Quick and Easy Fish Tacos

I'm the kind of person that's always on the hunt for new recipes. Specifically, recipes that are delicious, easy and Weight Watcher friendly. Well, last night on a whim I decided to do something different with the Tilapia fillets I defrosted. After some debate, I decided to try my hand at making fish tacos. Here's the result...

Best fish tacos ever. Weight Watchers Points Plus value: 6 points for 2 tacos

Here's the ultra simple recipe. Enjoy!

• 1/4 of a ripe Avocado (2 pts)
• Salsa to taste (I used medium for a little spice, but this is totally up to you) (0 pts)
• Diced onion (0 pts)
• 4 Tilapia Fillets (I like Tilapia because it's super light and fresh. It's also very points plus friendly 2 pts for 4 oz.). I suggest using 2 oz. per taco.
• 2 Corn tortillas (small, soft taco size) (1 point each)
• Blackening seasoning (store bought) (0 pts)
• Fresh cilantro (0 pts)
• 5 sprays of olive oil cooking spray (Pam makes a nice one) (0 pts)
• 1 lime (0 pts)

Directions:

Wash and dry Tilapia. Sprinkle blackening seasoning on both sides of each filet. Add 5 sprays of the Olive oil cooking spray to a pan and heat on medium temperature.

Place Tilapia in pan and cook for about 3-4 min per side (or to desired degree of doneness). Remove from pan and let cool. When cool, cut fish into smaller pieces. It will flake and break apart as you work with it. 

Dice onion in small pieces. Wash and chop cilantro. Slice avocado into quarters. Cut lime into 4 wedges.

Heat corn tortillas in microwave (approx. 5-15 sec). 

Take each tortilla and top with 2 oz. of Tilapia. Add generous amounts of onion, salsa, and cilantro. Top tacos with avocado and the juice from the lime wedge. Serve immediately and enjoy!

Easy, light and delicious. I gave this 6 points plus for 2 tacos. Not bad.

Try this and let me know what you think!

Reaching my 5% weight loss goal

At last night's Weight Watchers meeting, I found out that I reached my 5% goal. Basically, this means that I've lost 5% of my starting weight. While I know this is a great accomplishment, I can't help but have mixed emotions about it.

On one hand, I'm loving the fact that I'm making great progress, especially since I haven't followed the program as well as I should. With the stress of school and work, along with my foot injury, I see this 5% goal as an absolute blessing from above.

BUT then...negativity starts to creep in and I tell myself ,"5% means nothing when I have over 100 pounds to lose." I feel like I'm one of those cartoon characters with God on one shoulder and the devil on the other, struggling to determine which voice I'm going to listen to.

So what's the solution? It's easy to say I should ignore the negative thoughts, right? BUT, I think that's being unrealistic. The fact of the matter is that I do have over 100 pounds to lose, and that's something that I never want to lose sight of. I think the key is to not allow myself to focus solely on the amount of weight I have to lose. I have to learn to celebrate the small victories both on and off the scale, so that I don't become discouraged and quit like I've done so many times before.

Anyone out there share a similar struggle? What are some things you did to work through the negative thinking?

Setting eating goals for Thanksgiving

Today's Weight Watchers meeting left me with a lot to think about. With Thanksgiving just a day away, it's definitely time for me to reevaluate my plans for holiday eating.

One thing that my leader mentioned was making trade-offs between what you have to have, and what you can do without. Basically she stressed the importance of focusing the balance of our points on those foods that we love and can only have once or twice a year versus eating everything in sight, just because it's there. Great idea right?

So my new plan is to 1) include a green salad with my meal (to help cut my appetite), 2) to eat the foods I really love (Mac & cheese, yams, carrot cake) until I'm full (being STUFFED is not allowed) and 3) measure out small portions of those foods I can have anytime of the year (mashed potatoes, bread, ice cream, etc).

My goal for Thanksgiving is to enjoy the special foods that I really like, but not overstuff myself just because food is all around me. Anyone else out there have food related goals for the holiday?
Wish me luck :)

Is Jessica Simpson a good spokesperson for Weight Watchers?

Jessica Simpson in her Weight Watchers commercial

Every time I go to my Weight Watchers meeting and see Jessica Simpson’s face, I’m annoyed. Not because I have anything against her as an entertainer, but my annoyance is rooted in how she as a spokesperson perpetuates negativity toward overweight women.

If you didn’t catch her commercial, here’s a quick recap. Basically, the commercial is 30 seconds of a close-up of Jess’ fluffy face as she talks about “eating real food in the real world”. Yes, that’s right, all we ever see is a close up of her face. We never see her entire body, just her pretty face. This, to me, is problematic.

In my opinion, this commercial isn’t about selling a weight loss solution, nor is it about motivating women to lose weight. Unfortunately, the commercial is more about hiding a body that does not meet the world’s pre-defined standard of beauty. Not showing Jessica’s body implies that there is something that needs to be covered up…something that she’s not proud of…something that she is not comfortable with the world seeing. Many of us on Weight Watchers already have our own body image issues, so seeing this commercial certainly doesn’t help us change our negative thinking.

What makes Weight Watchers so special is that while it teaches you to make lifestyle adjustments for weight loss, they also do a great job encouraging members to embrace the “skin that they’re in”. Any member that is ashamed or discouraged by their body always receives loving encouragement that helps them accept who they are, and where they are at the moment. Hiding a “less than perfect” body is not part of the Weight Watchers philosophy, so unfortunately the Jessica Simpson campaign does much more harm than good.

I realize that the commercial was done to preserve the Jessica Simpson brand, and I’m sure if I break this down from a marketing standpoint, it makes perfect sense. I still wish that Weight Watchers would have selected a celebrity that was willing to be open and transparent about their weight loss journey from beginning to end. In my opinion, this would have made a huge impact on women nationwide, regardless of whether or not they are on the program.

Oh, this just in. Jessica has lost 60lbs, and has just finished shooting a new Weight Watchers commercial...AND, I’m assuming that you’ll be able to see her entire body in this one.

Coincidence…I think not.

Check out this image from the set. Jessica is the blonde on the far right.

On the set at Jessica's new WW commercial

Making the most out of the time I have

It's Friday night! The weekend is here and I'm ready to partay...unfortunately, I don't have any plans tonight, so it looks like I'll be spending this this evening hanging out at home.

Strangely enough, I have a crazy amount of energy tonight. Since I'm really not interested in doing homework or reading, I decided to do something wild and crrraaazy with my time! Now brace yourselves. Are you ready to hear what I did? Wait for it...Wait for it....

Tonight I decided...to...cook...not just one meal, but enough food for the majority of the weekend.

Pow there it is! Exciting right, LOL!

I decided to cook for a few reasons:

1. I was hungry and didn't want to spend money on dinner tonight
2. I had some produce that I needed to cook before it spoiled
3. I want to make better food choices this weekend  

This week I felt the effects of not planning my meals in advance, and I want to make it easier on myself to make healthy food choices all weekend long. On weekends it's really difficult for me to stay on program. I'm not sure if the lack of a structured routine causes me to slip up or what. I do know that my goal this weekend is to stay within my Weight Watchers points and to track (journal) all of my meals  (I've gotten a little lax with the tracking, so I need to get back to it before I get out of the habit completely).

Well, I've got to check on my sweet potatoes (baked sweet potatoes (plain, not candied) are a wonderful snack or side dish.) Have a great night everyone, and I'll keep you posted on my progress!

Weight Watchers Weigh-in (ain’t nothing to it but to do it)

Tomorrow is my official weigh-in day, and based on the way I ate this weekend (see previous post), I’m not looking forward to it. However, this time around, I promised myself that no matter how “good” or “bad” my week has been, I’m stepping up and facing it, despite what the scale may say.

In the past, I’ve always allowed myself to skip my weigh-in if I thought I’d gained weight that week. I now realize that by skipping meetings, I never forced myself to face the reality of the choices I made. Because losing weight is all about choices, my success hinges on understanding how my choices affect my progress. So with that ladies and gentlemen, I choose to keep moving forward, and will be a-steppin up on that scale tomorrow night.

Lower calorie candy options (for chocolate lovers only)

I’m always on the lookout for a healthy and delicious snack…well because…I love snacks. I love chips, candy and fruit juice, so whenever I can find "healthier" options, I’m a happy camper.

When I crave chocolate (which is all the time) my go to choices are the Skinny Cow Dreamy Clusters, and the Milk chocolate Heavenly Crisps. Both are solid choices if you’re looking for candy that tastes like the real thing (aka-doesn’t have that artificial sweetner/diet aftertaste).

The Heavenly crisp bars are 3 Weight Watchers points per bar, and the Dreamy Clusters are 4 points per bag. Give them a try, and let me know what you think. And oh yeah, good luck trying to eat just one, lol.

http://www.skinnycow.com/products/detail.aspx?id=30

*Note: I am not affiliated with the Skinny Cow brand, nor have I received any compensation from Nestlé USA for this review. This post was written with the sole purpose of helping my health conscious readers find a healthier candy option.

Eating healthy at Chipotle

Chipotle is one of those places where the food is hella good but super fattening. Whenever I eat there, I  prepare for the “feast” by telling myself “OK, I’m having this burrito today, but tomorrow I’ll be on it”. Even though there’s nothing wrong with treating yourself (every now and then), I wanted to find a go-to item that was calorie friendly but didn’t make me feel deprived.

Introducing the Chipotle Salad

The Chipotle salad is a tasty and filling alternative to your standard burrito. BUT, what sets it off is the dressing served with it. I’m not sure what they put in that vinaigrette, but it’s incredible. Unfortunately, the dressing has a TON of calories, which can blow your entire calorie (or points) count for the day. Below is my lower calorie version of the salad. I get it everytime I go to Chipotle and I love it…I consider it my “healthier” splurge for the day.

Give it a try, and let me know what you think.

Build your salad with the following:
Lettuce
Black beans
Fajita Veggies
Barbacoa
2 scoops of mild salsa
Extra lettuce
Guacamole
(No cheese, or sour cream.-the 2 scoops of salsa add extra flavor and kick so you really don’t miss them anyway )

Enjoy!

Watchers points: 12 (8 points without the guacamole).

Check out Chipotle's nutrition calculator http://www.chipotle.com/en-us/menu/nutrition_calculator/nutrition_calculator.aspx for specific info.

October Weight Watchers update:

During the month of October, I lost a total of 5.6 lbs for a grand total of 12.6 lbs down! Boy, does it feel good to break the 10-pound mark! I'm definitely pleased with my progress this month, especially since it was a pretty stressful one for me. On top of the stress from work, school, life, etc., I injured my achilles tendon, which was (and still is) pretty painful, and put a major damper on my exercise goals for the month. Fortunately, I received some meds and a treatment plan from my doctor, and I hope that I’ll be back to normal in the next 2-3 weeks.

The beauty of my injury is that it reminded me of the importance of eating right. Even though I did minimal exercise last month, I still managed to lose a decent amount of weight because I was disciplined about what I put into my body. Now, that doesn’t mean that I ate perfectly (I had an incident with some pizza a few weeks ago that we wont discuss here, lol), but it does mean that I stayed mindful about what I ate, how much I ate, and why I was eating it. I also wrote down (tracked) everything I ate at each meal. Tracking my meals also included weighing and measuring my foods so that I had an accurate account of the amount of food I was eating. Even though I HATE tracking (who wants to measure how many almonds they ate in a sitting, or how much creamer they poured in their coffee), it was helpful to see exactly how much food I consumed in a day. Not only did tracking keep me accountable to the Weight Watchers plan, but it also gave me great insight on my eating patterns/habits. These insights are super valuable as they allow me to pinpoint food related patterns/behaviors that hinder my progress.

Thanks to all my twitter and facebook peeps for your support! Y’all are the best!­­

Goals for November:
• To journal/track everything I eat, every day, at every meal

• To incorporate vegetables in my lunch and dinner (everyday)

• To blog everyday

• To exercise twice a week (depends on my doctors clearance…starting the week of 11/17)