Opa! Baked Falafel

The only other time I've made Greek food before was a horrible attempt at tabbouleh a few years ago. However, I've been craving falafel and I can't find a restaurant around me that makes it the way I like it. So I tried this recipe, and I'm so glad I did! 

Yield: I got 7 patties out of this, but I probably could've gotten 8 to make it even. Nutrition is per falafel, so 1/7 of the recipe.

Ingredients:
2 tbsp olive oil, divided

1 can chickpeas, rinsed and drained

1 c diced onion (use frozen if desired)

1/4 tsp garlic powder

2 tbsp dried parsley

2 tbsp dried cilantro

Zest of small lemon

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/3 c flour

1 egg, beaten

Preparation:

1. Coat a metal pan (I used a skillet) with cooking spray and 1 tbsp olive oil and put it in oven. Preheat to 375 degrees.

2. Pulse chickpeas, onion, garlic powder, cilantro, lemon zest, parsley, salt, cumin, pepper flakes, and baking powder in food processor until minced (not a paste). Transfer to bowl and stir in the egg and flour.

3. Drop mixture in golf ball sized amounts in the pan and bake 20 minutes.


4. Brush (or drizzle) falafel with remaining oil, flip, and bake another 15-20 minutes until golden brown on both sides.

Serve with pita bread, tabbouleh, and yogurt sauce (6 oz fat free Greek yogurt, juice of 1/2 lemon, salt, and cayenne pepper to taste). For the bread I used multi-grain Itsy-Bitsy Pita Pockets - they are only 40 calories each, and they were the perfect size for the falafel!

Shredded Chicken Nachos (with Homemade Baked Tortilla Chips!)

Today was my first day back to work and I decided to have a really good dinner to clear my head. I'm feeling much better except for my ears, which are still stopped up (like that feeling you get when your ears pop on a plane), and I'm about to go nuts listening to myself breathe really loudly all day. Couple that with the fact that I could only hear about 80% of what people were saying all day -- you get the idea. I needed some good food.

This started out as tostadas and by the time I got done, it ended up as delicious nachos. Mmm!

Servings: Listed as serving 1, but of course multiply by as many as you want

Ingredients:

1/2 chicken breast, grilled and shredded (or really any protein you like...lean ground beef, steak strips, ground turkey, meatless crumbles, etc)

3 six-inch corn tortillas, each cut into six to make 18 pre-chips

1/2 c fat free refried beans

1/4 c Mexican blend shredded 2% cheese

1/2 c shredded lettuce

1/2 c chunky salsa/pico de gallo

1 tbsp diced jalapeños

1 1/2 tbsp light sour cream

Canola oil cooking spray

Salt and lime juice to taste (optional)

Preparation:

I almost burned these...

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray and lay the tortilla pieces in a single layer. Make sure that there is space between the edges of each chip - if you put them too close together, they won't crisp up. Spray the tops of the chips with the cooking spray, and then sprinkle salt as desired. Once the oven is heated, put the chips in and bake for 8-10 minutes, until chips become crisp. Be careful not to let them turn brown, they can burn quickly!

2. While the chips are baking, heat the refried beans in the microwave for about one minute fifteen seconds, until hot. Get all your delicious toppings ready!

3. When the chips come out, scoop them on a plate and start layering. My order? Beans, chicken, cheese, lettuce, salsa, jalapeños, and sour cream, with a little fresh lime juice drizzled on the top. If you like your cheese extra melty, put it in the microwave for 30 seconds after the cheese goes on top, then finish with the cold toppings.

Experiments in Fashion Inspiration

I've been crazy bored out of my mind the past few days while I've been sick, and I decided to channel it toward something (somewhat) constructive. I've been looking at what to buy with my weight loss reward this month since I'm pretty sure with the plague that I have I'll make it to March 1 without regaining five pounds, and the online shopping has been out of control.

So for those readers who are less than interested in fashion inspirations, I'll make these posts after the jump for you. You are welcome.

Quick Update and February Goal Met! For Now...

This isn't me. I don't look this cute when I'm sick.

Just a quick update since I've been MIA for a few days. I've been really sick, finally went to the doctor today and got my antibiotics for a sinus infection. While I've been moping around the house in my pajamas the past three days, I've lost roughly six pounds. I'm sure at least half of that will come back on once I start feeling better, but I'm still counting it as reaching my February goal early! Total weight loss right now is at 16.8 pounds since January 1, which I think is pretty awesome.

Anyway, I haven't really been cooking and have been surviving off of leftovers made last week and takeout, so I'll just list a few of the things I've been doing the past few days:

1. Drinking a lot of V8 Fusion Strawberry Banana. I usually don't drink these since an 8 ounce serving has 120 calories and I prefer to eat, not drink, my calories, but I bought some cans a couple of months ago and they have been a real lifesaver this week. Got a bunch of good vitamins and fruit and veggie servings, and it's tasty too.

2. Watching Jersey Shore. Before this year I was one of the few proud people to be able to say that I'd never seen Jersey Shore. No longer, my friends. I have crumbled in my resolve and I love every minute of it. They've been running marathons on MTV and VH1, and I can't get enough. 

3. Ordering Asian takeout. I've been very good about cooking at home and not ordering food in or picking it up on the way back from work, but the past few days I just haven't been able to get myself psyched up for cooking, and there's always something comforting about some chinese or thai takeout. I called into my favorite thai place today for a pick up, and when the woman asked for my name, I said "ReDAY" with my stopped-up nose. She asked again, seemingly alarmed. I replied, "ReDAY! ReDAY! Sorry, I have a cold." She started laughing and said she'd see me soon. When I went to pick it up, I found that she included an egg roll and a cup of soup for free and told me to get better. (This is why I love Thai Spice. Seriously, check it out.)

4. Eating gummy vitamins. I love these, and the fact that they make them for adults now only proves how right I have been in taking the children's vitamins all along. The best I've found is the Slice of Life brand, but I've been known to take some Spiderman gummies from time to time. 

Hopefully next week I'll be back in full force. Stay well!

Gym Workout Today

Went to the gym (at my apartment complex) for the first time in...I can't remember when. Maybe last summer? Maybe.

I burned 350 calories on the elliptical in a little over 30 minutes. I was worried going in that I wouldn't be able to finish the full 30 minutes, but I surprised myself!

Definitely going more often now. Bonus: there were only two other people at any given point, so that was great. I expected it to be WAY more crowded around 7 o'clock.

I got my charm in the mail today, so I added it to my bracelet. Hopefully I can make this month's goal! I'm afraid it's going to be close, but so far a total of 12 pounds down since January 1!

Valentine's Day Treats!

Happy Valentine's Day! I spent all day yesterday baking and making these delicious treats to take into the office this morning. I felt a little like a crazy person since there were way more cake balls than I anticipated and ended up bringing in just under 100 of them, but most of them were gone by the end of the day, so I think they enjoyed them. Recipes will be posted later!

Red velvet cake balls in chocolate and powdered sugar

Cinnamon and sugar biscotti

Rice krispie treats

Oreo truffles

Just Another Meatball Monday

It was just another meatball Monday
I wish it was Sunday
'Cause that's my funday
My I-don't-have-to-run day
It's just another meatball Monday

So if you don't get the joke, you need to watch this video immediately.

Now that you've done that and laughed at my hilarious reference, take a look at my Valentine's Day dinner. I have been craving beef for a few days and I finally decided to make some penne and meatballs with arrabiata sauce. It was amazing.

Yield: 5 servings (about 15 meatballs if you make them pretty big)


Ingredients: 
1 lb lean ground beef (93% lean)
Jennie-O hot italian turkey sausage (3 links)
1/3 c breadcrumbs with Italian seasoning
2 eggs
1/4 c shredded Parmesan
18 oz jar pasta sauce (I used Safeway brand arrabiata)
Salt and pepper to taste



Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Remove turkey sausage from the casing and set aside.
2. Pour breadcrumbs into a large bowl and add 1/3 cup of hot water. Stir until moistened and let sit until the water is fully absorbed. Add eggs, Parmesan, and salt and pepper.
3. Mix in beef and turkey sausage - don't be afraid to use your hands! Form the meatballs, making sure they are equally sized so they will cook evenly.
4. Brown the meatballs in a skillet over medium-high heat for about 2 minutes on each side, or until some of the fat drains off.
5. Spray a large baking dish with cooking spray and place the meatballs in the dish. Make sure there is a little room between the edges. Pour the sauce over the meatballs.
6. Bake at 425 degrees for 35 minutes until bubbling. Serve with penne and mozzarella or Parmesan on top.

This was so good, and I'm definitely planning on freezing these for when I get another craving! In case you're curious, I used Barilla Plus pasta since it has extra fiber and I hate the taste of whole wheat pasta.

Goal Met: New Charm!

So after a couple weeks of ups and downs, I finally started dropping weight again and made it past my second charm bracelet goal for a total loss of 11 pounds!! I got so excited yesterday morning that I spent 20 minutes before work online shopping to pick out which charm I wanted. I chose this one:

It's a french macaroon charm, so I thought it would go nicely with the Eiffel tower charm I got last time. One of the women at work complimented me on my bracelet yesterday, and I told her about what I was doing and that each time I lost 5 pounds I bought myself a new charm. She was so excited for me, thought it was a great idea, and then commented on how much progress I was making. That made me feel really good. It's amazing what a little bit of validation from someone else can do!

Because I'm not the type of person to go in and complain about my diet (because there's really not that much I can't eat, I just have to eat smaller portions of it), people take longer to realize that I am working on losing weight. I think the thing that stops me from telling people I'm trying to lose weight is the unsolicited advice that comes with it. Every time they start in on that, I just want to tell them, "I've done this before! I know my method works! No need to tell me!" I don't know if it's because I'm overweight that they assume if I knew what to do I wouldn't be overweight anymore or what. So usually I just try to avoid the whole situation. But it is nice to get a little unsolicited encouragement along the way. 

I'm going to be making some Valentine's treats for the office this weekend, so not much actual cooking. I may post a few of them, but no promises that they will all be healthy recipes!

Quick Lunch: Sweet Salad and Soup

Salad nutritional breakdown

Today was another snow day which is crazy. It's not supposed to stick around until tomorrow, but it was nice having another work from home in my pajamas day. It's always dangerous to hang around the house all day though because there's the temptation to snack on things laying around the house. I did really well today and landed under 1300 calories with the help of my delicious lunch! I hunted for things I had around the house (including some of Wendy's pomegranate vinaigrette that I need to find in a store or online somewhere so I don't have to keep the leftover packets like a hoarder). I came up with two cups of organic baby greens, half a granny smith apple, 1/8 cup of craisins, 1/8 cup of goat cheese crumbles, and that packet of pomegranate vinaigrette. I ate it with a cup of jarred tomato basil soup and it was fantastic.

I also have to give a shout out to La Madeleine. Not only do I love their fat free Caesar dressing, they just came out with a low fat version of their tomato basil soup. That soup is pretty much the only reason I ever go to La Madeleine, but with the regular version, a cup has 340 calories and 32 grams of fat, so I would definitely have to save it for a special treat. The low fat version that they also sell in jars is 150 calories and 11 grams of fat for a cup, so I am thrilled. The best part? It tastes just as good as the regular fat version! They sell them online, and if you order some, you might as well pick up some of the Caesar dressing as well.

Takeout Swap: Chicken Fried Rice

This was a particularly rough Monday since I hadn't been to work in a week because of all the snow and ice. I didn't get to eat breakfast today, I had a pretty light lunch, I had to go grocery shopping on the way home, and by the time I got back I was starving. I really just wanted to stop and get takeout, but I made this instead and saved myself a LOT of fat and calories (an order of takeout fried rice can add up to 1500 calories, 10 grams of saturated fat, and 2,700mg of sodium)!

This recipe makes enough for leftovers the next day, and it's really a HUGE portion. You could probably get away with dividing this into 3 servings if you added a little more chicken.

Yield: 2 servings

Ingredients:
1 c uncooked jasmati rice
2 tbsp canola oil
6 oz cooked chicken breast, diced
1/2 c egg substitute (Egg Beaters)
2 scallions, sliced
1 small can of peas and carrots
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp oyster sauce






Preparation:
1. Cook rice according to directions on the package. I love my rice cooker since, for some reason, I can never cook rice over the stove.

2. Spray a skillet with cooking spray and pour in egg substitute. Leave on medium until completely cooked through and you have a sort of egg pancake. Remove from the skillet and cut into strips. Set aside.

3. Heat the chicken, peas and carrots, scallions, and oyster sauce in the skillet over medium heat until hot, about 2-3 minutes. Remove from skillet and set aside.

4. Heat the canola oil in the skillet over medium-high heat and empty rice into the hot oil. Stir to coat rice and let the rice crisp, about 2 to 3 minutes. Add chicken mixture to the rice and pour in soy sauce. Stir and let cook for 1-2 minutes. Add egg strips and cook until egg is reheated.

Just as good as takeout but it saves almost 1/3 of the calories!

Broccoli Rice Cheese Chicken Casserole

I've had to get creative with the meals since I haven't been able to get to the store. I'm still at my mom's friend's house, so I've been raiding her fridge and pantry to come up with a few meals to tide us over. This is what I had to work with for lunch and dinner today. It turned out to be the perfect warm comfort food for a snowy day.

The way I had to make it I wouldn't call it low fat, but with some substitutions (2% cheeses, low fat cream of mushroom soup) it could be a dish that is in my regular rotation, and I don't think it would change the flavor that much, if at all. Note that the calories listed are for the full-fat version.

Yield: 6 servings, 1/6 of an 8x12 casserole dish each, so about a 4x4 inch square.

Ingredients:
1 cup uncooked white rice
10 oz cooked chicken breast
1 10.75 oz can condensed cream of mushroom soup
2 tbsp margarine
1/2 c skim milk
1 12 oz package of frozen broccoli
6 oz Velveeta
1/2 c shredded cheese, cheddar or colby jack blend


Preparation:
1. Cook rice as instructed on package. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. While rice is cooking, steam the broccoli and chop it into pieces. You could use frozen chopped broccoli to make this step easier, but I prefer the Steam Fresh Florets; it seems like in the other packages all you get are stems.

3. Dice the Velveeta cheese into 1/2 inch cubes.

4. Dice the chicken breast into 1/2 inch cubes. All I had on hand was a bag of frozen, pre-cooked diced chicken from Kroger, so I just popped it in the microwave according to the directions. It was good! I am definitely putting it on my shopping list!

5. Once the rice is completely cooked, mix the rice, Velveeta, chicken, broccoli, cream of mushroom soup, water, and milk together in an 8x12 (13x9 is fine if that's all you have, just shave 10 minutes or so off the oven time) casserole dish and press down to even out the top. Put pats of margarine on the top. NOTE: If you want some additional texture, you can also put in a small can of water chestnuts or 1/2 of a small onion. I didn't have either of these on hand this time.

6. Bake for 25 minutes on 350 degrees. At 25 minutes, sprinkle the casserole with the shredded cheese and then return to oven for 10 minutes until the cheese is bubbling. I put the broiler on for the last minute just to get a good crispy texture on the top.

Snowpocalypse 2011: The Insanity Continues

On top of the ice sheet on the roads, six more inches of snow and still falling.

Low Fat Chocolate Chip Cookies

It's my first dessert post! Since I've been cooped up with basically nothing to eat the past couple days, I decided to make some cookies to snack on while I'm at my mom's friends house. I only thought about taking pictures with my phone after I'd made the dough, but I'm sure you'll get the idea.

The best part? These are made without butter (okay, okay, I used margarine, but technically not butter), without oil, limited sugar, and only egg whites! For under 100 calories each! And these are normal sized cookies, I promise. 


Yield: 22 cookies (that's how I counted the calories, but I'm sure you could stretch it to two dozen)

Ingredients:

3/4 c packed brown sugar

1/4 c white sugar

6 tablespoons margarine, melted

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 egg white

3 tbsp water

1 1/2 c all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt 1/2 c semisweet chocolate chips

Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 
2. Sift flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside. 
3. In a medium bowl, mix the melted margarine, brown sugar, and white sugar thoroughly. 
4. Stir in egg white, water, and vanilla extract. 
5. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt mixture and stir until dough forms. 
6. Fold in the chocolate chips. 
7. Refrigerate for 20 minutes. This is important because we started with melted margarine! It will help you form perfect dough balls so your cookies come out pretty, and they'll retain their shape instead of coming out too flat. 
8. Form dough balls and place onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes until lightly browned. They look a little funny like they aren't done yet, but pull them out at 12 minutes and let them sit for 1 minute on the cookie sheet before transferring them to a cooling rack. They will reduce to a normal shape and texture. 

Perfect with a hot cup of coffee!

Snow Days Are Way Better Than Ice Days

So it's the third day where working from home is not only acceptable but necessary because of the sheet of ice that is currently blanketing Dallas. Normally I would love this...working in pajamas, bad daytime television, sipping a cup of coffee, fireplace on...and I did love it the first day. Until Texas decided it needed to force rolling blackouts.

I woke up on Thursday morning and realized that the electricity was off. I texted a few coworkers to see if theirs was out as well, and they told me that there were rolling blackouts and they should last about 15 minutes each. No big deal, right? So I went back to sleep and waited for the electricity to return. And it did, about an hour later. Not exactly the 15 minutes I was promised, but livable. I got up, made some oatmeal and the chai tea I posted, and went to work. About an hour later, the lights went out again, but this time they were back up in about 20 minutes. I figured they'd worked all the kinks out and now were on the right schedule. In another hour, at about 11AM, they shut it off again. I still had some battery on my laptop, so I continued typing my January reflections post, thinking I'd be all ready to post it by the time the lights came back on...but they never did.

I kept waiting and waiting, but an hour passed, and then two hours...and still nothing. I called the electric company to report the outage. I went through all my junk mail that had been piling up. I played some minesweeper on my computer until the battery ran out. I didn't have heat or any way to cook since everything in the apartment is electric. Thank goodness for the gas fireplace, I spent the day sitting on the hearth trying to keep myself busy.

Around 2PM I started getting really hungry and began calling takeout places to get some delivery food. I called for nearly two hours and probably 30 places, and only found one that would deliver to me...and they had a two hour wait. I ordered up a pizza and sat down by the fireplace again, anxiously awaiting the delivery man's arrival.

Once I had my meal, I felt much better, and I tried calling the electric company again. I got a message that they had stopped taking calls, so they didn't have anyone I could speak to who could give me an estimated restore time. I talked to a few people on the phone, then realized that I should probably conserve my battery life and not play Angry Birds until the phone died.

I tried to reheat some of my pizza over the fireplace on a splatter cover and had that for dinner. It was pretty much the most ridiculous thing I've ever done. At that point, I decided it was time to make some decisions, because there was no way I could stay there through the night without heat. The wind chill was at 4 degrees.

I called my mom's friend and she agreed to let me stay at her place, but I had to find a way to get there since my car was stuck in the garage. I found a cab company who agreed to take me, and what should have been a 15 minute drive took about 45 minutes. You could ice skate on the streets; it was just a solid sheet. At 10PM, people were still having wrecks. I couldn't believe anyone was driving anywhere in this.

Yes, that sheet of ice is the street. 

Finally, I made it to her house, had a quick snack and a shower, and fell asleep. So glad I made it over here, because I called the office at my apartment and they said the electricity is still out and won't be fixed before 7PM tonight. I hope everyone else in the building had somewhere to go, because it looks like it could be this way for a while.

Stay warm everyone!

Some Reflections on January

I know I posted the January update yesterday, and even though I technically met the goal on the 24th, I was honestly a little bit disappointed at the result when I had gained back weight and didn't meet my goal on February 1st. The first few weeks are always the easiest to drop weight (mostly water, whatever, it still counts) so I really wanted to see myself beat my goal for the month. So I set myself a higher goal for January (9 pounds instead of 6 pounds) and when I didn't meet that, I didn't feel good about it. 

I think this is why I've gotten discouraged a lot in the past. People have told me that because I'm young, I should be able to easily lose 10 pounds a month, averaging about 2.5 pounds per week. When I wasn't able to meet that, I'd get frustrated with myself and eventually lose faith that I could do it. I’d mess up a couple times during a month and think, well now there’s no point, cause there’s no way I’m losing 10 this month! I have to remind myself that it's a lot of hard work and commitment for a very, very slow payoff. But I’ve been overweight my whole life; why wouldn’t it take a while to change that? It only makes sense.

That's why my goal system right now is going to work for me and help me get over the 10 pounds a month mindset. With the exception of January, my goal for each month is to lose 6 pounds, or about 1.5 pounds per week. When I think about that, my automatic reaction is that the pace is too slow. It’s a self-imposed guilt trip. I think to myself, "You're supposed to be able to lose 2 pounds a week. Why wouldn't you want to do the best that you can?"

I have to remember to answer with reason. I picked a specific weight I wanted to be at by my birthday this year, September 30^th (-57 pounds total). Then, I worked backwards and set my monthly goals, just evenly distributing the weight I need to lose over nine months. I set the goals low on purpose – so I could realistically meet them. I can't argue with math. If I only need to lose 6 pounds a month to meet that ultimate goal, then that's all I need to do. I can take it easy on myself a little bit. I can have a Mexican dinner complete with chips and a margarita and not blow my whole plan out of the water. I can work out on the Wii Fit and actually enjoy it instead of dragging myself to the gym for an hour-long, 600 calorie-burning workout. I can be normal at a Superbowl party and have a beer instead of wine so I don’t lose any street cred with the boys.

With all that, and at the risk of wiping out everything I just said, I weighed in today 2 pounds less than I did yesterday, so I'm already well on my way to meeting February's goal and .2 away from getting another charm for my bracelet! The important part is that I only missed January’s goal by a day, and I’m okay with it. 

Starbucks Addiction: Chai Tea Latte at Home for Under a Dollar

So in my previous Starbucks post, I talked about how I love the chai tea lattes but that I can make them at home very easily and they taste exactly the same as at Starbucks. Now, I know what you might be thinking, because I was skeptical too, but they really do taste EXACTLY like Starbucks version. For under one dollar compared to their $3 and change. Seriously.

Since this isn't really a recipe (hey, at least it's better than the Food Network's "recipes" for Dark Chocolate as a Snack and Late Night Bacon) I'm going to vary from my usual format. You will need:

- A box of Tazo Chai Tea Concentrate, they sell them in a few different types like decaf, organic, etc. (I get mine at Target for about $4 and it has 8 servings)

- Milk, I use 2% because it works best with the foam that we're going to make

- Frother, more on this later

- Dash of cinnamon to make it pretty and smell amazing


First, heat up 2 tablespoons of milk for the foam. Use the mug that is going to hold your latte. Heat up the milk for about 20-30 seconds until warm. Now here is the fun part! Use a frother (mine is an Aerolatte similar to this one, I got it for $10-15 on Amazon). Put the frother tip into the milk, making sure that it is completely covered by the liquid, and press and hold the on button. Move the frother around the bottom of the mug for about 30-45 seconds until a nice stiff foam forms. Make sure the frother is off before you lift it out of the foam. If you don't have the frother completely covered by the liquid while it's on, you will get sprayed with hot milk. Just trust me on this one.

This is how thick the foam should be. 

Mix 1 part of the tea concentrate with 1 part milk in a microwave safe mug or measuring cup. I use 1/2 cup of each to fill a normal sized mug, but use however much you want to drink. Heat it up in the microwave for about a minute and a half, depending on your microwave's strength. The key here is do not let it boil! I like to heat mine up at 20 second intervals after the first minute to make sure it reaches a good temperature.

I use a glass measuring cup so it's easy to pour.

Now we're going to combine the foam and the latte! This is why you want to make the foam in the mug that you want to use to drink; pour the chai and milk combination carefully into the mug with the foam, but do so in a way that the chai goes underneath the foam. If you pour it straight over the foam, it will not hold up, and all that hard work with the frother will be for nothing!

Pour slowly so as not to disturb the foam.

Sprinkle with cinnamon and congratulate yourself on saving $3!

PS: Don't you just love this mug?

The concentrate is great because you can just keep it in your fridge and make a chai latte whenever you want! For an iced chai, just combine 1 part of the concentrate and 1 part milk (again, 1/2 cup and 1/2 cup is the standard serving size) over ice, shake, and enjoy!

Turkey Enchilada Casserole

Since today was a snow day I cooked all three meals and have plenty of leftovers in case I can't make it out tomorrow either! I made scrambled egg beaters with cheese, a light english muffin with light butter, and a turkey sausage patty for breakfast (with a big cup of coffee, of course), for lunch I made some ravioli soup (recipe found here), and for dinner I made this yummy Mexican casserole. 

Before

Yield: 4 servings


Ingredients:

16 oz ground turkey

1/3 c chopped onions

2 tsp dried oregano

1/4 tsp ground cumin

10 corn tortillas 

1 1/3 c shredded 2% Mexican cheese blend 

29 oz can red enchilada sauce

Preparation:

1. In a skillet sprayed with cooking spray over medium-high heat, stir turkey, onion, oregano, and cumin until turkey is crumbly and no longer pink. Reduce to low heat and stir in a cup of enchilada sauce. Add salt to taste.

2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

3. Cut tortillas in half. Arrange a fourth (2.5 tortillas each) of the halves evenly over the bottom of a shallow 3-quart casserole dish, overlapping to fit. Sprinkle a fourth of the cheese (1/3 cup each) evenly over the tortillas, then top with a third of the turkey mixture and a fourth (1/2 cup each) of the remaining enchilada sauce, spreading each level. Repeat to make two more layers of tortillas, cheese, turkey mixture, and sauce; top with another layer of tortillas and sauce, then cheese.

4. Bake in the oven at 425 degrees until cheese is melted and casserole is hot in the center, 18 to 20 minutes. 

5. Sprinkle with chopped cilantro and top with low fat sour cream if desired. 

After!

And tonight, I'll have hot chocolate for dessert! Hope everyone is staying safe and warm!

Monthly Weigh-In: January 2011

This morning I woke up to a beautiful snow day! So while I'm working from home in my pjs, I'll give you the run-down for January.

 So it's the first month wrap-up for me. Overall, I'd say I did pretty well. If it hadn't been for the liberties taken this last week with food and working out, I definitely would've shown more of a loss. That said, my granma died on the 7th and I pretty much checked out for five days, so I am proud of the fact that I didn't gain any weight during that time. I think the main point is that I actually lost weight, and if I continue to lose at even less than this pace, I will meet my goal by my birthday. Now without further ado...


January (and total YTD) Progress:
Weight: -7.8 pounds
Days in calorie range: 19/31
Days worked out: 16/31

February's Goals:
Weight: -7.2
Track budget






February's goal was going to be to lose 6 pounds, but since I didn't quite make it to January's goal, I'm going to add on that extra 1.2 pounds to February and try to catch up to my goal. I'm also starting to keep track of my spending with a budget Excel spreadsheet that I worked on all weekend, so I'm also going to make a non-weight goal of keeping track of what I spend for the whole month and see how much I can save when I put my mind to it.

SNOW DAY!!!!

I will do my monthly update later but this is way more exciting. Here's the view from my front door after I did a little dance for no work today! And now I go back to bed.... :)