It's Tasty Tuesday! 

This has quickly become one of our favorite week night recipes! Its quick, easy, simple ingredients and EVERYONE (including the kids) love it. And it's also great for making a few extra to easily grab and go for lunch the next day! This is a recipe from the new Insanity Max 30 nutrition guide. The suggest topping the burgers with avocado, lettuce and tomato. We also like to top ours with a little fresh cut cilantro! It just adds a little something extra to the flavor of the avocado. The sweet potato fries are a healthy baked version of everyone's favorite side. The sweet potato gives it a slightly different flavor, and the cayenne pepper gives it just the right kick!

Clean Turkey Burgers w/ Sweet Potato Fries

What You'll Need

Turkey Burgers

• 1 lb 93% lean ground turkey (we sometimes uses 99% lean turkey)
• 1 tbsp. organic fresh salsa per 7 oz of turkey
• Romaine lettuce 
• 1 avocado, sliced
• 1 tomato, sliced

Sweet Potato Fries

• 2 medium sweet potato, cut into 1/2-inch strips
• 4 tsp olive oil
• 1/4 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Directions
For the turkey burgers, preheat oven to 375 degrees. (Or preheat a grill or broiler on high). Combine turkey and salsa in a medium bowl; mix well. Once mixed, form into patties of desired size. Bake or grill patties for about 6-7 minutes on each side, or until no longer pink in the middle. Serve each patty over lettuce, tomato and avocado (and with some fresh cilantro too!)

For the sweet potato fries, preheat oven to 400 degrees. Drizzle with olive oil and then sprinkle with black pepper and cayenne pepper. Bake in the over for 30 minutes, turning over after 15 minutes. Bake until all sweet potatoes are cooked thoroughly.

Giving Back On World Cancer Day

I honestly had no idea that today was World Cancer Day. When I first heard about it my initial thoughts were something like....

"What the hell? Breast cancer has an entire month. Now cancer needs another day?"

Then I realized what #WorldCancerDay actually meant. It meant raising awareness and taking a proactive approach to the fight against cancer.

Solutions DO exist and they are completely within our reach.

The theme of World Cancer Day is "Not Beyond Us". Meaning that the ultimate solution will exist and is reachable. It's all about cancer prevention, early detection, treatment and care.

• Chose a healthy lifestyle because healthy lifestyles can lower your risk of cancer. 
• Early detection. For many types of cancers, there can be warning signs and symptoms. The benefits of early detection are indisputable.
• Treatment. Everyone should have the right for treatment, and without suffering some finanical hardship because of it.
• Quality of life. Everyone, cancer survivors and their caregivers deserve high quality and compassionate care and support!

So I was thinking about how I could give back, and I decided that since the nutrition changes that we made after I finished treatment made such a big impact on how I felt and how I recovered, that was a a great place for me to start.

Let me tell you, it wasn't an easy switch after treatment! There were things I didn't know about and learned the hard way. There were special circumstances that I had to deal with because of treatment that I never had to worry about before. And I didn't really know who to talk to about it.

I'm not a doctor. I'm not a nutritionist. I'm just a mom who has been through treatment and fumbled my way through, learning as I went. And I want to share what I have learned with others.

So starting on February 23rd, I'm running a completely free, 5-day, clean eating group for survivors! If I can just help one person, or help them to make one small change, it will be worth it.

If you would like to join, or know someone that might benefit from this group, please leave a comment or visit the event page HERE.

Tasty Tuesday!! Bruschetta Chicken

It's Tasty Tuesday!

This was one of our favorite (and quick) recipes that we got from the P90X2 Nutritional Guide! This dinner was a really simple recipe that had a ton of flavor, and with the kiddos, we just didn't give them any of the salsa topping. Its super simple ingredients combined for a really fresh and tasty meal. I bet this would be even better in the summer when tomatoes are at their prime here! We made ours with baked broccoli (which we put a little EVOO, salt, pepper, and chopped garlic and Mommy burnt - so disregard that part) and some brown rice. A quick easy meal for any day of the week! This is also SUPER easy to measure out on the 21 Day Fix meal plan! Enjoy!

Bruschetta Chicken

What You'll Need

Salsa Topping

• 6 medium Roma tomatoes, seeded and chopped
• 1/4 cup finely chopped fresh basil leaves
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 3 cloves fresh garlic, minced
• 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 1 tbsp olive oil

Chicken Breast

• 1 tbsp chopped fresh oregano
• 1 tbsp chopped fresh basil
• 1/2 tsp. chopped fresh thyme
• 1 tsp chopped fresh Italian parsley
• 2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
• 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp fresh ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves

Directions
For the salsa, just combine all ingredients in a medium bowl. Cover and chill in refrigerator until ready to serve. Voila!

For chicken breast, combine all ingredients in a large ziplock plastic bag. Shake to distribute all the ingredients well, seal, and marinate in refrigerator for at least 1 hour.

Preheat over to 350 degrees and remove chicken from bag. Make sure to discard any extra marinade.  Place chicken in glass baking dish and cover with foil and place in oven for 30 to 40 minutes or until chicken is thoroughly cooked. Serve with salsa on top; garnish with fresh basil leaves. Enjoy!!

Tasty Tuesday!! Pork and Red Chile Hominy Soup (Pozole Rojo de Puerco)

It's Tasty Tuesday!

This recipe is one of my (Wes) favorite recipes!  I love authentic Mexican food and this is a very hearty rich soup. I have made this with many different varieties of chili powders and all have made for a delicious meal. Varying the type of chili's you use will either add more or reduce the heat depending on what you chose (pasilla, ancho chipotle, Anaheim, etc.) We like to garnish ours with shredded cabbage, avocado and lime wedges. We have also made this with adding black beans (which gives it a whole different taste and flavor, which is equally as good). This recipe is a great meal in and of itself, but can also be used as a good starting point for many other variations. You can essentially add whatever you like, you just need to play around with ingredients! 

We usually save this one for a Sunday evening which is when we like to cook some of the meals that take a little longer then our quick and easy ones during the week!

Pozole Rojo de Puerco (Posole)

 

What You'll Need

• 6 boneless country style pork ribs, trimmed of excess fat and cut into 1 inch pieces, if using bone in pork, cut into 2 inch squares
• 4 (14 1/2 oz) cans reduced-sodium chicken broth
• 2 tbs grapeseed oil
• 1 large white onion, chopped
• 6 garlic cloves, chopped
• 3 medium carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
• 2 to 3 tbs pure ground pasilla or ancho chile
• 1 to 2 tbs seasoned chili powder
• 1 1/2 tbs dried oregano (Mexican variety preferred but not a must)
• 1 tbs ground cumin
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 4 (15 oz) cans white hominy, drained and rinsed
• 2 (14 1/2 oz) cans peeled and diced tomatoes
• 1/2 cup, loosely packed chopped fresh cilantro (I always use more!)
• 1 1/2 tbs masa harina (flour for corn tortillas)
• Finely chopped cabbage
• Diced avocado
• Fresh Lime Wedges

Directions
Put the pork pieces in a medium heavy pan. Add 1 can of the chicken broth and 1 cup of water. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce heat to low, cover, and cook the meat until tender, about 40 mins. Reserve the meat in the broth, off heat. If the pork is on the bone, you may remove the meat from the bone, if desired, when it's cool enough to handle. Reserve the meat and discard the bones.

In a heavy large pot, heat the oil and fry the onion for 2 mins. Add the garlic and cook stirring, until onions and garlic are softened, 2 to 3 mins. Add the carrots, ground chile, seasoned chili powder, oregano, cumin thyme, and salt. Cook stirring, 30 seconds

Add the remaining chicken broth, hominy, tomatoes, cilantro, masa harina, and the reserved pork with it's broth. Bring to a boil, and cook over medium-low heat, covered, 25 mins to blend the flavors. Adjust salt, if needed. Serve the pozole and garnish with shredded cabbage, avocado, and lime wedge. Enjoy!

Tasty Tuesday: Homemade Whole Wheat Pizza Crust

It's "Tasty Tuesday"! 

So this week's Tasty Tuesday marks the first time that we tried to grill a pizza! We had it for the first time over the summer at my parent's house and it was really good, so we decided to give it a whirl! Instead of buying the pre-made pizza crust (which you could totally do to make it even quicker), Wes tried whipping up some homemade whole wheat crust which was surprisingly both good and super easy!

This recipe makes two twelve inch pizza's which worked out great for our little family of four because we were able to let the kids make one just for them with some more kid friendly toppings, and then we made one for us with grilled chicken, sauteed onions and some cherry tomatoes. I think all in all, for the first try, it ended up pretty good, and we have been able to do different variations since! This recipe was a hit with all four of us (and even Shamus too because The Squishy dropped an entire piece of pizza on the floor which Shamus quickly snatched up). When the summer was rapidly coming to a close, we were trying to use our grill as much as possible so did this a few times! You could pretty much put anything on your homemade grilled pizza and although its not quiet as convenient as picking up the phone to order one, it certainly is much better for you! What toppings would you try?

Homemade Whole Wheat Pizza Crust

What You'll Need

• 1 cup water(heated to about 110 degrees)
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 envelope (2/14 teaspoons) rapid-rise or instant yeast
• 2 3/4 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
• 1 teaspoon sea salt

Directions
Preheat grill to 500 degrees.

Whisk water, sugar, oil, and yeast together in a small bowl. Allow yeast to proof for 5 minutes. It should puff up some by then.

Pulse flour, parmesan cheese, and salt in a food processor until combined. While running the food processor, slowly pour in the water mixture and process until a shaggy ball forms, about 1 minute.

Dump the dough onto a floured work surface and quickly knead dough a few times until it comes together. Halve the dough.

On a floured surface, use a rolling pin to roll dough into two  rounds about 11 inches in diameter. Brush each with a light coating of olive oil.

Place each on grill for about 3 minutes a side, enough to get the outer shell a little browned. Add your choice of sauce, cheese and toppings! Place back on the grill until cheese is totally melted and starting to brown on the sides.

Tasty Tuesday! Healthy Burrito Bowls (Great for PiYo & 21 Dax Fix Meal Plans)

It's Tasty Tuesday!

For this week's Tasty Tuesday we are doing one of our (definitely one of Wes's) favorite meals, healthy burrito bowls! This is usually one that everyone loves, so long we don't give Emma any rice!! We starting making our own spice mix to make it a more healthy option than a taco seasoning packet. The great thing about this recipe is that you can essentially tailor it to your liking. You can add chipotles in adobo sauce if you want it spicier, or you can make it with ground beef or turkey instead of steak or chicken. Listed below is the recipe, and really you can just make the servings that are appropriate for your family size. We generally make things in servings of 4, since that works for us!

This is a great meal for us to make because we each eat it slightly different. Wes likes his with more rice, less lettuce, and I like mine more as a salad (more lettuce, less rice). This is a great meal to use with the PiYo and the 21 Day Fix program! This is also a really easy meal to make as a clean version. When we have time, we substitute the canned black beans with dry beans, we make our own seasoning, use fresh salsa and it's a great clean meal!

Also, this is pretty close to the Chipotle Burrito Bowl but a healthier and quick version made at home!

Healthy Burrito Bowls

What You'll Need

• Mexican seasoning
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Lean cut steak or chicken
• Black beans (1 can reduced sodium or dry black beans)
• Long grain brown rice
• Red onion
• Heart of romaine lettuce
• Cherry or grape tomatoes
• Avocado
• Fresh salsa
• Lime wedges
• Cilantro

Directions
Cut whatever meat you choose into cubes or bite size pieces. Chop red onion, tomatoes and romaine lettuce.

Prepare brown rice according to the package.Heat beans over medium low heat until warm. If you end up using the dry beans make sure you check the cooking instructions because they usually need to soak and cook for a while (this is a great thing to do on the weekend for a meal later in the week)!

Heat oil in a large saute pan on medium high heat. Add meat (steak or chicken) and reduce heat to medium. After 5 minutes, add Mexican seasoning and a 1/4 cup of water. Cook until water is mostly evaporated and thickened slightly.

While meat is cooking, slice avocado and lime. Chop cilantro.

Remove meat, beans and rice from heat. Serve in bowls (or if you are like us do it buffet style because there is less to clean up afterwards). Add rice, beans and meat. Top with lettuce, tomato, onion, and salsa. Squeeze lime wedge over top. Garnish with cilantro.

Tasty Tuesday: Healthy Mexican Lasagna w/Spinach

It's "Tasty Tuesday"! 

For this week's Tasty Tuesday we are talking about a new healthy Mexican Lasagna with Spinach that we tried out! As for how it went over with all four of us, both Wes and I were quite pleased! It had good flavor, was great for leftovers but I'm totally not going to lie. Emma wouldn't touch this with a ten foot pole (she completely refused dinner the night we had this) and Jack, well, he at least tried it and ate several bites of the ground turkey but that was about it. So maybe if your kids are a little more adventurous, or you have older kids, I think this would be a hit with them too. But not so much with our picky little eaters this go around. We are definitely going to give it another try though!

This is another recipe where you could really add whatever your family likes best. We actually didn't put in all the spinach that the recipe called for because frankly, it just seemed like a lot, and I think next time we might try chopping the spinach up into smaller pieces too. This would probably also be really good with zucchini or maybe some other veggies thrown in. What toppings would you try?

Healthy Mexican Lasagna w/Spinach

What You'll Need

• 10 6-inch corn tortillas
• 2 Cups of canned low-sodium black beans, rinshed
• 4 Cups of Healthy Tomato Sauce
• 1 1/2 Cups Monterey Jack Cheese
• 1 Bag (10 oz) baby spinach leaves, rinsed
• 2 Cups Grilled Chicken, diced
• 2 Tbsp Fresh Cilantro, rinsed, drained and chopped
• Nonstick Cooking Spray

Directions
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly spray a 9 by 13 inch baking pan with cooking spray. Place two to three corn tortillas on the bottom, trimming as necessary for a good fit.

Add beans, 1 cup of the tomato sauce (we used Wes's homemade clean spaghetti sauce), and 1/2 cup of grated cheese. Top with two to three more corn tortillas. Then repeat! But in this second layer, add the spinach in between the sauce and the cheese. Then top with two more corn tortillas.

Add chicken and 1 more cup of the tomato sauce, then top with two more corn tortillas. For the top layer, add the last cup of tomato sauce, 1/2 cup cheese and chopped cilantro.

Bake for 30 minutes or until the cheese is melted and browned and chicken is reheated. Let stand for 5 minutes, cut into eight even squares and voila!

Nutrition Facts Per Serving: (serving size is one square)
Calories: 304, Total Fat: 10 g, Sodium: 275 mg, Vitamin A: 80%, Total Fiber: 6 g, Protein: 23 g

Tasty Tuesday: Baked Pork Chops with Apple Cranberry Sauce

It's "Tasty Tuesday"!

We have been a little behind when it comes to our Tasty Tuesday recipes but today's is one of our new favorites! This comes from the same Healthy cookbook that our Healthy Turkey Meatloaf and Crunchy Chicken Fingers. This recipe has a very Thanksgiving-y feel too it, making it the perfect fall dinner. The orange and cranberries give it a sweet but tart (odd I know) taste. If you have picky eaters, you can give them the pork chop, with a side of applesauce and dried cranberries, which is what we did and both Emma and Jack loved it!

Baked Pork Chops with Apple Cranberry Sauce

What You'll Need For The Pork Chops:

• 4 boneless pork chops (about 3 oz each)
• 1/4 tsp ground black pepper
• 1 medium orange, rinsed, for 1/4 tsp zest (use a grater to take thin layer of skin off the orange; save the orange for garnish)
• 1/2 tbsp olive oil 

What You'll Need For The Sauce:

• 1/4 cup low sodium chicken broth
• 1 medium apple, peeled and grated (about 1 cup) (use grater to make thin layers of apple)
• 1/2 cinnamon stick (or 1/8 ground cinammon)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup 100% orange juice

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and season your pork chops with pepper and orange zest.

In large saute pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add pork chops, and cook until browned on one side, about 2 minutes. Turn them over and brown the second side, an additional 2 minutes. Remove pork chops from the pan, place them on a nonstick baking sheet, and put in oven to cook for an additional 10 minutes (to a minimum internal temperature of 160 degrees).

Add chicken broth to the saute pan and stir to loosen the flavorful brown bits. Bring to a boil, and then lower to a gentle simmer. Simmer for up to 10 minutes, or until the cranberries are plump and the apples are tender. Remove cinnamon stick.

Peel the orange used for the zest, and cut it into sections for garnish. Serve one pork chop with 1/4 cup of sauce and two orange segments.

Does It Really Cost More To Eat Healthy?

So check this out. I love data. I'm a nerd. I know. But I decided to do a little data drill to see exactly how much it costs Wes and I to eat healthy these days.

Pretty much everyone I have talked too since starting out on our new health and fitness lifestyle change has commented about how much more expensive it is to eat healthy! And based on our latest monthly grocery bills, I usually found myself quickly nodding my head in agreement. It was pretty easy to see that we were spending more money every Sunday on our new healthy diet, which was making my immediate answer to the question that yes, there was an increase cost of eating healthy.

Although it was pretty easy to see how much more we were SPENDING, it really didn't dawn on me as to how much we were SAVING at the same time! One Friday, I went down to the cafeteria to buy lunch and I didn't really realize how long it had been since I had been down there last. So it got me thinking that since we starting our meal planning and meal prep on the weekends, I hadn't actually spent a dime on buying lunch at work.

So being the data-loving-nerd concerned consumer that I am, I decided to check out the math behind it all.

Now here is my disclaimer. This was my quick and dirty accounting of OUR spending. I didn't really go too crazy and try to figure out which months had extra weeks, and made some assumptions, etc but you will get the idea.

First step. Why....make a spreadsheet of course!

Sheesh.

I went through our online banking and started to tally up the number of times I withdrew money from the ATM machine at work (because the only time I do that it's because I need to get money for lunch) and at the same time, I started to tally up our grocery shopping bills. I formatted the dates so they would only show up as which month so it was easier to determine the monthly cost for each. Here's a little snapshot of what I came up with...

Next, I do have to say that I think part of the increase in our weekly grocery shopping bill was our new location. On June 27th, we officially moved into our new home and you can see, the immediate grocery bills in the beginning of July (before we really started our health kick) were higher.

I then took that data, and added it by month, to come up with a monthly cost of me buying lunch and a monthly cost for our grocery shopping.

After I had the monthly totals I simply calculated the monthly average cost of my lunches at work and our weekly grocery shopping bills. We started our challenge at the end of July, so it was a clean break. Anything January through July counted as Pre-Healthy costs and anything after July was Post-Healthy costs.

So as you can see below, BEFORE we started our healthy eating habits, I was spending on average about $63 a month buying lunch at work (some months you can see were much higher then others). AFTER we started our healthy eating habits, I ended up purchasing lunch at work once a month, so I withdrew $20 a month (lunch really only cost about $4 now that I was eating less but I really only counted how much I withdrew like I did before).
 

BEFORE we started our healthy eating habits, we were spending on average about $861 a month at the grocery store. AFTER we started our healthy eating habits, we found ourselves spending on average about $901 a month at the grocery store.

So that basically translates into this. We are now SPENDING an extra $40 a month at the grocery store (not too shabby - about an extra $10 a week) but I am SAVING about $43 a month because I have been meal planning and prepping my meals each week!

The other thing, is that we have cut back on our liquor store expenses too! I didn't tally those up yet but that's even more savings!

So as you can see, at least for us, we are spending more for food at the grocery store, but it almost exactly matches what we are saving at the same time. As we get better at this, I have no doubt we will learn how to reduce that grocery bill even more each week! Just thought that was interesting!