Day 294: 6.5 miles + New Recipe + 2 New Products + New Dessert

Sigh. Another pretty blah day. I swear today felt like Monday… again. I got lots of work done though, and was able to get in 3.5 miles during lunch and another 3 after work – woo! I had lots of yummy food too: egg/sausage/cheese muffin + yogurt for dessert, red curry + 2 Hershey Bliss chocolates for lunch, yummy snacks including a banana, a light babybel and a no-pudge brownie (even BETTER the next day)– great day. When I got home me and Austin whipped up a new recipe inspired by For the Love of Cooking. We call it Pesto Pasta with Chicken & Mushrooms – here’s the recipe for two!

8 oz. chicken
5.5 oz mushrooms, chopped

2 tsp olive oil

4 oz. barilla spaghetti

1/4 cup of Trader Joe’s Pesto Sauce
1 tsp reduced fat parmesan cheese

2 basil leaves, chopped

Salt and pepper to taste

Set a pot of water to boil and set two pans over medium heat. For the smaller pan, spray with fat-free olive oil cooking spray and add chicken to pan. Sprinkle salt on chicken and cook until brown. For the larger pan, spray with cooking spray and add olive oil. Once hot, add mushrooms and saute for 5-7 minutes until golden brown. Add salt and pepper to taste. While mushrooms are cooking, cook noodles per instructions (9 minutes for spaghetti). Once noodles are cooked, drain and add to larger pan. Add pesto, mushrooms, and chicken to larger pan then mix thoroughly. Taste and season with salt and pepper if needed. Top with Parmesan cheese and basil. Serve hot. Nutritional Information: 529 calories, 42 carbs, 22 fat grams and 41 protein grams.



So yes – it’s one of my highest calorie meals and DEFINITELY the highest fat meal, but I’d never had pesto and have been noticing how low my fat is so I was like you know, let’s give it a whirl. And I’m glad I did – YUM, YUM! Where has pesto been all my life? Fab – can’t wait to make more recipes with it. Speaking of pesto – that was my new product: Trader Joe’s pesto sauce! Austin, who has had lots of pestos said it was good! (that's awesome in guy speak, right?)
My new dessert is brought to you by my friend Monica! I noticed her making it the other night and couldn’t stop thinking about it – so I bought these things and whipped it up!

I got a small bowl and put the pudding in, then I added 5 grams of Reddi-whip on top and 7 grams of Trader Joe’s milk chocolate morsels – YUM! I’d heard there’s where the best and wow – good stuff. And by the way – 7 grams goes FAR with that chocolate, probably like 15. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to eat it as I was SO full and I’d already hit my limits, but Austin tells me it’s fabulous – I’ll be trying one tomorrow night no matter what!!

After dinner (and Austin’s dessert!) we watched Law & Orders, I read more of my book (loving it!) and we cooked some more breakfasts and lunches for the week. I ended up at 1,792 calories, 233 carbs, 46 fat grams and 108 protein grams. Here’s what I ate.