Healthy and Sane » NYC streaking challenge

It’s Friday!

Elina — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 00:39:00 +0000

It’s Friday!!! Man, this week seemed like it flew by but today was soooooooo slooooooooow. I could not wait to get out of the office but the clock was just not moving. Despite not being very motivated, I still got a lot done though

Food today was interesting. I got home kind of late after my hair appointment last night. By the time I made dinner, ate, and blogged it was time for bed. I always make my food the night before but it was already late so I decided to just make it in the morning. I also didn’t really know what I wanted which was another reason I didn’t make it right away. I was hoping I’d just wake up with a craving. Well, surprise surprise, the morning was super rushed and I kind of just threw a bunch of stuff together.

BREAKFAST

Breakfast this morning was an egg and cheese sandwich (with tomato). I cooked the egg in the microwave for a little under 2 minutes while the english muffin was toasting. Then I slapped on a piece of white american cheese, a few slices of tomato and wrapped it to go. Here it is:

It was just ok. The english muffin got slightly soggy and I think I’ve decided I don’t like tomatoes on my breakfast sandwiches. Also the past few times I’ve made these I threw some bacon in there, but this time we were out and I really missed it. Oh well, it was still good, just not great. And it did feel me up.

PRE-WORKOUT SNACK

This snack I thought of 2 nights ago after I already made my food. I couldn’t wait to make this and this was the first thing I threw together to make sure I don’t run out of time

In the container is about 1/2 cup of TJ’s European style nonfat yogurt, mixed with 1/2 cup of pumpkin and 1 tablespoon of TJ’s pumpkin butter (for sweetness), topped with some pecans and 2 honey graham crackers. I crushed the crackers before eating and topped the whole thing with them. Very delicious! I would love it even slightly sweeter with a bit more pumpkin butter but I think that’s enough sugar for a pre-workout snack. Good stuff!

WORKOUT

I took today the Journey to the Core class at the gym. There are 7 stations with 2 exercises at each station, and you do each exercise for 30 seconds, and the whole circuit 3 times. Then there is really nice stretching at the end. The time really flew by at this class, but I recommended to the instructor today to hold the exercises for 45 seconds and only do the circuits twice instead. I think this would make it burn more (I know I’m a masochist ). He said he’ll think about… some people were struggling with even just 30 seconds, but I say let them rest if they need to. I want to get a better workout. I mentioned this to another girl after class and she agreed… she said she’ll back me up next time if he asks The class took 45 minutes and I really fought the urge not to jump on the elliptical or do more lifting. I shouldn’t over-train since I do try to workout 6 times a week. 45 minutes should be enough… I need to remind this to myself sometimes.

LUNCH

Lunch was the meal that really suffered the most from my lack of time this morning. I really wanted to make a salad but I just couldn’t think of a good combo this morning and was getting overwhelmed. At first I was just going to buy something for lunch (I hardly ever do it and there are a few healthy options I can choose from) but then I remembered that I have a few leftovers frozen so I grabbed one of them, or to be exact I grabbed a container with the fritatta I made a few weeks ago. It was a solid ice block and I was definitely taking a chance on it.

It was still frozen when I was ready for lunch and I was definitely not excited about it. I figured if it tasted horrible I would throw it away and go back to plan A. It seemed ok when I got it out of the microwave… although it did take 3 tries to finally get it to the right temperature. I was also planning on having a small apple with it (but I ended up eating the apple for a late afternoon snack).

Because I really wasn’t excited about this lunch, despite the fact that it tasted fine I just really didn’t feel like it. I felt like I was punishing myself a little (I hate that I always try to be responsible!) so I finally left the last bite on the plate and instead of the apple grabbed a 100 calorie pack of cookies for dessert. A much better treat!

I got this little package of chocolate chip “buttons” in a Whole Foods promotional goodie bag. I was going through it a few days ago and found these so I brought them to the office. Good thing! Here they are… so pretty

Ok so the truth is they weren’t that great. I pretended like they were real chocolate chip cookies, but really they weren’t. I took my time eating them, trying to savor every button. I figured it was still more indulgent than an apple.

SNACK 2 + 3

x2… I ate a whole banana with a whole package of Barney Butter. I split it into 2 snacks, but the truth is I don’t think there was more than an hour in between those. I just couldn’t wait to have the other half! I absolutely love almond butter with bananas!!!!

So yeah, there was snack #4 (I was just hungry all day today, probably because I really didn’t want to work and preferred to eat instead) which was the apple pictured above.

DINNER

For dinner tonight I planned to make some chicken with brussel sprouts I bought at the farmers market on Tuesday. When I got home I was absolutely starving and the chicken was stil
l frozen I considered waiting, or defrosting it in the microwave, but at the end decided to go to another Plan B and made chipotle shrimp tacos from Cooking Light (I followed the recipe to the T). I love how shrimp can be defrosted in just minutes under cold water. We always have them on hand (in the freezer) and they are a great lean source of protein. Yum!

Here are my tacos with shrimp, avocado, sliced tomatoes and TJ’s salsa verde on TJ’s low carb whole wheat tortillas.

They were a big mess to eat but were quite delicious

And yes I was still hungry after these, so I made dessert. One warm chocolate chip cookie with some decaf peppermint tea. Now my belly is satisfied

And as always, a quick recap of today’s “stats”

NYC STREAKING CHALLENGE- STREAK DAY 5

Calories (1200-1650)- DONE – 1630
Fitness – DONE- circuit training class
Water – DONE – 9 cups
F/V – DONE – tomato, pumpkin, beet greens, potatoes, mushrooms, banana, apple, avocado

I’m going to relax on the coach and watch a movie with my husband. I love weekends!

The streak continues

Elina — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 02:03:00 +0000

Streak day 4, 7 days ’till NYC…

Another excellent day today. Sorry if I keep starting these last few posts the same way, but I’m just always so excited about my good food choices and I feel great! Work is busy, but it doesn’t matter because I just feel good about myself which translates into feeling good about everything else. Ok, onto food…

Breakfast

‘Nuff said? Jk! This breakfast is not only extremely photogenic but is also extremely delicious! In this cup was about 3/4 cups of nonfat yogurt, 1/2 banana, a serving of TJ’s american trek mix, some kashi golean and Erin’s double chocolate granola. I definitely wanted more when I finished, but that’s because there was chocolate involved and I always want more chocolate This breakfast was slightly more calories than my typical breakfasts (the addition of granola was the extra) because I was planning on doing an 8 mile run during lunch and wanted to increase my calorie intake a little bit to fuel this workout.

Pre-workout Snack
Again, this one was a little bit on the larger size for a snack for me. Last night I made this little sandwich and photographed it before packing it up…

Whole wheat “british muffin” (from TJ’s) with a tablespoon of spreadable fruit and a little over 1/2 tablespoon of natural pb (mix of chunky and smooth). The spreadable fruit made the muffin slightly soggy, but it was still pretty yummy and was definitely good fuel for later

Workout
I’ve been meaning to do this 8 mile run since last Friday, but things just kept coming up. I’ve never run longer than 7 miles before, but the 7 miles didn’t feel like my limit, so I figured I should be able to do the 8. I still get nervous almost every time before I run. I don’t know why. I always do well. In fact, let me fastward to my workout today… I kicked butt! At mile 7 I kept on increasing speed at which point I actually had to slow down on purpose so as to not injure myself. I didn’t want to regret this run, but yeah, I definitely could have done this faster or run longer. Awesome! I actually forgot to look at the clock on the treadmill (yes I ran 8 miles on the treadmill! It was no problem for me, I was just watching tv the entire time)… but I averaged 6.4 mph, so maybe it took like 73 minutes or so?? I also did 0.15 mile walk for warmup and 0.15 mile walk for a cooldown… and I stretched after my run. I really wanted to make sure I wake up tomorrow and am able to walk

Do you ever slow down on purpose or do you just give it your all?

LunchLunch today was leftovers from last night: hamburger stroganoff. It was still super delicious!!!

I also had a pear for “dessert.” It was super juicy and delicious!

Afternoon snack
I had a hair appointment after work so I decided to have a quick snack so I wouldn’t be starving when I finally got home. I tried a new kind of KIND bar: walnut & date.

OMG, I am seriously in love with kind bars!!!! This is the second kind I’ve had one (well actually I tried another kind at a little tasting they had at Whole Foods and loved it too) and I love love loved it! Here is the picture of the bar up-close:

See how there are huge chunks of dates?! You can actually taste the ingredients, which are basically dates, walnuts and honey (there are a few others in there but these are the main ones). Awesome! I can’t wait to dig into my next one (I kind of bought every kind they had in the store )

Dinner
My husband went out while I was getting my hair done so I was on my own for dinner. He doesn’t really like salads and I seriously crave them, so this was definitely a salad night! I put the salad together but then realized it was too low-cal, so I made little polenta stacks, inspired by Caitlin. For the salad dressing I wanted a nice balsamic vinegrette (I think it goes perfect with spinach) but we didn’t have any at home because I can’t stand any of the low fat kinds and I never bought the full fat version until my recent goddess dressing purchase. I brought the goddess dressing to work, so I couldn’t use it tonight, but it actually inspired me to make my own. I remembered the tahini in it and thought that’s maybe the ingredient that makes the balsamic vinegrettes that I’ve liked before cloudy. I started putting a bunch of stuff together and it came out really well! I was super inpressed with myself

So here is dinner altogether:

The salad had spinach, some grape tomatoes, 1/3 oz of dried cranberries, 1/4 oz of pecans, and 1/2 oz of goat cheese. This is a really great combo!

My dressing consisted of (I think):
- 1 teaspoon of EVOO
- 1 teasp
oon of tahini
- 1 teaspoon of balsamic vinegar
- 1 teaspoon of lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon of honey
- S&P to taste

And then the polenta stacks… I cut up 1/4 of a polenta log into 4 circles, baked them in the toaster oven for about 8 minutes at 350 degrees, topped them with 1/2 oz of cheddar cheese (I was going to use fresh mozzarella but it went bad ) and broiled it for a few more minutes. Here they are out of the oven:

And put together, on the side of my large salad:

And ouf course I couldn’t end the meal without dessert so I had 1/4 serving of TJ’s chocolate covered edamames. Yum!

And that brought me to 1650 calories exactly for the day. Funny how that worked out!

So here are my goal results for today:

NYC streaking challenge – day 4:
Calories (1200 – 1650) – DONE – 1650 exactly
Fitness – DONE- 8 mile run + 0.3 mile walk
Water – DONE – 8 cups
F/V – DONE – banana, mushrooms, pear, kind bar (dates), spinach, grape tomatoes, slices tomato, cranberries

And that’s it for today. Do you like the new format (breaking it up into sections)?

Leftovers aren’t boring

Elina — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 01:10:00 +0000

Streak day 3, 8 days to go ’till NYC! Still doing great on my mini-challenge!

I got a craving for a breakfast I made last week: smoked salmon sandwiches, so yesterday I stopped by TJ’s to pick up some lox. This breakfast did not disappoint! It looks kind of messy (sorry the bread is very fragile and broke apart on it’s “commute to work”) but it was super rich and delicious!

The bread I used is The Baker wholegrain flaxseed bread. It is so nutty and addicting. My husband would hate it, so I know it’s not for everyone, but I absolutely cannot get enough of this stuff! Here is a picture of the package if you’re interested…

So breakfast was 2 slices of the bread, about 1 1/2 ounces of lox and 1 tablespoon of whipped cream cheese. I also had a cup of hazelnut coffee with half and half and a tsp of agave nectar. The usual stuff. I wanted more food after this breakfast but remembered that last time it kept me really full for a long time. I decided to wait it out a bit, which worked! I probably would’ve had a massive stomachache if I ate more like I instinctively wanted to.

About 3 hours later I snacked on this apple. It was my pre-workout snack. I wasn’t even that hungry, but I knew I needed fuel for my abs + spinning classes.

Both classes were soooo good and so tough today. I was super excited for them for some reason. I think it’s because I’m feeling like my old self. I love eating healthy and working out! It’s so good to know I’m taking care of myself! The abs class is the toughest one they offer at my gym, just basic stuff but you feel the burn after 15 minutes of straight crunching. And spinning… once again today was my favorite instructor and I haven’t been to his class in months. It was excellent. I was dripping sweat like crazy and loved it! He turned the lights on at the end of the class and I was super shiny, but looked so buff!!! My arms looked so toned. Maybe it was that boxercise class last night? Hmm, doubt one class did the trick. Anyways, I felt good!

Moving on to lunch, which is boring for blog purposes because it was leftovers from last night’s dinner. It was still absolutely delicious! In fact when I got back from the gym I had an email from my husband saying how good lunch was (he had the leftovers too). It’s pretty cool to get 2 meals for both of us in the same amount of effort. The flip side of course is when something doesn’t come out incredibly good and you’re stuck eating it the next day. Luckily I haven’t had any mishaps in a while

Afternoon snack, one of my absolute favorites. I’ve blogged about this snack before. It’s the perfect thing to take care of my sweet tooth! 1/2 banana, packet of Barney Butter inside a TJ’s low carb tortilla wrap. Best.snack.ever!

Speaking of Barney Butter, I found out today on Kath’s blog that Barney Butter is giving free shipping for orders over $14. This is your chance to stock up on their goodies (like the single serving almond butters) before they start selling their products at Whole Foods next year. Just type ship4free when you check out. I definitely took advantage of this today

Oh another little victory today was this: I was walking by a bowl with halloween candy at work and grabbed a york chocolate mint patty. I know this stuff isn’t that many calories comparatively to some of the other chocolate goodies so I felt it was a pretty good choice. I ran into a co-worker of mine on the way to my desk and we ended up talking about a transaction for about 10 minutes. Well, when I was done talking to her I realized I really didn’t need this candy at all. Just because it’s a healthier choice out of the bad stuff, doesn’t mean it’s a good one. I had my banana/almond butter wrap waiting for me, so I was good I put the candy back and made some tea and the wrap. It felt pretty cool. Small victories…

When I got home I remembered that I got some pumpkin butter at TJ’s yesterday. I decided to have a tiny snack featuring it! I had a little over 1/4 cup of TJ’s European style nonfat yogurt, with a little less than a tablespoon of the pumpking butter and a little less than 1/3 serving of Erin’s pb granola.

Pumpkin butter was pretty interesting. For those of you who haven’t tried it, imagine a pretty sweet pumpkin flavored jelly. Not sure why they are calling it “butter.” It was pretty intense so I would use it with causion. But it was quite nice and definitely very pumpkin-y, and since I’m recently a little obsessed with pumpkin and other fall veggies (like squash) I liked it.

For dinner tonight I made another 20 minute meal from Cooking Light November issue: hamburger stroganoff. My husband was super apprehensive about this one (I guess he hasn’t had the best experience with stroganoffs) but I already bought the ingredients (not realizing he didn’t really want it) and reminded him that all the other 20 minute meals from Cooking Light have been awesome. Fastforward 20 minutes or so, here is my plate:

And yeah, it was awesome!!!!! My husband loved it too and we’re both having it for lunch again tomorrow. Sorry to be boring, but when it’s good, I actually really look forward to having it again. I followed the recipe pretty much to the T, except omitted the onions, used about 30% more mushrooms and served it over egg-white-only egg noodles. Another winner! I love it.

And today’s tally is…

Calories (1200-1650) – DONE – 1464
Fitness – DONE – abs + spinning (60 minutes total)
Water – DONE- 9 cups
F/Vs – DONE- apple, banana, diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, mushrooms

Good night!

I voted!!!

Elina — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 01:44:00 +0000

Streak day 2, 9 days until NYC I’m kicking butt and taking names This is the healthy lifestyle that makes me happy!

I woke up extra early this morning so I could vote before going to work. The first thing I did was turn on the coffee maker! The coffee went with me to the voting place in my to-go cup It took a little under an hour to do the voting (there was a huge line outside before the place even opened!) but I was so happy I did it!!!

By the time I got to work, I was starving! I grabbed breakfast on the go, so it was the same old combo: 2 kashi golean waffles with a Barney Butter packet + 1/2 banana. I couldn’t wait to bite into it

Yesterday at the gym they were trying to have people sign up for a Boxercise class. It was at 5:30 pm today so I swapped my usual lunch workout for the evening one to try this new class out. This meant lunch first, then 2 snacks later (or three…).

Lunch was a simple turkey, dijon mustard, tomato, avocado sandwich on 2 slices of Arnold double fiber bread… with some baby carrots on the side.

Good stuff!

Instead of working out, I did some serious farmers market shopping during lunch. I bought so much stuff I couldn’t carry it home I left it in the fridge at work to bring it all back tomorrow, when my husband picks me up in the car.

First snack of the day: the rest of the larabar from yesterday (chocolate hazelnut kind) with some tea.

I decided that you really can’t taste the hazelnuts and that it tastes just like the regular chocolate larabar. Still good though, just the name is more exciting than the product. Sorry larabar! I still love you!

Second snack: about 2 tablespoons of Sabra original hummus, 1/2 serving of Back to Nature crispy wheats (just like reduced fat wheat thins, but I think they may be more natural… I loooove these) and a pretty large apple. A pretty good combo!

And then a little before the boxing class I was craving almonds, so I had a 100 calorie pack of raw almonds. These are an excellent grab ‘n go snack, because the nuts are already pre-portioned for you. You can of course buy a bag of almonds and pre-portion them yourself, but this is just something that’s already been done for you. 100 calories worth of almonds is about 15-20 almonds, depending on the size.

And at 5:30pm I got to the Boxercise class… basically a (contact) boxing class. It was ok. It was quite introductory. Only 2 other people showed up; the guy was trying to actually get a paid class going and this was his introduction course to get people to sign up (I didn’t know this until the end of class so he wasn’t pushing this or anything). Anyways, because it was pretty basic stuff (I’m not a boxer, but I’ve taken cardio kickboxing classes before so I know “the moves”). I kind of had to work myself extra hard because it was pretty easy to slack off. I basically jump roped in between all the segments (probably did about 15 minutes of solid jump rope overall) and kicked as much as I could. I know I’ll be sore tomorrow (in fact I’m sore already) but I won’t be back to this class, and certainly won’t pay to go. The guy was really nice though (definitely a boxer!) and told me I had a future in boxing. Haha!

On to dinner… I actually wasn’t that hungry. Most of the time after a workout I’m not very hungry for a little while (unless I haven’t eaten for hours in which case of course I’m starving but that’s not because of the workout) but when I got home my husband really wanted me to cook dinner asap. Good thing I planned another “20 minute meal” from Cooking Light. On the menu for the night was “pork vindaloo”… you can find the recipe here. I of course omitted the onions, but otherwise basically followed the recipe. Garam Masala is such an awesome spice. I love indian food, and garam masala is definitely the spice in indian dishes. Yum!

My serving (about 1/4 less rice than was suggested) + some sauteed spinach with garlic:

I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again: those 20 minute meals in Cooking Light (there are 6 of them in every issue) are the best!!!! I’ve never had a bad one (in fact every one was super delicious!) and they are really easy! When I asked my husband how many smiley faces this recipe earned (that’s how we rate them), he said: “Fill the page!” Hehe, yup, he loved it! And so did I!

Onto today’s goal accomplishments:
-Calories (1200-1650)- DONE- 1576, including 4 oz of champagne I will have when Obama wins
- Exercise – DONE- Boxercise class (about 55 minutes) + walked home (25 minutes)
- Water – DONE – 8 cups and counting…
- F&V (min 5 servings) – DONE – banana, tomato, avocado, baby carrots, 1/2 larabar, apple, spinach, diced tomatoes

Another awesome day! Healthy AND Sane… that’s how I like ‘em!

**edited to add** Go Obama!!!!!

+ I had a handful of pecans:

New plan

Elina — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 23:21:00 +0000

Just got back from Maine and let me tell you I was definitely in “vacation mode” the second I stepped foot in my in-laws’ house. They had halloween candy (and we also brought some) and I had a field day with them. I didn’t eat very much “real food” but more than made up for it with the candy, hazelnuts and cheese they had. I took a bunch of pics, but they are boring so I’ll spare you with them.

Anywayzzzzzzzzz, looking back at the last week I don’t like how unhealthy I was and this blog is supposed to be about healthy eating and living. This week has not been representative at all of my life and how I want to live it, so starting tomorrow I am going to do better. I hate being scared of stepping on the scale and I have to do the work in order to prevent that from happening. So tonight I am going to plan my meals for the week so I am more excited about the food I eat. Eating healthy is not hard. This is the point of my blog. I want to show people that eating healthy is fun and delicious, and this week I made it seem like a chore (not just on this blog but in my own mind more times than not). Tonight I am having one last “splurge meal” – pizza. I’ve been craving real pizza for a really long time. We make pizza sometimes and it’s ok. It’s even delicious on some occasions, but let’s be honest, it’s not the same as a nice greasy slice I really want once in awhile. So yeah, in attempt to keep this whole “sane” thing going, I am going to Uno’s tonight and ordering my favorite deep dish mushroom pizza. I’m sure it’s like a billion calories, but I don’t care. I know that tomorrow I will start over for real and I am excited about. I really am. I hope that starting tomorrow on I can not only work towards achieving my weight loss goal but also inspire some of you to cook more delicious healthy foods. Also, I am going to NY to visit my sister Inna in 2 weeks. I know that for me to truly enjoy this trip (and all the foods, i.e. cookies and brownies, we plan to consume) I need to be healthy before hand so I don’t feel guilty. I have no problem with indulging in fatty foods I truly crave as long as I balance it out and “deserve it” somewhat.

So, let’s get to the “new plan”… to ease back into this a little I am going to set a shorter timeline for now. This means that I am creating a countdown to the NYC trip until which time I plan on being on my best behavior So, here are some rules:
- I will count calories every day. This will insure that I don’t mindlessly eat – no foods with a mystery # of calories and no candy in unlimited quantities. I will stick to 1200-1650 calories every day. **edited to add** I will allow myself 1 day this week to go over the limit by 100 calories (this is the day when I usually go crazy and eat everything in sight. The 100 calories will allow me slightly more room for an indulgence just this one day)
- No getting on the scale this week. I like to weigh myself every day. It’s part of my morning routine and I think is quite healthy. There was actually some research done that concluded that people that weighted themselves every day lost more weight on average than people that only weigh themselves once a week. If I eat healthy and exercise, small daily fluctuations in weight don’t upset me. I know it’s just water weight or food from the day before still sitting in my stomach. However if I’m being bad or I’m “behaving” and my weight doesn’t move in the “right direction” then I think daily weigh-ins help me with re-evaluating the situation. With that said, I think this past week has been very bad, food wise, and seeing that number on the scale will just upset me too much. That’s not productive, so I will NOT do this to myself this week and will resume the daily weigh-ins next week when hopefully things re-stabilize.
- I will exercise 6 times/week
- I will drink at least 8 cups of water every day
- I will eat at least 5 servings of fruits and vegetables
- I will post my results on this blog with the countdown to the trip to NYC

Wish me luck!

Ok, enough with the rules. Tomorrow I promise to dazzle you with something delicious and healthy. Ok, I can’t promise that, but I promise to try