The News: Dean has type 2 Diabetes…and she had been hiding it for three years, while selling her brand of high calorie, fried, EVERYDAY FOOD.

She announce a big money drug endorsement deal to boot and has her son playing a little cover with his new show “Not My Mama Meals,” which is supposed to feature healthier food.

From:

Of Mouselike Bites and Marathons, by Frank Bruni, NYT

What’s more, she [Dean] had waited three long, greasy years since her diagnosis to come out. During that period, she promoted the deep-fried life without acknowledging her firsthand experience of how a person can be burned by it.

That’s a profound, unsettling act of withholding. But it’s mirrored by many smaller, less calculated, more innocent ones in the world of food celebrities and food celebrators, including those of us who have written orgiastic accounts of sumptuous dinners. Deen’s revelation jolted me in part because people in the business of peddling gastronomic bliss rarely draw such a bold connection between indulgence and its possible wages.

So are the food celebrities the food gluttons that we tend to believe they are or are they good at hiding it like a skilled under cover cop on a drug beat?

The issue I have with Dean, having never made any of her food and found her recipes and show more of an outrageous food laugh line than cuisine, is her lack of damage control.

He should have fessed up after her diagnosis.

But the larger issue is that the whole industry of food TV/publishing/Media.

People are cooking less and these food writers are running marathons and going on juice fast to have made-for-TV bodies that do not come from the food and indulgent lifestyle they promote.

We can point to Dean, but it did not start with her.

But what gets me about Dean is that she promoted her food as everyday, not special occasion fare.

Maybe more food celebrities should out themselves about how they eat and then maybe we can have a food media that reflects a lifestyle that will not promote obesity and Diabetes.

I had about the same clothes on and I eat about the same this week, maybe even less than the week before. The five pounds in one week seemed odd because I had not really been exercising yet with my program and even if I had it would still be wierd.

I am not training to run a marathon.

This week, I got on a different scale at Weight Watchers. There are four scales at the front desk.  And I wondered if the scales are rid different, but I did not want to be one of those people who blames the scale or questions the program.

No one complains when they lose weight if that scale is wrong, right?

But I do think something is off. Either last week weigh in was bogus or this weeks was, but I am so new with this that I cannot say.

My weight loss for three weeks is 3.2 pounds, which seems more reasonable. I am still in a good average of over one pound a week.

With this said, I do question my weigh in. Is there a difference from scale to scale and if so, why weigh in at WW at all if the results can vary?

I can always weight in at the gym on the same scale every week.

OK. One of the motivators for weight loss is a reward for hitting a target. Rewards can be vacations, new clothes shopping spree etc…

If possible, these rewards should be non-food based.

After all, getting a huge dessert every time I reach a weight loss target might not move my goal/life style forward.

So I have created a reward.

My goal is to be under 200 Lbs by late July.

That gives me almost seven mouths that lose 37.5 pounds, a little over five pounds a month, which sounds reasonable.

Common wisdom is to expect 1/2 to 2 pounds of weight loss a week on a program of moderate eating and exercise.

Last week, I lost 5 pounds, which I do not expect to repeat every week, but it does say that at least 1-2 pounds a week of weight loss is possible.

So, what is my reward for reaching my under 200 Lbs target?

My reward is to attend the Traverse City Film Festival in late July, early August.

The deal is that I will pay myself $10 per pound for every pound I lose ($375), which I figure would be most of the cost of attending the festival.

Why a film festival?

Because I am attending college for film
I am a huge fan of the festival
It is one of the best independent film festival in the US
It is in my own state and it is located in Beautiful Traverse City (Michigan’s Napa Valley)
And..I hope to submit and have a film accepted (long shot..but possible)

And if I do get short film in the festival, it will mean giving a talk  before and after the screening.

I lost five pounds this week.

The woman behind the Weight Watcher’s counter said “Wow” during my weigh in.

They give you stars when you reach a certain weight loss target.  I got my five pound star shown above.

I am glad for the high score, but where did the weight loss come from? I did not exercise much this week. (water weight?)

And this week was waffle cake week when I had 4 big waffle batter pancakes with butter and maple syrup.

I think my weight loss might have more to do with what I don’t eat then what I have been.

Since starting, I have given up soda, and my vending machine snack habit. I also used to hit up the EMU lunch buffet pretty hard with sugar cereal, burgers and often a snack/dessert. It is all one price there and they have soft serve and toppings. And then there was my daily cookie habit.

I do not expect to keep losing five pounds a week, but will takes this week’s success and enjoy it especially when the time may come when I may gain or hit a plateau.

From: Weight Watchers Upends Its Points System, by ELISSA GOOTMAN New York Times

“I just have one question,” the woman said. “How much is a potato latke? I need to know for tonight.”

“If I lived in the Caribbean, maybe I’d be able to make goal,” said Susan J. Slotkis, 64, an interior designer at the Park Avenue South meeting on Wednesday. “The pineapple is great; all the fruits are fresh; you’re never tempted to drink juice.” In the new system, oranges are free, but eight ounces of orange juice cost three points.

When my brother did WW, he had to account for fruit and veggies. A running joke at Weight Watchers meetings is how members rally against veggies.

“I don’t want to be forced to choose veggies. I do NOT like veggies or fruit,” one member wrote in an online discussion on the Weight Watchers Web site. “I feel like I am being forced to ‘diet,’ and that is what I DO NOT WANT.”

Does this mean you can eat all the fruit you want?

“We’re not talking about running home with a wheelbarrow full of grapes from a vineyard,” Lauren Cohen, a Weight Watchers group leader cautioned.

The saving grace seems to be bananas. Apples and Bananas used to be 2 Points, but now they are zero. Bananas and apples have been my go-to when I am hungry. You gotta love the idea of zero points food.

The free fruits and veggies works for me because I am a avid fruit and veggie fan having been a vegetarian for a while and practice macrobiotics for a spell.

Fruits and veggies are the best stuff on earth. They are healthy and great for us, so what is with the rebellion against them?

I figure it has to do with cooking. Many people do not cook, so when they eat fruits and especially veggies they are frozen or canned, which work in a pinch, but do not compare to fresh.

Think canned v. fresh green beans. We had canned green beans growing up and I hated them, but when I had my first fresh green bean I loved them. Go figure.

Chipotle Steak Burrito (rice, beans, steak salsa without cheese 18-20 points

OK, I lost some weight this week. I was really good and I follow the program and stayed within the “Points.”

Of course, Instantly I go into Fuzzy Weight Loss Math.

Basically, the math works like this. You take the weight you lost in say your first week on a program and you factor that result by lets say a year.

So the equation for me would be 1.1 (Lb) X 52 (weeks) = 57.2

I then figure/think…If I loose a bit more like say 1.4 pounds a week times 52 weeks, I will be at my goal in a year.

While not impossible…the key word here is FUZZY because this math does not factor the reality of real weight loss with ups and downs and all the rest.

My weight loss posts are about What Happens not Fuzzy Math

It is the new year and that means for many resolutions and that means for many weight loss.

Many will make and break resolutions and others will not make them at all thinking they do not work, but last Sunday’s New York Times reported that over 50% of people who make them actually keep them. I like those numbers.

So here goes.

OK. I admit it. I am overweight. Below is a picture taken last year around this time. The plan was to loose weight and be fitter, but I did not.

Today I weight about the same as the picture below, 237.5 Lbs (from my weight-in at Weight Watchers

Before 235 Pounds

I know a few people who went to Weight Watchers and had success, so this year I thought I would give it a try.

So what is the plan and were does my weight loss and this blog fit in?

The plan is pretty simple. I will attend Weight watchers once a week, follow the program and then report on this blog my results. (Thursday or Friday)

I will also still be talking a big food game on the blog and share recipes, but with a cooking light theme and for those on weight watchers folks, I will provide the “Points.”

Seared Pork Loin with mashed sweet potatoes w/butter and maple and saute apples and onions w/rosemary

My Resolution:

I resolve to live a healthy lifestyle (based in part in weight watchers) and to lose weight with the reasonable goal of loosing 1/2 to 2 pounds a week average toward  my goal weight of 165 pounds. (72.5 Pounds)

Some will recall my rebellious nature this year when it came to Thanksgiving dinner with my Alternative Thanksgiving idea post.

I guess I was still feeling that way when Christmas rolled around. Emily bought me a new pizza stone for Christmas and I have been looking to test ride it.

So I pitched the idea of doing pizza for Christmas. I figure it would be vetoed in the name of traditional or whatever, but to my surprise, it passed the vote in the house.

I think the offer to cook might have won everyone over. (smiles)

The beautiful dough ball above will be a personal pizza with special toppings.

Check out my Pizza at home Post for recipes/instruction

Happy Holidays

Jelly Doughnuts

Why was it that we never had doughnuts for Hanukkah growing up was a mystery. It was only when I started being a blogger that I did research into a traditional Hanukkah meal.

I basically make a batch of Latke for Hanukkah and have a little smoked salmon and call it good.

But little did I know that Jelly doughnuts were also apart of the tradition.

My family was in the Latke Camp. Apparently, when it comes to Hanukkah and fried delights there are the Jelly Doughnut (Sufganiot) and Latke (potato pancake) people.

The reason for the divide is that Sephardi Jews had more wheat (warmer climate) and the Eastern European Jews that I come from where potato (root crop) people.

The Israeli Jews (according to wikipedia) seemed to also be in the Doughnut camp. (warmer climate again maybe?)

So to honor my sunny climate brothers and sister and the greatness which is the Jelly doughnut, I have put them on the menu.

The doughnut recipe that I made were actually a Paczki Recipe, which Michigan folk knew is the large jelly-filled doughnut eaten on Fat Tuesday.

 Recipe Note:  (Follow the link to the recipe)

I used 6 eggs and not the egg york and I refrigerated the dough overnight.

Also make sure your doughnuts dough is thin. I tried to make them about an inch thick, but when I fried then they were raw in the center.

So I pressed them flat and fried them and they worked fine.

The recipes calls for the dough to rise for twenty minutes. This is a really sticky dough, so flour the surface well.

The recipe also calls to add the jelly BeFore frying, which I did not do.

I fried them.

And the make sure you use jelly, not preserve if piping.

I used preserves and it clogged up my piping bag, so I had to split the doughnuts and add jam, which actually worked out fine.

I figure that you can get a bunch of jams, preserves and curds and people can jam their own.

Enjoy

Strawberry and Lemon Curd

I am not sure when I came into my Eat More Kale sticker. It was a few years back and I put it on a journal notebook. It was my Eat More Kale notebook and I thought the slogan was pretty cool.

Kale is a kick ass food because it is a dark leafy green. The battle cry of nutritionist every where is “Eat more dark leafy greens” and Kale had the goods, but unless you were from the Southern USA or had a taste for white beans and kale soup, most people did not eat the stuff.

So when I saw the sticker, I thought this slogan is really saying something.

So I was surprised when I saw a NYT article a few days ago about the guy who started the Eat More Kale slogan and how he was actually being sued by Chik-fil-A to block his trademark of his slogan because they said would be confused with their slogan Eat Mor Chikin. (Really?)

In defense, Bo Mulller-Moore has started a petition against Chik-fil-a.

Check out his website for info on Eat More Kale stuff and to sign the petition.

In the mean time, Eat More Kale. Your body will thank you for it.

CB