Delicious Healthy Tacos

After living in Mexico for 15 months, there is one thing that I am certain of… I LOVE Mexican food. And since moving back, it is one of the things I miss the most. So the idea of healthy tacos was so appealing to me. And I was even more thrilled when these tacos turned out absolutely delicious!

Ingredients

• 1/4 Avocado
• 2 tbs Salsa
• 1/2 cup Black Beans
• 3/4 cup Brown Rice
• Corn tortillas
• 1/4 cup Corn

directions

• Cook brown rice
• Cook drained black beans on stove on medium heat for 5 minutes
• Cook corn on stove on medium heat for 5 minutes
• Mix/mash avocado and salsa in medium sized bowl
• Add beans, rice and corn to avocado and salsa and mix
• Heat tortillas on the stove top
• Put rice/bean/corn mixture in tortilla and voila!

The Power to Choose

Yesterday, I took a giant step forward.

For the first time in a long while, I made the conscious decision to be healthy instead of taking the easy, unhealthy option. It was my brother’s birthday, and my family had all planned to get together for dinner to celebrate. When I asked what we were planning to do for dinner, the answer was our typical family meal – pizza. In a constant battle to be healthy, I chose in that moment to offer to cook for my family.

Once my family agreed to enter into the Russian roulette of what may or may not be a delicious meal, I set out to find some good recipes with food I mostly already had at home – chicken breast and brown rice.

In my non-biased opinion, it was delicious. In fact, I ate it again today! Before I get to give you the Brown Rice Pilaf recipe, I want to encourage you… you…WE have the power to choose!

When we go out to eat with friends, we don’t have to order a hamburger; we can order a salad or chicken and veggies and ignore the bread at the center of the table. When at a meal for work, we don’t have to fill our plate; we can exercise portion control. When family gathers, we don’t have to order pizza; we can make a healthier option instead.

“There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them”
― Denis Waitley

 

Brown Rice Pilaf

ingredients

• 2 cups Uncle Ben’s Minute Brown Rice
• 1 cup celery
• 2 medium yellow onions
• 2 1/4 cup chicken broth
• 2 tbs extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 to 1 cup sliced almonds

directions

• Chop celery into little pieces
• Chop onion into little pieces
• Heat extra virgin olive oil in medium sauce pan
• Add onions and celery to sauce pan and cook, stirring consistently, for about 6 minutes
• Pour chicken broth in sauce pan with onions and celery and bring to a boil
• Bake almonds on cookie sheet 5-10 minutes stirring half way
• Add Uncle Ben’s Minute Brown Rice to boiling broth
• Cover, put heat on low and simmer for 5 minutes
• Remove from heat and keep covered 5 minutes
• Add toasted almonds
• Eat 🙂

Kicking Late Night Snacking in the Booty

Snacking is my kryptonite.

I can eat healthily all day long, but around 7pm, I just get the munchies. I just want to eat… not because I am hungry, but because there is something satisfying about nibbling on something. The result is I usually ruin a day of healthy eating with ridiculous amounts of snacking in the evening.

I had recently bought some healthy snacks (Nut Chips, White Cheddar Puffs and Bunny Grahams all purchased from Wegmans). This was a great start… healthy snacks. BUT, I ate all 980 calories of honey bunny grahams and 1300 calories of white cheddar puffs in 3 days. Oops! That my friends is what we call a snacking fail! It doesn’t matter how healthy the snack is, if you eat the entire bag in 2 days, you are probably going to go over your calorie allotment for the day.

So today, I decided to set myself up for success this week.

1. I portioned out my remaining snacks into little Ziploc bags according to their actual serving size. Now when I am desiring a snack, I have several 130-150 calorie options that will both be healthy and satisfy my need to munch. They will also be ready to grab and go in the morning.

2. I cut off the UPC of all the snacks I bagged and punched a hole and tied them together with a string. Now I have a little booklet ready to scan and enter into MyFitness Pal with ease. And the best part is, they are already divided by serving size so I just need to scan and hit “add.”

 

So, here is to a new week and a fresh start… I’m ready for it to be a successful one!

No Sugar Added Strawberry Ice Cream

Over the last few days, I have had a lot of late night cravings. I have been eating healthy all day and then losing it at night. So tonight I decided to make myself a healthy, guilt-free late night snack… strawberry ice cream. And it is delicious!!!! Perfect for cuddling up after a stressful day and watching The Bachelor with your girlfriends.

Ingredients

• 2 cups frozen strawberries
• 2 frozen bananas
• 2/3 cup skim milk (I have seen others use almond milk, but I used skim milk and it came out great
• (makes about 4 servings)

Directions

• Put bananas, strawberries and milk in blender
• Blend
• Eat… or freeze and then eat

Peanut Butter, Oatmeal, Banana Cookies. YUM!

I put a banana in my chocolate Shakeology (www.shakeology.com/tracicav) smoothie every morning. But sometimes I just can’t eat all the bananas before they get ripe. And in an effort to eat healthier, flour and sugar loaded banana bread just isn’t an option. So today I decided to make banana, oat, peanut butter cookies.

ingredients

• 2 ripe bananas
• 1/2 cup all natural peanut butter
• 2/3 cup unsweetened applesauce (I didn’t have any, so I put two small Golden Delicious apples in the blender with a cap full of lemon juice and a dab of water)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
• 1/4 cup chopped nuts (I used walnuts)
• 1/2 cup other add in (I used raisins, but chocolate chips would be another great option)

DIRECTIONS

• Preheat oven to 350*F
• Mash bananas in bowl
• Mix peanut butter in bowl and applesauce
• Mix oatmeal, vanilla extract, nuts, and other add ins in bowl
• Let dough sit 10 minutes
• Spoon 1″ balls on greased cookie sheet
• Flatten cookie balls with fork
• Cooke for 20-30 minutes

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner

One of my many Black Friday finds was a slow cooker. I was really excited to get one and try out some recipes that require little effort from me. The last few months I have been looking for some good simple ones, and finally found one I wanted to try. TACO CHICKEN!

Since I lived in Mexico for 15 months, anything that reminds me of the delicious food at at there is a win. And, the even bigger win is that this meal came out great and is really versatile!

INGREDIENTS

• 2lbs Chicken breast 
• 1tbs Chili Powder
• 3 tbs Lemon or Lime Juice
• 1 cup of your favorite salsa

DIRECTIONS

• Put the thawed chicken breast in the slow cooker
• Pour lemon/lime juice on top
• Put on chili powder
• Rub chicken around until covered with lemon/lime juice and chili powder
• Cook on low for 4-5 hours
• Fork apart the chicken until shredded
• Add salsa
• Continue cooking another 30 minutes

IDEAS

• After it was cooked I added some lettuce, onion, tomatoes and avacado to make a taco chicken salad
• You could add some beans into the slow cooker to make it more soupy and a little heavier
• You could use the chicken for a wrap

Peanut Butter Granola Bars

Today is meal prep day. Always looking for healthy snacks, today I decided to try making some granola bars. And they came out delicious! And the best part about them is they are customizable to your tastes. Here is how I made them…

INGREDIENTS

• 4 cup Old Fashioned Oats
• 1/2 cup unsalted peanuts, chopped
• Other nuts, chopped (optional – I added 1/3 cup of walnuts and a 1/3 cup of pecans)
• Any seeds (optional – I added 1/4 cup flax seed)
• 1 cup Raisins (you could add any dried fruit you wanted… raisins were just the only ones I had in the house)
• 1/2 cup Natural honey (or brown rice syrup)
• 2/3 cup Natural peanut butter
• Something sweet (optional – I added 1/2 cup chocolate chips to the top of the pan to add a nice topping)

DIRECTIONS

• In a large bowl, combine oats, seeds and nuts. Add honey (or brown rice syrup) and mix to combine.
• Add melted peanut butter and mix until moistened. (If dough is still too dry add more peanut butter or honey 1 tablespoon at a time until moistened…. mine was too dry and became very crumbly, but still tasted great!)
• Press dough in a greased (non-stick spray) 9 x 13 baking dish.
• Bake for 25 minutes

I’m an Iron Girl

For the third year, I have registered for the Iron Girl sprint triathlon in Syracuse, NY. This year is a little different, in that several ladies I know have signed up too. Not only will there be the added encouragement and accountability in training, but now I have extra motivation to train hard so I can beat them all. haha.

Last year, I didn’t train at all. Instead, I did the race the day after my best friend’s wedding on about 4 hours of sleep. This year, I am really hoping to set some goals and work to achieve them. So here it is… 650m swim, 30k bike, 5k run.

Year 1 (2011):

• Swim: 00:16:11 (turned out to be longer than 650m swim because they messed up the markers)
• Transition 1: 00:04:43
• Bike: 01:03:58
• Transition 2: 00:01:37
• Run: 00:30:40
• TOTAL: 1:57:09

Year 2 (2012):

• Swim: 00:15:26
• Transition 1: 00:05:13
• Bike: 01:10:40
• Transition 2: 00:01:24
• Run (actually walked about half): 00:35:05
• TOTAL: 2:07:48

Year 3 (2013) Goals:

• Swim: 14:00
• Transition 1: 4:30
• Bike: 1:00:00
• Transition 2: 1:00
• Run: 25:30
• TOTAL: 1:45:00

We’re Better Together

I mentioned a few weeks back that I joined a 60-Day Facebook Challenge Group. As a result of seeing the way accountability and encouragement helped the ladies in the group succeed, I decided to become a Team Beachbody coach and start my own 30 Day Fitness Challenge.

This will be a “30 Day Fitness Challenge” Jan 2-31. I am hoping to get a bunch of ladies to commit to this challenge together. So far we have 10 in the group.

Basically the challenge is to eat clean for 30 days and exercise 5/7 days a week. And then we will all be committing to drink Shakeology (www.shakeology.com/tracicav) every day. If you’re not familiar with Shakeology, it is a protein drink that is jam packed with nutrients. I have been using it for the last 2 months and have noticed decreased cravings and increased energy.

It will be a Facebook group where we can post and encourage others in the challenge. And then I thought it would be fun to put a little competition in it so there will be different things that can give you points (posting a picture of your meal, etc) and then the winner at the end of the challenge will choose a free Slim in 6 program or a Eat Clean Diet book of their choice.

Would you be interested in joining?

If so, please contact me on Facebook.

Motivation

Everyone is motivated by something different. I have found that I am motivated best by competition… I thrive when I am fighting to win.

Four weeks ago, I began a 60 day get fit challenge. There was a point system; whoever had the most points at the end of the week got a prize, and then the winner at the end of the challenge got the grand prize. Week 1 started great. I got the maximum number of points and won myself a free Eat Clean Cookbook. Then, the rules changed. The challenge changed so that the competition was removed and now everyone who completes the 60 days gets a smaller prize.

The result = The past 3 weeks my workouts and eating have been LAME! Not to say I haven’t been working out or eating healthy, but I am capable of so much more. But, I lost my motivator along the way.

Today, with it being Black Friday and all, I found myself a new motivator. I hit up the Nike Outlet and bought myself some super awesome new workout clothes and running shoes at incredible prices. What better motivator than to feel like you look awesome while you actually look like a fool sweating attempting to do moves that you aren’t coordinated enough to do? That will be me tomorrow… motivated and looking good.