Easy Chicken Soup (For The Twenty-Something Soul)

I have been down for the count with bronchitis for the past week. And while my sweet Hubs would get me anything I ever wanted to eat, all I was really craving was homemade soup. Something without weird, processed chicken and without 1 million grams of sodium. I also had no energy and very little ambition to do anything tedious. So, I made this up!

Chicken Soup, serves 6-8

Meat from 1 rotisserie chicken, skin removed
1 red onion, chopped
Baby carrots (to liking, I added half of a large bag)
6 stalked celery, sliced
2 potatos, peeled and diced
4 qts. low sodium chicken broth
1-2 clove garlic, minced
2 tbsp evoo
Salt/Pepper to taste

1. In stock pot or dutch oven, heat olive oil on med-high and add garlic and onions. Cook until fragrant (or translucent if you are sick, like me, lacking the ability to smell)
2. Add the rest of your ingredients and bring to a boil. Once boiling, reduce to simmer for at least 30 minutes. Could simmer for 45-90 minutes if you needed and/or wanted to.

Optional
1. This would be great served over noodles or rice. I used potato to bulk this up since Hubs is GF, rather than using noodles, but I think that would have tasted great!
2. Add avocado once plated.

YOU. ARE. DONE.
Feel accomplished.
You made soup.
In under an hour.
Bam.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend! More posts coming soon!

Meal Plan Monday Thursday

This week I'm eating...

• Egg white scramble w/ Ezekiel toast
• 2 HB eggs with string cheese
• Grilled chicken with cauliflower rice and s. potato
• Apple
• Indian Butter Chicken with jasmine rice and broccoli

I also ended up cooking up a shitstorm this past Sunday. New ways of cooking and new recipes... I should have stuck to my tried and trues because I was in the kitchen for 4 hours! I will do a meal prep post based on how I normally prep soon. 

HAPPY FRIDAY EVE!

Weekends & Grilling & Meal Plan Monday

1. Weekend. Filled with fun, lounging and scares. 

This weekend I had girls happy hour on Friday, was a lazy bum Saturday afternoon, went to Fearshire Farms with the gang on Saturday night (so fun! but scary!) and then, once again, did very little Sunday except for prepping my lunches and waffles! Sometimes it is amazing to be lazy!


2. Grilling like a champ. 

I have wanted to purchase an indoor grill for a while, since we live in an apartment and can't legally do any proper grilling. I have looked at a lot of popular options online, read reviews and finally came across one that seemed worth the money and time to test.

I chose the Hamilton Beach Searing Grill, from Target $60, for several reasons. It has really great reviews, it has a drip pan drawer that closes into the grill (rather than sitting outside of it) and comes in 4 pieces, 3 of which go into the dishwasher (the lid, grill pan and drip pan). It is super simple machine to operate. To turn it on you plug it in and then there is a simple temperature dial that you set and a light comes on when that temperature has been reached. Voila!

I cooked these chicken tenders for about 6 minutes on each side, at 350, and they came out perfect. I really was just guesstimating on time and temperature because the one down side, is that it comes with no directions.


3. This week I'm eating...

• Protein Waffles
• Pumpkin Chobani
• Grilled chicken tenders with broccoli
• Apple with PB
• Rotating dinners (Baked chicken stuffed with asparagus and cheddar is tonight!)

Weekend Adventures: Pat is 50!

This weekend my step-father-in-law turned the big 5-0! My MIL threw the cutest party, looking like something straight off of Pinterest, with an Ohio State theme (His school! Go Buckeyes!).

This week I am eating...

• Protein waffles
• Pumpkin yogurt
• Baked tilapia w/ brussels and brown rice
• Banana and PB
• Rotating dinners... (chicken tortilla soup/baked chicken and salad)

Houston is expecting a REAL cold front! YAY! HAPPY MONDAY!

Egg Muffins // Low Carb & GF// 3 Ingredients!

Meal prep is the best. It fills my fridge with healthy meals and it takes all the guess work out of eating well. It is my number one weight loss tip. It is the best thing I do for myself, health wise. I love it.

But sometimes, its gross. Like making 5 days worth of scrambled eggs. Have you seen a five day old egg white veggie scramble? Not appetizing. So this week, when I was chopping up my veggies I thought I would make little 'egg muffins' in my cupcake tray. Maybe they would be drier, less soggy. Maybe they would be delicious. Maybe they require less time of me standing over the skillet.

P.S. They are less soggy and more delicious. Winning.

EGG MUFFINS 

• Chopped veggies
• Liquid egg whites (or real ones if you aren't lazy like me)
• Oregano, pepper, or whatever seasoning you prefer

1. Preheat oven to 350. Chop all veggies as fine as you can. 

2. Transfer all veggies into large bowl, add seasoning, toss to combine. 

3. Spray cupcake tin with oil and fill each hole with chopped veggies. 

4. Add 1/4 cup of egg white to each hole. 

5. Bake at 350 for 25-35 minutes (watch your muffins! you want brown edges)

*I used red, orange and yellow bell pepper, red onion, green onion and this yielded 18 muffins

Per serving (3 muffins)

114 cal | 0g fat | 3g carb | 21g protein

I put them into a large tupperware container, take out 3 each morning, heat for 90 seconds and top with salsa. My favorite low carb breakfast so far!

Carb Cycling // Sample Meal Plan & Recipes

I have always loved the show Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition and gravitated towards Chris and Heidi - who come off so sweet and real. In my latest weight loss struggle I decided maybe I'd get a little kick in the pants by reading Chris Powell's book 'Choose More, Lose More For Life'.

In his second book, he really explains why he loves and utilizes carb cycling for all of his clients to lose weight, fast. There are 4 different versions of the cycles that alternate high and low carb days with cheat meals or cheat days, depending on the cycle you chose. There is the Easy, Classic, Turbo and Fit cycles to chose from.

Essentially, on high carb days you are stocking your bodies calorie-burning furnace and on low carb days your furnace burns fat, and lots of it! He wants you to eat 5 meals a day, with breakfast consumed within 30 minutes of waking up and each meal to follow every 3 hours until you've hit meal 5. Example:

• Breakfast @ 7:00
• Snack @ 10:00
• Lunch @ 1:00
• Snack @ 4:00
• Dinner @ 7:00

Above is the breakdown of what food groups make up high and low carb days. Each breakfast should contain proper servings of protein, vegetables AND carbohydrates to start your metabolism for the day. Low carb meals should contain protein, vegetables and a healthy fat. High carb meals should contain protein, vegetables and good carbohydrates. Simple! 

I have made a sample meal plan to give you an idea of what it's like to eat on this plan. This is just a sample of approved foods and the way I would possibly combine them. Sunday is a free day for me - on the Turbo Cycle. That is the cycle I chose, you get one day per week of whatever you want. For me, this probably doesn't mean eating pizza and wings and mozzarella sticks all day but it is nice to know that if I am craving something I can tell myself that I can have it Sunday. If by the time that Sunday comes around I am still wanting that food I can go get it!

In this example, showing the Turbo Cycle, every breakfast is high carb with alternating days of high and low carb.

Monday/Tuesday - Low Carb
Wednesday - High Carb
Thursday/Friday - Low Carb
Saturday - High Carb
Sunday - Free day

RECIPES:

Egg White Scramble

• 3/4 C egg whites
• 1 C mixed, chopped veggie (onion, bell pepper, mushroom)

Low Carb Protein Shake

• 1 scoop protein powder
• 2 C mixed greens
• 1 tablespoon peanut butter (natural)
• 1 C water
• Ice

High Carb Protein Shake

• 1 scoop protein powder
• 2 C mixed greens
• 1/2 C oatmeal
• 1 C water
• Ice

Mexican Slaw

• Prepackaged coleslaw mix
• Chopped cilantro
• 2 clove garlic
• Lime juice
• Cumin

I hope this helps any of you that are getting into carb cycling - when I first tried to look online for inspiration I found very few blog posts on Chris Powell's cycling specifically.

Chris's full list of approved foods and to learn more about carb cycling look at Heidi's post here.

Also, check out my favorites button in the nav bar for direct links to Chris's book and some of my favorite food prepping tools!

HAPPY CYCLING