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Low Fat Ideas for the Busy Mom

October 6, 2009 By The Recipe Mom Leave a Comment
Join the Healthy Mom Challenge!

Join the Healthy Mom Challenge!

Consider some facts. The average person works 40 or more hours week, especially us Work At Home Moms (WAHM’s). If they are parents they are also involved in school activities adding another 10-20 hours a week minimum. If you count in house hold responsibilities, you are now looking at just enough time to eat and sleep, but just barely! This makes for a hectic and busy schedule and most people do not want to add to it by having to spend time in the kitchen.

The result of this is a large number of prepackaged processed foods that are high in a number of things like salt, sugar and fat. All of these things lead to an unhealthy lifestyle. This makes for tired bodies and minds that are less able to process information and deal with stress. There are a few things however that people can do that can help provide low fat meals for their families as well as for themselves.

The first step is to avoid fast foods. While they are convenient and driving by on the way home from work and picking up dinner is a great way to eliminate cook time it is also adding a great deal of unnecessary fat to your diet. Frozen dinners may provide a low in fat alternative but you end up adding salt and other preservatives which can be equally as bad. Maintaining a low fat lifestyle is not just about cutting out fat it is about eating healthy.

How often have you been busy at work and just grabbed something from a fast food place or a donut or snack from a vending machine for a meal while rushing to complete this project or on your way to that meeting. You are doing yourself and your work a disservice. Taking the time to eat properly produces better results than the quick pick me up options.

Here are some alternatives, when making meals make double or triple the recipes. Then using freezer storage containers, they make some now that are the size of plates and can freeze an entire meal like a tv dinner, freeze individual meals in the freezer. Then all you have to do is pull it out and reheat. It saves time and produces low fat meals easily.

Buy low fat snacks to keep with you at the office or in your car. If you have a full busy schedule and meal times seem to be from vending machines, fast food restaurants or you drink your meals consider:

  • Low fat breakfast bars
  • Snack bars
  • Things that store well
  • Can be eaten either warm or cold

These will give you quick, on the go, healthy alternatives eliminating the fast food joints and vending machines from your diet without causing you to be inconvenienced.

Until next time,

PS:  Be sure to join us in “The Healthy Mom” challenge!  You could be our next winner!  We have had great prizes donated from the following companies:

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Ten Must Haves in a Dieter’s Pantry

October 5, 2009 By The Recipe Mom Leave a Comment
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Join the Quest!

Join the Quest!

Staying on a diet is one of the toughest things I have ever had to do. Especially with all the tempting treats everywhere you look. I have, however, found ten low fat items that I keep in my home at all times. These are staples to my low fat, low calorie diet. Without them, I don’t believe my diet would survive. If you are serious about looking for healthier alternatives in your diet, perhaps you should consider them as well.

•Dreamfields Pasta: When you have to have that pasta, Dreamfields Pasta will cut the carbs and tastes just as yummy as the real stuff.

•Cheerios Cereal: This classic favorite is just as good as it ever was. With very little sugar and fat, it is a great breakfast food for the devout dieter. Cut up a banana or throw in some berries for an added flavor.

•Fat Free Italian Dressing: Fat free Italian Dressing is virtually calorie free as well, allowing you to be fairly liberal in its use. It makes a great marinade for boneless, skinless chicken breast or tossed with fresh vegetables.

•Hostess 100 Calorie Pack Cakes and Muffins: For your inevitable sweet tooth, these tasty mini-morsels give you just enough to curb your craving.

•I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter Spray: This spray butter has zero calories and it tastes just like butter. You can use it on your toast, baked potato, vegetables or whatever you like. It’s a perfect alternative to the fatty butter or margarine.

•Lay’s Light Potato Chips: Here’s another great product with half the calories and fat but all of the flavor. They taste just like regular potato chips.

•Aunt Millies Light Whole Grain Bread: If you need fiber in your diet , then you will love this. It has fewer calories than regular bread. It also provides at least 20% of your recommended daily allowance of fiber. It tastes great too.

•Pam Cooking Spray: This should be a staple in your home. Use a few sprays anytime you use the skillet or baking sheet for a light tasty flavor and to keep food from sticking.

•Splenda Sugar Substitute: It tastes just like sugar and is great for anything you would normally use sugar for, even baking.

•Arnold Select Sandwich Slims: With your extra lean ground beef and these buns, you can make a delicious low fat, low calorie hamburger or Sloppy Joe. Serve it with Lay’s Baked Potato Chips and you have the evening covered.

As I mentioned before, these are all staples in my home and maybe they should be in yours if you want to shed those extra pounds. You won’t even notice the changes in your diet, but you will surely notice the changes in your waistline.

Until next time,

siggy

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Want to win on “The Healthy Mom”? It’s simple to do!

October 3, 2009 By The Recipe Mom 5 Comments
Healthy Mom Challenge

We have all heard of the show “The Biggest Loser”. Well, I have been on a quest to lose 87 pounds and I mentioned in my last post that I had 28 pounds to go. So while I am not necessarily in the same league as the contestants on “The Biggest Loser”, I have still gone quite a way.

I started my journey in March of this year (2009), and have made great strides to accomplish what I set out to do. For those of you who are counting, that makes 59 pounds lost so far. Now if you would like to join me on my quest for a healthier lifestyle and my push to lose the last 28 pounds of poor eating habits I have to go, then chime in and let me know you are joining me. We all can benefit from a little support, and especially us busy moms who still have to provide meals for our family.

To make the deal even sweeter, and to reward you for your success, I am offering up a challenge. The mom (Or Dad) who sticks with me, posts regularly with your successes or even your challenges and loses the most during our journey, you will win a wonderful gift basket filled with great products to help you stay on the path to a healthier lifestyle.

The rules are simple.

  • Leave a comment here letting us know you are joining the challenge.
  • Post regularly on your blog about your progress, any challenges you may have come across, and drop us a comment to let us know you posted.
  • Want extra brownie (The fat free kind of course!) points? Help us build our “Healthy Recipes” section! Submit a recipe via the link above! You get a little extra love to your blog or site and help another mom out there find something healthy to eat.
  • Lastly, grab our button and put it on your blog so you can help spread the word to get more people involved in our journey. While this won’t make you lose weight, it will help make more mom’s aware of our little challenge, and maybe convince them to join us in the quest for lighter loads and healthier eating.

At the end of our challenge, we will select the person who has stuck with us for the duration and has had the most success with their own personal journey to healthier eating and weight loss.

Good Luck, and remember: Healthy eating is a way of life, not just a quick fix.

Here is the button (Please right click and save to your PC): Healthy Mom Challenge

Until next time,

siggy

PS:  Be sure to join us in “The Healthy Mom” challenge!  You could be our next winner!  We have had great prizes donated from the following companies:

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Beloved Salad Dressings

March 12, 2009 By The Recipe Mom Leave a Comment

It’s salad time! We’ve got the lettuce, the vegetables, the cheese, the egg, the bacon bits and croutons. Oh no! – Can’t decide which dressing to have? There are so many choices, how do you know which one to choose? Let’s delve into the world of dressings to help with the decision.

We all know that no salad is complete without the salad dressing. Many of us go to extremes when it comes to dressing and think the more the merrier. That’s perfectly fine if health or weight is not something you’re worried with. However, bear in mind that many dressings contain tons of calories so you might want to pay close attention if you are. Let’s talk about the different salad dressings to help you decide which is best for you.

You can walk into any salad section of a grocery store and see shelves lined with salad dressings. The brands are numerous and the flavors out number the brands. Kraft, Wishbone, Hidden Valley and even a few named after some celebrities top the list. It’s a little overwhelming sometimes trying to find just the perfect flavor. The sky is the limit, unless of course you are talking about a specific type of salad. Sometimes only one flavor will do.

A Caesar salad for instance, works best with a Caesar style dressing. Cobb salad is enhanced with the ever tasteful Green Goddess dressing. Often times it’s easy to find the right dressing to recreate that perfect restaurant taste just by determining which type of salad you’ll be eating.

If you’re trying to create your own unique taste the dressing decision might be a little trickier. Often times when it comes to store bought dressings your own preferences will do the trick. Find the dressing that makes your taste buds tingle or one that you crave. You can’t go wrong when you choose a salad dressing you already know you like.

Salads are meant to be a healthy way of eating. When it comes to the dressings though, we forget that some are just not as healthy as others. We pour that dressing over the top of our salad until the fixings are hardly visible. All the while we’re thinking of the taste instead of the health factor.

It is important to read the labels on salad dressing bottles. When it comes to measuring dressing one serving usually means 2 tablespoons. Most regular dressings contain up to 11 grams of fat in 2 tablespoons. That’s not a real healthy choice for many of us.

How can we find healthier dressings? Look no further than the same grocery store shelf. Many companies are now adding low fat, low calorie dressings to their product lines. For many the taste is not that much different and the price is about the same, making them worth the difference for your health.
You can also try making your own version of your favorite dressings at home. Olive oil or canola oil along with flavored vinegar can be the base of a really great tasting dressing. Add some lemon or lime juice, pepper, poppy seeds or other spices to find just the right one for your salad.

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What Keeps a Salad from Being Healthy?

February 18, 2009 By The Recipe Mom Leave a Comment
008. DietImage by gelcruz via Flickr

Almost everyone loves a salad. All that lettuce and those favored toppings, makes your mouth water just thinking about it doesn’t it? Yet many of us ask ourselves if the salads we’re eating really are as healthy as we think.

First you have the lettuce. Lettuce is healthy but doesn’t have much of a taste. Therefore we add all those wonderful extras to give our salad the taste we savor. Things such as vegetables, seeds and even fruit give us taste and still benefit the healthy factor of our salad.

So what makes a salad not so healthy? Ever take a close look at a salad bar? What a mouthwatering experience. Yet many of the items on the bar are not so healthy. No one would blame you for adding these delectable little treats. If you want to keep that salad a healthy part of your diet you need to look at some of those tasty items a little closer though.

Fruits and vegetables are a healthy part of a salad. Things such as bacon bits and croutons can be the downfall. Real bacon bits add fat to a salad. Eat them sparingly and you will be fine but add too many and those unhealthy calories will start to add up.

Dressings can also be unhealthy when it comes to a salad. When measuring salad dressing we look at a 2 tablespoon serving. Many of the full salad dressings when measured this way have as much as 11 grams of fat. This is a lot when you really think about it.

Unfortunately we love our salad dressing and the more there is the happier we are. So how do you cut back on those unwanted fat calories? Try using a fat free or low calorie salad dressing. Many of our favorite flavors now come in these healthier versions.

Yes many of the low calorie dressing just don’t taste the same as our high fat favorites. If you find yourself shying away from the dressings that are better for you because of the taste try this. Instead of covering that salad with the dressing, put it in a small cup. When you take a bite of your salad dip it into the dressing cup before eating it. This will help to control the amount of dressing you consume.

Remember, if you want a healthy salad you must pay attention to the ingredients you place in it. With a watchful eye and a little self control you can have a healthy salad that tastes great too.


365 salad recipe collection

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