Yogurt and diet Update

Yesterday I posted about the Greek yogurt that I tried – Chobani.  I had tried the blueberry and complained that it was grainy and tart.  Today I have a strawberry and banana which is not as grainy and much sweeter – I think it’s the banana.  Since the banana is such a smooth texture I think it has smoothed out the yogurt and bananas are super sweet so that makes it much more palatable.

Now, if we could get the points plus value back down to 3 points instead of 4 – this is a low fat yogurt and yesterdays was nonfat which might also add to the creaminess of today’s selection but adds that one point to the total.

BTW, I weighed in last night at Weight Watchers and have now lost a total of 40.2 pounds – Woot!  That was my goal for this week since I go to the doctor on Friday for my fall check in and I know she will be pleased.  I’m hoping that she takes the high blood pressure meds away and maybe cuts the cholesterol meds in half – now that would be a sweet success.  J

Buying a baseball glove

Last night I have to say I had a one of a kind experience buying a baseball glove.  Now, I’ve bought a few baseball and softball gloves in my time but last night was the first time that it took 3 people, two cell phones and 1 hour!

Let me back up a minute and give you the background on this.  Tom is currently in Virginia at AIT.  His battalion gets weekends off but they don’t get to go off base.  So they find things to do to keep themselves busy and in shape.  Specifically sports. 

Tom called last week wanting us to send his baseball glove to him as they were planning a game on Sunday.  His glove is buried in with all the rest of his stuff in the shed down at the property.  First off I was not going to make it down there until the weekend and second it was too damn hot to go crawling around the shed looking for a baseball glove.  Fortunately, for him the game got changed to an ultimate Frisbee game and later a football game both of which he gladly joined in (he was the captain of the ultimate team in high school.)

So the game was rescheduled for this coming weekend.  Tom called to see if we would buy a new glove (using his money of course) and send it to him.  He was very specific in what he wanted – Rawlings, 12 inch.  Seems his old glove was about done anyway and he needed a new one so off Erik and I went to Johnny Macs sporting goods to look at gloves.

When I first entered the store I found the gloves right away near the door, but no Rawlings.  I looked and looked and found not a Rawlings glove in the bunch.  There were plenty of Mizuno, Wilson, and TPX brands but no Rawlings.  Erik and I hunted around and found a reasonably nice one in his price range so I called Tom.  I explained that we couldn’t find any Rawlings gloves but Erik had found a Wilson that might do.  Erik took a picture and sent it to him while I stayed on my phone and talked. 

Tom checked out the picture and said it would do so while still on the phone, Erik and I started to wander around the store a bit.  We found a clearance rack – and there was a Rawlings glove.  So we took another picture and sent it to him.  He wasn’t fond of it but it might work.  Then we wandered further and found the Rawlings gloves… an entire section of them!  So, we started the search all over again. 

We discovered that I have an uncanny knack for finding left handed gloves – seems that almost every glove I picked up was a lefty.  Tom is not left handed.  Finally I found one that I would have liked and sent a picture despite the fact that Erik didn’t like it as well.  Guess which glove Tom chose… mine.  *tee hee* 

So an hour later, two cell phones and 3 people – Tom has a new glove.  Now I just have to ship it to him at lunch time today.

Greek Yogurt

Recently there has been a boom in the yogurt industry, specifically in the ‘GREEK YOGURT’ industry.  I looked up Greek Yogurt in Wikipedia and here is what I found:

“Strained yogurt, yogurt cheese, labneh, or Greek yogurt is yogurt which has been strained in a cloth or paper bag or filter to remove the whey, giving a consistency between that of yogurt and cheese, while preserving yogurt's distinctive sour taste….. Due to the straining process to remove excess whey, even non-fat varieties are rich and creamy.”

I beg to differ.  I have tried Greek yogurt several times now including last weekend at Costco where they were giving away samples.  Unfortunately, they have to add honey to the samples to make them palatable.  That should give you a clue.

Erik has decided that he wants to start eating healthier and in a recent trip to the grocery he decided to try Greek Yogurt.  The particular brand that he bought was Chobani the strawberry and banana flavor specifically.  He brought it home and opened it up.  Like a lot of yogurts on the market, the fruit is on the bottom so you have to stir it up.  The consistency of the yogurt on the top is very grainy and when combined with the fruit is still too grainy for my taste. 

I tasted the yogurt that he had and it was not too tart so I decided to try buying other flavors.  The blueberry is very tart and I had to add some stevia to make it palatable.  I’m still not happy with the graininess of it – I don’t see where the terms “rich and creamy’ come from.

Chobani’s own website boasts that their product is ‘rich and creamy’ as well.  They may be rich, but certainly not creamy.  Yoplait has creamy yogurt – even the light.  I think I’ll switch back.

What's Cookin?

No veggie cube this week – they are putting the same corn and tomatoes in every week and I’m getting tired of it.  So, I plan to hit the farmer’s market on Saturday morning to see what I can find.

Monday:           Patty Pan Squash.  I think I’ll try frying it with garlic and onion and then sprinkling a bit of parmesan on when it’s done.  Chicken – If we have some bourbon chicken in the freezer, I’ll have that otherwise, I may have to fry some.

Tuesday:           Pulled Pork at Martha’s house and I’ll bring Tri color Pesto Rotini (WW)

Wednesday:     Layered Mexican Chicken (WW) and Green beans with Caramelized onions (WW)

Thursday:         Green bean, pearl onion and dill frittata (WW using leftover green beans from Wednesday)

Friday:              Tilapia, wild Rice, broccoli, Carrots

Saturday:          Stuffed Squash/Zucchini (Using left over rice, veggies and ground turkey to stuff)

Sunday:            Salmon, mashed potatoes, green beans or whatever fresh veggies I find at the farmer’s market.

Weekend Roundup

Bill came up on Thursday with the trailer to haul some of the stuff in the garage and/or basement down to the house to store.  First, it was supposed to rain on Friday so there was no loading up the trailer and getting everything wet but we did manage to clean out the computer room and load most of that in the back of the truck where it would be covered.  I can now get to my desk to work on Fridays!  Woot!  Second, we would not have been able to unload the trailer of stuff until we had rearranged the shed to put it all in (lack of planning on Bill’s part there ;) so pulling the trailer up was really a mute point.

Friday is my work from home day so most of this loading took place on Friday.  While this was going on we got some bad news – a friend of our passed into the Summerland unexpectedly (at least to us).  Apparently he had had some health issues that caused this.  Godspeed my friend.

Bill really wanted to leave on Friday night instead of Saturday because he wanted to look at my Escape and see what was making a noise.  So despite the fact that I wanted to go to the O’Fallon Farmers Market on Saturday morning to get more Goat Milk Soap and the fact that he pulled the trailer up to St. Louis for nothing – we left Friday night.  I gave money and a list to Erik so that he could go to the Farmers Market in the morning and get my soap (which he did – Oh delicious!) 

So Saturday morning we got up early so that Bill could go check on my car.  I puttered around the house a bit and watched a few episodes of Star Gate Universe the final season until he returned to tell me that my car was great!  John (who had completed the body work from the deer episode) had checked out the noise as well and determined that it was my brakes (which are brand new) making the noise.  I guess that happens sometimes.  I’ll keep an ear on it and see if it goes away.

So we ended up going to the Farmer’s Market in Fredericktown instead where I bought a Patty Pan Squash.  I haven’t tried it yet but it looks very interesting.  I think I might do something with it tonight for dinner.  Anyway, Justin and Jennifer (Bill’s son and daughter-in-law) were supposed to be coming for dinner that evening about 4:00 so we got our errands done in town and came back to the property so that Bill could finish putting pot lights up in the shop and getting a switch in.

Justin called about 2:30 to tell us that they were still in Rolla, MO.  They had borrowed Jennifer’s Dad’s little trailer to haul some furniture home and they had just finished loading it so it would be a couple hours before they got home.  Bill decided to push back starting the grill for the steaks until about 4:00.  As these things usually go, he decided to start the grill about 3:45 instead, so when he went out at 4:15 to check on the coals his phone rang – Justin and Jennifer were stuck in St. James, MO – the wheel on the trailer they were hauling home had broken and was trying to come off! 

Good thing we had not put the steaks on the grill yet – I turned the fire off under the corn that I had just put on and we loaded up to take the big trailer over to St. James to bring the little trailer home on.  I should have taken pictures – it looked very funny once they got the little trailer full of furniture loaded up on the big trailer and tied down!  By the time we got that done, we were hungry, it was about 7:00 and there was no way we were going to have steak for dinner on Saturday night.  So we ended up eating at Burger King in St. James and got home about 10:00!

The kids decided that they could come for Sunday dinner instead.  It was a beautiful day – in the 70’s so we sat out under the tree in the back yard and Bill grilled steaks and mushrooms.  Noah (Justin and Jennifer’s 4 year old son) ran all over the back yard with the dogs and a good time was had by all.

So the weekend didn’t end up quite as it had been planned but everything worked out ok in the end.

Oh and I heard from Tom on Saturday.  The General did an inspection of the barracks and out of 300 in his battalion; he was one of the top 10 that got an award from the General for excellence.  The three dogs are actually wolves and represent his battalion.

Now considering what his room used to look like at home… this is quite the change for him!  LOL!  I guess this army thing has taught him not only to eat his vegetables but to keep his room clean too!  ;)

Tattler Lids

Has anyone used Tattler Lids?  Here is the website:  http://www.reusablecanninglids.com/  I had a friend of mine tell me about these last night and they sound a lot better than having to buy new lids every year for canning.  I just want to know if anyone has used them and what they thought of them?

*SIGH*

Why is it that 15/16 year old girls can’t make up their mind about anything?  Last week Aubri was playing softball for the high school, this week she’s not.  Of course this week is when practice started.  I am jumping to a conclusion when I say that this turn of events started after her ‘boyfriend’ came over on Saturday.  If he told her not to play I will tell him to take a long walk off a short pier!  NO BOY TELLS MY DAUGHTER WHAT TO DO!!!

Now, I may be all wet but still – she is wasting a lot of talent.  Last year she was the only freshman on the Varsity team at school.  There weren’t even any sophomores!  You have to be good to get that kind of attention.  I was hoping for scholarships.  Her brothers are upset with her for quitting too.  They all wanted to play varsity in high school and they were cut.  She’s just throwing it away!

*Sigh*