August Little Big Meal is a Big Deal!

This month at Fresh Market, on Thursdays you can pick up a Little Big Meal for $20. While the past few months' deals haven't impressed me, August has simply blown me away!

You choose a protein - sirloin strips, chicken strips, or shrimp. 

You choose a starch - udon or soba noodles or rice. 

You pick up a pack of stir fry veggies (precut!!), a simmer sauce, a package of peanuts, and a pound cake!  All for just $20!

We immediately decided to purchase three meals to use all week, one of each type of protein. Chap chose to do 2 2-lb bags of rice and one package of noodles this time. The pound cakes went straight to the freezer and we just took one over to a friend's house for dessert last night. I also halved the chicken and steak into freezer bags and froze one of each, as well as all the shrimp. 

So we tried the chicken meal today for lunch. I pretty much followed the directions on the simmer sauce. Over medium heat, I browned the chicken a little in olive oil, added the whole pack of veggies, used a fork to break up the chicken, then added the simmer sauce and turned the heat down! I covered my pan to let the veggies steam some and cooked one bundle of noodles (there were 3 in the package). I mixed the noodles into the big skillet when they were done, and the meal was complete!

This was soooo easy and really delicious. We are going to have some of the steak tonight! I definitely plan to send Chap back for at least one more this Thursday!

Here is the purchase minus the pound cakes which were already in the freezer!

Here is the chicken dish made in the lemongrass basil simmer sauce! This was also after I served myself and the Monkey!

Dr. Soup

The pollen has attacked. With a vengeance. My face hurts, my nose is a faucet, and wow my ears are feeling the pressure. I'm doing a little rain dance here looking out the window - it's headed to Atlanta, just not as quickly as I prefer! The clouds are here, so bring on the rain!

I even took something. If you know me well, you know I hate taking medicine! I can work through basic aches and pains. This, however, is awful, and I broke down and took an allergy pill last night. 

Nutritionally, I'm avoiding dairy so that my sinuses don't swell up any more than they already are. I've eaten a Minneola for snack, and now this miso soup for lunch.  The soup is warm and is helping ease my sinus troubles a little.  Here is the recipe, in case the pollen has you down, too!

Dr. Miso Soup

By Miss Fit

1 c chicken or veggie broth

1 tsp chickpea miso paste

1/4 c chick peas, drained

Handful of chopped greens (I used collards)

Salt and Pepper to taste

Heat the broth and miso paste in the microwave for one minute. Stir to break up the miso paste. Add chick peas, greens, salt, and pepper. Return to the microwave for 30 seconds or until greens have softened to your liking. 

Optional Ingredients: Red Pepper Flakes, 2 Tbsp chopped Parsley, and/or 1/4 c Shredded Chicken

Enjoy feeling your sinuses open up, if even for just a few minutes!

Making the Cut Day 11

I've had quite a busy week traveling, so I am quite behind on posts! I took the Monkey with me to Athens to see some dear friends, and Chap and I toured some South Carolina/North Carolina college campuses for work. In order to keep clean (our meals, that is), we packed our own food for the trip - snacks and all!

I was stressed about my food intake because 1400 calories seemed SO low for me.  I was hungry all the time! The scale proved this was the case - I dropped a few unintentional pounds and am bordering on underweight. This was not part of my plan but realized the book is touted as being a way to drop the last 10 - 20 pounds. Well, if you are already at your ideal weight, this is a problem! I discussed with Chap and redesigned my calorie goal to 1700 for now. If I feel that this isn't working, I will increase again. My Day 9 workout went really well, so I feel like the extra fuel is just what I needed. I could see where someone would try to work through the low calories and be miserable, so I do wish the book spent a little more time talking about calories and people who might not need to lose 10 pounds. I'm sure I'm not the only one who experienced this. 

I'm so excited about the definition in my arms. They are looking fabulous! I will post halfway pictures in a few days. I've impressed myself with close grip push-ups... and pretty much all types of push-ups. I can tell it's working!

Of course it's pouring on a day I needed to do some sprints, so I will be getting creative later with my workout!

Making the Cut Day 4

Yesterday was tough in terms of following the meal plan. I did it (yea!) but felt really hungry and couldn't seem to think straight. Thankfully Day 3 is built to be a rest day - I definitely rested! I remember when I did my juice Reboot several years ago that once I got beyond 3 days, I was fine. Sure enough, I'm feeling alert and happy today on Day 4! My workout was great. In circuit 3 you complete 20 frog push-ups. On Friday I had to break it down into sets of 4 or 5. Today I did 10 before a little break, then 5 and 5!  Feeling stronger today is really motivating. I can even see some muscle definition in my arms. 

In other news, I received my first paycheck as a part time employee at Chap's business! I'm working for him while the Monkey is at morning preschool  three days a week. I learned a lot today and got my email set up! I also tried to give myself a raise, but that might have been a little too ambitious for the first pay period. I will try again next month! Haha

I'm so hopeful that nice weather is here to stay! I'd love to take part of my workout outdoors - especially when I need to do my 5 1-minute sprints! Even an open floor plan is not conducive to those!

Have a great sunny week!

Making the Cut Day 2

I feel that the first two days of Making the Cut have been successful.  After two workout sessions I can tell a big difference in my strength and endurance this go around. The last time I did this was five years ago, and I've come a long way! I've  heard/read your thirties are actually a time where you can see some peak performance, so I'm taking advantage of it!

Today's lunch salad was so delicious. The original recipe was Artichoke, Fennel, and Tomato Salad but fennel is not my favorite. So I subbed baby bok choy and it made the best base for this huge salad!  We would totally make this again. I also had two ounces of chicken with it, and the meal was quite satisfying. 

So here is the {improved} Artichoke, Bok Choy, and Tomato Salad!

We've also had Morrocan chicken and wild rice, along with delicious turkey wraps for yesterday's lunch. 

I really like trying the new recipes but already plan to scale back on the types of meat we have next week in hopes of lowering our grocery bill! I will let you know how that goes!

The Cost of Meat in Your Diet

I haven't blogged in awhile, but I've been busy with my many endeavors - namely becoming Chap's very part-time assistant and working on my Teachers Pay Teachers site.  In the meantime, we've had Birthday Month, which usually means we spend a lot more money than normal and our diet becomes almost sweets based.  I'm happy to report, though, that we spent way less money this year and we only had a small string of unhealthy eating.  Not that it's a bad thing, but Chap and I were quite relieved to go back to a very clean diet the other day.

My other new endeavor is personal and quite goal-oriented.  I've decided to complete the 30 day Jillian Michaels' Making the Cut.  I did it once before with Chap back in 2009.  In fact, I still had the meal plans and grocery lists saved on my Google Docs!  I'd forgotten how difficult it is to plan out your meals and groceries with the format of the book, but I simply refuse to pay extra money to have JM's website do it for me.  So...back to Google Docs and Livestrong's My Plate calorie tracking tool.  I will start on Friday, and I'm quite excited about becoming super fit and plan to look "smokin' hot" at my sister's wedding in June!

I'd ALSO forgotten how meat and protein-focused this meal plan is, and just how much money we spent on groceries back in 2009.  We were on two salaries then with no Monkey in the picture.  So the sticker shock of our groceries for 7 days was intense today!  I shopped at three places: The Dekalb Farmers Market, Kroger, and Trader Joes.  Oh.  Wow.  I almost passed out when my total reached $200 at the Farmers Market alone.  It was largely due to meat and seafood!  In total, for Days 1 - 7, meat made up exactly 40% of our spending.  That's just over a hundred bucks.  I've become accustomed to $70 or $80 being a really high week in terms of budgeting for groceries, and I have to remember to breathe when I think about the money I spent today on one week of food.

It makes me realize what a big difference buying meat makes to your budget.  These days we eat out of our freezer for meat, which has a few steaks left (Christmas gift) and venison from a friend.  The only meat we buy is occasional chicken or some fish.  To imagine the typical American family meal where meat is still the central focus, I can see exactly why people think eating healthy is expensive and difficult.  I'm so glad we've changed our focus in our little family to whole plant-based meals that may or may not include meat or seafood.  The savings alone is simply amazing!  Imagine if I'd bought beans in place of this meat - I could have bought 5 containers of different types of beans and only spent $10!  It's definitely something families can look at when trying to trim their budget.

One item we will NOT buy again - lamb chops.  It cost $37 for 6 lamb chops, and the original recipe actually called for 12.  I have such a difficult time justifying this expense when we could eat on $37 for at least 5 days normally!  So lamb chops are a one-time thing, even though they are loved by a particular member of this family.  Sorry, Chap!

I'm going to let my heart rate subside again (and put those receipts out of my mind) and finish up this post.  I'm so excited to do this workout and meal plan again, and I know the results will be worthwhile.  Check back in to see updates on how it's going for the next thirty days!  I will be sure to take some before and after photos and will probably post a few meal photos and recipes!  Here's to being fit and fab!

Easy Homemade Peanut Butter

I'm beyond thankful we have no allergies in my house. While we do avoid gluten for the most part, no one is actually allergic. Our pediatrician was great about keeping up on the latest research, so when the Monkey was 4 months old, she told us we could feed him any food except peanut butter. The peanut butter caution was actually because of choking, not because of potential for allergies. Now that the Monkey is older, he loves lots of foods, including peanut butter. It's so easy to make, and peanuts are very cheap at the farmers market and Trader Joes! We keep them on hand for snacks and days where peanut butter would just hit the spot!

Easy Homemade Peanut Butter

In a small food processor, combine 1/4 cup of peanuts, a couple pinches of salt, a half teaspoon of honey, and a drizzle of your choice of oil. Start with just a little oil, and as the peanuts grind up, check to see if they are too dry. It doesn't take much to make perfect peanut butter!

We ate our peanut butter with apples!