02/02/08 - Meals for the Day

Ok, going to try shoving all of my meal posts for the day into one big post. We haven’t been able to figure out how to have only the most recent post from each person on the front page and I don’t want to monopolize it.

02/02/08 - Breakfast

Mmmmm…..I’ve restocked the pantry with boxes of Kashi GoLean Crunch Honey Almond Flax cereal. Apart from maybe Life cereal, it’s my favorite.

It’s also jam packed with fiber, protein and Omega 3’s. It’s fairly high in carbs, but it’s entirely whole grain, so they’re good carbs. I’ve paired it with hormone free skim milk for more protein boost, but not much fat boost.

Breakfast: 265 calories, 4.5 grams fat, 44 carbs, 8 grams fiber, 15 grams protein

02/02/08 - Snack

Another Zone bar. This time Chocolate Peanut Butter. I’ve found the handy thing about Zone Bars is they require you to drink a lot of water. I can easily down a 20oz bottle of water while eating one. They’re tasty, but they dry you up.

I paired it with a Forelle pear. Tasty, but it wasn’t ripe yet, so again with the dry.

Snack: 260 calories, 7 grams fat, 38 grams carbs, 5 grams fiber, 14 grams protein

02/02/08 - Lunch

Giant salad. Huge, big, ginormous even. Waiting on Greg to come home from some deal at the church so I can hit the gym. This one was a little high on calories, but it was super high on protein.

Baby spinach, red leaf lettuce, baby greens, green onion, red onion, celery, carrots, tomatoes. This time I topped it with hard boiled egg, cheese, grilled chicken and a tiny bit of bacon. Low-fat three cheese ranch on the side.

In retrospect, I could have used half the amount of chicken and egg. It was a little heavy on both. Doing so would have shaved off around 90 calories and 7 grams of fat.

Lunch: 589 calories, 24 grams fat, 19 grams carbs, 6.5 grams fiber, 42 grams protein.

Dr. Atkins would like that meal.

02/02/08 - Dinner

Dinner tonight was a whole lotta new things. I bought some organic texmati brown rice to try in my rice cooker and topped it with some soy sauce for flavor. (Did you know soy sauce has just 10 calories per tablespoon but has 2 grams of protein?) You’ll also see a piece of potato crusted cod (which was not at all tasty) and a stack of asparagus I pan roasted with fresh garlic and some olive oil.

Dinner: 410 calories, 10 grams fat, 48 carbs, 4 grams fiber, 29 grams protein

Exercise

I did finally make it to the gym this afternoon. Logged 30 minutes of cross training on the Ellipital and about 20 minutes on the weights. Total calories burned: 400+

Daily Total: 1534 Calories, 45.5 grams fat, 149 carbs, 23.5 grams fiber, 100 grams protein

Of course I burned an extra 400 at the gym, so my daily calorie count comes down to 1134, which makes it REALLY tempting to go eat some raspberry newtons, but I shall abstain.

Would it be wrong of me…

…to ship freshly baked cinnamon rolls to all the other players?

>:)

Well, Here We Go With the Side Bets

Jeff Quipp just talked me into a $50 side bet on this contest. Whichever one of us ends up with the lower percentage of weight loss at the end of the contest will have to donate $50 straight to the charity of the other.

Wonder how long before we start to see more of these bets popping up. I’ll either have to not make many of these or really watch my food and exercise.

You’re Here Anyway, Why Not Join Me?

I’m seeing some comments come in, which is pretty cool. Tells me there are folks here actually reading these posts.

So…why not join me? I’m posting threads for breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks and when applicable, my work-outs. This accountability thing works pretty well. Want to join me on the quest? Post your own details in the comments of the thread each day.

You hold me accountable and I’ll hold you accountable.

02/01/08 - Breakfast

02/01/08 - Breakfast

Originally uploaded by Jennifer Laycock

Half of a honeycrisp apple and a bowl of cinnamon spice oatmeal.

Note to self: I really don’t like oatmeal. It’s not all in my head. (Which stinks, because it smells SOOO good…just tastes like…well, goo.)

Breakfast: 210 calories, 2.5 grams fat, 46 carbs, 4.5 grams fiber, 4.5 grams protein

Let’s Kick This Thing Off!

As you can see from my posts, I’ve already started making changes in the way I eat, even though the fat fighting contest didn’t officially start until today.

That’s because I have no interest in dieting. I don’t diet. It doesn’t work for me. The only time I lose weight is when I work out and eat healthy. That means no forbidden foods, only thinking twice before eating foods. If I want some chocolate and I put it off for an hour and I still want the chocolate, I’m gonna eat the chocolate. My goal is to make sure I’m giving serious thought to anything I eat before I eat it. That’s why you’re going to see this area flooded with pictures.

I will be trying to cut back on meat (especially red meat and pork), focus on natural plant based sources of protein and calcium, aiming to increase my fiber intake and drinking plenty of water. These are all areas I tend to fall short at.

My biggest challenge is going to be working out. I have a hard time working out at home. I have to go to the gym to get anything done. Unfortunately, going to the gym means a 20 minute drive each way and getting the kids all packed up and ready to go early enough to get there, work out, shower, get home, feed the kids lunch and get them down for naps. That means if I’m not out the door by 9am, it’s not going to happen that day. That’s a challenge on days like this on where I was up with the kids twice last night.

Hopefully Greg will get home from work early enough for me to head over there.

Now, I’m off to figure out what to eat for breakfast and to get the kids packed up.  It’s grocery day and I need to stock up on healthy snack options I can carry with me when we’re out running errands. Time for raw veggies, pretzles, some cheese sticks and maybe some Zone bars.

01/31/08 - Dinner

01/31/08 - Dinner

Originally uploaded by Jennifer Laycock

Mostly leftovers from last night, but packed into a bento box for portion control.

Top tier holds two hard boiled eggs, a few cashews, fresh pineapple and some kumquat. (Of course my toddler stole all the pineapple, so I didn’t get to eat it.)

The bottom holds leftover steamed veggies, two mini egg rolls, and leftover veggie fried rice.

Dinner: 430 calories, 23 grams fat, 52 grams carbs, 5 grams fiber, 23 grams protein.

01/31/08 - Snack Attack

01/31/08 - Snack

Originally uploaded by Jennifer Laycock

One of the things I really need to work on is my snacking. I rarely have time to sit down and eat a real meal, so I tend to graze on and off during the day. I also have a crazy sweet tooth. That means I can end up downing 400 empty calories on a snack.

With the focus on cutting back on meat, but still getting enough lean protein, I decided to opt for half a PBJ and a small glass of milk.

The bread is HFCS free and actually packs a decent bit of protein at 4 grams a slice. I went super light on the PB and used fruit spread instead of jelly. The milk is hormone free skin and I stole one of the kid’s glasses to make sure I only poured 8 oz.

Snack: 280 calories, 9 grams fat, 37 grams carb, 2 grams fiber, 18 grams protein

01/31/08 - Lunch

01/31/08 - Lunch

Originally uploaded by Jennifer Laycock

Lunch at Panera Bread. Half a classic cafe salad, a bowl of French onion soup minus the croûtons and a piece of French baguette. There’s a butter there, but I didn’t use it. (yay!)

Lunch: 350 calories, 10 grams fat, 3 grams saturated fat, 50 grams carbs, 5 grams fiber, 15 grams protein

Eek on the carbs. Not sure that bread was worth 25 grams of carbs.

That said, I’m a butter fiend. I normally would have used 3-4 butters with this meal, but I ended up not using any.

No Butter? 220 calories and 24 grams of fat saved

01/31/08 - Breakfast

01/31/08 - Breakfast

Originally uploaded by Jennifer Laycock

A pretty good size Honeycrisp apple. If you have never had a honeycrisp apple, you must immediately rush to the store and find one. No apple should taste this amazing.

It tastes like cider. It’s sweet, but has a bit of a zing to it. Best apple ever for salads and snacking. (If you’re in the Ohio-PA area, Giant Eagle and Meijer carry them, otherwise you have to go to Costco.)

Breakfast: 80 calories, 1 gram fat, 22 grams carbs, 3 grams fiber, 1 gram protein