On Tuesday night I was suddenly inspired to be pro-active in my lunch preparation! I went into the kitchen around 8:30 or 9PM that night and started preparing a couple of servings of oats for Wednesday and Thursday morning breakfasts! I took a page from Jenna's playbook and made the oats with light vanilla soy milk instead of water or just normal skim milk. Wow, that did make a huge difference!! It adds just a little bit more flavor (and a little sweetness!) to the oats. I also added a pinch of salt and vanilla while the oats were cooking on the stove top. These were "quick oats" that we already had - but making the two servings, I used the last of them.
Once the oats were done cooking (only took a couple of minutes) I divided up the portions into my two small glass Pyrex dishes and let the oats cool. It is really unhealthy to put hot things directly into the refrigerator, because of the sudden temperature change, it can promote quick bacteria growth. Yuck!
So I had the oats cooling in the individual serving dishes, and I started in on lunch. I had a can of chicken which I used to make chicken salad. OK, I have to say that I was so glad to see Tina write an entry about this the other day. She prefaced her blog entry with the fact that canned chicken sounds weird. See her entry from the other day here. Anyhow, I agree with Tina that the ability to make your own chicken sandwich is a good option once in a while, especially because of the extra protein it gives you. I used the can of chicken, a tablespoon of miracle whip and a celery stick to make my chicken salad. Once I had it mixed up, I added some ground black pepper, garlic and onion powder just to spice it up a little more. Yum. With these two things done, I felt set for Lunch for Wednesday.
On Wednesday, getting ready for work was so much easier since I had prepared a lot of my lunch the night before. I was at my desk by 8am on Wednesday morning with a travel mug of coffee to enjoy!
For Wednesday's breakfast, I enjoyed one of the servings of oats. Before I put the oats in the fridge, I added pumpkin spice, cinnamon and nutmeg to the top of it. Unfortunately, you can't see it here because when I re-heated it in the microwave, I mixed it all in. To re-hea
t oats, just use milk and pop your dish in the microwave. I used about a fourth of a cup of soy milk and heated the oats for a minute in the microwave, stirring after 30 seconds.Once the oats were warmed up enough, I added one packet of Barney Butter to the oats, and that made them fantastic! I could definitely taste the cinnamon, pumpkin and nutmeg spices I had added last night, too. It was a really satisfying breakfast. A lot better than the instant oatmeal I had been eating before!
For lunch I enjoyed my chicken salad on a whole wheat wrap with a tablespoon of roasted red pepper hummus. I also had pepper slices and grapes (all produce from Wilson Farms!)
I had to eat lunch at my desk on Wednesday because I went for a twenty minute walk outside. It was cold and windy, but it was still really nice to get outside. I love taking walks at lunch, to get up from behind my desk and get the heart rate going a bit! Even just a fifteen minute walk will help everyone get more energy for the rest of the afternoon!
For an afternoon snack, I had a cookie that Ben's mom had made. The cookie had peanut butter chips and chocolate chips. Yum!After work I got myself to the gym... whoo-hoo!! The bad news is that my ankle is acting really weird! I could only run half a mile on the treadmill, because the ankle was causing me a lot of pain... I have never had a problem with my ankles before, so I am a bit concerned.
But I did not give up on my gym workout. I switched from running to weights. I did legs and arms for twenty five minutes. Once that was finished, I hoped on the elliptical for twenty minutes. The ET was a lot easier on the ankle, so I am glad I did that for a while to get more cardio in.
After the gym, I stopped by Trader Joe's to pick up oatmeal (the "non-quick" kind!), low fat mozzorella cheese, "no salt added" tomato sauce and a couple of other items. I had dinner in mind all day. I was making the eggplant parmasean that I posted about earlier today... check out the recipe!
The eggplant dish came out well and Ben and I enjoyed a really nice dinner. For Wednesday night we had whole wheat pasta with the eggplant. I was full for the rest of the night. I really wanted a milkshake (what!? it's freezing outside!) but did not make one.
I hope everyone had a happy and healthy Wednesday!
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