The Sisterhood of the Shrinking Jeans LLC – Eating Right Because Our Jeans Are Too Tight

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Can I get a woot woot for football season??

OK, so some of you may not be as super-excited about the beginning of football season because that means for the next few months you’re a “football widow,” but most of us here at the Sisterhood are of the football-watching variety. Yes, my husband’s sooo lucky that I happen to like watching football (ok maybe not so lucky because that means I squeak in on his dude-time a little because I want to watch the game too.) But I think he likes me enough, so I kind of get a free pass and I am more than happy to let him go off and do his own thang when there’s a game on that I couldn’t give a hoot about.

But a few weeks back I was in a little panic because we were having people over to watch the University of South Florida game (and by the way I’d like to yell “Squeeeee!” at their beating FSU today, sorry Noles fans but I have to pledge my allegience here) and that usually means chicken wings and chips and beer but, see, I’m doing this here challenge, and well, I’m also trying to do this here Weight Watchers thing, and well, there’s this ridiculous amount of near-zero points they give me for the week so that means really, in essence, NO WING FOR ME. Or maybe one if I want to stay within my points. Oh heck, sure I couldeat the “naked” tenders instead and forgo my favorite breaded boneless at BW’s for now, but if I have to do that, I’m going to just make up my own yummy menu instead.

So I went straight to the Weight Watchers board to find something football-watching-worthy and I found an entire menu. Yes. Two guys and two girls ate an entire menu of Weight Watchers and still don’t know it! Sweet.

The menu:

Baked Potato Skins with Creamy Spinach and Turkey Bacon (2 points per potato skin) Bleu Cheese and Pear Salad (2 points per 1.5 cup serving)

Juicy Hamburgers (that was the actual name of the recipe– 5 points, includes bun)

I also served tortilla chips and cheese dip and potato chips, which I didn’t eat, but the above recipes (and oddly enough, the salad of all things!) were a total hit. We paired this with the 64 calorie Beck’s Light Beer, my favorite. Also I personally heart the baked potato skins. So here are the recipes:

Baked Potato Skins with Creamy Spinach and Turkey Bacon:

-3 Slices Turkey Bacon, cooked crisp -1/4 tsp. black pepper -1/4 tsp table salt -4 oz light cream cheese -20 oz frozen chopped spinach, cooked

-3 medium potatoes

Directions: Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cook bacon until crisp (I did it in microwave) and cook frozen spinach. Cut potatoes in half. Scoop out flesh from potatoes leaving about 1/4 inch of flesh in the potato. (You can keep all the scoopings for something else like mashed potatoes if you want.) Place potato halves on baking sheet, spray with cooking spray. Bake for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. While potatoes are baking, combine cream cheese, spinach, salt and pepper. Remove skins from oven, and spoon 3 tablespoons of mixture into potatoes. Bake until warmed through, about 5 minutes more. Remove from oven, top with crumbled bacon.

*note: out of kindness, I also made a few potatoes with cheddar cheese, bacon and sour cream. No one ate those ones. Can you believe that?

OK NEXT! Bleu Cheese and Pear Salad: Ingredients: -3/4 oz. Chopped walnuts -1/4 tsp black pepper -1 garlic clove -1/2 cup bleu cheese -1/2 cup buttermilk -3 medium pears -1 head romaine

-1 bunch arugula

Directions: Cut pears into one inch pieces. Toss with romaine and arugula. In separate bowl, combine buttermilk, bleu cheese, pepper and garlic. Pour over salad and toss. Top with walnuts. (The biggest fan of this was a dude. He ate this throughout the game. With beer. Apparently they go well together! Cracks me up!)

OK lastly: JUICY HAMBURGERS! Simple, delicious, and I love them. -Reduced calorie hamburger buns (whichever kind) -1/4 tsp black pepper -1/2 tsp salt -2 tsp garlic (I may or may not have used more because I’m a garlicholic) -1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

-1 lb lean ground beef (7 % fat)

Directions: Mix everything in a large bowl (except for buns). Shape into 4 patties. Have husband grill (like mine did) or put them in a pan with nonstick spray and cook to desired temperature. Loved these!!! I’ve also since made “sliders” with these, (the tiny burgers) with wheat bread and grilled onions and they ROCKED! The kids even loved them. Condiments may change point values.

OK so you’re not doing Weight Watchers and you wanna know calories?

Burger: 270 calories (not including condiments or bun)

Potato Skins: 150 calories, 4.5 grams of fat (**HOWEVER please note** I couldn’t calculate what it would be without a lot of the potato filling, so I would actually venture to say they’re much less, since you scrape out most of the filling.

Bleu Cheese Salad: 124 calories, 6 grams of fat.

My entire meal was about half the points for my day but I it was a football-watching day and I allotted for it. Just a few modifications to the normal foods and added some veggies in there, and everything was delicious. The burger is a standard here now.

Got any lowfat football season recipes you wanna share? Please leave us a link or the recipe in the comments! Happy Football Watching!

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