Food!!!

Huzzah!

We had our first monthly "public" weigh-in today. All the losers weighed in privately, then we had a big public shindig with friends, family, and coworkers where each of us was introduced, stepped up to a scale, and then they showed our percentage of weight lost since the competition began.

I tipped the scales at 312.8 lbs, down 2% from my official starting weight - hooray! At 2%, I was middle of the pack; three people managed a 4% loss (!!), another hit 3% and then the majority of us were bunched p at 2%.

The 'bugg reports that I'm burning off about 1% of body weight in fat over a week's time (water accounts for the other 1%). If this keeps up, I'll end up in the 250's when all is said and done.

250.

Wow.

In 1989 I started cooking school...I was 23 at the time and weighed 260. It's hard to imagine being around that weight again.

Anywho...my posting title promised something about food...before I get to recipes, I strongly recommend anyone interested in losing weight (heck, anyone that wants to cook) invest $30 in a digital kitchen scale that's accurate to the 10th of an ounce and also supports metric units. It makes all the difference in the world when you're trying to log what you're eating. ...on to the food:

Breakfast potatos (46 cal. per ounce - assume 2-3 oz/serving):

1lb 3 oz potatos, diced (about 4 lg. red potatos)
1 sm. onion (3.7 oz), chopped
1T chopped fresh sage
1T paprika
1/4 t cayenne pepper
1/2 T garlic powder
salt & pepper to taste
pam

Boil the potatoes until just tender; drain off the water and cool them down with some cold water.

Spray some pam into a hot pan & add the onions. Cook over medium heat until soft and translucent

Add the potatoes and spices

Cook until the potatoes are hot

(if we had any, I would've added 1/2c chopped bell pepper with the onions)

Homemade turkey-apple sausage (40 cal per 1-oz patty...yields about 15 patties)
12 oz ground turkey (or chicken)
1 apple, grated
1 T chopped fresh sage
salt & pepper to taste
1/2 t red pepper flakes

throw everything in your kichenaid mixer (you DO have a kithenaid, don't you?!?!) and mix it on medium speed with the paddle for about 3 minutes or until it gets sticky and starts to ball up...or put it in a mixing boal and mix the bejeezus out of it with a wooden spoon

Drop a mounded tablespoon full (that's what an ounce looks like) into a hot pan with some pam and flatten it bit. Cook it over medium heat - the sugar in the apple tends to scorch if the pan's too hot

you can't overmix this - and frankly, mixing is the most important part. You're not just combining ingredients...as you mix it, the proteins (normally a curly molecule) unwind...and the unwound proteins help the sausage mixture emulsify so that moisture is trapped inside the sausage when you cook it. If you don't mix it enough, it'll be crumbly and dry. Do it right, and it'll be delicious.

BBQ creole shrimp (serves 2 generously - 200cal each - , or 3 167 cal each)
12 oz frozen raw shrimp (shelled and deveined, tails on)
2t chili powder
1t chopped fresh thyme
1t chopped fresh rosemary
3 cloves garlic, chopped
s&p to taste
2T worcestershire sauce
2T lemon juice
2T water
1 t butter

• put the herbs, shrimp, spices, and garlic in a bowl with the shrimp and mix.
• saute the shrimp in a hot skillet with pam over medium heat
• after about 2 minutes, mix the shrimp around a bit and add the wet ingredients and butter
• stir a bit and cook until the shrimp are cooked (when you can't see any blue) and the sauce thickens a bit.

Goes great with garlic mashed potatoes (if you can manage the calories) or with rice.

Last note - I had a bit of an "aha" moment last friday driving home from a wine pairing dinner at Hawk's in roseville (4 light courses and 4 tastes of wine, approx. 1200 cal total). Earlier that day the losers got some 'bugg training - and in the process I got a look at some of the women's calric intake targets. Most of them are in the 1200-16oo calorie range. By comparison, my intake target is 2800 cal/day. Once I got done calculating the calories in the wine dinner, I realized that in an odd way, my size is an advantage for me. My increased intake target is due to my comparatively large lean body mass (LBM) -my weight excluding fat. Anywho, your body burns calories to keep your LBM up & running...which is why trainers will try to get you to build muscle. Building muscle increases your LBM...so you end up burning more calories at rest.

So...I'm not going to stop wanting to eat at nice restaurants. Nor am I going to stop cooking fancy shmancy meals from time to time...and I enjoy wine tasting. My "aha" realization was that I can do all that - I just need to stay big...and lean. With that in mind, my first task (as I see it) is to get lean. Once I get there, or as I get closer, I can start looking at how to change my workouts so that I'm concentrating more on building muscle and less on burning fat. And knowing that doing so will give me more freedom to enjoy food gives me some motivation.