that’s less common for me to want to eat. If anyone wants some of my dressing recipes, let me know in the comments section and I’ll post them!