First off, I feel the need to apologize for the picture of today’s chicken dish. See, one of my goals is to find some ways to “like” avocado. They’re chock full of healthy fats and other good nutrition type stuff… but the green color they lend to something like this dish… well I just couldn’t figure out a very appealing way to photograph it. But despite how it looks, I gotta say it was pretty tasty.

I suppose I could have called this guacamole chicken salad too, as the base of this is basically a guacamole variation. I took an avocado, mashed it with about 1/4 cup of plain yogurt, added some lime juice, little salt, cilantro but also added some celery seed and cayenne pepper. I mixed it all with some finely chopped celery, radish, green onion, shredded carrot and the last 3 or so ounces of chicken I had left (diced up).

I suppose I could have done a wrap with this. Originally I was thinking in a pita.. but the last half of a pita I had in the fridge had been there longer than I thought and was rather stale. So, it was time to just grab a fork and enjoy it as is. I didn’t actually eat it with the kale as pictured, I plated it like that simply for the photo then put it in a dish to take to work for lunch.

The avocado does lend a nice creaminess. I hear a lot of people talking about using it instead of mayo to spread on bread for sandwiches. I don’t really use much in the way of mayo these days anyways. And when I typically make a “salad” type sandwich I tend to use yogurt. I have a partial jar of mayo still in the fridge that I used to do a mix of yogurt and mayo, but I don’t really notice a difference anymore so the jar tends to stay where it is, way at the back of the fridge. Not that I have anything against it, I’m just at the point where it’s not the first thing I think of when I’m preparing something like this.

A lot of people talk about putting slices of avocado on a sandwich or chunks in a salad… I think it will take me a while to get to that point. It’s a texture thing. I’m not crazy about tomato slices on my sandwiches or chunks in my salads for much the same reason.

So there you have it, six different ways to use up a batch of chicken. It could be a couple pounds of breasts as I did here or maybe you grab a rotisserie chicken form the deli… the point is you don’t have to get stuck in a rut if you just use a touch of creativity. And I don’t think any of the things I threw out here are “gourmet” or anything that any of you couldn’t pull off yourselves. Even some of the additional things I made from scratch like the hummus have store-bought alternatives you could easily sub in there.

Let me know if you tried any of the things I threw out here, or maybe you made your own variation, or maybe you had an idea for another meal you could do along these lines that’s a favorite of yours! And… if you liked this whole series of stuff, let me know that too and maybe I can tackle doing similar posts using other items in the future.

I started thinking of soup when I first started this whole “six ways” thing. I did a similar “single-serve” soup a couple weeks back, using broccoli slaw. This time I wanted to have a bit of noodle action – I keep a bit of multi-color rotini on hand just for times like this. I figured I would throw in some veges, let it all simmer and I’d be good to go.

I started with what in the cooking world is known as a mirepoix – a mix of carrot, celery and onion. After starting about 2 cups of the chicken broth simmering, I lightly sauteed the onion, then celery and shredded carrot. After tossing the diced up chicken and 1/2 cup of the noodles in to the broth I had an idea… I have a bunch of roasted buttercup squash that I cooked up over the weekend so I cook about a cup of it and pureed it with some of the chicken broth, then put it along with the other veges back in to the pot with the chicken.

Once it was almost heated up I seasoned it with a bit of salt, garlic powder and fresh ground pepper… once in the bowl I garnished with a bit of green onion.

I’m sure I probably read about doing something this somewhere before, pureeing the squash to make a creamy soup without all the cream and such – this wasn’t an original idea, but it was tasty.

I’m sure I’ll do something like this again and I’ll try to formalize a recipe for it to share, but in the mean time… do what I did and just play with it a bit.

It didn’t feel right calling this a chicken pot pie when I cooked mine in a pan. A sauce pan for part of it and a cast-iron skillet for the baking part. So yea. But whatever you want to call it, this turned out rather well I think.

Now, I’ve never been a fan of “pot pies”. I’m really just not a huge fan of pastry type crusts in general. So I have no idea where the urge to make this dish came from. But what I did know is that it wouldn’t be a traditional type. I’ve seen similar dishes where instead of a top crust, you use drop-biscuits or dumplings of some sort. But alas, I’m not a huge biscuit fan either.. and I’ve never made dumplings (which aren’t they just “boiled” biscuits anyways?) So what to do?

Well, I asked for ideas on Twitter… and someone suggested corn bread (which I do love), or the “cheesy pizza crust” I was talking about a couple weeks back. Ding! I think we have something there. It’s such an easy recipe too… 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, 1 egg, and a 3oz block of cream cheese. And I knew I had all the stuff on hand. So we had a topping. But then what about the filling?

I had the chicken, the reason for this whole idea in the first place. I always have a few certain vegetables on hand… carrots, frozen peas, onion. That would work. When getting out the carrot I found some sweet potato left over from another meal. I had some celery too but option to skip that for this dish. Another thing I keep on hand is a can or two of evaporated milk. I use this in place of cream in making sauces to get a bit more depth than just milk (especially since my milk is soy milk), without as much of the fat. Oh! There’s also a can of mushrooms. Yea, I know… they’re slimly lil suckers, I would never use them on a burger or to top a steak, but I keep a couple small cans on hand just for occasions like this where they go in to something and offer just a bit of that mushroomy flavor.

Like I said, I’ve never made this sort of dish before, but I know that it’s basically the chicken and veges in a thick cream sauce. So I started out by basing this on my stroganoff recipe, in particular using a roux as the thickener. I did a video of this for BTV about a year ago. I chopped up some onion and lightly cooked it before adding the butter and flour. I used a small can of evaporated milk and about 1/2 cup of the chicken broth I had from cooking up the chicken. The veges I added were a medium carrot and some sweet potato about the same size as the carrot that were shredded and about a cup of frozen peas. I shredded the carrot and potato instead of dicing because I figured they would cook faster that way. In hindsight, I had some roasted squash and beets in the fridge that I forgot about and would have loved to add some of those in there.

I had two of the chicken breasts left, both just over 7 ounces, so I chopped one of them up, leaving me with just enough chicken left for my last two meals in this experiment. Then after I got the veges in, it was still a bit thinner than I wanted, especially since I wasn’t going to use a bottom crust, so I mixed in 3 tablespoons of ground flaxseed. So this not only added some fiber and some omega 3s, the flaxseed sucks up moisture and helped thicken the whole thing up a bit more. I seasoned mine with liberal amounts of garlic powder and fresh ground black pepper and a few pinches of kosher salt.

I poured this in to my 9inch cast iron skillet and dropped spoonfuls of the “pizza crust” batter on top. I didn’t do the greatest job when it comes to even distribution, but you get the idea. The whole thing went in to a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes, till the topping was lightly browned. Scroll back up to the top here to see what it looked like coming out of the oven. When I went to plate it, it held together very nicely. I don’t know if it was because of or in spite of the addition of the flax… but no matter the reason, it worked great.

It plated up wonderfully, I didn’t need a soup bowl to serve it in. The cheesy topping added a nice touch of sweetness overall… and it was very filling. I was figuring I’d get two servings out of this, but I think for a post-op, you’ll easily get three or four servings. I recently wrote a piece for my nutrition blog about being flexible in the kitchen, and this is a great example of that I think. It would be a great way to use some some left over vegetables. You could use various kinds of meats in here… season it to your own tastes, savory or spicy. And there’s many different ways you could top this, biscuits, corn bread, potato dumplings, etc.

So yea… it was a success. I got a dinner a lunch and an additional side dish out of this for me…. and I could see doing similar versions of this in the future. Also, you could easily double this and bake it in a larger pan.

Wraps are pretty basic overall, and I know I said I wanted to be trying some new stuff with this series, but I had a couple slices of some wonderful pepper-garlic bacon (no nitrites/nitrates) left and since bacon makes everything better, So for lunch yesterday, I whipped up a fairly basic club style wrap-sandwich. It sure looked good, right? But of course I have a few twists in here.

The basics of this are … well, pretty basic. There’s a couple different wraps I get, depending on what store I’m at and such. The South Beach Whole Wheat wraps are pretty decent. 110Calories, 5G protein, 17g net carbs (25g-8g fiber) and 3g fat from non-hydrogenated soybean oil. first ingredient is 100% whole grain whole wheat flour. The other one I get sometimes is Joseph’s Flax, Oat Bran and Whole Wheat Flour Tortillas. These are much lower in carbs, just 5g net (11g – 5g fiber). They’re also lower calorie at 70, slightly higher in protein at 7g and have just 1.5g fat. The first ingredients though are water, wheat gluten and corn starch. So I dunno, overall they’re sort of a toss up. The SB ones are “heartier”, the Joseph’s (pictured above) are softer and lighter.

The insides are pretty simple.. spinach, a bit over 2oz of chicken cut in strips and a couple slices of the bacon I picked up at a local co-op. The ranch sauce though is homemade, sorta. Instead of a ranch dressing I used about 1/2 cup of yogurt and mixed in 1.5 tsp of Penzys Italian seasoning. I’ve used this seasoning on everything from seasoning breadings and coatings for chicken or fish to making different sauces and dressings. If you don’t have something similar you can mix your own by using a mix of dried parsley flakes, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, pepper and maybe some dill or oregano. Grind it all up in a blender or food processor and mix in to the yogurt. Or… buy some ranch mix or pre-made dressing. But if you do that, please… skip the fat-free. Your body needs some fat. Ok, the bacon counts as a bit more than some, but still, fat-free dressing make up for the lack of flavor from the fat by adding sugar and chemicals and crap. So please?

Alright, I used some of the sauce I made on the sandwich and the rest as a dip for some carrot and celery sticks (they were my afternoon snack) and I had some left over refried beans as well.

Stay tuned for last night’s dinner in Part 4 – a potless, chicken pot pie.

I’m sure I’ve used this “joke” before… but this type of meal is something I’ve come to call the Mother & Child Reunion… and yea, I’m just weird that way. An egg scramble with chicken… among some other things.

This doesn’t show up terribly great in pictures, but this is scrambled eggs with chicken, spinach, green onions, and a light sprinkle of cheese.

Tossing a handful of spinach in the pan and “wilting” it before adding your eggs is such an easy way to add some great nutrients to your breakfast. And with using the pre-cooked chicken this only took a few minutes. I grabbed about 3oz of meat, roughly chopped it and started heating it up in the skillet while I chopped up a green onion and a handful of spinach. Threw those in the pan with a sprinkle of salt and stirred it up as it cooked for about two minutes then poured in the scrambled up eggs.

You could do this as an omelet by pulling the meat and stuff out of the pan, cooking the eggs then folding that stuff back in, and it looks better, but … well… I’m a dude… I’m not worried bout that much. I threw the cheese on after I plated it just because I had a touch left over from last nights pizza. For those counting, with two eggs this was over 30grams of protein in this plateful.

A quick note about portions… where I’m at with things, I can eat meals that I feel are “normal”, that are of size that I think most folks “should be” eating. Maybe a touch smaller. And while there are some days that are the exception to this, by far I seem to be able to eat more than many bariatric post-ops. I’m probably in the 1800-2000Calorie a day range overall, and I seem to be able to maintain my weight there at that level. It’s when I indulge in too many treats that things get out of hand on me. But I realize many post-ops that are as far out as I am, or even further, still tend to each much less.

Most of what I have been posting here is flexible enough that hopefully you can make it work. For example you can easily do half of what I did here… but on the flip size it’s also easy enough to bump something like this up in quantity if you’re cooking for other family members or something. And even the pizza I cooked last night would be great for families… let each member of the family top their own pizza, and if they have a much larger appetite add in a nice tossed salad to keep things healthy for everyone.

So yea, I get comments here and there regarding how much I can/do eat sometimes so figured I would throw this out there.

Coming up next is a lunch, I’ve got a couple slices of some garlic-pepper bacon, so I think a club sandwich wrap is in order. Look for that to be posted tomorrow!

Cooking when you’re single can suck sometimes. Then toss in the fact that I’m a surgically altered freak and it throws a whole ‘nother level of fun in to the equation. Generally when I cook, I try to cook just enough for a dinner and a lunch… but sometimes when you make something there is no easy way to make a limited quantity… like chili. So I end up eating it nearly every day for like a week.

Well, I had some chicken that needed to be cooked up, so I thought I would see just how many different ways, how many different meals I could get out of this one batch of chicken… and maybe it will give some of you some ideas on new things to try. Some of these will be sort of standards, but I’m also challenging myself here to try and come up with some new things too… like the white/green pizza I made last night.

Ok, fine. I realize there’s not much new, especially in the bariatric community about a tortilla pizza.. not even one with chicken. But… if you look close, that’s not tomato sauce… and no… it’s not alfredo sauce… it’s hummus. Hummus I made with green onion and some ripe olives to be precise.

I call it white green pizza because the chicken, the hummus, and the cheese are white. There’s green onion, jalapenos and cilantro for the green. And no, I’m not going to call it white-green-black because of the olives. Just pretend they’re green olives or something if it bothers you that much.

The point of this is, trying something just a little difference can give you a very different spin on something you might be getting tired of. The nice thing about this is that I didn’t have to crack open a jar of sauce just to use a few tablespoons worth. If you use store bought hummus, you shouldn’t be downing the whole thing in one sitting so having some left over for later is no big deal. And really, even if you copy my idea of using the hummus, you can top it with whatever you want. I’m using chicken here cause .. well… did you not just read the whole first part of this posting?

Oh, to back up a bit. I picked six ways because I had roughly 1-1/2 pounds of cooked chicken breast. (It started out just over 2 pounds). I cooked it by simmering it some chicken broth on the stove. Simmering it like that can help your chicken breast from drying out, a big plus for anyone maybe just a few months post-op. So yea, if I figure on using 3-5 ounces per meal I should get six meals out of the chicken I have here. There’s actually only about 2 ounces of chicken on the pizza, but I did eat about another 1-1/2 ounces on the side.

So stick around and see what over ways I come up with to use this chicken up. And don’t think you have to do single servings of stuff like this. These are all ideas you can apply to a meal for two or more… just you’ll need lots more chicken than I do if you’re doing all six is all.

I found this recipe on instructables.com, but the original pizza crust is meant for a 9×13 pan. I don’t need one that big. I basically cut it in about half…but the original calls for 8oz of cream cheese… I had one of those 3oz blocks in my fridge. So rather than go out and buy another one… I used what I had and it worked out rather well. With all this cheese and egg, it’s not only high in protein, but it’s a darn good gluten-free pizza alternative if you’re looking for something to fit that bill.

I topped my pizza with some homemade sauce, pepperoni, onion, some of my pickled jalapenos, some left over chicken and some mozzarella cheese. It turned out rather well. Now, tween the crust and what’s on top… there’s a LOT of cheese in this. This ain’t something I’ll be doing every week… but this could become a nice alternative to other pizza option. Yes, I could do tortilla crusts, but this had a nice thickness too it like a real, pan-style pizza.

I may have to try a full size batch of this next time but make maybe 3 smaller sized crusts and see how they hold up to freezing. That way you can make these up ahead of time to have on hand for when the urge for pizza hits.

One way to cut down on the overall cheese would be to use this crust to make some “goat cheese” pizza or use a light amount of feta or other strong cheese. You can then use less cheese on top and still get some decent flavor. I may also try incorporating some flax in to the next batch. Hit up my recipe site for the specifics on this as well as some “in progress” photos.

Did you realize it has been over three months since I last did a post about what I eat in a “typical day”? I know, horrendous, isn’t it? What was I thinking? Oh yea… that I’m kinda boring at times that way. And honestly, the only reason I’m doing one today is that my wellspring of post ideas is kind of tapped dry at the moment.

So yea.

Anyone that’s been around here for awhile knows that for the better part of a year my usual breakfast was a big bowl of quoatmeal. But, earlier this year I got a bit of a bug.. and for better or worse, since then I just can’t seem to eat that much for breakfast. Now it’s usually a protein shake, maybe an egg (sometimes two!), but lately I’ve been in a bit of a different routine.

Peanutbutter waffles. This particular one is a Kashi 7-Grain that I got on sale, half-price, at the local co-op. There’s a bit over a Tbsp of peanut butter, some chia seeds and a bit of raspberry preserves. I don’t always do the fruit topping, and this was the first time with the chia seeds. I actually did two of these today, but ate the first before I decided I should take a picture. The protein shake I drank after I got to work (so it was about 45min after I was done eating) just to get some extra protein. I do my morning vitamins just before breakfast; calcium, multi-vit, D and B12.

I also had a mid-morning snack, about 9ish (keep in mind, I eat breakfast about 6:10) of a banana. I didn’t take a picture of that, if you don’t know what one looks like, try Google.

Now, while my breakfasts in recent months have been pretty small… my lunches tend to be larger than what I think most people would expect.

That’s a chicken salad roll-up, made with chicken from a rotisserie chicken, some chopped onion, seasonings, romaine lettuce, and a slice of swiss cheese. The whole wheat roll up is a South Beach brand, a decent amount of protein to balance out the carbs. Oh, the dressing is a blend of mayo and yogurt. The salad is made from some corn I grilled the other night with chopped bell pepper, onion, jalapeno, cucumber and a spicy vinaigrette dressing. then of course some blueberries and some more calcium. I typically do either the Bariatric Advantage chews (caramel here) or Celebrate bites. They’re kind of like having a bit of candy or a dessert with my lunch.

Now, I had one meeting set for after work, then I had planned on going home and heading out for a run. But… cause of a work issue I missed that meeting, and my radio show meeting that I usually have on Thursday nights that I thought I didn’t have tonight I found out I do have.. so yea. Best laid plans and all that…

So instead of catching a snack (I was going to get some beef jerky) to get me through the run before having some left over grilled pork and probably a kale salad for dinner… I’m at my usual Thursday after-work hangout, Panera.

It’s weird, I was feeling really hungry when I left work… so I got my usual, the Pick Two, with tuna salad (probably my favorite of the basic sandwiches). I asked for it grilled, but they forgot that and I didn’t feel like worrying about it. I just found out they’ll grill any sandwich no extra charge, so it’s like a tuna melt… without the cheese. Though I could pay extra to add that I suppose. I also got the chicken cobb salad. The whole deal is about 500 calories, give or take a few. Not too bad actually. But, I got about halfway through the sandwich and maybe three-four bites of salad, and I’m full.

I’ve got a couple more hours to kill before my meeting, so I’ll likely finish it before I go. We’ll see. I think next week I’m gonna ask if they can do the tuna as a lettuce wrap for me. hmm.. that’ll cut the calories in the sandwich almost in half. Not that I’m terribly worried bout once slice of bread, but it might be a nice option.

I won’t be home tonight, likely till after 10. I have a bit of a treat at home if I’m feeling the need for something. Most days I do have a snack around 4ish, some jerky or fruit, or yogurt or something, and then I eat dinner around 7ish, so I can usually make it till bed time without another snack. But my schedule is kinda off today, so we’ll see how it goes.

So yea, oh… kale is really good for you and if you prep it right, makes for a tasty salad. It’s worth sharing, so I’ll try to do the salad and write something up about it in the next few days.

Till then…

Dinner – well Thursdays are a long day for me. Working 7am-4pm, then I have almost 4 hours of down time until a meeting for the upcoming radio show I’m going to be a part of (I’ll talk more about this in the coming weeks). My meeting is on the wrong side of town, so it’s not worth going home in between work and it. It was supposed to be storming – it was raining this morning. Otherwise I might have brought my bike with me and gone for a ride. I suppose I could have hit the gym, but I’m also still recovering from a pulled quad… so I think it’s gonna be this weekend or so before I really get back in to gear as far as exercise goes.

So instead, I’m camped out at Panera Bread. The free wi-fi is letting me get some work done… finish this blog posting… and get something fairly decent for dinner.

While it’s not mandated across the nation yet (I think just in CA so far), Panera is posting calorie counts on their menus already. And actually, some of the numbers did surprise me. (They also have a very comprehensive nutrition calculator online.) One of my favorites there is actually much lower in calories than I would have initially thought. It’s the Pick Two with their tuna salad sandwich and a Greek salad.

A whole Tuna Salad Sandwich is about 470 calories, with most of that (300) coming from the honey wheat bread. So a half is just over 200 calories. The bummer is, it’s loaded with sodium. If you sub in the white, whole-grain bread instead, it cuts 120 calories from the whole sandwich.

The Greek Salad dressing, unfortunately is about their worst dressing calorie/fat wise, accounting for 220 of the 380 in the salad, with another 80 coming from the feta cheese. But a half salad is under 200 calories… so I’m getting a decent meal at around 400 calories. Assuming, of course, that you opt for the apple vs the baguette. Which ok, I don’t always do.

And ya know what? After typing all that up… I go up to the counter to order and while waiting in line I decide to go with something entirely different. I still did the pick-2, but went with the French onion soup and a turkey sandwich. Yea.. I know. But, calorie wise it’s about the same… within 20-30 calories. What’s that saying about the best laid plans and all?

I decided I’m not terribly hungry, and someone sitting near me had the soup and it was smelling really good. So that’s what I went with. And while I did do the baguette… I went for the whole wheat. It went really well with the soup.

Panera can have some pretty good choices for an overall healthy meal… but you gotta be careful. And you especially have to avoid the cookies, pastries and stuff like that. And while yes, I have been tempted by an cookie or muffin top here and there (love the pumpkin ones), I think my biggest issue with Panera’s food is all the sodium. With the baguette, this meal accounts for about a third of the calories I typically eat in a day, but it also accounts for nearly three-fourths of the sodium I should be having. So while having the calories posted on menus can be useful for steering someone towards “better” choices… calories alone do not give you enough information to make a really “good” decision. But that’s getting in to a topic for a whole ‘nother day.

Now I’m thinking I’m a bit light on the protein today – so if after my meeting tonight I’m in need of a snack, I’ll probably do a shake of some sort… we’ll see how it goes.

Anyways, that’s pretty much in for today… be sure to check out the sites of the others that took part in this little food-fest today.

• Pam – Journey to a Healthier Me
• Beth – Melting Mama
• Andrea – WLS Vitagarten
• Tom – Beariatric
• Shelly – The World According to Eggface
• Nik – Bariatric Foodie
• Patrina – Stripped Bare

It’s been a quiet day here at work so far.  Was a rainy morning outside… supposed to be some storms moving in later. Whee.

Had a later morning snack – a stick of string cheese. Had that about 10:45. Even though I eat breakfast at about 6am, I still find it .. odd… to eat lunch before noonish or even 1pm most days.

I had a support group meeting last night, and on the way home as I was trying to think about what I would do for my meals today. I decided to do something sorta Mexican for lunch, in honor of Cinqo de Mayo I suppose. Though it makes me feel guilty for not having done anything in honor of Star Wars day yesterday now. Oh well. I’ll live. I figured I would do some chicken and bean burritos. By the time I got to the grocery store though, they were out of those rotisserie chickens and it was already after 8pm, and I didn’t want to do too much cooking. I broke down and bought some canned chicken breast. On top of that… I bought a can of refried beans.

I love… I mean really love… my homemade refried beans. But, I need to plan at least a day ahead of time to make them entirely from scratch. I didn’t have that sort of time. I suppose I could have bought just a can of pinto beans… but like I said, it was already getting late and I really didn’t want to “cook”. I just wanted to assemble. It’s not that there isn’t a couple of decent tasting brands of canned refried beans – but why do they need to put so much sodium? I think they were all 500+mg per serving. Oh well, I don’t use them but maybe a couple times a year when I’m in such a pinch.

So I drained the can of chicken meat, mixed it up in a bowl with some pickled jalapeno slices I diced up, a couple tablespoons of picante sauce, a liberal shake or three of cayenne pepper and a couple of chopped up green onions I had in the fridge. I used a whole-wheat tortilla that I really like. It’s not “low carb”, they’re average as far as that goes, and each one has 5g of protein, minimal additives (have to keep them in the fridge), and all around tasty I think.

I warmed them up in a skillet to make them nice and soft then spread a couple tablespoons of the beans followed by about 1/4 cup of the chicken mixture and about a tablespoon or so of shredded mozzarella (it’s what I had on hand) and rolled them up. I got six burritos out of the 10-oz can of chicken, so I figure if I eat two, it’s about 3 ounces of meat. Packed up two for lunch and put the others in the freezer for another day.

To go with this I chopped up some more of the jalapenos and threw them in the skillet for a few seconds, followed by some of the cooked quinoa I had just made (so I would have some for breakfast), few tablespoons worth of chopped cilantro and about 1/4 cup of the picante (Pace, for the record). A sort of Mexican rice knock-off to go with the burritos.

Oh, and also chopped up a bit of avocado and brought some cilantro-lime-yogurt sauce for additional toppings. Then my after lunch “treat” is my calcium. Yea.. I said treat. I use the Bariatric Advantage calcium chews as a sort of after lunch treat. I have all three current flavors, lemon, chocolate and raspberry in a container at home. I just grab two each day, making sure I have a combo of flavors. Raspberry and chocolate today. And I’ll typically eat them together.

I should probably mention water intake… I have a 20-oz, insulated Camelbak bottle that pretty much is with me at all times. I fill it with ice water before leaving the house and by the time I’m at work I’m about 45-60 minutes past breakfast and I start drinking it. I typically get at least one bottle downed before lunch, sometimes even two. Then I typically will down another after lunch and before leaving work. In the evenings, whether I’m running around doing stuff or at home on the computer, I tend to drink at least another 40 ounces. Weekends though, I sometimes kinda suck on the water. I’m out of my “routine”.

I don’t drink coffee… I don’t drink pop (diet or otherwise). I sometimes will use stuff like Crystal Lite, or more likely a product from True Lemon. I also like tea… sometimes hot, more often than not, iced. I’ll make a decaf tea using roobios, or just regular using instant tea… or sun tea in the summer.

Be sure to check out Part 1 of my Day With Joe as well as the other bloggers taking part in this today…

• Pam – Journey to a Healthier Me
• Beth – Melting Mama
• Andrea – WLS Vitagarten
• Tom – Beariatric
• Shelly – The World According to Eggface
• Nik – Bariatric Foodie

New Additions! (Let me know in the comments if you want on the list!)

• Patrina – Stripped Bare

Also… Ian (aka Baka) is doing some pretty stupid wacky stuff in order to raise some money for the WLSFA. Next week in Vegas, he’s going to be skydiving, jumping off the Stratosphere, and doing a canyon zip line. You can read all about it and throw a few bucks his way over at Jumping For Freedom. Go! Now!