I read an article today talking about combining nutrition WITH exercise. You can read it’s entirety here:

Dr. Steven Garner who was interviewed for the article tries to dispel the myth that just by exercising you are going to lose weight, he states:

The public at large hasn’t gotten that memo. Dr. Steven Garner, the chairman of radiology at New York Methodist Hospital, would like to change that.

If we turned the clock back 30 years, Garner says, “about 20 percent of the population worked out, and about 20 percent were overweight. Now, 70 percent say they do some type of exercise – and two-thirds of the population is overweight or obese. It seems to have gone up identically with exercise.”

In the article, they profiled a woman who joined a gym, worked out 6 days a week and after seeing no results, and getting frustrated, she asked a nutritionist for a meal plan. By incorporating small changes, less fried foods, less frequent junk food, watching what she ordered at dinner, she lost 37 pounds in no time at all!

It made me think about when I was training for my first Chicago marathon in 2005. I was at my heaviest weight at that time (199!) and I was like, “this is going to be awesome!” I am going to lose like 50 pounds….easy! After training for 8 months, running several times per week and doing the longer distances on Saturdays, 5 miles, then 7 miles, then 10 miles, then 14 miles, then 16 miles and getting up to 20 miles (which we ran twice!) guess how much weight I lost??? NOTHING!!

I know its hard to believe that someone can do that, but with I think a lot of people who work out a lot, sometimes you think, “well, I just ran 10 miles, so I can have an extra slice of pizza”, or this bag of M & M’s won’t matter, I ran 20 miles this week. I am living proof that if you don’t change WHAT you eat when you are exercising, your spinning your wheels! Shelley has learned to incorporate exercise AND watches what she eats and has seen awesome results! Roni has added exercise to her routine too! And of course Carla from Ms. Fit is a huge inspiration in the exercise department!

So, if you are working out all the time and aren’t seeing the results you like, it’s time to look at what you are putting into your body and see if making some small adjustments here and there will make the difference.

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Now on to something I made last night……Kale Chips!!!

Kale Chips

I’m pretty sure I can safely say I have not eaten Kale ever? If I have, it was when I was a kid and it probably was only once!

A few weeks ago I was reading Kath Eats and she was eating Kale Chips. She said it was like eating potato chips. I read all the comments, most people loved it, while other people (including one commenter’s husband said it was like eating leaves!) But I went in with an open mind. In fact when I went to the store, I had to ask someone who worked there where the kale was. Between the mustard greens, and other leafy vegetables, I didn’t know exactly what it looked like!

So, last night I decided to make it. Basically just wash the leaves and pat them dry. Tear off little pieces (you don’t need the middle stalk part) and place them in a bowl. Drizzle with a little olive oil and sea salt and bake at 325 for about 10-12 minutes. Keep an eye on it, because it can go from perfect to burnt pretty fast.

When you take it out of the oven, sure enough they are crispy like chips. I tasted one. I liked it! My son Mark (my picky eater) tried one, he liked it! My daughter Claire tried one, and she liked it!

I put them in a bowl and sprinkled a little parmesan cheese on top. We finished the whole bowl at dinner!

So, make your own opinion about that one, but I will be making these again!!

Ummm.. no, he’s lost ALOT of weight. The article said he was ordered by his doctors to lose weight and that he had gotten close to 400 pounds!

This is him close to his largest weight

Holy Moly, he looks so much better!

Yeah! I love it when people lose weight and especially for him it doesn’t matter what your age is, you can always try to look and feel better!

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Now onto today’s recipe. This is great to make for bbq’s or even a pot luck or block party. This recipe comes from Cook’s Country Magazine.

The one thing I love the most about Cook’s Country Magazine, is that the kitchen chefs try a bunch of different varieties and techniques before getting the best version.

You will need:

2 lbs. baby red potatoes, scrubbed and cut in half
2 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed, plus 2 cloves minced
1 1/2 tsp. grated lemon zest and 2 TB. fresh lemon juice
1 cup chicken broth
2 TB. olive oil
2 TB. chopped parsley(I omitted that ingredient)

Rinse cut potatoes under cold water tossing with hands (which helps wash off some of the starch), drain well.

Cook potatoes in a large skillet, with the smashed garlic, lemon juice, chicken broth and 1/2 tsp. salt. Reduce heat to medium low and cook, covered about 15 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender.

Remove the lid, increase the heat a little and the remaining chicken broth will evaporate. Once that is done, add the oil, and cook, cut side down for about 6 minutes, or until browned. (Watch the heat, I think mine was a little high, and some of them got a little darker than I wanted).

Remove the potatoes and place them in a dish, add the minced garlic reserved from before, and add the lemon zest and parsley if you have that and stir together. The lemon flavor was so great, not overbearing, but just perfect!

Lemon potatoes!

Here it is before cutting. I decided since it already had string on it, that’s the width I would cut them.

It turned out to make 11 pork chops (well 10 and 1 tiny one). I didn’t have any bread crumbs, so I just decided to dredge them in seasoned flour. I just threw flour, chili powder, cumin, black pepper and oregano into the flour and just dipped each pork chop in that.

Here’s them in the pan!

The pork chops were about to go into the skillet, (coated with a little olive oil) and I had no side dish/veggies planned! I asked if anyone minded if I made rice again, since I already made that once this week. Of course they could eat rice every day, so that was a no brainer.

But, to jazz up the rice, I added edamame, chick peas, a squeeze of lemon juice, a little thyme, feta cheese. I measured out my portion of rice.

1/2 cup cooked rice
1/8 cup of chick peas
1/8 cup edamame
.5 ounce of feta cheese (garlic and herb flavor)
squeeze of lime
salt and pepper to taste

The chick peas were from a can, I just rinsed them and warmed them up in the microwave for a minute. The edamame was frozen, I just cooked them in water in the microwave for a couple of minutes as well. It turned out really good too! I figured out the nutritional info for my rice dish on www.caloriecount.com. Thanks to my sister Biz for telling me about Calorie Count!

Nutrition Facts
Serving Size 83 g
Amount Per Serving
Calories 218
Calories from Fat 61
Total Fat 6.8g 10%
Saturated Fat 2.6g 13%
Cholesterol 13mg 4%
Sodium 170mg 7%
Total Carbohydrates 28.5g 10%
Dietary Fiber 5.8g 23%
Sugars 3.3g
Protein 11.8g
Vitamin A 3% • Vitamin C 17%
Calcium 16% • Iron 18%
Nutrition Grade A
* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Calorie Count will grade a recipe you enter which is nice, because you can kind of tweek the recipe to make the nutritional value better, or get a higher grade. I was happy to see my recipe got an A! So it turned out to be a tasty meal!!

But what’s been great about our relationship with them is that after all these years, we’ve stayed together. Through college, boyfriends, marriages, divorce, kids, moving, moving and moving again, we’ve always made it a point to get together. Sometimes it may be months in between, but catching up on each others lives is always fun!

I may have had one or two of these to start Twin Fest!

My sister made her famous salsa!

And we ordered pizza!!! YUMMY!

So, since I knew I would be splurging at lunch, I made a big pot of chicken brunswick stew (one of my Dad’s famous recipes!) I put all the ingredients in a huge pot with frozen chicken breasts (boneless and skinless) and by the time I got home it was perfect!

This is what the chicken looks like after taking it out of the pot and shredding it….so perfect!

Here’s his ingredient list:

6 cups canned tomatoes (or I used a 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes)
2 pounds red potatoes
2 quarts chicken stock
2 cans white corn
5 carrots
2 pounds chicken breasts
1 cup water (or more)
10 oz. frozen baby lima beans (or omit if you don’t like lima beans!)
1 1/2 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon sugar
1 medium onion, chopped
1/2 cup parsley, chopped (I used about a tablespoon of dried)
1/2 teaspoon pepper

I cut this recipe in half, it made about 10+ cups of thick stew. Then I add a bit of water when I heat up a single bowl.

One tip:

Instead of buying cans of chicken broth, I’ve switched to chicken base. Its in the same section of the store as the canned or boxed broth. For $2.39 cents there is enough base to make tons of cups of soup! You only need 1 tsp. of base per cup of water.

And here is the soup!! It’s even better the next day.

I had to show you a funny picture. At the store this weekend, they had bags of potatoes for only 99 cents for the bag. These were the size of the potatoes!! I weighed this one….it’s 35 ounces!!! And there were about 10 potatoes in the bag almost as big as this one. I have no idea what I am going to do with all those, maybe potato soup is in my future!!

This was my favorite breakfast this weekend. I had two slices of whole wheat artisan bread, 1 slice of swiss cheese, and 1 egg which I “fried” in a pan with Pam Cooking spray. I put it altogether and cooked it like a grilled cheese. So GOOD!

I had seen on other people’s blogs of baking them in a 12 muffin pan. But after discussing my dinner idea with my sister , she suggested cooking them on a wire rack with a jelly roll pan underneath to catch the fat, instead of cooking them in the muffin tin, where there is no where for the fat to go! Great idea!

It couldn’t have been easier! I mixed the ground beef with bread crumbs, one egg, romano cheese, sauteed garlic, salt and pepper and oregano. Then, to kick it up even more, I wrapped each one in a slice of turkey bacon!

And this is what they looked like after baking for about 20 minutes at 375 degrees.

On the side I made gross carrots! I tried to cook them in balsamic vinegar, to try to make a glaze, but it didn’t work out so well! BUT, the mashed potatoes turned out great!

All in all it was a pretty tasty dinner!

Earlier this week, I was browsing recipes and came upon the website for the incredible egg! . They had a recipe for mini chocolate chip scones. After reviewing the recipe, I did make some changes to try to make them a bit more Weight Watcher Friendly, and I think I succeeded!

This is my version of their recipe:

3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 cup ground flax seed
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, frozen
1/4 cup mini chocolate chips
1/2 cup skim milk
1 egg + 3 egg whites

In a large mixing bowl, add the flour, sugar, baking powder,flax, salt and chocolate chips. My sister gave me the idea to freeze the butter, and use my cheese grater to put into the batter. I don’t have a pastry cutter, so that tip worked out great.

That’s the shredded butter in there!

In a smaller bowl, add the eggs + milk and beat until combined. Add that to the dry ingredients. I used my kitchen-aid mixer with the dough hook for about a minute. Otherwise, just mix it all together with a spoon.

I weighed the dough, so I could divide the batter equally. Each scone before cooking was 3.05 oz.

This recipe makes 12 scones and each scone is only 6 points!

This is what they looked like before baking:

And…..after baking!

These bake at 400 for about 20 minutes or until they are golden brown and aren’t soft on the top. I also added some raw sugar on top before baking. These will definitely fix my craving for bakery scones I love so much!

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Now on to weigh in Friday!!! I used to step on the scale just about every day, but Weight Watchers recommends just one time a week, so that’s what I am doing.

Everyone wishes they could step on the scale and have a “Biggest Loser” week and lose 9 pounds, but I was happy with what the scale said today…. – 1 pound!

I’m happy with that because its still in the right direction and for my first month of doing Weight Watchers on-line, I’ve lost 6.5 pounds. I am very happy with that!