Ketchup isn’t red… its crimson

Last night we had a taco night.  As I was getting everything set up I was struck by how dark the salsa we put out looked.  Why you ask?  Well, probably because it doesn’t have anything in it to “preserve the color.”  This morning, I made scrambled eggs for breakfast and put some whole foods ketchup on them... Again the ketchup is more crimson then it is crayola fire engine red.  This is really interesting to me.  Who decided that bright red was a more attractive color for food then its natural dark red?  Seriously???  I’d rather eat my crimson ketchup then fluorescent red ketchup.  Take a look:

Cauliflower Pizza

Thanks to my friend Laurel we have a delicious, unprocessed, healthy way to eat pizza.  Take that domino's!  That being said.... we kind of messed it up on the first try.  But I already can’t wait to try this recipe again.  We did not spread the dough thin enough on the cookie sheet so we ended up cooking it for about 40 minutes before adding toppings.  When it was finished… only the edges were crispy… the middle of the pizza was cauliflower mush.  The flavor was amazing but the consistency kind of freaked me out.  I think we’re going to try again one day this week since we have another head of cauliflower in the fridge.  Stay tuned.

1 head of cauliflower
1/3 cup egg whites
2 cups shredded fat free cheese
2 tbsp reduced fat parmesan (optional)
1 tbsp dried italian seasoning

1. Cut the cauliflower off the stalk and into smaller pieces.
2. Place everything in a food processor and process until really fine. (if you don't have a food processor, grate the cauliflower on a grater and mix with the rest of the ingredients- doesn't make it as fine of a texture but still works pretty well).
3. Spray/coat a baking sheet with oil and push the cauliflower mixture onto the pan.
4. Bake at 350 until golden brown, about 10 minutes.
5. Top with marinara sauce and any other pizza toppings you'd like.
6. Bake again until done.

The whole crust is 600 cals/4g fat/48g carbs/97g protein/14g fiber
and if cut into 8 slices, each is about: 75 cals/0.5g fat/6g carbs/2g fiber/12g pro
compared to 1/8 of a regular pizza crust: 135 cals/2g fat/24g carbs/1g fiber/4g pro

Snacks

Quick post… my new favorite snack:

 

Organic dark chocolate and almonds.  The key is that you have to break the chocolate into little tiny pieces and put one small piece of chocolate in your mouth with one almond.  Delicious. 

 

More this weekend... food diary update and cauliflower pizza.  :)  Happy Friday.

Death by cupcakes

If you’re an elementary school teacher on a diet Valentine’s Day is your worst nightmare.  Before the kids even came into my room I was given: a heart shaped chocolate box, a bag of chocolate, a decorated sugar cookie, and a Milky Way caramel heart.  I did really good and stashed it all in a bag without looking at it, even when one kid kept asking me if I’d tried his chocolate yet. 

Then the afternoon party came…. A cupcake decorating party.  I started to set up all the toppings for the decorating while the kids were at P.E.  For whatever reason my phone decided not to save the picture so let me describe.  Five bowls on each table filled to the brim with gummy bears, skittles, mini marshmallows, heart shaped marshmallows, and gumdrops.  Want to know what the most delicious smell in the world is?  Opening a bag if gummy bears. YUMMMMMY.  I stuck to my guns and DIDN'T EAT ANY OF THE CANDY.  I even got rid of the extra cupcakes while the kids were still at gym so that I would not be tempted to eat one.  GO ME!

Cut to later that afternoon… I broke down and opened a Milky Way caramel heart thing and took a bite.  After only eating dark dark chocolate for 4 weeks it was a little too sweet on my stomach.  I threw the rest out and promptly took the rest of my Valentine’s Day stash up to the teachers’ lounge and left it there. 

Cut to later that night… two glasses of wine at happy hour made me eat a mozzarella stick and half of a spring roll.  Then go for fro yo and not choose the plain tart flavor that would have been unprocessed.  Oh well…. I guess my day balances our good/evil wise.

Food Diary 2-11 to 2-17

Date	Monday February 11. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with milk and stevia ·         Yogurt ·         Granola ·         Apple
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Whole wheat pasta ·         Homemade spaghetti sauce with ground turkey ·         Celery ·         Hummus
Afternoon Snack	·         Hardboiled egg ·         Dark chocolate and almonds
Dinner	·         Chicken with honey mustard vinaigrette ·         Brown rice ·         Celery ·         Hummus
Dessert	·         Wine

Date	Tuesday February 12. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         Apple ·         Yogurt ·         Granola
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Chicken with honey mustard vinaigrette ·         Brown rice ·         Apple
Afternoon Snack	·         Hardboiled egg ·         Dark chocolate and almonds
Dinner	·         Whole wheat spaghetti ·         Homemade sauce with ground turkey
Dessert

Date	Wednesday February 13. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         Apple ·         Yogurt ·         Granola
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Whole wheat spaghetti ·         Ground turkey ·         Oil/garlic ·         Apple
Afternoon Snack	·         Hardboiled egg
Dinner	·         Turkey ·         Homemade bread ·         Mustard ·         Homemade onion dip ·         Natural chips ·         Hummus ·         Celery
Dessert

Date	Thursday February 14. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         Apple ·         Yogurt ·         Granola
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Hummus ·         Celery ·         Egg salad ·         Crackers ·         Apple
Afternoon Snack	·         Hardboiled egg ·         ¼ of a turkey sandwich ·         1 bite of a milkeyway (processed)
Dinner	·         Mozzarella stick (processed) ·         Spring roll (processed)
Dessert

Yummmmmm. 

Date	Friday February 15. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         Apple ·         Yogurt ·         Granola
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Turkey ·         Homemade bread ·         Mustard ·         Apple
Afternoon Snack	·
Dinner	·         Out to eat: ·         Chicken burrito (tortilla was def processed) ·         Wine
Dessert

Date	Saturday February 16. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         Apple ·
Morning Snack	·         Crab mac and cheese at Phillip’s (processed)
Lunch	·         Homemade bread ·         Turkey ·         Mustard ·         Bean dip ·         Buffalo chicken dip ·         Chips
Afternoon Snack	·         Wine tasting at Boordy!
Dinner	·         At Gordon Biersch: ·         Chicken pot stickers (processed) ·         California cobb flatbread (bread was probably made from unprocessed flour… rest was probably unprocessed)
Dessert

Date	Sunday February 17. 2013
Breakfast	·         Coffee- with half and half and stevia ·         PB and J pancakes ·         Maple syrup ·         Scrambled eggs with cheddar cheese
Morning Snack
Lunch	·         Buffalo chicken dip ·         Italian herb bread ·         Veggies ·         Bean dip ·         ¼ of a chicken burrito
Afternoon Snack	·
Dinner	·         No dinner… ate really late breakfast and really late lunch
Dessert	·       Dark chocolate

Unintentional Weight Loss

I know everyone hates when “skinny” people complain about their weight.  And I get it… BUT… I’m 4 ft 11 ½ inches tall (yes that ½ inch makes a big difference).  At my height, I should barley weigh over 100 pounds.  At this time last year I was at about 123.  That’s when I decided I needed to do something about my weight.  I started using myfitnesspal (get website/app) to calorie count and lost weight very slowly (which was fine by me).  We also started running a lot more.  We did P90X for a bit last summer and now I am doing a boot camp at work in the morning. 

Anyway… at one point last summer I had gotten down to 109 pounds.  Then when school started and I was more stressed out I went back up to 116.  I started calorie counting again at the beginning of the school year and was running a lot but was not losing weight.  I finally came to terms with that and just gave up.

 I decided to stop logging my calories when we started switching over to being unprocessed because it was just too much effort to calculate the calories for everything when its homemade.  I stepped on the scale after our first week of going unprocessed and had lost 2 pounds!  A week later I had lost another 2 pounds.  I was down to 112.  We’re going to Mexico in about 5 weeks and I’m only 2 pounds from my goal weight… WHAT???  THAT’S AMAZING.  Especially when I gave up about a month ago.  I’m actually back up to 113 after my weekend of eating and drinking in NY… but I expect to be back at 112 after this week of clean eating. 

So even though I know some of you will hate me for this post… I’m happy about it.  I would love it if I am actually happy with my stomach when we take pictures on the beach in Mexico.  :)

Well... FAIL!

So our first week of “going hardcore” was a total failure.  You’ll notice there is no food diary posted because it would be a waste of time for me to even type it and a bigger waste of time for you to read it… we didn’t do well at all.  It’s not really our fault though…. (I know, I know… excuses, excuses).  We had a death in the family and traveled to NY on Thursday morning for the weekend.  I packed some snacks (almonds, dark chocolate, half and half, crackers, and bread) to bring with us.  I used the creamer and I ate some of the almonds… but as far as meals were concerned we weren’t able to stick to the unprocessed.  Without actually going to the grocery store and buying our own food it would have been impossible.  Plus, we didn’t want to exclude ourselves from family meals because of diet restrictions.  We had never intended for it to take over our lives, just as something to be mindful of when we are at home, so I’m not really upset about what I consumed this weekend… but I do feel kind of guilty that we binged a few days after saying we were going to go all the way… oh well.  Life happens.

On a better note… we used the bread flour from whole foods to make Italian herb bread (olive oil and basil) and it turned out great!!!!  It smelled delicious as it was baking and tastes delicious too.  Even better… it looks like bread!  Most of the bread we’ve been making is so dense with the whole wheat flour that it doesn’t rise and looks lumpy.  This time it actually looks like bread.  YAY!