Eggplant Kale Penne

It's funny how much things have changed over the past year.  One of our staple dinners has become Eggplant Kale Penne.  I learned about this meal through following my clean eating meal plan, and as I was brain storming how to tell you about this dinner, I went back though my old posts and found the first time I made Eggplant Kale Penne, on Day 13.

 

The difference between Julie Chickpea Future Jordan and the Julie Chickpea of Day 13 is tremendous.  First of all, I don't bother to look at the recipe anymore, so all the beef I had with the clean eating editors is long forgotten.  But now that I'm thinking about it, they really should have done a better job editing their cookbook.  Page numbers seem like a simple enough thing to check and fix.  Anyway, since Julie Chickpea Future Jordan doesn't follow the recipe anymore, the issue with ingredient quantity and portion size are nonexistent.  I make my own rules now.  So, here are my new rules/recipe:

Before starting, buy:

• 1 eggplant or two, depending on the size of the eggplant and the size of the people you are feeding
• whole wheat pasta of choice (2 oz uncooked per person)
• 1 package feta cheese
• 1 jar natural tomato sauce (optional)
• pine nuts
• 1 bag kale.  This is what we get:

So here's how you make it:

1. Bring a pot of water to a boil.  Make pasta.
2. Preheat oven to 400.  Chop 1 large eggplant into 1-inch cubes.  Yes, some of them will be triangles.  That's okay. Lighten up a bit, you're just going to eat it.  Line a tray with foil and spread cubes  evenly over the tray, adding a little bit of oil and some salt and pepper. Bake for 20 minutes, rotating the little eggplant cubes half way through.
3. In a large wok/frying pan, add kale.  If you have a small wok, cook the Kale in shifts.  Keep the heat on medium and stir frequently.  Season to taste.  We use garlic salt.  The entire bag should cut up in less than 5 minutes. 
4. Plate the pasta, add eggplant and kale, sprinkle with pine nuts and feta cheese.  Then, if you're MJ, add tomato sauce.

Something that hasn't changed this past year?  MJ is still pretty much Slowpoke Rodriguez. 



Days 57 - 60 (Week 4 Thursday and Friday)

Monday Morning Weigh In:
I lost 3 pounds this week!  I can't believe it.  I've lost 11 pounds in 8 weeks and now I'm only 2.5 pounds away from my goal weight!  I'm really happy with the way I've been losing weight.  Not a lot at one time and I really don't feel like I'm on a diet.  I cheat.  I eat twix bars.  I substitute out things I don't like for things that sound better.  I drink.  But I do everything a lot less than when I wasn't "eating clean."  It feels great to have made this progress.  In fact, today a male friend of mine asked me if I lost weight.  I didn't think my weight loss was noticeable and I really enjoyed getting that compliment from my friend.  

***Now since it's been so many days since I've blogged, I can add that three separate friends have come up to me to tell me it looks like I lost weight.  Feels great to know that my hard work has been noticed.  Thanks friends!

DAY 57

I did not follow a meal plan today.  


For breakfast, I had my "go to" breakfast.  Whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter and bananas.  And I look lots of pretty pictures for your enjoyment.  

Also, MJ made a smoothie for breakfast, so I drank about 1 sip.

For snack 1, I had my "go to" snack.  A slice of whole wheat bread with almond butter.

My new best friend, Mr. Almond Butter

Folded up, ready to go!

I had another snack later, because they were giving out free FREE free chocolate pudding at work.  I looked at the label and recognized everything, so pudding I did eat.


For lunch I had leftovers from when we went out to dinner the night before.  Essentially, I had some rice and veggies left over, so I added my own cooked grilled chicken to make it a meal.  Yum!

For snack 2, I ate some grapes.  No picture, but they were green.


Dinner
Tonight for dinner I decided to make pizza!  I wanted to reward myself with some food that I love and show that anything can be healthier and still taste good!


I open up my good ol' clean eating cookbook and find pizza in the index.  SHOCKINGLY the page numbers are wrong.  Seriously???  Where are the editors to check for these things?!  I flip through until I find the pages and essentially find out that if I don't feel like cooking my own dough (which I certainly do not want to do) then it's just a matter of finding pre-made whole wheat dough and putting whatever topics I like on it.  The cookbook also comes with a website for more pizza ideas.  I'm excited and check out the website they've given me.  And, the link doesn't work.  You go ahead and try it and tell me - www.cleaneatingmag.com/pizzacombos.  No go.  @#%$!$.  Seriously?  Seriously.  Edit this sh!t.  You are editors, after all.  


Apparently my grocery store doesn't have any whole wheat pizza dough.  We compared calories for our other options and picked the next best thing, and then bought a can of diced tomatoes (better than a jar of sauce), mushrooms and peppers for topping, part-skim mozzarella cheese and lots of spices.   Delicious!

Also I had a glass of wine.  Red wine.  

DAY 58

My goal today was to do a meal from week 4 meal plan.  I even went to the grocery store to buy everything last night.  But I woke up late and had 20 minutes to get dressed and get out the door, so if it wasn't already wrapped (i.e. bananas and granola bars) it wasn't coming with me. 

I started my day with a banana and a very large coffee.  My first snack was a Health Valley Double Chococlate Chip Granola Bar.  It was pretty good for a healthy granola bar. 


Lunch

As I said before, I didn't have time to pack a lunch.  I ventured into Mexican place by my office.  But remember, I vowed never to eat a ridiculous taco again. I saw that they had a special "tofu fajita."  Call me crazy, but I tried it.  Crazy!  Essentially they were 2 small tortillas with grilled onions, peppers, tofu and some cheese.  They were..... eh. ok.  Just ok.  I would never order them again but I didn't keel over and die.

When I got home I found out that those muffins I made went bad.  Guess failed didn't pass my "last a long time" test.   

My sister in law, Bethany, had been telling me about these things called VitaMuffins, so I finally looked for them in the grocery store.  I could read all the ingredients so I bought a box of VitaMuffin Deep Chocolate Muffin Tops.  I opened up the box and threw one in the microwave for a few seconds.  It was pure deliciousness.  Enough so that I made Michael Jordan try one when he got home.  Okay half of one - I ate the other half.  With a big glass of skim milk.  Delicious Delicious Delicious!!!

Dinner

For dinner I made another salad - spinach, grilled chicken, pistachios, craisins, blueberries, blue cheese, raspberry walnut dressing.  Yum! 

DAY 59 (Week 4, Thursday/Friday)

Today I really did make an attempt to follow the meal plan.  After all, I'm so close to finishing and bought all the foods to Thursday and Friday!  But, I accidentally switched what I was doing half way though the day, so I created a little Thursday/Friday mutant baby.  Oh well.

Breakfast: 1 hardboiled egg; 1 apple, 1 slice whole-grain bread, 2 tbls natural almond butter (Friday)

I liked having so many things for breakfast.  I ate the egg at home and then spaced out the rest of the breakfast during the morning.  I prefer snacking to having a large meal.

Snack 1: make ahead watermelon freeze (purée 2 cups watermelon chunks with 1/2 tsp fresh lime juice; freeze in a small cup with stick to make freeze pop); 1 cup low fat milk (Thursday)

This sounded way too complicated for a morning snack, and I wasn't about to try to bring a frozen watermelon freeze pop to work.  So I just ate watermelon.  Just plain old water melon.  No need to complicate things.  Skipped the milk.  I don't bring milk to work.

Lunch: 3 oz grilled chicken, 1/2 cup spinach, 1/4 cup each green and red bell pepper, 1 tbsp red wine vinegar, 1/2 tsp fresh ground blakc pepper on 1 whole wheat tortilla; 1 cup low-fat milk (Friday)

I simplified this lunch: threw some chicken, cut up peppers, and lettuce onto a wrap and sprinkled some red wine vinegar on it.  Wrapped it in some tin foil and threw it in my bag.  Super fast because we had left over peppers cut up from our pizza the night before.  This didn't taste like anything really.  Just a different way to eat a boring salad.  Skipped the milk.  I don't bring milk to work.  Still.

Snack 2: 1 cup blackberries, 2 oz goat cheese, 4 multigrain flaxseed crackers (Thursday)

I obviously replaced the blackberries with blueberries.  For the goat cheese and crackers, I bought this flavored goat cheese (olive and... something) that was low cal and spread it one some crackers.  Didn't really love it.  Ok didn't really like it, but I survived the 4 crackers.  I'll probably let that one expire... quickly


Dinner: Meh (Neither)
 
My dinner plans were spoiled because I got held up at work.  While I was stuck at work, I had an apple and another health valley granola bar.  

When I finally got home I was exhausted and decided I was only patient enough to make some eggs.  I whipped up some eggwhites with mushrooms, orange peppers and part-skim mozzarella cheese.  

Then I passed out from exhaustion.

 

DAY 60 (Week 4, Thursday/Friday)

I was a little discouraged today because most of the things I needed to complete the Thursday/Friday mutant child day are gone now.  I made do with what I had and ad-libbed the rest. 

Breakfast was supposed to be: 1 banana with 1.5 tablespoons natural almond butter; 4 hardboiled egg whites (Thursday)


This breakfast failed because we had no bananas or hardboiled eggs left.  I made a "go to" almond butter bread slice and called it a day.

I think we've seen this before...

Snack 1 was supposed to be: 1 pear, 1 oz goat cheese (Friday)
 
This snack failed because I didn't have a pear and didn't want to eat goat cheese without crackers.  So I replaced the pear with an apple and ate a mini twix bar.  A mini one I swear!!

Lunch: 2 cups torn Boston lettuce, 3 ox tuna, 1/4 cup each chopped carrots, celery, cucumber, scallions and basil with 2 tbsp red wine vinegar and 1 tsp evoo; 1/2 cup brown basmati rice

This lunch failed because I didn't have time to make rice.  I ate the rest of it, and it was horrible.  Just tasted like soggy red wine vinegar leaves.  Horrible.  I ate some of the tuna threw it out.  

I had a few cubes of cheese and crackers instead.  And 2 mini milky way bars.  Mini ones, I promise!!!

Snack 2: 2 tbsp hummus, 10 carrot sticks, 4 multigrain flaxseed crackers (Friday)


This snack actually didn't fail, per se, but I did upgrade it.  I ate hummus with snap peas and carrot sticks.  No crackers. 



Dinner: Nope (Neither Thursday or Friday)

MJ and I decided that since we actually had time to sit down together and eat dinner and watch some March Madness, neither of us wanted to cook.  We ordered in some thai food.  I had 2 steamed veggie dumplings, some Chicken Pad Thai and some Chicken Pad See Ew.  Mr. Jordan consumed twice as much as I did.  Good lord, why can't he gain weight???

For dessert I had a nice glass of white wine and split a vitamuffin top with MJ.  Perfect dessert after a not so perfect day.   

Sorry it's been so long between posts.  I promise to do better.

Days 53, 54 and 55

In order to fight off my problem with leftovers getting lost in my fridge, I interrupted week 4 for a few days of leftovers.  Brace yourself for the boredom (but at least there are pictures!!):

DAY 53

For breakfast I had about a cup of Nature's Path Optimum Blueberry Cereal... or whatever it's called.  


For lunch I had leftovers from Day 50's Lunch.


During the day, I snacked on:

• cheese stick
• 2 whole wheat crackers with peanut butter
• cocoa almonds
• 1 apple

For dinner, I used the leftover chicken (4.5 oz) and made a salad with spinach, grapes, strawberries, pistachios, and some blue cheese.  I topped it off with a little raspberry walnut dressing, which is not very healthy but I used a very minimal amount. 

After dinner I tried out a new healthy breakfast muffin recipe, that I will post about another time.  I know, talk about cliff hanger, right?!?  Just like the girl with the dragon tattoo trilogy - which I highly recommend!!!  

DAY 54

Today for breakfast I had 2 healthy muffins - post coming soon.  


For lunch I made a "healthy taco" using a whole wheat tortilla wrap, veggie burger, black beans, part-skim mozzarella cheese, chopped tomatoes and chopped onions.  It was pretty good, and a nice variety to the usual veggie burger meal.


My snacks today were:

• 1 chewy mocha brownie cookie
• 2 mini muffins
• 1 cheese stick
• cocoa almonds
• handful of grapes

For dinner I decided to re-make Lunch from Day 50 and upgrade it.  This time, I replaced the tofu with shrimp and the green onion with red onions.  Those little changes made a HUGE difference.  I would highly recommend this version of the meal - and it took no time to make!

DAY 55

Sorry for the lack of postings.  I've been unbelievably busy with work and just had a half second to sit down and finish up this post so you can read all about my lovely meals.

Today for breakfast I had a VERY LARGE cup of coffee and 2 healthy muffins.  I think.  I'm so tired I can't even remember what I ate for breakfast.  That is horrible.  I bet I'll find 3000 typos in this post when I re-read it.  Sorry for the severe sleep deprivation.

I snacked on an apple, cheese stick, and cocoa almonds in the morning.  

I ate a really late lunch from Chop't - a salad place that makes yummy salads. I had a salad with shrimp, tomatoes, avocado, pita chips, chick peas and a spa asian dressing (on the side - barely used it).  The nutritional info is the most complicated thing I've ever seen, but I think my salad was about 400 calories.  Which is amazing because I didn't even eat half of it.  Chop't = winner.  Or I = horrible at figuring out their nutritional info and I'm totally wrong and just too tired to figure it out.

I was exhausted all day and my friend Aimee and I were working overtime on this ridiculous project we have for work.  I was dreading when dinner time approached.

But then guess what happened for dinner?!?!!  

You will never believe it!!!

MJ COOKED DINNER!!!!

This is a rare occurrence in this household, so praise, thanks, and compliments must be given so that MJ will continue this new trend.

Chef Jordan prepared an feast for us, comprised of scrumptious morsels of chicken mixed with a medley of greens served over steaming brown rice a topped with a glazed orange soy.  

AKA he made asian stir fry.  Chicken.  Veggies.  Rice.  Asian flavoring.

But hey, I didn't have to make dinner so major props to you Michael Jordan!!

After dinner I had some low fat chocolate frozen yogurt and low fat cookie dough ice cream for dessert.  

And a large glass of wine to make the work seem less painful.

Now I think I need to get some sleep, since I'll be losing an hour anyway for daylight savings.  Sigh.  This may call for some more wine.

Also, I'm officially at 2,000 blog views!!  Thank you for reading and keeping me accountable for my clean eating life style.

Day 11

Today I was back at home but hadn't yet taken a trip to the grocery store, so I was determined to eat only what I already had in the house.  My plan for the future weeks is to not waste any foods. If I have leftovers, I will incorporate them into the upcoming days somehow.  I am not made of money.  Au contraire, I am made of fat. 

Today was the most boring day of blogging ever because I got to pick everything so nothing was bad.  Please brace yourself for the boredom:

For breakfast, I cooked up 2 egg whites, onions, some roasted red pepper, and 1 tablespoon mozzerella cheese.  Yum. I really can't believe I didn't eat eggs before this healthy eating kick - they are super easy.

For my first snack, I ate 6 oz low fat plain yogurt with 1/2 cup granola.  I was definitely right that plain yogurt tastes better with stuff in it.  If I had any fresh fruit I would have eaten that instead of the granola, but overall a pretty filling snack.

For lunch I had some leftover couscous, 3 oz tuna, and 1 tablespoon cheese - a quasi tuna melt.  Kinda.  

Snack 2 consisted of 3/4 cup kefir and a 100 calorie pack of cheese. 

Now for the exciting part. Buckle up.

For dinner, I flipped to the "Cooking for One or Two" section of the cookbook. I almost spit my water out laughing all over the cookbook because the first recipe listed serves 4.  Jokes on you, editors.  I turn the page.  I happen across a salmon recipe that is served with an orange glaze and decide that the meal is easy and suits my fancy.  But requires a trip to the supermarket.

Boyfriend and I venture out to the grocery store armed with a list of the ingredients we need for dinner as well as the next 3 days of food.  That's all.  I'll go back Sunday night to shop for the rest of the week. I am determined to win this fight against produce going bad.  

I'd like to pause here because I've had a request from one of my readers that I give my boyfriend a name.  From now on, he will be called Michael Jordan.  He picked this name on his own.  He's very creative.  And original.  I'm just going to call him MJ. 

So MJ and I got back from the store and I whipped up some fabulous salmon, served with spinach, mushrooms and tomatoes in a orange glaze.  Now the orange glaze was exceptionally delicious, but was definitely not the right consistency.  The editors suggest the glaze be used on any chicken or fish dish, so I will certainly be trying this again.

I found it very interesting that the orange glaze was made with Smuckers Low Sugar Orange Marmalade - not the Sugar-Free kind. I figured out that the sugar free kind is loaded with artifical crap (i.e. Splenda) that the clean eating editors think are bad for you.  I totally get you, editors. 

So tomorrow I'm back on track with my meal plans.  My apologies for my boring eating life today.  Tomorrow brings more misproportioned embarrassing foods, so get excited.

Shoutout to whoever is reading this blog in Germany. I wonder how you say cottage cheese in German.

Week 1, Tuesday (Day 3)

My produce is going bad.  I didn't realize when I was trying to pre-plan my shopping week on Sunday that all the nice, fresh stuff I was buying would be wrinkly and smelly before I was required to eat it.  Considering I have made 4 separate trips to the supermarket to buy more ingredients this week, I definitely should have held off on the produce.  Next week I'm only going to buy 2 days in advance.  


Breakfast: Oatmeal with cinnamon, low fat milk, 1 cut up apple


Sigh.  I'm not an oatmeal fan.  I feel like I start every post that way.  Maybe I am a picky eater.  I suck it up though, for the greater good of science, and eat the oatmeal.  Almost all of it.  Okay more like half but there's really no flavor in the whole bowl.   I threw some apple pieces into the bowl, but really apples taste better not cut up (and take a whole lot less effort too).  I barely eat half of the bowl.  This is going to be a long day.


Snack 1: 1/2 cup raspberries, 1 oz spreadable cheese


Alright I get the raspberry thing, but do people really eat spreadable cheese straight up?  Without putting it on anything?  I'm not one of those people.  I bring 2 whole wheat crackers (the kind that actually tastes like a cracker) to work and eat my cheese that way.  I decide the extra 30 calories are worth it.


Lunch: Sandwich with eggplant, onions, peppers, and tomatoes on whole wheat roll with goat cheese.


You've got to be kidding me.  When I saw this listed on the meal plan today I was so excited because it looked so good.  This morning I cursed loudly as I saw how long the prep time was to cook up all the veggies and prepare this sandwich.  I really should have thought twice about making cookies this morning - I should have been making lunch!  I flip to page 84 where the recipe is supposed to be and it's not there.  Typo.  C'mon editors, page numbers are so easy!  I flip to page 24 to find the real recipe and, low and behold, the recipe serves 4.  Great.  I do the quick math and realize that not only is my produce now old, but I have 3/4 of an eggplant that is totally useless, since it's not used anywhere else this weeks meal plan.  1 hour later I've made my meal, which still feeds two people even though I cut down the quantity.  I was only able to eat half of my sandwich before a 12:45 meeting, and at exactly 1:30pm my stomach started to growl.  Am I always going to be hungry?
I finished up the sandwich after the meeting and I really did enjoy it.  But the amount of time it took this morning was totally not worth it.


Snack 2: 1/2 cup Greek yogurt, 1 nectarine


I swapped out my nectarine for a clementine, which is the same thing as far as I'm concerned.  I also thought I was supposed to bring cottage cheese for my snack (which was totally unacceptable) so I replaced the yogurt with an almond butter cookie.  I don't regret this decision, but by 2:07pm, my snacks were gone and I was starving.  




Snack 3: Low Fat String Cheese


This was not part of the meal plan.  I cheated again.  But it was 4:36 and my stomach was so loud that my coworkers were starting to stare.  As soon as I got home I had a string cheese.  I'm a little cheater short and stout.  Here is my (love)handle, here is my spout.

Dinner: Chinese 5 Spice Beef and Bell Peppers (Wednesday's dinner)


I've never cooked red meat before, and this was much easier than I thought it would be.  This recipe was fast and simple, and tasted good, considering I left out the Chinese 5 Spice for which the dish was named.   I ended up quadrupling the amount of peppers the recipe required because nothing's better than filling up on a 7 calorie food.  


Dessert: Almond butter cookie


Gosh I cheated a lot today.  I went to the gym after work so I felt justified in my extra calorie intake.  Honestly this last cookie was only so my boyfriend could taste our new go-to dessert.  He was a fan, but disappointed when I informed him the authors don't recommend you drink milk with the cookies because it takes away from any health benefits you get from dark chocolate.  He drank milk anyway.


Overall I probably had closer to 1800 calories today.  I hope the Clean Eating gods aren't cursing me for expanding the meal plan today. Sorry, Clean Eating gods.  I'll try better tomorrow.