Dover sole, brown rice and herbed green beans and mushrooms

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Beebamom

In looking at the picture of last night’s dinner, I’ve decided that there was probably too much food of the same color on the plate. John quickly sauteed the seasoned sole in some cooking spray. I made the brown rice using the Cook’s Illustrated oven method – perfect rice every time! The green beans I cut in half diagonally. I sauteed the mushrooms in some cooking spray and then added the beans. I let them get a little char and then I added about a half cup of water which steamed them until they were done and the water had evaporated. I added some chopped up parsley, chives, and marjoram. I added chive flowers for some decoration. Of course, I also seasoned everything with salt. When you are not using fat to cook with, salt is about the only way to enhance flavor.

Dover sole with brown rice and herbed green beans and mushrooms

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Chicken with mushroom gravy, rutabagas and broccoli

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Beebamom

I am home from my trip. The weight damage was bad – 6 lbs. I have never been anywhere that has so much heavy food as Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. Frequently we went out for Italian food just to try to find something lighter. Fortunately, I’ve managed to lose about 4 lbs. since getting home. I always think that vacation weight gain is usually kind of transient. If you tackle it right away before it’s made its way solidly to your hips, you can lose it pretty quickly.

It was such a relief to come back to Chicken Monday. We had the standard meal with 3 ounces of meat, low calorie gravy from a packet with some sauteed mushrooms (sauteed in olive oil cooking spray), rutabagas made in the pressure cooker, and broccoli. After all the heavy food that I have eaten, this dinner seemed just right.

Chicken with mushroom gravy, rutabagas and broccoli

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There is no light food in Germany

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Beebamom

I have tried to choose items from menus that would fit into a healthy lifestyle. Mostly I have failed miserably. Here are some things I have eaten –

Tried to eat vegetarian on the Lufthansa flight and got a potato pancake with vegetables in a buttery sauce. This was listed as gnocchi and vegetables.


Chicken and mushrooms with noodles. Heavy cream sauce


Ordered perch. It came with cream sauce and fried potato puffs.

Salad for dinner? That's a lot of ham.

Gave up and ate bratwurst but gave one of them away. Thought that saurkraut would not be too bad.

Asparagus is in season. This is probably the lightest thing I have been able to find for lunch.

So needless to say, this has not been going easily. At least we have done a ton of walking but I think I would have to walk 24 hours a day to work off all this food. Sigh.

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Chicken tacos, black beans and cole slaw

Posted on April 17, 2012 by Beebamom

As we are leaving on Wednesday for a trip to Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic, we are in eat down mode. The chicken tacos for Chicken Monday were pre-cooked slices. Pre-cooked chicken is hard to rewarm without making it quite dry. But the rest of the taco was good, the beans were very good and the coleslaw which was made with the yogurt crema made a nice change from a regular salad.

The places we are going to are not known for their light cuisine. I think eating properly will be a challenge. I will take pictures of what I would consider the best choices possible over the next couple of weeks.

Chicken tacos on corn tortillas with cabbage, salsa, cilantro and crema served with coleslaw and black beans

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Whole wheat penne with shrimp and vegetables

Posted on April 14, 2012 by Beebamom

Ah, comfort food! I love pasta but a little pasta has to go a long way these days. This dinner is 2 ounces of whole wheat penne and 4 ounces of shrimp. The rest of the bowl is filled with vegetables. The whole dish is moistened with chicken stock. I love a GBOF (giant bowl of food.)

Whole wheat penne with shrimp and vegetables

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Bean burger with bolani and salad

Posted on April 14, 2012 by Beebamom

Thursday I needed something easy and low calorie for dinner. These days my go-to dinner when I need to eat with no fuss I choose chipotle bean burgers from the freezer. Tasty and nutritious, the burgers can be ready in two minutes. I also warmed up a piece of sweet potato bolani. Bolani is a stuffed Afghan bread. A large hunk of the sweet potato one has less than 100 calories. They had several different samples to try at Costco and they were all very tasty. Under my bean burger and bolani I had an arugula salad with fat-free dressing. My whole dinner was satisfying and prepared in less than 5 minutes.

Chipotle bean burger, sweet potato bolani and arugula salad

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Chicken Monday and a new, more slender me

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Beebamom

As I mentioned in an earlier post, this week is a difficult one with a couple of eating challenges. The first was a birthday celebration of one of our best friends. That took place last night. I had a salad with seared tuna and squid ink risotto with scallops. It was really good and not too terrible from a diet standpoint. Unfortunately I OD’ed on the bread. Oh well, nobody’s perfect. The second challenge will be tonight when we have our Passover seder (I know wrong day but it was when we could all get together.) We are having beef burgundy, mashed potatoes, green beans and matzoh ball soup. I’ll just have to eat small portions.

Anyway, on Monday, we had Chicken Monday. It’s good to eat right whenever it’s possible. I know that I will have to continue to have Chicken Mondays for the rest of my life.

Chicken, smashed potatoes and asparagus

I thought I would include a picture of John and me in our new more slender versions. He’s lost 45 lbs. and I have lost 62 lbs. Wow, that makes a grand total of 107 lbs. lost!

The new versions of John and Mary

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Dinner at Bouchon

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Beebamom

Sometimes you need a little celebration. In my book, a celebration is an occasion for some great food. To celebrate the end of a lovely week with Jonathan, we stopped overnight in Las Vegas and ate at Thomas Keller’s Bouchon. Keller is the owner of the French Laundry up in Wine Country. Bouchon is more of a French bistro, quite a bit more relaxed. While the food and service was good, it wasn’t cosmic. True to my dieting roots I chose a dinner entree that was pretty light.

Confit of sturgeon, leeks and roasted beets with sauce Albert (a creamy sauce with a touch of horseradish)

But I did also eat this –

Terrine of foie gras with toast (yum!)

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Jonathan’s visit to St. George

Posted on April 7, 2012 by Beebamom

Jonathan came to visit us in St. George this past week. We ate out a lot. Except for one bad choice (fish and chips but I gave half of it to the guys), I think I made good choices. Barramundi with rice pilaf and vegetables, hold the sauce, and grilled shrimp with white bean salsa, vegetables and jasmine rice. We also ate at the Mongolian BBQ where I had a vegetarian stir fry. Breakfast and lunch were always on plan.

Here’s a few dinners that we cooked –

Chicken Monday - pan roasted chicken breast, mushroom gravy, rice pilaf and Brussels sprouts


Everyboday loves shrimp tacos and black beans


Seared scallops with new potatoes and pea pods

On Saturday we are going to Las Vegas and dining at Bouchon, a Thomas Keller restaurant. That will be a big challenge. Then on Sunday when we get home we are meeting up with Sarah and having dinner at the Fish Market in Palo Alto. All this eating is followed by a birthday celebration on Tuesday with dinner at Piatti’s and the family Passover seder on Wednesday. Obviously in between all the eating I will have to exercise constantly! It is no wonder that my weight loss has been stalled but at least I am not gaining weight.

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Shrimp tacos with black beans and salad

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Beebamom

This dinner is an instant replay of fish tacos with black beans. Except this time we used shrimp. They came out really tasty. Shrimp are lower in calories and I am always looking for ways to minimize calories in one place so I can use more in another. Less calories? Another glass of wine.

Shrimp tacos with black beans and salad

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