Making the Healthy Switch to Olive Oil

Have you ever found yourself eating too much of something like cake and then when the scale shows those extra pounds declaring to yourself that you are never going to eat cake again.  No matter how much you really want to give up eating cake most people that make declarations like that never make it very far.  One of the reasons why you fail when you say that you'll never to do something again is because it is too extreme of a jump.  Because there is no instant gratification for giving it up, you don't all of a sudden lose all of the weight you gained by quitting eating cake.  So in a society driven by instant gratification it is too big of a temptation to get frustrated and give up and continue with our bad habits.  I have been guilty of being a yo-yo dieter for so much of my adult life often going to extreme measures of preventing myself from eating my favorite foods will forcing myself to eat terrible things like those awful prepackaged meals from NutriSystem.  But nothing ever worked because I couldn't stick to it.  But a year and a half ago my husband and I talked about how we needed to make some real changes to our diet and lifestyle other wise, so we decided to make some smaller more realistic goals.  Small things like, I started buying brown rice and whole wheat pasta.  We stopped keeping the house stocked with chips and instead got granola bars and trail mix.  We didn't make all of the changes at once but over time we added and took away more things, and over time we turned our changes  into habits.  We don't even think about the changes any more they are so apart of our life that it feels normal.

Another of the small changes was I switched to Olive Oil, like Olivari Olive Oil, for almost all of my cooking, from everything from baking to frying.  Some people feel that the taste of olive oil isn't good for certain foods but what I found was that I am so use to it that I don't notice it.  Olive oil has the lowest amount of saturated fat and contains more monosaturated fat a healthier type of fat that can lower your risk of heart disease by reducing the total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in your blood, it is considered the healthiest oil to cook with. Substituting olive oil was a small change but one that has reduced the calorie count and fat count of every dish I make.  Just another of the small changes that made a big difference in mine and my husband's life.

If you want more information about the benefits of olive oil and other facts you can check out this article. 

Change is coming for Small Wallet, Big Appetite

Win a $35 dollar gift code for CSN Stores by becoming a follower of Small Wallet Big Appetite

"CSN is an online retailer with over 200 stores, selling everything from eames lounge chair to cookware,"

Some big changes are coming to my life and they will effect Small wallet, Big Appetite, but change is good and I am excited about these changes.  The first big change is happening April 11th, my husband and I are moving back to his home country, England.  We are so excited about starting our new life together, excited to see what new adventures are in store for our family.  The second big change is coming in July with the expected birth of our first child.  No words describe how excited and joyful we are about this new arrival in our family.

Now what does this mean for Small wallet, Big Appetite?  Well several changes are coming and not all of them related to my personal life changes.  In the next few weeks you will start to see changes to the interface and design of the website as well as updates on all of the recipes.  Being new at blogging and creating recipes there are a few things that I didn't take into consideration before that I have become aware of.  For one thing none of my recipes had serving sizes and when my main focus is on how to help people budget and eat healthier that can prove to be very frustrating especially for those on things like weight watchers.  So I will be reviewing all of my recipes and doing my best to give accurate serving sizes for them.  The other thing that I found has proven difficult for many of my readers is that for some of my recipes I haven't added a weight amount.  In the US it is common for certain items to be pretty standard when it comes to the packaging so I have been guilty of saying something like 1 pkg of X.  Well seeing as how I have a lot of readers in the UK and across the Globe this proves to be a difficult thing to convert.  So I will be also making changes to include proper weights and measurements so it is an easier task to convert for others.

Other changes related to my upcoming move is that there may be weeks where I am not as active as normal, however this will not last long and there will always be at least one new posting a week.  But by far the most exciting adventure that I am looking forward to undertaking is when my little one arrives.  The mission statement of Small Wallet, Big Appetite is how to enjoy food without breaking your budget and that will continue.  But with the new addition of a baby I will be challenged to undertake what many of my readers already do and that is juggle it with taking care of a baby.  I look forward to the challenge and in overcoming the obstacles I face related to it and I will share that as they happen.  I will also be talking about budgeting tips when it comes to the expenses of a child.  Tackling the cost of baby food and healthier and cheaper solutions with making your own.  I won't fool myself into thinking this is an easy undertaking but I am excited for the challenge and I hope that you as my readers will enjoy coming along the adventure with me.

So in celebration of the new changes in store I am offering up a contest for a $35 dollar gift code for CSNstores.com to my first new follower.  Just click follow on my blog and email me at smallwalletbigappetite@gmail.com so I can email you the gift code.  Thank you all and I hope you continue to enjoy my blog.

Money Saving Tip With Reusable Jars- Teriyaki Sauce

As I look for more ways to save money I started looking at what I was putting in my recycle bin.  While not all containers are reusable I started thinking about the very nice glass jars that I was throwing away.  I am sad to say I have bought mason jars before and never even thought about all of the ones that I had been throwing away all of these years.  Glass jars are perfect for certain leftovers, especially tomato based ones that will stain your plastic containers.  I spent a little extra money on some nice plastic wear last year and one has already been stained really badly from tomato sauce.  So instead of ruining my plastic containers I am now using my reused glass jars.  You have already spent the money on them so why not get the most out of them.

The first important thing to do before you decide to reuse a container is to make sure it goes through a sterilizing process, just to be safe.  You never know how the outside of the container was treated before you bought it.  To do this clean the jars so there is no more residue on them and them submit them into a boiling pot.  This process will also help you remove the label.  Leave them in the boiling water for 30 minutes, then carefully remove them from the water.  Allow them to cool and remove the label.

I have used my jars for many things, homemade custards, curds and sauces.  Recently I decided that I wanted to make some Teriyaki sauce.  So I turned yet again to Allrecipes.com to find the perfect recipe.  One of the best things about Allrecipes is not just the recipes themselves it is the comments and reviews.  I have been able to sift through the hundreds of recipes to find the right one for me just by the reviews and comments, and so far I have never tried a recipe I didn't love.  And this recipe was no exception, to be honest after trying it I am not sure I could go back to store bought.

How to spend under $20 on a perfect romantic Valentines dinner

Funny thing about holidays like Valentines day it is a holiday created by retailers to sell their products and we accept it as a social norm to treat it as the day we celebrate the ones we love.  Now don't get me wrong, I think it is wonderful to set aside a day to celebrate those we love.  I just think it is silly that we buy into this strange list of rules that says we must do it on this day and we must do it in a particular way.  Buying your significant other a gift, or telling them that you love them with a card shouldn't be limited to one holiday in the year.  My husband and I have never celebrated Valentines day and as I am reading more about how much people spend every year I must say we will probably continue not celebrating it.  Retailers and restaurants push for higher sales on this day through almost guilt like advertisements.  And restaurants, well don't expect that to be the highlight of your night if you don't like waiting.  The average restaurant sees its dinner rush swell to over double and will leave you and your significant other waiting a long time to even just sit down.  Again I will say there is nothing wrong if you want to choose to celebrate Valentines day, I think it is just also important to not get so caught up in the marketing that you feel you have to spend a lot of money.  Instead of an expensive dinner try cooking up a private romantic dinner at home.  If you have kids arrange with either a family member to watch them or if you have friends with kids arrange to watch their kids for one evening in exchange for them to watch yours.  This will give you both the opportunity to have a quiet moment alone.  For my husband and myself we choose a day last week to celebrate, we just found out that we are going to be having a little girl so our day was a celebration of our love and what that love created.  For under $20 we had an incredible dinner that we would have had to pay at least $40 dollars for at a restaurant.  Just remember saying I love you doesn't have to be through spending a lot of money, it is those quiet unexpected moments that speak the loudest.  Offer to be the one that cleans up the kitchen while your spouse sits down with a glass of wine.  Or secretly arranging for a kid free evening just with the two of you.  And don't forget the other 364 days of the year.

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Honey Sesame Tofu

If you have been following this blog for a while you might be asking yourself, "What is with all of the tofu?"  No I am not a vegetarian as many of the meat articles I write will show.  You see tofu has gotten a bad image among most meat eaters, myself included until a few years ago.  I remember as a child, walking through the markets in China smelling the stench of the fresh tofu being sold.  The smell of it, the texture, nothing about it screamed it should be eaten by me.  But a few years ago when we first discussed getting healthier, as well as trying to cut down our food budget, my husband encouraged me to give tofu a chance.  My husband is one of those people that will always try something at least once, he is by far a much braver foodie that I am and I am grateful for that because he pushes me to experiment.  Not only was tofu a healthy, low fat form of protein but seeing as how we live near several Asian grocery stores it was also incredibly cheap.

Now I could never completely give up my love for meat but I knew that if I limited my intake, especially of red meat, and increased my protein from things like beans and tofu that I would start to see a change in my health, and boy did I ever.  The great thing is that over time our choices turned into habits we don't even really think about eating healthier any more, we just do. And these good habits I might add have come in handy for me now that I am 18 weeks pregnant.  My doctor has been amazed at how healthy my pregnancy has been, and with me only gaining 2 pounds so far she has predicted that if I continue this path during my pregnancy that I will lose all of the baby fat very soon after I give birth.  For me, someone who has always struggled in my adult years to get my weight under control, this has been such wonderful news.  Not only am I healthier but so is my baby.

I share this because I believe that if you can make a few small changes to your diet, that over time you would see life changing results that are permanent.  Because it isn't about going on a diet and depriving yourself all at one of your favorite things.  It is about the small changes that you make over time to develop healthy habits that you will carry with you throughout your life.  We allow ourselves to have a nice steak every once in a while and definitely give ourselves treats.  But what we have learned is how to eat healthier on a daily basis, it is so routine that we don't even thing about it any more. 

The Anatomy of an Egg

Rouxbe Online Cooking School & Video Recipes

Gluten-Free Hazelnut Cake

Gluten-Free Hazelnut Cake

I had the privilege of being a guest blogger for my old friend, Kimberly Schaub, a nutritionist and foodie who has an amazing blog called Peas on Moss.  She writes nutrition articles for Livestrong, and has published an article about Chef Ethan Stowell’s Staple and Fancy Mercantile in the Washington Magazine, based in Spokane. Kimberly's husband has celiac disease and they follow a Gluten-Free diet.  I love reading her blog and hope that you enjoy it too.  So take a look at my first guest blog where I share a recipe for a Hazelnut Cake that is Gluten-Free and delicious.

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Easy ideas for your Super Bowl Party- Cream Cheese Roll Ups

As we are coming up to Super Bowl weekend I decided I wanted to share one of my favorite easy appetizers as a simple solution for any occasion.  It was one of those snacks that my mom would make when I was a kid that no matter how much she would prepare there just never seemed to be enough.  It was the first thing I put on my list of foods I wanted at my wedding. And the great thing about it is that it is so simple to make that there are no excuses to not do it.  

Meal Planning with Allrecipes.com

One of the best ways to save money is by making sure that you put together weekly meal plans. But it's so easy to get caught up with life to not have the time to be able to do just that.  Sometimes we need the additional help to be able to not only do the work but come up with the ideas.  I can't tell you how many times I sat down to actually plan out my meals and I just couldn't think about what to cook.  We all go through that and so it is helpful to have different tools to assist us during those times.  One new tool that Allrecipes.com came up with is a meal planner. The meal planner allows you to pick and choose the recipes you want and then puts together a shopping list for you.  And with their incredible and extensive library of recipes it is so easy to be able to quickly put together even more then a weeks worth of meal plans.  I personally love to search for recipes using their ingredients search feature, especially when I am looking for inspiration so that I can make sure that I am properly utilizing all of the fresh ingredients that I buy.  Because there is nothing more wasteful then buying something for one meal and then allowing the rest of it go to waste because you didn't know what else to do with it.  Once you have select the your meals Allrecipes then puts together the grocery list you would need for those recipes and then you are done.  And the best thing about it is it isn't expensive, it is a feature that is only offered through their paid membership but their memberships start off at just $4 a month.  And right now they are offering special introductory rates at only $1 a month.  It is a great option to have, especially when you are struggling finding the time to put together menus and shopping lists.

Now the key to always remember about working with a scheduled weekly meal plan is that not everything works out perfectly.  I have had very few weeks where we have followed my meal plans 100% but it is important to not beat yourself up about it and just give up.  By creating a meal plan not only will you find that you significantly cut your spending and your waste but you will find that meal time is a little less stressful because you don't have to go through that struggle at the end of the day trying to figure out what on earth you are going to make.  Find the 20 minutes to sit yourself down once a week before you do your shopping and put together a plan, it doesn't even have to be an actual daily schedule, it could be as simple as you come up with 5 meal ideas and cater your shopping and cooking around those certain ingredients.  It isn't so much as making sure that you adhere to a strict schedule as is is making sure that you think ahead a time about your meal ideas so that you can make your life easier. 

Chicken and Veggies with Salsa Verde

Fresh and simple are two of my favorite words when I am talking about meals.  Being able to produce a meal that is tasty and yet takes very little effort is something that every cook needs especially after a long day.  And as my due date slowly gets closer I am beginning to understand how important it is to have simple and quick meal ideas because when this little one arrives the amount of time that I have to devote to cooking will be dramatically shorter.  And even when you don't have kids work and life can get us so caught up that we find it difficult to spend more then half an hour on preparing a meal.  With simple ideas like this one it takes less then half an hour to prepare and cook and it is delicious.