Phys-i-cali fit

Today I ate 5 jelly beans and then E told me to try turkey burgers...

So O and I have started an insane fitness challenge-we get daily points for doing things like eating fruits and veggies, not eating treats, not eating after 9 pm, drinking water, exercising, and all sorts of other horridly difficult things. We add up our points and our weight loss weekly and submit them to the grand master. The challenge goes on for 8 weeks after which an ultimate winner will be named. Lets just say, I am not sure O or I will be taking home the prize.

E told me about this all last Sunday and I thought I had better join in bc I have been on a bit of a downward spiral as far as health consciousness goes. I came home and told O he would have to do it to support me :)  O reads all the rules and says "OK, sounds good", then gets to the part about points for weight loss and says "no way! If anything I need to gain weight!" He then proceeds to step onto our scale (which I had just stepped off, after discovering myself to be even larger than my extreme large days when I had to fly home from Italy with my pants not only unbuttoned but also burst-not bursting but past tense-at several seams) and started screaming hysterically about how he has never been so huge, he used to be such a thin mint in high school,  why had I not mentioned it, etc. Suffice it to say, he signed up with alacrity. (and O has been making comments all week like, "my face is so round now" and "I worked my butt off today!-wait, I guess that is not really true")

Day 1 started off with O pondering where to buy squeezable veggies (he pretty much exclusively eats things in tubes-gogurts, those apple sauce squeeze packs, and fruit cups) and me realizing I had not had actual "fruit" in about 6 months (after E clarified that fruit snacks for some reason don't count). We ended up racing through Costco, then racing home to eat all of these fruit and veggies (and Arby's that we had to pick up bc our time was sooo limited) before 9:00. Days 2-5 were  pretty good, with O racing home every night at 8:40, followed by us shoveling in food as fast as physically possible (I'm not sure the stop eating at 9:00 is working out so well). Our exercise (which along with scissors is a word I cannot spell) consisted primarily of walking in place while watching TV (who needs a walking machine) but hey-when you are starting at the bottom, you don't have to go very far to make slight improvements! (ps: I do have my recent leg surg as an excuse, I did have a golf ball removed from my thigh after all)

Day 6 started off marvelously with a snickers candy bar, laffy taffys, mentos, and anything else nice I could get my mitts on. We get one free candy day and I was taking it to the extreme. Plus, I was skiing so I thought it was justified. Day 7 I decided to forgo the 5 points I would get from not eating sweets. Determined to live it up, I drank nothing but diet coke and sprite all day long and sadly, at 9:00 pm, realized I had to drink 64 oz of H2O. That is quite a lot of H2O and I'm not sure I will make that mistake again. I downed 3 water bottles, laid on the bed quite ill, and finally hobbled over to the scale to weigh in. Imagine my horror to see that I had actually gained 3 lbs! I slung myself back on the bed for another hour in dismay. I was relieved to find that, once relieved of all that water (and most of my clothing) I had lost 1 lb.

O hopped on the scale and started screaming hysterically (once again, I think Sunday nights might be a bit emotional for some time) that he had gained weight. He had to remove every stitch of clothing to just maintain his weight. (he was somewhat comforted when L told him perhaps he had gained muscle, which weighs quite a lot).

So we ended week 1 thinking that perhaps we will take things a little slow-week 1, just try to do the basic challenges, week 2, probably the same. Around week 3 we may try to go the next step and cut the 4-5 daily muffin ration down to just 1. No need to be too extreme.

This has all been building up to tonight-the RS bday party dinner.

There I was, sitting at my table, trying to make polite conversation with a few ladies I had never spoken with, and when they all started nibbling at the jelly beans sprinkled all over the table, I thoughtlessly joined in. I had a lovely dinner, talked for about 30 more min and suddenly, looking at those colorful jellybeans, which, by the way, I don't even like, it hits me, I ATE SUGAR!!!!!!!!!! I WASTED MY FREE TREAT DAY ON 5 JELLY BEANS!!!!!!!!!!  I was so upset I could barely focus and had to leave. I called E on my way home, hoping she would say, "oh, it is fine, that does not count" and instead she says "well this can just be your free point day" (so, since I had already had those dumb beans I ate a fruit snack and a snickers ice cream bar, a fun size one I might add). Then, when I confessed that (bc I ate them really fast while on the phone) she said, "you should sign up for this food program, they send you healthy foods like turkey burgers". At first I am like "oh doesn't that sound nice, I'll be sure to consider it" while inside I'm thinking "E is insane, did she just hear me when I said I just ate a snickers candy bar? I am not ready for turkey burgers", eventually I ask "are turkey burgers even good?" and she says, no lie "they are an acquired taste, but I like them now, I eat them plain, I don't even have a bun". Yes I am dead serious. Well gee, starting a few months ago when I go to Mcdonalds I get my cheeseburgers without cheese in an attempt to be healthy but I have never thought about getting it without the bun. (on a side note every time we go, which is not exactly infrequent, O says "what do you want" and I say "a hamburger" and O says "no cheese huh? you don't like cheese?" and I say "I like cheese, I am just trying to cut down on the fat/calories". We have this conversation like once a week, word for word, it is so bizarre. Next time I think I'll just order the cheeseburger.)

well, after tonight's breakdown I am getting back in the saddle. O and I are going to get serious about seriously getting in shape :)

I am, however, not ready for the turkey burger-ask me again on week 4.

Week 52 Triple Chocolate Cookies!

Well, I made it all the way to week 52. There were a few misses in there, its been a crazy year with moving several times, renovations, teaching, etc. However I'm glad to be finishing strong!

This week we made triple chocolate cookies. My fam had a progressive dinner to travel round to see everyone's Christmas decor so I made these for dessert. It was wonderful to be finished before Christmas as I have been sick and slogging around very slowly all day.

Pic is coming soon I hope (it is on my new iphone which is way smarter than me and I need M or O to figure out how to get it into my email)


 I am not a real chocolate fan so I'm not the best one to trust. To me these cookies were too rich-I could only eat 1/2 a cookie over the course of several hours (but maybe that is a good thing...). My reviewers however said they were divine! Everyone loved them. Some even made them into ice cream sandwiches with peppermint ice cream.

Check out the recipe and other reviewers!

Almond Biscotti

This week we made biscotti

here it is!

(I don't know why I even bother with the photos, they don't do me justice...)

I have just pulled it out of the oven so I'll hold off on reviewing it until tomorrow (they are supposed to sit for an hour before eating). However I must say, mine were not getting crispy in the oven (I even cooked them an extra 10 min) and when I ate one it was quite soft and lacking the usual biscotti crunch so hopefully that hour will do wonders for them!

Chocolate Roll

This week we made a chocolate roll up cake with marshmallow cream filling. This was OK but I think I made two crucial errors: 1. I did not use marshmallow cream, instead I just melted marshmallows and made my own cream which then ran all over the place and was a mess. 2. I think I should have read other reviews earlier and used ice cream instead of the cream anyways.

All in all, this would be great if you are making an ice cream roll thing. Otherwise, I'm not so sure, it was a bit like eating very very sugary packing peanuts (the cream part very sugary, the cake part very strange texture, but a texture that would support ice cream nicely).

Here is my photo. My food photographer says she does the best she can with what I give her and her camera phone. (I hope she gets a new and improved camera phone for Chrimbo so that my photos will start looking more like this...)

(perhaps I just need them to be bigger photos for starters)


Also, I suppose I should thank my little baking minion L and my food tasting staff M, L, and K for getting me through this week!
 

See other reviews and the recipe here:

Large Danish Bread

I'm a little late with this week's post but I'll put some pics up tonight.
We made a large danish bread. I actually made them into little indivual ones and used a lemon curd instead of a cherry filling. They were great!

see the recipe here:

The Best Buttermilk Biscuits

This week was my week to host. I was reading through all the recipes trying to decide which to go for and M said she was just dying for biscuits and gravy (odd as I don't think any of us have ever had them much). I was first leaning towards the ciabatta bread (which I make all the time and it is fabulous!), then I thought about the cheese puffs (which sounded interesting), the chocolate chip cookies are a regular so I almost went with those (such as nice staple), and I could not get the coffee cake muffins off my radar either. In the end, I went with M's choice and chose the best buttermilk biscuits. Biscuits had the advantage of not being sweet and with Thanksgiving just done I thought we might all need a break from desserts this week :)

 The dough was great so right from the beginning I was excited. I like that they use a ton of buttermilk powder to get in the flavoring.  They baked up nice and non-lopsided as I followed the directions to cut them out without wiggling the cutter. I was not convinced about the baking upside down but I did it anyways. They looked pretty good but in the end, my mom's oven (a- she MUST get new ovens ASAP, they are messing up my baked goods, and b-I have to cook at my mom's presently as my house is under massive renovations, some by choice, some not y choice at all!) so back to the ovens-the oven totally burned the bottom of the biscuits!!! That was terrible. However, myself and my panel of 4 reviewers all agreed these are still the best buttermilk biscuits we have had. I will certainly try these again, next I'll double pan them (place two cookie sheets together, a great trick L learned at her Pen Court Class).

Here is the only pic I have courtesy of Mad (I'll get one of just the biscuits tomorrow-it is on M's phone). The pic looks pretty awful (not to offend you M, it is just the gravy did not photograph so well) so check out the wonderful bakers in my club (who also are great food photographers) for better visuals and their reviews! (I don't have the links yet so just look back at my old posts to see their blogs)

(yes, this looks so appetizing. additionally, it sure looks like a biscuit)

Recipe:
3 3/4 c flour
1/2 c powdered buttermilk (this allows lots of buttermilk flavor, as you can only add so much liquid)
2 Tbsp sugar
4 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
12 Tbsp unsalted butter cut into pieces and chilled (no wonder these are good)
4 Tbsp shortening cut into pieces and chilled
1 1/4 c whole milk (and I actually followed the recipe and did not use skim here as my mom is always getting after me for switching things!)

1. Heat oven to 450 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper
2. Pulse dry ingredients with butter and shortening to resemble coarse meal, about 15 pulses
3. Transfer to a large bowl and mix in milk until dough forms using a spatula. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead until uniform, about 30 seconds. Roll into a 10-inch round, 1 inch thick.
4. Using a floured 2 1/2 inch biscuit cutter (or top of a cup if you are like me) stamp out 12 biscuits. Arrange the biscuits upside down on the baking sheet (I had to use two baking sheets). Don't wiggle the cutter, just stamp right down, otherwise you will get lopsided biscuits :)
5. Bake 5 min at 450 then turn oven down to 400 and rotate pan. Cook another 12-15 min or until golden. (Again, I would recommend double panning these so the bottoms don't burn)
6. Serve warm!

Pumpkin Spice Cheesecake

This week we made pumpkin spice cheesecake.

We tried the pumpkin cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory and compared it to this recipe and the results... 6 out of 6 reviewers said this recipe was as good as or better than the Cheesecake Factory!!!!! Very shocking, I must say! They actually tasted really similar and the texture of ours was just as great!

Another shock-O actually tried this baked item (as in he had one tsp full....) he said "I love it, it is the spirit of Halloween on a plate" So, take that how you will. And his review is in addition to the 6 above :)

I myself LOVE cheesecake. This was a little too reminiscent of pumpkin pie for me (which I really don't care for) but it was still pretty decent. I think a plain cheesecake would have been even better.

When I removed this from the oven I thought it was a total flop, the top looked strange and the whole thing looked  a little wobbly. However, the hours and hours and hours it required to sit were apparently important-it came together just fine in the end. I really liked the crust-I used all the spices and it was great. I also loved that the recipe was super easy-it took forever to cook, then sit on the counter, then sit in the fridge, but it was actually a simple recipe and only had a few ingredients which was nice.
My mom loved this so much she wanted to freeze it and take it to Thanksgiving, however, we ate it too fast for that, I guess I'll have to make it again!

TOTAL SUCCESS! You'll want to try this one for sure!
see Amanda's blog for the recipe:  http://www.girlplusfood.net/2012/11/bake-52-spiced-pumpkin-cheesecake.html

and ps: Amanda said it was even better the next day-I did not try mine until day 2 but maybe it needs time to sit.

check out other reviews here: