Wheat Pizza Crust

Mozzarella, Turkey Pepperoni and Jalapenos - MMMmmm

My husband and I decided to look at the ingredients on the popular brand of Boboli pizza crusts at Target during our weekly store run. Check this out:

Ingredients: Whole wheat flour, water, palm oil, polydextrose, yeast, wheat gluten, molasses, milk casein, salt, mozzarella cheese (milk, cheese cultures, salt and enzymes), sugar, preservatives (calcium propionate, sorbic acid), fumaric acid, modified food starch, sodium phosphate, whey, monoglycerides, lactic acid, natural flavor, garlic, artificial color. 

Twenty-two ingredients!!!!! It costs around $3.50 and really doesn't taste that great. It also includes all of those above preservatives and other unnecessary additives.  That was enough for us to come up with our own healthy recipe.

 

The below recipe has wheat flour and very few ingredients, all which are healthy and natural. And it's very easy. We made it tonight and could barely stop ourselves from eating the entire pizza (three pieces left!). It's just as good, if not better, than delivery pizza, with health benefits to boot. Be sure to stretch the crust nice and thin if you want it to be a little crispy. 

Oh yeah, and it takes 10 minutes. Worth it!

Ingredients:

• 1 ½ cups wheat flour
• 1/4 cup wheat germ 
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar 
• ½ teaspoon sea salt
• ½ cup water
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Directions: 
 

Preheat your oven to 400'F.

 

1) Add flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into a big bowl. 

2) Make a well in the center and add the water and oil. Combine by stirring with a spoon. Add more water if necessary (I added water a couple times) 

3)Transfer the dough to a floured surface and knead it for 2 minutes.

4)  After kneading, use a floured rolling pin to flatten the dough to desired thickness.

5) Spray your pizza pan with olive oil (or put some on a paper towel and use it to coat the pan). Place dough on pan.

6) Place your pizza sauce on the dough and then cover with your favorite toppings.

5) Put it into the preheated oven. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes.

 

 

Cheese and Tomato Toasts

Courtesy of Myrecipes.com

Ingredients

• 5 to 6 oz. light cream cheese, at room temperature
• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 plum tomatoes, seeded and diced  
• 2 tablespoons olive oil 
• 1/8 teaspoon salt 
• 1 loaf (about 8 oz.) Italian bread or wheat baguette
•  1 clove garlic, halved

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 400°F. In a small bowl, stir together cream cheese and pepper until thoroughly combined. In a medium bowl, stir together tomatoes, 2 Tbsp. olive oil, salt and parsley.
2. Slice off and discard ends of bread. Slice loaf diagonally into 1/2-inch-thick slices and place on a baking sheet. Toast in oven until golden brown, about 5 minutes. Rub 1 side of each toast slice with cut side of garlic.
3. Spread toast slices with cheese mixture and top with tomato mixture. 

I'm always on the look out for easy, tasty appetizers.  With only eight ingredients, most of which you probably already have on hand, this recipe is a great option for dinner parties and drop in guests who need something to munch on. The original recipe calls for mild goat cheese, but light cream cheese serves as a cheaper and lighter option.

This recipe made about 16 toasts, and I topped the remaining toasts I had left over with the cream cheese mixture and a sliced, spicy dill spear. They were a hit! The combination of the creamy cheese and the fresh tomatoes makes a delectable, albeit messy (serve with appetizer plates -- those little tomato bits have a tendency to jump off the toast!), pre-dinner snack.

Ode to the Vodka Tonic

Vodka Tonic

1 ounce vodka

1.5 ounces diet tonic

1/2 lime, cut into wedges

Pour vodka and tonic into a glass with ice. Squeeze lime wedges into drink, then toss in. Stir. 95 calories.

Nothing says Saturday night sitting on the couch watching Dateline like a vodka tonic. Light, refreshing and bubbly, this low calorie drink has it all. Class. Ease. Non-staining if dropped. Quick to the blood stream. It can't be beat.

The vodka tonic combination is quite amazing. Somehow the combination of two terrible tasting items, vodka (ew) and diet tonic water (gross) mixed together become amazing. A little like stray dogs and sweet and sour sauce. I can't explain it. And I don't want to.

And my husband found this out yesterday.

"Can I take a drink of this?" He asked, picking up the bottle of diet tonic water off the counter. "I don't think I've ever had it."

"Um. Sure...but you're not going to like it," I said.

He unscrews the lid, takes a swig, then makes a face as he chokes it down. "That's disgusting!"

"Um, yeah. I told you you wouldn't like it," I told him, chuckling. 

 

He then proceeded to try to wash the taste of his mouth out with scotch. It didn't help. He learned his lesson: Tonic without vodka is like a Lifetime movie without a love triangle between a stalker, an inappropriate masseuse and Eddie Cibrian. It just doesn't work.

 

The Gym Rats

After joining a gym, I can't help but notice the people working out around me. No matter what day it is, these people are always there. And I can't help but stare.

1) The Rhinoceros: This guy is always at the gym. Tall, muscular and with that blank look always behind his eyes, he takes up about half of the weight lifting room with this Rhinoceros-like body. Constantly talking about his glorious college football playing days ("I was so much better than Tim Tebow. And my receivers were half as good as his!") while swinging ridiculously huge dumbbells around to "warm up," this guy makes me wish I went to an all female gym. Being that I've never actually seen him do any actual weight lifting, this leads me to believe he just hangs out there, then heads home to shoot up some kind of steroid. I can't prove it. Yet.

2) The Sweater: This guy is also always at the gym. Medium height and build, he always looks like he just  climbed out of a pool full of sweat. Dripping from his curly hair down to his soaked socks, he is all over the gym, doing 10 sets of this, 20 sets of that, leaving a trail of sticky, damp handles in his wake. I purposely try to avoid looking at what machines he's using, otherwise I'd never be able to use those machines again. He's the reason Purell bottles are all over the place. Two words: home gym. Trust me on this.

3) The Buddha: This guy is my favorite. Consistently at the gym, this Buddha-shaped exerciser only does abdominal exercises.  Laying on the floor, he does crunch after crunch after crunch, taking breaks in between sets. It's like watching a cat swing at a foam piece of cheese on a string, expecting to bite into some gourmet brie if he just keeps trying. I don't get it. But, he doesn't sweat all over everything, so I let him crunch away as he pleases.

4) The Spandex Queen: Spandex is an okay material for clothing. But it should be illegal to make spandex clothing in any color other than black. As proven by the Spandex Queen on a daily basis, grey and white spandex shows sweat. Everywhere. 

Now this is just a sampling of the regular crowd. There are so many more I haven't had the opportunity to analyze yet.

People talk about needing motivation to go work out. I've got mine.

Beef and Vegetable Soup and Other Healthy Recipes

Courtesy of Betty Crocker

Beef and Vegetable Soup
Heat oil in big soup pot on stove; brown meat, then drain fat and return meat to pot
1 pound beef stew meat
1 tbls. olive oil

Add below to pot, bring to a boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for 1 hour:
32 ounces beef stock
4 cups of water
1 tsp. dried oregano, crushed
1/2 tsp. dried marjoram, crushed
1/4 tsp. black pepper (or more)

Then add below, bring back to boiling, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes more:
1 can stewed tomatoes, chopped (with juice)
1 16 oz package mixed frozen vegetables
2 cups new potatoes, halved
2 carrots, sliced
1/2 cup pearl onions, peeled (boil for 3 minutes, then rinse in cold water, cut off root end and squeeze from the other end)

Salt to taste. Eat! This makes 8 servings, about 235 calories each.


Tuna With Lemon and Relish
1 can tuna
2 tbs. dill pickle relish
Juice from 1/2 lemon

Mix and Eat. 20 grams of protein and just a little over 100 calories.


Sludge
1 scoop vanilla casein protein powder
1 tbs. peanut butter
Little bit of water

Mix the casein powder and peanut butter together. Slowly add a little bit of water at a time until it becomes thick and creamy. Freeze for at least 30 minutes. The colder the better.


Above are a few of the recipes we've tried this weekend. When my husband and I get onto healthy kicks, we go all out. It's all or nothing in our house. So when we decided about three weeks ago that we were going to get back into "pre-dating" shape, we meant it.

"Pre-dating" shape refers to before we met eat other, when we both were hitting the gym six to seven days a week, eating clean and drinking protein shakes, and being in pretty great overall health. Once we starting dating, we were going out to eat three to four times a week (Seafood! Sushi! Mexican! Indian!), drinking bottles of wine, scarfing thigh-size pieces of french silk pie and skipping workouts left and right.

Those days are over. Granted, the Sludge recipe above is not like eating ice cream, pudding or french silk pie for that matter, but it's reasonably eatable and is very filling. It basically tastes like really thick, cold peanut butter, with a slightly pasty aftertaste. But don't let that discourage you. It has a lot of protein and makes a great snack after dinner when you need something to hold you over until morning.

The soup recipe hit the spot yesterday while we watched six inches of snow fall outside. A perfect snowy Saturday meal. It made enough for us for lunch, a big tupperware to put into the freezer, then two more smaller tupperwares full to put in the fridge. And it was pretty low effort to make. Perfect! Enjoy!

Love the Lentils

Green Lentils

 

Favorite Middle Eastern Lentils

 

8 ounces of green lentils

½ white onion, minced

3 whole carrots, chopped

2 cloves garlic

1 tsp. cumin (and more to taste)

2 tsp. salt (and more to taste)

1 tbsp. pepper (and more to taste)

Plain yogurt

 

Rinse lentils, then add to large pot. Cover lentils with water and turn heat to high.  Add carrots, onion and garlic to pot. Then add cumin, salt and pepper. Once the water boils, turn down the heat to simmer. Simmer for 30 minutes or until the lentils and carrots are tender, stirring occasionally. Add more salt, pepper and cumin to taste.

 

If the lentils are not soft after 30 minutes, add more water and let it cook until soft.

 

Serve with yogurt.

 

 

We’ve stopped buying any kind of crunchy, salty snacks, also known as “cupboard crack” because neither of us has the self control to not eat an entire bag while watching Brian Williams. We also completely avoid the entire aisle that has sugary snacks at the store, to avoid being tempted by nutter butters and oatmeal pies. The lentil recipe above has become a staple in our weekly meal plan.

 

After eating healthier, avoiding going out to eat and really sticking to our eating plan, we’ve both been mocked on a daily basis by our bathroom scale. It literally taunts me by showing my goal weight, then showing an error, and once I step off and get back on, shows my actual weight. It’s quite bad for my mental health. I step on, my eyes light up as I see my goal, then my hopes are crashed as the evil little machine forged in the depths of hell laughs in my face and “Erroor”’s out on me.

 

It also doesn’t help when the person across from my desk at work brings in some kind of unhealthy food twice a week. Friday, it was a giant barrel full of cheese balls. Today, it was a Tupperware full of red velvet cupcakes. Normally, I don’t have a problem ignoring treats at work. But when you’ve got a trail of people popping over every half hour, talking about how good they are, and how they “Just need one more!” while licking cream cheese frosting off their fingers, it becomes a bit much to handle.

How do I combat this, you ask? Unhealthy amounts of sugar free mints. I’m quite confident I’m ingesting the same level of mints they used to test on monkeys who then starting having seizures. 

 

But I didn’t eat a cupcake. Mission accomplished.

The Office

For anyone who has ever watched "The Office" and laughed at the seemingly ridiculous scenarios, I would have to say that the office I work in could compete. With a wide range of characters and never ending ridiculousness, just sitting at my desk can turn into an entertaining episode on a daily basis.

Just yesterday, pink, red and white roses beautifully arranged in a vase were delivered to my manager. I've never seen flowers delivered to a man in a public place before, but it was everything I'd imagined. His flaring nostrils doubled in their circumference, his face turned red, and he quickly put the flowers under his desk on the floor and almost completely out of sight. He then opened the card and found an anonymous note, with some kind of message, which he wouldn't share with us.

To a woman, this would've been a wonderful treat. Gorgeous flowers to proudly display on her desk, enjoying every time someone would ask, "Who are those from?" and "What's the occasion?" with thinly veiled jealously.

But to a man, it was like being, well, sent flowers. At work. In front of a lot of people. I had to chuckle to myself as the story spread around the office, with everyone speculating who sent them, why the note was anonymous, blah, blah, blah.

As the afternoon went on, I walked by my manager's office on my way to the break room and noticed a ProFlowers box on the floor. Then, like a flashback in a movie, I remembered I had seen the woman in the next desk over from me looking at that web site yesterday, trying to hide her unlawful internet browsing with her empty potato ole's container and Big Gulp of Mountain Dew. But I was on to her now.

A few hours later, I see the secret flower sender carrying the flowers to her desk saying in a huff, "Well, if he doesn't want to put them on his desk, then I'll put them on mine." The ladies around her laughed, but I sat in my grey swivel chair with a knowing smile on my face.

Well, being that you're the one that bought them, I can see how you'd be wanting to see your $50 flower arrangement.

Then, she sat and turned to me and said, "Gosh. I wonder who would send those to him." 

"Yeah, me too..." I paused for emphasis. "And I wonder why someone would send those. It's kind of...weird."

She looked off into the distance and said, "Yeah, sure is."