The French give as much credit to the hostess that shops well as to the one that cooks well. When you are watching your weight it becomes a more elaborate exercise than dropping by your favourite Pusateri's or Rahier pastry store and picking the prettiest and highest calorie-laden delight. It is more about reading labels and calculating amounts as well as finding tasty dishes. Slowly but surely, I am amassing a ready menu of tasty goodies from the store shelves.
As much as I would like to say I stay at home and cook every meal, my lifestyle doesn't allow it. I eat out a lot and when I do eat at home I am quite often busy until almost dinnertime and don't have time to slave over a hot stove. So much is so for the last three days. I have been eating out one of two meals a day and in between am rushed to present a suitable meal at home.
Last night, I had two of my grandchildren stay with me and my husband came home for dinner too. I had to find something that suits all palates as well as not having to cook three different dinners. The barbecue is always a wonderful fallback on a summer's day. So a quick trip to the butcher and I bought 3 ounce chicken burger patties and beef burger patties that the butcher had made up the same day. I also bought hot dogs at the little girls' requests. They all went on the barbecue at the same time along with tomatoes that were seasoned and topped with grated cheese that came from package. While I was preparing that, it was a no-brainer to boil corn-on-the-cob. As I often do, there was fresh fruit salad we make every few days in the fridge. Everyone enjoyed the dinner. The girls had their hot dogs, my husband had his hamburgers and a hot dog and I had a chicken burger.
Tonight was another rare night that my husband was home for dinner and there were leftover burgers in the fridge that were easily reheatable in the microwave. This time we started with broccoli soup. My butcher and some fine grocery or specialty stores have bottled soups that are low-fat like Soup's On or So Delicious. Calculations added up to 2 points on the Weight Watchers plan. I took one sweet potato and had my housekeeper peel it and slice it into 1/4" rounds and put it on a cookie sheet along with some well-cleaned leek and a head of garlic. I roasted it as soon as I walked in the house at almost 5:30 tonight. There was a delicious dinner all done and dessert was the remaining fruit salad from the day before.
I have also found some yummy and fulfilling snacks that are 3 and under points. Sha Sha snaps are wonderful little heart shaped cookies and they are organic and Kosher if you need that too. There are 15 cookies for 3 points. A lot of the ice bars like Oreo or ice milk cups or frozen yogurt treats that are 100 calories or so also amount to 3 points. Skinny Cow is one of the best known makes but there are others. Cheese strings are always a good go-to savory snack at a mere 1 point. It turns out that peanut butter piles on the calories and points as does the healthy fat, avocado.
So to all of you out there that are ready to throw in the towel, buy a little blue Weight Watchers calculator and have fun converting the nutrient labels on packages to find your favourite foods and treats without tying your apron strings to the kitchen.
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