Protein Overnight Oats Strawberry Edition

My meals have been pretty bland lately (minus the couple outings around town), so I decided to switch up my usually egg white breakfast for some overnight protein oatmeal! I had a nearly empty smuckers sugarfree blackberry jar so I used that cause lets be real I hate doing dishes!

So here is the recipe:

1/3 C Oatmeal

2/3 C Almond milk

1/4 C Plain Non Fat Greek Yogurt

1/2 Scoop Cellucor Strawberry Milk Shake Protein Powder

and the little reminents of the sugar free blackberry jam (about 1 TB)

2/3 C Fresh Strawberries

Mix all your ingredients minus the strawberries in your jar and put in the fridge overnight! Either heat them up (1:30 min) or eat them cold and top with strawberries! and Enjoy! Cant wait to try these in the morning! 

Macronutrients:

264 Calories

4 G Fat

27 G Carbs

21 G Protein

Enjoy! 

Black Bean Peanut Butter Brownies

Finally made the Black Bean brownies that so many people have been raving about! And yet again a quite delicious clean eating dessert success! This recipe was inspired by joefearn so if your on instagram make sure you follow him! 

Here is this easy peasy recipe! Hope you all enjoy! 

Black Bean Peanut Butter Brownies! 

1.5 Cups Black Beans (1 can)

3 T unsweetened Cocoa

1/2 C Oats

1/3 C Walden Farms Pancake Syrup

2 Packets Stevia

2 t vanilla

2 t baking powder

4 T peanut butter (try and use natural)

Preheat your oven to 350. Begin by combing all ingrediants except the peanut butter in a blender. And blend till basically smooth (it will be thick!). Fill a sprayed brownie pan with your mixture. Next heat your peanut butter for 1 min in the microwave. Slowly drop little amounts of peanut butter in the brownies. Then use a tooth pick to swirl the two together. Place in the oven for about 15-20 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean! 

Then enjoy! 

Macronutrients (makes 12 brownies):

71.7 calories

3 g fat

9.1 g carbs

3.6 g protein

Have a wonder last week of February! 

Protein Chocolate Rice Krispies

Found this recipe from http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/livefit-recipes-chocolate-peanut-butter-protein-crisp.html. Mine is similar but a little bit different! And better for those with gluten issues. 

Protein Chocolate Rice Krispies

4 Cups Rice Krispies

1 Scoop Vanilla Protein Powder

1/4 Cup Crushed Almonds

3/4 Cup Natural Peanut Butter

1/2 C Agave

5 packets Stevia

3 Tb Unsweetened Dark Coco Powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

Combine Peanut butter, agave, stevia, unsweetened coco powder and vanilla, melt in microwave till melted. Add in rice krispies, protein powder and almonds. Mix with rubber spatula and put in square container with parchment paper. 

Freeze for about and hour and then cut into 15 pieces! 

Macronutrients:

158 calories

7.7 grams fat

18.7 grams carbs

5.6 grams protein

BBQ Chicken Cauliflower Pizza

Pizza!!! Umm to any one on a diet its like a death word! But with the new healthy alternatives and substitutions anyone on any real diet can now have pizza! 

Let me just tell you first off the flavors on this pizza were delicious! With that being said, my dad did quote "It's no pizza but it is good." Yes its almost impossible to eat with your hands so if you are looking for that super thick crust that you find at costco well this recipe may not be for you. But for those of us just wanting a little taste of something similar to pizza well this is the recipe for you! 

First of let me give credit to http://slfit.net/cauliflowerpizza/ which is where I found my cauliflower crust recipe, but what I put on top of it is all mine. And thats the best part you can be so creative with this recipe! 

If you do end up making the recipe be sure to leave me a comment about what all you added to yours! 

BBQ Chicken Pizza

2/3 Head Cauliflower

6 oz chicken (grilled earlier)

Walden Farms sweet BBQ sauce

1 Roma Tomato

1/2 Cup non fat mozzarella cheese

2 TB garlic

2 Egg whites

A couple slices red onion

1 TB Oregano 

Cilantro

Preheat oven to 425. Pulse the Cauliflower in a blender or food processor till you get rice like consistency.

Then sauté with garlic and oregano on low heat for about 5 min. Combine 2 egg whites and mix through. Place Cauliflower mixture on baking pan and make your curst whatever shape you want!

 Bake for 15 minutes until crust turns yellow color and sides begin to brown. 

In mean time marinate your chicken with a little BBQ sauce and chop the veggies. After 15 minutes pull out the crust. Top with more BBQ sauce, cheese, chicken, red onion, and tomato. Cook for another 5 minutes. Finally top with cilantro and devour!

Macronutrients: 

167 Calories for half a pizza

1.2 grams of fat

26.9 grams carbs

24.7 grams protein 

Hope you all enjoyed your presidents day weekend and continue to have an amazing 2013! 

What I typically eat

So I have had a lot of recent questions as to what I tend to eat on a daily basis, well obviously that changes from day to day but this is a typical look at the various foods that I eat: 

Grains, Carbs and Starches:

Oatmeal (literally have this almost every moring, its cheap and easy and you can change it up all the time)

Quinoa (it has protein in it)

Brown Rice

Sweet Potatoes

Rice Cakes (look for low salt)

Veggies:

Basically anything

Spaghetti Squash

Zucchini 

Brussel Sprouts

Cucumber

Sweet Peppers

Spinach

Lettuce

Broccoli

Edamame 

Carrots

*remember that all these have the best nutrients when they are not cooked

Fruits:

Basically Anything

bananas

apples

blueberries

Strawberries

*I tend to limit these to 1-2 servings a day or else I tend to feel bloated but its up to you

Dairy:

Fat Free Cottage cheese (good protein too)

Fat Free Greek Yogurt (good protein too)

Almond Milk

Protein:

Egg Whites

Chicken

Turkey

Tuna

Salmon

Protein Powder (get a flavor you like! Its an easy way to increase your protein intake)

Fat:

Avocado

Nuts (almonds and cashews are my go to)

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Peanut Butter

Toppings:

Salsa

Sirachi 

Greek Yogurt

Cinnamon 

Vanilla extract 

Sugar free jams

Walden Farms (check it out zero calorie sweets and dressings)

PB2

I eat anywhere from 1500-2000 calories on a day, if you are training hard you need the calories dont worry about the intake as much as what food you are intaking, and that you are getting the proper nutrients. I eat around 6 meals a day that are about 250-300 calories each. This is how I eat and its not fit for everyone so see how it works for you and go from there. I recommend getting the myfitnesspal app it helps to keep track of all your calories by more importantly your nutrients which is the major component for example I like to have my protein intake at about 145 g, carbs at 120-160 g and fats 40 g a day. Again this is just for me and I am not an expert but this works for me.

Hope some of you find this helpful! Have a wonderful rest of of the week and enjoy the love of Valentines day! 

-Daniella 

Banana Protein Muffins

So I was inspired by Blogilates Paleo Almond Muffin Recipe (http://www.blogilates.com/recipe-index/paleo-almond-muffin-recipe#) and decided to make something a little similar and boy were they delicious!

Not only did this smell amazing cooking but they are that perfect little something to hit that sweet tooth craving! Plus they are packed with good nutrients to keep you fueled for the day whether you have them for breakfast, dessert or a snack!

Banana Protein Muffins:

2 Mashed bananas (I used frozen but I would recommend using fresh)

1/2 C Almond flour (or in my case blended almonds till they form a powder)

1/2 C Vanilla Protein Powder

1 Tbsp PB2

1 Tbsp Cinnamon

1/2 C Egg Whites

Mix all ingredients together and bake at 350 for about 25 min (probably less if you use fresh bananas).

I made 9 muffins with this recipe and topped a couple of them with blueberries! But you could add slivered almonds, raisins, cranberries, dates anything your heart really desires!

So Yummy and guilt free! 

Macronutrients:

83 calories

3.2 G Fat

7.9 G Carbs

7.3 G Protein

Hope you enjoy and have a blessed week! 

Squats Squats and More Squats

Hopping that this quote is pretty accurate and based off of my calorie burn yesterday I saw its pretty dang close to being true!

Plus besides it is one of the only real exercises to get that booty nice and toned and we all want that dont we?!?

So here is the fun well not so fun but sure to work squat workout as taught to me by my little brother:



All you need as a timer to watch and a barbell with some amount of weight I do a 50 lb barbell and I am 5'8 and 145 pounds so you can be the judge of what weight is best for you. Set up your station put the weight on your back and your ready to begin. The workout entails 13x 13 sets of squats slow and low. 3 seconds up and 3 seconds down no resting or pausing at the top or bottom until you are done with a set. You start a new set every 2 minutes. So that is 1 min 18 sec squatting and 42 seconds rest until you are done with all 13 sets! Thats it!

Basically is 26 minutes of squatting getting that booty nice and toned! Enjoy and have fun keeping that bikini body all year long!

Banana Chocolate Protein Cookies

So I made these the other day for the Superbowl and when the guys at the party found out they were healthy they were shocked! The girls couldn't get enough of them! They were very similar to no bake oatmeal cookies except for the fact that I baked mine and mine are clean eats!

Banana Chocolate Protein Cookies:
1 Mashed Banana
4 Egg Whites
2 Scoops Cookies and cream protein powder
2 Cups Oatmeal
2 TB craisins
1/2 t vanilla
2 packets stevia

Mix all ingredients together and bake at 350 for 10 min- Makes 12 cookies

After they were cooled I dipped them in some Walden Farms Chocolate Sauce :) Can we say yummy?!?!

Macronutrients: 

95 Calories

13 G Carbs
1 G Fat
7 G Protein

Enjoy My fitness friends!!!

Arms and Cardio

So Im forever trying to find new ways to change up my workouts and routines partially to hopefully keep changing my body for the better and also to avoid the boredom that can come along with doing the same routines over and over.

I love to lift weights but sometimes I hate doing my cardio afterwards but this workout kept my heart rate up the entire time and made the whole 30 min cardio session not really a 30 min horrid cardio session so here is what I did :)

Run at a 6.5 for 10 min
Then 2 arm exercises
Run at a 7.0 for 5 min
2 more arm exercises
Run at a 7.0 for 5 min
2 more arm exercises
Run at 7.0 for 5 min
2 more arm exercises
Run at 7.0 for 5 min
2 more arm exercises

And then boom finished!!!

Here are the arm strength training exercises that I did and my weights:
1. Laying down tricep kick ups (5x5 at 20 lbs) subsetted with isolation bicep curls (5x5 at 22.5 lbs)
2. Straight arm front raises (5x5 at 17.5 lbs) subsetted with hammer curls (5x5 at 22.5 lbs)
3. Lateral raises (5x5 at 15 lbs) subsetted with tricep kick backs (5x5 at 15 lbs)
4.  Single arm tricep overhead extensions (10x5 at 20 lbs) subsetted with tricep dips heels lifted (10x5 at 45lb plate)
5.  Bicep curls (10x5 at 17.5 lbs) subsetted with shoulder bicep rotations (12x5 at 15 lbs)

Arms were jello by then end of this! And I was sweating up a storm, according to my polar FT40 I burned over 600 calories in my workout!

Hope you all enjoy and are keeping up with your new goals!

Avocado Chicken Mash

Chicken salad has always been popular! Although the mass amounts of mayo and or other dressings that end up in it tend to make it more on the unhealthy end :(

So I came up with a new creation filled with protein and good for you fats and none of the processed mayos out of a jar... Introducing the avocado chicken mash!

Avocado chicken mash:
1 large avocado
1 Cup Shredded Chicken
Mustard to taste
1-2 tablespoons finely chopped red onion
Couple banana peppers
Sprinkle of garlic, chili powder, and pepper flakes.

Mix and mash all ingredients until mashed together! That's it that simple! You can eat it straight out of your container, put it on some lettuce cups, make a sandwich or do what I did and spread it across a rice cake, topped with some tomatoes!

This can also be made with a can of Tuna and tastes great!

Nutrients for Chicken Mash: (3 Servings)
150 Calories
4 G Carbs
9 G Fat
13 G Protein

Nutrients for Tuna Mash: (2 Servings)
127 Calories
3 G Carbs
4 G Fat
11 G Protein

Leg Workout=== Turning my legs to jello!

I am in a total love hate relationship with Leg Day lately, I am finally seeing the results that I have been after for a while, yet the aftermath of how I feel well makes me hate it (in the best way possible)!!!

I came to realization that I was doing too much weight on a lot of my leg exercises and not getting the full range of motion (Ass to grass isn't just a saying!), and then on some of them I definitely wasn't going heavy enough! Clearly I was just all mixed up! But I am on the right track now and can already see the improvements over the last couple of weeks!

By the way I do 5x5 of the majority of my lifts (I go as heavy as I can with proper form, and yes I know that these sets normally help build muscle not just tone. But I needed to switch up my routine for a bit).

So here was my leg day workout:

1. 10 Min on the stepper at a level 13
2. Hack Squat 5x5 at 115 lbs with Hack Squat Machine Calf Raises 5x20 at 115 lbs
3. Smith Machine Single Leg Squats 5x5 at 135 lbs with Sumo Squats  5x20 at 35 lbs
4. Smith Machine Squats 5x5 at 155 lbs with lateral lunges 5x20
5. Glut Kick back machine 5x5 at 90lbs with 3rd step step ups 5x20
6. Quad Extensions 5x5 at 90lbs with toes out calf raises 5x20
7.  Laying Hamstring Curls  5x5 at 80 lbs with calf raise squats  5x20
8. Finished with 15 min Incline walking 30% at speed 2.5

Needless to say my legs are feeling like jello but I am loving it!

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend and make sure to get your fitness on!