You MUST try this now!

Greek yogurt. It's pretty much the most delicious thing ever. Especially the full fat kind with honey. And it has like 15g of protein per cup. Basically, it's like halfway between yogurt and cottage cheese. But so much yummier than non-fat nasty...er, I mean...cottage cheese.

Next, I'm going to try my hand at making it myself. The only difference between greek style yogurt and traditional yogurt is straining. The greek stuff has extra whey removed, which makes it so creamy and delicious, and explains how so much protein gets in there.

I found this recipe a while ago, and loved it. I have since found the wonderful site where I found it is down, so I wanted to copy it and preserve it for all enternity.

Caro’s BBQ Ranch Chopped Chicken salad:

For those of you who’ve been to a California Pizza Kitchen restaurant, I was OBSESSED with the CPK Original BBQ Chopped Chicken Salad–the version below is huge, filling and NOT a calorie bomb!

268 cals, 26g carb 28g prot, 7g fat (2g sat), 6g fiber

Dressing:
2 TBSP Just 2 good ranch
2 TBSP Kraft Low Carb BBQ Sauce

1/6 head iceberg lettuce, chopped into ½ - ¾ inch pieces
1-2 cups spinach, chopped into ½ - ¾ inch pieces
1 green onion, chopped
2 TBSP yellow corn (canned or frozen, thawed)
2 TBSP black beans (canned, drained)
1 TBSP parmesan cheese - you can sub shredded fat free chedder if you prefer!
3 oz chicken breast, cubed/chopped into ½ inch pieces
1 roma tomato, chopped

Toss all the ingredients with the dressing and serve.

Progress!

I've been following the New Rules of Lifting for Women workout for the past month or so. I'm still in the first phase, which seems really wimpy compared to a Cathe or P90x workout. The workouts are finished in under 30 minutes, including a warmup. The difference is that I'm trying to lift as heavy as I possibly can. WAAAAAAAAAY heavier that I've ever done before, even when I *thought* I was going heavy in P90x, it was nothing compared to this. I'm just starting out, so these numbers are still "low" compared to how they will be, but still, squatting 95lbs or deadlifting 80lbs is significantly higher than the ~40lbs I'd ever done before.

So, despite lifting much heavier, I still thought that I'd not see a lot of progress during this first 6 weeks because the program starts with a break in phase for people who have not been working out at all. (Ordinarily, I would decide I was too good for any such break-in phase, but after taking off a year+ to have a baby, I thought I should be nice to by body...) Anyway, even this "easy" break in workout is making progress. About 2 months ago, I tried to do some chin ups (easier than pull ups!) and was sad to find that I couldn't even do one without cheating. Well, today I tried again, and I was able to whiip out 3 no problem. If it wasn't a workout day, I would have tried for more, but I didn't want to burn myself out before my workout. So, woo-hoo, yay me. And I'm sorry NROLFW that I doubted you.

Spicy Chicken Soup

So I was thinking something along the lines of a tortilla soup for this, but it came out somewhat less tortilla-soup-y than I had imagined. Still really really yummy, though. And the whole thing took like 5 minutes to make.


Saute until translucent:
1 T olive oil
1 clove garlic
1/2 onion, chopped

Add and cook for one more minute:
1T cumin (more or less to taste)
2t red pepper flakes (more or less - I added a bunch, maybe as much as a tablespoon)

Mix in and simmer for ~15min:
8oz frozen corn
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 can diced tomatoes
2-3 cups chicken broth

After simmering, remove the chicken breasts, dice, and return to the soup. Yummy!

Test post from iPhone

Because it's cool!

Peanut Butter Cookies

1/2c peanut butter
1/2c splenda
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1/4c rolled oats
1/2t baking powder
1/4 cup egg substitute

Process everything in a food processor until smooth and blended. Roll into balls and bake at 350 for about 10 min. Makes 6 good-sized cookies.

Per cookie: 162 cal, 11.5g fat, 7g carbs, 10g protein

Hellooooo?

Yes, it has been well over a year since I last posted....but I have a good excuse: Kylen. Probably the best reason I have ever had to quit working out. But I'm back. I've started a new program, The New Rules of Lifting for Women, which has been all over all the fitness forums and the blogs I read. And of course, as a bandwagon jumper-on-er, I had to get it and try it. I'm really excited to be working out again, this program is perfect for new parents because it emphasizes heave weights and low reps and high intensity interval training for cardio, both of which take less time than traditional workouts. Perfect since I have to do it after Kylen goes to bed and I also need to eat, clean up, pack my and Kylen's things for the next day, give my cat his medicine and often tutor between 7:00 and bed. Definitely no time for the hour+ workouts I used to do. :(

Anyway, I'll be posting regularly to keep track of my workouts and how it's going. Promise.