Making Spiced Nuts

 Nuts are a great snack.  They are my go to as a bedtime snack most nights.  So I thought I would share my spicy nut recipe with you.

Spiced Nuts

Ingredients:

1 large egg white

1/4 cup sugar (I use monks fruit sugar for less calories) 

1/2 tsp salt

1/2  tsp chili powder

1/4 tsp ground all spice

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1 3/4 tsp cayenne pepper

4 cups nuts (any mix will do, cashews, walnuts, pecans, almonds)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 300 deg.  Beat egg white until frothy. Combine all the spices and add to egg white. Mix well. Stir in nuts until well coated and spread mixture in a single layer onto a ungreased cookie sheet.

Mix well

Bake nuts for 15 min and remove from oven. Toss using a spatula to help separate nuts. Reduce oven temperature to 250 deg. and return nuts to bake for another 10min or medium brown. Remove from oven and toss and stir again, then place cookie sheet onto a wire rack to cool.  They will crisp as they cool. Break up any that stick together and enjoy.

Into the oven

Don't they look yummy!!

I must admit I do take short cuts occasionally; this morning I used 2 1/2 tsp of Cajun spice and it works well.  For an Asian flair, 5 spice is another but cut the spice down to 1 tsp and use brown sugar instead.  Italian spice,  Montreal speak spice, just to name a few.

Dieting 101

The diet I started 2 weeks ago was a great success.  Lost 11 lbs in 10 days.  Although not for the faint of hearted and will test your will power, by the end of the 10 days I was feeling much better.  The first three days is almost like having the flu.  Nausea, light headed, and fatigued.  Your body is missing all those carbohydrates normally pumped into them.  It grumbles, rolls and generally complains. 
I did manage to find a few great recipes that now will forever be in my weekly make list.  One was this simple cracker recipe from Wholesome Yum https://www.wholesomeyum.com/recipes/paleo-crackers/

Needless to say after our 10 days (my son went on the same diet as is way easier to diet on the buddy system, he lost 12 lbs) we went out for lunch and take it from me DON'T do it.  Needless to say I am back on the diet with a few modifications and feeling a lot better for it.  So my diet does not have a name that I know of, but here are the rules.  

1 - Measure out portions.  I cut my portions down to a reasonable size and no 2nds. 

2- Cut out the carbs.  It is impossible to cut out all of them but my rule of thumb is; no bread (although I did find a recipe for a soft gluten free bread that was easy to make and the first loaf of bread I've ever made that wasn't so hard you could use it as a hockey puck), No pasta, no white rice, In fact if it's white don't put it in your mouth.  The only exception to this rule is cauliflower, eat lots of that.  No sugar........check the carbs on your sugar, wow.

3 - Eat meat, not if it is processed but everything else.  Including bacon (low sodium) just remember rule number 1.

4 - make your own salad dressings without sugar added.  There are lots of recipes out there that are sugar and carb free.....have fun searching for them and you will forget about your tummy for a few hours.

5 - Snacks; you may need a lot of them during the day at the start to stave off the hunger belly rolls so a handful of nuts, a bowl of vegetables raw, salad, and best of all 5 of the above crackers.

One discovery made was having a protein drink for breakfast.  Love it, it has almost all the vitamins and minerals required in a day, easy to make and yummy.  Add water, shake, and enjoy.  Keeps me going until lunch.

Not saying that it is a perfect diet for you and you should always check with you doctor to make sure you can diet (I have to have a banana a day for the potassium, my doctors rule), it may not be the right thing for you, but it sure works for me and I may just stay on this forever as I feel better and way more energy. I will take it a little slower this time but with 2 to 3 km walks a day.

So my new goal is 15 lbs over a 3 month span.....wish me luck!

Columbia StrEAT food truck fest

photo from /www.newwestcity.ca/calendar-of-events

Last Saturday the City of New Westminster closed down Columbia Street down town and moved in a over 150 food trucks.  It was fun to wonder up the strip and check out the different food venues.  I settled on Pad Tai and of course had to have a local brewed beer in the beer gardens.

There were artisan displays in the Anvil Center, things for kids to do, things for adults to do and by 6pm it was packed with lineups to many of the trucks.

It was a fun day that ended at the far side of the strip (for me) at one of my favorite restaurants the Taverna Greka for lasagna (I know in a Greek restaurant, right.  But so good.) and to watch the belly dancer.

A fun day to wander, snack at all the watering holes along Columbia, people watch and enjoy the awesome weather we have been having.

Beer garden in the shade.