Day 34: Soups On

I want to start off by sharing a recipe for a white bean and chard soup that Don and Julie made and shared with the group. When I heard "chard" I was prepared for "bitter." But nothing doing for this soup, it is smooth all the way down! It was so good I had some with my breakfast!

White Bean and Chard Soup
4 TBL extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, diced
3 stalks celery, diced
Kosher salt
2 15.5 ounce cans cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 12 ounce jar roasted red peppers, drained and coarsely chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 bunch Swiss chard, leaves roughly chopped
Freshly ground pepper

Heat 1 TBL olive oil in a medium pot over medium-high heat. Add the onion, celery and 1 1/2 tsp salt and cook until the vegetables are golden brown, about 5 minutes. Add the beans and broth, bring to a simmer and cook 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat the remaining 3 TBL olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the roasted peppers, minced garlic and cilantro and cook until the garlic is soft, about 2 minutes. Stir in the chard, cover and cook until wilted, 1 to 2 minutes. Scrape the contents of the skillet into the pot and simmer until heated through, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Day 33: I Love My Containers

There is no way that I could do this diet if it weren't for my containers!

When I open up my refrigerator in the morning and am faced with all these choices, how can I go wrong? This week Nadine provided black beans (with five different peppers!) that are great to serve over scrambled eggs, egg casserole loaded with broccoli-cauliflower-carrot-and other yum! She also made a dish for Don (I'm still trying to figure out he got HER to cook for HIM) that was an eggplant-tomato offering that I've yet to try.

I made the string beans that were presented on the Day 32 blog (which by the way are getting rave reviews by Don, so I forgive him for not doing his own eggplant). I also made up the remoulade that was on Day 31 blog. In all fairness Don and Julie made a white bean and chard soup that is out of this world smooth and delicious! I'll be posting that recipe on the next blog.

But back to the containers...when all the food is shared and I can go to any of those options it makes breakfast and lunch a snap! For dinner Deanna usually has a protein and salad and I just grab one of my bean options and I'm good to go! I always have a container of the falafel on hand as well, so that can fill in or is a great evening snack.

So, go grab some friends & Tupperware and get started

on your own 12 percent pursuit!

Day 32: More Chinese, Less Fat

Wanting to try a new vegetable dish I turned to one of our family favorites – Szechuan String Beans. We learned how to make these 25 years ago while living and working in China. When we go out to a Chinese restaurant we are sure to order these. These are super easy to make and taste great. You can vary the intensity of the ingredients if you want them more or less spicy.

Brown a pound of ground pork in a heavy pot or wok. Pull the meat out and set aside. Leaving the grease generated from the pork in the bottom of the pot, turn the heat up and add salt & pepper, 3 TBS red chili pepper, and 1 small finely chopped yellow onion. Cook until the onions are translucent.

Dump in 2 lbs of washed and trimmed string beans and let them sear.  After cooking approximately 10 minutes add 2-3 TBS of soy sauce and 5 minced garlic cloves. Stir and cook another 5 minutes then add the ground pork and cook all together until the string beans begin to soften.

While cooking last night the boys kept walking through the kitchen and saying how good it smelled! I think they’ll be disappointed to hear that I gave ¾ of it away to my fellow dieters! I had some for lunch today and they are delicious!

Day 31: A New Salad

As much as I liked the bacon slaw, I was ready for a change. I saw this recipe and thought it looked good! It tastes even better! But first a French lesson:

Remoulade (ray-muh-LAHD) A classic French sauce made by combining mayonnaise with mustard, capers, and chopped gherkins, herb and anchovies. It’s served chilled as an accompaniment to a cold meat, fish and shellfish.

This “Reinvented Remoulade” created by Gabriel Rucker, chef at Portland, Oregon’s Little Bird, is lighter and used as a dressing over a celery-root salad.

Dressing:

2 TBL mayonnaise
2 TBL minced scallion

2 dashes Tabasco

1 ½ tsp whole-grain mustard

2 tsp dry white wine

1 ½ TBL fresh lemon juice

Pinch of celery seeds

Veggies:

½ pound celery root – peeled and halved

1 medium carrot

¼ cup very thinly sliced red onion

1 celery rib, very thinly sliced on a diagonal

Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

In a medium bowl whisk together the dressing.

Using a mandolin, slice the celery root and carrots paper-thin. Finely julienne the celery root and carrot slices. Add the celery root, carrots, onion, and celery to the dressing and toss.

Season with salt and pepper. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Bon Appetite!

Day 30: Standing

Not much for you today...no great recipes or funny stories...just a day when I was back on task eating food that will get me to my goal.

So thinking about my goal, here is my wife and I with our son at his Homecoming picturefest this past weekend. He is part of the reason I have the goal to keep in shape and get to 12%. My hope is that one day I can stand (not sit or be lying down) with my grandson at his Homecoming picturefest!

That's all folks!

PHASE TWO (day 29) With The Beach In Mind

After a completely enjoyable Saturday that started with the Juicy-O breakfast love fest and ending with a Whiskey River BBQ burger and sweat potato fries at Red Robin for dinner followed by pecan pie and some ice cream with peanut butter for my evening treat, I was ready to get back on the wagon today and start another day on the diet!

Katherine and I toast my 1% loss.

So it was back to eggs, sausage, and beans for breakfast - chicken, broccoli, and salad for lunch - and more of the same for dinner. I've felt full all day and haven't had many cravings for sweets. Of course there weren't any tempting treats around the house as I made sure I had finished them all up last night!

This morning the scale said I'd gained 1 or 2 pounds and that is cool...I know that will drop. Knowing that this diet is working to reduce the percent of body fat is great so I'm signed up for another month and will test again. If I keep this up at this rate I'll be at my 12 percent goal by the end of January. And if I do hit that goal it means that when Deanna and I go to the beach in February I'll be feeling pretty good about getting into my bathing suit and going for a jog on the beach!



Day TWENTY-EIGHT: Celebrate good times, come on!

It was truly a celebration today!!! But before we get to HOW we celebrated, we need to do a little review of what got us started and how far we've come!

On August 27, 2011 I stepped into the Bod Pod. This piece of equipment measures very accurately the percentage of fat and lean content in your body. At that time I was 17.2% body fat and set a crazy, impossible, never before reached in human history goal: get to 12% !!!

Over the last four weeks I have been eating proteins, beans, and veg tables and eliminating flours, sugars, and dairy. I ate strictly on this diet for six days and then on the seventh day I would "cheat" and have my "Diet Gone Wild" day. If you've been reading my blog then you've seen those days and been green with envy!

So the jury was out on how this diet would work...I saw some weight loss, but not as much as I thought I would. I did loose some, but gained on the weekend...I kept saying that the REAL test would be the second bod pod test which was TODAY! My hope was that after four weeks I would loose at least 1% of body fat.

So at 8:00 am this morning I met Don and Chad and we had our second round of Bod Pod and measurements, so.........drum roll please...............here are the results:

	August  27	September 24	LOSS
weight	172 lbs	166 lbs	6 pounds
waist	37"	35"	2 inches
% fat	17.2%	16.3%	0.9%

I was really excited to hear the tech say 16.3%!!! (Ignoring the .01%) I hit my desire of dropping 1%...definitely I'm moving in the right direction and will continue with this diet!

OK, so to the CELEBRATION part of the day! After the time in the lab, the three of us headed to Juicy-O for breakfast. Let me tell you, any place that serves fresh made mini donuts for appetizers should be put on the greatest wonders of the world list!

We decided to order to our hearts content and share it all!

What is about to ensue is borderline food porn, so be prepared!

Red Velvet French Toast with Cream Cheese Icing, One Mammoth Cinnamon Roll drowning in Icing, two Pancakes the size of your head, Breakfast Sausage Sliders with hash browns, Avocado-Bacon-Cheese omelet with fried potatoes, and all washed down with endless coffee!

Don "the pusher" D. shows off one of his favorites.

Chad "the green lantern" K. thinks these will increase his speed and agility!

Three Amigos that work out together, diet together, and Eat together!

All amazingly happy and all with a sugar high!

Celebrating four weeks of discipline with complete abandon

..."it's a celebration"

Tommorw I'll reflect on what comes next...