Bad idea

When I wrote the last blog I was like,

"oooo those veggie chips are still downstairs..... a few won't hurt. yum chomp, chomp chomp.

So I am almost to my "girl time" and just while I have been sitting here I polished off that bag of veggie chips. They are good, but that was a bad idea. Be careful.

:)

Portobello Mini Pizzas (no bread)

So I have been craving pizza and decided to try something that I saw on Rachel Ray a long time ago. They were really good, filling, quick, and low fat.

2 portobello mushroom caps with stems cut off (Harmons had these for 2 for $3)

marinara sauce (sugar free for HCG)

canadian bacon slices (can be found by the pepperoni at any grocery store)

thin slices of tomato

1 mozerella string cheese

Line a shallow cookie sheet with tin foil and preheat oven to 400 F. Rinse the porobellos and dry with a paper towel or napkin. Place the caps on the cookie sheet and spoon marinara sauce onto the top. Place tomato slices and canadian bacon on the tops. Peel the string cheese into thin strips and place over other toppings.

Heat in oven until cheese is melted.

These are delicious!!!! I haven't tried making them upside down, where you would fill the mushroom bottom but I bet it might be good too. You could also try using different toppings these were just my favorite.

Other findings: I found some vegitable chips at Target that are so good! I have missed that crunch sensation from crackers and chips and that worked well.

If any one knows where to get cocoanut oil for really cheap, please let me know.

Thanks, Alies

Fitness Test

Well today was sort of a downer. Since I am now on phase 2 of the HCG diet I decided that I am going to start working out more to tone up and manage my weight until I go on another round of the HCG diet in July.

PS. I went from 211 down to 174 from April 3 to May 23. That is 37 lbs in less than 2 months!!!!

So I joined Lifetime Fitness in Riverton and went in for my fitness test today. It was pretty discouraging. Even with losing almost 40 lbs I am still considered obese and am "not fit" according to every standard. GRRR. I mean at least I am eating so much better, but I have a long road ahead of me until I am considered "healthy".

I feel like I was a food aholic and now I am paying the toll of 24 years of binge drinking or something. Anytime I am around food I look at it like it is heroin or something that if I even take one bite of that, I might go back to where I started. They really need to have like a food-aholics meeting group or something for those of us who are changing our ways.

I just wish that the food market would come out and tell us exactly how unhealthy the food that they are promoting is. I mean even Sweet Tomatoes or Subway is like TERRIBLE unless you are only eating the vegitables, fruit, and whole wheat bread. And I was eathing out all the time, chips, soda, snacks, pastries, pasta. CRAP. And not exercising like at all. So now I am paying my dues I guess.

You eat crap, you will feel and look like crap. Unless you are Josh..... That boy could eat a crap 24/7 and look like a Rock Star.

Anyways so new goals aside from eating better:
1. Go to the gym Mon-Fri for at least 45min.
2. Stretch/ yoga every morning and every night.
3. Lift weights twice a week.

I have been reading a new book about doing hard things called
DO HARD THINGS

And it is really great. I can DO this if I make it a priority in my life.
So I will keep this updated and let you all know how it is going.
:) Alies

Other recipes and life

So the diet is going great. I didn't loose that much weight last week, but after another apple day I have lost 3 more pounds. So the total so far is 33. Yeah!!!! So that is way cool. I feel a lot cuter, and Josh couldn't be happier... :)

I even went shopping for some teacher clothes cuz target had five 75% off racks today. And I got 2 really cute shirts for under $10. And they were medium and small, not EXTRA LARGE. So that felt really nice too.

Chlesea asked me the other day "Wouldn't it suck if this were all a dream, and we woke up tomorrow and were all chubby again?" It just is so fast! I have lost 33 pounds in a little over a month!!!!! It almost does seem like a dream. And I never want to be that big again. It is scary to even imagine gaining all of it back. I am even reading a diet book I got at the DI a while back called, "I'll Never Be Fat Again" by Carole Livingston-Stuart. It has some great ideas in it and reccomend it to anyone who is doing a major diet, especially the HCG. She gives a life change approach to keeping the weight off and tells it how it is... HARD.

One quote that I really liked from the book was, "Knowing you are thin is like knowing you have had an orgasm. You either know you did or you didn't. If you hope or think that you did, you didn't. When you are thin you know you are thin." HA HA! Oh man, I about fell out of my bed I was laughing so hard. Sorry if that was a big graphic for some readers. :)

Well here are a few more recipes.....

Bunless Burger

3 0z of extra lean ground beef

1/2 red onion

iceberg/ bib lettuce

1 Tomato

Grill the hamburger as a patty, and serve with the vegetables.
Here are some types hamburgers you can create:

Phase 2 options

Blue Cheese Stuffed Burgers

Sprinkle of Worstichire sauce

Minced onion

blue cheese crumbles

Salt and Pepper

Mix the meat with the onion, sauce and salt and pepper. Then stuff the blue cheese crumbles inside of the patty when you are molding the meat into patties. (This sounds so freakin' amazing, I can't wait to be on phase 2)

Another idea Carmalize yellow onion cut into rings in your frying pan and top them on your burger.

So it isn't letting me copy paste on here and I am tired, but if you look at Rachel Ray's site in Recipes under burgers she has a lot of great ideas for spices, and other ingreadients that you can add to your burger to make it aweome. http://http//www.rachaelray.com/food_results.php?kID=38

One great idea I saw was to make a spinich artichoke burger with spinich in the patty topped with artichoke hearts and a slice of melted provalone???? Can you say yum? oha man

Well then there is the idea that came from work. I was watching a girl make the Bruscetta pasta and decided that I am going to try to make my own bruscetta tomorrow and put it on the melba toast crusted yogurt chicken that I put on here a while back. If it is good I will post that recipe.

But today I tried making some battered baked Zucchini with the same melba toast/ yogurt idea and it was really good. So here you go

Battered Baked Zuchini

1 small Zucchini

2 Tablespoons of plain fat free yogurt

1 Melba Toast ( you can find these at Harmons, or Smiths, Albertsons too.)

Salt and Pepper

Slice the zucchini into lengthwise strips or coins and coat in yogurt. Place on a piece of wax paper on a cookie sheet. Sprinkle with Melba toast crumbs and Salt and pepper. Bake at 375 F until the zuchini is tender.

I used to go to Astro burger all the time and get the deep fried battered zucchini. So this was a nice way to satisfy that craving.

I will be posting the phase 2 cocoanut oil ideas I found probablly tomorrow or sunday.

Question: has anyone tried making a cake or brownies out of black beans? I am thinking of trying it? Any ideas or recipes would be great. Thanks

Alies

Mock mayo waldorf, and strawberry shake

Allright so I have been reading up on a few things and really experimenting to try and make some of the things I miss. It hasn't worked out as well as I hoped on some recipes but on others I canot believe how good things can taste without any fat, oil, or sugar.

So here are a few attempts from the past few days....

I went to a wedding shower a few weeks ago and they had that waldorf chicken salad in croissants and I about died watching people go back for 2-3 sandwhiches while I sat there eating my cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and raw califlower with no dip. Then they only had a sugary punch to drink and no filtered water. grrrr... anyways, so I decided to try something a little bit different to make a waldorf salad.

I was talking to Mellie and she said that a girl she knows substitutes ground up califlower as mayo on her husband's sandwiches so that he eats some vegitables without realizing it.

So I decided to try to make some mock mayo out of califlower.







Waldorf Salad
1 long stem of celelry
1 granny smith apple
Iceberg lettcue (as a mock croissant)
3 oz chicken

Mock mayo
About a handful of califlower, steamed
garlic salt
paprika
lemon juice
apple cider vinegar
spash of milk
salt
pepper
chopped up fresh chives about 1 tsp
chopped up green onions about 2 tsp

So first I put the chicken in to bake on 375 F for about 30 minutes. I but it in a baking dish that was covered with waxpaper so that the chicken won't stick.

Cut up your califlower and steam it or boil it until it is tender.

Chop up the chives, and green onions.

In a bullet or a blender (my mom just got a Bullet for mother's Day and I love that thing, you can blend ANYTHING.) combine the mayo ingredients and add the seasonings to taste.

This didn't taste perfect and I think that I am definately going to work on it a bit for flavor, but it worked pretty well. My mom ate it up in minutes so I am guessing it was good, and she said it was good.????

Place the dressing in the fridge to cool. (it will look a litttle bit green because of the chives)

When the chicken is done separate it into pieces with a fork and place it in the freezer on a plate to cool. Chop up the apple and the clelery and place in a bowl. Add the chicken pieces and dressing to coat. Roll into the lettuce if you want a kind of sandwhich, or just eat it out of the bowl.


This recipe needs some work, but if you try it and find a different spice or mix it differently let me know. You can also add some stevia to the dressing to make it sweeter if you want.

In my next phase I want nuts in this and some grapes.

The ground up califlower with milk would really make a great base for other dressings because it is really creamy. When I am in my next phase and I can have cheese I am going to try some blue cheese crumbles in this for sure. Maybe even add a ranch packet to it if I can and make some ranch dressing.

Also in researching for the next phase I found another mock mayo recipe that I am going to try with cocoanut oil. ??? I will let you know how that goes.

Fat free strawberry shake:

This was soooo good.

I was craving ice cream really bad, and so I whipped this up for fun.

Handful of frozen strawberries, lime juice, crushed ice, stevia, spash of skim milk.

I didn't really measure the ingredients just added them to taste, and it tasted awesome. I put this in that bullet of my mom's and it worked great. But I believe that a blender would be just fine.

New FATFREE /HCG precipes

So now that I have been out of school for a week I have had some time to whip up some new things in the kitchen. It seriously is one of my favorite things to do. And I love making things that I really liked before the diet all dieted and fat freed out:)

So here are a few that I have made.

Chile Rellenos/ Stuffed red Peppers

One Red Bell Pepper

3 oz. of Extra Lean Ground Beef

1/2 of a yellow onion sliced into cubes

1/2 tsp of minced garlic

1 tsp of tomato paste

1 TB of beef stock

Salt and Pepper

sprinkle of cumin

sprinkle of smoked paprika

sprinkle of ground cinnamon

Turn on your oven broiler on high.

Cut the bell pepper in half lenthwise and remove seeds.

Place the pepper halves on a baking sheet and place in the oven under the broiler flipping them so that both sides get charred and black spotted. (most Recipes have them all the way black, but I liked it not very black, just kinda charred.)

Brown your beef on medium high. once browned add the onion, garlic, and other seasonings.

When the pan starts to get sticky add the beef sock and let simmer on medium until the stock is evaporated and cooked in to the beef mix.

Remove pepper from oven and fill with the beef mixture. Serve hot!

This is sooooo good and if you like it a little less spicy, you can add more cinnamon to make it a little bit sweet. Super yummy if you are craving some mexican.

And you can bet y our bottom that when I am in phase 2 that cheese is gonna be on this too. :)

String Bean Chicken

3 oz of chicken

1/2 of a yellow onion sliced into cubes

1 TB of chicken stock

1/2 tsp of minced garlic

handful of fresh green beans snapped in halfs

Fill a small frying pan bottom with about 1/2 in of water and bring to a rolling boil.

Place your beans in the pan and add salt boil these until they are still crisp but really green.

In another frying pan brown your chicken with the chicken stock and add the garlic and onion.

When the pan starts to get brown, drain and add your beans.

Brown this for about another minute. Serve with salt.

I took this idea from when I worked at Panda Express. You are supposed to cook it in a diffferent sauce, but this tasted pretty similar. Just don't over cook the beans or else it looks like this...

Well that is all I have time for now. But I will post some more soon. :)

So happy and excited to let you know that I am going to be Student Teaching this fall at Bennion Elementary!!!! It is in Taylorsville, so I am glad that I won't have to Drive too far. I will find out and meet my teacher I will be working with on the 21st of May. So, yeah. Can a person be this excited? I feel so elated. Anyways...

Diet news. I have lost 30 lbs now and the diet is still going great.