10 Day WIN & Pumpkin Fluff

10 completed days on Weight Watchers!!  Yay me!!  I am 1/4 way through my mini goal of staying within my WW points for 6 weeks!

I've been getting more and more comfortable with Weight Watchers and would say this week has been less challenging for me.  I'm not quite as hungry as I was last week so that's been making it easier.  I'm also getting the hang of inputting all my foods.  It sure is a nice break from calorie counting.

One thing I haven't been doing as much of this week is exercise.  I wanted to get in more, but I have found myself really busy with the beginning of the school year.  I've decided not to stress too much about this and just work on doing what I can for now.  I DID however finally receive my copy of The New Rules Of Lifting For Women in the mail yesterday!  I plan to read the book and then get started on my workouts. For the food portion I will take into account what they say, but probably just stagger my weekly points to use (some) on lifting days. 

One of my Facebook Page fans gave me a fantastic recipe!  The recipe is for Pumpkin Fluff.

1 can pumpkin puree
1 tub 95% Fat Free Cool Whip
1 package Sugar-Free Fat-Free Vanilla pudding mix
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Thaw the cool whip.  Combine ingredients and mix well in a bowl.  Chill for 20min and serve!

Basically you can eat it on its own, with graham crackers (or other sweet cracker) OR as I discovered this morning, as a topping to your oatmeal!   This stuff is absolutely delicious and filling.  1/2 cup works out to 1-2 PP. I always overestimate and say 2 because I feel like I'm treating myself big-time when I eat it!.

Roasted Broccoli

Tried a new recipe for lunch today.  Well, it was actually in addition to my lunch.  I was thinking that I needed a little something extra, and I have been struggling to get all my veggies in some days.  I have to say, this was a delicious and easy way to get in some greens.

1 Head of broccoli
1 Tsp of Olive Oil
1 Tsp of bread crumbs (optional)
Garlic powder
1 Tbsp of Parmasan

Pre-Heat Oven to 425 degrees.

Chop up the broccoli into bite sized pieces.  Put the broccoli in a bowl and toss with olive oil.  Sprinkle on
the garlic powder, bread crumbs and parmesan.

Spread the broccoli over a cookie sheet and bake for 9-11 minutes until tender.

Low Cal Tuna Melts

These have been a big lunch favorite lately!

1 plain rice cake
Sliced pickle (Enough to cover rice cake)
1/2 Can tuna
1 Portioned slice of cheese (I used Great Value slices)

I placed the pickle on the rice cake.  Then I patted the Tuna down on the pickle and topped with the cheese slice.  When melted the cheese held it together pretty good.

Broil until the cheese is melted how you like (I like mine slightly browned) and you're good to go!

Very quick and easy!

165 cal for one, and I usually have two for 330 cals.

I paired these with some carrots and a greek yogurt the other day for my lunch.

Spaghetti Squash Deliciousness

1 Spaghetti Squash

2 Chicken Breasts (frozen)

1 Tomato

5-6 Mushrooms

2 Tbsp Olive Oil

2 tsp Crushed Garlic

1/4 cup Feta (I used Goat Feta)

1 Tbsp Lemon juice

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp Basil

Preheat Oven to 350 Degrees.  

Put frozen chicken breasts in oven and cook for 35 min total

Cut Spaghetti Squash on half and scoop out seeds.  Place on a lightly oiled pan. Place in over to cook for 30 min total.  I put mine in about 5 minutes after I put my chicken in so they would be done at the same time. 

Chop up your tomato and mushrooms.  

When time is up, remove squash and chicken from oven and set aside.

Then in a frying pan on medium heat add your oil and garlic and allow it to heat. Then add your mushrooms and tomato.  Add your lemon juice, basil and salt.  Cook for 7-10 minutes until your veggies are softened.

While your sauce is cooking scoop out your spaghetti squash into a large bowl.

Combine your sauce and your squash and toss it.  

I put the mix onto two plates and topped each with 1/8 cup of feta and 1 chopped chicken breast!!

It was delicious, and I was sceptical at times when preparing this!

Pumpkin pancakes!!

Can you tell I'm on a pumpkin kick? I've been looking forward to working with pumpkin for months so now I'm experimenting!  I really enjoyed these pumpkin pancakes, and although they were pretty low-calorie as well!

I used:

1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 tbspn sugar (You could sub your own sweetener to lower cals if you like)
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
1 egg
1/3 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup 3.25% Milk (That was all I had, so you could sub skim, almond or soy milk as well)

First I mixed up all the dry ingredients, then I whisked in all the moist ingredients.

Then I fried them up in a non-stick pan with a tiny bit of cooking spray on medium heat.  I had to cook them slightly longer than normal pancakes because the pumpkin makes them pretty moist.

I actually ate these without syrup and they tasted great!

Calories per pancake were :89cal.  I ate 3 for 267calories and I'm stuffed!

Also, NSV, this morning I shared this pic with my Facebook friends.  It's a 1x shirt that I bought over 5 years ago. Today is the first day I have been able to wear it comfortably!  Losing weight = awesome!

Pumpkin Pie Greek Yogurt Recipe

2/3 cup of pumpkin puree

2/3 cup of Fat Free Greek Yogurt

1 Pkg French Vanilla Splenda (You can sub stevia)

1tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice (I actually used apple pie spice)

2 graham crackers crumbled

Mix the pumpkin and yogurt together with the spices and sweetener. 

Top with graham crumbs!

Turkey Dinner in a muffin!

So tonight I decided I wanted to make something with ground turkey... I ended up with awesome!

These turkey muffins reminded me of a great Thanksgiving dinner, but all in little serving sized portions. I had 4, which equalled out to 317 calories!!

Here is the recipe should you want to try your own!

1lb of ground turkey
1 sweet potato
1 cup of frozen spinach
1/2 cup egg whites
1/3 cup bisquick
1 tablespoon of dehydrated onion
Stuffing seasoning (I used Epicure Apple and Sage)
Garlic Powder
Salt
Cooking spray

First I mixed together the Turkey, Spinach (thawed), egg whites, bisquick, onion, and stuffing seasoning. I separated the mix into 12 equal (sprayed) muffin tins.

Then I cut up the sweet potato into medallions.  I put them in water in the microwave for 3min.  I placed one medallion on the top of each tin of the mixture.  Then I sprinkled it all with a dusting of garlic powder and seasoning salt (regular salt it good too, or omit the salt for sodium concious peeps), and I sprayed them with a little cooking spray to help the sweet potato crisp a little.

I put them in the oven at 350 degrees for 35-40 min. Took them out and let them cool slightly and then served them.

My husband and little dude devoured them!  Okay, so did I!  YUM