Meal Plan Week 15

Today I want to share my fitbit workout calendar with you.

Look at that! I have been rocking my workouts the last 2 weeks. And I want you to know that I almost ruined it today. I slept in, like til 10:30 (I went to bed at 11...). I didn't want to get out of my warm bed with the snuggly puppy. I told myself, "Go get breakfast, then get dressed, and you'll have the energy for your T25." I drank my Shakeology while watching Sunday's Kardashians. Then I proceeded to waste the next 45 minutes procrastinating. Facebook, Daily Mail, updates on Baltimore, Instagram, Pinterest... I had zero motivation to get up and get moving. The struggle was real folks. But I did it. And I rocked it. I felt strong the whole workout and even did an exercise without using Tanya (the low impact modifier). When I finished I honestly felt so much better than when I started.

Penny weeds the pool deck while I do my workouts!

Part of the journey is teaching my body to do and enjoy exercise. Learning that eating well and exercise truly does make my body feel good. Everyday is a new chance to build new habits and learn to listen to my body. Trust me, I want to be sitting on the couch binge watching TV right now. But the sun is shining, I'm dressed and ready for the day, and I've got things to do! Here's what we're eating to give this body the energy it needs to get through the next 3 workouts.

Monday:

Cajun Chicken Pasta

*Made this last night. I wish I hadn't bothered with making the sauce. It was a disaster.*

Tuesday:

Zesty Garlic Lemon Tilapia with Roasted Asparagus and Rice

Wednesday:

Cheddar Ranch Chicken Burgers with Baked Fries and a Salad

Thursday:

Spinach and Mushroom Quesadillas

Friday:

Mock Lasagna with Salad

*Words cannot describe how good this dish is. I crave it! Most made recipe off Pinterest*

Meal Plan Week 14

Let this be motivation for you. The scale does not define you. It does not define your hard work. It does not measure the worth of your effort. It is just a number in a box. Don't let the scale put you in a box.

I KILLED IT last week with my workouts. I got a workout in every single day, except for Saturday. I made it to the gym M-W-F-Su, and rocked a T25 workout on T-Th. I even got a little yard work done on Saturday, so I wasn't a complete couch potato. I'm noticing my endurance increasing with my elliptical and bike routines. I'm lifting heavier and for more reps, and adding in new free weight strength exercises.

I knew I was going to have 2 meals out this week, so I tried to pinch my calories where I could. I made a couple dietary mistakes, but I recognized them and talked about them with E so I wouldn't make the same mistake twice.

I lost no weight.

It's craft beer week here in Pittsburgh. The coolest part of that is all the collaboration brews. How cool is it that brewers around the city get together to brew unique, small brewed collaboration beers? These beers are only available during craft beer week, and when they're gone, they're gone. Finding these beers often involves a scavenger hunt around the city. This year there were 8 different collabs, and they were all on tap at my neighborhood craft beer and pizza place! Now now, don't worry your pretty little head. I did not drink 8 beers (whew! maybe that's why the scale isn't moving!). I thought I was going to have to drink 8 beers to taste all of the collabs, but thank goodness for flights! Caliente, the craft beer pizza place, offered 4 4oz pours of the beers. So in trying all 8, I only consumed 16oz of beer (I split the flights with my husband).

It's all about choices people. Last year I fo sho would have been drinking 8 beers. Because I needed them after working in the ICU, lol! But really, every little choice that you make helps you get one step closer to being a healthier you. Eat an apple instead of that cookie, swap popcorn for potato chips, take the stairs instead of the elevator.

The scale hasn't moved in a week. It's not the end of the world. I am smarter. I am stronger. I am healthier. Focus on the positive improvements that you're making to your life, and I promise that you will see progress. Good luck with focusing on your goals this week!

Here's what we have on the dinner menu this week. I'm recycling some stuff that didn't get eaten last week.

Monday:

Buffalo Chicken Salad

Tuesday:

Southwest Stuffed Peppers and Mexican Rice

Wednesday:
Ranch Pork Chop Shake 'n Bake

Thursday:

Teryaki Salmon with Sriracha Cream Sauce and Jasmin Rice

Friday:

Cajun Chicken Pasta

Meal Plan Week 13

Happy Monday lovelies! Life has been busy here in the McCarty household. E has been working 60 hours per week. I have been refocusing my energies back to getting healthy. I said one of my goals for 2015 was to use this blog as accountability, and I'm sorry readers that I fell off the wagon the last couple weeks. I've been struggling with motivation and progress. The past 3 weeks have been a standstill. No weightloss, poor exercise commitment, and poor housewife commitment (haha). It's hard to not see progress and keep committed. One of my problems has been staying on track during the week, but when the weekend comes I feel like it's ok to splurge. Or if I've been to the gym, it's ok to eat those extra 200 calories. I've also been drinking more and more diet soda.

I took some time to refocus myself and realize that even though I haven't lost weight in the past 3 weeks, I also haven't gained any. While the scale hasn't moved, I've noticed progress at the gym and with my workouts. I started this journey barely able to complete the low impact version of T25 cardio. I've been doing the workout now for about a month, probably at least once a week. I can now get through the entire workout without feeling like I'm going to puke and without taking a rest. That's huge progress! Another struggle was maintaining my endurance on the elliptical. This past Sunday I totally rocked my workout. 45 minutes non-stop on the elliptical while maintaining an average speed of 3.6 (w/e that unit of measurement actually is). That's huge progress from only being able to maintain that speed for about 10 minutes or so. Let's remind ourselves that the mirror and scale are not the only indicators of progress.

Are you struggling like me? Just remember to take things one day at a time. Progress and change do not happen overnight, but all of your hard work will pay off!

I've got a couple of events this week, so I really need to kill it with my workouts and really try and focus on my nutrition. My goal this week is to eat an apple if I'm craving a sweet snack, and a 100 calorie pack of popcorn if I'm craving salty. Here's what else we're eating this week.

Monday:

Brother's Birthday Dinner

*this little cutie is celebrating his 23rd birthday today*

Tuesday:

Tacos! with Fresh Guac, Salsa, Chips, and Chipotle Chicken Soup

Wednesday:

Ranch Chicken and a Garden Salad

Thursday:

Cartel 10th Chroma Anniversary Concert day!

Friday:

Southwest Stuffed Peppers and Mexican Rice

Saturday:

Teryaki Salmon with Sriracha Cream Sauce and Jasmin Rice

Meal Plan Week 12

Monday:

Tuna Casserole

*recipe to be posted on Wednesday!*

Tuesday:

Chicken Enchilada Rice Bake with sauteed red, yellow, and green peppers

Wednesday:

Omelettes

Thursday:

Meatloaf with Mashed Potatoes and Sauteed Spinach

Friday:

Last Fish Fry of the season 

Meal Plan Week 11

Spring has sprung! Although March seems to have gotten confused on the whole "in like a lion, out like a lamb" thing. We had snow yesterday! But today it's 65 degrees. More snow in the forecast for Friday. Whatever, I know warm weather is right around the corner because little green things are starting to poke up around the yard, yay!

Here's what we're eating this week:

Monday:
Gemelli Pasta and Meatballs

Tuesday:
Homemade Cheeseburger Helper and broccoli

Wednesday:
Salisbury Steak and mashed potatoes and green beans (my mom made it for us)

Thursday:
Chicken Enchilada Rice Bake with sauteed peppers

Friday:
FISH FRY!

Penny says, "Be a better blogger Mommy!"

Meal Plan Week 9

Spring is coming! Spring is coming! Here in Pittsburgh, the snow is beginning to melt and we're having the first week in ages where the daily temp gets above 40 degrees. My family was able to get out and go for a walk around the neighborhood last night and I think little Penny had forgotten what it looked like! She had so much fun exploring everyone's yards with the grass starting to peek out. Here's what we're eating for dinners this week.

Monday:

Ham BBQ with Baked Beans and Green Beans

Tuesday:

Spinach and Feta Crescents with Italian Wedding Soup

Wednesday:

Tomato Tortellini Soup with Asiago Cheese Bread

Thursday:

Oven Baked Parmesan Pork Chops and Mixed Veggies

Friday:

Fish Fry!

Ranch Chicken Burgers

Here's something you may or may not know about me, I love chicken sandwiches. 9 times out of 10 I would rather eat a crispy chicken sandwich than a burger. But when I came across this recipe from The Girl Who Ate Everything, I was a little skeptical. I'd never had a chicken sandwich made with ground chicken before. Wouldn't it be dry and more like a hockey puck than a burger? Isn't ground chicken really expensive? I was wrong, I can admit that. This ranch chicken burger is fantastic!

Well, kinda wrong. Ground chicken is expensive. It was $6.19/lb at my store. I usually pay less than $4/lb for 90/10 ground beef. But this week chicken breasts were on sale BOGO. I got 5lbs of chicken breasts for about $2/lb. I had read somewhere on the internet about grinding your own meat with a food processor, so I thought now would be the perfect time to try it! Now if you're trying this recipe at home, know that you can use any kind of boneless skinless chicken to grind. I found that grinding breasts made for a perfectly moist burger, but adding chicken thighs to the mix may add some more flavor.         

First step is to cut up the chicken into bite size pieces. Place these pieces in the freezer for about 15 minutes. You want the outsides to be pretty frozen, but the insides will still be thawed. This frozen crust helps the food processor grind the meat uniformly.

Put the semi-frozen chicken into the bowl of the food processor. Process the meat on high for about 20 seconds. The chicken should look, well, like ground chicken. Remove the meat and put in a large mixing bowl. Check it over for any large pieces. Return these pieces to the food processor and repeat the grinding process.

Add all your spices to the meat. Mix well, then form into patties. I made 4 1/4lb burger patties. You could make them smaller if you wanted to. The ground chicken doesn't really shrink like ground beef. The ground beef has a higher fat content, and that fat melts out during cooking causing your burgers to shrink. While you're making the patties toast up some sandwich buns. I used King's Hawaiian Sandwich Buns. They're a little sweeter than the average bun, and I find them absolutely delicious when toasted with a little butter. Speaking of butter, definitely toast your buns with butter in the pan that you're planning on using to cook the burgers. The little bit of residual butter in the pan helps cook the chicken.

Once your buns are toasted and your patties are made, add them to the hot pan. Remember, these are chicken burgers, not beef, so they need to be completely cooked through! I cooked mine for 3-4 minutes on each side, then checked the internal temperature before I took them off the stove. You want the very middle of the burger to be at least 160 degrees. If you don't have a meat thermometer, go out and buy one now! I got mine from Kohls for about $20. This little guy is great, and the one I own, because it already has proper meat temps programmed in. Stop risking illness and check your meat temperatures!

When you have about 2 minutes of cooking time left put the cheddar cheese on top of the burgers. I steamed my burgers to make sure that my cheese was totally melted. This is how restaurants make the cheese on your burgers so ooey and gooey. It's a really simple process. Just put about a tablespoon or 2 of water in the bottom of your pan, then quickly cover with a lid. The water will not effect your food, but the steam will make sure that the cheese completely melts.

Put your burgers on your delicious butter toasted buns, and top with things that are only going to make this burger more yummy. I topped mine with lettuce, red onion slices, and about a teaspoon of ranch dressing. I would have added some tomato, but they were pretty skanky looking at the store. Side note: I can't wait for warm weather and big delicious tomatoes!

I served my burgers with some cajun seasoned tater tots and green beans. This meal wasn't exactly low-cal, because of the buttered bun, but definitely better for you than a burger! According to MyFitnessPal.com, my sandwich clocked in at about 700 cal. The bun alone is 250 cal. The burger is 415 cals. In the future I'd lighten this recipe up by using a generic hamburger bun (120cal) and ditch the cheese (220 cal). I wouldn't try and lessen the amount of breadcrumbs because they give the burger much needed texture and help to hold the chicken patties together.

I hope that your family enjoys this recipe as much as mine did. Have a great weekend everyone!

Ranch Chicken Burgers

Serves 4

Burger Ingredients:

1 lb of boneless skinless chicken, or 1 lb of pre-ground chicken

½ cup Panko bread crumbs

¼ cup Italian seasoned bread crumbs

1 Tablespoon dried onion flakes

1 teaspoon seasoned salt

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 Tablespoon dry ranch dressing mix

Burger Toppings:

4 slices cheddar cheese

2 tablespoons butter

4 sandwich rolls

Lettuce

Prepared ranch dressing

Red onion

·        Cut your chicken into bite size pieces. Place in the freezer for about 15 minutes. The chicken should be very cold, but not frozen through.

·        Place the partially frozen chicken pieces in your food processor. Use the highest setting to grind the chicken. This takes about 20 seconds. Remove the chicken to a large mixing bowl. If there are any remaining large pieces, repeat the grinding process with only these pieces.

·        In the large mixing bowl, stir together the ground chicken, both types of breadcrumbs, onion flakes, garlic powder, seasoned salt, and dry ranch mix.

·        Form the chicken mixture into patties. One pound of ground chicken should make four quarter pound patties.

·        Butter both insides of the sandwich buns. Place buns in the pan that will be used to cook the chicken burgers, this will provide a little bit of oil to cook the burgers. Toast the buns until golden brown. Set aside.

·        Place burgers in the hot non-stick pan. Cook patties for approximately 3-4 minutes on each side. Use a meat thermometer to measure the internal temperature, which should be at least 160 degrees. During the last 2 minutes of cooking, place the cheddar cheese on top of burgers. Add about a Tablespoon of water to the pan, then cover with a lid. This steam will help melt the cheddar. 

·        Put the chicken burger on the toasted buns. Top with lettuce, red onion, and a squirt of ranch dressing. Enjoy!

Menu Plan Week 6

Happy Presidents Day! I hope everyone had a great weekend. If you were lucky enough to celebrate with someone you love on Valentine's Day, I hope you were spoiled! If you weren't with someone special, I hope you spoiled yourself!

I certainly was spoiled! I had a great weekend out and about with my hubby. We had some great quality time together, and of course we ate a bunch of great food! I had steak 3 days in a row. I haven't had that much red meat probably ever! We ate at Texas de Brazil, which is a churrascaria. If you're not familiar with what that is, it's like a mobile meat buffet! Gauchos prepare a myriad of traditional meats cooked over an open flame on giant kebab skewers then they bring the meats to your table. It's awesome! Then on Friday we ate at Melting Pot. We enjoyed our dinner of filet and lobster tail in a really cozy secluded booth. We got to cuddle and take our time really enjoying our meal. Dessert was the best part. We had a dark chocolate praline bourbon fondue with fresh fruits, brownies, and cake. Soooo yummy. Saturday we got loud and dirty at the Monster Jam, then got dressed up and had a great steak dinner at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. See? I told you I was spoiled!

This week has a couple of big events going on too. Tuesday is Mardi Gras, the last big Hurrah! before the Lenten season begins. We have a couple of traditions that we honor with our family. My side of the family always gets a King Cake from a local bakery that makes the best cake ever! E's family traditionally celebrated with eating Paczki. Paczki (pronounced Punch-key) are traditional Polish pastries eaten to mark the beginning of Lent. We'll be doing both. This only happens once a year, so no excuse not to celebrate. Then Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, the official start to the Lenten season, aka Fish Fry Season. We take our fish fries very seriously here in Pittsburgh. Every Friday you'll find lines out the doors of Catholic churches around the city. The best fish fries batter and fry their own fish, and the really good ones have homemade pierogies! This week is a bonus week, we get a fish fry on Wednesday AND Friday. E and I travel all around the city every Friday in search of the best fish. We will seriously drive close to an hour to get fish. So I'll be changing my posting schedule up a little bit to accommodate our fish adventures. Instead of posting recipes on Friday, I'll be posting on Thursday.

Well I definitely need to get back to the daily grind after that epic chowdown. Here's our meal plan for the week.

Monday:

Buffalo Grilled Stuffed Chicken Breasts with Cajun Tater Tots and Maque Choux

Tuesday:

Slow Cooker Jambalaya with Cheddar Bay Biscuits

Wednesday:

FISH FRY

Thursday:

Bean and Cheese Baked Burritos

Friday:

FISH FRY

Menu Plan Week 5

Happy Monday Internet lovelies! How was your weekend? Mine was nice and relaxing. We got a little shopping done on Saturday and Sunday we went to a puppy playtime and tried out a new pizza place. Penny loves running around and wrestling with all the other doggies!

We've been on this cleaner whole food eating plan for a little over a month and we are loving it! I've lost a total of 7lbs since we started. I haven't been too strict either. We eat out on the weekend if we want, or have a cheat day. I walk a couple days a week, or shovel snow, and try to do a T25. I feel like I have more energy and am more clear mentally. I'm more regular, if you know what I mean and I've even noticed my skin hasn't been so dry. It hasn't been too hard either. The most difficult part has been staying committed to cooking at home. It's easy after a busy day to say "Eh, let's just go out." But having a gameplan, and having the ingredients on hand helps me stay on track. Here's what we've got going on this week:

Monday:

Spinach, Mushroom, and Onion Quiche and Sauteed Garlic Spinach

Tuesday:

Tuna Cakes with Chipotle Mayo and Green Beans

Wednesday:

Fish Tacos and Chipotle Corn Chowder

Thursday:

Dinner out at Texas De Brazil

Friday:

Valentine Dinner out at Melting Pot

Have a great week everyone, and I'll check back in on Weigh In Wednesday!

One Pot Lasagna

One pot lasagna? Not possible you say. You have to make the meat sauce, and the cheese filling, and boil the noodles, then assemble the whole thing, you exclaim! All true points. Making traditional lasagna is time consuming and can get expensive quickly. You could buy a frozen lasagna to skip all the fuss, but those are full of ingredients that you can't pronounce, and I find they're never as satisfying as the real thing. So what's a girl to do when she's CRAVING lasagna, but doesn't have the time or ingredients to make it, nor the money, or desire to wash her hair to go out to a restaurant and buy it? The answer is to make this one pot lasagna of course!

I'm just going to put a disclaimer on this recipe, it looks gross and it seems impossible all of the ingredients actually work together. Please trust me, this recipe definitely works and your family will eat it all up. It doesn't call for any ricotta cheese, but a cup of cottage cheese! It's truly the secret, amazing ingredient here. This dish tastes EXACTLY like traditional lasagna. I've even heard talk that cottage cheese is the secret ingredient in lasagna that little old Italian grandmas make.

Get started by putting a large pot of salted water on the stove to boil. Remember, your water should taste like the sea! Adding salt to your pasta water imparts flavor to your flavorless pasta. Cook your pasta according to package directions. You can really use whatever pasta you want here, but some choices are better than others. Small pastas tend to work better than long noodles. Think macaroni, cavatappi, penne, etc. I like to use raditore pasta. They have lots of nooks and crannies for the sauce to soak up into.  

While your pasta is cooking, heat up your marinara sauce and ground beef in the microwave. You want these to be close to the same temperature as your pasta. The heat will help you melt your cheese in the next step.

I always have pre-cooked ground beef in my freezer. I like to buy my ground beef in bulk and freeze it so I always have it on hand. Why is my beef kind of orange you ask? It's because my beef is packed full of veggies! Before I freeze it, I puree an equivalent weight of vegetables, think carrots, onions, celery, and saute my meat with the veggie puree. Example, if I have one pound of beef, I'll add one pound of carrots, onions, and celery. It effectively doubles the amount of meat I have which saves me money and adds valuable nutrients to my meat. It's not great for hamburgers, but for recipes that call for ground beef you can't even taste the difference! I'll do a blog post on how I stretch my ground beef next time I run out of meat.

Another way I save money is by buying my cheese when it's on sale, or at Aldi, and then freezing it until I need it. I buy the block cheeses and the shred it on demand. I never buy pre-shredded cheeses. For me a generic 8oz bag of shredded sharp cheddar cheese is regularly priced $2.99. At Aldi, the same sharp cheddar cheese block is $1.79. That's an extra dollar I get to keep in my wallet!

Once your pasta is fully cooked, drain it, then return it to the pot. At this point mix your pasta with the marinara sauce, beef, and cheeses. Mix everything together until your pasta is fully coated in sauce and the cheeses are completely melted. You will see visible cheese curds from the cottage cheese.

Once everything is all mixed together it doesn't look super appetizing, something about those visible curds, but I promise that it is delicious. The first time I made this my husband was skeptical and said, "You put what in here?" But 10 minutes later his plate was empty and he was going back for seconds.

Give this recipe a try, and comment back to let me know what you think!

One Pot Lasagna

Serves: 4

Ingredients:

8oz Radiatore Pasta

12oz Garlic Marinara Sauce

½ lb pre-cooked ground beef

1 cup shredded Mozzarella Cheese

½ cup grated Parmesan Cheese

1 cup cottage cheese

Directions:

• Bring a pot of salted water to a rolling boil. Cook your pasta according to package directions.
• Heat your marinara sauce and ground beef in the microwave. You want them to be the same temperature as your pasta.
• Drain your cooked pasta and return it to the pot it was cooked in. Add the marinara sauce, beef, and cheeses to the pasta. Stir everything until pasta is well coated in sauce and cheeses are fully melted. You will still see some cottage cheese curds.
• Serve immediately.

Weigh in Wednesday, Posted Thursday?

Checking in for my Weigh In Wednesday...on Thursday. Sorry, I got caught up yesterday and wasn't able to get on the computer to blog. More importantly though, I'm down 1.4lbs. Another 2lbs and I'll be back to where I started losing weight over a year ago.

After the debacle at the beginning of the week (Super Bowl Couch Fest) I wasn't sure that I was going to have made any progress. I was pretty nervous to step up on the scale. Discouraging thoughts were running through my head, like I'm always going to be fat. I'm too lazy to do this. Etc. I'm still trying to get into the right mindset. I really wasn't even happy after I saw that I lost this week. I thought "ugh...just another pound." But today I was thinking, if I lose a pound per week all year long, I can lose a total of 52lbs this year. That totally doesn't suck. I went into my freezer and pulled out a pound of chicken and told myself, "this is the weight that is no longer on your body. This is just a pound." Again, that totally doesn't suck.

I've gotten back into my normal routine and am starting to feel better. My energy levels are up, no more stomach issues, and I feel clearer mentally. This has been a rough week so far, hopefully there'll be more progress next week as well. In the meantime, Penny and I are going out to play in the snow!

Menu Plan Week 4

After the Super Bowl this past Sunday do you feel let down at all? I'm not talking about the game (but seriously though who throws the ball on the 1 yard line at the end of the freaking Super Bowl?), I'm talking about how I actually feel. I ate a bunch of processed foods on Sunday. Doughnuts for breakfast, Little Caesars for lunch, leftover pizza, homemade stromboli, and beer for dinner. I spent all day Monday in a funk. I was tired, my stomach hurt, and I felt like I couldn't focus. I didn't work out, or do anything at all really. According to my FitBit I took a measly 1,645 steps. I'm really marveling in the fact that changing your diet can really affect how your body feels. A month of eating good, whole, homemade foods has really changed me, which is crazy to me. I've had little to no cravings for processed foods. This is coming from a girl that craved, and indulged that craving, chips and McDonald's at least once a week. After 1 day of completely breaking my diet, I feel like I need to run out right now and grab a McChicken and stop for a bag of Cheetos on the way home. Time to get back on track. Don't let one bad day throw away all your hard work.

Here's my gameplan for this week. I already made some ranch pork chops for dinner yesterday. Today I'm going to use some leftover dough from the stromboli to make homemade pizzas. We're going to do a classic pepperoni and then a white pizza. Here's what's on deck for the rest of the week.

Monday:

Ranch Pork Chops with Green Beans and Rice

Tuesday:

Homemade Pepperoni and White Pizza

Wednesday:

Balsamic Glazed Tuna Steaks with Roasted Potatoes and Carrots

Thursday:

Mock Lasagna

Friday:

Chipotle Corn Chowder

Good luck getting back on track everyone. Looking forward to Weigh In Wednesday! Penny says "It's time to get off the couch, take me for a walk!"