tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75762843807295957682011-04-21T20:09:56.615-07:00Recipes and Fitness Tips for Living Happy and Healthy with your Family, (despite your husband's need for chicken wings, chips, and ranch dip . . . )JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.comBlogger141100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-36874124591039255022008-03-31T18:43:00.000-07:002008-03-31T18:53:19.144-07:00

I really love hummus. As such, I find any excuse to buy a new brand of it at the store--I think I'm obsessed at this point! Anyways, I found a new jar of it at Safeway yesterday that was just the garbanzo beans, garlic, and spices added--the olive oil was not added in yet, and the instructions said to add it in to taste.Well, as you can guess, this made the calorie and fat content much better, so

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-68906417803469817792008-03-29T14:37:00.000-07:002008-03-29T18:00:15.224-07:00

Earlier in the week, Ryan had been saying his co-workers keep complaining because I always send treats to his work, and it was making them gain weight. I love to bake, and although I am trying to do recipes that are healthy and nutritious, my kids love me to make them an occasional treat that doesn't fit into those categories (how they get me to do his is bat their eyes at me and tell me I'm the

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-31863310345281369542008-03-29T14:25:00.000-07:002008-03-31T18:53:45.563-07:00

Hi all--The 2008 finalists for the Betty Crocker Cookie Mix Recipe Contest have been posted, and can be found here on the website. You can vote for your favorite.I looked over the recipes, and one caught my eye--"Wild Blue Energy Chews". They start with the oatmeal cookie mix, and add things like toasted wheat germ, egg whites, canola oil, etc., making them a little more nutritiously sound than

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-37933928740438232572008-03-29T14:11:00.000-07:002008-03-29T14:16:47.346-07:00

HI everyone--I'm sorry I haven't posted much this week, I have made some food (which I'll work on posting now), but I've been really busy with different things. Now, if you ask me "what", I would probably reply, "I don't remember!" It's been one of THOSE weeks.Anyways, I have managed to get back in the everyday workout routine starting last Saturday, and stuck with it all week. So, I have

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-66185435274542084182008-03-24T19:33:00.000-07:002008-03-24T20:32:59.646-07:00

I recently got introduced to a recipe website called Quirky Cupcake which has a montly contest called "Cupcake Hero" in which Laurie picks an ingredient theme of which you have to use in the either the cupcake, filling, or frosting (or all!).When I saw this month's ingredient was "marshmallow", I just knew I had to enter! My kids love these butterscotch marshmallow bars, and I thought that I

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-64946975867625963452008-03-24T19:31:00.000-07:002008-03-24T20:33:46.463-07:00

One of Ryan and I's favorite restaurants is a local Mexican restaurant called Fiesta, near his work. We particularly love this Fiesta Platter, which has lots of different meats served fajita style, including some delicious pork carnitas.I decided a while ago to re-create the recipe at home. After much research, I realize why it tastes so good. Traditionally, the pork is roasted all day and then

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-29421761224473249222008-03-22T22:14:00.001-07:002008-03-24T20:34:14.997-07:00

Well, it was Friday night, and Ryan and were without children. Ryan was working late, so I decided to have a dinner ready for him getting home. You see, we had a big date to watch "No Country for Old Men".Here's a dish that is really easy to make, tastes great, and fits into my healthy eating perfectly. I adapted it from one I got off allrecipes.com3 large chicken breasts, sliced into large

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-63304802616153253562008-03-21T11:54:00.000-07:002008-03-21T13:34:38.079-07:00

Poor Aaron stayed home again today with me--he still has a bad cough. Frankly, both of us were a bit blue, I was down due to frustration over this lingering bronchitis, and plus it hit me as I was reading some of my morning blogs I look at that I had done pitifully nothing for Easter for the kids.Now, I don't consider myself Martha, where I need to handweave baskets for them and paint eggs using

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-41174937206491160092008-03-20T13:18:00.000-07:002008-03-21T13:34:55.089-07:00

Well, I was reading the oxygen website and they posted that graham crackers are OK on occasion as clean eating (see here!). This excited me like nothing lately--wow, graham crackers as eating that is allowed, and not even really a treat! Yeah!So, of course the obsessive part of me decides that I won't eat just any graham crackers, that it would be better for me to make my own, so I could control

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-19253478987255103242008-03-19T16:01:00.000-07:002008-03-21T13:35:24.227-07:00

Hi all--I'm slowly getting better, but last night I had some serious chocolate cravings that would not go away. As such, I decided to try a recipe I had seen blogged about on baking delights, called brown rice syrup brownies.Here's the link to the mighty foods website where it was located. So, I made up a batch, except I used unsweetened baking chocolate, as I had no bittersweet, and I did use

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-63229611086820992402008-03-18T12:14:00.001-07:002008-03-18T13:20:39.714-07:00

Still stuck at home, this morning I was searching for something new to bake, and I remembered this recipe on the back of my Bob's Red Mill Whole Wheat Pasty Flour that I had been meaning to try - it was for Carrot Cake, and the label was that it was the "Grand Prize Winner" on a recent natural foods baking contest. Here's the link on the website.For those like me who try and eat clean, which of

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-43605921778131419482008-03-16T10:40:00.000-07:002008-03-17T10:58:49.406-07:00

Back to the subject of my eating healthy, I've discovered that I really enjoy eating egg whites. I know it sounds crazy, but I really like them. I would have never guessed, since I think egg yolks used to be my favorite part of the eggs. However, egg white protein is a slow-digestable protein, which means it is good for giving my body sustained nutrition over a longer period of time. It's not

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-67641887674912513812008-03-16T10:18:00.000-07:002008-03-16T10:37:36.408-07:00

We've had a brutal week here at our house. My husband got sick with a cold Sunday, I came down with it Wednesday, and Friday our 6 year old son Aaron had also fallen victim. It's one of those annoying illnesses where you just feel horrible, run fevers for days, and have a sore throat/coughing spits at any given moment.Somewhere along the line in my life, I decided the cure to such an illness is

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7576284380729595768.post-90723229429482584122008-03-15T20:07:00.000-07:002008-03-19T16:01:22.475-07:00

About January, when all the other resolutioners came back to the gym, I had a different resolution (already at the gym most of the time, I really couldn't go anymore than I do). I decided to try and eat healthier, or "eat clean" as Tosca Reno says. I was inspired by my early morning gym workout friend Tami who is going to enter a figure competition in August (go Tami!).Thus started a brutal "must

JENNIEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15933987399627267957noreply@blogger.com0