Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Lean Green Eggs and Ham Cups...That Sam I Am

This recipe hails from the Abs edition of Oxygen magazine:

Preheat oven to 350° F. The green of the lean green eggs and ham cups...green onions.


This recipe serves 2. Whisk together 1 whole egg and 3 egg whites with a bunch of green onions. The recipe called for 1/3 chopped chives for a serving of 4. I chopped and chopped. I love green onions or onions period.




Next, spray a muffin tin with cooking spray. Then, take 97% fat free ham slices and mold them into a muffin tin. After molding the ham into the muffin tin, evenly divide your egg mixture amongst the ham cups.


Place in oven for 15 to 20 minutes. Top with cheese and bake for 5 more minutes.


Remove your cups from the muffin tin and voila...Lean Green Eggs and Ham Cups. Now you may experience a little seepage off the eggs into the muffin tin, but everything should just pop out of the tin.




I paired the ham cups with some leftover beans w/salsa and mixed fresh fruit.





Sunday, August 16, 2009

Rerun...Alas the time has come...

If you follow my other blog Ah Me so Hongry! The Misadventures of a Weight Watchers Repeat Offender, yes this is the same posts.

Well folks, as of 12:00 AM my Summer officially ends :-( Tomorrow, the teaching staff must report back to work(Actually, I went to work last Friday to jump start my room preparations.).

This past week I walked around in a funk in anticipation of my return back to work. Don't get me wrong, I am more than grateful to be gainfully employed, but I can't help but feel a tinge of remorse as I enjoy my last few hours of Summer. My back-to-work funk interfered with my weight loss endeavor, and knocked me off the wagon. I only worked out once last week, but i managed to make somewhat sensible food choices. Even though I worked out once, my week kept me super busy and active.

Despite residing in Funkytown last week, I managed to drop 2.4 pounds bringing me to a total of 32.6 (something like that) pounds removed! This week I plan to get back on the wagon and ride it till the wheels fall off. GAME ON!

So tonight, I contemplated writing a post about my weekend OR last weekend's end of STATS class celebration OR my mom's red boots, BUT instead I decided to create a photo montage celebrating my first summer off. I hope you enjoy my montage SUMMA-TIME 2009:


Saturday, August 15, 2009

And the award goes to...



ME! Thanks to Solace at Reduced To Ashes, I recently received the One Lovely Blog Award. So in the spirit of the One Lovely Blog Award I must:
  1. Acknowledge the giver
  2. Pass the award to 15 other blogs I love:
  1. GOD'S FAVORITE SHOES
  2. Queen of my Domain
  3. For the Love of the Run
  4. It's Not a Diet, It's a Weigh of Life...
  5. The Ivy League
  6. Trim the Fat
  7. Project Hot Mommy
  8. Scientific Nature of the Whammy
  9. Hollie's Weight Loss Blog
  10. Fat[Free]Me
  11. Prior Fat Girl
  12. The Masked Mommy (Check out the Jello Fire Fighter's Hat)
  13. Witness This Fitness
  14. Eat Move Write
  15. Little Miss Hungry

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Ants-On-A-Log


One of my most favoritest (not a real word, but it is now) snacks in the whole wide world: Ants-On-A-Log!

Yes...real true live PEANUT BUTTER! I tried a few healthier alternatives, but none of them can hold a candle to Peter Pan's Honey Roasted Creamy Peanut Butter, salmonella and all.


I tried Better'n Peanut Butter, but it should be renamed to Better'n Paste. Better'n Peanut
Butter is better suited as paste for art projects or to seal envelopes.




There IT (Better'n Peanut Butter) is on the side of the miracle whip, in front of the cheese. By now the Better'n PB is probably sporting a fur coat. Hmmm...I better go and check.


Wednesday, August 12, 2009

What a JERK!

My Mom made some homemade jerk seasoning. The Recipe....COMING SOON!
MOM, send the recipe. Thanks.




Thursday, August 6, 2009

Oui, oui, Monsieur: Stuffed French Toast Sundaes!

Bonjour Mes Amis! Yes, I took French in high school. Oui oui monsieur, bonjour mes amis (Hello My Friends), est la plage? (Where is the beach?) and est la bibliothèque? (Where is the library?) sums up the extent of my French vocabulary. So if by some chance we end up in Paris together, we're pretty much limited to the beach and the library.

As I previously mentioned, I enjoy the show Cook Yourself Thin. So much so, my Mom and I ordered the cookbook.

Yesterday I decided to make Stuffed French Toast Sundaes. Too bad I didn't cook the Stuffed French Toast Sundaes on Sunday. If I had, my post title would read "The Perfect Sundae to Start Your Sunday!" Pretty creative post title huh...too bad I read it in the cookbook.

The Ingredients:
I also provided the link to print the recipe towards the end of my post.

The sundaes took about 20 minutes to make. Start by cutting the crust off the bread.


Next I mixed 2 egg whites, 1 TBSP 2% milk (Recipe calls for skim but I used what I had on hand.), 1/2 tsp cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon honey. The recipe provides directions to make 2 servings, but I cooked 1 serving. None of my kids wanted to participate in my french toast sundae experiment.


Now, dip the bread into the egg mixture.


After dunking the bread in the egg mixture, spray your muffin tin with cooking spray. Then, mold the soggy bread into the muffin to resemble a bread bowl. Bake at 375° for about 12 minutes or until crisp.


While your bread bakes, prepare your fruit. I chose strawberries, raspberries and blueberries. The recipe calls for blackberries and raspberries, but I didn't feel like picking blackberry seeds out of my teeth for the next 6 hours.

After you prepare your fruit mix 1/4 cup of ricotta cheese until creamy.




After 12 minutes remove your bread from the oven. Disregard my foil muffin tins. Since we used to eat out frequently, there was no need to invest in real cookware.


Pop those babies out of the muffin tin and BAM...sundae cups! How cute are those?



Fill your bread cups with ricotta and fruit. Voilà...Stuffed French Toast Sundaes!


Their sundaes vs. My sundae...I WIN!



After you stuff your sundaes, drizzle syrup over them. The recipe calls for pure maple syrup, but that crap costs $6000 bucks a bottle...not really. At the store I went to, the cost of pure maple syrup ranged from $6.99 to over $10 bucks a bottle. Uh...uh...no ma'am. So, I used my Smucker's sugar free syrup.


I took so many pics...I had a french toast photo shoot going on in my kitchen.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Cooking Myself Thin: Potabella Tuna Melts

So my new favorite show...Lifetime's Cook Yourself Thin...I noticed that I start a lot of my sentences with so. Sooooooooooooo...a few months ago a WW member mentioned the show Cook Yourself Thin at a meeting. I remember racing home so I could search the Comcast guide for the show and to no avail I found nothing! Well as most of you know I kicked Comcast to the curb for AT&T's U-Verse (which I love). Anywho... One day I sat on the couch flipping through channels and BAM...Cook Yourself Thin on the Lifetime Real Women Channel.

So real quick, the premise of the show entails three cooks, providing makeovers of your 3 favorite high calorie, high fat dishes. After your food makeover you receive a basket with all of the ingredients necessary for you to create the made over meals at home. Weeks later the three cooks visit your home to see if you cooked yourself thin. Most of the ladies lose at least one dress size.

After watching a few episodes I quickly developed a list of recipes I want to try. Well I now present my attempt at preparing Cook Yourself Thin's Portabella Tuna Melts.

Here are the ingredients: portabella mushroom caps, Albacore tuna, big ole tomato, parsley, lemon juice, swiss cheese, celery, (not pictured) salt, pepper, and EVOO.




I used low sodium Albacore tuna. The items below were mixed with the tuna. FYI...my instructions seem a bit vague, which is the reason why I provided the link for you to print the recipe.




Next I scooped the gills, cut the stems and washed the mushrooms. I need more practice at gill scooping.


I placed the mushroom caps on a pan and broiled them for 10 minutes.


After broiling the caps, I divided the tuna amongst the 4 mushroom caps.


...and I then placed a slice a Swiss cheese on each cap and broiled them again for too long. My cheese melted quickly...toooooo quickly.

Voila, Portabella Tuna Melts!!!



My Melt vs. Their Melt: I win!



UMMMMM...YUUUUUUM!!!!