I Have A New Love....

and its name is Greek yogurt.

Back a few weeks ago I posted about my love of Yoplait and one of my readers mentioned that I should try Greek yogurt. I did and yummy! Creamy with a nice little tang to it. Plus, you get a lot for only 100 calories. It is the perfect afternoon snack with fresh berries. For those who are on the go and don't want to cart around fresh berries (there is a high smush factor) it is also sold with fruit (though with substantially more calories). I have tried a few different brands and they are all good - I can't really recommend one over another. Buy some today and give it a try!

Falling Off The Wagon

I went on a major food bender this past week - kugel, pizza, Thai, chocolate torte, pear tart strawberry pie, lasagna, Doritos, lots of alcohol, the list goes on. I am trying to chalk it up to a mini vacation from the diet, but the guilt is gnawing at me. I can't even say that I wasted the calories on anything all that great (with the exception of the kugel and desserts). Most of it was junk that actually had me feeling kind of yucky afterwards.

I weighed myself, and at least I didn't gain any poundage, but then again I am still doubtful on the whole weight/scale thing really meaning anything.

At least I avoided jelly beans and chocolate rabbits.

Recipe: Chocolate Tart

So I of course went off the diet (way off the diet) for our Seder. This year, all us "kids" contributed to the meal to try and make things a little bit easier on my mom. My contribution was a chocolate tart, which, if I do say so myself, was scrumptious. It was also incredibly easy to make. Here is the recipe......

Chocolate Tart with Nut Crust (from John Johnson, chef and owner of Rancho de San Juan in New Mexico)

1 cup chopped walnuts
1 cup pine nuts
½ cup plus 3 tablespoons sugar
½ cup butter
9 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate
6 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon cognac or brandy
½ teaspoon almond extract
Unsweetened cocoa powder


In a food processor, whirl walnuts, pine nuts and ½ cup sugar until nuts are coarsely ground. Pour into a 9-inch tart pan with removable rim. In a 2-cup glass measure, melt ¼ cup butter in a microwave oven. Add melted butter to nut mixture and rub in with your fingers to blend. Press mixture evenly over bottom and up sides of pan. Set pan on a foil-lined baking sheet.

Bake in a 325 degree regular or convection oven until crust begins to brown around edges – 20 to 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, chop half the chocolate into ½ inch chunks and set aside. Finely chop remaining chocolate.

In the glass measure, combine remaining ¼ cup butter, cut into small pieces, with finely chopped chocolate. Heat in a microwave oven at half power until chocolate is soft, 30 to 45 seconds. Stir until mixture is smooth.

In a bowl with a mixer on high speed, beat egg yolks, remaining 3 tablespoons sugar, cognac and almond extract until mixture turns pale yellow, about 3 minutes. Add chocolate-butter mixture and beat to blend. Stir in coarsely chopped chocolate. Scrape into warm nut crust.

Bake in a 325 degree oven until filling barely jiggles when pan is gently shaken, about 15 minutes. Set on a rack until warm or cool.

To serve, remove rim and dust tart lightly with cocoa and cut into wedges. Can be served with softly whipped cream.

Some Like It Hot

I have always enjoyed spicy foods - the hotter the better. I love that sweat you get when you eat really spicy Mexican or Chinese food.

One of my favorite spicy food stories is when I was eating at a hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant in Texas about five miles from the Mexican border. The waiter put down complimentary chips and three salsas - medium (no mild salsa of course), hot and really, really hot. The waiter warned us that most people couldn't handle the really hot stuff. I, of course, immediately dug into the really, really hot stuff. I made my way through one bowl and asked for seconds. The waiter looked a little stunned, but didn't say anything and brought me a second bowl. After awhile my dinner companions and I noticed that there seemed to be a parade of staff (including kitchen staff) trooping past our table. Our waiter delivered our entrees and asked (with a smirk) if we had noticed all the staff trooping past. We commented that it was hard to miss and he told us that everyone who worked there wanted to see the little white girl who could handle eating all that hot salsa! I think I was as red as the salsa for the rest of the night.

I bring this up because I have been relying on hot sauce (lots of it) to make a lot of the food on this diet more palatable, from the egg whites in the morning to many of the provided entrees. Tabasco is of course a standby, and I have also been using Scotch Bonnet Caribbean Pepper Sauce by Tropical Pepper Co and Dave's Gourmet Ultimate Insanity Hot Sauce. The Scotch Bonnet is very flavorful and adds a nice degree of heat. The Ultimate Insanity Hot Sauce lives up to its name - lots and lots of heat, though not a ton of flavor.

So, my question - do you have a favorite hot sauce and if so what is it and where can you get it?

Recipe: Back to Loving Cucumbers

I know I just wrote how I would be happy to never see a cucumber again, but then the boy reminded me of my spicy cucumbers - my absolute favorite cucumber recipe. So, I whipped up a batch and now can't stop eating them. Here is the incredibly easy recipe:

3-4 medium sized cucumbers
2-3 hot peppers diced (I usually use jalapenos)
1/3 cup shallots diced
1/3 cup green onions thinly sliced
1/4 cilantro chopped
1/2 rice wine vinegar
2 tbs sugar
1/2 tsp salt

Mix the cucumbers, hot peppers, shallots, green onions and cilantro together. Then, mix the rice wine vinegar, sugar and salt and pour over the cucumbers.

It could not be easier and they are absolutely delicious (and, by the way, a perfect side salad for BBQ chicken)

Sorry For The Lack of Posting

My apologies dear readers for my lack of posting this past week or so. It was due to a combination of lots of work (which involves writing), the end of winter blahs and hitting a bit of a wall with this diet.

The wall that I have hit is namely salad. I am sick to death of salad, especially what, on this diet, is considered salad. Anything really interesting that you might put into a salad (peppers, broccoli, asparagus, even tomatoes) is considered a vegetable serving, and you are limited to two one cup vegetable servings at dinner only. The unlimited salad vegetables are essentially lettuce (including spinach and cabbage), cucumbers, parsley (which I don't even consider a vegetable so they are cheating there), celery, radishes, sprouts, mushrooms and zucchini. After a month and a half on this program I would be happy to never see a cucumber again, and I have decided that I really don't like radishes. I have tried to change things up with the dressing, but even that has gotten old - there only so many good low fat or no fat dressings out there.

So, I found myself less than inspired to write. Hopefully though I will be a little less depressed in the weeks ahead as the days get longer and the air warmer and the thought of baring skin in summer clothing will get me inspired again and make cucumber seem not so bad.

How Strict Is Too Strict

Right now dieting is a mother-daughter endeavor. My mother is trying to lose some weight so that she can have knee surgery. She is, at least for now, doing it through a doctor's program. I have taken to calling him the Diet Nazi because he is so extreme in his "rules." According to him, my mother should NEVER EVER have any sort of red meat, any fat of any kind (including olive oil), and absolutely no carbs of any kind...EVER. I can't stress the ever factor more.

I feel he takes it too far. To say never, ever is setting up anyone who remotely loves food for failure. Plus, I don't understand why never is necessary. As I said in one of my first posts, the program I am on lets you eat most foods, including red meat, carbs and dessert (hell, I had chocolate chip pudding last night), just in extreme moderation. Plus, the program even advertises that "you can take the weekends off" (now everyone who watches TV should know what program I am on). As far as I understand it, Weight Watchers works on the premise that you can also eat almost whatever you want, including eating out, so long as you keep within your points. So why this mandate of never?

Maybe this never philosophy works for some patients, but my mother, like me, is a real foodie. Telling her never on almost everything but fish, chicken and steamed or raw vegetables is dooming her to be miserable and either giving up, or at some point binging and doing more damage than if she was allowed once a week to have a very small piece of lean beef.

I also know that for some people completely cutting out carbs (or white foods) can make a real difference, but that is usually when there actually is something wrong with ones endocrine system or digestive system and they can't metabolize or digest certain foods. According to this doctor though, my mother does not have that problem. This guy just seems to have one set of rules which he lays down with an iron fist.

So, what do you all think - should diet rules be extreme and iron clad law, or does moderation with room for cheating now and then work better?