DiStefano Harvest Wheat Thin Crispy Pizza

I really love pizza. I usually prefer to make my own with a Boboli, but who has time for that? My boyfriend wanted frozen pizza for dinner last week, so I picked up an Albertson’s brand pepperoni for him, fully intending on popping yet another Lean Cuisine pizza in the microwave. They’re good and all, but sometimes, you just want that real pizza feeling… ok, or something closer to it than a sponge with some cheese on it.

Anyway, on my way out, I saw a the end-cap freezer had a promo on these DiStefano Harvest Wheat Thin crust pizzas. I’m a thin crust fan and it was touted as being 25% lower in fat than they’re normal thin crust pizza. Now, I don’t give a crap if it’s delivery or DiStefano. I have to agree with Tim, DiStefano is not delivery and it never will be. But, this looked tasty and not too terribly “expensive”, Points -wise, so I thought I’d give it a go.

This stuff is really good. The sauce is spicy and rich and the veggies are crisp. The cheese was obviously low-fat, as it didn’t totally completely melt, but it was tasty nonetheless. The crust was a little bland right at first, but I got used to it and once it all mixed up with the toppings, it didn’t matter. The Points were a little weird, though.

The slide-calculator I got at my WW meeting told me in the store that it was 4 Points for a fifth of the pizza. I got home and cooked it, then tried to slice it into 5 strips. It wasn’t easy, the pieces were like an inch and a half wide. I just said, “eff it” and I decided for 4 Points a serving, I could have 2 servings, get a reasonable amount of food and for only 8 Points , which seemed fair for this sort of food choice. Imagine my surprise when I calculated it online later on and it told me that it’s 5 Points a serving and 11 Points if I have two.

Yeah. So, really? This is not for every day. This isn’t even for once a week. But if your chaturbate friends are ordering pizza or your boyfriend wants pizza and you just really gotta have that “pizza experience” that doesn’t involve a “silver microwave crisping disc”, give this a try. This would be a better alternative, for sure, than a regular frozen pizza or delivery.

I also would have liked to have seen more flavor varieties. They only had pepperoni and supreme, which really, aren’t the healthiest of choices for a “healthy” pizza. I would have preferred some roasted veggie or a grilled chicken or maybe a spinach and mushroom job… whatever. But italian meats aren’t known for their fat-burning properties.

Or, you could get of the new Boboli Whole Wheat Thin Crust pizza shells, crack open a can of seasoned diced tomatoes, spread it over the top, drizzle some extra virgin olive oil, sprinkle on a little 2% shredded mozzarella, some sliced veggies like tri-colored peppers, mushrooms and red onions and bake in the oven for 15 minutes or so. Add some crushed red peppers if you like and a shake of low-fat parmesan. Good stuff! (I actually add torn-up cilantro and grilled chicken to mine sometimes, too, which is delish!) I can’t recall the Points for that right now, but it’s someting like 8 Points for half the pizza. Not bad!

Anyway, I give the DiStefano Harvest Wheat Pizza about 3 donuts out of five. It’s not quite the healthy as you might think (really check serving sizes… sometimes, they’re just unrealistic), but I would choose it again under the right circumstances.

Super Easy Personal Pizzas!

I made the best accidental discovery last night. I had a package of Trader Joe’s frozen Indian Flatbread in my freezer (or Naan bread). At 180 calories, 2 grams of fat and 3 grams of fiber, I decided to warm a piece up in the oven (I was craving bread, man. What can I say?)

I heated the oven to 400 degrees for 10 minutes (per the package instructions), then I laid a couple pieces (some for the jasminelive boyfriend, too!) on the pizza sheet and spritzed them with a little I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter Spray. I sprinkled a little garlic powder on top — just a little! I toasted it for 3 minutes in the oven, flipping them over half-way through.

When I realized that I needed to make a meal out of it, not just a piece o’ bread, I dug around in the fridge to see what I could serve with it. DING DING DING! I had some 2% skim mozzarella and a little marinara, so I added a couple tablespoons of sauce to the top of the flatbread and 1/3 cup of cheese to the top of each. I sprinkled it with a little italian seasoning and a shake of crushed red pepper and threw it back in the oven for another 3-4 minutes.

Booya. Instant pizza and for only.... *drumroll* FIVE POINTS. Five! That’s it. 3 for the flatbread, 2 for the cheese. You can count the sauce if you want, but it’s only like 0 to half a point, so I didn’t sweat it. If I ate more than that, then I would, but sometimes, you just have let some stuff slide.

Now this was just your basic cheese pizza, but you could easily add some turkey pepperoni (I love Hormel’s lowfat variety) or load it up with “free” veggies. It came out perfect. Even my boyfriend loved it. Woo!

Next Stop, Plateauville

It seems as though the buck stops here. I am no longer benefiting from the post pregnancy weight drop and have been hovering here at 13 lbs over pre-pregnancy weight for two weeks. Granted, I haven’t logged my points diligently and exercise comes when I get the opportunity and usually involves pushing the around the neighborhood in the stroller so, it has been inconsistent at best. I think this will be my biggest challenge yet.. getting these last 13 lbs off me so I can wear my old clothes and not have to buy a transition wardrobe. Having the has thrown any sense of scheduling out the window for me so I need to at least force myself to log my points and get out of the house once a day and walk for at LEAST a half an hour. Hopefully this new tactic will get the last few stubborn pounds off or at least get me close.

Another problem I have, aside from time management, is my lack of time to make proper meals. I find myself cramming a granola bar down my throat on many occasions since I rarely have time to cook anything. Not to mention I am limited in the foods I can eat since 0 point veggies tend to give the gas. Gas that launches 4 hour long screaming sessions. It’s a sacrifice I have to make . Sleep is more important to me than food or my weight.

So I am on a plateau if you will, and one that I don’t know I can truly get past until I stop breast feeding. Which will be in the next month or so since I need a glass of wine like, STAT. SO long story short, no loss to mention, though I think my hips lodged themselves back into their sockets, which is always a plus.

Tofu Shiritaki Noodles

I read about these “amazing” noodles in People Magazine’s Your Diet which was on newstands in January (I don’t know if it’s a regular mag or not). Then I read about them on Hungry-Girl and in various other weight loss places. People are going bananas over these things. I finally scooted over to Whole Foods yesterday afternoon to find out what all the hub-bub is about. Even the Whole Foods staff said they can’t keep them on the shelves!

What’s so great about these noodles, you ask? Well, for one, they’re 40 calories for the whole damn bag. One 4oz. bag contains 2 servings at 20 calories each, not to mention only half a gram of fat, 3 grams of carbs, 2 grams of fiber and 1 gram of protein per serving. And Weight Watchers? It’s ZERO Points for the whole bag! Made with yam flour and tofu, these Japanese noodles have become a huge hit with calorie counters and low-carbers everywhere.

So you can imagine my chagrin when I thought they tasted like hammered cat ass. Ok, so the flavor wasn’t that bad; my main issue was the texture. They come in a variety of shapes, like fettucini (the one I got) and they look like real noodles. In fact, they even feel like real noodles. But my “wasted money” alarm started going off when, as I was reading the instructions, I came across this gem, “Parboil to reduce the natural aroma of Shiritaki.”

Now, call me crazy, but if my food recommends that I boil it to reduce it’s funk, I don’t know that it’s something I will enjoy like the jasminlive shows, you know? But, with so many people raving about them, I figured it couldn’t be as bad as all that, so I drained the water (the noodles are found in the refrigerated tofu-y section packed in a bag of liquid) and blanched them for 2-3 minutes.

Still, they looked like noodles. And honestly, their “natural aroma” wasn’t really an issue. It was their lack of aroma entirely. You know how when you cook noodles and they kind of have that noodley smell? These had no smell at all. None. It was kind of odd. Then, after I drained them, I decided to eat a test noodle before piling on my yummy vegetable pasta sauce.

Ptooie! Ptooie! Ptooie! BAH!

I tried a second noodle, assuming I’m just being a big brat. No, still cat ass. The thing is, they don’t really taste like anything, which is the beauty of tofu, but I also kind of find it disconcerting when my food doesn’t taste like anything. And I’m not talking “bland”, I’m talking “nothing”. I probably could have loaded it up with sauce and pretended, but the texture killed it entirely.

The texture was similar to calamari. Maybe not as rubbery, but it had that same smooth, almost rubbery surface and when you bit into it, it had that initial teeny tiny ‘pop’ that happens when you’re eating calamari. If you’re a calamari eater, you may know what I’m talking about. It skeeved me. I like calamari, but this was flavorless cat ass calamari and that just won’t fly.

For nutrition’s sake, for flavor’s sake and for the love of pasta everywhere, I’d choose a whole grain pasta over this stuff any day. I’d rather have the calories and get the benefits of the fiber.

Welcome to the trash can, Shiritaki. Thanks for playing.

Wearing More Than I Am Eating!

I’m a little late checking on my weigh-in but infants will do that to a schedule I guess. All my days and nights seem to blend together right now and I get on the computer when I can. Anyway, I did manage to hop on the scale yesterday morning and logged a 1.5 lb loss. I don’t know if I should credit my eating habits or the breastfeeding but either way I’ll take it. 13 more to go to Pre-Pregnancy Weight Goal #1. I have managed to keep somewhat to my points schedule and have even taken a few walks with the (laps around Babies R Us counts right?) so I feel like I am off to a good start. I am trying not to be too strict (hence the cup of thiny thin ice cream from Carvel yesterday...hey, its next to Babies R Us, shoot me) since Weight Watchers doesn’t really allow breastfeeding mothers to do the plan, so I have consistently gone over points purposefully all week to make sure I am eating enough for the little guy, but I think not gorging on eggs and cheese and eating a whole gift basket of Godiva is lending itself to my body’s return to pre-pregnany land.

Additionally, I spent more time this week wearing spit up, breast milk, poop and pee than I did worrying about what’s in the refridgerator so the distraction, albeit a little in the gross bodily fluids department, is helping me keep busy.

Somehow my mom convinced me to try on my old jeans yesterday and I did (stupid idea). The bad news is, I still don’t fit in them, but the good news is I could pull them up and actually get them on my legs and over my butt so, my goal of wearing them isn’t far off. If I could get to a place where they could be buttoned, I’ll be in decent shape. For now my birthing hips are keeping a nice 3-4 inch gap between the button and its button hole on the other side.

Either way I look at it, it’s progress.

Wearing More Than I Am Eating!

LONDON, Jan. 17 (UPI) — The 20-year-old, from Farrow Drive, Whitburn, bled to death on Christmas Eve after suffering medical complications after an operation to remove three infected teeth.

Scott would eat only white sliced bread, fast food french fries, and the occasional plate of baked beans. He hated foreign food, and refused to eat fresh fruit or vegetables. His dreadful diet damaged him so badly he developed cirrhosis – a condition more commonly seen in hardened drinkers.

The disease meant he developed a secondary condition, auto-immune hepatitis, which thinned his blood and prevented his body from healing properly.

He was told a transplant could save him but he was too frightened to have the operation and continued eating his favorite McDonald’s french fries, sliced white bread and canned baked beans, the newspaper said.