150 calorie meal that is amazing, also frustration.

So, I have been doing just awesome for a few weeks now, I track my food, I am walking more again and I finally got to weigh myself but alas! that last part is oh so important for moral and focus for me and the scale is refusing to play nice. I am not saying that its not playing nice because I am not losing, no no, I am indeed losing but its not playing nice in the way that I got on it 5 times this morning and I got a different weight every time! This has been happening more and more and I have a feeling that the scale may be defective or it might just be telling me to get the hell off that it cannot breathe when I am on there. The fact that I cannot get a solid accurate number each AM is messing with me in ways that I don't need to be messed with right now and I believe a new scale is in order because to get frustrated 5 minutes after I wake up because of something that is suppose to help me is not a good start to any day. 

The last couple days I have been struggling with feeling hungry and I can;t decide if its just my body trying one last time to convince me that I need to eat the junk not unlike a five year old would do for fifteen more minutes before bed? or if my frustrations are projecting into hunger. I am not diggin' on this hunger any more that I would enjoy listening to a Justin Bieber CD from start to finish so we gotsta figure this one out. Wify said this morning "Go get a new scale" so I believe its what I will do as this needs not be more frustrating than it has to be and speaking of Wify, she came to the rescue last night with the dinner that you see above. 

My calories were approaching a number that was starting to mean no dinner for the big fella or at least a very small unsatisfying dinner so I started going through options and mentioned that egg whites might not be a bad idea. Wify said something to the effect how would egg whites with spinach on whole wheat wraps sound? since we had some baby spinach left in the fridge and a short conversation later I said "Make me your vision then and I appreciate it" so it was made so. As it turns out we had no wraps left so I decided that having it on light whole wheat toast open faced would be good so as Wify was cooking the spinach with some garlic I made the toast. She was going to dice the tomato up and put it on top cold but I decided that popping it into the pan with a bit more garlic ~I mean who doesn't like MORE garlic?~ would be better than cold and the result was amazingly simple to make and tasted awesome for a tiny amount of calories.

We made enough for three open faced sandwiches but I decided that I would have two and let her try one so for three open faced sandwiches the calories would have only been 225 calories which is insane because it was quite filling. Over all I am doing fine with my restart but the last two days have been a little less than peachy because of the hunger and my obviously  mismanaging of my AM calorie intake meaning eating more heavily early on. We will make adjustments as necessary and as long as Wify kicks in her creativity every now and again maybe we will get back down to a fighting weight by the summer. 

That's all I got for today, the support is greatly appreciated so please feel free to comment or email me and for Gods sake keep on reading along! 

As Ever
Me

Soup is good for the soul, not bad for my ass either.

Halfway through the week and feeling great, I am officially off of my AM cup of Joe and feeling better early in the days, it really is amazing how eating better foods will do that. Eating better was priority and as I get a handle on that its time to start thinking about some "real" exercise as I have been doing very short rides on the trainer and my Baby Calisthenics. With the more real exercise in mind I have to remember that I have a problem with my shoulder that I need to keep an eye on, I am not sure why but my shoulder hurts and its been that way for a while but getting better so just something to keep an eye on. 

Incorporating daily walks back into my routine is a must, when I dropped most of my weight the first time  around I was walking daily, no excuses, no cold or rain stopped me it was as important as breathing to me and I need to get there again. The problem that I am having is that I either take the toddler out in the cold for a brisk walk in January, wait until the evening and walk the narrow DARK country road and hope that I don't get hit by a car or walk in a mall during the day. I am not driving to a mall that's 20 minutes from my house so its going to have to be one of the other options, and the first time around my other daughter wasn't much older than this one and she walked with me so perhaps we will try that.

On the food side of things, We had a ham bone from Christmas that I stuck in the freezer to make something with and yesterday I decided that I would try a ham bone and white bean soup. I have never in my life made a soup out of a ham bone and beans so this was an experiment as much as a meal and I gotta say I think it turned out awesome! I made stock with the bone, removed all of the remaining ham from said bones added a bag of white beans, a finely diced onion, one medium potato and finished it off with spinach, this was seasoned with black pepper, rosemary, thyme and 2 cloves of crushed and minced garlic. Wify picked up a loaf of french bread to have with it that I stuck in the broiler for a few minutes and man this was some good soup if I do say so myself and very simple as far as ingredients and prep goes. 

We wanted to figure the calories out per cup so we added all of the ingredients together, divided by how many cups were there and I was extremely surprised at the number we came up with, this very hearty soup comes in at about 120 calories per cup. After we all had dinner and sent some to my mother in laws there are about 12 cups left so plenty for me for the rest of the week as lunches etc and I will likely freeze a small container to have next week.

This next statement may be a bit premature but I have to say I feel like I am in a good place and feeling very motivated to keep this going in a good direction. Next on the agenda is to get the walking into my days and come slightly warmer weather climb my ass back onto my bike and hit the trails on a regular basis again, good plan eh? 

With some discipline, dedication, exercise and maybe some luck I am hoping to get back down to a weight where I feel healthy and am able to do everything in my days agenda without issue once again. 

That's all I got for today, make sure to pop back in tomorrow to see where the next installment of as the fat guy turns takes you!

As Ever
Me

Tortilla pizza recipe inside.

So I haven't posted a recipe in forever and since I'm always looking for low calorie alternatives to my favorite foods I thought that I would share how I get through a pizza craving with my tortilla pizza recipe. I call it tortilla because I use a tortilla wrap as the crust but I think that it falls into the flat bread pizza category ultimately and who wouldn't want a piled with veggies flat bread pizza for a mere 270 calories? When we are on a limited calorie budget getting creative with meals is a must and I think that this one fills a void that so many people have with pizza where the normal would be to go without, I say why go without? just adjust it around what we can have! so let me get right to it with the ingredients.

The ingredients are as follows

2 Tortillas/wraps I use Smart Delicious because they are only 100 calories each.
1/4 cup Spaghetti sauce
3 T Parmesan cheese
Garlic powder
2oz Mozzarella cheese
1oz Green bell pepper
1oz Red onion
1oz Black olives
1oz Baby Bella mushrooms
Jalapeno
Black pepper
Pinch of Splenda (optional)

Let me start by explaining some of my choices because most if not all of these ingredients can be customized to what you like, my choices are based on caloric value and price. The tortillas that I use are only 100 calories and there eight huge tortillas in the package so its a good bang for the buck in calories as well as price, besides that they taste really good and I use them for lots of other recipes too. I use Spaghetti sauce in place of pizza sauce mostly because its cheaper to buy a big jar of sauce rather than the smaller pizza sauce jars and again I use it for other things and with a tiny pinch of Splenda it tastes like pizza sauce which is something that I have been doing forever and that explains where the Splenda comes into play as well and also why its optional. All of my veggie choices are because they all lend huge flavor benefits while having a very low calorie value per ounce besides the olives so I can use them pretty much at will, the pepper came out of my garden so it was free of charge and that's always a plus for me too. The Mozzarella cheese is your run of the mill part skim milk Mozz and was chosen on price and calorie value, it happens to be stop and shop brand and has a very average 80 calories per ounce and I prefer it to the fat free or full skim milk variety because of flavor and the rest of the ingredients is just what I happened to have on hand.

Okay, at some point we will want to chop up the veggies and weigh the cheese out so that making the pizzas goes smoothly and the above photos show what I ended up with after that step. My daughter was my assistant and insisted on using her little cereal bowls when she saw me snapping pictures and in that second photo you can see the amount of Jalapeno that I used as well as what 2oz of Mozz cheese looks like on a saucer. This is how I assemble the pizzas and in what order the items go on.

1.) I start by preheating the oven to 425 degrees and spray a very light film of low calorie cooking spray onto the baking sheet while I create the pizzas.

2.) Lay the tortillas onto the sprayed cooking sheet and measure out 1/4 cup of the spaghetti sauce and split it equally onto the two tortillas spreading it around evenly followed by a couple pinches of Splenda on each one to give it that pizza sauce taste that I like.

3.) Shake 1/2 T Parmesan cheese over each sauce covered tortilla and add a shake of garlic powder and the Jalapeno at this point, I like the jalapeno under the Mozz but on top of the sauce because it seems to put the flavor into the sauce a bit more that way.

4.) Put 1oz of Mozzarella onto each of the pizzas and shake some black pepper on top of the cheese once its spread evenly over the sauce and jalapeno.

5.) Now add 1/2 oz each of the Bell pepper, Red onion, Black olives and Baby bella mushrooms to each of the pizzas and then shake 1oz of the Parm cheese onto each pizza and you should end up with something pretty close to the image below.

6.) Place the pan into the oven for 10-12 minutes, depending on your oven cooking time may vary a bit but I just keep an eye on them since the tortilla is pretty thin and can burn easy if not watched. I prefer mine slightly more crisp than my daughter does so hers was done in 10 minutes while mine took 12 minutes and you can see from the picture below the edges were beginning to darken up on mine and that's how they came out of the oven, perfect.

7.) The final step is to cut it up and enjoy! below is the finished product just seconds before it found its way onto my plate and into my gut, it was a mighty tasty little alternative to its high calorie cousin if I do say so myself.

My entire dinner which consisted of both of the pizzas that you see in the second to last image was only 542 total calories which is as I stated earlier only 270 calories per pizza. I was full when dinner was all said and done while my mouth was left with the flavor of some pretty good pizza in it all for a measly 542 calories, in my book that's one for the W column and us calorie counters. The next time that you crave some pizza give this recipe a try and I think you might just find that it hits the spot! The next time someone asks you how you lost all of your weight you can then reply with "by eating pizza of course!", but seriously don't think that you can't have your favorite meals just because you are "dieting" its all about how we make our food choices work for us because this is a lifestyle and eating well can and should be a part of it.

I hope that you enjoy it if you try it and please let me know if you do in the comments, if I get a good response I may just start posting my recipes regular like because I hardly say it but I love getting feedback from you who choose to read my chicken scratch each day.

That's all I got.

As Ever
Me

Cajun Salmon and some random thoughts for day 802.

This weekend is not exactly turning out how I wanted it to, I was suppose to go out on a date with Wify Friday night and because of a situation outside of my control it didn't happen, not that it would have been too much fun because I have a new cold yay! My daughter came home from school with a head cold and I got it! I couldn't taste anything at all almost all day yesterday so a dinner date for Sushi probably wouldn't have been all that satisfying anyhow. I am feeling better than yesterday right now so hopefully this doesn't hang around too long but I am staying well within my calorie range I am not getting much cardio in because of the stuffy head. on the other hand. I came in way low on calories for yesterday because I had saved up for the date but I wasn't very hungry anyways so no big loss really.

I did play with dinner tonight and yes I know that I am not suppose to play with my food but I wanted to change my sides up a bit so I made a seasoned rice and topped it with some sauteed zucchini and yellow onion to have with the Salmon fillets that I made. I seasoned the Salmon with a very light shake of a Cajun spice that I picked up a while back and let me tell you I will be making this whole dish just as is again because it was very good. Making meals that taste as good as stuff that I would get in a restaurant really makes me feel like I am cheating at this whole weight loss thang, seriously. I eat better now than I ever have and the food taste so much better than the over seasoned crap that I use to eat when I was 500 plus pounds its unbelievable that I ever liked that other processed stuff. I snapped a picture of my plate before digging in and of course got the standard "Dada how come you like to take pictures of your food?" from my daughter she will some day read my blog and see why I took all of those photos and will be able to read all about how her Pops took his life back. This entire plate which consisted of 3/4 cup of the rice, 3/4 cup of the zucchini and onions and 7oz of the Salmon only cost me 480 calories and of course I had a nice big glass of green tea with it.

Cajun Salmon and sauteed zucchini with rice, 480 calories for the entire plate.

Rollin with this in lieu of being sick all week because I have to, This year will be the year that I hit my fitness goals and get down to that once seemingly unattainable 275 pounds and below I will go. I use to wonder if I was going to be able to get where I wanted to with my weight loss, I use to look at that goal number and think "Man that's a shit ton of weight to drop, is it even possible?" and these days I have completely changed the way that I see that goal, I am going to make that goal and even surpass it. Throughout my life I tried to lose weight and did lose some here and there but in all honesty looking back at it I was half ass-ing 90% of those attempts and all I needed to do was put 100% into it and look at what can happen. I am that pain in the ass who carries his scale around, I am that guy that when I head over you say "I am making chicken and corn on the cob does that work for you? should I make yours a different way?" and I don't care that I am that fellow, its what I need to get where I am going.

Saying that I am that pain in the ass with the scale is not always the case though either, I do have a beer with the neighbor from time to time, I do eat pizza and I do go out to eat at restaurants because that's just life and its going to happen. I literally just watch portion control and make sure that what I am eating is cooked the way I need it to be in order to make my calorie balance and that's it for the food. I have said this before and I am going to say it again, I am not special and contrary to popular belief I do not have any super powers when it comes to eating or exercising. I am just a fat guy that had enough of watching life happen around him while his waistline grew uncontrollably, perhaps one day I will not see myself as a fat guy but I am not there just yet folks I suppose that chapter is waiting to be written.

You can do this just like I am and many others out there that took their life by the horns and decided to live. Thanks for following along while I literally change my life and know that all of the support is more than appreciated.

That's all I got for tonight.

As Ever
Me

Salsa Tilapia recipe and pre weigh in thoughts.

Making my way through my week and here it is Thursday already, that of course means that tomorrow is a weigh in day and I am really hoping for a new low weight this time around. I had been to the gym 9 days in a row on my quest for the three teens and then on Monday night it happened, my daughter who has a bad cold couldn't hold back any more and gave Dada a nose kiss and bamn! Tuesday morning sick. I went to the gym Tuesday anyways as it was just the beginning but yesterday there was no way I was making it out to the gym, instead a trip to the doc for my daughter and by last night I was achy and went to bed way early and was unable to complete the yoga routine that I have been doing with Wify in the evenings. This morning I feel terrible and don't see a trip to the gym in my near future for today as my daughter will not be going to school again anyways so my workouts in the early part of the week will have to carry me through until tomorrow mornings date with the scale.

I know that I am lower than last Fridays weight but I am unsure if I will hit those teens this time around but I figure if I eat perfectly clean today and try that yoga routine again tonight that maybe just maybe I can hit 319 tomorrow. I am not looking at this as even a bump in the road, people get sick and there is always next week if I don't get there this week but man I was seriously looking for high mid teens this week. Something happened to me and I have become motivated beyond where I have been the last couple months and I want that sub 300 pounds really bad, the way I see it is that if I am sub 300 pounds I am only 25 pounds from my goal and there is something about being so close that gets me in a mood to just get er done already.

Salsa Tilapia with seasoned rice and corn, 490 calories.

Enough about the weigh in, I made a new Tilapia recipe last night and everyone seemed to like it a lot and I think that I will add it to my bag of tricks because frankly I am starting to lose my love for Tilapia but this spiced it up a little different. I haven't done a recipe in a while so I thought this one would be a good one to post up, I found it by searching around on the net but I did make a few changes to it to lighten it up so that each 3oz fillet cost roughly 105 calories each salsa topping included.

What you will need.

1 to 1.5 pounds of Tilapia fillets
1/4 cup Parmesean cheese
1/3 cup Salsa
1 T light mayonaise
Black pepper
Adobo spices
Non stick cooking spray

Preheat your oven to 425 degrees and put the salsa, Parm cheese and mayo into a bowl and mix it up, shake some black pepper into the mixture and set it aside.

Rinse off your tilapia fillets and place them into a baking dish that has a bit of non stick cooking spray in it and shake some adobo and black pepper to taste onto the fillets. Once that is done spoon equal amounts of the salsa mixture onto each fillet to coat them evenly and into the oven for about 20 minutes and thats it!

We had 8 fillets all about equal size and the bag was a 1.5 pound bag of fish so I figured each fillet was roughly 3oz or 75 calories and after adding all of the ingredients in the salsa topping and dividing by 8 we came up with 30 calories per serving of the topping for 105 calories per cooked fillet. I made seasoned white rice and corn with this meal and the plate in the image is 490 calories total and it was more than enough for me to feel full. The changes that I made to the recipe I found online is I used half of the mayo that it called for as well as I used light mayo and the recipe called for 1/4 cup of salsa, I used 1/3 cup so that the volume would be the same because of the lack of mayo in mine. I also seasoned the fish with black pepper and adobo spices because it didn't make sense to me to not season the raw fish, there's nothing like under seasoned fish to ruin a good plate of food for me. The only thing that I would change about the recipe is the next time I make it I will stick it under the broiler for a quick minute to brown the top a bit more, otherwise it was pretty good.

All around this week has been good in lieu of me getting this wonderful cold from my beautiful daughter and I have a good feeling that I will have a new low weight come the morning. I am not happy about having missed the gym yesterday and the fact that I will very likely miss it today but hey! what can I do. I hope that if you try this Tilapia recipe that you enjoy it as much as my wife did and make sure that you check in tomorrow to see what I have lost this week, hopefully there will be some pictures posted of items weighing the same as me and what I have lost and if not? then there is always next week. I have a cup of hot tea with honey calling to me from the kitchen so that's all I got for today, as always thanks for following along and thanks for all of the support it is always appreciated.

As Ever
Me

A recipe and I am still under the weather.

Today's report said a sore throat and congested chest and head 100% possibility and it came through, I still feel like I swallowed broken glass and have a bath towel stuck in my chest and nose, but I wanted to get a post up anyways. I stayed within my calories on Monday besides the tea in the morning with the honey and Brandy, i did not count that towards my calories but had about 100 extra at the end of the day so I am pretty close, I only drank 1 gallon of green tea plus maybe a 30oz cup of hot tea in the morning so this is effecting my keeping hydrated, but since I am pretty much just relaxing I am probably ok and I did not do anything for exercise yesterday besides walk around my yard with my daughter talking about the flowers and I ran out in the afternoon to restock my veggies supply in the house.

Chicken and veggies cooking up in the pan.

Since I am under the weather and am holding off on running until this whatever it is clears up I thought I would post a recipe, in fact I just made this about an hour ago for lunch. I started with 4oz chicken breast that I had grilled for dinner last night, I chopped it and set it aside, then into a frying pan I put some chopped up yellow onion, green bell pepper and shot of low cal cooking spray. When the onion and peppers were soft I dropped in some sweet red roasted peppers and the chopped up chicken, cooked it until the chicken was hot all the way through and then added a tiny squirt of pueblo pepper sauce that I had laying around.

Getting close, here it is before I wrapped it all up.

While that was finishing up I chopped up some tomato and lettuce and put it aside, I layed out my Lavash bread and dumped the chicken and veggies into it and added the lettuce and tomato. Then I rolled it up cut it in half and plated it with a garlic pickle wedge and the rest of the tomato chopped up as a side, of course I had green tea with it and it was pretty good if I do say so myself. Very filling and tasty and for a total of 365 calories I will make this concoction again, in fact I think this is something that Wify and my son would enjoy so I may try it out for dinner one night and se how they like it.

The finished product and a great way to spend 365 calories if ya ask me.

Just a quick post with a recipe for today, I am hoping that I will feel good enough by tomorrow to start week 3 and get this C25K thing rolling again but I am not going to push it because wify had this same thing the week before last and continued to run through some of it and did not have good results, in fact she stayed sick for more than a week and I don't plan on following in her foot steps on that one so easy does it is how it's going down. If you try the above recipe I hope you enjoy it as much as I did and remember that H2O, hydration is key to dropping the pounds in my humble opinion, Thanks for reading along.

As Ever
Me

Grilled Trout and an Eagle oh my!

My intake for Monday was spot on again coming in at 1665 and was pretty well rounded, I got in 1 gallon of green tea and 1/2 gallon of water as far as hydration goes that was on point as well. Earlier in the day the weather broke long enough for me to take the little one out on a walk around the lake and I went 1.7 miles @ a little faster than 3mph and that's just what I was going for so I am happy all the way around with how the day went.

During my walks I always bring my camera to cut down on those "man I wish I had my camera" moments and yesterday I was glad that I did. The lake I live on has an interesting animal that lives in the area and we sometimes have the pleasure of seeing it cruise around in the sky looking for fish in the lake and that animal is an American bald eagle. Yesterday while I was walking he flew over head and was pretty low so I pulled out my camera and zoomed in out and clicked off a couple of photos hoping to get lucky enough for a decent picture and I managed to get a picture so I thought I would share it, I zoomed in on the Eagle so that you could see it better and the photo is clickable to get a look at the larger photo.

Click the image for a full sized image.

For dinner I threw some trout that I caught on the grill and I have to say that everyone loved it! including wifys step dad that I invited over for dinner, it came out very good and 6oz worth only has 250 calories so its low calorie to boot. I prepared the fish with some black pepper, rosemary and some Grillmates Salmon seasoning, coated it in a very light coat of olive oil and straight onto the grill they went. For sides to this dish I made red potatoes seasoned with olive oil, rosemary, thyme and black pepper then placed into a 400 degree oven until they were brown and green beans with black pepper and Smart balance, simple right? I find that the simple ones are usually the best tasting ones and this will be my go to prep for trout from here on out. I snapped a picture of my plate before digging in so that I cold share here on the blog, have a look.

The blue plate does nothing to make this look better but here it is.

Everything that is happening this week is how it should be where losing weight is concerned so I am looking forward to Fridays weigh in number, I have walked almost every day, I am eating right and I am staying hydrated and that is the recipe for fat to burn. I feel good and am down in weight since Friday so off to a good start for my goal to hit 344 pounds this week, will it happen? it is a possibility but if it doesn't happen this week it will happen the next so no worries. I have decided that I am going to focus on strength training more than I have been and want to start doing my daily push ups again if my shoulder holds up, it has felt good for about 3 weeks now and I am getting itchy so today I will test it out with a few short sets just to test the waters.

The end has come to another post in a long line of posts and I am going to keep on ding what I am doing because it has worked to this point. Thanks for following along and don't forget that H2O!

As Ever
Me

Making choices...

Making good choices along with being driven to accomplish a specific task is the formula needed to lose weight and it is as simple as that. The other side of that coin has the complete opposite effect where bad choices and unfocused health habits can cause extreme weight gain & the break down of a fit body. I don't know how the conversation came up but last night wify and I were talking about "old times" and how we would eat and my evening trips to Del Taco on the way home from work came up, as I was mentioning to her that I would grab 3 extra cheese burgers and devour them before I got home so that she would not know about them she said "Imagine just how many calories were in that meal" My response was "I don't want to know" but out came our calorie book. I was actually disgusted at the figure she came up with for my average take on a late night run to good ol Del Taco, without getting into the specifics lets just say I was consuming 3300 calories from a single stop on my way home from work almost every night, so 3 times per week on average at 9:30 pm I would stop and grab a big bag of fat ass for myself and willingly stuff it into my piehole.

The idea of eating that way now is so foreign to me that I honestly cannot believe that it was me, but it was. Lets look at me now, I eat an average of 1700 calories daily and can honestly say that I enjoy my food more now than I have in quite some time. I have always been creative with cooking and nine out of ten times that I cook something that someone has not tried before I get asked for the recipe, this has always been the case yet I chose to eat at fast food restaurants and or out of plastic packaged boxes. Last night I tried a little chicken recipe that I read on a forum but I changed it up a bit to fit how I would enjoy it and it was a big hit all the way around with my family. I took boneless skinless chicken breast and pounded it flat, I then mixed a wedge of laughing cow garlic & herb cheese with a bit of spicy mustard and spread it thin over the flattened chicken breast. After the cheese was on the breast I put 1.5oz capicola over the entire thing and I placed thinly sliced green bell peppers at one end of the concoction. Minced garlic and black pepper along with some other spices went on next and then I rolled it up and seam down placed it into a casserole dish, it was baked at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes. I served rice with pueblo pepper sauce and light sour cream on it along with some green beans with the chicken rolls and was very pleased with how the whole meal came out, have a look I snapped a picture before I dug in.

This was a pretty good meal if I do say so myself, click it for a larger view.

My total calories for the day came in at 1705 and it was pretty balanced I think, I drank 1 gallon of green tea, about 12oz of coke zero (1 glass) with dinner and maybe 3/4 gallon water so Iwould say I was properly hydrated and I rode my bike for 22 minutes in the morning and took a 1.5 mile walk @3.1 mph roughly as well as my squat routine, so exercise was good for the day as well. Have a look at the menu from Tuesday.

03/24/09

Breakfast
8:30 AM
2oz capicola 100
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1oz American cheese 110
1 T miracle whip 35

Lunch
12:15 PM
2.5oz ground chicken 105
1oz light cheddar 80
3 taco shells 150
tomato/lettuce/light sour cream 55

3:00 PM
small apple 80

Dinner
6:15 PM
7oz baked chicken breast 350
3/4 cup white rice 150
1 cup green beans 40
1 wedge laughing cow 35
1.5oz capicola 75
Bell peppers 10
light sour cream 20

8:15 PM
1 apple 90
1 orange 80

Tuesday was pretty much a perfect day where this weight loss regimen is concerned, I ate well, I exercised enough and I stayed hydrated. That's all I got for today, remember to stay hydrated and exercise is key, Thank you for following along with this fat dude getting thinner and know that you can do it too as long as you are willing to put in some hard work and take an honest assessment of how you are treating your body, 3300 calories worth of bad Mexican fast food is does not a good diet make. Grab that H2O and keep on keepin on, YOU are the one at the wheel, YOU are the one lifting fork to mouth and YOU are the one that has to make the choice to live healthy.

As Ever
Me

The Lavish life, Salmon & fauxtatoes, pictures inside!

Today I ate like a king, well I am not sure how a king eats but it was a very good day with very good very healthy meals and I found a new item to add to my body fueling arsenal. Today was our "bulk shopping day" and that usually means that we get a nice piece of fresh fish for dinner, today was no different. Let me start with breakfast first as this will be a meal related post, I woke up late and had a bowl of corn chex cereal with 1% milk, bamn! the breakfast portion of this post has concluded, like a king you say? Ok, that was around 9am and we set out to get our shopping done and 1:00 pm came around and we had still not eaten lunch, yes yes, I know that's not a good idea! AND you said you ate like a king Mister Meatball! welp wify had bought some "honey wheat pretzels" so I grabbed a few 7 or 8 of em and it stopped the grumbling from the gut region, "hey now you said Very good, very healthy meals!?" yes yes we are getting there, while in the market I picked out a couple cucumbers and some nice ripe tomatoes and off to find some pita bread I went, while looking around I see something that says "Joseph's flax oat bran and whole wheat flower lavish bread" on it, 100 calories per whole piece and 3g of fiber to boot so into the cart it went. After getting home it was time to get a proper meal type food into my stomach and earlier in the day I remembered that someone on a forum mentioned cucumber sandwiches but made on wheat pita bread.

Here is where the good food comes into play and its such a simple little wrap for so little calories that I have to say that I wish I had come across the idea sooner! I skinned a whole cucumber and sliced it up diagonally with one of the tomatoes and that's pretty much all that goes into these besides the dressing, salt and pepper. I spread a tiny amount of Newmans own light honey mustard dressing across one end of the lavish bread and laid the cucumbers and tomato on top of it, then added salt and pepper rolled the veggies once into the bread. I added a tiny smear of Miracle whip between that and the end of the bread, rolled it all the way up and ate my new favorite lunch item. Each wrap was roughly 150 calories and that was counting high! two was more than filling and I have to admit that I ate too much and one would really have been enough but like I said they were awesomeness wrapped in lavish bread. 1 whole cucumber and maybe 2/3 of a medium tomato was used to make 3 wraps, wify really liked them as well and we will be making them again for sure, now onto dinner.

Dinner as I mentioned was fresh fish, we had grilled salmon fillets with mashed cauliflower and green beans and to say that I enjoyed this meal does not begin to say how good it was. I bought 1.5 pounds of fresh Atlantic salmon fillets and decided to cook it out on the grill, and the only prep was a light garlic rub, some black pepper and a drizzle of olive oil and onto the grill they went, here is a look at them as they cooked to a perfect 135 degrees.

This is a shot as I turned them over after the non skinned side cooked for about 5 minutes.

and right as they were done and brought inside.

The mashed cauliflower was absolutely amazing and it was also a very simple recipe that I sort of just winged and made up as I went using my mashed potato recipe. I boiled 2.5 pounds of fresh cauliflower for about 7 minutes until it was soft but not falling apart, drained it and dumped it back into the pot where I mashed it up with a mixer after mixing in about a tablespoon of minced garlic, 1.5 tablespoons of Smart balance spread, less than 1/4 cup of 1% milk and some black pepper. Once that was as mixed as it was going to get I put about 2/3 of that into a food processor and blended it into a smooth mix and poured it back into the still lumpy mixed portion so that there would be some texture to it, fold in a bit of Parmesan cheese and into a casserole dish it goes. I then shook a bit of parm cheese over the top of the whole thing and into a 400 degree oven it went for about 7 minutes, I then stuck it under the broiler for a minute or two to brown the top and that's it! the fauxtatoes were done! Here is a look at my plate seconds before I dug in and cleaned my entire plate.

8oz grilled salmon steak, 1 cup green beans, slightly more than a cup of mashed fauxtatoes ala cauliflower, about 600 calories and quite filling.

If this had been served to me in a restaurant I would have given the chef my compliments, it was honestly that good! so as a king I was fed today as far as I am concerned and a couple more high quality low calorie options get added to my eating arsenal. That will conclude another post and I hope you got your H2O in today! I have had a gallon of green tea and about a quart of water so far myself and will have about another 1/2 gallon of water before I retire for the evening, keep on keepin on and remember there ARE options to fatty high calorie foods out there that will allow us to eat heartily and until we are full. Thanks for following along and check in tomorrow for the next episode of as the fat guy turns.

As Ever
Me

Mirror mirror on the wall.

A funny thing mirrors can be, This morning as I was getting into the shower I took my shirt off and looked at myself in the bathroom mirror and I am unsure if I just don't study myself or if it was just unnoticed but my collar bones are very prominent now as well as my shoulders and traps are starting to look closer to how they looked 10-12 years ago, meaning visible. Good news often brings a bit of bad with it and this time is no exception, while looking at myself and feeling good about what I am starting to see I noticed the skin and how it seems to be moving southward on my body and the higher up the body part is the better it looks, from the weight of the extra skin pulling down keeping the upper parts taught no doubt. I would be willing to bet that I would lose a whole shirt size if the skin was not loose, and I wish I was exaggerating! and because this is not something I wasn't expecting I will not feel bad about it because it is what it is and worrying about something that has no answer makes little sense to me, but man! does it bug me and it has far worse to get before I am done.

Enough about the skin, let me tell you about my new favorite sandwich that I made yesterday, I took 2 slices of light rye bread and put 3oz of deli Turkey breast on it then added 1oz of Hormel Turkey pepperoni, some sliced tomato and miracle whip and bamn! a new favorite for me. The entire sandwich has 305 calories and really is a LARGE sandwich, I honestly thought it was going to be more calories than it turned out to be and all of the flavors compliment one another perfectly, it is sweet, spicy and hearty with lots of protein and is little calories so it gets added to my arsenal of "good foods" to keep on the list. Have a look at yesterdays menu which was actually pretty heavy while still maintaining the calorie level compared to what it has been lately.

10/29/08

Breakfast
8:30 AM
2 slices light rye bread 100
3oz deli turkey 90
1oz turkey pepperoni 70
1 T miracle whip 35
sliced tomato 10

10:30 AM
1 banana 105
1 T peanut butter 95

Lunch
12:30 PM
1oz doritos 140

3:30 PM
1 can Progresso soup 160

Dinner
6:45 PM
8oz ground turkey 320
2 80 calorie rolls 160
6oz sweet potato fries 150
condiments Ketchup/sliced pickles/mustard/red onion 45

8:00 PM
8oz Dannon light and fit yogurt 120

Grand total of 1600 calories for the day but let me tell you that I did have a bite off of my daughters Turkey burger that she did not finish at dinner time so its slightly higher but definitely still under 1700 calories. Honestly take a look at that days worth of food and ask yourself if thats not enough to fill you up for a day, would you believe that a person could eat those foods and still be down 164 pounds if you weren't seeing it? I am doing it and don't believe it sometimes myself! in fact I think I am eating better now than ever before and the difference is empty calories vs nutrient filled healthy calories, barring the doritos of course but those are more of a treat and eaten not often. Weigh in is tomorrow and with it comes Halloween and candy I will do my best to NOT eat any! we all know thats not going to happen so I will just record what I do eat and count it in my calories for the day which will likely keep me from munching away because seeing the numbers add up are always a good deterrent for me, so thats the plan.

Random insertion, If you read to this point you deserve a big glass of water so get up and go get yourself a glass or bottle and drink it down, you know its a good idea and you also know that the effort to go do so is not very much and your body will appreciate it and probably needs it, so go!

As Ever
Me

I have discovered, nectar of the Gods!

I have been playing around with my green tea recipe and have struck gold as far as flavor goes, anyone that reads my blog daily knows that I drink green tea every day and as much as I can get into my cup! but buying the pre-made gallons of Arizona Diet Green tea was starting to get expensive at an average of $3.00 per gallon and the price has creeped up to $3.19 per gallon locally in many stores so I went back to brewing my own again to save a few bucks. I make the tea right in the Arizona tea bottles that are 1 gallon, I fill the bottle with hot water straight from the tap and I use 3 different kind of tea bags to get the flavor that I like, here is my secret recipe. I use 2 Arizona green tea w/ginseng tea bags, 1 generic green tea bag bought from a local Chinese market (this tea has a strong flavor compared to the Arizona brand bags) and 2 Black tea bags, thats it! put all five bags into the mouth of the gallon bottle and place the cap back on and leave it alone for about an hour to an hour and a half and bamn! a gallon of fresh green/black tea, and last night I stumbled on something that makes this blend nothing less than exceptional to the pallet. I usually cool the tea on the counter until its slightly more than room temperature and then into the refrigerator it goes until cold and to drink it I pour it into a large glass and add splenda to taste but as I said last night I figured out something simple that adds so much to the flavor! ready for this? lime, thats right plain old lime juice squeezed into the splenda laced tea. We had some limes left over from a six pack of Guinness that we bought (I have a recipe for that too) and rather than let them go bad I decided to slice one in half and squeeze some into my tea, now this might not seem like a ground breaking idea or recipe but man if I could bottle this stuff for retail I know it would sell! lime will be going into all of my green tea from this point forward and I think anyone out there that drinks green tea should give this a try.


Yesterday I rode my stationary bike for 35 minutes total and I did 40 push ups, I mentioned in my last post that I was upping the exercise again and I am doing just that. I want to start off slower than full on and thats why it was only 40 push ups and the bike ride is what to expect as I feel that 30 minutes is enough for cardio, especially since I am going to be adding more ST. I wanted to get a walk in this afternoon but its decently windy outside or as the man in the plastic box says "blustery" and still low 40's and having my daughter to bring along I am not sure its a good Idea today for her sake, I will ride the bike for sure and there is a possibility that I will get in a solo walk when wify gets home and can keep the kiddo cozy inside.


This week started off rocky where intake is concerned, I ate that chicken parm grinder on Saturday and I had pizza for lunch on Sunday but even with that said I expect to have an ok week this week where a loss comes into the equation, why? because its what I want so its what I am going to have and next week will be better! my last entry mentioned that I need to lose an average of 4 pounds per week if I am to hit that new goal I set for myself of losing 200 pounds in 2008, that 4 pound average does not include this week so whatever I get this week is extra and ort of like bonus poundage towards that goal and I am going to work for that edge. somehow I have become entirely driven to hit this goal and lost that 200 pounds by years end and I am unsure where the push came from but I am glad its here and know that I will do whatever I can to hit that mark.

To sum it all up, Green tea plus black tea with a shake of Splenda plus lime equals nectar of the gods, I am going to be one sore and sweaty individual in the next couple months and I am going to need every ounce of determination to hit my goal of 200 pounds gone in a year. compare that to last year at this time and you get, Cherry coke equals nectar of the gods, the sore and sweaty part was probably still true but for different reasoning and 200 pounds gone was a pipe dream as I was believing about a surgery to cure my ills. My oh my what a year can do.

As Ever
Me

A buffalo chicken recipe, and anticipating a big weigh in moment.

I have a feeling that tomorrows weigh in will give me the 150 pounds lost notch in my belt, I am really close now and its just a gut feeling that I will in fact hit that number in the am. IF I do I will post up a few more compare pictures @ that 150 lost mark and I will be within 9 pounds of having less than 100 pounds to lose and that is yet another milestone for me, so I may have a couple of milestones to report in the next couple weeks, with the first one starting tomorrow hopefully.

Everything else is on track for the most part but you will notice that the deficit tracking section to the left ha not been updated, thats because I have not exercised for the most part because my foot has been bothering me for almost a week now and I don't want to do anything that can hurt or injure it, so until the pain goes away exercise shall be non existent.

On a different note I did fool around with making a buffalo chicken sammie recipe which came out very much better than I had expected it to and wanted to share that with you.

what you will need.

shredded chicken (I used thigh and breast meat mixed which was seasoned)
light Italian bread
Franks hot sauce or the equivalent
low fat mozzarella cheese light ranch dressing (blue cheese for those who like it) olive oil cooking spray sandwich maker

Shred the chicken into a bowl and shake on as much Franks hot sauce as you like (I like a lot) mix it up so that the chicken is covered in the sauce, next lay the bread on a plate and put 1/2 oz shredded low fat mozzarella cheese onto it, put about 2oz of the shredded chicken on top of the cheese and give it an extra shake or 3 of the Franks to keep it moist throughout cooking, then cover the chicken with another 1/2 oz of the mozzarella cheese and place the second slice of bread on top of that. spray your preheated sandwich maker with a light coat of the olive oil cooking spray and lay the completed sandwich into the maker and grill it up, three minutes later you have a buffalo chicken sandwich that is oh so tasty, remove it from the sammie maker and serve with some light ranch dressing to dip it into. A single sandwich made this way costs about 280 calories and then add whatever calories that the ranch costs (would depend on brand I think what we have was 60 calories per 2 T) and just like that an under 300 calorie buffalo chicken sammie is created. for those of you that are thinking "mozz cheese on buffalo chicken?" yessir, it adds a bit of texture, makes it feel naughty and most importantly it helps to hold the whole sandwich together, I hope you enjoy it if you try it, I thought it was pretty good as did wify, I think some finely chopped red onion would be good in this as well I just didn't have any so they were not used.

With that another post has come to an end, and I hope to be able to post up some new pictures in the morning of me at 150 pounds lost. Thank you for reading and don't forget to check out tomorrows post.

As Ever
Me

Exercise, a recipe and deficit tracking has begun.

Today is the day after the second day that I am back in the exercise game and I will say that I am glad that I am back to doing it. I only got to ride once yesterday for 20 minutes, its just how it worked out and I almost did not do it but wify said "just do it you know you will regret it if you don't" so I took her advice and rode and then added 70 push ups and that was that. I have added a column on the left side of the page to show the deficit tracking and I don't know what I will shoot for this first week, I want to see what I end up with by the end of the week and then set a goal slightly above that for next week, I do think that I want to go for 3500 calories burned in a week but I don't want to jump in head first without an idea what that is. calories for the day were right where they should have been coming in at 1690 total, and I will continue on a 1700 per day goal for a while more and see where it goes. I also wanted to post a sort of recipe which is really nothing more than a pile of pizza like ingredients that I have been making lately, we call them pizza pockets round here and they came about because I remembered that we had a sandwich maker in the cabinet, I needed something for lunch and well yeah that was that, here is what you will need.

Sandwich maker
Light Italian bread (4 slices)
Low fat Mozzarella cheese (2oz)
Light pizza sauce (2-3 T)
Turkey pepperoni (30g)
Sliced jalapeño (4-5 slices)
Light parm cheese (just a shake)
Garlic powder
Black pepper
Olive oil cooking spray

This has got to be the simplest thing in the world and is pretty self explanatory as to what happens next but here goes, and I do have a piling order. start by spreading the sauce on all four slices of bread and then shake a small amount of garlic powder and the light parm cheese on each slice of sauced bread. Next put about half of the shredded mozz cheese onto two of the slices of bread and then chop the jalapeños up and spread them evenly over the same slices with the cheese, next layer the Turkey pepperoni evenly over the cheese and then add another small shake of parm cheese and black pepper, finish it off with the remaining mozz cheese and top it off with the other slices of sauced bread. give the sammy maker a very very light spray of the olive oil cooking spray, place the 2 sandwiches into the sammy maker wait until the green light comes on indicating that they are cooked and bamn! spicy Jalapeño and pepperoni pizza pockets and all for a total of 435 calories. My wife substitutes mushrooms for the jalapeño and you can basically use your favorite kind of pizza toppings, these are very customizable and 2 sandwiches make 4 pockets which is very filling to me as a meal.

I will try and get on the bike today for two 20 minute rides for a total of 40 minutes of cardio, and I will do as many push ups as my wrist allows, I did not mention this but for whatever reason the push ups are making my left wrist a bit tender so I am watching that. I am approaching one of my goals which is to have lost 150 pounds, as of last Fridays weigh in I have lost 141 pounds and as of this morning its a bit more than that and my body is really starting to show the weight loss, in positive as well as negative ways. the positive is obvious, I am thinner, I am more healthy and I am back in a big way, now the negatives I am not so enthusiastic about and the issue of loose skin is becoming more apparent lately, I can't help but worry about how it will be remedied when the time comes. it looks like surgery is really the only way to fix it and its not a procedure covered by insurance (unless problems come of it) and its way expensive, so this weighs on me a bit with my recent visits to the mirror where I am seeing some of the damage that I have done with the weight gain. Oh well thats a fight for another day I think and all I can do is to keep doing what I am doing and maybe it will tighten up a bit more as time goes by, and for todays post in the words of porky pig, Thats all folks!

As Ever
Me

An evening interlude and recipe of sorts.

I had some time and was just sitting around after dinner relaxing because its still at 6:45 pm 87 degrees outside and very very humid so I am hanging in the living room with the AC on for the time being. like I said I just finished a very good dinner, I made open face BBQ Turkey burgers with fried onions topped with laughing cow swiss cheese and on the side I had some seasoned white rice with 1/4 cup of whole kernel corn mixed into it. though what I had was not low calorie by any means coming in at 750 calories it is within my calorie range (I had a light day today) and I did have 2 open faced sandwiches, this could have easily been changed to 465 calories total if one sandwich was eaten instead of two, which is what my wife had. very quickly I will run through how I made this delicious dinner.

Click the image for a full sized look, this whole plate is 750 calories and was very good.

I mixed Grillmates mesquite seasoning, garlic powder and black pepper into the ground turkey and separated it into 4oz patties and tossed them onto the grill where I already had half of an onion frying up (in a low cal cooking spray). toast 2 pieces of whole wheat bread and put it aside. when the burgers are just about done I put a bit of Hickory BBQ sauce onto the toasted bread with some of the fried onions and place the grilled burger on top of that and spread a wedge of laughing cow swiss over the burger drop a dab more BBQ sauce onto the cheese and spread it out just a bit and top with a few more onions and enjoy! the rice is just seasoned with black pepper and Goya Adobo and topped with a little corn, and of course you can see my green tea in the back ground. My wife just rolls her eyes when I take photos of my meals, but she also asked "did you want me to load these pics onto your computer for ya?" welp there ya have my little intermission, hope everyone had a good day intake wise and got some movement in.

Until next time..

As Ever
Me

Chicken Chili Soup Recipe

I mentioned that I had concocted a variation of my Dads chicken soup recipe into something with more of a Spanish flair to it, its more of a chicken pepper soup than anything but everyone that had some of this loved it and I thought it was pretty good myself, so here it is for you to enjoy.

what you will need
1 chicken carcass
3 medium sized onions (the large side of medium)
1/2 lb Celery
2 cloves of garlic
1 large can of crushed tomatoes
1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
1 can whole kernel corn (2 cans would make for a heartier soup, I use one to save calories)
2 cans Goya black beans (1 can may be used to save calories)
About 6 pepperocinis
1/4 cup sliced jalapeño
Cayenne pepper
White rice
Black pepper
Bell’s poultry seasoning
Salt
Goya Adobo

What to do

1 Take a decent sized pot (more than a gallon) I am sorry I do not know exactly how large the pot I use is. fill the pot with water leaving enough room for the carcass and put it on to boil, while its starting to boil take as much of the meat off of the carcass as you can and put it on a plate. We usually have a thigh and a leg and random amounts of white meat still on the bones; just get as much as possible off. Now cut the carcass into a couple of pieces and drop it and all the skin and bones into the pot that’s on the stove. Leave it alone for at least an hour, I cook it for an hour and a half usually, sometimes closer to 2 hours. Basically long enough to make a nice strong broth.

if you want to cut back on cooking time cook it for 45 mins and use a few chicken cubes instead, I honestly do not think it tastes as good with the cubes but if you are short on time its still good.

2 while that is boiling chop the 3 onions up nice and fine and place them to the side, chop both bell peppers up into smallish pieces and place them to the side, cut the celery up as well at this time and place it to the side, slice the pepperocinis and the jalapeño up into small pieces you basically want it to disappear into the stock when its completely cooked, lastly cut the chicken that you took off of the carcass up into soup sized pieces and chop the garlic up fine, place them to the side

3 when the broth is ready strain the bones and skin out of it saving the broth, place the broth back onto the stove and put the onion, bell peppers, celery, garlic, jalapeño, pepperocini and chicken pieces into the strained broth to cook. add slightly less than 1 tspn of the Bell’s poultry seasoning into the broth and veggies and give it a stir, shake as much Cayenne pepper in as you can stand (I make mine hot and it doesn't take much to really heat it up), shake in some Adobo (1 tbsp approx), add salt and pepper to taste, I like to use a lot of black pepper at this point and the Adobo is salty so you may not need any salt at all, let that boil until the peppers and celery start to get soft, less than an hour usually.

4 while that’s cooking strip the rest of the meat off of the carcass, you would be surprised at how much meat is still on there! Discard the carcass once you have all of the meat, and I like to just drop that meat right in with the peppers and onion, also add the can of crushed tomatoes at this time.

5 when the peppers and celery are just about soft, open and drain the corn and black beans pour the corn and the rest of the chicken that you put aside earlier into the pot (if its not already in there) and let that cook 15 mins or so. After that add the black beans and taste it, if it needs a tad more poultry seasoning, Adobo or pepper add it now and let it simmer for another 15 mins.

6 cook the rice separately and let the soup simmer while that cooks. When the rice is done so is the soup. It should take 20 mins.

While the soup is simmering (it will be a few hours total simmer time) remember to give it a stir every now and again and taste it along the way, you can actually taste this recipe getting richer and more blended as it cooks. I usually let the soup cool for at least 15 minutes before eating it but that is not necessary, when the rice is done the soup is and you can put some rice in a bowl and pour on the soup, remember to give it a stir before you take a serving out, I have found that the oils from the peppers seem to rise to the top so stirring it mixes the oil into the soup assuring you get a spicy bowl, this is a pretty spicy soup and sort of has a chili taste to it, My whole family liked it and even though it is spicy my 2 and a half year old daughter asks for more every time I make it.

As Ever
Me

BBQ rice, beans and chicken dish...a recipe by me.

Lately I have been messing around with recipes just to spice things up and change things about. most times when I list my meals from the previous day I will say "3oz chicken breast, 3/4 cup white rice, 1/2 cup black beans, broccoli" now that just seems plain to me but its how it gets put into the Excel sheet that I keep because its just to count the calories not really which recipe I ate that particular day. from time to time I will list it how it was eaten and sometimes I get an email or comment asking how to make something, welp here is the BBQ rice and beans with shredded chicken that I have been making lately.

I will explain which parts of the chicken get used when I make this recipe because its pretty specific and not specific at all, if that makes sense. I roast whole chickens a lot around here and usually we eat off of that for the previous nights dinner and whats typically left is about 2/3 of a breast, 1 whole thigh and 1 whole leg among other random pieces of mixed dark and light meat (I skin and season the bird before roasting), this is what I shred to make this meal and the carcass gets made into soup, frugal aren't I? I know that the dark meat is not as "low calorie" as the white but I can't just let it go to waste now can I? if you were to choose to make this meal you can substitute the pieces from a whole chicken like I do it for boneless chicken breast or whatever you like, I happen to think the dark meat makes it taste a bit better and is only 60 calories per oz.

What you will need

12-16oz chicken (Dark mixed with white meat makes for a good combo)
Cooked white rice
1 can of Goya Black beans
Mccormick Grillmates BBQ spices
1 small onion
Black pepper
1 bottle of your favorite BBQ sauce (I like the Jack Daniels Tennessee Hickory)
Fresh Broccoli
Omega 3 butter spread or regular butter

and thats all you will need to make this easy, fast and tasty meal.

1) cook your white rice first as it takes the longest to cook out of everything in this recipe, that is assuming the chicken was pre cooked like mine is. and I assume everyone knows how to cook perfect white rice but if not here you go, basically you want to use 2 cups of water to every cup of rice, so lets assume that you are making 2 cups of rice. you would bring 4 cups of water to a boil add any seasoning to the water, around here its usually Adobo and some black pepper, you then want to put a couple drops of oil into the water and dump the 2 cups of dry rice into the pot cover it with a lid drop the heat down to a low simmer and leave it alone for 20 minutes, bamn! a whole pot of white rice shall be yours in 20 minutes.

2) Next you will start the broccoli, we steam ours so basically wash it place it in the steamer set it for 17 minutes and walk away. you can cook it how ever you like, steam it in a pan or boil it if you do not have a steamer.

3) While the rice and broccoli cooks open your can of beans and drain 85-90% of the fluid from the can and then dump the beans and the 10% fluid into a bowl, then take the Grillmates BBQ seasoning and shake some onto the beans and mix it up, give it a taste and add more to taste, I usually stir it up and them add some more and stir again. set the beans to the side.

4) Now for the chicken, shred it into a bowl and put a tiny amount of BBQ sauce into it, I use less than two tablespoons but more than one it should be relatively dry but coated, mix it together and add some black pepper, put it to the side with the beans.

5) The easiest step in this process, finely chop some yellow onion, set it aside.

6) pop the beans in the microwave for about 3 minutes or until its hot, do the same with the chicken, unless you made the chicken fresh and its already hot. everything should just about be done now and you can start measuring and mixing.

7) ok now its time to make the concoction, put 3/4 cup white rice onto a plate, on top of the rice scoop out 1/2 cup of the beans with the BBQ seasoning on them and on top of the beans drop a bit of the finely chopped onion and mix it all up until its even and the spices from the beans coat the rice. take 3oz of the shredded chicken with the BBQ sauce on it and drop it on top of the rice and bean mixture, add 3/4 cup of steamed broccoli on the side with a tiny bit of omega 3 butter spread and black pepper to the broccoli and enjoy.

30z shredded chicken = 180 calories
3/4 cup cooked white rice = 150 calories
1/2 cup black beans = 90 calories
3/4 cup steamed broccoli = 35 calories
onion and omega 3 spread = 15 calories

for a total of 470 calories and that is a huge portion of food for dinner, it fills me up easily and you can adjust the calories down to whatever you need them to be because everything is mixed at the end. an example is how my wife makes this meal she uses.

2oz shredded chicken = 120 calories
2/3 cup cooked white rice = 135 calories
1/4 cup black beans = 45 calories
3/4 cup steamed broccoli = 35 calories

Which comes to a total of 335 calories wify eats her broccoli plain and no onions in the mixture, I have eaten this amount and it is enough for a meal for me but I am usually trying to make up calories so I have a larger portion.

There you have it, BBQ rice and beans with shredded chicken and a side of steamed broccoli, I would imagine corn on the cob would fit right in next to this on the table I just prefer the broccoli because its lower in calories. by mixing the seasoning into the beans and then mixing it into the rice leaves a very light flavor on the whole plate and then You get the kick of a stronger BBQ flavor with the chicken. everyone in the family loves this meal and its a little different, I apologize for not having a picture to toss up here of the finished plate but it does look almost as good as it tastes, I make a spanish rice and beans with shredded chicken like this as well but thats for another day. Hope ya like it if you decide to make it.

As Ever
Me

Country casual...Kilts and Fedora's

Tuesday went just as any given Tuesday would go, I did come in over my calories because of a Nutrition bar that I had later in the evening but not by much, total was 1540 calories. I did zero exercise as I am in the middle of an experiment with this weight loss thing, which may not be a good week to do it because of the light loss last week but, its Wednesday already so I am going with it. I am going to try to alternate an exercise week with a no exercise week and see how it goes, it seems to me that I lose more weight on average when I do that, results will be in in a couple weeks.

I have a wedding to go to in August, it is an outside wedding and the attire is "country casual" I don't claim to be a fashion expert so what exactly does "country casual" mean? and who in their right mind has an outside wedding on the hottest month of the year in New England? I have googled, I have asked an abundance of people and no one seems to know, I have gotten lots of opinions but none are the same and wify has not been able to get hold of her cousin to ask specifically what they mean (he is the Groom) so I have made sort of a game of this and am trying to figure out what this "country casual" means. I have got opinions from "khakis and a checkered shirt" to "country club casual, a polo shirt and try to look like you hang with people named Miffy" right on up to "maybe they mean Hee Haw" I am considering a kilt, of course with no skivvies underneath, with a bowling shirt and Fedora , thats casual for sure and the highlands are in the country right? if anyone that reads this has an opinion of what country casual is please comment.



Like the Salmon, I have received some inquiry as to how I prepare my sweet potato fries, so I thought I would pop that up here this morning for anyone interested, and this has to be the most simple basic recipe in the world and the end product really turns out well. first I take 3 sweet potatoes and wash them off, slice each one in half long ways and then lay it on the flat side on a cutting board. start cutting lengthwise into pieces approximately 1/8 inch thick, make them look like steak fries. once you have all of the potatoes cut like that you prepare the pan that you will be cooking them in by putting just enough Olive oil, or oil spray onto the bottom of the baking dish or pan (I use both a dish and a pan) and you want only to use a very very small amount of oil, just enough so that the fries do not stick. then I sprinkle a light coat of adobo into the pan over the oil, followed with black pepper, layer the fries in a single layer on the bottom of your dish or pan. then give them another shake of pepper on the side thats facing up and pop them into a 450 degree preheated oven for 10 minutes, after 10 mins check them out to make sure nothing is burning, usually I keep them in for another 2-3 minutes so 13 mins total cook time. make sure you check the under side because if they are going to burn they do it fast, make them a few times and you will figure out how long they take to be perfect. its really that easy and they taste great, its a super food and only has 25 calories per ounce, as with all of the recipes that I post, I hope if you try it out you enjoy the end product.

Thanks for taking the time to read along.

As Ever
Me

Saturday morning, turkey and trains.

Hmmmm, so have ya noticed the new header? Boredom and the fact that I have been thinking about making a new one created that which you see above, I seem to have slipped into that state of mind, I feel unstoppable when it comes to getting healthy (which I know I not true but its how I feel) , so I thought that facing an oncoming train seemed fitting. Opinions? hows it look :) I like it and since it fits my attitude I think its perfect.

I also thought that I would toss up the directions for how I prepare my turkey burgers since there has been some interest shown through some of your comments. its very very very simple and anyone can make them this way and in my opinion they turn out great. first we start out with a 20 oz package of Shady brook farms ground turkey we usually buy whats on sale, which is usually the 97/3% lean, but we look for the 99% lean when possible, the difference is that the 97% has 160 calories per 4 oz and the 99% is 140 calories per 40z serving, when its on sale we will buy 3 packages and keep them in the freezer. ok ok back to how I prepare them, put the turkey in a bowl and fold in some chopped onions, I chop them very fine and mix them in good, after the onions are mixed in throughly shake in some Mccormick Grill mates BBQ flavoring (I go a little heavy on this as it gives it a smoky flavor), garlic powder and black pepper. mix that all together and separate the meat into 4 oz patties (we weigh each one to keep the portions equal). drop them onto a hot grill or frying pan, sprinkle the top with a tiny amount of adobo and grill until they are cooked through. I make mine with 80 calorie rolls (stop & shop brand) sliced onion, pickle, tomato and lettuce with some spicy mustard and a bit of ketchup to sweeten it up a little and I have to admit that this has become one of my favorite "healthy" meals that I have found. Usually it gets served with home made sweet potato fries, a dill pickle and my usual Giant glass of green tea. If you choose to follow my very simple directions I hope you enjoy the meal, I know we do.

This morning the scale had some very nice words to whisper in my ear but I am not going to count what it said to me until it stays that way for a few days, lets just say that the century mark was reached this morning, surpassed actually, but like I said its not official until its there for a few days, I will keep this updated as it changes. and there you have it, My Saturday morning post, we're on the way out the door but I wanted to get this up here before we left, Thanks for following along with my trip backwards through time.

As Ever
Me