Cocoa-Nut Mousse
Whipped ricotta cheese with cocoa, Splenda, vanilla & almond extract, toasted coconut and toasted almonds. S t r e t c h the imagination and you almost get Almond Joy.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Weak and tired
Day 5
I found it hard to lift my limbs today. Crawled out of the bed just before noon, forcing myself to scramble some eggs (couldn't find the leftover asparagus to make into an omelet) and nuke some turkey bacon before lying in the tub and falling back asleep until the girls woke me up at 5:00. Not sure what serious disease I have this time, but I'm wiped out for sure.
Tried some new-to-me French Onion flavored Lite Laughing Cow cheese with celery and will repeat.
Warned our 12-year-old dinner guest about our eating Plan and she seemed to enjoy the black beans and chicken on brown rice with olive oil and Parmesan seasoning. I reluctantly skipped the rice. A gazpacho salad with cuke, cherry tomatoes and green peppers in South Beach balsamic rounded out the meal nicely. The girls were content with strawberries & blueberries with Lite Cool Whip for dessert and I was tempted to join them, but got up and washed dishes instead. It's really hard to pass up something so healthy! Have I mentioned I only have 9 more days of Phase 1? Not that I'm counting or anything. I don't feel deprived really, but I will have more variety when I get to Phase 2.
I have to say that I haven't even been truly tempted. The popcorn smell was the hardest so far, but I even watched one child drink a milkshake and walked right by an Auntie Annes. Go me.
I found it hard to lift my limbs today. Crawled out of the bed just before noon, forcing myself to scramble some eggs (couldn't find the leftover asparagus to make into an omelet) and nuke some turkey bacon before lying in the tub and falling back asleep until the girls woke me up at 5:00. Not sure what serious disease I have this time, but I'm wiped out for sure.
Tried some new-to-me French Onion flavored Lite Laughing Cow cheese with celery and will repeat.
Warned our 12-year-old dinner guest about our eating Plan and she seemed to enjoy the black beans and chicken on brown rice with olive oil and Parmesan seasoning. I reluctantly skipped the rice. A gazpacho salad with cuke, cherry tomatoes and green peppers in South Beach balsamic rounded out the meal nicely. The girls were content with strawberries & blueberries with Lite Cool Whip for dessert and I was tempted to join them, but got up and washed dishes instead. It's really hard to pass up something so healthy! Have I mentioned I only have 9 more days of Phase 1? Not that I'm counting or anything. I don't feel deprived really, but I will have more variety when I get to Phase 2.
I have to say that I haven't even been truly tempted. The popcorn smell was the hardest so far, but I even watched one child drink a milkshake and walked right by an Auntie Annes. Go me.
On the road
Day 4 (Friday)
I couldn't bring myself to scramble eggs with onions and jarred red peppers before we left on our St. Augustine road trip this morning, so I grabbed 2 more leftover quiche cups. No, I'm not a creature of habit or anything. But in my defense, the recipe made 12 and I refuse to let them spoil! It is safe to assume that I will have V8 and coffee each morning as part of my new ritual.
Felt a little funny packing a lunchbox like a schoolgirl, but road rot and SouthBeach don't really mix. Boar's Head roast beef and 2% cheese cubes stood in for Tex-Mex roll-up, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do sometimes. More tweaking.
After our campus tour Kellie scraped me up off the sidewalk and somehow I made it to the car and we made it to Jax to Todd's Bonos BBQ for lunch before I completely wilted. An extra large salad with smoked turkey and bleu cheese dressing perked me up enough to hang out at the Mall while it stormed. Went to a movie and really struggled with the popcorn flavor that they pipe into the theater. But victory was mine when we left empty-stomached. I was planning to finish off the roast beef on the way home but hours in the car even in an ice-packed insulated bag left limp meat and warm cheese. A few nuts aided me the distance to the nearest Chick-fil-A where I devoured a bunless chargrilled chicken sandwich. Ok, so it was more like a piece of chicken and a piece of lettuce with a tomato side.
Arrived home too late to make Espresso custard, so subbed a No Sugar Added Fudgsicle and a glass of milk. 4 down and 10 days to go with no carbs. It's perfectly acceptable to pity me.
I couldn't bring myself to scramble eggs with onions and jarred red peppers before we left on our St. Augustine road trip this morning, so I grabbed 2 more leftover quiche cups. No, I'm not a creature of habit or anything. But in my defense, the recipe made 12 and I refuse to let them spoil! It is safe to assume that I will have V8 and coffee each morning as part of my new ritual.
Felt a little funny packing a lunchbox like a schoolgirl, but road rot and SouthBeach don't really mix. Boar's Head roast beef and 2% cheese cubes stood in for Tex-Mex roll-up, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do sometimes. More tweaking.
After our campus tour Kellie scraped me up off the sidewalk and somehow I made it to the car and we made it to Jax to Todd's Bonos BBQ for lunch before I completely wilted. An extra large salad with smoked turkey and bleu cheese dressing perked me up enough to hang out at the Mall while it stormed. Went to a movie and really struggled with the popcorn flavor that they pipe into the theater. But victory was mine when we left empty-stomached. I was planning to finish off the roast beef on the way home but hours in the car even in an ice-packed insulated bag left limp meat and warm cheese. A few nuts aided me the distance to the nearest Chick-fil-A where I devoured a bunless chargrilled chicken sandwich. Ok, so it was more like a piece of chicken and a piece of lettuce with a tomato side.
Arrived home too late to make Espresso custard, so subbed a No Sugar Added Fudgsicle and a glass of milk. 4 down and 10 days to go with no carbs. It's perfectly acceptable to pity me.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Out & About but not eating
Day 3
Leftover quiche cups in place of poached egg & smoked salmon. It's hard enough for me to eat fish even when 1) I don't have to cook it and 2)I don't have to smell it cooking, but for BREAKFAST??? No way!
Saw my doc this morning and she is pleased with my numbers. Agreed this was a good Plan for me and recommended adding Metamucil. Don't tell my husband because he is religious about it and has been on my case about adding it to my regimen for years. Don't you just hate it when they're right?
Since I had to run errands today, I packed more cheese sticks (this time paired with sliced turkey breast) and stopped for a Chick-fil-A salad (with chicken on it this time) and the cows thanked me.
Out and about all day left no time for cooking, but luckily rotisserie chicken was on the agenda for tonight anyway. With a few white beans and asparagus (instead of roasted artichoke hearts- some more tweaking on my part) and a glass of milk I was a happy camper.
Not sure if I'm looking forward to Lime Zest ricotta for dessert, and still didn't get any exercise, but let's focus on baby steps and call it another success.
Leftover quiche cups in place of poached egg & smoked salmon. It's hard enough for me to eat fish even when 1) I don't have to cook it and 2)I don't have to smell it cooking, but for BREAKFAST??? No way!
Saw my doc this morning and she is pleased with my numbers. Agreed this was a good Plan for me and recommended adding Metamucil. Don't tell my husband because he is religious about it and has been on my case about adding it to my regimen for years. Don't you just hate it when they're right?
Since I had to run errands today, I packed more cheese sticks (this time paired with sliced turkey breast) and stopped for a Chick-fil-A salad (with chicken on it this time) and the cows thanked me.
Out and about all day left no time for cooking, but luckily rotisserie chicken was on the agenda for tonight anyway. With a few white beans and asparagus (instead of roasted artichoke hearts- some more tweaking on my part) and a glass of milk I was a happy camper.
Not sure if I'm looking forward to Lime Zest ricotta for dessert, and still didn't get any exercise, but let's focus on baby steps and call it another success.
What was I thinking?
Day 2
Goal: dazzle family with gourmet healthy meals
Reality: Ew, gross, Mom!
Ok, so maybe I was the only one to partake in the spinach Quiche Cups to Go this morning. But I thought they were divine. A little V8 and coffee and I'm good to go.
Confident in my ability to handle eating out after mastering one whole day on the Plan, I met friends for lunch at Atlanta Bread. Half of a Balsamic Bleu salad (sans apples since I'm still in Phase 1) and half a bowl of garden veggie soup (the veggies were actually all of limits: carrots, corn & peas, but the broth was good). Note to self: add chicken to salad next time. By 2:15 I was already starving.
Cheese sticks are now my best friends. Sorry gals!
Shopping at Target at 5:00 was a bad idea in so many ways. Still hungry from lunch and dinner nowhere in plain sight, a handful of SB recommended nut mix saved the day! With a piece of lunchmeat chicken as I walked in the door, I was able to hang on until the Shepherd's Pie was ready. Enter the kids and their "EWWW." They don't even know that edamame and cauliflower can stand in for peas and mashed potatoes if you use your imagination and a lot of spices. Their loss. Dave raved.
Now this is where the what was I thinking comes in. Dessert was supposed to be maple almond flan. Have you ever actually made a flan? Me neither. Well, I'm not sure at which stage I messed up (maybe at all stages), but the darned thing never set. It turned out to be almond latte (forget the maple you were supposed to drizzle over the top since there was nothing to drizzle it on top of!) and didn't taste bad for a coffee-type drink with no coffee in it. Won't be making that again any time soon. I think I tend to rush things when cooking. Just ask my friends who suffered through the Strawberry Pretzel salad.
Ok, so this Project really requires some intensive labor or some tweaking. Tweaking sounds about my speed. So tired from the flan attempt I didn't exercise at all. Just sat on the couch and moaned about how weak and exhausted I was. But I'm still calling Day 2 a success.
Goal: dazzle family with gourmet healthy meals
Reality: Ew, gross, Mom!
Ok, so maybe I was the only one to partake in the spinach Quiche Cups to Go this morning. But I thought they were divine. A little V8 and coffee and I'm good to go.
Confident in my ability to handle eating out after mastering one whole day on the Plan, I met friends for lunch at Atlanta Bread. Half of a Balsamic Bleu salad (sans apples since I'm still in Phase 1) and half a bowl of garden veggie soup (the veggies were actually all of limits: carrots, corn & peas, but the broth was good). Note to self: add chicken to salad next time. By 2:15 I was already starving.
Cheese sticks are now my best friends. Sorry gals!
Shopping at Target at 5:00 was a bad idea in so many ways. Still hungry from lunch and dinner nowhere in plain sight, a handful of SB recommended nut mix saved the day! With a piece of lunchmeat chicken as I walked in the door, I was able to hang on until the Shepherd's Pie was ready. Enter the kids and their "EWWW." They don't even know that edamame and cauliflower can stand in for peas and mashed potatoes if you use your imagination and a lot of spices. Their loss. Dave raved.
Now this is where the what was I thinking comes in. Dessert was supposed to be maple almond flan. Have you ever actually made a flan? Me neither. Well, I'm not sure at which stage I messed up (maybe at all stages), but the darned thing never set. It turned out to be almond latte (forget the maple you were supposed to drizzle over the top since there was nothing to drizzle it on top of!) and didn't taste bad for a coffee-type drink with no coffee in it. Won't be making that again any time soon. I think I tend to rush things when cooking. Just ask my friends who suffered through the Strawberry Pretzel salad.
Ok, so this Project really requires some intensive labor or some tweaking. Tweaking sounds about my speed. So tired from the flan attempt I didn't exercise at all. Just sat on the couch and moaned about how weak and exhausted I was. But I'm still calling Day 2 a success.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Harder than I thought
Did I really say one year? I meant one month, perhaps one week. Just finished Day 1 and I have to say WHEW. It didn't sound too daunting when I read the list. Shrimp cocktail. Check. Sirloin steak, grilled. Um, I don't know how to operate that Big Green Monstrosity outside, so out came the Foreman to ruin a perfectly innocent piece of shoe leather. Check. The green peppers and onions, grilled (in a pan on the stove) and marinated in balsamic vinegar were tasty and enhanced by the leftover shrimp (non-fish-eating child's portion) to restaurant-worthy status, as declared by hubby. Check. The kids gave the heart of palm potato salad a big thumbs-down, but I stretched my imagination enough to at least equate this dish to the summery salad described. There were no actual potatoes harmed in the making of this dish. Check. But then it came to the dessert. Shoulda actually read the recipe before we were all finished with the unusual dinner and ready for a tantalizing treat. Oops, Maple Flan needs to be chilled for 4 hours or overnight. Saving that for tomorrow. Lesson learned. A quick substitution was made and most of us enjoyed the Peanut Butter Delight made with ricotta cheese and you guessed it, (natural) peanut butter. I'm going to bed now so I don't mess up Day 1.
Day One
My eyes popped open this morning at the crack of noon and my body did a self-diagnostic to figure out why the blood was already pumping. First day of my Project. Had that anticipation/dread like it was the first day of school. There's nothing like shiny new school supplies to get me excited. Even though I haven't been to school in um, a few years. So this blog is like a new notebook, a blank canvas yearning for that first doodle.
Breakfast (should I say brunch?) was a ham & cheese omelet, low-sodium V8 and coffee. Omelet turned out picture perfect if I do say so myself, but I'm no Julia! I flipped it with a spatula instead of tossing it like a pizza.
By 4:30 I was ready for lunch. To make this Project work, I really need to follow the Plan, so I may end up eating dinner at midnight. The mid-morning snack, which I combined with lunch was a homemade guac, using cottage cheese. The spices gave it a substantial kick and transformed the tasteless celery stick into a gourmet appetizer. The Chock-Full-of-Veggies Chili was more spicy goodness. Instead of dolloping with low-fat or nonfat plain yogurt, as called for, I had to put 2% Cheddar in it to appeal to my picky children, so if I don't lose any weight I'm blaming it on that. It was supposed to be eaten with a large, mixed green salad, but I already had the celery and major helpings of raw veggies don't agree with me, so I'll bulk up on cooked veggies later. Already with the compromises! But as the good doctor said, the "Sample Meal Plans are meant to be guidelines, and you should adjust them to suit your personal tastes." Off to exercise...
Breakfast (should I say brunch?) was a ham & cheese omelet, low-sodium V8 and coffee. Omelet turned out picture perfect if I do say so myself, but I'm no Julia! I flipped it with a spatula instead of tossing it like a pizza.
By 4:30 I was ready for lunch. To make this Project work, I really need to follow the Plan, so I may end up eating dinner at midnight. The mid-morning snack, which I combined with lunch was a homemade guac, using cottage cheese. The spices gave it a substantial kick and transformed the tasteless celery stick into a gourmet appetizer. The Chock-Full-of-Veggies Chili was more spicy goodness. Instead of dolloping with low-fat or nonfat plain yogurt, as called for, I had to put 2% Cheddar in it to appeal to my picky children, so if I don't lose any weight I'm blaming it on that. It was supposed to be eaten with a large, mixed green salad, but I already had the celery and major helpings of raw veggies don't agree with me, so I'll bulk up on cooked veggies later. Already with the compromises! But as the good doctor said, the "Sample Meal Plans are meant to be guidelines, and you should adjust them to suit your personal tastes." Off to exercise...
I'm so Julie
The Books
The South Beach Diet SuperCharged. First edition, 2008. Arthur Agatston, MD, with Joseph Signorile, PhD. Dr. Agatston became my hero when he introduced me to the concepts of "good carbohydrates" and "good fats".
Julie & Julia. Paperback movie tie-in edition, July 2009. Julie Powell catapulted to the top of my list of heroes after I saw the movie, which inspired me to mount my own project of dedication and diligence to enrich my life and live to the fullest.
The Contender
Busy stay-at-home mom by day, diet book junkie by night. Too old for supersized, too young for disease, too overweight to do nothing, I am up for a challenge. Risking my friendship with the staff at Bagel, Bagel, I am signing on for a daunting assignment. Picking just one diet, uh hum, I mean healthy eat plan and sticking to it. 365 days. 1095 healthy meals and 730 healthy snacks.
One serial dieter and no idea how to cook. How far it will go is probably not tricky enough for a suspensful cliffhanger...
The South Beach Diet SuperCharged. First edition, 2008. Arthur Agatston, MD, with Joseph Signorile, PhD. Dr. Agatston became my hero when he introduced me to the concepts of "good carbohydrates" and "good fats".
Julie & Julia. Paperback movie tie-in edition, July 2009. Julie Powell catapulted to the top of my list of heroes after I saw the movie, which inspired me to mount my own project of dedication and diligence to enrich my life and live to the fullest.
The Contender
Busy stay-at-home mom by day, diet book junkie by night. Too old for supersized, too young for disease, too overweight to do nothing, I am up for a challenge. Risking my friendship with the staff at Bagel, Bagel, I am signing on for a daunting assignment. Picking just one diet, uh hum, I mean healthy eat plan and sticking to it. 365 days. 1095 healthy meals and 730 healthy snacks.
One serial dieter and no idea how to cook. How far it will go is probably not tricky enough for a suspensful cliffhanger...
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