I could've waited until New Year's Day to make this decision and tell all of you about it, but then I guess you'll all see how human I really am. Trust me...my family in Iowa has amazing food. My husband quite frequently says (insert farmer voice), "YYYYep, I married myself a good Iowa corn fed girl for sure." Whatev...
Wednesday, December 26th
Breakfast: Kellog's Special K with Red Berries, frozen blueberries (serves double duty for keeping the milk cold and super healthy too); almond milk (double the calcium and more than 1/2 the calories of skim milk); coffee with York peppermint patty creamer
Lunch: Seafood 'n Crab Salad from Subway; I mix iced tea and lemonade at Subway to make an Arnold Palmer, and I dove into the rest of my daughter's Harvest Cheddar Sun Chips. That was a "crap, I forgot I was journaling" moment. Gotta love it!
Dinner: I made Sweet 'n Sour Chicken that was amazing, and so easy. I didn't have any Sweet 'n Sour sauce in the fridge, but I just happened to have all of the ingredients in the house. I also had a piece of banana bread and skim milk.
Sweet 'n Sour Chicken
1 T. olive oil
1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces(I used 3 chicken breasts from Costco)
1 bag (16 oz.) frozen stir-fry vegetables
1 can (8 oz.) pineapple chunks in juice, undrained (I had a fresh pineapple that I cubed)
1 can (10 1/2 oz.) low sodium Chicken Broth
2 cups Minute White Rice, uncooked (I would've used brown, but accidentally opened the white)
1/2 cup sweet 'n sour sauce
Homemade sweet 'n sour sauce (makes too much so you can reduce accordingly)
3/4 cup white sugar
1/3 cup white vinegar
2/3 cup water
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 T. ketchup
2 T. cornstarch
Place the sugar, vinegar, water, soy sauce, ketchup and cornstarch in a medium saucepan, and bring to a boil. Stir continuously until the mixture has thickened. You will only use a half cup in the meal.
1. Heat oil in large skillet on medium-high heat. Add chicken; cook and stir 5 min. or until cooked through.
2. Add vegetables and pineapple with juice; mix well. Stir in chicken broth. Bring to boil.
3. Stir in Rice; cover. Remove from heat. Let stand 5 minutes or until almost all of the liquid is absorbed and rice is tender. Stir in sweet 'n sour sauce.
4. Makes 4 servings. Enjoy!
Evening snack: I had a piece of gum after dinner and made some microwave popcorn later in the evening with water.
Thursday, December 27th
Breakfast: Kellog's Special K with Red Berries; frozen blueberries; almond milk
Lunch: Leftover sweet 'n sour chicken (I ate cold because reheated chicken is disgusting)
Afternoon Snack: Apple with peanut butter; Sabra Supremely Spicy Hummus (they are not kidding, this is super spicy hot) and 1/2 of a pita.
Dinner: We drove back to Iowa this evening and we stopped at Wendy's along the way. I had a Wendy's spicy chicken sandwich. I love these...a lot. Since I was journaling, I refrained from fries and I'm very proud of myself:)
Evening Drinks and Treat: We are at my mom's house and this is the beginning of the end. I say this is the nicest way possible, because it was so worth it. On our way home, we bought this Egg Nog liquor. When we arrived my parents and I had 2 drinks. All you do is put the liquor over ice and it's so divine. No kidding. AND, yes, my mom makes the most awesome sugar cookies. BUT, not only are they delish, they are decorated beautifully. I ONLY had one.
Cookies we came home with. There were a few more, but they were not eaten by me!
Friday, December 28th
Breakfast: Frosted Mini Wheats, fresh blueberries; skim milk; coffee; sweet cream creamer. My mom makes this amazing coffee cake, but I opted to stick with the cereal instead.
Lunch: BBQ Pork (I skipped the bun); jello salad that I can't describe, but I do know it's green and has cottage cheese in it; raw carrots; a handful of Bugles (I don't buy these, because if I did, I'd turn into a bugle); Chocolate cookie (look at picture above); pinwheel cookie; water
I do need to stop here and discuss self-control. This is VERY important. I don't need to go into detail, however our family did have a death in the family last week. With the wake and funeral comes a lot of food. During the wake, food was brought in and I didn't have any. I know if I wasn't journaling, I would've totally ate sweets and probably a sandwich too.
Dinner: Anyone from Iowa knows Happy Joe's pizza. Especially the taco pizza. All those who live far away, come home, and get there fix whenever possible. Seriously, I love this stuff. SOOOOO...I had 3 1/2 pieces. I washed every single bite down with water.
After dinner, we attempted to go to a Dubuque Fighting Saints hockey game. Holy crap, these games sell out! As we got closer to the rink, we saw a long string of cars heading that way. I called to see if tickets were available, and the only 7 together available were along the glass for $21 a piece. Otherwise, it was standing room only for $11. With 2 kids and 5 adults, we just couldn't spend $147 to sit, or $77 to stand for a game. If we go to a Steel game in Bensenville, the tickets are general admission, and they cost $8 a pop. OH, and by the way, the Fighting Saints lost to the Chicago Steel in overtime the very next evening! Go Steel!
Evening Drinks and Treats:
We saved some cash and skipped the game to go home for some free beers. I had 3 Leine's Lemon Berry Shandys (I have a friend who'd be proud I stick with Miller/Coors products). As far as treats, and there were plenty to choose from, I had homemade chocolates....a mini almond joy, peanut butter cup, and a Butterfinger. All smaller, and so good! Lastly, I had a few pieces of cheddar cheese with triscuit crackers.
Saturday, December 29th
Breakfast: Frosted Mini Wheats; fresh blueberries; skim milk; coffee; York Peppermint Patty creamer
Lunch: The funeral was in the morning and after the burial it is customary to go to the local hall for lunch. The community gets together and makes food for family and friends to enjoy and celebrate the life of the person who's passed. These ladies make a mean lunch, and I say this like it's very good. I had roast beef, mashed potatoes (I took a much smaller portion that I'd usually take), and green beans. The dessert table was to die for. I stared at red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, blueberry dessert; pumpkin pie, chocolate cake, white cake, pecan pie, and the list goes on and on. I did not, I repeat, did not take any dessert, because I knew the our families Christmas celebration was just a few hours away. Now, I did get to watch my Grandpa partake in 2 desserts, but he's 90 and he's totally allowed:)
Grandpa Charlie and the family
Snacks: Snacks is an understatement. Before dinner, I had almonds, cashews, mm's, a couple slices of cheddar cheese, 2 crackers, graham cracker pretzels that went with this fantastic Tastefully Simple Key Lime ball, a couple Bloody Mary's, and 2 Leine's Lemon Berry Shandys. I'm full...
Dinner: But there's still dinner! Pork loin (a piece the size of a deck of cards), mashed potatoes (1/2 the amount I normally would take), green bean casserole, and a salad that consisted of spinach, blueberries, blue cheese crumbles and raspberry walnut vinaigrette. Mom made 2 desserts and usually I love all desserts so it just makes sense to have a small piece of each. Am I wrong???? The first dessert was an Eu Claire dessert and the second was a pumpkin dessert. YUMMY!
After dinner snacks and drink: I had a chocolate cookie (see above picture) and 4 dark chocolate crisps. The crisps look like pringles and they are awesome. I did enjoy one last Egg Nog Liquor on ice.
Sunday, December 30th
Breakfast: 1/4 of a bagel with cream cheese; strawberries with fruit dip; a piece of sausage breakfast pizza
Late Morning Snack: Almonds and Cashews; My mom makes this fantastic chex mix. It's mixed with dried apricots, walnuts, brown sugar, butter, and whatever other yummy ingredients are in there. I had 2 small bowls of it...probably the worst thing thus far not including all of the pizza from Friday night.
Lunch: A small piece of pork loin, the green jello I described above, cranberry jello, and good 'ol Iowa corn.
Afternoon Snack: More of the chex mix (ugh!), a piece of homemade chocolate, and a couple bites of BBQ pork as I was packing leftovers to take back to Iowa. My mom asked me to take back cookies, but I immediately said no, because I have NO self control. However, I do have a family who likes the cookies too, so yes I took about a dozen cookies. I will not eat one of them as they are for my kids and husband if they'd like one. NOT FOR ME!
Dinner: I literally felt like I ate all day and was not even a tinge hungry at dinner time. We stopped in Rockford to feed the family, but I couldn't even think about food. When we got home, I had an apple. Drank water throughout the night.
Monday, December 31 - Happy New Year's Eve!
Breakfast: Today at FITT-RX, we had 3 Holiday $5 classes. I organized 5:40am boot camp, and when I got home I had Kellogg's Special K with Red Berries; frozen blueberries; almond milk. After breakfast, I hopped in the shower - wait I lied - I played that stupid CANDY CRUSH game that I'm so addicted to first (I'm on level 41, take that fellow candy crushers!), and then I hopped in the shower.
I headed to the studio where we had 8am Total Core, then 9am Boot Camp Poker. All in all, a fantastic morning! Thanks to Jen for her 2 minute plank, her 2 sets of 90 second Burpee Jacks, the 20 second push up hold, and the dreaded 45 seconds of split squats while holding dumbbells overhead. I worked off most of the chex mix from yesterday! I loved it and sweated nicely:) OH, had a coffee when I got there at 8am.
Lunch: 1/2 Pita with the super spicy hummus; an apple; mozzarella ball; and a grape tomato. I think I'm still full from the weekend!
We have a New Year's Eve Party tonight and I consciously chose to make healthy appetizers to share. The first is a skewer with 2 grape tomatoes, 2 basil leaves, and a ball of mozzarella. The second is crab meat that can be dipped in a red cocktail sauce. PLUS, we're making it a slumber party because I don't want my entire family on the road after midnight. Not to mention, that if someone doesn't drink, it'd be me, so I say we STAY OVER! For the morning, I'm bringing bagels, cream cheese, pineapple, and a cherry Kringle. Not super healthy, but not super terrible:)
Have a safe New Year's Eve. I promise to be sure to develop a better eating schedule like I did the last time I blogged my food journal. Like I said, this was probably not the best time to start, but you gotta do whatcha gotta do. I welcome anyone to join me, and ask questions whenever you have one.
Jill
PS - Can't get this picture below to delete. It's a subliminal message and I don't like it one iota!
