Food Friday - (and weigh in...ick)

I'm joining up with Eilyne over at Suite 100 for Food Friday again!  Make sure you check out her blog at http://www.eilynedavis.com/

I have recently discovered that the Hungry Girl lists Weight Watchers Plus points on her recipes so I've been having a lot of fun trying out some new recipes - and actually cooking to the surprise of my husband!   So far what I've made has been really good so I question the actual point values.  The best so far is the "HG's Mega-Delicious Chipotle Chicken Panini"  I have seriously had it 5 times in the last week.  She says it's only 6 points and that's what I'm hoping is true!!  Apparently it's a healthier redo of a Panera Bread sandwich, I've never had that one but this one is excellent. 

HG's Mega-Delicious Chipotle Chicken Panini

Ingredients:
Sauce
1 1/2 tbsp. fat-free mayonnaise
1/2 tsp. adobo sauce (from canned chipotle peppers) or chipotle hot sauce (like the kind by Tabasco)
2 dashes onion powder
2 dashes garlic powder

Sandwich
One 100-calorie flat sandwich bun (like Arnold Select/Oroweat Sandwich Thins)
2 oz. cooked skinless lean chicken breast, shredded or pulled into pieces
1 tbsp. roughly chopped fresh basil
2 thin slices red onion
2 slices plum tomato
1 stick light string cheese, shredded or pulled into pieces

Directions:
In a medium bowl, combine ingredients for the sauce and mix well. Set aside.

Split bun in half and lay the halves flat, split sides up. Evenly spread half of the sauce onto the bun halves, leaving half of the sauce in the bowl. Set aside.

To the bowl with the remaining sauce, add chicken and toss to coat. Set aside.

Evenly top one bun half with basil, onion, tomato, saucy chicken, and cheese. Place the other half on top, sauce side down.

Bring a grill pan sprayed with nonstick spray to medium-high heat on the stove. Place sandwich in the pan. Using a spatula, press down gently but firmly to seal the sandwich. Grill until hot and lightly browned, about 2 minutes per side, flipping carefully and pressing down with the spatula to seal.

Cut in half (or not) and enjoy!

Definitely check out the Hungry Girl's website for even more tasty and healthier dishes.  If you have tried some, please let me know the results in the comments! 

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And now for the dreaded Friday weigh in....

Starting weight:  172

Last week's weigh in:  168

My current weight:  167.4

My goal weight:  154

Gain/Loss this week:  -.06

Total lost so far:  -4.6

Food Friday!

I am so honored to be asked to participate in my friend Eilyne's "Food Friday" feature!  If you haven't checked out her blog yet, you ABSOLUTELY must.  She has an incredible way with words and inspires me each morning with her posts....please check her out here:  http://www.eilynedavis.com/

So my Food Friday entry is the oh so healthy, "Zero Point Weight Watchers Garden Vegetable Soup"....exciting, no?!  It is, it is!  This is a bit of a twist on the soup that I learned about 5 years ago.  My Mom reintroduced me to it recently and we've been tweaking it to our liking.  The best thing about this soup is that it's low-cal, low-carb, high-fiber and no-fat.  It's also quite filling and keeps me from going crazy at meal times...I have a cup before eating lunch or dinner and find I'm not as hungry and I eat much less.  It's supposedly zero points, even on the new + program, but I still count it as 1 point per cup.  Can't beat that though!

Zero Point Weight Watchers Garden Vegetable Soup

6 cups broth (we actually use water only because of the high content of sodium in broth)
Cooking spray
2 carrots, peeled and diced
1 large onion, diced
4 teaspoons garlic (from a jar or substitute four cloves minced garlic)
1/2 cabbage, chopped (or use a bag of slaw, the biggest chunks you can find vs the fine, don't skip the cabbage for it somehow makes the soup)
1/2 pound frozen green beans
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 large zucchini, diced

Spray a Dutch oven with cooking spray and heat on MEDIUM HIGH. Add the carrots, onion and garlic and cook for about 5 minutes. Add all the remaining ingredients EXCEPT the zucchini and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat to MEDIUM and simmer for about 15 minutes or until the beans are tender. Add the zucchini and cook until the zucchini are tender. Serve and enjoy!

Different veggies can be added or substituted.  I love adding bell peppers and a dash of hot sauce. This is a good 'clean out the fridge' soup.  Different spices can be added to give it a different taste too.  Be creative and play around with different tastes.  My next batch I'm going to add in some curry for a twist. 

Thank you so much Eilyne for allowing me to join in on the Food Friday feature!  Make sure you check out her blog at www.EilyneDavis.com....she's sharing yummy, beautiful cake pops...you can indulge in them after eating this healthy soup and feel less guilty!

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Since it's Friday, I gotta get my weigh-in in too!  

Starting weight:  172

Last week's weigh in:  169.9

My current weight:  168.7

My goal weight:  154

Gain/Loss this week: -1.2

 

Day 7 of My Favorite Things

  My Kitchenaid mixer!  I am not a good cook and lately do it very rarely but I do like to bake and this baby is the best.  My Mom bought it for me for Christmas about 3 years ago and I love it! 

Tonight I had a little Christmas dinner with my girlfriends and I whipped up this coconut-chocolate cake with my handy dandy mixer!  I found the recipe for the cake here....Family Circle.Com  It was yummy if I do say so myself!

 

Welcome to the Thanksgiving Day Recipe Blog Hop!

I am so excited to be participating in my first ever Blog Hop!  Thank you so much to Kiera of ChambersMade for inviting me!  This is going to be fun!   If this is your first stop on the blog hop and you'd like to start from the beginning, head over to Robin's blog at Creative2xMom.

OK the truth of the matter is--I don't cook much...eek...what was I thinking participating in a recipe blog hop of all things?  As soon as I said yes I wanted to do it, I then called my Mom and said "HELP!"  After I calmed down and thought about it though, I do collect a lot of recipes and have had my moments of glory in the kitchen.  (See the photo of my personal cookbook? That's pretty official right?)  Now the trick was narrowing it down to Thanksgiving worthy recipes.  2 side dishes came to mind! 

The first is a non-traditional Thanksgiving side, but one that is super yummy and will add even more calories to your day...but it's OK because Turkey day calories don't count, right?!  I got this recipe from my Aunt Donna...she made it for us once while we visited her in Tennessee.  The whole meal was excellent, but I had to have this recipe.

Vidalia Onions

6 Vidalia Onions

1 cup Parmesan cheese

20 crushed Ritz crackers

1 stick margarine

Slice onions as thin as possible and saute in margarine until limp.  Spray a casserole with Pam.  Make 2 layers of onion, cheese, crackers.

Bake at 325 for 30 minutes uncovered. 

 The second recipe is a Rachael Ray recipe called "Micro-way-cool Bacon and Green Beans" - I have a whole section dedicated to Rachael Ray recipes when she was 'teaching' me how to cook 5 years or so ago.  This recipe is time tested and will be super simple if you want to add just one more thing to that Thanksgiving feast!

Micro-way-cool Bacon and Green Beans 

6 slices bacon

1 (16 oz) bag frozen green beans 

A drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

Salt and Pepper

Place bacon between paper towels and microwave 60 seconds on high.  Cool bacon and chop or crumble it up.

Place greeen beans in a bowl and drizzle with EVOO, sald & pepper.  Cover the bowl loosely with plastic wrap (I use a Pampered Chef microwave bowl-that works perfectly!) and microwave green beans on high for 5 minutes, stir and cook 5 minutes more.  Remove wrap and top green beans with crumbled bacon.

Super simple, but yummy!

Your next stop will be to Jamie at Creating Home.  Have fun and thank you so much for stopping by!! 

The Children's Reaction

Not good.  As promised I said I would do a post on how my children are taking this new way of eating healthier.  Eh, not ideal.  At least tonight's meal didn't go over too well.  We made chicken fajitas, cilantro lime rice and black beans, all from the Food Revolution book.  Aaron and I thought it was excellent, a restaurant quality meal.  Kids not so much.  Initially it started good, they each tried everything on their plate, but in the end only ate the tortillas.  The new rule is this:  Eat what's on your plate, figure out a way to make it edible if you don't eat it as served, OR make yourself a PB&J.  That's it.  No cereal, no bagel bites, no ice cream.  That's it. 

They're not going to starve however, I've resurrected a previous idea and they are excited about what they'll find in the muffin tin everyday.   

Past Post: New Approach to After School Snack 

At least there will be smiles, until dinner that is.

Healthy Living: Moving into Phase 3, it's a big one!

Last month I moved into Phase 2 with my Healthy Living 2010 plan...the food part.  The exercise part is going well, I'm doing it regularly...yes, even running.  Not to the point I have the urge to enter a race, but getting it done.  I started the food journey with what I know works, but got bored and other food started sneaking into the mix.  With the recent popularity of Jamie Oliver and his New Food Revolution, I decided to investigate what he had to offer.  I'm completely impressed.  I love that his focus right now is on the kids and getting them to eat healthy.  My ultimate, ultimate goal is not just myself feeling healthy and fit, but for my kids to grow up feeling good and not having to break themselves of the horrible processed food, trans fats, high fructose corn syrup and all the other icky stuff out there. 

On Wednesday, Aaron and I spent ALL DAY clearing out the kitchen of basically everything, making a shopping list of what basics we needed  (we used the essentials list in Jamie's Food Revolution--beautiful book BTW) and pretty much getting rid of (throwing out and donating) everything else.  We had chocolate pudding mix that expired in 2006!  If it's not good for us and we're not going to eat it, why store it? 

I forgot to take a before picture but here's a couple of afters.  We are so proud of what we accomplished!

We got the basics from Jamie's list and the ingredients for tonight's dinner and it really wasn't that expensive.  I'm excited and happy to truly learn to cook from the beginning and in a clean way.  This is what we are making for dinner tonight, along with cilantro lime basmati rice and black beans...mmmmm. 

Somehow however, this snuck into the cart and home...

Uh, AARON!!!! 

Coming up in a future post....the children's reactions to this food revolution!

Adagio Tea Article

 

Confirmation that I picked the right tea company to become infatuated with! Fresh Cup Magazine - Web Feature: Is This the Apple Store of Tea?

And come on, they picked Chicago as the place to open their first retail store? My favorite large city.  Confirmation I need to book a trip there again soon.  

My Adventures into Tea

I don't drink coffee, wine or beer.  I want to, I have just never acquired the taste for them.  I also gave up diet sodas and I refrain from drinking anything high in calories or anything that uses artificial sweeteners.  I drink water.  And I'm bored.  (Disclaimer: I do drink David Rio SF Chai every morning but I do have concerns about it-specifically the partially hydrogenated stuff in it.).  I read on Cathy Zielske's blog that she was introduced to an online tea company that she highly praised....not only for the tea but for the packaging and service of that tea.  I LOVE GOOD PACKAGING. 

Even though I've dabbled in tea before with not the best of results, I decided to get an intro package to this Adagio Tea - Gourmet Loose Leaf Tea and see what happens.  First of all my order came within 36 hours of my ordering it on a Sunday evening.  Love that.  After watching the 'how-to' video on how to brew a cup of loose leaf tea, I was on my way.  My reaction to my first cup of tea?  Uh, it tastes like weeds.  And like tea.  Aaron says, "Uh, duh."  (The chai I drink daily tastes nothing like tea to me.  It's practically more like cocoa then tea.) He then helped me make about 5 more cups with varying levels of tea vs. water vs. brew time vs. sweeteners.  None thrilled me.  After being disappointed, calling my Mom for tea tips and even typing into Google: "I want to like tea, but I just don't, what do I do?"  I decided not to give up and persevere.  I WILL LIKE TEA.  I went back to the cup that had been sitting on the counter and tasted it again.  Hey, it's actually not bad.  Turns out I don't like hot tea!  I like lukewarm tea much better....add some soy milk, and mmmm....this stuff is tasty! 

The next day I went one step further...I brewed a cup of really strong tea, added some honey and poured it into a tall glass filled with ice. I added some vanilla soy milk....I'm in heaven.  I'm back in the tea business!  Now I'm experimenting with different sweeteners...currently I'm using the amber sugar crystals that they sell. 

I'm eager to try the other flavors of tea offered at Adagio.  I can't wait until their chai sampler is back in stock.  Chai how it's supposed to taste...without partially hydrogenated crap!  (Don't get me wrong....I do love me some David Rio...I buy it 3 pounds at a time!)

If you are intrigued and want to try it too....Here is a $5 gift certificate to Adagio Teas: 3587330875!! http://www.adagio.com  It's a great deal because for $14 you get the Starter System as well as 4 sampler tins...which equals up to 40 cups of tea!  (Click here for the Starter System.)

And when I'm not drinking some freshly brewed, doctored up tea...I'll be drinking my vodka water out of my beautiful new wine glass given to me by my Dad.  Making water a little less boring!

Favorite Things: David Rio Chai - Triple Play

Tiny running recap--still doing it but missed the last couple of days because of the crazy rain storms we are experiencing all throughout California.  I vow to run outside today rain or no rain however. 

Because of the stormy weather, I have doubled my intake of my absolute favorite cold weather drink chai tea.  And not just any chai tea, I LOVE David Rio Sugar Free Chai Orca Spice.  My Mom and I discovered this powdered version of chai about 5 years ago on a trip to Cambria.  I now purchase 3 pound bags of it regularly on-line and get agitated when I'm out of it.

In addition, it needs to be prepared just so.  My favorite way to make it is with 80% water, 20% non-fat milk, splash of vanilla creamer AND made in my  machine.  If you haven't heard of a Cocomotion it is simply the best way ever to make a hot powdered mix drink.  The machine mixes and heats the drink simultaneously and when it's done it has a bonus yummy frothy top.  Love it. 

And to make this a 'triple play' favorite thing...I prefer to drink my chai out of my "I Wanna Be Sookie" mug!   Aaron gave this to me for Christmas, he purchased it on Etsy from MaidofClay and it's the absolute best mug, such great quality and so unique...I can't help but hear Vampire Bill say "Oh...Sookie" every time I drink out of it.  Cracks me up!

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