No Lite n' Easy For Me! - Weight Loss Week Twelve Day One - Weight Loss Eating Plan

Week 12

Day 1 - Wednesday
2/04/2014

No Lite n' Easy For Me!

I forgot to order my Lite n' Easy for this week so I'm doing it for myself this week.  
You can find my grocery haul here.  
With the help of My Fitness Pal here.

McYummy :)

Breakfast: Wholemeal Muffin with Ham, Egg and Cherry Tomato

Homemade Coffee (low fat milk, no sugar) 

Ingredients: 1 x Tip Top English Muffin Wholemeal (Woolworths)
25 g Berg Sliced Leg Ham (Aldi)
1 x Extra Large Egg (Coles)
2 x Cherry Tomatoes (Coles)
*This meal cost: $1.70 and would last approximately 6 breakfasts because there are only six Muffins.

I usually review Lite n' Easy food, so I feel a little odd reviewing my own! ha ha ha 
I think the Tip Top Muffins were a little bigger than the Lite n' Easy ones, but I didn't mind ;)
This is one of my favourite Lite n' Easy breakfasts and quite easy to replicate, added in some Cherry Tomatoes for extra yumminess.

Big Banana

Morning Snack: Large Banana ;) (Coles)

*This Banana cost: $0.36 (currently still on special and they are huge!)

Oh Banana how I missed you being on Lite n' Easy!

It's a Wrap!

Lunch: Pumpkin Harissa Hommus, Ham, Cherry Tomato, Carrot & Baby Spinach Wholegrain Wrap & Grapes

Ingredients: 20g Coles Spicy Roast Pumpkin & Harissa Hommus Dip 
25g Berg Sliced Leg Ham (Aldi)
2 x Cherry Tomatoes (Coles)
Half Carrot Grated (Coles)
1 x Cup Baby Spinach Leaves (Aldi)
1 x Bakers Life Wholegrain Wraps (Aldi)
*This meal cost: $1.42 and would last approximately 8 lunches because of the wraps.

Grapes: 3/4 Cup of Green Seedless Grapes (Aldi)
*This amount of Grapes cost: $0.18 and would last approximately 10 servings.

Wrap It Up!

Wraps are another frequent lunch on the LnE menu and easy to do.  
I wanted simple, healthy food that was easy to create.
I realised after that Pumkin dip on a salad wrap is a little odd but it was actually nice, the dip had a bit of a spicy bite to it.  You could add mayo, mustard, salsa, whatever you like.  I just calculated everything in My Fitness Pal before I went ahead and ate anything, planning is key.

I haven't had green Grapes for ages!  These were so sweet and delicious!

Fruity and Nutty!

Afternoon Snack: Banana Berry Yoghurt Smoothie and Fruit & Nut Mix

Smoothie: 100g(mls) Farmers Union Light Greek Yoghurt (Coles)
100g Sweet Haven Mixed Frozen Berries (Aldi)

Half Large Banana, sliced (Coles)

*This Smoothie cost: $1.73 and would last 5 serves due to the amount of Berries

Fruit & Nut Mix: 30g Oh So Natural Wholefoods Nut & Fruit Mix (Aldi)
*This amount of mix cost: $0.34 and would last about 11 serves.

I got in some Melercise today so I added a smoothie.  I have included a 1200 calorie plan for today, down the bottom of this post.  I left out the Peanut Butter and Honey as I wanted to keep down my sodium and sugar levels.  The original shake is much better, this was way too salty and needed the sweetness. 

The Nut & Fruit Mix was delicious, I really enjoyed the variety of this one.  It has Cashews, Almonds, Brazil Nuts, Walnuts, Raisins, Sultanas, Sunflower Seeds and Pepitas.  I would definitely buy this mix again and it was only $4.00 for 350 grams.

Lean Cuisine - Sundried Tomato Chicken with Pasta

Dinner: Sundried Tomato Chicken with Pasta (Lean Cuisine - Woolworths)

*This dinner cost: $6.69

I didn't have time to plan healthy dinner recipes, only realised the night before, so I decided on frozen meals.  Not my first choice but they will do for this week.  I really want to start trying out healthy dinner recipes, so this week has been good as it's helped me realise that.  

I'm not a huge fan of Lean Cuisine or any of these really and I wasn't sure about the Aldi ones.  There really wasn't much to choose from in Woolworths, a few Weight Watches, Healthy Choice and Lean Cuisines.  The didn't have much at all and nothing was on special for the dinner sized meals.  

Is this really Chicken? 

I decided on the Sundried Tomato Chicken as I've had it before and did like it.  The Chicken is a little strange to me, I think they make it into a Chicken Loaf and slice it.  The Chicken is in perfectly shaped, thin pieces and I'm not a huge fan of it. 

The sauce is a creamy Tomato sauce and it is good but runny and just a little on the salty side.  The Pasta was tender but not much variety on the vegetable side with only Peas and some Zucchini.

Is it better than a Lite n' Easy meal? I don't think so.  
I would have it in a pinch but the Lite n' Easy meals seem more substantial and have more variety.  
The Lean Cuisine meals were $6.69 (go on special frequently) and the Lite n' Easy are $11.00 each. 

*The total cost for today's portions = $12.42
*These prices are calculated by current costs and specials and calculated per gram or item.
Keep in mind that I am also consuming about 1500 calories on average due to exercise. 

Glasses of water: 6

Goodbye Blues

Exercise: Dancing (Melercise)

I usually try to exercise about an hour after I eat but today it was about three hours.  I noticed my energy levels depleted earlier and I was starving!

My Fitness Pal
This is an example of a 1200 Calorie diet, you don't have to have Coffee or Coke Zero hee hee. 

My Fitness Pal - Example of 1200 calories

This is the full calculation of what I ate for the day. 

My Fitness Pal - Example of 1500 calories 

I'm kind of enjoying the challenge of working out what to have every day.  
How do you think you would go? 
Do you do your own meals? I'd love to hear from you :)

Healthy Grocery Haul - No Lite n' Easy This Week

Yes, that is TWO jars of Peanut Butter...they were on special, don't judge me!

Ordering Lite n' Easy completely slipped my mind these week, I have no idea how!  I didn't realise until the night before my delivery was due!  I realised and freaked out for all of a second and then I thought "I've got this!"  I've been making my own snacks for the last week and slowly incorporating my own food.  

I've been on Lite n' Easy for almost three months so I definitely know the types of foods and portion sizes.  I do want to go off Lite n' Easy eventually and do it for myself, however, I want to have some solid healthy dinner recipes behind me first.  

Because I didn't have time to plan my dinners I opted for frozen ones and decided to make my own breakfast, snacks and lunches.  I wanted to share it with you all in case the same happens to you, enjoy :)

Aldi Receipt - *Items blanked out were not part of my groceries

First stop was Aldi because they closed earlier and I wanted to get the bulk of my groceries there as they are cheaper.  Most of their brands/foods are just as good or better than brand names in my opinion but there are exceptions.   I got some pretty awesome prices there. :)

Woolworths Receipt - *Items blanked out where not part of my groceries 

Then off to Woolworths for the rest of the groceries.  

The total was $91.99 for both shops.  I do have two Lite n' Easy dinners left in the freezer and about four lunches.  I got a lot of variety and this stuff is definitely more than a weeks worth of food.  I mean who would go through two jars of Peanut Butter in a week? Okay, that was a bad example ;)

I wasn't too happy about having Lean Cuisine meals almost every night for dinner, there wasn't much variety at Woolies, but it's only for a week, I guess we will see how they go.

I also have some extra items already at home like Bread, Cottage Cheese, Cherry Tomatoes, Yoghurt and Eggs.

In the blog posts to come this week I will be including all the brands/recipes and reviews.

Please let me know if you have any further questions or suggestions :)