April Hustle Brings May Muscle

Con­grat­u­la­tions! You’ve com­pleted Day 1 of April boot camp. Only 15 (or 27 depend­ing how you’re count­ing) days to go…

Make the most of this month by fol­low­ing two sim­ple rules:
Log and Blog!

Log: You’ve prob­a­bly heard it hun­dreds of times: write your goals down. But do you know why this step is so impor­tant? When you put pen to paper, you turn your thoughts into some­thing tan­gi­ble. That’s why we strongly encour­age you to track your diet and fit­ness goals by writ­ing them down. You will quickly see how the act of writ­ing these things down helps keep you motivated.

Blog: Have you ever heard that work­ing out in a group is one of the best ways to stay moti­vated? It’s true! Hav­ing peo­ple there along­side you to share in your expe­ri­ence and encour­age you along the way is often­times the dif­fer­ence between a suc­cess­ful exer­cise plan and one that tends to fiz­zle out over time. Share in your chal­lenges and your suc­cesses with your fel­low BC4Cers, and be sup­port­ive of their efforts as well by check­ing this blog after every workout.

You can also stay in touch with your fel­low BC4Cers via our Face­book page. Go ahead… go there and Like us today!

Tell us how you’re doing on Day 1. Leave a com­ment by click­ing the “Com­ments” link at the top of this post.

Pay Up… and Then Move On

So you ate that cookie you were try­ing to avoid… or you stayed in bed instead of work­ing out… what do you do next? Do you for­give your­self and move on? Or do you crash even fur­ther into a tailspin?

Many folks feel so guilty that they throw their hands up in fail­ure and give in to even fur­ther temp­ta­tion before they get back on track. They think, “Well, I’ve already failed, so why bother even try­ing now?”

Don’t let this hap­pen to you. Every­one has a weak moment here and there — and that’s OK. If you fall into a trap, imme­di­ately rec­og­nize it and declare a con­se­quence for your­self. For exam­ple, give your­self extra chores around the house. Or, take away a weekly treat like your Fri­day night glass of wine.

By adding a con­se­quence to your slip-ups, you’ll stick to your work­out and diet rou­tine — or you’ll pay the piper — instead of feel­ing guilty.

How do you bounce back from temp­ta­tion? Share your thoughts by click­ing “Com­ments” above.

Boost Your ‘Good Fats’

Excerpted From Pre­ven­tion Mag­a­zine, on MSNBC

Incor­po­rat­ing “good” unsat­u­rated fats into a fruit-veggie-lean-protein-whole-grain diet helped peo­ple with pre­di­a­betes reduce their risk of devel­op­ing full-blown type 2 by almost 60 per­cent, accord­ing to a land­mark gov­ern­ment study. And now, emerg­ing research points to monoun­sat­u­rated fatty acids (MUFAs) in par­tic­u­lar as poten­tial super­heroes for con­trol­ling blood sugar, reduc­ing insulin resis­tance, and fight­ing belly fat specif­i­cally vis­ceral belly fat, the dan­ger­ous kind found deep in your abdomen and strongly asso­ci­ated with pre­di­a­betes and diabetes.

Of course, you can’t sim­ply add lots of choco­late or hand­fuls of nuts to an unhealthy diet and expect great results. The key is to work right-size por­tions of oil, olives, nuts and seeds, avo­ca­dos, and dark choco­late into the mix of healthy foods you’ll eat at every meal.

Read the full arti­cle for a closer look at how these five fab foods help fight dia­betes and boost your health, plus some deli­cious recipes you can try today.

Good fats include:

1. Oils — Canola oil, flaxseed oil, olive oil, peanut oil, pesto sauce, saf­flower oil, sesame oil, soy­bean oil, sun­flower oil, wal­nut oil
2. Olives — Black olives, black olive tape­nade, green olives, green olive tapenade
3. Nuts and Seeds — Almonds, Brazil nuts, nat­ural peanut but­ter, dry-roasted cashews, dry-roasted peanuts, dry-roasted sun­flower seeds, hazel­nuts, macadamia nuts, pecans, pine nuts, pis­ta­chios, roasted pump­kin seeds, sun­flower seeds, walnuts
4. Avo­ca­dos — Florida avo­cado, Hass avocado
5. Dark Choco­late — Dark or semi­sweet choco­late chips, shav­ings, or chunks—aim for cacao con­tent of 70 per­cent or higher

Recipe of the Week: Chicken Crusted with Almond and Flax

This recipe for lean chicken fea­tures a won­der­ful crust of almonds and flax with no fry­ing. Almond but­ter can amp up the mari­nade, along with gar­lic and some clas­sic herbs. Add a lit­tle kick (or a lot) with cayenne pep­per and paprika. Flaxseed con­tains the plant form of omega-3 fats. Sci­en­tists gen­er­ally agree that includ­ing more omega-3s (also found in cold water fish) in our diet pro­vides heart health benefits.

INGREDIENTS

• 4 (4 oz.) bone­less chicken breasts
• 1/4 cup almond meal (crushed almonds may be substituted)
• 2 Tbsp. ground flax meal
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 Tbsp. olive oil
• 1 Tbsp. almond but­ter, optional
• 1 tsp. lemon juice
• 2 cloves gar­lic, minced
• 1/4 tsp. cayenne pep­per or to taste
• 1/4 tsp. paprika
• 1 tsp. dried parsley
• 1 tsp. dried thyme
• 1 tsp. dried basil
• 1 tsp. dried oregano

PREPARATION

1. Pre­heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Using kitchen mal­let, pound breasts uni­formly flat, if desired.
3. Com­bine almond and flax meal and salt in small bowl and stir to mix uniformly.
4. Com­bine oil, almond but­ter (if using), lemon juice, gar­lic and all spices and herbs in medium bowl. Mix thor­oughly. Add chicken to mix­ture and let mar­i­nate for at least 5 minutes.
5. Remove chicken from mari­nade and place on bak­ing dish. Sprin­kle half of almond-flax mix­ture evenly over chicken. Pat each breast with your hand to ensure it adheres and forms a crust. Gen­tly turn over each breast, being care­ful not to dis­turb coat­ing, and repeat the process using remain­ing almond-flax mixture.
6. Bake 25 to 30 min­utes or until meat ther­mome­ter reaches 165 degrees F when inserted into chicken.

NUTRITIONAL INFO
Makes 4 servings.

Per serv­ing: 210 calo­ries, 11 g total fat (1.5 g sat­u­rated fat), 3 g car­bo­hy­drate, 25 g pro­tein, 2 g dietary fiber, 300 mg sodium.

Save 100 Calories: Lunch & Dinner

Mak­ing small changes in your diet can save you calo­ries in small places where you won’t taste the dif­fer­ence but your body will know the dif­fer­ence. Eat­ing 100 less calo­ries a day (or 100 more calo­ries a day) adds up to about 10 pounds in a year. So 200 calo­ries less = 20 pounds, 300 calo­ries less = 30 pounds, etc. – small changes add up!

We are post­ing a series of arti­cles that will pro­vide you with tips on sav­ing 100 calo­ries at every meal, includ­ing snacks. Today we have tips for lunch and din­ner — typ­i­cally your two larger meals of the day.

• Sand­wich on Kaiser roll vs. hero (160)
• Sand­wich on 2 slices bread vs. roll or wrap (80−100)
• Scoop roll or hero (tak­ing out 1–2 oz of bread) ( 80–160)
• For your sand­wich, make a let­tuce roll-up vs. wrap bread ( 200+)
• Remove skin from chicken (100)
• Grilled chicken sand­wich vs. breaded (150)
• Broth or tomato based soup vs. cream (100+)
• Cup of soup vs. bowl (80+)
• Omit the oys­ter crack­ers soup (200)
• Omit cheese (1.5 oz) from sand­wich sub­sti­tute roasted pep­pers and other veg­gies (100+)
• Omit cheese in salad. Sub­sti­tute another veg­etable (100+)
• |3 oz extra lean ham or turkey breast vs. salami, bologna or corned beef (150)
• Pizza slice w/ veg­gies vs. meat (100)
• Thin crust pizza vs. reg­u­lar (100)
• 3 oz 99% fat free ground turkey vs. 85% fat ground beef (150)
• Eat open faced sand­wich on one piece bread (80+)
• Use light bread or Arnold sand­wich flat vs. reg­u­lar sliced bread (80)
• Deli turkey sand­wich vs. tuna salad sand­wich (300)
• Make tuna salad with1 T. low fat mayo or plain yogurt vs. reg­u­lar mayo (65)
• Use 93% lean ground beef, 4 oz vs. 80% lean (120)
• Sir­loin, 6 oz, vs. rib eye steak (260)
• Tuna packed in water vs. oil (100)
• Steamed shrimp over fried, 3 oz (120)
• Leave 10 french fries on your plate (100)
• Skip crou­tons in your salad (100)
• Choose coleslaw over potato salad (100)
• Order veg­gie burger vs. beef burger (175+)
• 6 oz pork ten­der­loin vs. lamb loin (215)
• 6 oz white meat chicken w/o skin vs. duck w/o skin (140)

Did you miss our break­fast tips?