January’s Recipes and Q & A Wrap-Up

Below you will find a list of all of the recipes and Q & A sessions from this past month’s newsletters. If you’d like to get these types of articles delivered to your email on a regular basis, please sign up for the Fit Facts Newsletter (and get a free e-report in the process!).

RECIPE: Deconstructed Pizza Pasta Salad

Just about everyone loves pizza, but for the most part it is heinously unhealthy—tons of grease, sodium, processed carbs and depending on how the sauce is made, often a significant amount of sugar as well. Next time you get a hankering for this guilty pleasure, try this alternative. It totally hits the spot, but is a much better option! Give it a try for yourself and let me know how you like it!

Salad Ingredients:

• 8 oz small pasta
• 8 oz fresh low-fat mozzarella, diced
• 4 oz mushrooms, sliced
• 2 1/2 oz turkey pepperoni, halved
• 2 1/2 oz baby spinach
• 3 cups tomatoes, diced
• 1 large cubanelle pepper, diced
• 1/2 red onion, diced

Dressing Ingredients:

• 2 oz olive oil
• 2 oz red wine vinegar
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons basil, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard

Prepare pasta according to package instructions. Drain and allow to cool. Place the pasta and the remaining salad ingredients in a large bowl and toss. In a small bowl or dressing shaker, mix together the dressing ingredients until emulsification occurs. Drizzle over the salad and toss again. Serve at room temperature for best flavor. Enjoy!

Recipe credit: http://coconutlime.blogspot.com

RECIPE: Chipotle Lime Chicken Thighs

Newsletter subscriber Kevin S. sent this slow-cooker recipe in and I gave it a try—it was awesome! Give them a try for yourself and let me know how you like it!

• 1 cup onion, sliced
• 1 cup celery, chopped
• 1 cup carrots, chopped
• 4 lbs chicken thighs, fat and skin removed
• salt to taste
• pepper to taste
• 15 oz can tomato sauce
• 1/4 cup lime juice
• 2-3 chipotle chilies in adobo sauce, drained
• 2 tbsp adobo sauce
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 avocado, diced
• 1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
• medium grain brown rice
• salsa (optional)
• nonfat plain yogurt (optional)

Arrange onion, celery and carrots in bottom of slow cooker. Season chicken thighs with salt and pepper and arrange over vegetables. In a medium bowl, whisk together tomato sauce, lime juice, chipotle chiles with sauce, and garlic. Pour mixture over chicken. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours or high for 3 to 4 hours. Serve over brown rice and top with salsa and yogurt, if desired. Enjoy!

RECIPE: Turkey Breakfast Sausage Patties

I love breakfast sausage as much as anyone, but traditional pork-based breakfast sausage is incredibly fatty (with saturated fat) and not a healthy breakfast choice. This recipe gives you a way to enjoy this food responsibly, without breaking your diet. These go great alongside an egg white scramble, or inside an egg white omelette. Give them a try for yourself and let me know how you like it!

• 1 pound ground turkey
• 2 tbsp garlic, minced
• 1 1/2 tbsp red onion, minced
• 1/2 tsp dried thyme
• 1/4 tsp ground sage
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cayenne (optional)

In a medium bowl, combine the turkey, garlic, onion, thyme, sage, pepper, salt and cayenne, if desired. Mix well and divide into 4 equal parts. Shape each into a ball and flatten into 4″ patties on a piece of waxed paper. Set a skillet over medium-high heat and spray with cooking spray. Cook the patties for 1 to 2 minutes per side, or until just starting to brown and no longer pink inside. Enjoy!

Q&A: Asthma and Exercise?

Hi Ben,

I love your articles! I had a question and I was hoping you could answer it in your newsletter for me? I have asthma pretty bad, and every time I try to do hard cardio I have to stop because I have trouble breathing. Is there anything I can do to get over this? I am not able to lose the weight I want because of this problem!

- Sandy

Dear Sandy,

You may be pleased to learn that there is plenty of evidence to suggest that regular participation in exercise may help asthmatics deal with the symptoms of asthma. Any exercise that raises the heart rate and increases the respiratory rate without being overwhelmingly hard on the lungs will help train your body to adapt to breathing in a strenuous environment. Practicing additional, specific breathing exercises like pursed-lip breathing or “in the nose, out the mouth” beathing in conjunction with normal training will help you progress even further. In other words, if you start out performing moderate cardio, you can gradually increase your exertion, allowing your body to adapt on the way. Currently, you are probably working at too high of an intensity level off the bat and need to drop it back for a while till your respiratory system adjusts.

Obviously, precautions will help immensely with the avoidance of a triggered bout of asthma. Avoiding pollenated or polluted air while exercising is critical. Pre-medication prior to exercising (within 30 minutes prior to engaging in activity) can help a lot as well. Be sure to keep an inhaler on hand while exercising, and make sure to always properly and thoroughly warm up before any strenuous activity.

- Benjamin

Q&A: Losing weight after having children?

Hi,

I need help to lose weight. I’ve had two babies in two years and can’t seem to tighten my belly, got to get ready for swim suit season… Thank you very much!

- Adriana

Dear Adriana,

Losing weight (preferably fat, not muscle) is all about maximizing your metabolism and controlling your caloric intake (the amount of food you eat each day). Getting on a consistent resistance and cardio training regimen, and tracking your daily calories is the sure-fire way to get you to the results you seek. In order to calculate the total calories you should take in each day, fill in the following equation with your stats:

655 + (4.35 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) – (4.7 x age in years) x [exercise multiplier] – 500

Exercise Multipliers:

• 1.2 — Sedentary — Little or no exercise
• 1.375 — Lightly Active — Light exercise (1 to 3 days/week)
• 1.55 — Moderately Active — Moderate exercise (3 to 5 days/week)
• 1.7 — Very Active — Hard exercise (6 to 7 days/week)
• 1.9 — Extremely Active — Hard daily exercise and/or a physical job

So, let’s say you’re 35 years old, have a height of 5’2″, weigh 140 lbs and work out with moderate intensity 3 times per week. Your calculation would be:

655 + (4.35 x 140) + (4.7 x 62) – (4.7 x 35) x 1.55 − 500 = 1,655 calories

You would thus aim to take in 1,655 calories per day while working out 3x per week. You would of course potentially need to modify that number up or down depending if your exercise schedule changes, and as you track the results you get from week to week in order to optimize them.

- Benjamin

Q&A: Preparing for first modeling shoot?

Hi Ben,

I will be doing my first modeling shoot in 2-3 weeks. I currently lift weights 6 times per week and I do HIIT cardio 3 times per week. I was wondering what kind of diet I should follow for the next couple weeks to insure I look the absolute best that I can, and what the best way is to lose water weight is, so that I don’t go into the shoot looking or feeling bloated?

Any advice will be greatly appreciated!! Thanks!!

- Karla

Dear Karla,

Congrats on your upcoming shoot! I have a few suggestions, without knowing exactly where you’re starting at, so please bear with me. First of all, you should probably bump up your cardio to 6 days per week. You can intermix lower intensity cardio for the days in between the higher intensity bouts. Also, make sure your resistance training is efficient—perform lots of compound (multijoint) movements such as deadlifts, cleans, squats, etc. to maximize your caloric expenditure during the workouts.

Nutrition-wise, you will want to cut out sodium a few days beforehand, and cut down on dairy and all other processed/packaged foods. Increase your water intake to around 1.5 gallons per day—you will notice a lot of water weight will disappear if you stay very well hydrated! Then, the night before the big shoot stop drinking water, and the day of the shoot don’t take more than a few sips to wet the mouth. This will drop any remaining water, allowing you to come into the shoot looking very lean.

Good luck!

- Benjamin

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