Huge Comeback!

Hello Fitfam!

Well how to start this one... maybe with saying SORRY for not having let you hear anything on my blog in like forever?! Probably. I seriously have no other reason than the truth: I just wasn't making any time for it. 

I hate when people say they couldn't find time or couldn't make time. It's all about priorities. And I set my priorities in a way that did not fit in any blogtime. But now I am back and I am all motivated to give you all the content I've been collecting the past months. 

I recently moved out of my parents house and into my new little own housing. I am still decorating a little here a little there but I am so overwhelmingly in love with my new home. I decited to go all white and just added a touch of copper. Whenever I open the door I feel great! It's just a pretty place to be and I cannot wait until all the unfinished pieces fit together.

I also did some changes on my workout plan meaning that I actually have a plan now! I am no longer wlaking around the gym like 'uhm what do you do with that?'. No I just discovered Whitney Simmons' YouTube channel - and that girl? She is bomb! She really knows what she's doing! Her workouts I think are very individual, creative and fun - yeah- FUN to do! I am so in love with her channel I actually wanted to share my obsession. So if you - just like me- never really knew what and how much of what you should do at the gym, go check her out, hit the like button and subscribe to stay tuned!

So taking all the new and fresh motivation I needed some space to share all of my happiness and all of my motivation. This is how I got back to my Blog! Sorry again for letting y'all waitso long but now I am back. I have a huge comeback in fitness, food, fashion and travel. I regained so much power and finally found my space. 

So you guys if you are interested in where this new energy will lead us let me know in the comments what you would be interested in hearing; would you like to see more travelling? More fashion? More fitness? Do you want to get to know me better? You let me know!

Write you soon, XoxO
Jana

.    .    .    always give it your all    .    .    .

24 Hours in Denver

 

 Hello and good morning Denver!

The day before packing to leave for Denver, USA I was checking on the weather. A solid 20°C was calling for a light jacket and some light T-shirts. Maybe I should pack another sweather just to be safe? A windbreaker would be great if I would find some time to visit the mountains?

Good thing I checked out Brittany Lessers snapchat that day! She lives near Denver and snapped pictures of the snowy landsacape. 

Well this is obviously the bad thing about traveling having to trust in weather predictions so I also packed my heavy iceblue winter coat for good measure! Right before takeoff my collegue just told me : 'There is no reason for complaining about the weather in Colorado for it changes within the next minute!' 

What can I say - she was defenitly right! Good thing that only counted for the temperature during our stay. The sun luckyly stayed out constantly - unlike the following days that were predicted to bring a lot of heavy snowstorms. Hopefully this has nothing to do with the icecubes I threw into the toilet by the end of the visit?!(An US-American saying calls for ice cubes in the toilet if you wish for a snow day afterwards - I actually just wanted to remove the remaining cubes off my cold drink before tossing the cup) But let's take it to the beginning!

The day was almost over when I reached the city of Denver - a long day just called for a hot soup and a good night of sleep. I was andering around to find any spot to have soup at which appears to not be too easy at 8pm downtown Denver on a saturday night. Some of the food spots close very early on weekends which -in my opinion- is defenitly okay and understandable, yet not too great if you have no other option than eating out.

Wandering around Downtown at night was quite an experience as well. Not only the big tower in the center of the town was glowing green (for St pattys day) but there was also a slight hint of a 'green smell' in the air. As Cannabis is to be consumed legally in the state of Colorado the smell on the streets sort of reminds me of the streets of Amsterdam.

I did find a fast food bakery -other than panera- called 'Corner Bakery' where I was able to enjoy a great soup before getting a great cap of sleep for the upcoming long day!

To start my morning right whenever I am in the states there is no place like Panera bread for breakfast! I really love the bagles and always bring some home with me. Although I also developed a habit in always having the Power Quinoa Oatmeal the day I am having breakfast there - I recomment to substitude the honey for peanutbutter and you will be in heaven! This time I also tried the strawberry pecan oatmeal - subbing pecans with PB again and the Chai Latte made with almond milk. Both of course have been amazing again - even though I only got to drink half of the Chai because I was so full! I kept the remaining part in my fridge overnight and added a cup of ice cubes (see where the came from) to it to make it a frappe and I really have to say I almost liked that version more.  So if you -like me - are not able to make it though the entire cup of Chai just leave it for the next day and it will be amazing enjoyed as a refresher!

By the time I hit Panera (around 8am) It was already as beautiful as cold outside. I was very very glad I packed my thick winter coat trying to keep away the freezing cold air as much as possible. I even had to ask a Panera worker if it was possible to wait inside until they open - it was THAT cold! I tried taking a picture of the great mountain view in the morning but obviously all I caught in all its clearness was the Panera logo. Denver itself makes a beautiful city to visit because from almost every corner of the streets you get a great mountain view! The city itself looks a little older and very beautiful. A free bus system takes you up and down the main street where all restaurants are located. It took me a while to find the really great spots but all in all I have to admit that I've eaten lots of great food - I will share the spots with you later on. On the mall street there are located several pharmacies, TJ Maxx and Ross as well a tiny mall featuring Victorias Secret, Bath&Body works, Forever 21 and many more. Overall you can get a great variety of things to buy by not even leaving the town.

But if you are that close to the Rockys why would you not leave the town to reach for them a little more? Right you wouldn't!

So around 9:30 I met some of my colleagues to hit the bus straight out of town towards Boulder - the town I already knew from following Amanda's blog. I was having high expectations of that area and I got to admit they were more then met! 

Even the Bus drive was worth the trip already. Apparently there is a fast and a slow bus depending on how many stations they were stopping - it took us around 40 minutes that , again, passed so fast while I was just looking at the mountains, enjoying the weather.

Boulder itself is a smaller old town featuring plenty of old little butiques and many trendy spots to grab a snack. We hit a spot called 'The old Chicago' to grab a lunch. The food was very good and well done, the servants were friendly while most of the time connected on their mobile phones.

Avocado Chicken Salad, no cheese, 

dressing on the side

After lunch we split in smaller parties depending on what everyone was up to to. One of my colleague - the same age as I - and I decited to enjoy the weather a little and wlaked around some beautiful park, some random neigbourhoods and the streets until we 'accedently' found the Bouder Teahouse. By this time we must've hit the 15-20°C already! Time to take off the coat and have a sip on the best frozen Chai latte I've ever tasted in my life! Yes, I obviously have an obsession but at least it's no alcoholic beverage ;) So if you ever get to visit this beautiful Teahouse in Boulder you have to have a try!

Teahouse Boulder

 We almost spent all day wandering around the streets of Boulder, shopping for some sweet TOMS - even though I could not find any my size. We collected some sunshine and listened to many street artists while we talked about everything and nothing at all. It was a great afternoon after all! On our way back we got off the bus at some shopping area to visit TJMaxx, Target and Wholefoods.

By the time we were back at Denver we - of course - were hangry as little lions again! We hit a place called 'Chili's'  to have a meal called 'bottomless Soup and Salad' that also featured a huge bowl of Tacos and dip. All the way satisfied we were ready to call it a day for the last time in Denver.

The last hours in the city were well spent on shopping a light spring dress and ofcourse again some food - I would really want to point out two more places to eat when being in Denver. One is called the 'Protein Bar' featuring lots of delicious, healthy meals - located on the upper end of the mall street (16th). The other one is more of a place to satisfy cravings : Santa Fe cookies & Co. This small and almost nondescript place gives you the feeling of standing right in the middle of grandmas baking place , only that not granny but a young girl is too busy baking for even taking your money. Self service for all kind of cookies and other baking goods for really small money - downstairs in front of starbucks just across the mall.

So here you have a small conclusion of a day I would always love to repeat again! I hope I was able to give you some hints and inspirations. Let me know what you think about this travel journey and if you'd like to see more of that! Have you ever traveled to Denver or live there? What are your secret tips?

When suddenly your sister starts reading your Blog ;)

As I promised my sister I would give her the recipe to this quick and simple breakfast or whatever time snack idea I finally got to write down everything on blog. Regarding the long list of ingredients you have to admit though that this defenitly is a complicated recipe! I'm just kidding. There is nothing more simple and yet delicious as a bisquit roll. Plus as I mentioned before you can have it whenever you are craving something sweet and cakey ;)

So here you are, the recipe for my delicious Bisquit roll, my love:

Bisquit roll (Serves one because you would not want to share) :

• 3 eggwhites
• 1 egg yolk
• 30g protein (can substitude for regular flour, coconut flour or grated nuts)

1. Preheat oven to 180°C.
2. Stiffen eggwhites in a seperate bowl.
3. Mix together the flour and eggyolk and slowly add the beaten eggwhites. Add in a little sweetener of your choice if you have more of a sweet tooth. I personally don't think it is neccessary!
4. Spread as thin as possible on a baking sheet and place in the oven for about 13 minutes.
5. Meanwhile you can prepare your stuffing. I like to stuff mine with fresh fruit and greek joghurt mixed with mashed banana. Sometimes All I do is PB&Banana - you can seriously go crazy with your stuffing!
6. Once your Bisquit is done - remove it from the oven and let it cool down a little before filling and rolling it.
7. Enjoy your sweet and delicious snack! <3

Extra tipp: If you leave your dough unsweetened you may also try to fill your roll with savory goods like sauteed vegetables or deli meat!

.   .   .   respect everyone   .   .   .

Spring sun, bright mood and crafting

The feeling when you wake up and the sun is up already is just not the same in spring as it is anytime else. After all these months of suffering in the grey and dark, cloudy and wet, the bitter cold freezing storms slapping your face for no reason at all - there is no better feeling than the soothing hug of a warm sunlight. You fall in love at first sight and on second you realize it is pretty cold still. This I did again this year - like I do every year - when going for a walk to have the first ice cream of the year with my bestfriend. In my ballerinas. No socks. 

No crying over here I shuld've learned my lesson last year, or even all those years before but it just feels a little more like spring in open shoes. If you are all the way honest you have to agree that spring is really overdue now in the middle of may. 

So anyways no cold can bring me down as long as the sun is up. And it was all day! So how to use all that energy - especially when I just cleaned everything when it was messy out still. So I worked out - sun right in my face - yeas I will just mention it in every single sentence - and then I got a little crafty.

Basically what I accomplished today is a project laying around for so so long now - you guessed it - I just needed a little extra motivation to start it. Basically it is not even a big deal but I was really happy about the outcome! May I inntroduce :

My sparkeling pillow backpack!

I always thought about how these backpacks are made. Like how is the chord supposed to go to make it work like the whole system is supposed to be?

Turns out there is no magic at all and actually making one of these is so simple you could bascially make them without any knowledge of sewing. Things are even on top of being simple if you use a pillow like I did.

Let me know if you are interested in a step by step introduction into the project - or any craft project in general!

... and here is my delicious froyo!

.   .   .   time you enjoy wasting is no wasted time   .   .   .

Blueberry muffins and other life goals

#125 - bake perfect muffins

In my whole entire life I've baked a ton of muffins. Healthy ones, unhealthy ones, baking mixes, homemade, cupcakes - the list goes on and on. Never did I rech the perfect muffin consistancy you know from starbucks etc. Never did I ever even get my cupcackes to grow further than the end of the muffin line. These babies I baked for my family and to take with me on competition day and look how awesome the look already! Plus: They are homemade and mostly healthy with no added sugars!

I used BakerByNature's recipe as inspiration and changed it here and there to my needs. I decited to use more oats next time to give them a little more bite :)

So now I can finally cross that off my life goals list !

... sorry for bad quality ...

Blueberry Muffins (makes 12):

• 2 cups of any flour you would like to use
• 1 cup oats
• 1|2 cup almond milk
• 1 cup applesauce
• 1 cup soy joghurt or any joghurt you like
• 2 eggs
• splash of vanilla
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• a little salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1,5 cups blueberries

Whisk together all ingredients - and I actually mean all of them. No need to slowly add the wet or dry ingredients. I literally put all ingredients -except the blueberries- into a bowl while I was preheating the oven and mixed them up to a firm consistancy. Than I folded in one cup of blueberries. Devide the dough into 12 lined muffin tins. Make sure the tins are filled upo all the way to have a huge delicious muffin in the end. I used the remaining blueberries to top the muffins for a good look. As I really love the blueberry flavor I will probably use even more next time. Put into the oven at 200°C for 18 minutes and then turn down the temperature to 180°C for another 9 minutes. Let the muffins cool completely - or at least to a temperature that is good to handle, because we all know everything that comes out of the oven tastes best when still warm. Enjoy & share your muffins <3

.   .   .   you cen reach every goal   .   .   .

Chocolate cravings and other problems -

I am not the kind of person that is into fasting at all. I never fasted and actually I think I never will. If I feel like restricting myself in any sort of food I am capable of doing this whenever I feel the need. And I actually mean I am totally capable! Once when I was on banana Island I went out for dinner with my friends to a chinese all you can eat buffet and I filled up with bananas before we went, took one on the go and all I had that night was some rose tea. So when it comes to dicipline I do not really need a special occation to go after my goals. 

So totally out of that fasting frame I recently decited to not have any Ben & Jerry's Ice cream until my birthday which is on april 15th. Usually I am very good at keeping the promises that I made to myself and I got pretty far in the game this time as well but I am just having a really bad time which could also be because I am following way too many great food bloggers on instagram... just saying.. 

As some of you may or may not noticed - B&J currently brought out some new cookie deliciousness and I AM OFF THAT STUFF RIGHT NOW. I literally feel like an addict that needs his drugs. I even drove to the supermarket to have a look at the new B&J's and luckyly they only had the usual ones. In sale. Man am I good in training my strongness.

Anyways a girl has to satisfy her cravings so I am defenitly back to anything chocolate. Literally everything works but some forms I just prefer over others. As it got harder around here so find some silken tofu I felt really lucky in finding a place to buy it from today. Finding silken tofu means vegan mousse au chocolate in my kitchen. ASAP. Since this is one of my favorite and also as simple as delicious recipes I would like to share it with you guys -

...sorry for the bad quality...

Vegan chocolate mousse (serves only as 

           many people whom you feel like sharing with ... )

• 1 Package silken tofu
• around 5 Dates
• 2 - 3 Tbsp baking chocolate 
• optional : agave syrup

All you need to do is to obviously put all ingredients into a food processor. Once you got a firm cream your mousse still needs to rest at least one hour in the fridge. The more rest it gets the more firm the texture will become. I made different experiences with different sorts of dates. If your dates are very soft and sweet you won't have to use more than 5 dates. If they are dry and less sweet it is recomented to also use a splash of agave syrup, honey or any kind of sweetener if not even a couple more dates. If your dates tend to be really dry like mine I recommend soaking them in some water first which should make it easier to handle them later. Enjoy your sweet and rich in proetin snack. <3

Please let me know if you are also interested in my vegan Mars Bar recipe whom I topped the mousse with.

.   .   .   never forget that all sides of you are your chocolate sides   .   .   .

How to fix your broken pancake...

So this pancake story is about to turn into a deep psychological observation - you better grab a snack and take your time to think about life and the universe. Just kidding. Still there is one thing I would like to talk about with you - the one thing psycologists call resilience. Resilience basically is the word that describes the procedure of bouncing back after something bad happened to you. As I am planning on taking a seminar on this theme at work I am thinking about this topic a lot. Spoiler alert : this will become more psychotic and crazy than I actually intented it to be in the first place - BUT there will be a recipe at the happy end.

For me personally I can say that resilience is not my biggest strength. Actually at some days I am not even able to try at all - which basically shows in me crying on the floor asking why all of that always just happens to me and how I am the person who does never achieve anything while everyone is just the best at life. So as you might have noticed I am a real talent at getting up after I fell all the time - but some days I am also able to keep my shit together - no worries!

Why I want to talk about this topic though and what the heck it has to do with pancakes you want to know? 

Well for myself I was learning a lot about how a positive mind can affect your current mood and how much your current mood does affect your overall life - duh! As a bad mood is able to hurt your social life as well as your work area, most of all: your well-being, a good mood is also able to push things up a lot. So reselience is an important tool in your life to make things so much easier yet way better. To me - realizing how moody I can become and how it affects my social life was a first yet important step to building up my resilience. I am grateful to have this blog to express my emotions sort of like I could in a diary and I am greatful for all chances life gives me to build up me reilience, including the course I am hopefully gonna take at work. Maybe this post does nothing but help myself by putting my thoughts into written words but maybe even one person reads this and feels great about it which would be more than amazing.

Bringing the word back to the pancake; what I want to introduce to you today is what the internet translator would call a 'sugared pancake with raisins' - or what I would translate as the 'german traditional pancake' (even though it might be austrian, who cares?!); the Kaiserschmarrn. 

This recipe calls to make one giant pancake - a dreampancake you bake in the largest pan you have. Doesn't that sound just amazing? Right! This refers to your perfect goal you want to achieve. Once you poured all your batter into the pan it looks all good and you can already imagine your pancake on the biggest plate you own, but as soon as you try to turn it around it breakes into large pieces. Your perfect plan just got torn apart. Your pancake is broken and so is your dream. But then you look at it from a new perspective. How about cutting your giant pancake into a bunch of small ones - will they still taste amazing? They sure will! And your plans that did not work out how you wanted them to? Do they still have a chance to result in a great outcome? They sure do!

So this little - and I got to admit also wierd - connection shows us that everything happens for a reason, even if you feel like your whole world is breaking apart - try to look at it from a different angle. Same counts for relationships. You have had trouble in your relationship lately? Maybe your partner is stressed out from work. Your mom is yelling at you for no good reason? Maybe she is afraid of you growing up and leaving the house. 

I do not want to teach you to psychologically look at your life all the time. But please remember if you feel like nothing goes right - just go left...

... and turn your pancakes into a glorious Kaiserschmarrn!

Kaiserschmarren (serves 2):

• 100g oat flour
• 4 eggs devided
• 1 Tbsp apple sauce
• a dash of salt
• 100ml sparkling water
• 100ml almond milk
• 1 Tsp vanilla

1. Devide your eggs and beat the eggwhites until they are stiff.
2. Lightly coat a large pan with coconut oil or whichever oil you like most.
3. Mix the eggyolks with the remaining ingredients, gently folding in the eggwhite at the end. If you don't want to use sparkling water feel free to sub almond milk or just regular water - sparkling water is just going to make the dough more fluffy.
4. Add half the dough into the pan and wait for the bottom to brown slightly.
5. Devide your dough into four pieces which makes it easier to turn the giant pancake.
6. Gently turn the pancake in four parts and continue cutting your pancake into small pieces.
7. Wait until your kaiserschmarrn is fully cooked through and serve with any topping you like - I highly recomment the typical applesauce - raisin - powdered combination which is how they serve it in the german mountains!
8. Enjoy your german pancake <3

.   .   .   take some time off for yourself   .   .   .