New Supermarket Finds

From Suggestions from blogs/emails/in person, I have found 4 new buys that are pretty much awesome!


Aunt Jemima's Confetti Pancakes/Waffles
These are super cool. I had the pancakes this morning for breakfast! they are Made with love, not preservatives. Good source of 6 vitamins and minerals. The nutritional stats are 3 pancakes for 260 Calories or 2 waffles for 160 Calories. They taste like the traditional funfetti cake! I can now feel like it's my Birthday everyday! ;) I had my pancakes with sugar free syrup and a side of melon for breakfast! (I will in the near future try my own version of these with Heart Smart Baking Mix!)

Fiber One 90 Calorie Brownies
Let your taste buds be your guide! I had one of these for the first time last night during my C++ programming class. My wonderful friend Sherin brought one for dessert for class, but we swapped desserts that night (I gave her a piece of peach upside down cake). These taste really good and are of relatively large size. What's great about Fiber one is that it allows you to get 20% daily fiber value, and it tastes like chocolate. They come in two different flavors, chocolate peanut butter and chocolate fudge brownies (and they are only 90 calories and taste amazing!)

Chobani Champions
I have done a post before about Greek Yogurt, and I recently discovered these and they are awesome! They smaller packs of yogurt (4 to a pack), but are only 100 calories. They are meant for kids, but I think they are great. They come in two different varieties, VeryBerry (filled with strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries) and Honey-Nana (bananas and honey). Both are really fantastic and are packed full of protein, which leaves you feeling full longer!

Wrigley's Extra Dessert Delights Mint Chocolate Chip
So I lied, this one actually isn't all that new. I have been chewing the different flavors of the Dessert Delights for over a year now. My favorite is the Mint Chocolate Chip. It tastes like a York Peppermint Paddy! Each stick of gum is less than 5 calories, which saves those empty calories you would be eating if you had a giant bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream. This gum always takes the edge off of me when I'm feeling really hungry, but don't have time to eat right away because I'm busy at work. This is my favorite gum of all time and I carry it around with my in both my backpack and my purse!

Strawberry Short Stack

I just came back from a wedding in Sedona this weekend. It was absolutely beautiful. My amazing friend Karlyn married her best friend Jon and I couldn't be happier for them. Although the time change has thrown me off, and my busy underpaid graduate student life and lack of sleep has been keeping me pretty busy, here is a breakfast I made right before I left for AZ. Super amazing in every way. Again, its like dessert for breakfast! Who wouldn't like it!

Ingredients
Serving Size: Entire Recipe
Calories-289
1/3 cup whole-wheat flour
2 tbsp. old-fashioned oats
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 no-calorie sweetener packet (like Splenda)
Dash salt
1/4 cup fat-free liquid egg substitute (like Egg Beaters Original)
1 tbsp. light vanilla soymilk
2 tbsp. sugar-free strawberry preserves
1/2 cup sliced strawberries
1/4 cup Cool Whip Free, thawed
Optional: Fat Free Reddi-wip, sugar-free pancake syrup

Directions:
To make the batter, combine flour, oats, baking powder, sweetener, and salt in a bowl. Add egg substitute, soymilk, and 2 tbsp. water. Mix well and set aside.

Place preserves in a microwave-safe bowl and nuke for 20 seconds, until softened and warm. Stir into pancake batter until thoroughly integrated.

Bring a skillet sprayed with nonstick spray to medium-high heat. Add half the batter to form a large pancake. Cook for 2 - 3 minutes, until pancake begins to bubble and is solid enough to flip. Gently flip and cook for an additional 1 - 2 minutes, until both sides are lightly browned and inside is cooked through. Plate your pancake and set aside.

Remove skillet from heat, re-spray, and return to medium-high heat. Repeat with remaining batter to make a second pancake, and then set that aside as well.

While pancakes cool slightly, combine strawberries with Cool Whip in a bowl and lightly stir. Spoon this mixture evenly over one pancake, and then place the second pancake lightly on top.

If you like, add a squirt of Reddi-wip and a drizzle of pancake syrup. Woohoo!

Mango-Mango Pancakes

New Recipe I made this morning. It is a variation on the banana pancakes recipe I did a while back, but with a little twist. My aunt had bought mangos from Costco a while ago, and we still had a ton as of this morning. So I decided to make mango pancakes with them.

I love fresh tropical fruit, especially during the summer time! And boy do these things taste like summer!

Ingredients
Number of Servings-5 (2 Pancakes)
Calories- approx. 215
Heart Smart Bisquick (pancake and baking mix)-2 cups
Fat free skim milk or vanilla soy milk- 1 1/4 cups
liquid egg substitute-1/4 cup
1 medium fresh mango
1/2 Tbs. Mango Butter (I used Trader Joes Mango Butter)
cinnamon-2 teaspoons

Heat a pan on the stove on medium high heat and spray with non-stick cooking spray (I use butter flavor). Combine all ingredients (except mango) in a bowl and mix until all lumps are gone. Cut and mash Mango into small pieces and fold into pancake batter. Pour 1/4 cup of pancake mixture into pan and flip pancake when one side has set and golden brown. Let cool slightly and place two on a plate. Spread 1/4 Tbs of mango butter on each pancake and lightly drizzle with sugar free syrup or top with lite whipped cream. You don't need a lot of syrup or whipped topping because they are pretty sweet enough, but I love syrup so that's why I added it.

I get up at 5 AM to cook breakfast normally (I get up early to go to work or to train), and my Aunt and Uncle said they woke up, not because I was making too much noise, but because they said it smelled good downstairs in the kitchen! That's always a good sign!

Red Velvet

I have three favorite desserts of all time: Key Lime Pie, Tiramisu, and Red Velvet. If those three dessert flavors come in anything, you can bet 100% of the time that I'm going to get it. Although I would like to post about all three of these yummy desserts, I am doing a salute to the goodness that is red velvet. I LOVE me some red velvet and I have two recipes that I'd think everyone would enjoy. One takes a little more effort than the other.

Rockin' Red Velvet Pancakes

Again an awesome Breakfast Recipe. I got this from the HG's 300 Under 300 cookbook. And why not combine my favorite meal of the day with one of my favorite desserts.





Ingredients
Serving Size: Entire Recipe (2 Pancakes with glaze) 273 Calories

Icing
2 Tablespoons Cool Whip Free, Thawed
1 Tablespoon Fat Free Cream Cheese, Room Temperature
1 no-calorie sweetener packet

Pancakes
One 25-Calorie Hot Cocoa Mix
1 Tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon mini-semi sweet chocolate chips, divided
1/3 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon of baking powder
2 no-calorie sweetener packets
Dash of Salt
1/4 cup fat free liquid egg substitute
1 tablespoon light vanilla soymilk or fat free milk
3 drops red food coloring

In a small microwave bowl, combine all the icing ingredients and mix until smooth. Set aside. In a tall glass combine cocoa mix, cocoa powder, and half of the chocolate chips . Add 1/4 cup of very hot water and stir until all contents have dissolved and set aside.

In a mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder, sweetener, and salt. Add cocoa mixture, egg substitute, and milk and mix thoroughly. Add food coloring and mix well.

Bring a skillet with non-stick spray to a medium heat on the stove. Add half of the batter to form one large pancake. Cook until batter begins to bubble and is solid enough to flip (bout 2 to 3 minutes). Gently flip and cook until the inside of the pancake is fully cooked (about 1 to 2 minutes). Repeat these cooking steps for the other pancake.

Microwave icing until warm (5 to 10 seconds). Spread over your pancakes and eat up!!!

These are so good! It's basically dessert for breakfast! The first time I made this, I microwaved the icing for too long (I did 20 seconds) and it came out runny, but it still tasted really good! So just be aware of that fact.


Yoplait Red Velvet Snack

This is another snack option which I found is absolutely fantastic. And it still gives you all that red velvety taste!

Ingredients
Serving Size: 1 Serving: 150 calories
1/2 package of Nabisco 100 Cal Oreo Thin Crisps
Yoplait Light Red Velvet Cake Yogurt

Assembling this duo is simple: Just lightly crush up half a pack of those lil' chocolate crisps, pour the pieces into the yogurt, and swirl 'em in. Yogurty snacks are 36 percent more fun and delicious with cookies mixed in; it's a fact. You could also dip uncrushed Oreo Thins into the creamy cake-flavored yogurt, DunkAroo-style. The choice is yours...

Scary Fact
Out on the Town...

BEAT IT! Claim Jumper Red Velvet Cupcake
PER SERVING (1 cupcake): 796 calories

Here's the thing: The average slice of frosted red velvet cake will cost you around 500 calories and 25g fat. But if you think the cup-contained stature of this dessert makes it a decent choice, guess again. Almost 800 calories for a CUPCAKE? Skip. It.

Banana Pancakes Recipe

So this is my first recipe that I am posting. You hear it over and over again, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. But why is that?

When you skip breakfast, you are likely to become tired when your brain and body run low on fuel. By mid-morning, you might grab a cup of coffee or wolf down a sugary candy bar to wake up again. This might work for a few minutes, but by lunch time you are hungry, crabby, and perhaps your mood might make you a little more prone to make unhealthy choices at lunch.

Skipping breakfast is a common strategy for losing weight, but not a smart one. Many people believe that they will lose weight if they skip meals, but that just isn't true; the body expects to be refueled a few times each day -- starting with breakfast. Actually, eating breakfast is good for weight loss. In fact, studies show that people who eat breakfast are more likely to maintain a healthy weight. I personally almost never ate breakfast when in school studying my undergraduate and of course I gained most of my weight there.

Here is one of my favorite recipes. I love pancakes, in any way shape and form. I made these for the first time for my family when I was home in AZ in December. They are a healthy alternative to a well loved food. I mean come on, who doesn't love pancakes!!!!

Ingredients
Number of Servings-5 (2 Pancakes)
Calories- approx. 200
Heart Smart Bisquick (pancake and baking mix)-2 cups
Fat free skim milk or vanilla soy milk- 1 1/4 cups
liquid egg substitute-1/4 cup
1 medium or large banana
cinnamon-2 teaspoons


Heat a pan on the stove on medium high heat and spray with non-stick cooking spray (I use butter flavor). Combine all ingredients (except banana) in a bowl and mix until all lumps are gone. Cut or mash banana into small pieces and fold into pancake batter. Pour 1/4 cup of pancake mixture into pan and flip pancake when one side has set and golden brown. Place two on a plate and eat with yummy fat free whipped cream or low calorie syrup (Makes around 10 pancakes)

You can find heart Smart Bisquick in the baking aisle in most supermarkets. Its amazing and I use it as a staple in a lot of my cooking. It is low in fat, has 0g trans fat, naturally cholesterol free, and a wonderful source of calcium. If you don't want to use the liquid egg substitute, you can use one egg, it increases the calories a little bit, but not by much.

This recipe always leaves me satisfied! The bananas make the pancakes so sweet that you almost don't need syrup, and they melt in your mouth. I usually pair this with a large cup of coffee and watching the Today show on NBC ;). But if you do need syrup, then you should go for the sugar free low calorie types. I get the generic low calorie kind from Giant supermarket near my apartment.

Not only did my mom and sister adore these, my 13 year old male cousin fell in love with these and wanted more! So it is a kid friendly recipe. The recipe is kinda large, but these guys have no problem being stored in the refrigerator and reheats very well in the microwave.