In a moment of slight madness, I have joined the Personal Finance Bloggers Weight Loss Challenge, which is being hosted by Baker at ManVSDebt.
Boy, am I glad I did! I have not owned a scale in years so when out got one and hopped on – YIPES!!! I had no idea actually how much I weighed so bring on the challenge.
In doing my research in how to tackle this weighty problem I discovered SparkPeople. Which is an amazing website that will help you tally up your daily eating then analyze it by how much carbs, protein and fat you consumed. I can spend hours on this site putting in recipes and it telling you the facts about them.
In looking for recipes I looked back at Sexy Packed Lunches part Deux where I mentioned Chunky Gazpacho, the ultimate diet food. Then immediately whipped up a batch. This is the perfect food, filling, more than your five a day of vegetables and in season so cheap to make. Very LEAN.
A few of my other favourite recipes are Mexican Scrambled Eggs and Flash Fried Steak with White Bean Mash by the fabulous Nigella Lawson. I absolutely adored the mashed cannelli beans, which taste very decadent.
The next thing I have to tackle is exercise so I am going to walk more and take the bus less.
Do you have any tips or recipes to help Team Epsilon, which is my team by the way. Go Team!!!
If you like the mashed beans idea, you could also try cooking one rinsed and well-drained tin of green lentils in a tiny bit of vegetable stock (or low-fat cooking sprayed pan) with half a crushed clove of garlic and two handfuls of washed spinach. Top with char-grilled chicken breast / 2 grilled veggie burgers / poached smoked haddock. Bistro-style food that fills you up.
One tip is to have some lean protein at every meal to keep hunger pangs at bay. The other tip is to temporarily cut out alcohol (boring for most of us, but probably the most effective way to cut calories without losing valuable vitamins and minerals).
Good luck, and stay away from those nasty low-calorie crash diets.
If you like the mashed beans, also try tinned green lentils, small clove crushed garlic and 2 handfuls of washed spinach. Top with chargrilled chicken or veggieburgers, or poached smoked haddock. Looks like a bistro dinner and guests would never guess it was low-cal. Bon appetit!
Hello Penny and thanks for commenting.
I love your idea about the lentils! As for lean protein, I have really been liking the Waitrose BBQ range, especially the sate beef. I have half a pack of that and some salad, just beautiful! Also that range gets marked down quite often during the week when people are not BBQing as much.
The challenge seems to be going well. What team are you on?
Thanks for commenting. I am on Team Epsilon and I must say we are a determined group. The competition is heating up.
Great post
There’s nothing like being lean and healthy. In today’s America, we really need toworkout occasionnaly and get rid off our bad diet habits. It’s not that hard. You only need to stick to a diet program and keep going until you reach your goals.
Thanks for sharing this with your readers.