Elbow deep in brownies

I've been planning a retirement party for one of our most preeminent scientists for the last few weeks. It has been kind of stressful, as everyone wanted the party to reflect how much we admire and respect this man's work. He made some key discoveries in understanding the link between radiation and cancer. At any rate, the bottom line to all this is that I spent the day, pretty much literally elbow-deep in high-end gourmet brownies and cookies. Ask Jennifer. Just ridiculous. I did ok trying not to eat them for most of the day, but did have some. For some reason resisting has been harder - being surrounded by excellent food all day...those brownies really were worth it. Also we had so many choices and kinds of desserts and food. I did cave a bit...for months I really didn't even want the stuff, but today I was working to stop....and then I came home to the most excellent spaghetti and meatballs made by my fabulous chef sister-in-law. I ate 3 small ones and a right-sized portion of pasta but I easily could have eaten double. Oh well. I'm glad now that I didn't, as overeating does make me ill now...but one more meatball would have been awesome!

Buffalo pasta

I'm not sure why this anti-processed foods gal has such a thing for Buffalo sauce, but we can't always define or choose what we're attracted to. Otherwise we'd use an algorithm to find our mates.

So one of my favorite summer meals is Buffalo Chicken Salad - a great substitute to eat when you're craving something really super greasy and disgusting like Buffalo wings. Indya can offer her opinion - she and Ben tried it. The other night I tried a new take on things - Buffalo pasta. Recipe below salad recipe.

Buffalo Chicken Salad

• Fill bowls with lettuce and any other vegetables you like - peppers, cukes, onion, etc.
• Sprinkle 1 Tbs blue cheese crumbles on salad. I give Dave more and me less.
• Grill or cook lightly seasoned boneless thighs or breasts, although in this recipe thighs are better. Sometimes I mix them both.
• When chicken is done, chop into small slices and then toss in separate bowl with Buffalo sauce from supermarket. You may want to set some aside for the kids that has no sauce.
• Place warm chicken on top of salad and serve with either old and vinegar or blue cheese dressing (I uesd to make blue cheese dressing, but now I'm lazy and mix half TJ's brand with half non-fat Fage yogurt). With all the other saucy stuff going on you don't need much dressing.
• I sometimes serve with some starch - leftover brown rice, brown pasta or if I have a nice bread in house. If I'm really craving the chicken I will have no starch and more chicken, but sometimes I want a starch to cut the sauce down a bit.

Buffalo Pasta Leftovers

Not sure what inspired me to try this.....and I don't remember the amounts that well. I made a really small serving as the flavor combination was a gamble.

• In bowl put cooked whole wheat pasta, with drizzle of Buffalo sauce, 2-3 Tbs low-fat ricotta (but find a brand without fillers) blue cheese crumbles.
• Slices of lean meat like chicken or pork loin
• Heat all in microwave slightly. Mix.
• Eat a small amount with a large salad!

Fat-free salad dressing haters vindicated!

First off.....An interesting story on NPR discusses some known facts and specifically quotes some research that found that salad eaten with fat-free salad dressing resulted in lower nutritional absorption than that same salad eaten with olive oil. I feel this vindicates the notion that fake chemically foods are gross and bad for you.

On a related note.....I do wish there were more data on exactly which kinds of vegetables are most nutritious. SO much conflicting information. My general attitude is to eat a variety of different colored fruits and vegetables each day. I try and buy local and organic but sometimes the prohibitive prices coupled with the convenience of the supermarket win me over to more traditional American purchasing habits.

Here are things I've heard, but would like to understand better:

• In Pollan - vegetables have vastly different levels of nutrients depending on the part of the country and soil they're grown in. A scientific study was meant to be done decades ago but farmers protested and it was nixed.
• Frozen veggies are better than fresh as they're frozen immediately so nutrients don't deteriorate while traveling. Is this true? Is it more true for some fruits/veggies than others?
• If nutrients do deteriorate while traveling, at what rate, what is the date of picking of the veggies I'm buying, and how much do they deteriorate each day, is it a linear deterioration? What if they sit in my fridge for a few days? What percentage of their nutrients are being lost over what time period?
• After coming up with all these questions I just decided to eat a mix of fresh and frozen, depending on what I like and figure that I'm doing pretty well if I'm not eating Lean Cuisine, no matter where my veggies are from.
• I know organic produce has higher nutrient levels, but at what rate? 5% more, 80% more?

My problem is that there is so much ideological blather about local, organic, etc. and I would like to see more facts so I can make an educated decision about what is practical and realistic.

As for my carbon footprint - I get that veggies shipped from far away are bad for the planet. But at some level so is everything I do that has any sort of energy cost. I try to be conscientious in general. I'm not a fan of large SUVs, massive houses, and our super-sized American lifestyle in general. But sometimes I want to give my kids strawberries in the winter. Selfish I understand, but at a certain point the argument of leaving a smaller footprint would advocate my living in a tent and eating canned green beans all winter. Currently I'm not sure exactly what the right balance is.....

Stealing another's idea

This looks fantastic - Carrie I'm sure you'll love it.....

Foccacia picture

Day off

I like the concept of taking a day off, most likely Saturday. WW gives a person 35 extra floater points and I don't use many during the week. Maybe 5-6 in kind of willful undercounting. Like when my lunch is 7 pts but I don't want to admit it so I call it 6. I don't use all 35 for my day off. (sometimes 2 half-days off depending on what is planned for the weekend). And I try not to go utterly crazy, just on principal. Just because you have the points doesn't mean you should act like a complete glutton. Also, unlike the daily points, the 35 points are optional, it says right in the literature don't eat them all if you want faster weight loss. Not that I'm trying to lose, but I still like the structure of saving splurges for the weekend or special events, and I don't want pigging out as a reward to be part of my lifestyle.

This past week, I was feeling kind of restrained, wanting to eat seconds at dinner on both Thursday and Friday. I made some pretty yummy food and wasn't sure how much of it to eat and I probably under-counted a bit. So I ate a little more - after all, I'm on maintenance! But I just had that feeling of wanting to eat to complete fullness, like before. I looked forward to Saturday and left the kitchen.

So yesterday, at around 10:30 am I was hungry and I knew full well I was really just thirsty from the heat, but then I remembered that it was Saturday and I could eat whatever I wanted - including between meals! For me Saturday is not so much about what foods I eat as how much, and when. I let go of all my structure. I took out the fabulous foccacia I had made (recipe below) and some edamame dip I'd bought and had a few pieces, along with a huge glass of seltzer water. Now instead of waiting to see if I was full, I decided to really indulge - to just pig out basically and had a couple more pieces (they were small, maybe 1" x 4" strips) and then finally stopped. Now usually on my day off, I eat extra, but I don't totally pig out. I still show SOME restraint. Not this time.

About 20 min later, I was so full and nauseated I could barely concentrate. I have not been that full in years maybe. I rarely if ever did that before I dieted - I just ate small amounts all day long. I felt like such a huge idiot. Not for wasting the calories, but for wasting the treat of my day off by feeling sick for hours. I didn't even eat that much, but my stomach is not used to overeating at all any more. I was so full I didn't even think about food until about 4pm when I picked a couple things, and then had a normal dinner.

So if you looked at the whole day, I didn't even probably eat more calories than a normal day, so I can enjoy the 2 parties we are going to today (wouldn't that always have been a better choice??), and I did learn a lesson. It's good to let go, but overindulging is never a good idea. Acting like a glutton just felt odd to me and then I paid for it.

Foccacia recipe:

1 bag Trader Joe's or other brand whole wheat pizza dough

1/2 cup fresh shredded parmasean cheese

2 tsp olive oil

salt

1 tbs (maybe more?) Provencal dried herb mix

• Preheat oven to 425 and let dough sit at room temp as directed on package, spray pan with non-stick spray, spread out dough like a pizza.
• Brush olive oil on dough (I actually may try again and skip this step)
• Sprinkle cheese (truth here is that I used about 3/4 cup but I don't think that much was necessary)
• sprinkle some Kosher or sea salt
• Take herb mix, which is all the basics, oregano, thyme, basil, etc. and crush in fingers while spreading a pretty generous portion across whole surface.
• Bake for 12-18 min or until seems done.

Not sure of the calorie count, but it is delish, especially with minestrone soup, which I also make from scratch. I can post the recipe for that too if anyone is interested. I think next time I'll actually measure the ingredients (above are guesses) and come up with a calorie count from nutritiondata.com.

My husband is very proud of me

Dave is very proud of me. He looks at me all the time with pure bewilderment. He loves my new body. He really respects my discipline. He even honors my need to go running every morning by leaving for work a little later. He talks about me at work with his new co-workers, extolling the virtues of discipline and hard work. He sends people the link to this blog and tells them to exercise at lunch like he does, instead of eating loads of crap and chatting. He beams proudly when people comment on the healthfulness of the lunches I pack him.

After a few incidents at work of people noticing his healthy lifestyle, and asking for my blog link he decided to read my blog for himself. I can't believe he never did this before, but no matter. He said it's better that he read it after the fact, as if he read it in the beginning he would have thought I was whining. I think there are quite a few posts about being hungry at the start, basically as I was eating way too little kind of by accident.

His disdainful attitude towards fat people as being too lazy to help themselves was one of the main reasons I was so motivated. He thought less of me and after Alex turned 4 I felt he had a point. But he never thought I'd get this thin or this muscular and neither did I. He told me he had felt resigned to live with a chubby wife - after all, I wasn't obese or anything. so it's kind of like he won a new car at a raffle or something: a really great treat and surprise, but life would have gone on perfectly well if he had lost.

Of course he chose to have this whole discussion with me when I was in an agitated, "It's 20 min past Alex's bed time and I want him in his bed now" state of mind, but I'll make him tell me again when we're not putting the kids to bed. This respect is a benefit I had never anticipated. After 10 years of marriage, when it's easy to take the things we fell in love with in each other for granted, it's a great time to add an arrow to that quiver.