Wednesday, January 30, 2008

The Official Announcement

Well today it's official. The Helena Newsletter came in the mail today announcing to the whole city that I am a contestant in the Slim Down Challenge. We didn't know that we would be getting pictures made that night or else I would have dressed up a little and not looked quite so fat. LOL

I have been on the diet for a week now and I can already tell that I have lost weight. So far, it has been fairly easy to stick to. I have found myself eating to many Quacker Quak Rice Snack (ranch flavor). Those little buggers are good! I have been getting my cardio in at the YMCA and have done resistance training once. We weigh in next Tuesday night and I want to have lost at least 5 pounds.

This weekend will be a challenge for me though. Friday night we are having a pizza party for my brother Joey, Saturday night is a Women's Night Out for our church ladies group and of course Sunday is the big Super Bowl and we are having people over. Any suggestions on low fat super bowl snacks???

6 comments:

Leigh of Tales from Bloggeritaville said...

fat free sour cream, mix in the envelope of ranch dip and eat with veggies and baked wheatables. I dont know calorie counts but low in fat. Also buy a bowl of some pretty mixed fruit, add a little honey (natural) to sweeten.
Good Luck!
My fav rice cake-the cheese. YUM! (not nacho, just cheddar)

Michelle said...

I feel your pain Deedra! HA Atleast your weight wasnt splattered all over Helena, like mine was.. :) I am so happy for you! It definately feels good to feel the results! I started counting points today..I am going to have a POSITIVE approach to this.. :) As for anything that you can have for Super Bowl.. Id stick with fruit, veggies and maybe get some of those 100 calorie packs of whatever you like and COUNT them..But Id fill up on the fruit and veggies..

Hewy Nosleep said...

Diet Coke...lots of diet coke! Good luck. I think is great we have two Helena bloggers in the challenge

Leigh of Tales from Bloggeritaville said...

Deedra, you will kill me for tkaing up so much space. I got these from a fellow blogger (Maryanna). It is copied in her own words. It looks good....

Low Fat Dinner
Chicken Marsala (Low Fat)

Thanks to my friend Alison, I got an opportunity to make this dish. She wanted me to email her the recipe, and I thought I'd just make it and post it on my blog. Thanks Ali! I love the chicken marsala at Carrabas, and I've always wanted to make it. The good thing about this recipe is that it's a low fat version, and it tastes great. The recipe calls for dry Marsala or dry sherry. I've tried both, and the Marsala tastes the best in my opinion. The first time I made this, I served it with smashed potatoes (with the red skin). The other times, I've served it over angel hair pasta or linguini.
You can find the Marsala wine at any liquor store. It has more alcohol content than regular wine, so grocery stores can't sell the bottled wine. However, they may be able to bottle it as a "cooking wine." It would probably be next to the dry sherry cooking wine in the grocery store.


Ingredients:


1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp dried marjoram, crushed
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
2 cups sliced fresh mushrooms
1/4 cup sliced green onions (2)
3 TBSP butter or margarine (I used olive oil b/c it doesn't burn as bad as butter)
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup dry Marsala or dry sherry

Directions:

1. In a shallow bowl stir together flour, marjoram, salt, and pepper. Place chicken between 2 pieces of plastic wrap. Using the flat side of a meat mallet (I used the back of a heavy serving spoon), pound chicken lightly to about 1/4 inch thick. Remove plastic wrap, and lightly coat chicken pieces on both sides with flour mixture; shake off excess.

2. In a 12-inch skillet cook mushrooms and green onions in 1 TBSP butter (or olive oil) over med-high heat until tender; remove from skillet. In the same skillet cook chicken in remaining 2 TBSP butter (or olive oil) for 5-6 min, turning to brown evenly.

3. Remove skillet from heat. Return mushrooms and green onions to skillet. Carefully add broth and Marsala to skillet. Bring mixture to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, uncover, for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally. Season sauce to taste with additional salt and pepper. Transfer chicken to a serving platter or plate. Spoon mushroom mixture over chicken. If desired, serve over pasta.

Nutritional Info per serving (1 piece chicken & 1/4 mushroom mixture):
298 cal; 12 g total fat (6 g sat. fat); 90mg chol; 329mg sodium; 10g carbs; 1g fiber; 30g protein.



Posted by Maryanna at 8:14 PM 0 comments Links to this post



Guilt-Free Dessert
Strawberry Shortcake Trifle

Oops! I accidently ate dessert first (stay tuned for the chicken marsala later tonight). I couldn't help it. I had this good idea to prepare dessert first, but now mine is gone. This is one of my favorites, and it's guilt-free! You can also add different kinds of berries. Blueberries are really good with the strawberries, and it makes a good 4th of July dessert (red, white & blue). I don't have exact measurements with the ingredients, but just get a big trifle dish or bowl and start stacking.





Ingredients:

1 container of fat free cool whip
1 box of sugar free white chocolate pudding prepared with skim milk
Small bag of frozen strawberries, thawed OR a small basket of fresh strawberries, sliced
Tube cake of Angel Food

Directions:

Layer ingredients in the dish in this order: Angel Food Cake; Strawberries; Pudding; Cool Whip. Keep layering until ingredients run out or until you fill up the dish. I've found that the frozen strawberries are more tart, but they soak the cake really well. The fresh strawberries are more sweet, and if they are used, the pudding and cool whip tend to soak into the cake instead of the strawberry juice.

Deedra said...

Leigh, thanks for the recipe. That sounds yummy and I will definitely try it. Someone is bringing a veggie tray to our party so I will munch out on that for sure.

Michelle, let me know how the point diet goes. It sounds simple enough and I agree with you, Debbie Fulgham looks AWESOME!!

Hewy, What other contestant is a blogger...you?? or do you mean Michelle as a former contestant.

Anonymous said...

ah ha, so that's you LOL Thanks for the birthday comments. That turned into a very rough day and it's nice to see happy things on my page. Good luck with the slim down challenge. After my dad's heart attack and bypass surgery, I am actually determined to lose some weight...and it takes a lot to determine me LOL