Recipe: Chicken Salad

Alright guys, it's recipe time! Yesterday I made dinner for my roommate and me. She wanted to try some of my healthier food, to see how good it was. Well, it was a hit! I made a delicious simple chicken salad over my even simpler carrot noodles. It's just a bonus that it's LOW CALORIE. :)

Here's what you'll need:

One large can of chicken breast. I think it's the 8 or 9 oz can.

1/2 cup of fat free cottage cheese
1/2 a cubed avocado
2 cups of spinach cooked
seasoning of choice
3-5 Carrots
1/2 teaspoon per plate of Flax seed

1) Mix the chicken (after being drained), Cottage cheese, and avocado in a medium sized mixing bowl.
2) Mix until the chicken and avocado are smooth.
3) Add seasoning of choice, I added pepper, and sirracha. I'm pretty sure anything of you want will work.
4) Saute some spinach in a pan and add to the bowl
5) mix all together and tada! All done! :D
6)For the carrot noodles
I peeled about 3-5 carrots, depending on how thick your peeler peels and heated them up in a pan sprayed with cooking spray. If the peels are pretty thick it might take longer to reach the doneness you may like. I like mine to have a little bit of a crunch. I season those with pepper and a tiny bit of salt.
7)Top the dish with some flax seed, I do this for appearance and the omega 3s.

Calories: For 2 Servings 311 calories (including carrot and flax seed)

Enjoy. Tell me how it comes out. :)

Week 1 of 10 WK Challenge

Here to week two ladies and gentlemen. I increased my cardio, and calories. I'm happy with the results I see. I've been bloated this week so, weight loss is only at one lb. Ugh. Next week should be better, I'll push hard this week.

Start
 

After Week 1
 

I'll try and think of some recipes to post for you guys.

Till next time, keep pushing and celebrate the little changes.

Carbs and CALORIES

Hello again guys! It's been a great few weeks! Well, other than the fact that I've only lost 2 lbs in 2 weeks. A pound is a pound though, yay!

Today I've decided to explain possibly why I have only lost 2 lbs in 2 weeks. Too few carbs + too few calories= not a skinnier Kirsti.

I've increased my exercise regimen so much that the 1300-1400 calories I've been eating isn't fueling my body and is causing it to store all my food. Hence, no weight loss. It's quite frustrating, I've been leaving the gym dripping wet is sweat and it's not reflecting on the scale. So after the second week of disappointment, I took matters into my own hands and ask my trainer and nutrition teach (who's a registered dietitian) WHAT'S UP?! Okay, i didn't do it like that, but I really was wondering what was going on with my body.

My trainer first told me that I needed to increased my calories up to 1800 or even 2000! Let me tell you, that scared me so much! I've gone the last year eating less than 1500 calories, and to eat 2000, wow that's almost heart attack status. ( my thoughts were, "what if I start to gain weight?!") I asked my nutrition teacher what he thought and he said I need to think of my body as if I were an athlete, because I workout like I am. (Talk about confidence boost, I'm an athlete now) So, I've slowly increased my calories to 1600-1700 on light days and on intense days, I'm eating 1900-2000. I need to trust their knowledge and experience. I'll tell you guys if that helps or not on the next weigh in.

While I'm not eating enough calories my carb intake is way too low. I know that I need to eat on the lower end of the daily recommended carb amount because it's better for my body but it was way too low for how much exercise I do. Before talking to my teacher I was eating 100-120 grams of carbs a day, well, my body needs at least 150-170 a day. No wonder I was having headaches! Carbs fuel my body, which helps me burn calories.

So after every workout I need to eat carbs and protein. (PB sandwich, yum!) While I need to eat 150 or so grams of carbs 130 of them need to be eaten before my afternoon snack. Hello to carb loading before 2 pm.

Here are some good foods for carbs:
Oatmeal, of course
Whole grain bread
brown rice
Wheat tortilla
Fruit
Peanuts
BEANS- really good source of fiber.

To reach my 130 carbs in the morning I eat oatmeal, bread, rice, fruit, peanut butter. And for after my afternoon snack, for dinner I have beans, and veggies.

I know this was kinda a boring post but for some people they might be working out really hard, but depriving there body of fuel. You're not gunna lose weight if you don't fuel your body properly. Learn from my mistake and drop the pounds. :)

Side note: The detailed information referring to my daily caloric intake, and recommended carb intake are for me, please look at this post to determine the amount of calories you should eat. And the recommended amount of carb intake for a person is 46-65% of your daily calories. Please talk to a doctor or registered dietitian before considering anything less.

Till next time enjoy the good carbs and leave the gym with no regrets.

10 Week challenge

Alright ladies and gentlemen, I'm gunna get personal with you. REAL personal. But I think at this point in the game I need to lay it all on the line. As you can tell by my handy little short term goal tracker to the left of your screen. :) I am currently 186 lbs, 6 lbs away from losing 100 lbs! I want to be completely open with you guys as I lose the last 26 lbs. How am I going to do that you ask? Well, I'm going to show you what I look like, with just a sports bra and running shorts. Kinda sounds crazy to me, but it's what I gotta do.

 I'm not ashamed of what my body currently looks like. I've worked hard to have it look this way. I've lost 94 lbs, that's almost a whole adult human! That's not saying it's easy for me to post this, it's still quite reveling and very personal. I hope me being open with you guys helps you push harder and motivates you to want to reach your goal.

The reason for taking this photo in the first place is because I've started a 10 week challenge with someone on Instagram. I'm posting a photo every week till Christmas to show my results as I work hard and push myself. I'm going to continue to eat healthy and workout daily. My goal is to be down to 165 by the end of the 10 weeks.

If you have an instagram account follow me! kmcwold is the add. If you want to do the challenge just post your photo weekly and tag #illreachmygoal so we can motivate and inspire each other to keep pushing to reach our goals.

Till next time, push hard and drink lots of water! :D

Recipe: Breakfast of champs! Perfect for me.

Hello hello! I'm getting settled and use to school, moving in a week and been wanting to share with you guys the most important part of my day. Well, one of the most important parts of my day. BREAKFAST! I tell everyone to eat breakfast, it's so important. You're breaking your fast between dinner and lunch, telling your body that it doesn't need to store lunch as fat because it's not in store-all-the-food-because-i'm-not-gunna-get-anymore-for-a-while-mode. Breakfast revs your metabolism for the day, and it's gets going to burn calories.

Time to tell you what I do for breakfast! Warning, I have little variety but you can be as adventurous as you want. I eat this because it's a solid breakfast and quite tasty. Why change it? Here's the basics:

Peanut butter, whey protein, and oatmeal, plus some fruit, and unsweetened almond milk

Ignore the items not mentioned in this photo, those will be mentioned in another post. :)

Morning oatmeal:

1/4 cup of dry oatmeal

water to cover the oatmeal

1/2 scoop of whey protein

1 tbsp of peanut butter 

Unsweetened almond milk for consistency wanted. 

Fruit of choice

I heat the oatmeal in the microwave with about enough water to reach the first knuckle on my index finger. Cook for 1 minute and then add half a scoop of whey protein powder, don't mix once the why is added. Add the tablespoon of peanut butter (Make sure the peanut butter has low sugar, I think mine has 3 g) then mix a little bit to see what the consistency is. It's normally too thick for me and I like thick oatmeal, so I add a little bit of unsweetened almond milk. Once you've added the milk, mix it around and enjoy. :) 

I like to add a little bit of fruit, one because I need it and two it's nummy. 

A few strawberries, or berry of any kind is good. And I LOVE these mini bananas, they are PERFECT for me. Just big enough to fill my banana craving but not too much sugar. 

Now that I've shared how I make my Breakfast of Champs I'll explain why I'm eating it.

So oatmeal is a really good food to keep you full, a little goes a long way and it's a good source of fiber and grain protein.
I add the peanut butter for taste, extra calories and protein which is also why I add the whey. I didn't start doing this till I met with my trainer and started weight training. I need lots of protein to feed my muscles and more calories to keep my metabolism going. I need to eat more calories to lose more weight, specially since I'm doing so much cardio and interval training. If you're not weight training a few times a week or partaking in daily workout classes you probably don't need 20 grams of protein like me. Just oatmeal with unsweetened almond milk and fruit should do the trick.

This is the breakfast I have everyday. Mixing up the fruit really helps me not get tired of eating oatmeal everyday.

Once a week I have my "nutella" on toast. Here's the recipe. Warning its super good and personally I think so much better than nutella, just because it has so much protein in it.

Protein nutella:

1/2 scoop of chocolate whey
1 tablespoon of peanut butter
Unsweetened almond milk for consistency.

In a regular bowl mix the whey and peanut butter, then add almond milk till it's the consistency you like. Finally put it on a slice of bread. This breakfast option has less carbs then oatmeal. I like to use Dave's Killer Bread 21 Whole Grains. It has 6 grams of protein and 5 grams of fiber per slice! Hearty and yummy!

Breakfast is my most important meal of the day, and oatmeal has so many options. You can add eggs to it, honey, spices, fruit.. whatever you want. :)

There's a little look into my daily routine. I'll soon share with you what my morning consists of, and how I prepare my food for the day. :)

Till then, eat breakfast and live with no regrets.

Busy busy busy

Hello hello ladies and gentlemen! So I know it's been about a month since I posted something, but let me tell you a lot has happened in the last month and I've been super busy. I moved back to Washington for school, started school and am currently waiting to move from my grandparents into a friend's place. One of the biggest reason there has been no new posts is because, my grandparents have no Internet. Yes, I'm living without connection to the rest of the world. CRAZY. Hah.

OR

 

 

Anyway, I want to get you guys caught up. Like I said a lot has happened. Let me start with my first disappointment/ reality. I came home and weighed myself on my scale, and wadduya know the scale said 195! I was sooo confused and disappointed. How could one scale say 195 and the other say 180?! That's a 15 lb difference, not a few pounds. So, I decided that my scale is junk. When I got to school I weighed myself on the DIGITAL scale (normally the most accurate) and I was 191. Better than 195 but not as good as 180. So I'm going to be basing my weight off of the scale at the gym, and ditch my scale at home. (I might do a post later about how digital is better than analog.)

Something else new is I got a trainer! Yes! I'm very excited and super stoked. I'll be seeing them once a week until the end of the quarter. Side note related to my consultation earlier this week, my trainer tested me to see what my physical capabilities are(push-ups, lunges, squats, planks) and I was astounded with my results. I did 12 push ups, I worked super hard for the last 2 and did a 2 minute plank! It was awesome! In January I was only able to do a 45 second plank!  (I'll keep you posted on how the visits go.)

 

 

Next, mainly a large part of why I got a trainer is because I'm going to Las Vegas for my birthday! I wanna be at my goal weight when I go, this is my new motivation! I'm turning 21 so I might as well spend it in Vegas, right? That gives me 3 months to lost 28 lbs.

I think this might be the last thing that's new for me, I'm starting to train for a 10K. The race is Dec. 15th in Seattle. Ill post how that training is going too.

There's a lot to tell you this quarter, I'll try to post as often as I can. It will become more regular when I move and actually have Internet!

Till then, work hard, it's the only way you're gunna get the body you want! :)