Seven Days & Counting – New Year, New You?

There are SEVEN days left in January, counting today. If you made a new year’s resolution or set a goal to be healthier this year, how is it going? What have you done so far to achieve those goals? If the answer is “nothing” or “very little” or “I tried doing ____”, then remember that there doesn’t need to be a deadline on your goals. Get started right now! Do some jumping jacks or pushups, make a healthy dinner, etc… It’s never too late to start.

For me, I have been going to the “gym” (my intense Kosama classes) most days for the past two weeks. We ran the P.F. Chang’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Half last weekend and it went really well, other than my lingering shin issues which will hopefully be fully resolved by next week. I took Monday off from the gym for recovery and had to stop early in our kickboxing class on Wednesday when I thought I was going to be sick from how much pain my legs were in, but I’ve pushed it harder on the strength training and upped some of my weights to make up for it. At this point, I am avoiding “bouncing around” on the cardio stuff and while my overall calorie burn is a little lower than in last week’s classes, I’ve been burning more calories from fat and my pants feel a bit looser, so I must be headed in the right direction.

I had grand plans this week to make a bunch of different things for dinners but time really gets away from you once you get into a routine of work-gym-store-dinner-shower every night and I haven’t really had the time (or energy) to make any of the delicious recipes on my list. HOWEVER, I do plan to make the following this weekend:

Spicy Black Bean Burgers These are make-ahead and need to be frozen before you can cook them, so I plan to whip up a batch to freeze and have available on nights when we are feeling particularly lazy. The recipe also includes a chipotle mayo that sounds delicious, and the best part is that these are super healthy and packed with protein.

Crock Pot 3 Bean Turkey Chili   I have actually made this one before and it was great. It has a little less protein at 16.8 grams per serving but it’s still great and it makes 12 servings, which will make putting lunches for us together next week a breeze. I substitute the small red beans with dark red kidney beans since I can never find the other kind and it’s just yum.

(Please note, the above food photography is © 2008-2012 Skinnytaste, Inc. All rights reserved.)

And I just wanted to share what I made for dinner LAST night, which was pretty quick and easy.

Pesto Chicken Pizza I modified this recipe out of necessity and health consciousness. While I actually DID have some frozen puff pastry, I opted to use some 8″ multi-grain tortillas I had laying around instead. The resulting carb count on the recipe was still a bit high, but not awful. Instead of straight pesto, I blended fat free cottage cheese with some pre-made pesto to create a protein pesto which I spooned and smoothed onto each tortilla. I then topped with thinly sliced garlic, some pre-cooked rotisserie chicken pieces I grabbed at Fresh ‘n’ Easy, a bit of shredded mozarella and a bit of grated parmesan. The resulting fat count was probably a bit higher than usual too, but I tend to forget to include fat in my lunch each day, so I’m sure it balanced out a little. I baked them for about 15 minutes and they were delicious!

(Pesto Chicken recipe photo is property of Nealy Dozier of thekitchn.com.)

So, if you are trying to get into the groove of a healthier new you, plan out some of your own make-ahead recipes (I’ve put links to my favorites and favorite recipe sites here).

And in the meantime, check out this neat article on whether there is more than one right way to run. It examines the foot strike of barefoot runners versus those who wear sneakers , but primarily, that for all the research we have done, nobody really knows yet what the “right” or natural way of running is or should be. I imagine though that it is not the flailing around that I generally do when out running. 😉