Weekend Doings!

Just a bit of this and that. I’ll get around to writing about the trip eventually. I had some different meals lately, and enjoyed them very much. I finally remembered to pick up a package of spinach and have been enjoying it in various forms, both in my smoothies, and also cooked. Here it is in a breakfast scramble with some red potatoes, onions, and mushrooms. Oh, and an egg and some egg beaters mixed in. Quite yummy. Adding potatoes definitely ups the allure of eggs for me (I’m not a big egg lover.)

In the same day, I decided to make a big batch of marinara sauce because I wanted to try out the homemade noodles that the 86 year old lady whose farmhouse I stayed in in Ohio had gifted me with. You know I don’t eat pasta that often, but I had to try these. They really were very tasty noodles! And the marinara sauce was yummy. I roughly followed my directions for Darn Good Spaghetti Sauce (but started with a can of crushed tomatoes, a can of diced tomatoes, and a can of tomato sauce) and omitted the meat so I could use it in a variety of ways. Now I have lots of marinara sauce in the freezer!

I added some turkey burger to some of the sauce for this meal.

On Thursday, MLG (master landscaping guy) came over to start on the new raised bed. He worked for 2 1/2 hours IN THE RAIN before giving up. He came over again on Saturday morning to finish the job, and then went to the nursery to get a truckload of dirt to fill it up! I helped out by moving the dirt around as he dumped in wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of the stuff. It doesn’t look like much, but that is actually very hard work. I love the way he did it in tiers.

This picture is taken from my front door, so you can see the first bed and where it is in perspective to that. Of course, MLG pointed out that it would look super cool if we were to continue the flagstone pavers up between the two beds. And he’s right, it would. I am going to price them at Home Depot this week.

I woke up with a very sore back on Saturday morning. Later in the afternoon, I went to the gym for a nice long swim. I don’t know if that helped it or not, but for the time I was in the pool, nothing hurt. It sure was nice.

On Sunday morning I wanted to try a new recipe. I had bookmarked this original recipe for “giant breakfast cookies.” Of course, I had to try to lighten it up a bit. Plus, I didn’t have applesauce, so I sub’d pumpkin. Did you know that applesauce and pumpkin have the same amount of calories??

These were quite tasty (and quite gigantic!) I put it on the plate that I usually plate my scones on for comparison. I think they are the same size as my scones. And I was very pleased with how long it kept me full. To make sure they were worthy, I had another one for breakfast this morning. I’ll post my recipe later today.

Before church, I hit the gym for a fairly long session on the bikes. I don’t really know what other people do on the bikes, but my mileage/time is pretty consistent. In 45 minutes I “rode” 9 1/2 miles.

And then Sunday afternoon I went to a potluck. Oh brother. I guess in hindsight I didn’t do too badly. A few too many dessert samples were consumed. (I took my go-to potluck dish of a ton of fresh fruit and a bowl of the Creamy Fruit Dip.) It was a potluck to benefit Second Chance Dogs. This is Noah’s trainer’s project. She takes dogs from the local humane societies that often times are unadoptable and keeps them on her ranch and works with them until they are perfect canine citizens and then finds homes for them. The transformations are amazing. She has re-homed over 250 dogs in the past 10 years.

And in between, I did some quilting. Lots and lots of quilting. It was a VGW (Very Good Weekend.) Hope yours was a good one too!

AIM–A Girl’s Gotta Eat!

Its the first Monday of April and time for another AIM post. This time we’re answering a reader’s question about the “brass tacks” of our daily food plan–how, what, and why we eat what we eat. I write about that almost every day, so why am I finding this so hard? I think its because I don’t want to mislead anyone. I could just write about what I am eating now, how I plan for it, think about it, cook it, shop for it. But that is not how I’ve always eaten. When I thought about it, I decided there have been four main stages I have gone through. So far. I am pretty sure I will have to adjust my food plan again. Aging and all that, you know. So here goes.

Stage 1. When I first started losing weight, the majority of what I learned about food was from Weight Watchers. Sure, I investigated on my own. But the main focus was on counting calories (points) and paying more attention to the fiber content (high was good) and fat content (high was bad.) It did not matter a lot if the food was processed. In fact, I think it was easier to count the points if it was packaged with all that information already on the box. (This is probably unneeded information, but I was the QUEEN of Cool Whip Lite. I made sure that I never ran out of that stuff.) I did start to eat more fresh fruits and vegetables. And the biggest change I think I made was having a good breakfast. I continued to eat this way when I reached my 100 pounds lost and started to maintain at that level. (Yes, I lost 100 pounds while ingesting Cool Whip Lite almost every day.)

Stage 2. I was struggling a bit with maintaining my weight loss, and a good friend recommended a personal trainer. Little did I know, the trainer was a foodie too! I learned so much about good food and nutrition from her. I started eliminating all processed foods from my diet. I learned that there were new foods that I actually enjoyed eating. Lentils, edemame, and quinoa come to mind. I also started exploring healthy fats (avocado, olive oil, nuts–specifically walnuts.) It was during this time period that I read (among other things) The End of Overeating. The deadly combo of fat/sugar/salt really rang a bell with me. I decided to minimize wheat and sugar in my diet.

Stage 3. During an especially stressful three year period, I regained some weight (25 pounds.) I never stopped my healthy eating lifestyle. I continued to explore healthy recipes. I developed new recipes myself as I went along. I just ate too much.

And this has led to Stage 4. Through all the reading and investigating I have done, I tried one more thing. And it seems to be working. I am losing weight slowly and steadily. I am eating a little more protein, and a little less grain and fruit. As I think about it, these are the most significant changes I have made:

• My breakfast is consistently smaller–200 calories instead of 300-350 calories.
• Walnuts have gone on the back burner. Yes, they are a super food. But for me, they are almost as much of a trigger food as chocolate chip cookies were when I first started. I still have walnuts, but they are a much smaller portion, and I NEVER grab a big handful to eat.
• And I have taken to eating whey protein in various forms (smoothies and Quest protein bars.) I am finding it quite enjoyable. So that is a new tool in my arsenal. I love the convenience. I love the taste. And I especially love the way that I feel filled but not stuffed for a long time after.

So on to the day to day stuff. These are the habits that have lasted through all four stages:

• Fresh fruits and vegetables. When I started out I had to force myself to eat a piece of fruit instead of a cookie. Then I got a little obsessive about keeping all kinds of fruits and vegetables available at all times. This led to either a) overeating, or b) wastage. Now I am still careful that I ALWAYS have plenty of fresh vegetables available. And I keep enough fruilt on hand. But not too much. I am keeping a little more frozen fruit–good for smoothies and convenient for baking. Fresh fruit is still my first choice. I probably shop twice a week.
• Batch cooking of meat. Even though cooking is something I truly enjoy, I don’t always want to spend the time it takes to cook at mealtime. So I LOVE batch cooking. I routinely buy boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut them into approximately 4 ounce pieces, and season and cook them and then freeze the majority of them. They are ready for a big salad or just to add to some veggies for dinner.
• Low calorie baked goods. This might be where some people think they cannot change their tastes. But once you decide that having brownies and cookies on a daily basis are no longer an option, the low calorie healthy treats start to look (and taste) pretty darn good. I really enjoy baking, so that is another part of the enjoyment. As soon as my baked goods cool down, they are wrapped individually in tin foil (makes it convenient to re-heat,) and placed in the freezer. If I start to have too many baked goods in the freezer, I put a moratorium on my baking until I need some more. These days most of my baked goods are healthy breakfast options.
• Tracking. Its second nature to me now. A few times I toyed with not tracking or journaling my food. But I am more comfortable keeping track. It does two things. If I am feeling deprived, I can look and see what I have already eaten, or look forward to a meal or snack that is coming. And if I get anxious that I am “eating too much” I can look and be reassured that I am eating a perfectly normal amount of food. I just heard something recently. John Ortberg was talking about a book called The Power of Habit. In it the author describes keystone habits. A keystone habit is one that will set off a chain reaction to other habits.  In terms of physical health, food journaling is a keystone habit. Once people start keeping a food journal, they start to plan menus differently. Then they start to exercise, just as a result of keeping a food journal. Almost every night I write out the next day’s menu. I write down the food and the calories. I am careful to get enough protein throughout the day and make sure there are several servings of vegetables. There is usually at least one fruit and one grain, and I really like to have 200 calories left at the end of the day for a snack of my choice. I can change the menu if the mood strikes (most often it is sub’ing hot food for cold,) but I stick pretty close to the plan.

These are the main day-to-day habits that seem to come almost naturally to me now. It doesn’t mean that I don’t indulge, or make poor choices sometimes. But it is my Intention to continue to eat healthfully for the rest of my life. I have a Vision of what that life is: healthy cardiac, endocrine, immune, and musculoskeletal systems. The Means are all the practical habits I listed above. (I wrote about V.I.M. here.)

I love food. That’s not gonna change. But I can still love food, enjoy its endless variety and tastes, and live a healthy life. I hope that this might provide some inspiration for those food lovers out there who think its not possible to truly enjoy food AND live a healthy life. I’m living proof that it is.

To read more about what “a girl’s gotta eat!” be sure to check out my friends and maintaining experts:

Lynn @ Lynn’s Weigh

Lori @ Finding Radiance

Shelley @ My Journey to Fit

Cammy @ The Tippy Toe Diet

AIM: Adventures in Maintenance is Lynn, Lori, Debby, Shelley, and Cammy, former weight-loss bloggers who now write about life in maintenance. We formed AIM to work together to turn up the volume on the issues facing people in weight maintenance. We publish a post on the same topic on the first Monday of each month. Let us know if there is a topic you’d like us to address!

 

What I Ate

What I ate–I’m referring to last weekend, when I took a 4 day trip out of town to that quilt workshop. I was really looking forward to “getting away.” I put that in quotes because, why, exactly, does a person who lives alone need to get away? Exactly what was I getting away from? Four dogs?–don’t answer that question!

ANYWAY, that was my intent. It was a short trip, both in time and in distance, but I wanted to relax and enjoy myself. Hmmm. So just exactly how relaxed was I going to be with food?

Those of you who read often will know that I am very good at traveling with food. I always like to get a hotel room with a microwave and refrigerator, and I usually google directions to any restaurants that have good low-cal food (Baja Fresh!) and local grocery stores.

This time I decided I wanted to be a little more relaxed about my food. I took some pre-portioned homemade yogurt, and some of Shelley’s famous granola, some fruit, and I also took some of my low-cal baked goods for breakfast. I had one serving of that wonderful ‘tropical slaw’ left, and I couldn’t leave that behind, so I stuck it in the bag. I brought some of my Quest protein bars, and some dark chocolate and commercial microwave popcorn. That was way more food than I was going to need, but it gave me some choices.

I knew they were serving a delicious catered lunch at the workshop each day. And I knew I wanted to eat dinner out one or two nights. AND, I knew I would get frozen yogurt at least once. So yeah. For a person whose been consistently dieting for 3 months, I was definitely planning to be a little more relaxed about my food.

Added into the mix: this was the first time I would be “recognized” as “The Healthy Quilter.” The Quilt Life magazine had just come out, and Alex Anderson (co-creator of the magazine) was the workshop teacher. That was making me a wee bit nervous. Was everybody going to be looking at me and thinking “who made her the queen of quilt health?” or “LOOK at what SHE’s eating!” (answer: no. Not very many people paid any attention at all.)

So this trip was a mixed bag. I made some really great choices–the side by side salad at Baja Fresh the first night. They give you so much grilled chicken that I saved half of it. The next night I mixed it into that tropical slaw that I had brought along. Ooh, that was a very good idea.

I ate that microwave popcorn two nights, but I really don’t like it any more. I much prefer my own paper bag concoction. So I trashed the rest of it.

This was my snack tonight–6 cups of the paper bag microwave popcorn, 1/2 a serving of M&M’s (110 calories) and a diet coke.

One day after the workshop I needed to stop at Safeway for something. And they had a Chinese food bar where you could get a bit of this and that. It looked so good, and I did get just a bit of this and that. Not too much of any one thing. It looked way better than it tasted. Oh well…

The lunches at the workshop were just delicious. They had wraps one day, and wonderful salads another day. The third day they had sandwiches, and they all had mayonnaise (yuck) on them. I ended up just picking out the meat and tomato and tossing the rest. They had some homemade potato chips that were quite tasty. I also trashed them just so I wouldn’t eat all of them. I did not, however, trash the desserts…

Alex saw that I had a brownie on my plate and got out her iPhone to take a pic of the evidence and send to Ricky. So I obliged by posing with it.

One of the hardest things for me was that in the afternoons they had some of that dang trail crack (trail mix with nuts, raisins, and M&M’s) on the back table. It is so hard for me to resist that stuff. I did pretty well. But I wondered if my table mates (who all were fairly normal weights) had the constant ongoing inner conversation that I had. I don’t think that’s normal.

One day I got some frozen yogurt, and even though it was not very good, I ate it all :{{ The last day I was there I found another froyo place (Menchie’s) and it was TOTALLY WORTHY! Got one for the drive home.

Back home, and I went right back to my healthy diet. No problems. No lingering cravings. I was very happy to be eating food that I enjoy that makes me feel good. I did notice that eating that much sugar made me feel bad. I wish I could describe it better. And the weirdest thing is, (and I remember this from ‘the good ol’ days’) when you are feeling bad from eating the sugar, you think that eating a little more will make you feel better. Hmmm. Did I just describe the thought process of an addict???

So there you have it–the good, the bad, and the somewhat ugly. I realize that this is a long boring ramble about “what I ate.” But I wanted to share the real life of a person who is maintaining a large weight loss and is even currently losing weight. Some people still seem to want to know.

How to Build a Better Pizza

1. If you have “issues” with pizza, like you can’t stop eating it, or you are not eating wheat or cheese or whatever, then don’t even start.
2. If you have problems with honesty, forget about it. This is the kind of food assemblage that requires brutal honesty.
3. But if you really enjoy pizza, and would like to have it once in a while without breaking the calorie bank, read on.

I made this pizza out of stuff I had leftover in my fridge. Look through your refrigerator and see what you have that might be good for pizza toppings. In my opinion, you need mozzarella cheese and marinara sauce for it to be a real pizza.

What I had on hand: mushrooms, onion, pineapple, roma tomatoes, a little bit of pepperoni, and some olives. I use Trader Joe’s whole wheat pizza crust. I love this stuff. The dough comes pre-made in a plastic bag that you can stick in the freezer until the mood hits.

You also need a piece of scratch paper to write down the calories on all the stuff you add to the pizza. This pizza dough is supposed to make enough crust for 8 slices. But I stretched it extra thin, so it ended up making 12 nice sized pieces.

I measured out the marinara sauce (I used Contadina’s for this. I also like TJ’s marinara sauce.) Both of them are pretty low in calories. I used string cheese for the cheese. Just because they are pre-measured, and I don’t use much cheese. I thought I would only use 2 (2 ounces.) That was really pretty skimpy, so I added a third. I sliced the mushrooms and onions, and spread them on there. And then measured out a couple Tbsp of olives, and cut up one cup of fresh pineapple. And I cut the 8 little slices of pepperoni into little bits and spread it around. Oh, and then I cut up one roma tomato and added that on top.

Now here’s where the brutally honest part comes in. It would be so easy to add just a little bit more of this, or a dab more of that. But if you want to enjoy your pizza without guilt, just be honest. Only use what you measure and count.

Here’s how it added up:

• Pizza dough:  960 cal
• Pepperoni:     100 cal
• Pineapple:       80 cal
• Olives:              30 cal
• Sauce:              60 cal
• Cheese:         240 cal
• Mush/Onion     45 cal
• Tomato             15 cal

Grand total: 1530. Divided by 12, that makes it 127 calories per slice. The first night I took three slices, but that was really too much. Two slices would have been just right. The rest of the pizza was wrapped in foil and frozen for later. I reheat almost everything at 425 in my toaster oven. Just like fresh baked.

I always like to have some kind of plain green vegetable with my pizza. Not that I make pizza all that often–I probably make pizza once or twice a year. This was so delicious!

So did you guys hear that we had a freak snow storm here on Tuesday? It dumped so much snow so fast that I couldn’t get home for about three hours. There were cars sliding off the road all over the place, and both main roads that I take to get home were closed. I was so happy to get home before dark and to find that the electricity was still on.

Noah LOVES the snow.

The view off my deck the next morning:

We took a walk before it all melted away.

The end.

 

 

One Recipe, Three Ways

Cauliflower haters, just look away!

Honestly, that cauliflower potato bake is one of my go-to comfort foods now. At 66 calories a serving, it can’t be beat. (Of course, I seldom eat a single serving…) The recipe came from my health insurance magazine, so I can’t claim credit for creating it.

Anyway, last week I had all the ingredients for it in my fridge. And I had a LOT of leftover ham in the freezer (Christmas ham for one!) So I put them together! I added 8 ounces of lean ham (cut into bite sized pieces) to the original recipe, and added another 1/4 cup of parmesan to the topping. This made it into a main dish (4 servings) at only 220 calories. I’ll add the details to the original recipe.

Okay. But four servings. There’s only me. So one day I decided I wanted eggs. A very rare occurrence, that’s for sure. I took half of one of those cauliflower-potato-ham servings, heated it in a pan sprayed with oil, and added one scrambled egg. YUMM. Another comforting dinner for about 200 calories.

And so it goes. The continuing adventures of finding good enjoyable tasty food to eat for 200-300 calories!

Which, completely unrelated to cauliflower, I was toying with making a pineapple upside down cake for a special occasion. I had cut the recipe out of a magazine. 600 calories a serving! Oh my. I do love pineapple upside down cake. But that is just plain depressing to think of the fall out of eating probably more than one piece of it. So I went to cooking light’s site (I think those folks generally like good tasting food) and searched ‘pineapple upside down cake’ and up popped this recipe for 250 calories. Ahhh. That’s better. I will use the fresh pineapple that I have, but otherwise will probably follow their recipe.

 

So Much to Say, So Little Time…

Well, I missed out on that whole end-of-year-review AND the beginning-of-the-year-goal-setting. I’ll just say that my BF pointed out to me that it had been a VERY GOOD YEAR for me, and she is so right. And it is already starting to be a VERY GOOD YEAR in this new year.

The two biggest projects for the past year are converging at exactly the same time, and that is the reason there is “so little time” to write. Tomorrow I go to Folsom to hang the quilts for the gallery showing. The quilts that I have been working on all year. TWENTY quilts. I am so pleased that I set a goal for myself to make 20 quilts, and that I actually was able to accomplish that. Some of them are pictured over on the quilt blog. I hope to have all of them photographed and to do a slide show or something. But that will have to wait for a week or two.

Because the other BIG THING that is happening is that I leave for Haiti on Monday. And this is also at the end of a year of working on our child sponsorship program for the children of Carrefour Poy. We are so happy with what we have been able to do so far. But have so much more that we want to do. It will be so helpful to ‘see for ourselves’ the situation and the needs. You can see some pictures of the kids on our website. We were so happy when they were able to start a lunch program. And our shoe drive for the month of December reaped fantastic results. We have about 175 pairs of shoes! Our suitcases are stuffed to the gills. Fortunately the weather is warm there, so our lightweight clothing will not take much room!

But you all know that what I really like to talk about is the daily dailies. And food. So here’s a bit of this and that.

I made crepes!! I was pretty excited at how perfectly I was able to make crepes for the first time. I used Georgie’s recipe, which if you look at it, it is a form of our protein pancakes.

But here’s the weird thing. I made these for myself Christmas morning, but I didn’t really like them. The chocolate banana filling was too rich for me. So I tossed them, and had a piece of that baked oatmeal that I had made out of the fruit salad. BTW, I liked that baked oatmeal so much that I figured out how to make it again and will post that recipe soon. The crepes themselves were great, though, and I will try them again. Maybe with a blueberry filling.

And then, for Christmas, I finally bought myself one of those spiralizers. SUPER COOL!!! I bought the one that Cammy had pointed out to me. So nice. Hand-held, and I can put it in the drawer when I am done. Look at these cool spiralized carrots and zucchini! I cooked them and made some of my Darn Good Spaghetti Sauce to serve on top of them.

And this is a nice little gift idea: Home-made muesli fixings. My mom likes me to make muesli for her. Lately I haven’t had enough oatmeal on hand, so I just put all the other stuff in a container and tell her to mix it in with oatmeal. For Christmas I had the idea to layer the ingredients in a mason jar. You can use whatever you want as the add-ins. This jar has slivered almonds, unsweetened coconut, date pieces, dried apricot pieces, and dried cranberries. The powder in the top is some cinnamon splenda.

And a little health and exercise update: after 6 weeks of PT, going twice a week, and dutifully performing all my exercises between visits, my knee is VASTLY improved! I celebrated New Year’s Day by taking the three mile walk to the end of my road and back. I haven’t done this for about 9 months because it hurt too bad to go uphill or downhill for too long, and there is a very long steep hill on that walk. On New Year’s Eve I was at the gym, and it was a bright and sunny day, so I got to take a dip in the pool. What a treat! I am doing fantastic staying on my “me diet.” I am not sure what will happen food-wise in Haiti. I am taking some protein bars with me, and hopefully I will not gain weight like I did in Africa. That was a bit weird…

 

I’m not sure I’ll get to blog again before I leave, so I will say Happy New Year and farewell. And will be anxious to share with you when I return!

What if?

What if you’re not in control of the Thanksgiving Feast? What if someone else is in charge of all the cooking, and you have no say over what is going to be served? What if the person doing the cooking doesn’t think the same way you do about food and healthy nutrition?

What do you do?

• Do you fight and whine?
• Do you just give up and go with the flow?
• Or do you have a plan?

Admission:  control freak here. And I find myself in the position I described in the first paragraph–I am not in control of the Thanksgiving meal! And then I found myself going through the process I listed above. Gah!  It was almost like going through the stages of grief!

All of us are in different places in our relationship with food.  And most of us have found ourselves in different stages at different times in the journey. Right now I am at a point where I am very serious about trying to lose some weight and eat as healthily as possible.  So after I got over being mad/sad/whining/giving up, and after my good friend reminded me that it was my responsibility to moderate my intake, not my hosts, I made a plan.

I looked at the menu and noticed that there was no fruit.  I will ask nicely if I can bring a fruit salad.  I have all the fruit ready and have a terrific recipe in my head. I also bought a bag of baby carrots to add to the hors d’oeuvres’ platter. If they don’t want a fruit salad, I will bring an asian pear or an apple with me, and eat it in the car on the drive over. I used to do this way back when I first started Weight Watchers. I would eat a piece of fruit in the car on the way to meet my friends at a restaurant for lunch. That way I wasn’t too hungry and it was easier to make good choices.

Part 2 of my plan:  Since I am not doing the cooking on Thanksgiving, I am planning on cooking a modified Thanksgiving meal for myself, so I will have ‘leftovers.’ I bought a turkey breast to cook (how much leftover turkey does one girl need?) and of course I have a cauliflower in the fridge to make some cauliflower mash.  I would like some cranberry sauce, but I don’t want to have too much hanging around the house. Maybe I can figure out how to make a mini batch.

If all else fails (meaning, I eat too much,) I will be kind and remind myself that it is one day. And that is what it is. I am not eating differently up to the day, and I will not eat differently after the day.

Oh, and maybe I should spend a little more time thinking about the real meaning of the day…

Broccoli Slaw Two Ways

I posted the delicious broccoli slaw the other day.

And then I remembered why I had originally picked up the package of broccoli slaw.  I wanted to try cooking it.  Fortunately I had gotten another bag of it at TJ’s last week.  So tonight I threw the whole package (140 cal) in the pan and cooked it, added those leftover veggies (53 cal) from last night, some pre-cooked shrimp (90 cal,) some crumbled bacon (70 cal,) one container (2 servings, 310 cal) of brown rice, and 1 Tbsp sesame oil (130 cal.)  Seasoned with some pepper and soy sauce.  Four big servings of delicious for less than 200 calories each!  I love the texture of the broccoli slaw in this.  And no extra work for me–win-win!!

Based on my basic fried rice recipe.

I am definitely on a cooking jag lately.  I made another batch of homemade yogurt today, and there was still some leftover milk, so I dug a box of the sugar free chocolate yogurt out of the cupboard, and made a batch of that.  I like that pudding once in a while!  I’m going to have a bowl of that tonight, and then give the little guys some lap time.