Month Two: Portion Control!

So I have 11 months until The Big Day, and roughly 20 pounds to lose.  That means 2 pounds a month, which means 1/2 a pound a week.... which means cutting about 250 calories from my day (just trust me, I did the math... 3500 calories in a pound; if I have half a pound a week to lose, thats 1750 calories a week; 1750/7 is 250.  See 250 calories a day. I told you to trust me.) Sounds easy... not when you're a Graeper who enjoys her food.  That's why we have Sheddin for the Weddin Month Two: Portion Control!  Very simple changes to my daily routines has already made this month super easy.

Change #1:  Use a smaller plate Instead of eating from huge dinner plates, I use a salad plate; it's a mind game.  I like my plate to be full of food, and I'm a founding member of the clean plate club (as are most Graeper's).  So if I use a salad plate instead, I get the satisfaction of both a filling a full plate, and eating a full plate!  
Change #2: Don't go back for seconds This one kind of speaks for itself...  I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not eating my last meal; there will be more food later.  There's no need to eat like I'll never eat again.
Change #3:  Find recipes with fewer calories  This is where last months mission comes in handy.  Veggies have less calories... duh.  So if I continue to Eat More Veggies, I'll cut calories without even thinking!


If you know of recipes that are super low in calories, super delicious, and super filling, please send them my way.  I'm desperate.  This month isn't going to be an easy one, but when it's all in the name of Sheddin for the Weddin, anything is possible!

The Eggplant Saga

I've never eaten eggplant before.  If I have, it was snuck in somewhere.  But I don't think my mother liked it, therefore, I didn't get to eat it when I was growing up.  I had absolutely no idea how to prepare an eggplant, cook it, or eat it.  Skin on, seeds in?  I had no idea.  So it was time to hit the interweb and do some serious research.  I've watched enough Food Network to know something about it being bitter, and needing to salt it to take the bitterness out, but that just seemed like too much work.  I wanted something easy, fairly fast, and with enough other stuff to disguise the taste- at least for the first go round with this beast. Maybe next time I'll explore taste; this time I just needed to get past texture.  baby steps...

After much research, I found that the skin doesn't necessarily cook down.  So, to ensure I wouldn't gag, I removed the skin.

Now what?  Here she is, in all her goodness, and I still had no idea what to do.  More research.  I found a recipe on food.com that was adapted from Cooking Light.  Perfect!  It was an Eggplant Parmesan Recipe.  My only concern was that it instructed you to dip the eggplant slices in mayo before coating in breadcrumbs...  not very "light" in my book.  So I used a beaten egg instead.  I do have to say, however, that after this recipe, I am officially a fan of eggplant.  Preston even tried it! He said it tasted just like a pasta dish.  Great!  The only problem with that is that he hates pasta dishes...  agh.

Eggplant Parmesan

Ingredients

1 Eggplant, sliced into 1/4in coins, skin removed

1 Egg, beaten

1 TBS mayo

Dash of garlic and onion powder

1 Cup panko breadcrumbs

1/2 Cup parmesan cheese, grated

1 tea dry Italian Seasoning

1 tea salt and pepper

Instructions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Peel the skin off the eggplant with a potato peeler.  Slice the eggplant into 1/4 inch coins.  Whisk together the beaten egg, mayo, garlic, and onion powders in a small shallow dish.  Combine the breadcrumbs, cheese, Italian Seasoning, salt and pepper in another shallow dish.  Dip one of the eggplant coins in the egg mixture on both sides, then into the breadcrumb mixture on both sides, then lay flat on silpat lined baking sheet (I'm sure you don't need to use the silpat, I just read in a lot of recipes that said the silpat helps crisp the breadcrumbs).  Continue dipping the eggplant until the baking sheet is full.  Bake for 12 minutes on one side, flip the eggplant, and continue baking for another 10 minutes. 

Once all the coins were baked, I put it in a casserole dish, layered it like a gratin and covered it with a tiny bit of homemade marinara sauce, and topped it with a little bit of mozzarella cheese.  I broiled it for just a few minutes until the cheese was melted.  So yummy! I'm an eggplant believer now!

The actual recipe I sort of followed...