Recipes & Such

So my dear friend Nikki has a blog and she posts recipes she has tried and I thought I would give it a try, as well. The problem I've had is that I don't have the patience to cook. I've never really enjoyed it. But recently, since I've started this diet, I've been trying to be good and cook at home, instead of eating out for nearly every meal. And I have discovered a bunch of new things I like. I've had fish several times, and I even like steak, as long as it's not over-done. I didn't used to really like grilled chicken, because it was boring, but now I've discovered new ways to cook old things. So it's getting more fun, because I've been having success!

Yesterday the family and I went to Wal-Mart and I found this magazine.

I started flipping through it in the magazine aisle at Wal-Mart and immediately found several things I thought looked good, so I decided to buy it. There was a Weight Watchers cookbook I looked at last week at the WW meeting and nothing in it appealed to Mom and I, so I was thrilled to find this magazine with things in it that we would actually try. The first recipe I decided to try was a potato skins recipe. I also had found a fish recipe in the Weight Watchers bi-monthly magazine, so I fixed that as well. So here are the recipes!

(picture from here, though it's not the same recipe. it looks the same so i snagged it.)

Crunchy Oven-Fried Fish PREP 20 MIN BAKE 20 MIN SERVES 4

Preheat oven to 425°F. Place large rack in large rimmed baking pan; spray rack with nonstick spray. Place ¼ c all-purpose flour on sheet of wax paper. Beat 3 large egg whites in shallow bowl until frothy; whisk in ⅓ c fat-free mayonnaise, 2 Tbsp all-purpose flour, ¾ tsp paprika, and ½ tsp garlic powder. Crush 4 high-fiber crispbreads into fine crumbs; transfer to pie plate. Add 1½ tsp olive oil, ¼ tsp salt, and ¼ tsp black pepper; toss well until crumbs are evenly moistened. Sprinkle 8 (3-oz) tilapia fillets with ¼ tsp salt and ¼ tsp black pepper. Working with 1 fillet at a time, coat both sides with flour, tapping off excess; then dip in mayonnaise mixture and then in crumbs, pressing to adhere. Transfer prepared fillet to rack. Bake fillets until firm and coating is browned, about 20 minutes. Serve with 4 lemon wedges. PER SERVING (2 fish fillets with 1 lemon wedge): 280 Cal, 5 g Total Fat, 1 g Sat Fat, 0 g Trans Fat, 92 mg Chol, 676 mg Sod, 21 g TOTAL Carb, 2 g TOTAL Sugar, 3 g Fib, 37 g Prot, 37 mg Calc. PointsPlus value: 7.

I copied this from my e-mail, so ignore the weird font/colors. The only thing we didn't have for this recipe was flour, of all things, so I used cornstarch. I don't know if that's okay or not, but it turned out DELICIOUS. And Dad and I think it would work well with any kind of white fish. Plus, I think I might even try the breading recipe on some chicken. Yum.

To go along with my fish, I cooked Mini Cheddar Potato Skins.


Points Plus Value: 2 (per serving = 3 potato halves)

Ingredients:

• 1 pound red fingerling potatos (I just cooked the amount we wanted to eat, which was 3 whole potatoes)
• 1 tablespoon butter, melted (I used Country Crock instead of real butter)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper (I omitted this, because I am not a fan.)
• 3 tablespoons reduced-fat shredded extra sharp cheddar cheese (I used 4 tablespoons because I had fat free cheese)
• 2 tablespoons thinly sliced green onion (I omitted this, because I didn't have it or need it.)
• Cooking spray

Directions:

1. Preheat broiler.
2. Scrub potatoes; place in a single layer in a microwave-safe bowl (do not pierce potatoes with a fork.) Cover bowl with plastic wrap (do not allow plastic wrap to touch food); vent. Microwave on HIGH 5 to 6 minutes (I did six) or until tender. Let stand 5 minutes or until cool enough to touch.
3. Cut potatoes in half; drizzle evenly with butter, and sprinkle evenly with salt and pepper. Lay cut sides up on a foil-lined baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Top evenly with cheese. Broil 2 minutes or until cheese melts, and sprinkle evenly with green onions. (We actually sprinkled bacon bits on ours.)
   

I am not going to type up the nutritional values unless someone really wants me to. And I am not sure that my potatoes were as small as they should have been, because 3 filled me up really good and I cannot figure at all how 3 of them were only 2 points. But the thing is, even if you are NOT on a diet, you can still make this recipe, just substituting whatever kind of cheese you want (and how much you want) plus onions or bacon bits... or adding sour cream, etc. But I will say that even though these babies had fat-free cheese on them (and not much at that) I liked them better than I like most restaurant style potato skins. The only thing I would want is more cheese. Other than that, they were amazing... as was the fish.

So all in all it was a delicious meal that I will be cooking again. :) Yum!

I am 5% Loser!

Today was another Weight Watchers meeting -- well, actually Mom and I didn't stay for the meeting, because she had a funeral to go to, but we went for the Weigh-In. And I lost FOUR MORE POUNDS!!!!!!!!

This means I have lost a total of 12.2 pounds! :D And when you lose 5% of your weight, you get a bunch of goodies. I got a little, cheap, plastic trophy -- which makes me ridiculously happy considering it's such a small thing. Haha. And I got a blue ribbon because I lost 10+ pounds. Plus, the little pamphlet is all about losing 5% of your weight. I haven't read it yet, because I was so excited I wanted to come home and write a blog entry about it all. So that's next on my agenda, to read that.

Mom also lost weight; she lost 3.2 more pounds. So she is down 12.6, I believe, and I am down 12.2. WE ROCK! I think this is all really a testament to just how awful we ate before, because these pounds are just falling off. Mom has been doing really good at exercising, but me... not so much. I know that eventually I am going to have to kick it up a notch, but I really hate walking on the treadmill. But Mom and I discovered a fun new way to exercise. I've only done it once so far; Mom and I bought "Just Dance" for the Wii, and it is awesome. (I like it better than Dance Central for Kinect, even though the Kinect takes funny pictures of you.) Yesterday I tried it out for the first time and was laughing through my work-out! My favorite song to dance to was "Cotton-Eyed Joe," haha, because you got to do goofy foot-tapping, "cowgirl" dances. And it was definitely a work-out. Some of the other songs weren't as much, but they were still fun. One song I didn't try yet was "Wannabe" by the Spice Girls. :D I can't wait to try that one.

We also tried a cardio dance video from Netflix, which wasn't as fun, but it was definitely entertaining to see Mom and I try to white-girl dance our way through that. We were glad no one could see us! Hahah.

Anyway, I am so very excited about all of this. My only wish is that someone had told me a long time ago that this program would work so well for us, because I would've done it months ago had I known. Oh well. The time is now and we are KICKING BUTT!

Eight Point Two

Just a little update this time.

Mom and I went to our meeting tonight and we were both losers! ;) I lost 3.6 pounds, and I think she lost almost 5 pounds. That brings her total to 9 points and mine is 8.2 (to be exact!) So I wasn't quite as far down as my grandparent's scale said, which I knew I wouldn't be, but I was still down, so that's what counts! It's pretty crazy considering that's what we've done in just one month (having one of those weeks off, too!) I know the weight loss will slow down after a bit, but I can't help but feel pleased with the results.

Unfortunately, something I had forgotten... if you miss a meeting, you still have to pay for it. Like... membership dues or something. It's $12 a week! If you miss, you still have to pay the $12. RIDIC! Oh well. It's working! I always said I would pay someone if they could make me skinny... so I guess this is kind of like that, haha. Plus, it's motivation to go to the meetings!

Picture Proof

I forgot I wanted to do this, so since I have the time and inclination, let's get it out of the way. :)

When I joined Weight Watchers, the leader of the meetings gave us her website address. So I went to it and one of the things she had on it was her story, and it was accompanied by photographs of her weight loss progress. I decided that I wanted to do that, too, so I could see how far I've gotten and use that as motivation to never go back.

So here's what I looked like at my starting weight:

And here's what I look like after a 9 pound weight loss (and a haircut!):


I know, there's not really a big difference yet. (I hate the belly! Ugh. I look pregnant!!!) I mostly took these -9 pound pictures tonight as my "starting" pictures, because I wasn't sure if I had any full-body shots of me or not. So here they are!

This is the start of a BRAND NEW ME!

A bigger loser?

Tonight I went to my grandparents' house and they have a digital scale. My dad has lost 60 pounds in the last 14 months, so every time we go there, he weighs himself. I decided to hop on tonight, even though I thought maybe I should just wait until Tuesday and the WW meeting. You know, to give myself 2 more days to work on the weight loss... But I got on anyway.

And I was shocked to find that I've lost five more pounds. Granted, I hadn't eaten anything but some grapes and a banana in 8 hours, so maybe it had a little to do with that, because I was completely empty. And maybe my grandparent's scale is different than my home scale or the scale at the Weight Watchers meetings, so I won't know for sure -- or at least feel like it's for sure, until Tuesday, but if their scale is right... I have lost 9 pounds! Since February 9th.

I don't want to base my weight so much on the number I see in front of me on the scale, but moreso on the number of pounds I have lost. So my idea is to use the scale at the Weight Watchers meetings as my regular scale. Because it has to be consistent every time, right? Unlike trying to base my weight on my scale at home, the scale at my grandparents', the scale at the doctor, etc. I am going to base my weight loss on the scale at the meeting. So maybe on Tuesday I won't be down five pounds, and that's okay, but I sure as sheep can't be five pounds off, right? Which means I still lost some! So here's to waiting until Tuesday to see for sure.

I will keep you updated, as I am sure you are all shaking with anticipation. :)

Time's a rollin' by.

It's been awhile since I've posted in here and my last post was about my "first" bad day. Well... let's just say I fell off the wagon and had lots of bad days.

The first week I was on WW, I lost 4.6 pounds. The second week, I am fairly certain that I didn't lose any, just from weighing myself throughout the week (which I regret doing in the first place, as it's discouraging.) I went to the meeting to find out for sure if I had lost any more weight or stayed the same and found out that the meeting was canceled due to a "water problem" in the building. After that... it fell apart.

Mom and I are doing Weight Watchers together, but I was going to that meeting alone, because my mom was on vacation. This was last week. Since my parents were out of town, it made doing Weight Watchers a LOT harder. Mom and I have done a lot of it together, from grocery shopping, to planning meals, to being each other's support. And once she was gone, I tried... for a couple of days... to "be good," but it just didn't work out. All I wanted to do was run through the drive-thru of some fast food place, instead of going home and trying to russel up some good grub. So basically, since I did badly, and Mom was gone... I just kind of gave up for the week. The whole time I knew I was going to start it again when Mom got home, but I just didn't care for the week. Which I realize is bad, because that meant that the weight I had already lost I was basically welcoming back with open arms.

Anyway, I haven't weighed myself for probably a week and a half or so, and I'm sure I've gained a lot back (if not more than I started at) but I am jump-starting the program again.

On Tuesday I started the program again, after taking basically a full week off. Our WW meetings are on Tuesdays, but Mom and I decided not to go this week because we had both had a bad week. Plus, Mom wasn't feeling well and had JUST gotten back from vacation, so we decided to skip. So I haven't been to a meeting for 16 days and won't go again until Tuesday. But I have done really well this week and will continue to do so from now on.

I am looking forward to getting back on track. Now if I could just find the energy/time to exercise.