I miss my chin

This is an email conversation I had with my friend Jessie this morning.

Me: I am considering a blog entry too -- one of the nice things about Google Chrome is that now it carries over all my bookmarks from home to here. so I have the links I need to write one. The problem is the content I want to write is pretty Debbie Downer so I am not sure I should write it. Or maybe pull one of those no-comment moves, because I don't really want anyone chiming in. Even though I hate when people do that. 
Ugh. 

Jessie: Debbie Downer in the self-esteem department? Everyone gets to have no more than seven (7) of those days per annum. I don't think you've used up your allotment this year. 
Or are you Debbie Downer in just a life-in-general way?

Me: Hahaha, I may just include that HR-benefits joke into the post. 
Self-esteem. I am feeling very fat, I miss my chin and my hands, but I don't know that I am at the tipping point to do anything about it or if I just want to complain about it and magically wish it away. 

Jessie: At least you recognize that Magical Golf Cart Wishing* is a stage that is separate from doing something about it. I think that's a big and pivotal difference between you and other folks.

I really understand, and I think that you really understand the difference between having Debbie Downer feelings and wallowing for far longer than is actually productive. I think the people who enjoy reading your blog also have negative feelings or feel defeated, and even if you don't let them comment (you drama queen, yuk yuk wokka wokka), you'll be surprised by how many folks will understand and/or give you feedback like, "Even if you're feeling super cruddy, the way that you tackle every day with confidence and humor is very inspirational."

For example, I would say that.

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*Magical Golf Cart Thinking came about a few years ago when a group of us went for a brisk walk through a nearby forest preserve. After about a half-hour of walking, a few people started grumbling about wishing for someone to come on by with a golf cart to pick us up and take us the rest of the way. Now it's become short-hand among my friends (okay, mostly Jessie, WINKIE) for the easy shortcut that does the work for us.

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Jessie, by the way, is blogging (or boogerin', as we like to joke) over at We Need Your Help And/Or Pies, where you can read her special blend of wokka-wokka humor and genuine enthusiasm, thoughtfulness, smarts, and all-around awesomeness as she travels on her own weight-loss journey (and very successfully too, I must add). She is also a recent convert to Gwynnie Bee; someday I may convince her to post an outfit photo or two! (OMG, SHE DID!!!!)

She has left the Magical Golf Cart far behind her these days. It's pretty great to see.

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Anyway. Back to the problem at hand: my hands. And my chin, singular. I miss them. I look down at the back of my hand and I don't recognize it anymore. Where are my tendons? I look at my outfit photos and pick the one to post not that has the most flattering outfit presentation but doesn't show the triple-chin explosion as much. 

Some days I don't have any photos that I want to post at all.

I tried reading Fat Acceptance blogs, and most days I am okay with how I look, but in the end...I don't want to be fat forever. I don't know if there's a "skinny" girl busting to get out of me, but I don't want to live the rest of my life like *this* either. 

Which brings me to my next problem: how do I get rid of all this extra weight? There are so many plans and options, and I have tried and failed at many of them. The craziest was Medifast, but of course that was the one that I lost the most. LoseIt, Weight Watchers, just trying eating less, that weight-loss challenge we did at work...even my doctor's come-to-Jesus talk last year didn't spur me into action. (Speaking of which, I have been putting off my annual physical to avoid THAT conversation. Can't do that for much longer!) 

I think I know what I want to do, but I don't want to verbalize yet -- because I don't think I can handle another public failure. And as much I like blogging and I appreciate everyone who reads and leaves helpful, funny, and/or encouraging comments, I am always aware of how public this is, and how embarrassing it is to fail in front of people. All I need to do is look at my tags some days and see all the failed diets and resolutions and dreams. Ugh.

And yet -- all that self-pity and dislike, and I am still not sure I am at the tipping point. Seems amazing, doesn't it? Seriously, I haven't hit rock bottom yet? 

No, I haven't. 

I know that I need to do something, and I am pretty sure I know how I want to do it. I just don't know yet that I WANT to do it. And that's the piece I cannot succeed without. 

So I am kind of hanging out at the edge of the cliff, peering out from time to time, watching my friends strapping into their gear and rapelling down the rocks. I wave to my other friends already at the bottom. I'm happy for all of them, and I cheer them on with genuine enthusiasm. 

But I still want that Magic Golf Cart to get me to the bottom of the cliff. I know it can't; I know that the real success in getting to the bottom of the cliff is in doing it myself, with my own sweat and hard work and commitment. 

Right now, that thought exhausts me. 

But some day soon, I hope it won't. That will be my tipping point day.

Until then, my chins and I will be here.

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Comments on, because I don't want to turn them off and be a drama queen, but truly, I am not looking for a pep talk. I just wanted to write this out, get it off my chest. 

Thanksgiving 2012: The Calorie Count

A couple of days before Thanksgiving, this fascinating article made the rounds on several of my news and food sites. The question asked was: how many calories will you eat on Thanksgiving Day?

The answer: 2,486 calories, excluding any alcohol or breakfast. They estimated including those could bloat it up to over 4500 calories.

This was their breakdown:
A six-ounce serving of turkey with the crispy skin on, including 4 ounces of dark meat and 2 ounces of white for a total of 299 calories.
• Sausage stuffing at 310 calories — go big or go home, right?
• Dinner roll with butter for 310 calories
• Two kinds of potatoes are always in order during the holidays: Big serving of mashed sweet-potato casserole made with butter, brown sugar and topped with marshmallows for 300 calories per serving, and a half-cup of mashed potatoes for  140 calories of starchy goodness.
• Green bean casserole at 110 calories for 2/3 cup, cranberry sauce at 15 calories and roasted brussels sprouts (veggies!) for 83 calories.
• Then there’s pie that has to get shoved in there — pumpkin pie at 316 calories per slice, pecan pie for 503 calories and lots of whipped cream on all of that at 100 calories.

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I decided to do my own tracking on the LoseIt! app. I already showed you guys the calorie counts for all the recipes I did, so adding them together was a snap.

My total for the whole day was somewhat less, and it DID include alcohol, breakfast, and the Thanksgiving Sandwich for dinner.

Breakfast was two mini cinnamon rolls and a small plate of fruit: 243 calories.

Pre-lunch was cheese-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon and a cranberry pomegranate cocktail: 403 calories.

Lunch was turkey breast with no skin (178), cranberry sauce (37), mashed potato casserole (195), cornbread stuffing (188), Brussels sprouts (59), green beans (57), and a second cranberry cocktail (216): 930 calories.

Dessert was pumpkin cheesecake and a pumpkin-oatmeal cookie: 362 calories.

Dinner was my absolute favorite part about Thanksgiving, The Sandwich. 2 slices wheat toast, turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce and a slice of bacon: 343 calories.

That comes to 2,281 for the whole day. My dinner alone was 930 compared to 1567 in the Times article. Guess burning the rolls helped me more than I thought! ;-D




How did you do? Does the thought of counting up the calories for Thanksgiving horrify you?

P.S. The costume for the flamingo was a gift from my mother-in-law; she got us outfits for them for all the major holidays. It's been a running joke that we make fun of the geese on her stoop that she decorates for the holidays, so this was her "revenge". Ha! She found them in a catalog somewhere. I am afraid to ask where. :)

Oven-dried Tomatoes, Frog Jam, and assorted Bentos

Rose Rounds asked how I made the oven-roasted tomatoes. I found the idea on The Local Beet, one of my favorite localvore blogs. They used juliet tomatoes, which are long like Romas but smaller in size. I couldn't find any of those, and the Roma's were too expensive. Tony's had a sale on "cocktail" for 79 cents a package, so I grabbed one of those to experiment with.



Local Beet said to set the temperature to 200 degrees, then stick them in for 8-12 hours, unattended. The problem was I took that "unattended" thing too literally, and I let them stay in the whole 12 hours. (In my defense, I was out for the afternoon during the key end time, so I didn't check on them at all.)

They ended up way too dry. A few crumbled to powder in my hand.



So I was out 79 cents. Lesson learned!

The next batch I used the cherry tomatoes from my Dad's garden. I really did not want to ruin these, and they were even smaller than the cocktails, so at about the 6 hour mark I checked on them. They had shrunken quite a bit, but all of them still had pockets of moisture on their bottoms. Every hour after that I checked again. At hour 8, many of the smaller tomatoes were ready (dried but still soft and chewy looking), so I pulled those out and let the rest keep drying. An hour later, they were all done.



Looking forward to using them in frittatas, salads, and maybe a sauce. 

Another lovely treat I've been enjoying this summer has been frog jam.

Yes, you read that right.



I picked up a jar in New Buffalo this summer, and I am IN LOVE. Way better than plum butter, and even the blackberry jam I got at the farmer's market earlier in the summer.

It isn't made of frogs, thank goodness. But can you guess the ingredients?



Figs - raspberries - orange peel - ginger. F-R-O-G, teehee.

It is F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C. It's raspberry, but with richer, sharper notes from the figs and ginger, and a nice burst from the orange peel at the end. I am definitely going to be looking for this again next year. (Or my next visit to the New Buffalo area.)

Despite all the lovely food photos I have taken this summer, I actually haven't been that good at maintaining the foodstyle; I've skipped more than a couple of Sunday Cooking sessions, especially as the summer waned, and I was pretty bad about bringing in lunches on a daily basis. That said, when I did do it, I ate really well. My goal this fall is just to do it more often.


PB&frog jam sandwich, yogurt, blackberries, and Mom's bread and butter pickles. Easiest lunch ever!


Drier's ham salad sandwich, deviled egg salad, black bean and corn salad, blacberries, and a handful of snack mix. This was leftovers from the vacation. :)


Kale frittata, blue cheese coleslaw, yogurt and watermelon.


One of my favorite grilled meals of the summer: portabello swiss sausages, pineapple, and onions. We ate this and our turkey-bacon wrapped chicken thighs most often on the grill this year.


Pretty table set during my parent's visit. Hmm, maybe we should eat at the table more this fall...

What was your favorite foodstuff this summer?

Sunday Cooking: Easy come, easy go

For posterity's sake, I am noting that I skipped Sunday Cooking last week. Not just the post, the actual cooking. I had plans all weekend and only a small window of opportunity to cook, and when I asked Hubby what he would like me to whip up quickly, he asked for another round of the bacon-wrapped chicken thighs from the week before. I wasn't in the mood for more of that, but I made them anyway.

I cannot express how much of a mistake this was. For both of us.

I won't go into details, this last week definitely taught me that it takes almost nothing for the foodstyle habits to come undone. They are mostly definitely not second-nature like I presumed they were, and junk food still holds a strong allure that I have to actively overcome.

So back it was to Sunday Cooking this week!

First up was a Miracle Mac and Cheese recipe I found on Budget Bytes this week. I used whole wheat elbows, skim milk and low-fat sharp cheddar cheese. So, so easy, and it tasted great. It reheats okay too.




Next I made a Green Pasta Sauce that Sheila from Ephemera sent me. I hope it's okay to re-print the recipe here, Sheila; it's so good I definitely want to share it.

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Sheila's Green Pasta Sauce
(For the WW people: 5 PP per serving, makes 4 servings)

3 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp of olive oil (3 PP values)
1 bunch of chard, kale or beet greens
1 bunch of spinach or watercress
1 250 ml tub of skim ricotta cheese (16 PP values)
Nutmeg
Salt, pepper

Sauté the chopped up garlic in the olive oil. Wash, then remove the stems and roughage from the chard, etc. Chop up (makes a lot, about 12 cups!) and then gradually stir into the garlic/olive oil until it’s all reduced (down to a much smaller amount). Add a bit of water if it seems dry. Add nutmeg (a few good shakes), salt and pepper to taste.

Put into a blender with the ricotta and puree until smooth, or puree with a hand blender. Serve immediately (for 4 people) or freeze.

Great with any kind of whole wheat pasta. Add chicken or prawns and lots of veggies and you have a delicious meal!

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After cooking the spinach and kale, with seasoning added.



The finished product. I used a hand blender in a big bowl since I don't have a stand-up blender anymore (never used it).

I have several bags of whole wheat pasta that I have been buying over my last few shopping trips, and this will be great with those. Hubby loved the flavor and was eating it with a spoon before I stopped him. :)

For lunches, I cut up watermelon and strawberries, and bought some roast beef for sandwiches. I haven't posted any bento boxes in a while, but here is one from a couple of weeks ago.


This was the bacon-wrapped chicken, roasted carrots, blue-cheese coleslaw, and a cut-up granola bar. Delicious, but too many days of it was not a good idea.

The last thing I made this weekend was shredded pork. I got the recipe from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything app. I was browsing through it on my iPhone, and was amazed at how easy it sounded. I usually make shredded pork BBQ-style in the crockpot, but it requires a LOT of barbecue sauce, and then it can't be eaten as anything else. This version can be used in tacos or BBQ or anything I feel like having.

It was super-easy, and even better I didn't have to print out the recipe; I opened the app up on my iPad and just read it from the screen!



I did not follow the last sentence about using pork shoulder; I couldn't find one at any of the 3 grocery stores I went to, so I did it with a 2-pound loin roast. Then I quartered a large onion, added plenty of minced garlic, salt, black pepper, 2 bay leaves, and a good seasoning of Northwoods.




The whole recipe is this:
1. Cut up pork into 1-inch cubes, add all the seasonings, onion and garlic into a Dutch oven. Cover with water and heat until it boils. Turn down to simmer so it still bubbles, and let cook for 1 hour until the pork is tender.
(I let it go longer because I had the leaner roast. I did taste-test it at that time, and added a little more kosher salt and some Worchestershire.)
2. When pork is tender, let cool. Remove pieces from liquid, and shred it with your fingers.

That was the whole thing!

I think we are back on track this week. Fingers crossed!
Next up: catching up on all my blogs. I think my Shelley had a birthday last week. Woohoo!

And how were YOU last week?

Sunday Cooking: Mystery meat

Here is a pop quiz.

See these ingredients?



What did they become? (Answer at the end.)


The next one is too easy. What did these ingredients become?



Yep, my Babchi's spaghetti sauce. I polished off the last baggie in the first dish, so I knew it was time for a new one. My timing was perfect, as my grocery store was having a sale on crushed and pureed tomatoes -- 99 cents a can. Since all the other ingredients are spices I have on hand, this batch (which will last 2-3 months) will cost me less than $5.

Other items in this week's cooking jag included prepping melon for the week, another batch of mustard coleslaw, and roasting the last Brussels sprouts of the season. They're just too big now, which means they are probably the end of the crop. See you next winter, you amazing baby cabbage heads!



The other big item I made was this spaghetti squash au gratin, from here. You know how I love my spaghetti squash; it's my pasta substitute that I eat almost weekly. I found this recipe through a link or Pinterest, and it grabbed my attention. It's almost like mac and cheese without the mac. Mmmmm. I read in the comments that someone had added ham, and I knew I would be doing the same.

You guys, it was AMAZING.

Before:



After:



I tweaked the recipe of course, replacing the butter with a splash of olive oil, and using low-fat and fatfree sour cream and cheese. Added some Canadian bacon and we were good to go. I can probably go with less cheese next time, but I needed to polish off the bag before it spoiled so I just dumped it in. The ham (and extra cheese) makes it a main dish instead of a side. which is for the best since I am more likely to portion the larger part of my plate. 

All of it took about 3 hours: coleslaw, spaghetti squash au gratin, a batch of sauce, Brussels sprouts, canteloupe, and lastly, the ingredients at the beginning of the post. My grocery bill was again about $75, and we have plenty to eat all week.

I have delicious food made from whole ingredients, I spent a couple of hours cooking so I don't have to for the rest of the week, AND I saved money on food for the week. PLUS, I am now down 6 pounds since the beginning of the year.

Win, win, win, win. I am so, so, SO GLAD I have made this Sunday Cooking a habit. I love my foodstyle!

Before I go, it's time for the reveal. These were the ingredients.




Did you guess meatloaf?



Happy eating!

Sunday Cooking: Wrap it Up

In my last post, I mentioned that I had been inspired by a recipe post from Eating Well about burrito/wrap ideas. None of the actual recipes in the slideshow intrigued me, but I wrote down a list of ones that we would like:

-chicken salad wrap (with celery, grapes, ff mayo, and some shredded lettuce)
-fish tacos/burrito (with the fishsticks still in my freezer and a spicy cabbage coleslaw)
-BBQ chicken burrito (with pinto beans, and avocado for Hubby)
-scrambled egg wrap (with chopped basil pesto chicken sausage and sauteed peppers and onions)
-fajitas (with strip steak, peppers, carrots, onions and leftover pinto beans and avocado)

Each one could be put together in minutes each night; all I had to do was shop smart and prepare some of the base dishes.



I'm not a bargain shopper, but it's occurred to me that this weekly-cooking thing saves us a lot of money. This is what $75 buys.

There was dairy and meat....



There were dry groceries...



There were fruits and vegetables.



Of course, not everything pictured will be eaten this week; I don't have a plan for the potatoes or tortellini but they looked really tasty so I will figure out how to incorporate them for next week. And I have in my fridge right now a few items from last week's shopping to be used this week, like eggs and basil pesto sausage and dried beans. 

Since I had to work on Sunday, I did my weekly cooking on Saturday afternoon. I started with the one that would take the longest, the pinto beans. They came out so amazing a couple of weeks ago I decided to make another pot, this time leaving them for sides dishes instead of mashing them up into soup. I cooked the beans using Alton Brown's method here; adding in the seasoning bundle and then the salt after a half-hour is positively genius. Who knew beans could soak up THAT much flavor without drenching them in fats? Amazing. I skip the soak session; I've never seen beans need it. Of course, you can use his method for any bean type; he had black beans in his, I had pinto at home.



While the beans simmered for a couple of hours, I seasoned the boneless chicken thighs by tossing them in olive oil, kosher salt, and Penzey's Mural of Flavor seasoning, then baked/roasted them for 45 minutes in a 350 degree oven.




I had some leftover chicken from the previous week, so I cut that up into chicken salad with celery and grapes. It was so good I ate it for two days!





The last recipe I made was tangy coleslaw. This one I made up as I went along, but was a half-bag of shredded cabbage, fatfree mayo, dijon mustard, celery seed, kosher salt, and more Mural of Flavor. (I find it brightens every dish.)



The rest of what I did was veggie and fruit prep. I am far more likely to eat them if I wash and cut them up beforehand. It's silly but I'm surprised at how less likely I am to throw away rotting veggies if I do this.





Hmmm, I think I figured out why it works: when I got home from my go-live on Sunday and dove into my chicken salad on whole wheat tortilla with coleslaw and carrot chips on the side, Hubby decided to make himself chicken with sauteed peppers in the spinach pesto wrap. Somehow I think he would have picked something else if that big bag of sliced peppers weren't sitting in the fridge...

It's only Tuesday, but working on Sunday has made it seem much later in the week. I'm pretty beat by it all, but I have to confess: I am really looking forward to my fish tacos tonight! I am glad I came up with this theme week of burrito/wraps; it's a way to have a lot of similar dishes without being too repetitive or too varied.

Any suggestions for other theme weeks I could try?

Sunday Cooking: Daddy's Girl

(My Thanksgiving haul 2011.)

I love grocery shopping.

I always have; I take after my father that way. He always has a running list of what is needed, written on these small white pads we call "Dad pads". He has one next to his spot on the kitchen table, in his car, in his office by his computer, etc. My whole life, I have rarely seen my Dad without his Dad pad nearby. He keeps track of errands, groceries, anything he is working on; when it is time for groceries he reads through the circulars and jots down what is for sale, then goes through his coupons and tucks the ones he will use under a couple of sheets of the pad. By the time he gets to the store, he doesn't need to consult his pad much, and he knows the layout of the store so he can make quick work of gathering his items in the cart.

Maybe I don't love grocery shopping as much as I love my Dad's efficiency at it. Or I maybe I just love them both. :)



 I don't clip coupons or read the circulars before I shop, but I do make my list on my own Dad pad (available at Staples, he tells me), dividing out which store carries what so I can get the better quality or the brand we like. Jewel has my Dannon yogurt and Hubby's granola, Tony's has great inexpensive vegetables and fruits, Whole Foods is the only grocery where I buy our meats, Harrison's for chicken if I can get there, and so forth.

When I have a long list, I try to hit the grocery circuit on Saturday mornings before it gets busy, as one of the benefits of being an early riser. Lately, my list has been relatively short, and it occurred to me this weekend that that is a function of being as efficient as my Dad. Every week before I start Sunday Cooking, I freeze up any leftovers from the previous week, and when I shop, I often stock up on an item we don't use right away but that can last in my cupboard or freezer until I am ready to use it. So all I am buying these days are the fresh items to supplement what I already have waiting to go.




For example, this week's groceries included:

Fresh produce: grapes, lettuce, butternut squash, bananas
Canned produce: black beans, diced tomatoes, corn
Dairy: yogurt, organic skim milk, string cheese
Bread: whole wheat English muffins, Natural Ovens whole wheat bread (I am on the hunt for a new chewy whole wheat bread, this one might be the keeper)
Groceries: granola bars, WW ice cream bars, coffee, fatfree evaporated milk, cornstarch, center cut bacon

On Sunday, that turned into food for the week:
-Spicy Black Bean Vegetable Soup (with tomatoes and corn)
-roasted spaghetti squash with homemade sauce (turkey meatballs to be purchased at Trader Joe's because I ran out of my supply; after many taste tests, I have concluded TJ's has the best turkey meatballs)
-Bacon Pumpkin Pasta (made with whole wheat pasta and canned pumpkin)
-sauteed chicken thighs for salads
-roasted carrots and butternut squash for a soup I am making on Tuesday or Wednesday



I had the spaghetti squash, carrots, frozen chicken thighs, pumpkin, pasta and sauce all at home, and it was time to use them up.

This was Monday's lunch:



I love the black bean soup, but it doesn't keep me full all day, so I added some string cheese and a granola bar to tide me over. It worked!

My remaining challenge with Sunday Cooking has been making it last all week; we start off so well, bee-lining straight into the kitchen when we get home late on Monday and Tuesday, happily reheating what is there. But by Thursday, we're bored and stressed and in no mood to cook anything, and out comes the frozen pizza (dangerous, but I am afraid of the alternative if we don't have it available) or we order one (the more dangerous alternative). Then Friday is usually a wash, and Saturday is junk food while we are out and about, and in the end we have only eaten healthy food four days out of seven.

I need to break that cycle, but I am not sure how. Maybe I will put off the spaghetti squash/sauce meal until Thursday so I can have the flavors of pizza without the calories...

Any other thoughts?

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P.S. Happy Belated Birthday, Dad! And thanks for teaching me to love grocery shopping. :)


(Last year, Dad opening his (mostly a joke) birthday gift of bologna and Whoppers. He was pretty delighted about it; I am not kidding about him being a grocery nerd!)

Sunday Cooking: Sauce du Cabinet

Somehow even though all I made were building blocks last week, we ended up having a lot left over, either in cooked form or in raw. Since the freezer is pretty well stocked and the fridge and cabinets were bursting from the seams, we only purchased staples this week (bread, coffee, milk, onions) and I made what my mom affectionately calls "sauce du cabinet" (said with an exaggerated, and bad, French accent).

Sauce du cabinet is made from using whatever you have on hand. There's no real recipe, you just cross your fingers you get the right proportions of flavors. Sometimes, especially for those of us who are terrible and/or new cooks, it can end up as a disaster. Othertimes it feels like magic. I often don't feel strong enough, culinarily speaking, to try something so bold, but today I did.

Of course, I made butternut squash soup and a quiche, both of which I have made different variations of many times, but still, it was a little scary!

Luckily both turned out great.



Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

I had a roasted squash and a couple of servings of other roasted veggies (carrots, cauliflower, potatoes and garlic) left over. I diced and sauteed a medium onion, two celery stalks, 2 carrots, and 2 cloves minced garlic. Once all of that had softened, I added the squash and other veggies and all the chicken stock I had on hand (2/3 of a big box). I brought that to a boil then turned it to simmer. Since nothing had been overly seasoned in its first cooking, I added tons of Penzey's Northwoods, kosher salt and pepper, and even a good shake of Worchestershire. Let that simmer for 20 minutes, then used the immersion blender to get to a nice, thick consistency. It was still a little too thick so I added another cup of water. Perfect!!

Next up was the quiche. Quiche and frittatas are so easy: it's just eggs, some kind of cheese, veggies, a type of onion, and a meat. The only difference between quiche and frittatas is if you use a crust. I happened to have one left over in the freezer so quiche it was!

Bacon, Cheddar and Kale Quiche

Preheated the oven to 350. First I chopped up the last of the kale and sauteed it in some olive oil until it had softened, about five minutes. Took that off the stove. In a large bowl, I cracked a half-dozen eggs, and seasoned them with a lot of Penzey's Mural of Flavor, and some kosher salt and pepper. Added a package of shredded cheddar cheese (from some idea for a recipe that I never did), and chopped up the last of the bacon I had made last week (and never eaten, that's usually for Hubby). Mixed all that together and then added the kale. By then the mixture felt too thick so I added a couple more eggs. Poured all of that into a frozen pie shell. Since it was sitting so high in the pan, I put the quiche pan on a jelly roll pan so if it cooked over it would be okay. Baked this for 35 minutes, until a toothpick came out clean.

Before it went in.



After it came out. Hubby is already eying it for his dinner tomorrow. And maybe breakfast. It spilled over onto the jelly roll pan, probably an egg and a half worth, nicely seasoned and baked. Hubby inhaled it, LOL!



After that, I was done. We bought chicken sausages for Super Bowl dinner tonight, and since we each like different kinds we each have two left over for the week. Hubby carmelized some onions until they were super dark and sweet, and I had mine over cognac and cranberry chicken sausage with ground mustard on a whole wheat bun, plus a cup of squash soup. Yum.

Since I am sharing sauce du cabinet recipes, let's talk roasted veggies for a minute. They're so easy I never think to link a recipe or write one out, but for anyone wondering, this is what I do.


Roasted Vegetables

Preheat oven to 400. (You can do it at 350, but then you never get any nice coloring.)
Prepare your veggies in large, even-sized chunks. For Brussels sprouts, cut them in half so the edges get crispy.
Fill a baking pan with veggies. I use a brownie pan. Seriously.
Season them with a good glug or two of olive oil, kosher salt, pepper and another seasoning of your choice. I like fresh or dried thyme, or Northwoods seasoning, or cumin. Toss the veggies with the oil and seasonings with your hands so everything is liberally seasoned.
If you want to get fancy, chop the top off a garlic bulb and nest it in the middle of the veggies. Pour a little extra olive oil on it. 
Roast in oven until done. Most thicker veggies (carrots, potatoes, beets, parsnips, squash) take about an hour. Brussels sprouts are done in about 30 minutes, asparagus (oh so good in spring!) and green beans are about 15-18 minutes.
If you added the garlic, let it cool a bit then squeeze out all the sweet roasted garlic onto your veggies and enjoy.

Do you have any sauce du cabinet recipes you would like to share?

Dieting Tips, agree or disagree?

Eating Well blog just posted a series of entries about Dieting Challenge tips. Not so sure I agreed with all of them. But since Dieting Season (which comes right after Holiday Season) will kick off for many next week, I thought it was timely.

1. Take a Quiz to find out if you are ready to lose weight. I'll give this one a free pass because it was clearly a gimmick to introduce the other tips. You don't need a quiz, you KNOW when if you are ready.

2. Set a Date. At first I thought they meant 'set a date when you will start' but they actually meant 'set a date for a goal you want to reach'. I disagree with both ideas. First off, if you want to start losing weight, don't gear up to do it, just do it. Saying you will start eating right on Monday, or after New Years, or after you've gone grocery shopping, is the equivalent of saying, "...because right now I am going to go on a Last Hurrah Bacchanalia Journey of My Favorite Junk Food, pass me the Ho-Ho's please." It becomes a diet, not a Foodstyle, if you plan on a start date. It's like quitting smoking; just go cold turkey and start eating right at the very next meal you have. (Which I also did, about eight years ago. Pack-a-day habit for twenty years, GONE.)

Secondly, unless I have a small amount of weight to lose (which has never happened), setting goal deadlines has been a recipe for failure for me. You know how much I have to lose? All of it. I don't know how long that will take. As long as it takes, I guess.

3. Calculate your Daily Calorie Intake. If you never done any other weight loss plan before, or if you aren't sure how much you should be eating, this is pretty good advice. But, ugh, math and counting. I like math a lot, but I don't like to eat like that. I much prefer to think of it in terms of whole foods and whole servings, like the Food Pyramid/My Plate/Weight Watchers Core and their original food plan all those years ago. But for an experiment, if I used their formula of [my weight x 12] - 500, my daily allowed calorie intake is 2284. I can't even translate into food; it seems like a lot. Does that mean I can a piece of chocolate cake every day? I think so! (Hmm, that's already backfiring.)

4. Count Calories. I think I have expressed my opinion on this above. That said, I do agree that keeping a food log is critical to success. It forces you to be honest and accountable for what you are putting in your mouth. How you break down that food log, into Points or Calories, or little boxes checkmarked Protein, Veggies, etc, is entirely up to you.

5. Weigh Yourself and Log Your Progress. I have no scale-phobia so I am all for regular weighing. But not all of us feel the same way; some people get obsessed with the habit, get too focused on a specific number or ritual, or they invest too much in the outcome and it can derail their other successes. My pal Helen has found her solution; she uses a Zero Scale which hides her actual weight and just shows her weekly and cumulative loss. My other pal Shelley doesn't use scales at all anymore; she's lost and kept off 100 pounds for several years now, and she goes by how her clothes are fitting. Whatever works for you, what keeps you motivated and inspired and excited, is what you should do. Me, I love my scale, and I love my spreadsheet. I'm sticking with it.

6. Go grocery shopping. YES. This is the best part of eating right (after losing weight, of course). Try new stores, or go to your regular store and wander a new path through it. Go to the cheese counter, and the veggies, and dairy, and really look at all the options. Is there a new meat cut you want to try? Suddenly interested in persimmons? Buy one and see what it's like. There are so many foods out there that we don't even see in our line of vision. Instead of making a beeline to stuff you know, spend some time and look at foods you don't know. They might become your new favorite thing!

7. Make a Meal Plan. I would put this before #6; use your meal plan as your shopping list. And they are absolutely right; do not forget the snacks. String cheese, fruit, yogurt, almonds, popcorn, whatever, just make sure you have it on hand -- especially in the office -- or you'll regret it.

What tips do you agree or disagree with? Got any of your own to add?

A Gift for Yourself

I was going to suggest a few last-minute gifts but since most have to be ordered online, they're probably too late for Christmas. However, New Years comes right after that, and if you have been putting off starting your own "foodstyle", maybe buying yourself one of these will help inspire you to kick your New Year's Resolutions off right!

1. Get a cool lunch box.

I got mine from Laptop Lunches. I actually bought an extra set of inserts too, which is so helpful on the days when I am too lazy to wash everything out in time. Plus I have twice as many colors!

These are great for portion control and variety; with so many sizes and shapes, you can fit just about anything you like to eat in there, and they work great for bringing lunch and snacks. Look at all the ideas for filling them here!

2. Get a cool lunch box, v2.0

The Mr Bento is from Amazon. It's great for soups and liquids, perfect for cold weather lunches. Two of the containers can be used for hot or cold, and the top two are better for snacks and dry goods. So the bottom one is usually yogurt and fruit, the next is soup or leftovers, the next is clementines or a slice of bread with cheese, and the last is almonds or grapes.

$40 may seem like a lot for a lunch box, but I've have both of mine for two years already, and they are both going strong.

3. Replenish your spice cabinet

Spices only last for a year before they lose their flavor, but I have the worst time remembering when I bought them and if it's time for them to be replaced. I restock on flour and sugar at Thanksgiving, and this year I'm going to start replenishing my spices for New Years.

And that means Penzey's, people. Penzey's.

It's a Wisconsin/Illinois company, but you can order online from anywhere. Everything is fresh, and the clean look of the bottles will make you want to cook more, I swear. After several years of trial and error, these are our staples:

Northwoods Seasoning -- adds a layered kick to everything, from chicken to roasted veggies to soup
4/S Seasoned Salt -- for grilled meats especially
Chicago Steak Seasoning -- the only thing we ever put on steak
Italian Herb Seasoning -- that and some basil is all I need for my tomato sauce
Krakow Nights -- we add it to sauteed cabbage and mushrooms, like the good Polacks we are
Greek Seasoning -- my favorite in the summer on chopped cucumbers and feta

I also order the pure spices and herbs like chipotle, cumin, bay leaves, cinnamon, dried minced onion, garlic, celery flakes, rosemary, French thyme, and red pepper flakes for Hubby's pizza. But for starter cooks, the seasonings are all you need; Penzey's know how to blend everything perfectly. You can buy all different sizes too, so if you just want to sample something, get the 1-2 oz. jar. At this point, I buy 4-oz bags to refill my existing jars. Whatever works!

And spices DO work. They are my secret weapon of cooking; I just buy basic meats or veggies, douse them with olive oil, kosher salt, and a seasoning, and cook it up. Everything tastes so good, I never miss the butter, sauces, gravies, etc.

4. Get a cool lunch box, v3.0

Okay, maybe I'm the only who wants that one. Just like the one I had when I was a kid!

Mark Bittman also had a list of gift ideas for the non-cook. I would LOVE to offer shopping lessons to several of my co-workers, either for clothes or for groceries.

As for me, this is shaping up to be a Cooking Christmas. We already got a Farberware percolator, and our coffee has never tasted better. Plus, I get the daily nostalgia trip when I wash out the grinds and the pot! Flashbacks to Acorn Lane... :) I am also hoping to get a new smaller crockpot, a local soup cookbook, new set of colored cutting boards (to separate veggies from meat), and a new spice rack.

What are you hoping for under your tree?