Is it so wrong to plan Mondays around yoga and a cocktail? My Mondays begin on Sunday which means grocery shopping – everywhere – from the West side to the East and markets stuffed in between. Days which can find my back and legs sore and achy from a weekend of heavy catering, the kitchen a minor or major disaster. Unload, clean, scour, organize, maybe some prep and baking to ready for the next day’s work. Monday morning is the beginning of a long day in the kitchen – lower back tingling, psoas cranking ever tighter, left hip feeling deeply bruised and beaten. What keeps me motivated and focused is the reward of Tami’s Monday night yoga class where I can breathe deeply, stretch and wring out the ouchies. No gentle class, this – think yoga boot camp, hot power Baptiste vinyasa flow. The kind of class that tests your mettle, the class that might find yourself questioning whether you can take any more (get out of that head!), right about the moment where you reach the other side of the practice and it’s time to rest. What remains from this joyful expression of endurance is a soggy, puddling, open, breathing, smiling and blissful remainder of the body that stumbled in an hour and a half before. Thirsty.

In my car I have waiting a large box of coconut water of which the greater part immediately gets chugged with gusto. The balance is designated for my Monday night special. Ok, I am not suggesting in any way that this beverage would be considered as “healthy”, but as far as booze-driven drinks go, this is pretty damn close. Healthy-ish. Icy cold, refreshing, hydrating, replenishing, relaxing. And just as welcome on a Friday.

The Monday

Serves one, blissfully

Ingredients:

2 oz. 100% blue agave white/silver tequila

2 oz. coconut water

1 oz. fresh lime juice

1/2 oz. raw agave nectar

Generous pinch fine unprocessed sea salt

1 small, thinly sliced thin-skinned lime

Place all ingredients in an ice-filled shaker. Shake until so cold that your fingers hurt. Pour into waiting rocks glass, or strain into an upglass. Namaste.

There still is time to support Veggie U over at Cleveland Foodie.

Check out this rad Cleveland event: Yoga for Foodies at the Greenhouse Tavern with David Romanelli.