Build up your weaknesses until they become your strong points

Friday, March 20, 2009

Well, dinner got switched around a bit because I forgot to prepare white beans for the chili, so we had the chicken and veggies in cream cheese sauce instead. It was good! I made the sauce by mincing onions and 1 jalapeno with seeds and satueeing them slightly in homemade stock, then I put in the food processor 1/5 cup of stock and 1/3 cup of lowfat cream cheese, 1 oz of cheddar cheese, and some Mrs. Dash and garlic salt. I added the sauce to the onions and jalapenos, and also chicken, celery, corn, green beans, and cauliflower. I thought it was good, I think Bill did too. He said it didn't need salt, which is a win in my book. If you don't like spice, you might want to leave out the jalapeno, de-seed it, or substitute it with a less spicy pepper, such as an poblano, chipotle, or anaheim. A delicious lower-carb, high protein meal!

My workday was insane, running from one experiment to another. Suddenly, I have a million things going on! Next week I need to fix some equipment, do a lot of FISH, count quite a few cells, and clone clone clone. Whew!

The weather has been nice, although the nights are still cold. However, I hear this will make for some nice maple syrup! Too bad it makes it chilly inside at night sometimes. I can't wait for spring to really hit, mostly because I can't wait to go shopping at the farmers market for fresh produce! I'm so sad. I'm still dreaming of the day when I can afford grass-fed beef on a regular basis!

My wheat experiment is so-so, last night I felt crummy. I definitely notice that I feel great in the morning and deteriorate throughout the day as I eat the wheat more, but I'm not yet getting nearly as sick as before Christmas. I am eating wheat every day, mostly puffed wheat and yucky Atkins bars now, but Sunday I'm back on carbs and therefore can eat fiber one bars, which taste better, and have fiber in them! I do think though, that I may look into buying some wheat bran and making my own bars. Maybe I'll use the sorghum flour or quinoa in them, yum.

I did another crazy workout tonight. I started on the bike with a lopsided pyramid, increased from level 1-7 over 7 min, and then dropped back 5, 3, 1 over the las three minutes. Then I did 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, and 10 push-ups on my knees, get-ups, squats, crunches, dips on floor, and leg raises. That's 100 of each. Whew!

I'm not sure I'm loving the high carb = weights, low carb = aerobic/circuit workout schedule, because I feel very tired on low carb. I think for the first two weeks of April I'm going to focus on low-density, high-fiber, low cal, balanced but not excessive carbs/proteins (I'm thinking 80-100g protein, 160-200g carbs). Go back to a split with 3 days of strength, 3 days of circuits/aerobics, and 1 day of yoga/pilates for workouts. Even if this month's weight loss results are reasonable, I don't function on low carb and lots of workouts, my body simply can't handle energy production in that way, I know, I keep trying.

  

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

CINCYDORA 3/21/2009 3:13PM

I'm not familiar with you high carb = weights, low carb = aerobic/circuit plan but that sounds counter-intuitive to me. I've always been told that extra protein helps strength building and complex carbs make for a better aerobic workout. I'd love to see the logic behind suggesting the reverse. If you aren't feeling well with your current plan, your April plan of going back to a standard strength/cardio alternation might be smart. I hope is works out for you. Report Inappropriate Comment

A good cook is like a sorceress who dispenses happiness

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Tonight, I made a fabulous dish for dinner! Chicken with asparagus and tomato in a creamy balsamic sauce. I pretty much put it together myself with some ideas and a few "oh, you can combine those" from the internet.

I browned 1in chicken pieces in just a bit of olive oil and spiced them with garlic salt, Mrs. Dash, and oregano. Then I added cut-up fresh asparagus and a bit more olive oil and sauteed until crisp tender. I made a sauce of 1/2 cup homemade chicken stock, 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar, 1/4 c heavy cream, a tsp onion powder, which I heated for a bit, and then added to the chicken and asparagus and let simmer for about 10min. Right at the end I added 2 cut up roma tomatoes and topped with a four-cheese Italian mix (although I'm sure mozzarella would have been fine). It was delicious! Try it. We had a salad on the side.

Enjoy! The rest of my day was pretty typical. It was a bit crazy at work, lots of people needed my help, I had a conference call that actually lasted an hour about modeling. My PCR still doesn't like me, but my FISH is going nicely, so far.

This morning I did a Leslie Sansone boosted walk, and this evening we went walking. It was nice earlier, but it got so cold when we went out, and my left foot felt incredibly numb for a while, and we started later than my workout usually starts, and I was starting into severe low blood sugar when we got back, so I jumped into snack, and switched my snack around to grab something faster, but still fit into my calories and stuck with lower carb options, however, I'm pretty sure I hate Atkins bars. Lower sugar or not, I've got to find a better way to manage that, maybe I'll buy more fiber one and make my own again.

I am tired tonight. Got to get some serious sleep!

  

Not by appointment do we meet delight

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Today was one of those days where I was a bit out of it, so I tried to keep it to easy things. Fortunately, we got the new bulb for the epifluorescent microscope, so I sat and counted cells for 90 min. I'm used to doing that, and it doesn't require much movement (i.e., nothing to drop and break). I survived and even eventually woke up a bit.

Dinner was just a classic stir-fry with pork, bok choy, and sugar-snap peas. I ground up somme cauliflower and chick peas to give a rice-like texture. It worked pretty well.

I ate mostly typical other foods. My yogurt veggie dip is pretty good now, with onion powder, dill, chives, Mrs. Dash, and just a bit of cayenne. I've got some atkins bars that I'm munching on to keep my wheat intake while low-carbing, and I've determined that I hate the awful sweetener taste of those bars. I used to like them, not anymore. I think I like that.

I did a crazy workout tonight. Started with the bike, 3 min warm-up, and 2 sets of pyramid intervals: 30 sec fast, 1 min recovery, 1 min fast, 1 min recovery, 90 sec fast, 1 min recovery (repeat). Then I did 5 rounds of continuous circuit of 20 each of crunches, squats, push-ups on knees, and dips. Then I hopped back on the bike for 10 min of intervals 30 sec fast, 30 sec recovery. Then 5 more rounds of the above circuit.

Lost was interesting, one of the better episodes in my opinion. Now it is bedtime, because I have to get up at the usual early time tomorrow. I slept in 30 min today, so, tomorrow is early. Goodnight!

  

In the field of observation, chance favors only the prepared mind

Monday, March 16, 2009

Tonight was Louisiana Red Beans and Rice found at Eating Well here: www.eatingwell.com/recipes/re
d_beans_rice.html . I used a ham steak instead of Canadian bacon and my beans were pretty mushy due to being crockpot made during the day, so I didn't mash any. I also served it mixed up with wild rice. I may have been a bit too liberal with the Cayenne pepper. I thought it was pretty yummyif a bit spicy, but Bill didn't really love it, said maybe with cheese or something. He ate it with no complaints, so I'll take that. Anyway, if you like rice and beans kind of dishes, give it a try. I like that it has lots of veggies, beans for fiber, and can be done with lean meats.

The rest of my eating today is going fine. My tummy was acting wierd few times in the middle of the day, seizing up and hurting, but seems to be calm again. My wheat products today included: bisquick pancake with breakfast, wheat germ and granola bar for snack, ritz crackers with lunch, flour in cheese sauce with dinner, and I'll have wheat-including granola on my yogurt tonight after I work out.

Starting tomorrow I am back to low carb for a while. My wheat will mostly be wheat germ and atkins granola bars and puffed wheat cereal. I figure it doesn't get any more wheat than puffed wheat, and it is yummy, and low in cals and not too high in carbs. Tonight is my last tough workout day, and I have lower body scheduled, which means tons of lunges and squats, can't wait!

Other than that stuff, I did quite a bit of work at work (novel idea I realize), and was helping another postdoc who is more of a biochemist do some molecular ecology. My PCR is still giving me all kinds of trouble .... but I'll figure it out. All my machines are now in my lab though, so I no longer have 4 flights of stairs to run samples, yay! It is spring break for UMass, which means no students (yay! quiet!) but the buses run on reduced schedules (every 35-45min instead of every 15). I ran late making dinner tonight because I missed the 5:41 bus and had to take the 6:16. Tomorrow is going to be another long day because I have small group ministry, so will stay at work until 6:30-6:45 and then go to small group from 7-9 before getting home. I already have dinner made for tomorrow though, so that's good. Maybe I'll sleep in Wed. to make up for it. Tomorrow is also Evacuation Day (observed) for UMass, whatever wierd Mass holiday that is, an nicely placed on St. Patrick's Day, but I don't care about either holiday, so whatever. We're not Irish, a bit scottish on both sides, but no Irish, and we're happy to keep it that way.

Ok, I have to go plan the remainder of tomorrow's meals and then workout!

  

I know that balance leads to the highest good for all.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Menu Plan Monday
hosted today by 5DollarDinners.com but usually found on OrgJunkie.com. Just a sampling of my blog reading insanity.

Monday: Louisiana Red Beans and Rice and cheesy broccoli

Tuesday: Paprika chicken and a salad

Wednesday: Teriyaki stir-fry with bok choy and sugar snap peas

Thursday: Chicken with bolognese and asparagus

Friday: Chicken and white bean chili

Saturday: Chicken and corn and green beans in cream cheese sauce

Sunday: BBQ Meatloaf and mashed potatoes

Monday and Sunday are high carb/cal days, Tuesday - Saturday are low carb. Bill may or may not join me. I'm not sure how this system is going so far, it's hard to follow in pieces, but I'll have to wait until the end to really know. My biceps are starting to look nice though and Bill has nice things to say about my back end.

I cooked up a large pot of turkey bolognese today and used 1/4 of it in a "lasagna" casserole, and froze 3 other portions, so that will be used on Thursday. The casserole today used cooked spaghetti (wheat since I am on wheat, but rice would work too) mixed with ricotta, on top of that was a layer of bolognese, then some mozzarella, then repeat the three layers and bake until heated through and top cheese is melted and bubbly.

I've eaten more wheat today, but all of it within diet confines. My tummy was trouble earlier, but it seems to be better right now.

Today in church was all about Jazz as a great analagy for UUism. How awesome is that? I may have also joined the music committee, I know, it is a slippery slope, but I already do a lot of music, so it made sense.

Ok, time for tea and then bed!