I am going to Peru soon so I am trying to eat all the goodies in my refrigerator and freezer. This morning I got up trying to figure out what to eat for breakfast because I am pretty much out of fruit. However, I have a bag of frozen blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. So I got the idea to make homemade waffles with a berry sauce. They turned out delicious and I have breakfast for several days.
This sauce is so easy to make. Below is the recipe:
1 cup frozen berries (your choice)
2 packets of stevia or sweetener of your choice
2 TBS cold water
1 TBS cornstarch
Put the berries in a pot over low to medium heat. Do not add the water. Liquid will form when the fruit starts to thaw. When the berries start to thaw, add your sweetener. Then cook for about 5 minutes until berries are thawed and sweetener is dissolved.
Next whisk together the cold water and cornstarch until dissolved. Then add to the berry mixture and stir until thickened. Try and keep berries whole.
You can double or triple the recipe. Use as a topping on anything. I put this on waffles but it would also be good on angel food cake.
Do you ever truly think about where your food comes from? I do. Lately it has really been on my mind because of recalls and an article that I read about the footprint of our food. So after doing some checking, I was shocked. This post mainly deals with canned food. I will talk about fresh and frozen on another post.
After cleaning out my cabinet where I keep canned food. I noticed most things came from the US. Like the salsa, diced tomatoes, green beans, and asparagus. But the water chestnuts and mandarian oranges came from China. The pineapple came from Philippines and my sun-dried tomatoes came from Turkey.
If you think about this, these countries are a long way from the states and travel for miles to get to us. I wonder how old the food I am eating is? I will say I do not eat a lot of canned food. Mainly tomato products, pumpkin, and soups.
It is truly amazing when you start looking at the cans and realize where they originated. They have traveled a long way. So I dare you to start looking at your canned food, notice where the food originated from, and think about the process that it took to get into the can that you are opening.
I finished the Tone It Up 7 Day Slim Down this past week and wanted to review the plan. I had lots of success on the plan by losing 4 pounds. The main benefits from the plan that I learned are:
1) Drink your water. Add fruit if needed but get at least 90 ounces in a day. It really is easier than you think.
2) Make the majority of your plate, fruit and veggies. You will find yourself eating less calories and becoming full by doing this.
3) Try new products. If you do not like something, try something else. I used to stick to the same veggies but now I branch out and try new ones.
4) Also use tools that make it easier to cook or eat. I found water bottles that I love and non-stick pans that made cooking and clean up a breeze. If it is easier to eat healthy, I bet you will do it.
5) Plan. I did have one mess up eating the wrong thing because I did not review the plan for the day but it was not a big deal. I just went back and re-read everything. I also created a board to help me plan my days which made life so much easier.
6) Find exercise that you enjoy. I went to the pool and did laps because I love the water. I didn't feel like I was exercising. I also started listening to audio books on tape while I walked. This helped me to increase my distance because my mind was stimulated too.
7) Don't be afraid to put yourself out there. I started doing these videos and I know that I do not look the best but I love that it is a record of my journey.
8) Last but not least, get a support system. I love Tone It Up support on twitter. I have found so many others that tweet their success about Tone It Up or another plan and learn from them. There are definitely other people out there like you and I know that would be glad to help if you just ask.
I cannot believe it is already day 4. Here is my bootycall.
This really has not been that bad but I will tell you a couple times I have had some cravings but have worked through them or figured out the best thing for these cravings.
Most of my meals were very similar today except I had the most delicious dark sweet cherries rather than grapefruit on meal 2.
I also switched up my meal 3. I did not want fish or chicken today so I had something I bought last night on top of my salad. I bought them because I had a coupon, buy one, get one free. Well I am glad that I did, these patties are delicious. Here is the product.
Realize that these are NOT on the plan. I just needed something different. Actually they are not that bad except for the fat which is 28g but each patty has 21g of protein. I will take this protein with this kind of flavor every once in awhile.
If you will notice the drink I had with my meal. This is also a new product to me which I really like. They are very refreshing and called La Croix. They are naturally flavored sparkling water and the ones I bought were BERRY flavored. So good with strawberries in my glass. I tend to like gaseous water more than plain.
Meal 4 ended up being a protein Popsicle rather than a shake because it was 109 degrees today. I used a GNC protein powder that is the best taking cookies and cream flavor that I have found. This protein powder is low in sugar and high in protein. Calories are not bad either around 70 per scoop.
Here is how to make the protein popsicle. It is so easy but make sure that you get pasteurized egg whites. This way they are safe to eat.
One last product I wanted to share with you I found last night at Walmart and I already love it. It smells so good and is not greasy. It is Hawaiian Tropic's After Sun in Lime Coolada. Since I have been outside so much lately, I wanted a good aftercare product and this is a great one.
I will be heading out later tonight for another bit of exercise. Need to wait until it cools off again. Tomorrow is a more restrictive day on the plan and that is ok because today I have felt a little bloated. I will say that when I got on the scale this morning, I have lost 2 lbs. This made me very happy because I had been stuck at 8 lbs and now I am at 10 lbs. So lets see what tomorrow brings!
Hi! Today was Day 3 of the Tone It Up 7 Day slim down for me. I will tell you that this day was a lot easier than yesterday. I think what helped was that I got a good night sleep. Yesterday I had a little mistake in my eating so this morning I created a board to help me keep track of what I was doing for the day and month. Using the post-its makes it easy to change my meals.
So if you remember the past two days I started off with a 30 minute walk with Chloe. Today was not any different. You can check out my video. I also need to say that I was off from work today so it made it a lot easier to stick to the plan.
Meal 1 was a protein pancake. I will say that I love these. If you have not tried them, you need to because they are really tasty. Here is a picture of mine. Usually I never can get them to flip but I did today.
If you would like to know how to make them, watch Karena and Katrina.
There are different variations too! I have made a lemon one with blueberries that is sooooo good.
Meal 2 was grapes again.
Meal 3 was leftover salad from yesterday with iced tea.
Next, I went to the pool. It was packed but I got in a little over 20 minutes of laps plus a little bit of sun.
Once I got home from the pool, I was starved. So I got my meal 4 which was a protein shake. I did the same one from Day 1. The Mocha Chocolate Protein Shake. This shake is delicious. After I let this settle, I was still very hungry and felt like I needed an extra boost because the sun took a lot of energy out of me. So I drank a Zico Passion Fruit Coconut Water. These are the best and I think they work like Gatorade.
Ok, so I made it through all of this and I was sitting on the couch watching some TV and realize it was getting very, very hot in my house. It hit me that my air conditioner was not working again. This has happened about 3 times already. So I turned the air off and waited for 30 minutes and turned it back on. Realize that my house was sitting at 89 degrees at this point. I did get it to come back on but it is taking forever to cool back down because it was 107 degrees outside when it went off. I ended up with a headache after all this and really did not want to eat my dinner. Actually what I wanted to do was go to Sonic, but I didn't. I ended up just fixing some greek yogurt with strawberries, chia seeds, and chai tea. I thought the chai tea would give it a little kick. It was ok. Might experiment more later. This was not my original dinner planned but it was better than Sonic.
So overall I feel like I had a very successful day. Lets see what tomorrow brings.
