Food Diary - August 8

Skipped breakfast again.  Didn't seem to have much of an appetite today, either.

Lunch:
Homemade soup
Cup of grapes
1 strawberry (this is a big deal for someone who doesn't typically like berries!)

Snack:
5 pretzel sticks dipped in ranch dressing

Dinner:
Classic Ranch Salad with grilled chicken from The Yard House (minus the tomatoes, dressing on the side)
Lipton cream of chicken soup
Handful of popcorn

Food Diary - August 7

Skipped breakfast today.  Wasn't very hungry.

Snack:
5 dark chocolate covered almonds (the machine gypped me! Usually I get 7!)

Lunch:
Homemade soup
Pretzel stick
Cheese stick

Dinner:
1/3 spinach chicken and feta wrap from stew's
Salad with homemade buffalo ranch dressing
Slice of wheat bread with margarine

Food Diary - August 6

Breakfast:
3 hard boiled egg whites with salsa
Red seedless grapes
1/2 wheat bagel with ~1 tbsp scallion cream cheese

Lunch:
Spicy honey chicken salad with broccoli slaw
A few potato chips

Dinner:
1/2 Spinach, Chicken & Feta wrap from Stew Leonard's
Caesar salad with Parmesan cheese and croutons with Light buffalo ranch dressing

Snack:
Tortilla chips with guacamole and chipotle dip

Bad day and exercising

I ate really badly today.  So much so that not even am I just embarrassed to write it all down, but I really can't remember.

First, Caitrin, Michelle, and I went to the diner for brunch.  I ordered a side salad with a burger.  I ended up eating half of Caitrin's chicken and rice soup and my side salad, dipped in ranch dressing (not poured over it).  I brought the burger home with me because I had no room left in my stomach, but I felt full.

On the ride up to Connecticut, I finished off the bag of buffalo flavored pretzel thins that I had started on Thursday night.  We had a family party for my cousin who is going away to college, and food was more than abundant.  We had a variety of appetizers, including chips, tortilla chips, sweet potato chips, carrots, spinach dip, ranch, and salsa.

Dinner was 1/2 a slice of pizza with a chicken and American cheese sandwich, topped with light mayo, onions, and lettuce.  It doesn't sound like a lot, but I cannot even tell you how many sweet potato chips I ate, or how much spinach dip was piled on top.

After that came dessert, some sort of light chocolate and vanilla cookie dough ice cream explosion and a chocolate cake with white buttercream frosting.  I did have a chocolate filled strawberry, but no news here: I still don't like strawberries.

Then I kept picking at those darn sweet potato chips. And the worst part is, I could STILL have a sweet potato chip if one was in front of me.  Or two.. or three..

I digress.  I felt so full and bad about what I ate (and come to think of it, most was captured above) that I needed to do something.  So I rolled out a yoga mat and did the following:

• 10 situps
• 10 leg lifts
• 10 leg side-to-sides
• 10 crunches
• 10 modified pushups
• 10 seconds of plank
• 10 lunges
• 10 squats
• 5 burpees

It won't exactly make up for all that I ate, not even close, but at least I put a little effort into it.  

Food Diary - August 3

Snack:
Cucumbers with fat free ranch dressing

Lunch:
Sweet & Sour chicken and cauliflower
Rice Pilaf
Chips with guacamole

Snack:
Tortilla chips with green salsa

Dinner:
One white slice of pizza and one regular slice of pizza

Late-night snack after the bar:
Sandwich on a roll with Boar's Head buffalo chicken, Monterey jack with jalapeno, mayo, lettuce, and onion

Food Diary - August 2

Breakfast:
3 hard boiled egg whites with salsa

Lunch:
Homemade soup
Spicy chicken salad with honey vinagrette
Skinny Cow ice cream sandwich

Snack:
3 clementines


Dinner:
Buffalo flavored pretzel thins
Not a great dinner... not quite a dinner at all.  I went out with some coworkers after work for happy hour, and it was a happy few hours.  By the time I got home, I wasn't hungry, and I pretty much went right to bed. 

Food Diary - August 1

First of all, rabbits!  It's good luck to say it on the first of every month.

Breakfast:
3 hard boiled egg whites with salsa

Snack:
String cheese

Lunch:
Homemade veggie soup
Chinese chicken, broccoli, and carrots
Rice pilaf

Dinner:
Sweet potato fries (homemade) with 2 tbsp FF sour cream
Chicken cordon bleu
Salad with broccoli slaw, white onion, jalapenos, 1 tbsp light buffalo ranch dressing

Snack:
Pretzels with guacamole

Chinese Chicken, Broccoli, & Carrots

Disaster struck in my mini crock pot yesterday.  I had all these great ideas for different lunches this week that didn't involve salads.  At some point while I was perusing Pinterest, I decided that I was in the mood for Chinese food.  But I wanted to try my hand at making it myself, so I'd know exactly what ingredients I'd be using.

I have no idea why the crock pot popped into my mind, but I thought it'd be a really great option to try chicken and broccoli.  The carrots were an afterthought to bulk it up a little without adding that'd break the calorie bank.

This is what happened:
I added the frozen broccoli and precooked chicken (thank you, Trader Joe's) to my crock pot.  I then added the ingredients from this recipe, but altered it slightly:

3 large cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup fat-free, low-sodium beef or vegetable broth 1 cup water with 1/2 tablespoon of beef bouillon
1 tablespoon low-sodium soy sauce
1 tablespoon cornstarch meal
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon canola or corn oil
3-4 scallions, thinly sliced

See what I did there? I added water because I thought that it'd boil out in the crock pot and that I'd need the extra water.  This is what it looked like after I mixed it all in there:

Pretty, right? Looks can be deceiving.  While I tended to the rest of my lunch meals, I lost track of time.  I figured the longer, the better, so the meal could absorb all the flavors.  When I lifted the cover and tasted the broth, I *wish* someone had been standing by with a camera to capture that moment.  It was completely watered down!  So hurriedly, I started throwing in more ingredients - a little more brown sugar, a little more soy sauce, more scallions, etc.  It helped.  I guesstimate that I pretty much doubled the recipe (albeit a little late, but whatever).

Another hour or two went by.  I opened up the crock pot to realize that my broccoli was not only soft, but it pretty much fell apart when I tried to stick a fork in it.  I DO NOT LIKE squishy broccoli.  I loathe its very existence.  It grosses me out to think about.. ick.. it makes me gag.

I am literally gagging right now.

Okay, phew, I'm over it.  So the only solution to this that I saw was to pick out the chicken and carrots that were still viable, toss the rest, and start over.  Luckily, I had the time to spare, so that's exactly what I did.

Minus the crock pot.  This time, I made the sauce (reducing it to 1/2 cup beef broth) and zapped it in the microwave.  After stirring for what seemed like an ungodly amount of time, it was done.  I happen to enjoy a little kick to my sauces, so I added in a pinch of red pepper flakes and a little bit more garlic.

As for the veggies, I threw the cooked chicken and carrots into a container with the thawed broccoli and shoved it in the fridge.  The next day, I mixed them all together, and ta-da! It finally came out right.  I even had a coworker sample it, and he was impressed.  Success!