Recipe of the Week: Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower

From Rodale

If child­hood mem­o­ries of smelly boiled broc­coli have kept you from enjoy­ing cru­cif­er­ous veg­eta­bles, this cook­ing method may very well change your mind. Bak­ing lightly oiled broc­coli and cau­li­flower until crisp-tender inhibits the release of any unpleas­ant sul­phur aro­mas. Tossed with sweet cit­rus just before serv­ing, the veg­etable mel­lows even more.

Ingre­di­ents

• 4 cups broc­coli florets
• 4 cups cau­li­flower florets
• 5 tea­spoons extra vir­gin olive oil
• 1/2 tea­spoon salt
• 1/8 tea­spoon ground black pepper
• 1 tea­spoon grated lemon peel
• 1 tea­spoon grated orange peel

Direc­tions

1. Pre­heat the oven to 450°F. Coat a large bak­ing sheet with cook­ing spray.
2. Com­bine the broc­coli and cau­li­flower in a large bowl. Toss with the oil, salt, and pep­per. Spread over the pre­pared bak­ing sheet and cook, stir­ring occa­sion­ally, until crisp-tender and slightly browned, 20 to 22 min­utes. Return to the bowl and toss with the lemon and orange peels.

Nutri­tional Facts
per serv­ing

CALORIES 98.3 CAL
FAT 6.2 G
SATURATED FAT 0.9 G
CHOLESTEROL 0 MG
SODIUM 339.9 MG
CARBOHYDRATES 9.3 G
TOTAL SUGARS 2.4 G
DIETARY FIBER 4.7 G
PROTEIN 4.1 G

Eat This, Not That: Wake Up and Go

Thank you to all the friends that joined us today. We had a huge turnout, which is good news for our push-up challenge!

We hope that all of our new friends enjoyed the work­out as much as we always do. When you have a moment, sign up and join us for a full month. In the mean­time, enjoy this arti­cle about the best way to start your day…

Here’s the 6th and last install­ment of the six research-backed quick cures wait­ing for you in the fresh pro­duce bins and super­mar­ket shelves.

When You Need to Wake Up and Go…

Eat This:
Eggs and Whole-Wheat Toast

Eggs are a great source of pro­tein, and hav­ing them for break­fast sets you up for a per­fect day of eat­ing. Saint Louis Uni­ver­sity researchers found that peo­ple who eat eggs for break­fast con­sume 264 fewer calo­ries the rest of the day than those who eat bagels and cream cheese.

Not That!
Bagel and Cream Cheese

At 500 calo­ries and 20 grams of fat, this deli dis­as­ter is one of the worst ways to start your day. Sixty grams of fast-burning car­bo­hy­drates will cause a dip in energy and a spike in hunger, long before lunchtime. The same goes for crois­sants, dan­ish, donuts, and pancakes.

Mission possible: A fast, easy low-carb angel food

BY J.M. HIRSCH
ASSOCIATED PRESS

This cake is easy to love because it is fast and sim­ple to make, is deli­cious and is great for dieters. It makes a stan­dard size angel food cake, but has just 133 calo­ries, 3.5 grams of fat, 23 grams of pro­tein and 2.75 grams of car­bo­hy­drates per quar­ter of the cake. That’s right. Per quar­ter of the cake.

It seemed impos­si­ble. I wanted to make a zero-sugar, low-carb ver­sion of a cake that is made from almost noth­ing but sugar and carbs.

And it took 20-something attempts. But after many dis­ap­point­ing – and some down­right dis­gust­ing – ver­sions, I finally man­aged to bake an amaz­ing and sweet angel food cake that rises beau­ti­fully and has the same del­i­cate, almost spongy tex­ture as tra­di­tional recipes.

My moti­va­tion was sim­ple – Mom. A long­time vegan, she has lived with­out her (and my) favorite cake for decades. But she recently started eat­ing egg whites again, which put angel food back on the table. Except she isn’t eat­ing sugar and is try­ing to limit carbohydrates.

Angel food cake has three pri­mary ingre­di­ents – egg whites, sugar and flour. Egg whites and sugar are whipped until they form a thick, airy bat­ter, then flour is gen­tly folded in. Could I make a cake with only one of the key ingredients?

From the start, struc­ture was the chal­lenge. Using egg whites and the nat­ural sugar alter­na­tive known as ste­via, I was able to bake up cakes with the proper taste. And they would rise beau­ti­fully in the oven. But as soon as they came out, they wilted into near pud­dles of cooked dough.

To get the struc­ture I needed, I turned to two ingre­di­ents pop­u­lar in gluten-free bak­ing – guar gum and xan­than gum. Most baked goods get their lift and struc­ture by work­ing the gluten (a type of pro­tein) in wheat flour until it forms bonds that trap air. Peo­ple who avoid gluten need to find a way around this, so they use other ingre­di­ents to repli­cate those bonds.

The cake still needed dry ingre­di­ents, and for that I turned to more egg whites. A blend of pow­dered egg whites and egg– or whey-based pro­tein pow­der was a good start. A bit of almond flour com­pleted the dry mix, giv­ing the cake a bit of extra body.

A cou­ple things to keep in mind:

• Tra­di­tional angel food cake is made from a very del­i­cate bat­ter. This is why the flour is gen­tly folded into the whipped egg whites by hand. The bat­ter in this ver­sion is much stur­dier and eas­ily stands up to using the mixer to add the dry ingre­di­ents at the end.
• Whey or egg white pro­tein pow­ders are widely avail­able in the grocer’s nat­ural foods or pro­tein bar sec­tions. Look for a brand that doesn’t con­tain sugar. We used Biochem’s 100 Per­cent Whey Pro­tein vanilla powder.
• Pow­dered egg whites are exactly what they sound like. They are sold in the bak­ing aisle.
• The recipe was writ­ten to be gluten-free. If you aren’t avoid­ing gluten, it also can be made sub­sti­tut­ing 1/4 cup cake flour for the 1/4 cup almond flour called for.
• Want to make a choco­late ver­sion? Sub­sti­tute 1/4 cup unsweet­ened cocoa pow­der for the pow­dered egg whites.
• If you pur­chase pack­aged liq­uid egg whites at the gro­cer, be sure they are appro­pri­ate for whip­ping. Some brands will not whip; the car­tons usu­ally are marked to indi­cate this.
• Xan­than gum and guar gum are widely avail­able in the gluten-free sec­tion of most gro­cers. Almond flour gen­er­ally is sold in this sec­tion, too.

Get the recipe →

How to Burn Your Holiday Belly

It’s no secret our hol­i­day tra­di­tions cause weight gain. The Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion reports most peo­ple gain five to 10 pounds between Thanks­giv­ing and New Year. Overindul­gence in alco­hol, desserts and tra­di­tional hol­i­day treats along with spend­ing more time eat­ing and less time exer­cis­ing may leave you with a lit­tle extra bulge in your belly.

If you are guilty of overeat­ing dur­ing the hol­i­days, here are some tips to get you back on track and burn off your hol­i­day belly.

1. Drink 80 oz. of water daily.

Drink­ing 80 oz. of water or more is one of the most impor­tant things you can do on a daily basis. It’s as nat­ural as you can get. There are no added calo­ries, or cho­les­terol, and none of those unhealthy addi­tives you find in other drinks.

Another ben­e­fit of drink­ing water is that it helps remove tox­ins from your body. It helps trans­port food from one part of your body’s diges­tive track all the way to the very end. Fur­ther­more, dehy­dra­tion can affect your metab­o­lism which can delay weight loss. Drink up.

2. Replace cof­fee with green tea.

Green tea can help boost your metab­o­lism and burn fat more quickly. It also con­tains caf­feine and antiox­i­dants. Green tea helps reg­u­late glu­cose, fight heart dis­ease, pre­vent can­cer, and reduce inflammation.

Another way green tea is good for burn­ing belly fat is because it is a nat­ural diuretic that helps reduce water weight from the body. This makes you look less bloated and helps clean out your sys­tem each time you drink.

3. Eat lots of fruits and veggies.

Fruits and veg­eta­bles are weight loss all-stars. Not only are they low in calo­ries and high in fiber, they con­tains antiox­i­dants that boost your health. It’s impor­tant to eat a wide vari­ety of col­or­ful fruits and veg­eta­bles every day to reap opti­mum health benefits.

4. Choose bet­ter carbohydrates.

Get rid of white sugar and processed car­bo­hy­drates and choose instead to eat whole grains. Good sources include: steel oats, brown rice, whole grains, yams, sweet pota­toes and legumes.

Eat car­bo­hy­drates after an intense work­out when your body is most recep­tive and will con­vert them to energy. Also include pro­tein and fats in your daily meals.

5. Stay active.

It can help you imme­di­ately feel bet­ter. Car­dio exer­cise can include brisk walk­ing, run­ning, bik­ing, danc­ing, or cross-country ski­ing. Doing car­dio four to five times a week with com­bi­na­tion of weight train­ing two to three times a week is a great way to burn body fat.

If you are not see­ing results, increase the inten­sity of your car­dio exer­cise. But give your­self time to see results. The key is to stay active.

We all overindulge from time to time but get­ting back on track is one of the best ways to deal with the stress and anx­i­ety that comes from overeating.

Start now. With each healthy choice you make, remem­ber your com­mit­ment to stay healthy and fit year-round while quickly burn­ing off your hol­i­day belly.

Source: Active​.com

Snooze-Friendly Snacks

Remem­ber to place your bid to become Trainer for the Day. Jeff Leonard, Julie Adams and Kate Schin­del are the new lead­ers with an $80 bid. Get in on the action… pool your money with up to 2 friends and place your bids today! Get all of the details and place your bid here →

Well-planned bed­time snacks can help keep hunger pangs from wak­ing you dur­ing the night while pro­mot­ing rest­ful­ness. Rather than eat­ing ice cream or tor­tilla chips straight from the pack­ages, which sets you up for overeat­ing, try rea­son­able por­tions of sleep-friendly foods:

Warm milk with honey. In addi­tion to pro­vid­ing warmth and com­fort, this snack pro­vides valu­able amounts of tryp­to­phan, car­bo­hy­drates and cal­cium — a min­eral that enhances mus­cle relaxation.

Banana with nut but­ter. Bananas and nuts also pro­vide tryp­to­phan and car­bo­hy­drates, with the added ben­e­fit of healthy fat. For added cal­cium, choose almond butter.

Air-popped pop­corn. As a whole grain, pop­corn pro­vides more vit­a­mins, min­er­als, fiber and pro­tein than snacks such as french fries and chips. To guard against night­time bloat­ing, use nat­ural herbs and spices instead of salt.

Turkey on whole grain toast. Tryp­to­phan is blamed for post-Thanksgiving feast grog­gi­ness. Although overeat­ing and alco­hol are usu­ally stronger influ­ences, turkey does con­tain the calmness-boosting chem­i­cal. The NSF sug­gests pair­ing it with bread for opti­mum sleep enhanc­ing benefits.

Oat­meal. Oat­meal, another nutri­tious whole grain food, pro­vides more fiber and pro­tein than low-fiber cere­als, such as puffed rice and corn flakes. For tryp­to­phan ben­e­fits, pre­pare oat­meal with low-fat milk and top it with nuts or sliced banana.

Yogurt. Yogurt, like other dairy prod­ucts, pro­vides valu­able amounts of cal­cium, pro­tein, tryp­to­phan and car­bo­hy­drates. To main­tain low sugar intake near bed­time, swap your usual ice cream out for yogurt topped with fresh or frozen berries and whole grain granola.

Read more at LIVE​STRONG​.COM →