Recipe: Over Easy Caesar Salad

I have to say, I make a killer Caesar salad, which I will have to post the recipe for… and was the inspiration for this recipe. I LOVE eggs over easy. Eggs over easy on buttered rye toast is my absolute favorite breakfast. But when I’m trying to cut down on grains/bread, there’s no fun eating eggs over easy on just a bare plate. Unless you have no shame and don’t mind licking all that yummy yoke off the plate. I can’t bring myself to do that, so I needed something to put my eggs on that wasn’t grain-based. Well, real Caesar salad dressing is made with raw egg yoke, right? Why not do a variation… It’s fast, easy and delicious. This recipe is based on one serving.

Ingredients:
1 whole egg [or two if you're more hungry]
1-2 cups chopped romaine hearts
1 Tsp Extra Virgin olive oil
Lemon juice to taste 
1/2 Tsp of your favorite mustard [I actually like the organic version of regular ballpark mustard] 
Salt to taste
Fresh cracked black pepper to taste 
1 Tsp Grated parmasan cheese 
1 Tsp olive oil for cooking
Garlic powder or 1 fresh garlic clove smashed but in one piece for flavor – optional [we are talking breakfast so you may not want the garlic flavor 1st thing in the morning... which is why I didn't include the anchovy paste, either...]

Method:
- In the bottom of a wide, shallow bowl, combine the mustard, salt, pepper, lemon juice and a drizzle of olive oil [and optional garlic powder or whole garlic clove]
- Mix together, then toss in the romaine and coat lettuce well [take out whole garlic clove at this point if you put it in... you only want the essence of garlic for this dish]
- Sprinkle grated parmasan cheese on top and more fresh cracked pepper to taste
- drizzle a little olive oil in a pan on medium low heat, cook egg to your desired doneness, sprinkling a little salt for flavor

Slide your perfect over easy egg on top of your salad, break yoke, cut up the egg a bit and mix together and you have a delicious warm Caesar Salad! Enjoy! 

[I'll take a pic next time I make it to post with this recipe]

Product Review: Therajoint

When I started my current workout routine 6 months ago, the circuit training workouts really emphasize lower body strength, so there’s a lot of squats, etc. After a few days of it my whole body was sore… but after a few weeks, my muscles were fine, but my knees were still sore and not getting better – in fact, they started clicking and popping, sometimes painfully so. I was getting discouraged because I had to modify a lot of the exercises to accommodate my knees, which meant I could do the whole workout, but it wasn’t as much of a challenge for my muscles. And my knees weren’t getting any better… this went on for a couple of months until I couldn’t take it anymore.

I was on netrition.com looking around to see what they had for joint support supplements and found Therajoint. For the price and the fact that it has all-natural ingredients, I figured I’d try it and worst case scenario – it doesn’t work and I send it back [netrition.com has great customer service]. 

Well, I just took 2 capsules in the morning with breakfast and another 2 at night with dinner and I swear each day I felt my knees feeling a little better. After about a month, the clicking and popping stopped and the soreness was gone, and it didn’t take long before I had the strength in my knees to do all the exercises with full range of motion. My knees have never felt better. I’ve had issues with them since I was little, so needless to say, I love this product. 

It says that you should take 8 capsules a day from the start until your joint pain is gone, but I never took that many. I still take at least 2 in the morning, and if I feel I need it [if I had a particularly hard workout that day], I’ll take another 2 with dinner, but if they feel okay then I skip it in the evenings. 

If you suffer from achy joints that don’t seem to get any better no matter how much strengthening exercises you do for them, try Therajoint – hopefully you’ll have the same results I did… and for the record, I don’t make money off promoting other peoples’ products or websites – I just like passing on a good find if I feel it really works, and I love it. Enjoy!

Recipe: Micro Fast Mahi Mahi

Since I wanted to start eating better today, I had to scramble to figure out what to do for lunch – since I haven’t gone proper grocery shopping yet [I'll go on my way home tonight...]. I always keep frozen fish from Trader Joe’s in the freezer, so I took out some mahi mahi and thawed it enough to pry the pieces apart [I thaw in cool water in the sink in a bowl - only takes 10-15 minutes or so...]. Here’s what I did with it. This recipe is based on a single portion, but can be multiplied by however many servings you want to do…

Ingredients:
1 serving Mahi Mahi [or any fish you prefer]
1 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 large garlic clove, smashed, but still in one piece [skin removed]
Red Pepper Flakes to taste
1/2 Tsp Dry Thyme [substitute for your favorite herb - you can use dried oregano if you prefer]
Salt and Pepper to taste
Lemon Juice to taste

Method:
- Take a thawed or fresh piece of Mahi Mahi and dry, set aside
- In the bottom of a microwave safe dish with lid, mix together olive oil, salt & pepper, red pepper flake, dry thyme and smashed garlic clove
- Drop in mahi mahi and turn several times to coat evenly with oil an seasonings
- At this point I bring it to work, so it marinates for a good 4 hours before I’m ready to cook it
- When you’re ready to cook it, squeeze some fresh lemon juice over the top and turn the fish again to coat well – there should be excess liquid at the bottom of the container, almost like a salad dressing, that will help to steam the fish
- Microwave on high for 3-4 minutes, depending on your microwave’s power – you know it’s done when the flesh is completely white – check with a fork through the thickest part to make sure it’s cooked all the way through

That’s it! It takes 2 minutes to throw all the ingredients into the container and another 3-4 to cook an it comes out delicious and perfectly moist and tender, but fully cooked. So easy! Enjoy!

[Next time I make it, I'll snap a picture to include in this post...]

Taking the Plunge…

I started eating healthier today. Not sure why it’s always Monday that I start these things. It’s not so much that I go hog wide on the weekends with eating – actually, I tend to eat a lot less because we’re always so busy running around, trying to get house and garden stuff done. It must be because Monday means back to the daily routine. It’s easier to stay on course when I can incorporate new eating habits into an existing, predictable routine. 

So, this is my plan:

Eat 3 meals a day – and each meal centers around a good piece of protein. Today’s lunch is Mahi Mahi. I’ll post the recipe in a separate post because it’s a good one that I threw together really fast this morning and can definitely be used for pretty much any type of fish when I’m in a pinch… 

Have a serving of fruits/veggies and/or a salad with each meal – including having fruit salad with my eggs for breakfast in the morning. I’ve also made warm caesar salads with eggs that I’ll have to post as well. Also a good one – easy, delicious and if you’re avoiding refined carbs but love eggs over easy, it’s a great way to eat them without the bread.

Have 2-3 snacks per day – a serving of fruit and a handful of nuts to keep me from getting too hungry between meals. Simple. I love fruit, and I love the crunch of roasted nuts – I keep plenty in the house. My favs of the moment are pistachios, almonds, pecans, pine nuts, and pumpkin seeds [pepitas]. Sometimes I’ll make a mix, other times I just want one specific kind, depending on the fruit [like this morning - I love pecans with my banana]. I also love cooking with nuts – they’re great to throw in with a sautéed veggie of some sort. 

Cook with Olive Oil – I already do this, so this isn’t a big change, but I do tend to add butter for flavor. I’ll probably keep that to a minimum. The only time I don’t cook with olive oil is when I want a more neutral flavor – in which case I go for either grapeseed oil or cocnut oil. Both are very healthy as well. 

Limiting grains, including wheat, rice, etc., as well as starchy foods like potatoes – I won’t say I’ll never eat grains. I LOVE bread and pasta and sushi… and potato chips. But I can do with a lot less than I normally eat. My life doesn’t revolve around them, which is good. I maybe crave pasta once or twice a month. I won’t feel bad about that. But less is definitely more, healthwise for me. I’m especially easily addicted to chips and other crunchy starch snacks. But if I don’t eat them, I don’t go crazy missing them. As long as they’re not in front of me I can do without.

Limit sweets, chocolate, etc. – This will be tough for me. I love chocolate and pretty much have it on a daily basis [until today!]. I go for higher-quality stuff, not candy bars, but still. It has sugar in it, and sugar and I don’t mix. If I go out for dinner and decide to have some dessert, fine. I don’t go out that often. But I don’t want to keep too much of that at home anymore. I also LOVE ice cream, but can do without most of the time. 

Drink 10-12 oz of water with each meal and snack – I definitely don’t get enough water on most days. I’m not severely dehydrated or anything, but if I’m going to be cutting down on things like grains, and burning some fat, I’ll need the extra fluids to help my body flush out any toxins that end up in my blood stream from the fat burning process. A lot of toxic stuff ends up being stored in fat and it’ll end up back in your blood stream when you start to use fat for fuel again. 

Sleeping 7-8 hours a night – this isn’t anything to do with diet, but does have a lo to do with metabolism. And I need all the help I can get… If you’ve read any of this blog already, you know that I’m not good with sleep. I never get enough!

Watch Less TV – Lately, TV has been stealing precious sleep time from me [my own fault - I just love the Olympics!]. I’m a TV junkie – I get hooked and then I sit and watch like a zombie for hours. I used to think having a DVR would save me so much time – less watch time when you can fast forward through the commercials… BUT you can also record a lot of shows you’d normally miss, and then they pile up and we end up watching them ALL – and it’s a lot. Too much! They say that you gain weight directly in proportion to how much TV you watch… so I need to cut down, but I also started doing something new last night, too – I started doing yoga while watching TV [we're lucky our livingroom is big enough for me to do yoga and not block my hubby's view at the same time]. I’m going to make that a nightly ritual, I think… along with walking away from the TV by 10:30 so I can be in bed, lights out by 11:00.  

Much of the above was inspired by Christine Lydon’s “Ten Years Thinner” book. I highly recommend this book, even if you don’t follow everything to the letter. I find it very informative, and unlike most ‘diet’ books, it’s written by an actual MD, not some guy that went on a lemonade fast and lost 60 lbs in 2 days. lol… 

So… that’s my plan. I’ll also continue taking my daily supplements and drinking my ‘mud’ when I first wake up, to get me going so I don’t workout on an empty stomach. I’ll post my progress. I suppose I should have some form of measurement. I don’t weigh myself and I haven’t measured my self in a long time… I prefer just doing the work and noticing it in my clothes… and then buying NEW clothes when the old stuff gets too big!  

Photo credit: Andrew & Williamson Fresh Produce