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.... :)