One thing that attracts me to Weight Watchers is the fact that you don't really have to "give up" everything, you just have to exercise some self-control, and you have to recognize that to have that Twix bar now, you're going to end up being hungry later because you've already spent the points. Is it worth it? Sometimes...
The funny thing is, I actually like fruits and vegetables. I love a really well-made salad, I enjoy the heck out of things like oranges and apples. I love the taste, texture and crunch of a really good bell pepper. The problem I've had, in part, with my diet choices has been my teeth. I have a genetic disorder which has plagued every woman in my birth family who has borne children. We pop out a rug rat or two, and suddenly our teeth become weak and begin to break. You'd think this would only happen when eating something hard... try a turkey sandwich. I lost TWO that way. It didn't help matters that we seemed to be without dental insurance repeatedly, or that just as we'd start on a "plan" for fixing my teeth, hubby would be laid off and we'd have to start again with a new employer, a new dental plan, a new dentist.
Fat foods = soft. Healthy foods = crunchy. Not always of course, and certainly there are exceptions - but try building a food plan of healthy foods when eating salad is a major challenge, not just because of the crunch, but because a) pieces get stuck where they shouldn't or b) you're dealing with varying temperatures within a single salad. Ever try biting a piece of cold tomato with a broken tooth? PAIN PAIN PAIN PAIN PAIN!!!
Fortunately, I had all the really bad teeth pulled. Unfortunately, no sooner was that done we lost our insurance... so I don't yet have my "new" teeth. It is, however, a lot easier to eat healthy (and crunchy) foods when your mouth isn't full of broken pieces, when you're not afraid every bite is going to cause another break, when you're not wincing with every bite because the temperature of the food is causing the nerves in your mouth to scream.
So I am reconnecting with my love affair for salads, fruits, veggies in general - and loving it.
I'm also wanting to make sure that I don't "miss" anything too badly. One of my weaknesses - fruit dipped in this stuff:
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| Definitely a fat food! |
Let's take a look at the pertinent values (for WW) shall we?
Serving Size: 2 Tablespoons
Calories: 70
Fat Grams: 3g
Fiber: 0g
= 2 Weight Watcher Points
TWO points for TWO Tablespoons. What's that? Enough to dip three strawberries into???
Tonight I decided to have one of the yummy Gala apples I picked up today... and I realized I had a Weight Watchers Vanilla yogurt in my fridge. I like bananas in vanilla yogurt, so I figured I'd try dipping the apples in the WW yogurt... if it didn't mix well, no harm, I'd eat them separately.
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| NOT a fat food! |
A 6oz serving of WW yogurt is 1 point. One point. For SIX ounces. Imagine my surprise when I realized it tastes exactly like the T. Marzetti fruit dip. EXACTLY like it. And at 6oz, there was plenty enough to dip every thin slice of my apple, with a few tablespoons left over to nom straight off the spoon.
Do you have any idea how AWESOME that was???
Zeb and I both love cheese. Zeb loves blue cheese. You can imagine that snacking on cheese is probably something we'd miss deeply... and honestly, if not for soaking up info from Hungry-Girl almost religiously, I'd have pretty much written off cheese and crackers completely, assuming that we either shouldn't eat it, or we'd be stuck with rubbery, dry, tasteless fat free cheese (is that really even ACTUALLY cheese??). Thanks to H-G however, I learned about this stuff:
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| Happy cows = happy noms! |
And oh my, you have no idea how incredible this stuff is. One wedge is one point. When you first open the package and pull out a wedge, you think to yourself, "what is that? Enough cheese for one cracker? Pshaw." Seriously, it's what I thought.
Now remember, I'm also having a love affair with Kashi brand products. I've yet to taste anything from them that I don't like... had their Southwest Style Chicken entree earlier today, as a matter of fact. Yummy! In particular, I am obsessed with their TLC 7-grain crackers right now.
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| Crackerlicious! |
Fifteen of the little buggers, for 2 points. And two wedges of Laughing Cow garlic & herb light ends up being a very generous slathering of cheese on each cracker. Four points total. Throw in an orange for a point, 1/2 c of Horizon low-fat cottage cheese for 2 points, and you've got a really nice little (and filling!) lunch for 7 points.
Suffice it to say, Zeb and I are both thrilled to find that we're able to nom all sorts of tasty alternatives to the really fattening stuff we've usually been drawn to. I love that we can eat these things without having to stress over how many points it's going to "cost" us towards our total food consumption for the day.
Another thing I love about WW, and about the Tracker I have access to through my Online program - I can adjust portion sizes as needed, and the points recalibrate to reflect the new portion size. So while 15 crackers and 2 wedges of cheese is what it takes to fill me today, to keep my body from thinking it is starving (and thus force it to hold ONTO fat) and to make sure I'm not craving food constantly... in a few months, when my points allotment has decreased exponentially (you lose one point for every 10 lbs you go down), I can switch to having 7 crackers and 1 wedge - what would be considered 1/2 a serving, and my points debit automatically adjust to reflect that.
As it is, I'm struggling to consume my alloted points. For as fat as I am, my actual stomach is oddly small. I fill up quickly. I'm trying to make sure there isn't a huge disparity between how many points I'm alloted, and how many I actually consume... otherwise my body won't be convinced it is being fed. But I'll rest easier when my allotment drops a few points and I don't feel quite so much like I'm eating more than I "should."
Oh yeah, one more nommy deliciousness... I found a recipe in my H-G cookbook for an Outside-In Cheeseburger. I'm not comfortable posting the recipe... but suffice it to say it is a burger, with the cheese on the INSIDE. In my case, that's Laughing Cow garlic and herb light. In Zeb's, it's their light blue cheese. Oh...my...!!!! We skipped the buns and condiments, just served the burgers up with a small fresh spinach side salad with Paul Newman's Light Raspberry & Walnut dressing. HEAVEN!!!! Absolute HEAVEN!!! We made them using lean (90/10) ground beef from Trader Joe's. We're going to try them again in a few days using ground turkey instead, just to see how they turn out.
I can't wait. And I LOVE being excited about food again, without having to feel guilty!
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