Simple Fitness for Busy Moms: Few new recipes,,,experiments gone well.

Friday, May 16, 2014

Few new recipes,,,experiments gone well.

I've tried a few new recipes this week. I picked up a pretty low sodium, low calorie maranaide from Costco and covered 5 pieces of chicken with it in crockpot & served with rice. You can do this with any maranaide. AJ's has some good looking low calorie maranaides.

I also maranaided chicken in a coconut balsamic oil overnight. I simmered the balsamic & tbls of honey in pan then cooked the chicken in it for 25 min or until brown. I served this with sautéed spinach & brn rice.

Last was simple & yummy. I used the 1/2 corn 1/2 wheat tortillas I'm currently addicted to. I put them on the burner added 1 large tbls of refried beans & 1 oz of cheese. I added the salsa crockpot chicken i make (the recipe is on wk 2 I believe) I cooked the tortilla until it was harder like a tostado. I took it off and added red onion, tomatoes, avacado & salsa. So yummy & very filling.

Once you know the basic meal plan, you can start experimenting & creating your old fave recipes in a healthier way! Let me know of any of your experiments gone right!!!

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Meal Prep

I want to say, you will not be successful if you do not meal prep. It's too much food, too much cooking, and too many times you will want to talk yourself out of doing it. I personally don't like leftovers. I have to eat it & remind myself food is fuel!! I make all my meals for Monday-Friday on Monday & then I might cook a little over weekends. Now that my metabolism is better I cheat more over the weekends, so I don't like to waste food by meal prepping. I wouldn't recommend cheating for the first two weeks of this diet so your metabolism will stabilize.

Carb Cycling

I hit a plateau about 6 months into my fitness regiment & noticed messing around with my carbs helped get me to my ultimate goal of 18 percent body fat (I stopped looking at the scale, I'm about ten lbs heavier than I was before kids, but in a smaller pants size,,,the scale lies!). I don't recommend necessarily starting with carb cycling, start simple, one step at a time, but I want to explain it, as that is what I do & I will talk about it a lot in my meal plans. Everyone has a different take & There are a million ways to implement it, so I will just tell my version & you can research it If you want further info.

Healthy carbs that you'll want to eat are brn rice, oats, sweet potatoes, and brn rice pasta. For my snacks I have fruit, eat your fruit early in the day because it is a complex carb. I have popcorn with no butter & light light light salt sometimes. If you pick a protein bar or shake, pick one with low carbs. Quest bars are high in carbs, so I eat them in the mornings or closer to my workouts.

So if you notice I eat 1/3 cup of oats in the am, 1/2 cup carbs for meal 4, then 1/4 cup carbs at meal 5. On a low carb day I might lower this or keep it the same. On a high carb day I will eat more carbs. Most of the time I add healthy carbs to snacks, I eat a full 1/2 cup with my meal at night. I still leave out carbs of meal 6.

My carb cycle is simple, when I've had a intense workout, especially when I've worked my legs or back I eat high carbs, most other days I keep them lower.

Hopefully as I blog this will make more sense!

Basic Meal Plan

Meal 1--1 scoop protein shake. (Check your label, muscle milk, for instance is high in calories & carbs, try muscle milk light. My fave is protein 7) an apple or banana, 11 almonds or teaspoon of peanut butter. (I love flavored peanut butters from trader joes & sprouts.)

Meal 2--4 egg whites & 1/3 cup cooked oatmeal add an ounce of cheese to eggs or avacado & tomato. I buy egg whites in a carton. So much easier than cracking eggs.

Meal 3--snack, could be same as meal 1 or try protein bar ( read your labels! I love quest bars)

Meal 4--4oz chicken breast, grnd turkey, or 5-6oz talapia, veggies, 1/2 cup of rice, sweet potatoes, or rice pasta, and a fat, 1/4 avacado, 1 oz of cheese, or a teaspoon of Peanut butter.

Meal 5--same as meal 6, except remove carbs or only have 1/4 cup.

Meal 6--1 scoop protein shake.

*you can rearrange meals & snacks to your own schedule, for instance, I workout at 5 am, so I eat a fruit & pb before I go & have my protein shake right after. That's my meal 1. If you'd rather eat eggs right when you wake up & eat the snack later go for it. Just make sure you get all your meals in!

*this diet is formulated for a woman, men get double the amount of food. So for men, 8 egg whites in stead of 4 & 8oz meat instead of 4 oz, 1 cup brn rice instead of 1/2, and so forth. No fair!