Delicious Dish - 6

I have SO many products that I have discovered that have made making healthier choices, not only easier, but SERIOUSLY delicious! This is one of them. It is called Better'n Peanut Butter.

I have only tried the original because I LOVE IT! But they also have a low sodium version, and, get this. A chocolate version. Is there anything better in the world of sweet food than chocolate and peanut better? I can't think of a thing!

I eat this on English Muffins all the time! I add it to shakes, I use it in an HG brownie recipe, and when I really want a fix, I scoop out a tablespoon and eat it slowly with a glass of water. It's that good!

A serving is 2 tbsp, but I always only need 1 at a time. 1 tablespoon has 50 calories, 1 gram of fat and 1 gram of fiber. Do not adjust your monitor... you read that right 1 GRAM OF FAT! Peanut butter is notorious for being high in fat. Because nuts contain fat. That's just how it is. I don't know who the genius behind this sensation is, but I hope that he is enjoying serious benefits from his discovery. It tastes just like peanut butter but has a smooth, slightly grainy texture, that makes you think they just crushed up nuts and threw them in a jar!

If you are a peanut butter lover, I highly recommend you pick this up. You can find it at Super Targets, Sprouts, Whole Foods, and probably other places, but that is all I know for sure. Our Kroger carried it once... but it has been gone for months =-(

Check it out!

Delicious Dish - 5

Okay, I'm excited about this one! I started making this as a morning snack a few months ago. I have since discovered it in a Hungry Girl cookbook. Now that's funny. But I promise I mixed it myself before I saw it in her book!

Anyway. This is a sort of parfait, I guess you would call it. I LOVE yogurt! I don't buy flavored yogurt though. When it comes to yogurt, I like to buy vanilla and put my fruit of choice in it. That way I can control how much goes in it and it is always fresh and yummy!

Okay, so actually I am a bit of a yogurt snob. I'm not saying that there aren't other good yogurt options out there, but I have a favorite, and I pretty much never stray from it. Not only do I only buy vanilla, I also only buy Yoplait. Yoplait Vanilla Light, to be exact.

For a few years I would slice up a kiwi and toss it into my vanilla Yoplait. Kiwi and yogurt are two foods that nutritionists are constantly recommending you eat more of because they give your body all kinds of vitamins and goodness! And I LOVE LOVE LOVE kiwi! Mmm, mmm GOOD!

But post marriage, I have gone another route with my yogurt mixture. I wanted something to give it a little crunch and I discovered these little babies.

I have been a rice cake fan for years, but I always go for the caramel. Well one day I decided to try the apple cinnamon and it was greatness! So when I was looking for a low-cal cruncher for my yogurt, this was an obvious choice. But apple cinnamon rice cakes with kiwi felt like an odd combo. So instead, I tried it with strawberries.

TA DA!!!

This is SO delicious!

I empty a carton of Yoplait Vanilla Light into a bowl (or to go container, when I am taking it to work...) slice 5 strawberries into the yogurt, and crush a serving of apple cinnamon rice cakes on top. I mix it all together and indulge.

This is DELICIOUS! Sometimes I eat it at night when I am hunting for an ice cream fix. It is actually more calories than one of my WW ice cream bars, but it is a nice dose of vitamins, so it's an option!

Mmm... that sounds really good. I might just go make me a bowl RIGHT NOW!

Delicious Dish - 4

Okay, first I should mention that this is a dish that I am thinking of altering. I know that there are all kinds of oats out there, and some are better for you than others. But whether I change it in the future or not, it doesn't change the fact that right now, this is a seriously delicious dish! Also, let me apologize for the fuzzy pictures. That's the best I could find.

This is super simple. It works well year round and, most importantly, it is a FILLING breakfast. I feel good for a few hours when I eat this. It holds me over well until 10:00 or so when it's time for my "morning snack".

I'm talking about oatmeal.

I started wanting to eat oatmeal for breakfast a few years ago after I had been told about 2,000 times that it is a healthy start to your day. Oatmeal is good because it is packed with fiber, and fiber helps your body digest things. Also, the boxes all say that it lowers your cholesterol. It's on the box, so it must be true, right? Now growing up, we were not oatmeal eaters. The thought of making it on the stove leads me to visions of sticky pots and pans and burned milk. So I shopped around for a low cal instant oatmeal and landed on this:

I have been eating it now for probably three years, and I have never tried any other flavor. My sister likes the blueberry, but I LOVE cinnamon, and when I really like something I can eat it over and over without getting tired of it, so apple cinnamon is the one for me! And this one is great because it's a low sugar version so it has 110 calories as opposed to the 150 that most flavors provide.

Now here's the deal with instant oatmeal packets - they're small. People say that oatmeal is filling, but half of a cup of anything isn't going to fill me up. So here is my routine. I use one packet of apple cinnamon oatmeal with half of a cup of my milk substitute of choice, Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Breeze.

Why do we need a milk substitute? I'm not really sure. But I heard this product mentioned so many times that I decided to try it. It's super low in the calorie department (40 for a WHOLE CUP!) and it has a crazy smooth creaminess that I really love! So there you go.

While the oatmeal is cooking in the microwave for a minute and fifteen seconds, I slice up a small Golden Delicious apple.

How can it not be good? It's NAMED DELICIOUS! Adding the apple to the oatmeal makes it a filling breakfast for me, and I am starting my day with, not just one healthy choice, but 3 fiber filled, energy giving goodies!

It's not fancy, but it was such a good breakfast solution for me, I wanted to share it. This oatmeal and Boca burgers are my two breakfast staples. I switch off every other month or so, but they are both greatness and I would never give up either!

Delicious Dish - 3

Enchiladas!

You heard me!

I have had very few enchiladas in my life. I'm a taco girl. And I'm weird about cheese. I don't really like it in sauce form... or in slices... or in big chunks. But I love it melted on pizza or in quesadillas or on top of tacos. But I have always kind of steered clear of enchiladas. I don't know what kind of cheese might be lurking in that melty dish.

The first time that I had an enchilada that I enjoyed was at a singles pot luck a couple of years ago. They ordered a few trays of enchiladas from Los Lupes and I was shocked to find that I enjoyed, none other than, the CHEESE enchilada! It wasn't saucy at all. It was mostly chili, and the cheese inside of the tortilla reminded me of string cheese melted, rather than a big block of cheese.

So here is what I have recently pieced together.

I start with a stick of Weight Watcher string cheese.

I wrap it in my tortilla of choice (shout out Mission carb balance tortillas! WAY less calories for a smoother texture).

And I top it with the greatness of Wolf brand Turkey chili.

Then I top it with a few chopped onion. Green if I have them.

This is a seriously delicious dish, and the calorie count is TINY compared to what it would cost you at a restaurant or even in the freezer aisle! I can eat two of these for 345 calories and be pretty satisfied. If you are wanting more bites, you can cut each tortilla in half, split each string cheese, and make 4 skinny enchiladas! I did that on Friday and it was a little hard to keep the tortilla in place, but that problem was solved once I poured the chili on top.

Just lay the rolled up string cheese side by side in a small glass baking dish, top them with a half of a cup of chili and bake them in the oven at 350 long enough for the cheese to melt. 10-12 minutes or so. Sprinkle with onions when you pull them out, and voila! Dinner is served!

Delicious Dish - 2

My next post is actually a combo of two products that I eat together. The first one I learned about at Weight Watchers. There was a girl there obsessed with them. She found a reason to mention them every week. The thing that she was most proud of was that she ate them for breakfast even though it is not a conventional breakfast meal. Well I've always been a big believer in mixing your conventionals! Pancakes for dinner, cereal for lunch (shout out Marie!) and even, da da da DAH: Boca Burgers for breakfast.

What is Boca? Let's ask the website.

Made with the nutritious goodness of soy, BOCA foods help you get protein, fiber and calcium—substantial nutrition that helps you live a balanced life. BOCA and you believe the same thing... that the road to better balance starts with what's inside us.

Soy burgers! They are found in your freezer section, and they are DELISH! Well, if you are going for the lowest calorie count possible (70), go for the original vegan burger. It has a nice meaty smell, but the flavor is just so so. But if you are willing to spend a few more calories (120), check out the flame grilled! It's got a really nice flavor that stands well on its own!

So that is the meat part. What about the bun Kim? How do I keep my burgering calories to a minimum? Well, lots of people would tell you to ditch the bun and go with two slices of low cal, high fiber bread. But not me. Most high fiber breads, honestly, taste too much like cardboard to me. It just doesn't do the trick. But my sister and I discovered a product that is high in fiber, fairly low in calories and, in my humble opinion, totally DELISH! Thomas Light Multi Grain English Muffins.

I use these bad boys for burgers, sandwiches, snacks, you name it. Anything that you need bread for, you can reach for these. Except maybe hot dogs.... they're just not the right shape. If you are like I was a few years ago, you think that you don't like english muffins. But the key to eating an english muffin is to always, 100% of the time, TOAST IT! It gives the outside a nice crispiness while warming up the inside to give you the warm chewiness that a lot of us crave in our bread experience.

I make my burgers like so: Boca burger with lettuce, pickles, onion and mustard on a toasted Thomas Light english muffin. It is every bit as satisfying as a whopper from BK, but it is 2 points (one for the "meat", one for the "bun") rather than the 11.5 I would spend on a whopper. (And that's a whopper with mustard. If you are a mayo fan, make that 16.5)

I hope that you will give Boca a try. Watch for coupons because, as with all "health food", you're going to pay big for the small stats. They come 4 to a box and when they are not on sale, they are usually $3.99. But this is what I eat for breakfast that keeps me full and satisfied. (With 5 grams of fiber and 14 grams of protein, how could it not?) This is what I eat for dinner when I drive past the Burger King next to my work and I struggle not to pull in and drive through. And it is the perfect quick lunch when you are in a hurry because it takes 1 minute, 15 seconds to microwave and a tad more to toast. Keep your onion and lettuce pre-chopped in a bag, and you are good to go!

That's my dish for the week. Tune in next week when I talk about... I haven't decided yet, but it will be something Delicious, for sure!

Delicious Dish - 1

First an intro:

Okay so, the last two weeks have been interesting. I have introduced some activity into my life and it's been great! I want to be healthier, and I'm not going to lie, I want to be smaller. I'm HUGE! I hate seeing my reflection in the windows every morning when I walk into the building, and I need some of my old clothes to start fitting again so I will have more to wear. The walking and working out has felt really good the last two weeks, but I didn't go down on the scale this week. I maintained. I'm thankful for maintaining! But I can do better. Yesterday I bought a food/activity journal and I'm looking forward to tracking on my own, and not because someone told me to. I love to make lists and write things down, so I think it will be a good tool to keep me accountable and aware.

I've also started reading a few new blogs, one of which is a food blog that introduced a product to me that I am now thoroughly enjoying as my mid morning snack and it made me think about sharing some of my delicious finds on my blog! I am hoping that this will be a weekly post (I'll keep posting until I run out of tastiness to share!). Some posts will be recipes and some will just be products that I enjoy. I will be starting with my new mid-morning snack.

I eat breakfast around 7:00 every day, and I usually eat some fruit around 10:00. This week I bought some Larabars because Angie mentioned them on her blog a few times and I was interested. It is more calories than my bag of cherries, but they are super filling and really delicious! Now I save my cherries for the afternoon, and it helps hold me over til dinner.

Here are the flavors I have tried and loved:

and here are the flavors I can't wait to try:

My favorite so far have been the peanut butter cookie and apple pie. The chocolate coconut didn't really taste like chocolate or coconut, but actually made me think of raspberry. It wasn't what I expected, but I still enjoyed it. I hope that you try a few and enjoy them yourself! They were $1.49 a piece at Kroger, which is a big cost increase to the weekly grocery budget, but I am going to keep an eye on them and try to stock up when they go on sale. And if it saves me from mindless snacking, then I will save both money and calories!