Red, White, Blue

Last fourth of July Isaac and I spent the whole day moving into our new apt. The year before last I did a heritage 5 mile race. This year I decided to combine the two. I woke up early, got moving, and did my own independence day run 5 mile run without having to pay $35 to do it. It feels great to be back running.

I returned home just as the rest of the house was waking and we all had some b-fast. I has a little juice concoction. An oldie but goodie, 3 carrots, chunk of raw beet, quarter of a large english cucumber, and 1 fuji apple.

Bright red in celebration of the holiday. Isaac tried the juice. He said it smelled like salad, but liked the sweet flavor and he came back for two or three tastes.

After b-fast and showering, my friend and I headed off to Charlottesville for a blogger meet up on the downtown mall. Kath organized a lunch meet up at Eppie’s with a few blog readers, Andrea of Bella Eats, and Jess of Peanuts & Crackerjacks. I had never been to Eppie’s, but it was a cute little lunch spot. You order at the register and then call you by name, Panera style, only faster.

I ordered the sandwich soup combo- the daily salad with champagne vinaigrette and the soup of the day, which apparently is always gazpacho in the summer and always tomato in the winter.

The Daily Salad had baby spinach leaves, grape tomatoes, dried cranberries, candied walnuts, and bleu cheese.

LOVE candied walnuts! This salad was really good and I was totally a member of the clean bowl club after chowing down.

And the gazpacho

To be honest, it was just okay. I didn’t end up eating it all-  it was a bit too thick for my tastes.

But to my delight, they also served the combo with a mini loaf of pumpkin bread. Loved that!

It kind of makes me want fall to come faster so it’ll feel right to start eating all things pumpkin- oh pumpkin oats how I miss thee.

After chatting over lunch we decided to head over to a little gelato shop to continue the chatting. It looked amazing, but I was stuffed from lunch so I passed on gelato, but I was did get an iced Americano (how appropriate) with vanilla soy milk that was quite tasty.I need some energy for the drive back to Richmond as I have a tendency to be hypnotized by the road on long drives. I’m totally not kidding about this.

Here are the gals.

And here is a shot of everyone (minus the photographers- my friend & Karen)

After the photo shoot my friend and I hopped back in the car to head back to Richmond. The drive wasn’t bad at all- it’s a scenic route and only a little over an hour, plus having a friend to chat with makes the time fly by.

Once back I had to quickly get my goods together for Isaac’s family’s traditional 4th of July party. All I really had to do was put everything in portable containers and bag them up, as I had already done most of the work on Friday night. I made a Raw Corn and Avocado Salad and cut up veggies for a vegetable tray with hummus.

This dish was a huge hit. I didn’t tell anyone at the party that it was raw (besides Isaac’s mom) because really they wouldn’t have cared, but it was DELISH…. honestly, it’s a must try!

Raw Corn and Avocado Salad (Serves 8-12) Based on this recipe.

• 6 ears of fresh sweet corn, husked and cut from cob
• 1 cup red onion, diced
• 1 large avocado, diced
• Juice of 1 lime
• 2 Tablespoons fresh basil, chopped
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• Freshly ground pepper to taste

What to do:

After husking and cutting corn from cob, pull out as many corn silks as possible. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Easy, right?

Serve immediately or allow it to marinate. I made the salad the night before and allowed it to marinate all night as it tastes even better the next day!

Here are the prepped veggies & hummus:

Sabra sundried tomato hummus….

Sabra is still my all time fav hummus. It much more creamier than any other brand I’ve tried!

The whole shabang:

Lastly, what’s the 4th without a drink to celebrate?

On Friday they were doing a tasting at Trader Joe’s of an awesome Sangria. It was so good that I bought all the ingredients and decided to make it for the 4th. On a side note, I probably need to stop doing the wine tastings there because two weeks in a row they have convinced me to buy the wine/drink that they were sampling. And, they had smoked gouda paired with the sangria on Friday I also ended up buying that! I don’t even like cheese that much,  because the sample was so delicious I really couldn’t resist.

I didn’t get a good shot of the Sangria, so I’m not going to post a pic, but it was quite pretty with all the fruit floating around. Plus it was so easy to make and totally refreshing on a hot day. I had about 4 small glasses while eating, chatting, and watching the fireworks display from Isaac’s lawn! All in all, a fabulous way to celebrate. Happy 4th of July!