Moving in the Right Direction (yay meat)

Another Friday, another rotation in the weight room, another weigh in…

According to the Doctor-type scale at the YMCA I’m 265 lbs. as of today, which is three pounds down from last week and I think about fifteen pounds total from my starting point (the first time I weighed in I was 277, but that was actually a week after I got rolling – I’m guesstimating I was all the way up at 280 there at one point).

I forgot, or possibly lost, my trusty MP3 player today. You can imagine my dismay when I got to the gym and emptied out my gargantuan handbag in a frantic search for it. I’m hoping I just left it in the desk drawer at my office because getting through the cardio portion of my workout is completely boring without my music to inspire me.

I did notice however that I’m an awful lot friendlier without it. Partially this is because on Friday afternoons the wellness center is mostly populated with kindly older ladies who smile and say hello to me – and it’s virtually impossible not to smile and say hello back to people who remind you of your grand mom. They also make me feel like Hercules because invariably following one of them onto a weight machine, I get to move the weight level UP for once instead of down.

So yeah, I talked to more people, smiled at more people and had a few more laughs today than I would normally have being plugged in – but chucking along on the cardio machine without my music to back me up was a serious drag.

Feeling good, feeling strong. The pain from weight lifting won’t hit me yet for another 24 to 48 hours, and I got beef stew for dinner. Yum.

I had almost forgotten just how much I love a good bit of red meat – and stew’s a nice way to get it. The potatoes, carrots, onion, etc. all have a relatively low calorie cost. They’re cooked with meat, so they’re meat flavored (yay) and you wind up eating a relatively small amount of the actual meat. I found it very satisfying.

So – in honor of red meat and omnivores in general; here is the beef stew recipe I used tonight (with nutritional info courtesy of the Daily Plate):

2 & ½ lbs. cubed steak

1 & ½ lbs. red skin potatoes

1 large sweet onion

2 -3 cups baby carrots

2 tbsp. minced garlic

1 jar of beef gravy (17 oz.)

1 can of college inn beef broth (14 oz.)

1/3 cup Worcestershire sauce (I like Lea & Perrins)

Salt & pepper the raw steak, then sauté in a tablespoon of olive oil until it’s browned and dump the meat and all it’s lovely cooking juices into a crock pot.

Chop all the vegetables and add them to the crock pot.

Add all other ingredients, mix well, and cook on low for 8 hours, or high for 5 hours (low is better).

Very good if you’ve got some sliced fresh bread to dip into the juicy bits at the bottom. It was a tiny bit bland for me, so next time I think I’ll add some gravy masters to the mix. However as stew goes; it was quite English – warm and filling for a cold autumn night.

Nutritional Info:

Serving Size: About 2 cups

Calories: 437

Fat: 13 grams

Protein: 43 grams