This was a colorful week. In many respects. It started with a bit of an experiment. An egg poached in a plastic bag dropped into a pot of water. Good idea. Poor execution. You’ll see in the video below that I had to do a bit of trim work to try to make the egg look like, well … an egg rather than a white tube with a yellow spot. I prefer the texture of an egg poached the traditional way — in a pot of boiling water.
Mid week, a spectacular double rainbow accompanied me on the way to work and while friends tell me it marks an auspicious occasion, I’m still waiting for that propitious event. I’ll let you know when it happens. I hope you plan to follow me for a while — I have a feeling it might be a while.
In other news, I had a date with the scale this morning, as I do every Sunday morning and I decided I’d better go light for dinner the night before.
Another crack at a quinoa cake with a poached egg and my new favorite condiment — Peruvian Aji Verde (recipe below) hit the spot, although I’m still not in love with the quinoa cake thing. I think I’m hoping it will have the taste and texture of a potato pancake, but it’s missing a fairly important component… frying in oil!
After the weigh-in breakfast ensued. It wasn’t a heavy Sunday brunch affair. Those meals are a thing of the past, but somewhere in the week I apparently overdid it because I managed to put on 4/10ths of a pound. ACK! Stop that now! It could be worse. To date, I’ve lost an average of 1.1 lbs. a we ek! Sure, more would be great — better even, but I’m still smiling and feeling so much better.
I decided to continue on the lean eating after the weigh-in and during my usual trip to Trader Joe’s after the meeting I picked up an interesting Vegetable-Rice Bento Box from the frozen food department. It wasn’t the best Japanese food I’d ever had … ok, maybe it was among the worst Japanese food I’d ever tested, but it satisfied my hunger. I’d finally broken down and eaten at the Sushi carousel at the mall the day before and while it is a cool idea, it was obviously mall food and while not great, like the bento box, my 4 small plates satisfied me without an overabundance of food. I’d forgotten to take a look at the rate sheet and had no idea how much I was paying for each plate. The waitstaff tallies the number of plates in each color category to come up with your total and I didn’t want to spend a ton on lunch in either points or dollars since I was a big points-spender at breakfast before heading to the mall.
A home made waffle and a bit of maple syrup accompanied by a couple of rashers of turkey bacon added up to a whopping 11 point breakfast. That left me with just 18 points for the rest of the day. Not a killer. Just something to keep in mind and I guess it was just too much for the day before a weigh-in, although really … does a gain happen in real time? Right, I don’t think so either. That waffle and syrup may yet find their way to the scale.
I’d say it was a deliciously colorful week and I’m looking forward to what next week will bring.
Have you had Aji Verde? How about Peruvian food? It’s my current favorite cuisine!
| Peruvian Aji Verde |
- 1 large bunch fresh Cilantro
- 1/4 cup Flat Leaf Parsley
- 1/2 small Onion
- 3 fresh Jalapeño Peppers, ribs and seeds removed
- 2 tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 2 teaspoons Cider Vinegar
- Zest of 1 Lime
- Juice of 1 Lime
- 1 teaspoon Sea Salt
- 1 clove Garlic
- 2 tablespoons Water
- Blend all ingredients in a blender, food processor or mortar and pestle until smooth. Add more water, a teaspoon at a time if necessary.
- Refrigerate unused sauce.
This sauce is so versatile, you’ll find yourself using it on almost everything once you’ve gotten a taste of it.
This condiment has a Weight Watchers Points Plus value of 1. Be careful, you’ll find yourself wanting to drink it!
For added body, add 2 tablespoons mayonnaise. Surprisingly, the addition of mayo will not increase the points value. The calories will just about double, however to 32.2.
