Before we left for vacation I got a package from Weight Watchers asking me to try out their new Red Velvet Crème Cakes.  Long time readers will know that Weight Watchers was how I lost 70 pounds back in 1999-2000.

Weight Watcher’s new campaign “Tasting is Believing.”

Each cake is 90 calories and has 4 grams of fiber, or 2 WW points.

The verdict?  These are delicious.  I actually like the size of it – two bites and your sweet tooth is satisfied.  It’s not overly sweet and I also like the fact that they are individually wrapped so it helps with portion control.  Thanks Daniel for letting me sample these treats!

Breakfast yesterday was a Biz McMuffin, this time with goat cheese, egg whites and baby spinach with fresh fruit.

I thought I had planned my insulin perfectly – look at all that fruit!  I was shocked when I tested my blood sugar before working out that it was 127 – while normal, too low for me to work out.

On my last Sam’s Club run I thought it was a good idea to buy 10 pounds of carrots because they were only $2.98!  The bag was so big it hardly fit in my vegetable drawer!  So I decided to find out what the hell I could do with carrots.  Have you ever had carrot soup?  Me either.  I found inspiration from this blog.  The only changes are underlined below.

Carrot & Ginger Soup

4 servings: 1.5 cups each:

• with heavy cream added:  262 calories, 12 fat, 32 carbs, 5.3 fiber and 3.6 protein
• without heavy cream added:  160 calories, 1.9 fat, 31 carbs, 5.3 fiber and 3.6 protein

Ingredients:

• 8 medium-large carrots, peeled + chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped  (nope!
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon Earth Balance (or olive oil)
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1 teaspoon thyme
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 32 ounces vegetable stock
• 1 tablespoon raw sugar (I used a teaspoon)
• salt + pepper to taste
• I added 1 teaspoon of crushed red pepper
• I added 12 ounces of cooked potato with skin on
• I added 1/2 cup of heavy cream at the end

Since I made this before work, I just chopped up the carrots and added everything in the pot except the heavy cream and cooked over medium heat for 30 minutes.  Off the heat I used my stick blender to puree and then stirred in the heavy cream.

I had a basil, baby spinach, roasted red pepper and goat cheese panini on the side.  Holy yum!  I really really liked this soup.  The red pepper balances out the sweetness of the carrots, and I think the potato gave it some more texture too.

I had on our dinner menu cauliflower pizza crust pizza.  Um, turns out I didn’t read all the directions and the cauliflower crust had to bake longer than I expected, so I just went with my go to no rise pizza dough:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 cup water
• 1 teaspoon yeast
• 1 teaspoon salt

Mix together and roll it out.  No need to rise.  Although its been so long since I’ve made my own thin crust pizza, I forgot two important steps – one, to pre-bake the crust for about 5-7 minutes, and two, taking the pizza off the pizza stone and putting it directly on the oven rack for the last 5 minutes to crisp up the crust.

So while this is good, it wasn’t great.  Oh well, can’t win them all.

We had storms last night so I had to keep the computer turned off, so I am not sure about my calorie stats for the day, but my guess is around 1600.

We have more storms in the forecast today, although right now at 7:30 in the morning it’s sunny and 65.  So I decided to make crock pot tacos for our work lunch today with cilantro rice and my baja fresh salsa and chips.  I was actually able to grill the tomatoes before the storms came through last night.

I never met my 100 mile goal for May, although I will follow through and announce a winner of my salsa tomorrow for all those who joined in my challenge.  Also, new June goals will be posted tomorrow!  (hint: insanity may be in my future!)

Make it a great day!

So it’s not unusual for me to be Bizzy in my Kitchen before work.  Over the weekend I bought a whole container – nearly three cups – of poppy seeds for only $1.58!  Since I know my boss likes sweet breakfasts over savory ones, I decided to make some poppy seed pancakes with slivered almonds.

I was going to use honey as my sweetener.  I just bought an $8 jar.  But as I was reaching for it, I changed my mind and decided to use agave nectar.  Sadly, I didn’t put the honey back on the shelf right, and before I knew it, my honey smashed on the counter and then all over the floor.

Somehow I thought I could catch it, and in the process ended up cutting my left hand in three places.

Instead of getting pissed, I slowed my roll, and thought with all the ugly shit going on in the world today, if this was the worst thing to happen to me today it was all good.  It did end up taking me 15 minutes to clean up though!  And in the end, the pancakes were worth it!

Almond Poppy Seed Pancakes

• makes 10
• 135 calories, 2.4 fat, 21 carbs, 3.6 fiber and 4.8 protein

Ingredients:

• 2 cups whole wheat white flour (I used King Arthur)
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 1.5 cups vanilla soy milk
• 2 eggs
• 3 tablespoons agave nectar
• 1/3 cup poppy seeds
• 10 teaspoons of slivered almonds

I am lazy, so I just mix everything together just until combined.  None of this shit of one bowl for dry, one bowl for wet, then combine.  I used a 1/4 cup measuring cup to make mine.  Once the batter is in the pan, then I sprinkled the teaspoon of slivered almonds over the top, pressed them in a bit so they wouldn’t fall out during the flip. I served with sugar free syrup and a couple slices of deli ham.

I like these pancakes because they are not overly sweet, and with the sugar free syrup its just right.

I am sore people from my cross fit workout the other day.  Especially my shoulders and delts (I think?).  So I just did 32 minutes on the StairMaster on the interval setting – 2 minutes fast until you think you can’t step anymore, then 2 minutes slow to recover.  I was super sweaty in the end!

Over the weekend I picked up some naan bread – 5 loaves for .99 cents!  I decided to make a naan pizza for lunch, using leftover grilled chicken from our Caeser salad the other night.  I also used baby spinach and chopped jarred roasted red pepper.

Even though the package says “nan” I always thought it was “naan?”  Correct me if I am wrong!    Each loaf is 230 calories.  (note to self, clean out the office toaster oven!)

Yum and yum.  I was planning on having that whole pizza you see in the toaster oven.  But one of the partners was running late, didn’t have a lunch and had to leave for a meeting in 15 minutes, so I split my plate with her (um, she was going to eat a bag of brownies!).  And you know what?  That plate was plenty! #winning!

Even with the honey debacle, I still managed to cook some rice in the rice cooker before work so Tony could make his famous fried rice.   Chicken, broccoli, carrots, water chestnuts and bean sprouts.  If it were up to me I would double the veggies, but I cannot complain – it is the best fried rice I’ve ever had.  And I didn’t bring out the low sodium soy sauce either!

Yum and yum.  It was all I could do not to finish that entire bowl, but I restrained myself and ate 3/4.  Ha!

So the day before yesterday?  I was hungry all day.  I ended up having snacks of granola in the afternoon at work and then had a cup of peanuts in the shell after dinner and ended up with about 1900 calories.  Yesterday?  Just a couple garlic crisps with some cheese spread.

Stats for the Day:

• no stretching because of operation honey clean up
• 32 minute Stairmaster
• 1394 calories, 44 fat, 152 carbs, 13 fiber, 81 protein
• 44% of calories from carbs, 28% from fat and 28% from protein

Today I think I am going to swim to hopefully loosen up.  Right now I have some carrot potato soup on the stove – lunch today is carrot soup with a ham, roasted red pepper and goat cheese panini.

I puffy heart goat cheese.  Question of the Day:  Do you like goat cheese?

Make it a great day!

Thanks to all of you for welcoming me back from vacation!  It was funny when I went to the grocery store on Monday the first half of my basket was all fruits and vegetables, I think even my body was like “no more meat!”

Since I didn’t have a blog to post yesterday I got my walking shoes on and went for a 30 minute walk before work – so refreshing to start the day out like that. 

Breakfast yesterday was what I like to call an inside out omelet –it’s low carb and high protein too!.  This was for two servings, one for me and one for my boss:

Inside Out Omelet

2 servings:  223 caloires, 6.7 fat, 6.1 carbs, .2 fiber and 33 protein

• 4 slices of deli ham
• 1.5 cups liquid egg whites
• 1.5 cups chopped baby spinach
• 2 roasted red peppers, chopped (I used jarred in water)
• 1 ounce of cheddar cheese

Scramble the egg whites with the spinach and peppers.  It takes a while – I usually just put that in my pan on medium and walk away for about 5 minutes. 

When I got to work I laid out the ham, divided the egg mixture between the slices of ham.  I put the filling at the top of the ham slice, then rolled it tight.  Sprinkled the cheddar cheese over the top and then put in under the broiler until the cheese was melty and the filling was heated through.  I was in a hurry so no natural light in these pics!

My sister is friends on Facebook with Courtney from Biggest Loser Season 11.

She posted a workout on her wall that my sister said might work for me during a lunch time workout.  At the time, I didn’t know it was a cross-fit workout until my co-worker told me it was!

First of all, I totally modified this – I did a 1 mile run, then for the pull-ups, I used the rings like this for the 100 pull ups:  Still fucking hard though!

Then I did 50 push ups, 50 sit ups, 100 air squats and then finished with a 1 mile run.  It took me 40:50!   I am happy that my first mile and second mile were almost the exact same pace!

        

My friend Jody put on Facebook that they were showing cross fit on the Extreme Weight loss show last night.  I told her I was taping it.  She’s a huge cross-fit fan, has lost 40+ pounds and keeps trying to convince me to do it.  Here was our conversation:

I thought it was funny when she said “and ur still alive?!”  I am feeling it today – especially in my back and shoulders.  As soon as I hit publish on this post I am going to do my Classical Stretch on the DVR to stretch out.

When I was at Sam’s Club I saw they had a new salad kit for only $2.39.  I was going to make a chopped Asian salad from scratch, but I couldn’t buy all the ingredients for that price, so I used this as the base.

It said it was 3.5 servings, I only made it two.  I used 1/3 of the dressing and my boss used the other 2/3 – I don’t like an overly dressed salad.  Monday night when I was grilling our steak, I cooked the chicken for this dish.  The chicken marinated for about 2 hours before cooking, but I am sure it would be even better marinated overnight.

Asian Marinade

4 servings:  53 calories, 3.1 fat, 5.3 carbs, .1 fiber and .5 protein

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon sesame oil
• 2 tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon splenda (you could use sugar)
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon fresh chopped ginger
• .25 cups water
• 1 teaspoon sriracha

I may or may not have added sriracha to my salad.

I also drank all my Detox Water at work.  You know how I could tell I was dehydrated?  I drank all 2 liters and only went to the bathroom once!       

                

Dinner was grilled chicken Caesar salad – a super easy week night dinner.

I had to stop by Walgreen’s after work to pick up my insulin.  I had to get a new prescription when I went to the doctor a few weeks ago.  I have no idea what he wrote down, but I got two boxes of pens for the price of one!  Normally a box costs me $40, yesterday I got 2 boxes for $40!

Check out how much it would have cost without insurance for those two boxes – crazy!  I don’t know what people do without insurance!

Alright, off to stretch – make it a great day!

I am happy to say that we are safely back home after our trip to Austin.  While I loved being away, not having to worry about work, seeing my family, eating great food, etc., it is nice to be back home. 

Tony made me a delicious breakfast this morning – it was nice to have a home cooked meal!  Creamy spicy eggs in a Pam fried corn tortilla. Love the extra sriracha on top!

While on vacation I ate a lot of food. 

Italian beef sandwiches with chips and cookies on the boat.

I need to recreate this dip at home – Lizz recommended it and it was so spicy and delicious!  I think I ate 3/4 of the container by myself with everything flat bread crackers.  We found this at HEB – biggest grocery store ever!

 

Best sausage hands down at The Salt Lick:

The brisket was good too:

They let me enter the employee doors to get a good picture of the pit at Salt Lick – the smell is amazing!

We had burgers twice for lunch:  One at Elevation Burger.  This burger was good, but what made it great was a balsamic mustard sauce – I must recreate this sauce at home!

And Mighty Fine Burger.  Tony and I were underwhelmed at this burger for the price.

One night Joe, Lizz and I went to Chuy’s Mexican restaurant.  The place was packed on a Tuesday night!  The Boom Boom sauce on the side was amazeballs:

We had avocado egg rolls and sweet and spicy shrimp at Kona Grill.  Tony and I never thought we’d ever say these words, but it was too much avocado in these rolls, and they had stinky red onions in them.

I ended up getting a delicious pan fried noodles with beef tenderloin.  I asked them if they could make it spicy and leave out the onions.

udon noodles, beef tenderloin, vegetables, black bean garlic sauce

I really wanted to eat this whole dish, but I ended up eating half of it.  So flavorful, the meat was tender.  I never even heard of Kona Grill before but found there are two in Illinois. 

And on the last day I finally got to go to my first food truck!  I realized that a lot of the food trucks are either open at lunch time – typically 11:00 to 2:00 and then don’t open again until like 11:00 at night for the bar crowds.

We found that Garbo’s Lobster Truck was about a 20 minute drive from Joe and Lizz’s house and that was our lunch on Friday.

You had your choice of either doing it “Connecticut Style” or “Maine Style.”  Joe and I went with the Connecticut style – toasted bun, lobster and tarragon butter sauce.  Tony got the Maine style which is the classic version with a light mayo dressing.    After taking the stinky scallions off, this was an amazing sandwich – so much lobster!

But the best food for me was at Rudy’s BBQ.  Blog readers Peggy and Mary told me it was the best BBQ in Texas.  Best suggestion ever.

You buy the food by the pound.  Tony and I ordered half a pound of the lean brisket, and a link of sausage and potato salad.  Lizz and Joe step up to order a pound of the moist brisket, 1/2 a pound of turkey breast, jalapeno sausage and creamed corn.

They just give you butcher paper for a plate and lots of white bread!

The moist brisket was to die for.

I love my step daughter-in-law and was glad we spent time to get to know her better.  They moved away to Austin about three months after they started dating, got married at the justice of the peace last November and had a whirl wind trip to Chicago after that and we didn’t get to see much of them.

#1 reason I love her?  She loves her food!  She’s tiny, probably about five feet tall and maybe 110 pounds?  It was amazing to watch her build her sandwich at Rudy’s.

I drank lots of beer:

              

    

So I was shocked as shit when I stepped on the scale this morning.  Not kidding I had a dream while on vacation that I stepped on the scale when I got home and it said I weighed 206 pounds and I was worried how I was going to explain a 26 pound weight gain to you guys!

I lost 2.4 pounds!  I don’t recommend this diet to you, but I am happy not to have gained 5 pounds, because we all know that it takes four times as long to lose the weight than it is to gain.

We had fun with Joe and Lizz:

Lizz is a huge Brittney Spears fan, love it!

Got to see my brother Charlie and his family.  Charlie and I being goofy!

   

I only got to see my niece Sarah (on the right) for a quick lunch before she had to head back to Denton where she’s working this summer while school is out.  I got to spend more time with Rachel since I slept over at their house on Tuesday.  I knew she had to leave the house by 8:15 and when I woke up at 7:45 and she was still asleep, I went to her room and climbed in bed with her.  She had the radio alarm going and I started singing Demi Levato’s Heart Attack really loud to wake her up!

Yep, I am the crazy Aunt B.!!  We laughed so hard at that.  This Wednesday I am going to send her a text at 7:45 asking her if she wished I was there to sing her awake!

Charlie and my SIL Laura:

And I will miss Cinnamon Bun.

It just reminds me how much I miss having a dog, and Cinnamon is just so friendly.

Tony liked him too, well, until Cinnamon decided to jump off the couch several times using Tony’s balls as a spring board!  Tony also thought he was a noisy dog, but I got used to it.  If we ever get another dog, Tony would never go for a tiny dog like Cinnamon, but I loved him.

We enjoyed our time on Lake Travis – Tony is a great captain!

Of the 507 pictures I took?  Not one of me and Tony together!  I’ll have to see if the kids took any on their iPhones.

Now I am off to meal plan and do a grocery store run.  It will be nice to get Bizzy in my Kitchen again!  I only made salsa once so I literally haven’t cooked anything in 9 days – I think that’s a record!

Hope everyone is having a great Memorial Day.  I probably won’t post again until Wednesday – I hope to walk before work tomorrow!  See you then!

 

Happy Friday!!  Hope everyone has had a great week.  I can’t believe we will be heading home tomorrow already!  Today is hopefully the day that I will eat off of a food truck.  We are going to find Garbo’s Lobster truck – how bad could that be?!

I am still having to use my phone to load pictures from my iPhone onto a blog post.  I have about 300+ on my Nikon!  So these pictures are in no particular order.

I love Joe and Lizz’s pets, but especially the dog.  It makes me miss Ed all the more.  He actually even slept in bed with us and I am seriously trying to think of a way to bring him home with us!  Tony thinks he’s too noisy of a dog, but not me.  As a thank you for their hospitality, I went to Walgreen’s yesterday and printed out two pictures I liked of Jasmine and Cinnamon Bun and put it in a frame.

 

Yesterday Joe treated us to a movie at the theater he works at.  If you have never seen a movie at an iPic before, you are missing out.  Recliner seats, a call button for a server to give you anything you need.  Great food, blankets if you get too chilly.  We ended up seeing Hangover III.  Um, save your money and wait until it comes out on video.  A few chuckles, but that’s about it.

 

 

On Wednesday night Tony and I went to 6th Street.  I was a little worried because it was going to be a lot of walking for Tony but he was a trooper.  We stopped at one bar to have a beer.  We were trying to decide where to go, when we realized we couldn’t find the restaurant we wanted so we ended up at an Irish Pub.  I know what you are thinking – in the heart of Austin, tex-mex capital of the world, and you eat an Irish Pub?

But it ended up being a great choice.  Being that we are middle aged, ahem, by about 8:00, the quiet bar that we had our first beer at turned into a loud house band show, and when we were walking back to the car almost all the bars were so loud with music that you probably couldn’t even have a conversation!

This is one of the owners of the bar.  He called his bar the “grown up” bar on the strip, and it was true nearly everyone else in the place was around our age.  They had a trivia night that we participated in and it was fun.  The food?  I ended up ordering a grilled chicken sandwich with roasted red pepper and goat cheese on Texas toast.  So good.  But Tony’s rule of thumb is order what you think their house specialty is, which in the case of an Irish Pub, fish and chips was his go to.

Sadly, the breading was kind of greasy, and the fish was just okay.  We didn’t say anything to the owner about it, but Tony did a yelp review. 😀

 

 

Last night we went to Kona Grill, which I found out is a chain and they actually have one in Oakbrook and Lincolnshire at home.  Holy crap, this plate of food was so flavorful and good – pan noodles with beef tenderloin and vegetables (no onions!) and I asked them to kick it up a notch and it was perfectly seasoned.  I wish I could have finished the whole plate, but I ended up bringing half of it home.

 

 

On the way back to the car Wednesday night, we stopped to go to the bathroom and have one final drink before heading home.  This was the sign on the woman’s bathroom!

 

I have been loving the local beers I’ve tried since we got here.  The beer below is Fireman’s Brew #4.  Super light, crisp and refreshing.

 

We have had such a great time this week.  It’s nice not to think about work.  Going to bed whenever and waking up whenever and just seeing where the day takes us.

Thanks again to Lizz and Joe for opening up their home to us this week.  We appreciate it and it made this vacation all the more affordable.

Although truth be told, I miss the kitchen.  The only thing I’ve made all week is a big batch of grilled cherry salsa, and I am looking forward to getting back in the kitchen and making some healthy food next week.  Detox week for me next week, getting back to the gym, drinking the detox water and eating healthy food.

Hope you all have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!  See you on Monday!  Hugs!