Saved By Blue Balls

It’s so weird to have such nice weather in February, that it’s hard to figure out how to dress, what coat to wear.  It was still around 40 degrees when I left the house, but by the time I got downtown it was already 52 degrees.  The weird thing is seeing what other people were wearing downtown.   As I was waiting at a stop light, I saw two women standing side by side.  The woman on the left still had her UGG boots on, North Face down coat and scarf on – while the woman next to her was wearing a mini skirt, bare legs, sandals and short sleeved shirt.  I was just fine in my fleece jacket and actually took it off once I was on the train.

As I do with my weekly meal prep, I baked off a few baked potatoes to use later in the week.  Gotta love a 10 pound bag for $1!  I normally take the potato filling and mix that with the scrambled egg mixture, but I wanted fruit too and used just 2 ounces of the baked potato shell (2).  I scrambled a whole shredded zucchini with one egg (2), then topped it with an ounce of 50% reduced fat Cabot cheese.  6 points for breakfast.

My twin sister and walking buddy had the day off yesterday, so it was just me on my walk.  I started walking southwest of my office in a different direction than I usually take.  The streets weren’t nearly as crowded in this area (maybe Greek town?!) because of President’s day.  I got about half way through my walk when I realized that I smelled something amazing – and it was coming from an Indian restaurant.  I stopped to look at the menu and saw they had buttered chicken, fresh naan, basmati rice, and all of a sudden I had thoughts of ditching my lunch that I brought.  I was literally standing there thinking “okay, I still have 22 weeklies left before Thursday’s WI, lunch would probably set me back 15 or so points . . .”  The internal dialogue went on for a couple minutes when I decided to walk around the block and see what I decided.

Yep – giant BLUE BALLS!  For you non-WW peeps, blue dots are shown on your calendar for the day if you eat within your healthy range – which for me is 27-37 points.  It was a sign to just eat the fricken lunch I brought!  Happy to say I continued on, sans the Indian food.  I don’t know if I’ll ever not be tempted by the smell of certain foods (burgers/fries/pizza/Indian food/Greek food/Italian food . . . !)  I was saved from making a poor food choice by blue balls!  Never thought that would happen to me!  

And I packed a delicious lunch!  Baby pork tacos – 3 mini Mission corn tortillas (3) three ounces leftover grilled pork (3) topped with red cabbage and salsa, cucumbers carrots and apple and not shown, 1/2 a serving of tortilla chips so lunch came in at 8 smart points.  And was delicious!  I found this mini tortillas at Wal-mart – a package of 24 was only $1.79.

I worked a bit late and missed my usual train, but had time to walk around for about 30 minutes before catching the 6:00 p.m. express train, which got me home in :57 minutes – nice!  I can’t help but walk through the French Market which is below my train station.

I had my banana and an 1.5 ounce of my Cabot cheese for a snack for the train ride home (3), but I would have given my right arm for this thing of beauty!

“Delicious milk chocolate cup filled with chocolate moose, topped with fresh fruits and glaze.”  #swoon  Pretty sure that’s insulin worthy!

It was only Monday night and I am already off my meal plan, but in a good way.  I had forgotten I defrosted a small steak over the weekend and never used it, and it had to be cooked.  It had already been sprinkled with Hardcore Carnivore Rub, so dinner came together in a matter of minutes.   After I cooked the steak in my cast iron skillet, I added 1/3 cup sliced mushrooms, sprayed the pan with Pam and cooked them for a couple minutes.  Then added 1/2 teaspoon butter, 1/2 teaspoon flour and cooked that for about 30 seconds, then added 1/2 cup of beef broth and cooked until the pan sauce thickened, just a couple minutes.

My twin sisters daughter Claire LOVES boxed mashed potatoes.  I had a small package of potatoes, but I actually made them completely different from the package instructions.

That package said that there was six 1/3 cup dry servings in the bag, to make 2/3 cup prepared potatoes with butter and milk.  When I opened the bag up I thought, there is no way that there is six servings in here, and sure enough, it was only 5.  So I calculated the whole bag to be 11 smart points.  In a microwave safe measuring bowl, I heated up 2 cups of water for 3 minutes (or until boiling), I added 3/4 cup of unsweetened cashew milk to the water, a teaspoon of Everything But the Bagel seasoning and parsley, and whisked it up.  Each 1/2 cup serving is only 6 smart points, making my dinner just 7 smart points.

This was literally ready in about ten minutes – perfect on a night when you get home from work a bit late.  That dinner put me at 26/30 points for the day, which left me with 4 points for dessert.  Which you’ll have to wait until tomorrow for the recipe.  My friend Liz reposted a recipe for her blood orange scones – they looked amazing, but with heavy cream a whole stick of butter for 8 scones, I knew I had to come up with a healthy, yet tasty alternative using her recipe as inspiration.  I made 16 baby scones that come in at just 4 smart points each – perfect for a picky plate breakfast this morning with a hard boiled egg and fruit.

Hope you had a great start to your work week – here’s to having a great Tuesday!