Apple Chips. You know you will eat the whole bowl.

To answer your question: Yes, yet ANOTHER snack recipe. But honestly: Snacks are my weakness. I can prepare three healthy meals a day and not miss a thing but I would still totally love to go for potato chips and the like. This is why I included many healthy snacks into my diet.

This recipe is as simple as it gets: Apple Chips

Turkey Burger and Fries - The best kind of Fast Food!

What better way to enjoy the weekend than having a Burger and Fries? I love this combo as much as the next person, but believe me, this superb version of this fastfood will blow your mind! Because lettuce and a slice of tomato is just too mainstream...

I present to the: The ultimate Turkey Burger and Fries.

My weight loss journey: Up and down.

I started this blog 5 weeks ago, and of course started off with a post on why I want to lose weight.

As you know: I lost a lot of weight in one year, reaching Stage 3 on the way of my not-yet-decided goal. Then my weight stayed the same for a couple of months before spiraling up again at the end of last year. This is when I started this blog. So, to start my monthly posts about my weight loss progress I present you now: My weight loss journey in numbers:

Started // July 2012: 238.8 lbs  

Reached Stage 1 // November 2012: 218.4 lbs (- 20.4 lbs) 

Reached Stage 2 // April 2013: 210.2 lbs (-28.6 lbs) 

Reached Stage 3 // July 2013: 198.2 lbs (- 40.6 lbs) 

Lowest weight // October 2013: 195.2 lbs (- 43,6 lbs)

October 2013. This was a good time for me. But things quickly spiraled out of control from there. I had personal problems and turned to food for comfort as I've always done. Then came Christmas Time and tons of food. And then came January, showing me the results. Oh boy.

Re-Start // January 2014: 208.2 lbs (+ 13 lbs from lowest weight)

It was not really a shock when I saw those numbers on the scale. I expected it. I noticed the fat around my chin and hips returning. It was painful to drop behind Stage 3. But after getting way too close to Stage 2 I had to put a halt to this. And even though my weight has been going up and down like a buoy in the past weeks I'm happy to announce that the weight loss, over all, has started going again! Yeah!!

Going down // February 2014: 205 lbs (- 3.2 lbs since restart // -33.8 lbs in total // -5.1 lbs to go back to Stage 3)

Wohoo! Go me! My goal for now is to reach Stage 3 again. I'll worry about Stage 4 once I got there ;)

So, wish me luck!

Question of the day: How do you lose weight? Do you have one big goal? Do you have stages like me? Or do you just go on losing weight without worrying about a goal or stages?

Take care and be sexy,
Anna

Diet, casually - Fruits. The original Candy.

Let's talk about fruit, shall we?

I know there are many people who tend to avoid fruit, saying they have too much sugar. And I absolutely agree that you should try and avoid having too much sugar in your diet. But in the case of fruit-calories there's something to take into account: A calorie is not a calorie. I will explain this in a future post in more detail, but for now all you need to focus on is: The calories a fruit gives you are wayyyy better than the calories - let's say - a cookie will give you.

(Image Source)

Dessert and sweets: Fruits

Wow, big shocker here, right? But just hear me out!

I don't know about you but I tend to overeat. I'm only full when I'm REALLY full. 'Mentally satisfied' is what I call that moment when I don't crave more food. We're all taught to ignore the signals our body gives us. After all there is no real reason to have something like "dessert", right? You just had a big ass meal, why eat the same amount of calories you just consumed again, but this time in form of a piece of cake?

A couple of months ago I started bringing more fruit to work than usual. After lunchtime I go into the kitchen and cut up some really sweet fruits: maybe half a Mango or one persimmon, a couple of figs or a banana. Here's the fruit stash I have at work right now. A mango for dessert plus a banana and some mandarins to munch on over a period of 2 to 3 days in case I want to grab one of those evil cookies in the company kitchen.

 Tipp: While citrusy fruits like Oranges or Grapefruits are great throughout the day, they shouldn't necessarily be your first choice for dessert. Your stomach is full after a proper lunch. Piling acidy fruits on top of that may cause acid reflux. 

I make a point in bringing a little bowl with the fruit and a cup of tea to my workplace after I finished my meal, take a couple more minutes to enjoy my dessert and allow my head to become 'mentally satisfied'. For me it helps to silence the little voice in my head that screams for something unhealthy.

But keep this in mind: Just because fruits are awesome and healthy doesn't mean their calories don't count. 

The pile on the picture above, if I ate all of this at once, would contain around 450 to 500 calories. That's around 4  Pepperidge Farm Milk Chocolate Macadamia Cookies. A couple of pieces of fruit throughout the day will keep you full of energy and satisfied - but go easy, okay? As long as you're not a Raw Vegan, eating 30 bananas a day will lead to disaster. Just listen to your body. If you feel like you had enough fruit you probably had. I trust you on that ;)

But nonetheless: Always have at least one piece of fruit at work. I keep mine within eyeshot.

Hopefully this inspired you to buy some fruits when you head out for lunch today.

Until next time and be sexy,
Anna

Secret Veggie Pasta Bake - by Sorted Food

Today was a special Day!
A very dear friend of mine (*waves*) got a fabulous new kitchen and we dedicated our lunch to it by using both her stove and oven for the first time together.

So for this occasion we decided to use one of the delicious recipes by the amazing guys from SORTED Food: Their Secret Veggie Pasta Bake. Make sure to check out the video on their homepage as well!

Without further ado:  Secret Veggie Pasta Bake (And sorry if we didn't follow your recipie 100% boys, we still loved it ;) )