{"id":3845,"date":"2022-03-31T21:25:31","date_gmt":"2022-04-01T04:25:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/?p=3845"},"modified":"2025-06-24T12:45:49","modified_gmt":"2025-06-24T19:45:49","slug":"the-mindfulness-menu-x-well-connected-exclusive-dare-we-say-heavenly-recipes-from-a-new-york-times-bestselling-cookbook-author-plus-her-own-daily-eats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/the-mindfulness-menu-x-well-connected-exclusive-dare-we-say-heavenly-recipes-from-a-new-york-times-bestselling-cookbook-author-plus-her-own-daily-eats\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mindfulness Menu x Well Connected: Exclusive feel-good, comfort recipes from a bestselling NY Times cookbook author"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I associate eating with pleasure. I\u2019m an omnivore, who embraces everything. I eat meat and fish, and cook with fat\u2014but I\u2019m mindful about where my ingredients come from. I try to eat locally and seasonally, and love a good farmer\u2019s market. The only food I avoid is mass fast food. I can\u2019t get on board with how the animals are raised and the workplace practices. Since I work with food, it can be hard to plan what I\u2019m eating. So if I\u2019m filming a video<\/a> for celery caesar salad<\/a>, that\u2019s what I\u2019m eating that day!  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With drinks, I try to only do alcohol on the weekends (which sometimes starts Thursday night). Wine, beer and sake are great, but I feel like crap if I go overboard, so I try to avoid drinking when I have something the next day, like a video shoot.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Breakfast  <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Typically I don\u2019t eat breakfast, which is a habit I got into from my days at Bon App\u00e9tit. We would always have tastings in the afternoon, and I wasn\u2019t in control of what was on the table. Sometimes it would be 10 dishes! So I\u2019d need to have an empty stomach to handle whatever came my way. My morning definitely involves caffeine\u2014I make a cup of black tea, usually Assam or Darjeeling (but I\u2019m not above PG Tips!) with a splash of whole milk and drink it in bed.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lunch <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I work out before I eat lunch, which gives me more energy throughout the day\u2014and a meal to look forward to afterward!  Since I make dinner every night, I usually have leftovers for lunch the next day. Today I had leftover cooked greens and beans in the fridge, so I made the lentil and greens bowl with feta cheese from my book, \u201cThat Sounds So Good.\u201d<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Lentils, Greens, and Marinated Feta Recipe<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coffee break <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Every day at around 3pm I have coffee, usually caf\u00e9 au lait or a cappuccino. Today I made it at home, but there\u2019s a coffee<\/a> spot near me I like when I need an excuse to get out of the house.  I don\u2019t usually eat again before dinner because I have a late lunch, but today my sons were snacking when they came home from school, so I stole a few of their crackers and hummus. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dinner <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I cook dinner for my family pretty much every night. Tonight, it was pan-fried chicken thighs with Italian salsa, smashed crispy potatoes and a big green salad. The chicken renders a lot of fat as it browns, which I strain and keep in the fridge\u2014I call that liquid gold! After dinner, the guys do clean up.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Pan-Fried Chicken Thighs With Italian Salsa Recipe<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dessert <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

When I’m not drinking (aka most weeknights), I get a sweet tooth, so we keep dark chocolate in the house for those moments. I love the salted almond flavor from Tony\u2019s Chocolonely,<\/a> and hot tip: Trader Joe\u2019s has surprisingly great chocolate. Their 1-pound block of bittersweet chocolate is affordable and delicious! Tonight, I had a hunk of that.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I ate a lot of cake when I was working on the dessert section of \u201cThat Sounds So Good<\/a>.\u201d That was a dangerous time. The recipe for my lemon polenta sheet cake with cream cheese frosting took 5-6 tries to perfect, so needless to say there was a lot of that going around\u2014not that my family was complaining.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Reprinted from That Sounds So Goodby Carla Lalli Music. Copyright \u00a9 2021 by Carla Lalli Music. Photographs copyright \u00a9 2021 by Andrea Gentl and Martin Hyers. Published by Clarkson Potter, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Lemon Polenta Sheet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I associate eating with pleasure. I\u2019m an omnivore, who embraces everything. I eat meat and fish, and cook with fat\u2014but I\u2019m mindful about where my ingredients come from. I try to eat locally and seasonally, and love a good farmer\u2019s market. The only food I avoid is mass fast food. I can\u2019t get on board […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":3912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-food"],"metadata":{"_edit_lock":["1750794351:21"],"_edit_last":["21"],"adobe_analytics_repeatable":["a:1:{i:0;a:2:{s:4:\"name\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"value\";s:0:\"\";}}"],"_yoast_wpseo_content_score":["90"],"_yoast_wpseo_estimated-reading-time-minutes":["4"],"show_featured_image":["1"],"_show_featured_image":["field_609ee1cf1ce13"],"primary_category":["3"],"_primary_category":["field_608c33bdd26d5"],"mobile_image":[""],"_mobile_image":["field_60bf7692abe28"],"_post_views_count":["field_6107dfafd6a27"],"_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":["3"],"_thumbnail_id":["3912"],"post_views_count":["4145"],"sidebar_products_use_global_default":["0"],"_sidebar_products_use_global_default":["field_63a349a11086a"],"sidebar_products_items":[""],"_sidebar_products_items":["field_63a349a110878"],"sidebar_products":[""],"_sidebar_products":["field_63a349a0dadad"],"sidebar_products_title":["Related Products"],"_sidebar_products_title":["field_6408d62123449"],"_yoast_wpseo_title":["Mindful eating & happiness | Murad Skincare"],"_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":["What the Optimism Doctor eats for joy and wellbeing. Mindful eating tips and mood-boosting foods. Learn how nutrition effects your happiness."]},"aioseo_notices":[],"acf":{"show_featured_image":true,"primary_category":{"term_id":3,"name":"Food","slug":"food","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":27,"filter":"raw"},"mobile_image":false,"post_views_count":"4145","sidebar_products":{"use_global_default":false,"title":"Related Products","items":""}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/41"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3845"}],"version-history":[{"count":62,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13504,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845\/revisions\/13504"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/3912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellconnected.murad.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}