Blah blah blah

Feeling much better today! I still can't talk, but I am much less congested. I think it is all because of my cold fighting secret for dinner last night...

This is sooo simple, it's just a 4 cup box of low sodium organic chicken stock, with 2/3 bag of chopped baby carrots in it. I only added a bit of salt, some dried/crushed rosemary, and a TON of black pepper so I could taste it.

This is one of my favorite comfort foods because it is warm, mushy, and has good nutrients from the carrots for when you are not taking in a lot of calories. Yum! I ate all the carrots, and about 1.5 cups of the broth (1.5 servings).

This morning I got up at 8:30, and could breathe well so I decided to try out the gym. My morning fuel:

The blueberry bliss might be my new favorite, it tasted so good! Not too sweet but very blueberry flavored.

At the gym:

• 20 minutes on a new elliptical trainer; level 8, random setting
• 25 minutes on treadmill; 3.5 mph pace, 4.0 incline

I broke a great sweat even though I slowed my pace down since I felt so cruddy yesterday. And learned to avoid this Life Fitness elliptical:

I felt too tall for it, like I was about to jam my knees. Also, I know that calorie counters can be way off on commercial gym machines, but this one said I only went 1.2 miles in 20 minutes and that I burned 280 calories. I mean, I get over 2 miles on the other trainer, and usually burn about 200 calories as well. Definitely not using this model again if I can help it!

When I got home I was starved from my workout and low calorie intake from yesterday. So, I made a feast:

• With the extra 2.5 cups of stock from last night, I mixed in some brown rice and the remains of my chipotle corn from last week. I had 1 cup of that mix, topped with 1 TJ's chicken patty and chopped tomatoes
• steamed carrots, mushrooms, and spinach

So good, and so filling. I didn't even need a snack this afternoon! I also found that steaming the spinach tasted just as good as sautéing it, but less calories because you don't use any oil :-)

Even though I didn't need a snack, I was hungry for an early dinner by 5:30. Kyle and I forgot to set up our dinner in the crockpot this morning, so we went for something quick and dirty since I have class tonight.

We had buffalo burgers with sweet potato fries:

The burgers are from TJ's, and the fries were unexpected find at Giant. We heated up the burgers on the forman, and baked the fries in the oven. Voila!

I had one burger with a piece of fresh sliced gouda cheese, 1 serving of fries, steamed mushrooms (no seasoning), and a side of Texas Pete spiked ketchup.

This was really a great combo; the seasoning on the fries wasn't too spicy, which I missed. However, you could easily add your own spice blend to these or to your own fresh cut sweet potatoes before baking them. And, as always, the burger was amazing... the gouda was a perfect match!

Well, I'm off to my first night class in two weeks... it feels like the first day all over again!