Luck O' The Irish

I'm convinced the weigh in scales are messed up.  But when it's in my favor I'm okay with that.

When I got home from school today I was over my weight from last week, so I stripped down to just shorts and a tank, weighed myself again, and was dead even with where I was last week. So I walked on the Nordic Track for 30 minutes.  Miraculously I went down 0.4 from that little bit of exercise. I threw on my coat and boots, took my sexy white legs outside in our 18 degree snowy weather, and went to weigh in.  My official weight is down 1.4 pounds from last week, a full pound less than my scale says (which matched what their scale said last week, by the way).  I'll take the higher weight loss, especially considering the corned beef and Irish soda bread binge I had 2 days in a row, and my Shamrock shake on Saturday.  I just hope it doesn't even out with my scale next week and show less weight loss, like what happened the first week.

My goal is to have lost 20 pounds by spring break.  That means losing 5 pounds according to my scale, 4 according to theirs, in 2 weeks.  I can totally do it if I don't cheat.

Dinner tonight is "fried" rice.  I got an Asian medley frozen veggie mix with little corns in it.  Who doesn't love little corns??  Mix that up with some lean marinated stir fry steak, brown rice, a scrambled egg, and some low sodium soy sauce.  Mmmmmm :)

Asparagus Chicken Cordon Bleu

Tonight I made a really yummy dinner, so here's the recipe!

Asparagus Chicken Cordon Bleu

• 4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
• 4 slices ham sandwich meat
• 2 wedges Laughing Cow Cheese, I used garlic and herb flavor
• Dijon mustard
• Asparagus
• Seasonings
• Olive Oil 
• Olive Oil cooking spray

Preheat oven to 350. Spray cookie sheet with cooking spray.  Trim and rinse chicken breasts.  Place one at a time between cellophane and beat with a mallet until it's about 1/4 inch thick (I use Press and Seal, it's thicker and doesn't tear).  Lay flat on cookie sheet.  Squeeze a stripe of Dijon mustard lengthwise onto each breast.  Lay one slice of ham across each breast.  Spread 1/2 a wedge of cheese lengthwise across top of ham.  Cut ends off of asparagus and coat leafy ends with olive oil to prevent scorching.  Lay 6-7 spears lengthwise across chicken, using the cheese like glue to hold them in place.  Wrap the chicken and ham around the asparagus like a taco, and use toothpicks to hold in place.  Sprinkle outside of chicken generously with garlic powder, Mrs. Dash (or whatever you want, rosemary would be good), and salt and pepper to taste.  Bake for 30 minutes.  I served mine with brown rice and mixed veggies.

Hey Saggy Pants

It's been awhile... oops.

Monday was weigh in.  The week before that I lost 2 pounds, woohoo!! Then I ate crap all week, but still managed to be down .2 pounds yesterday.  Since I fully expected to gain 5 pounds, I'll take the .2 and be happy with it.

We are half way through the challenge, and they had an event last night to celebrate the half way point.  We were supposed to weigh in, then have healthy snacks catered by an eatery in town, and then they were giving a prize to the man and woman who lost the most, and another prize to the person who submitted the most meaningful change they've made to be successful in the challenge, and for that prize you had to be present to win.  So I waited until 6 to go, walked in, and did get a $10 gift card to Natural Grocers.  Then I weighed in and lost .2 pounds.  The lady who weighed me in said, "Good job Betsy, I'm so proud of you!" Now I appreciate the support, but I don't know her, and I barely lost any weight.  Give me a break lady.

Anyways, I was all excited to get free healthy food, and walked up to the small buffet table with a huge grin, completely starving because I hadn't eaten in over 6 hours.  I grabbed a plate, listening eagerly for the food lady to tell me what everything was.  My face dropped as I looked at what they had to offer.  There was a fruit pastry made with buttery white flour croissant looking bread.  There were white bagels with hummus.  There was some vegetable shit full of onions that was covered in oil.  There were sauteed veggies, covered in oil.  And there was spaghetti squash with a marinara sauce, which I'm sure was equally oily.  I looked at the lady with my empty plate and realized there was nothing for me to eat.  I thought they were giving us healthy snacks!!?!?!?? If you are going to eat the pastry and the bagel, you might as well eat pure sugar. Just because you put hummus on it doesn't make it healthy.  Veggies are really good for you, but not if you cover them in salt and oil.  Chris ate it and said it wasn't even that good.  No freaking wonder people are having a hard time loosing weight, they don't know how to eat, and not even the sponsors of the challenge can lead them in the right direction.

So I was starving and disappointed, and sat down to wait for them to announce who had submitted their most meaningful change and won the money.  The way they advertised the contest made it seem like they were going to actually read them and put some thought into the winner. No. They put them all in a box and randomly picked one.  And the guy who won put "diet and exercise." Well no shit!!! By that time I was so pissed and hungry that I had to walk out. I went home and made a low calorie chicken piccata, with whole wheat pasta and green beans.

Don't get me wrong, this challenge has motivated a lot of people in this town to do amazing things for their health.  I feel great, my self esteem is way higher, and even though I only have one pair of pants that actually fit, I'm fitting shirts and bras that haven't fit in a few years.  But if you are going to sponsor a competition, then you need to have a freaking clue and not screw everything up.

At this point I'm thinking the other teams can eat the white flour and sugar and oil and all the shit they want.  MY team will eat healthy food, and exercise, and won't waste time talking about our most meaningful changes because nobody seems to care, and we will win this competition.  MY team won't eat a bunch of junk and then wonder why we aren't loosing weight.  At least when we do have bad weeks we know why, we admit that we didn't do our best, and then we work extra hard to make up for it the next week.  We are going to win.

I just hope they don't screw up the prizes.

Dinner tonight is quinoa stuffed peppers.  As always I played with the recipe a bit, but they are really yummy.  We also discovered 100 calorie frozen treats at the grocery store.  We got some fudgsicles and some sorbet ice cream pops that are AMAZING for my sweet tooth, and they aren't itty bitty either.  The weird thing is that I still crave sweets after every meal, but if I eat a cookie or a brownie or something it tastes too sweet.  It's like quitting smoking, you still crave a cigarette but when you smoke one it tastes and smells so nasty that you can't enjoy it.


One last thing, is I can't get over how yummy the turkey quinoa meatloaf is.  It is so moist and flavorful, not dry and bland like ground turkey usually is.  I really recommend trying it!!! Here is a side view.  I really like taking pictures of food, so I might as well share them :P