Children and food, Take 1

Boy, this cooking-what-I-want-to-eat thing while children are here is hard! Even as I page through cookbooks looking for what I feel hungry for, I'm constantly editing based on what I think the kids will eat. Last night, it came down to what we had in the cupboard. I decided on the low-fat creamy herb pasta pre-mix that has been sitting around for a while. I defrosted some chicken breasts and added some frozen green and red peppers and onions to the mix as well as frozen broccoli stir fry. In winter, I rely on high quality frozen veggies from Brennans more than fresh because the fresh just don't taste all that great out of season. It was terrific with lots of veggies and, surprise, the kids loved it! But what they really loved was Colin's birthday cake. I used a vanilla cake mix in a bundt pan, then I poured a fat free instant chocolate pudding around the ring in the center. It baked (took a little longer than usual), but most of the pudding went to the bottom and made it come out unevenly. But it was a really moist bit of cake. I did have a small piece.

On Sunday night, I made a terrific lo-fat soup. I cut up a bulb of fennel (one of the fresh veggies I will use in winter) and cooked it in four cups of chicken broth. I added some garlic and onion and a little curry powder, salt and pepper. When it was soft, I blended it it. It was delicious! And totally fat free. I made Tim some turkey soup with orzo and had a bit of that as well. It was also delicious and low fat.

Today I have several meetings at coffee shops. I'm just going to have tea at both meetings and eat dinner when I get home--probably frozen Lean Cuisine, which I like. For lunch I'm going to load up on a salad with lots of veggies.

I still need to do better on getting my exercise in. The problem is that when it's really cold, I have a hard time lately getting out as my back and legs ache. But I have to do it. I also have to start taking vitamins.