{Originally posted on Fit Bottomed Girls}

The Fit Bottomed Girls are all about enjoying all that life has to offer, and sometimes life offers dessert. And the FBGs love us some dessert—and not just the fat-free type. Unfortunately, over consumption of mouth-watering desserts can get in the way of maintaining a fit bottom, and most of them aren’t exactly easy to make anyway. Have you ever actually tried making a Martha Stewart dessert? I did it once in college, and after a whole day in the kitchen, while staring at a smug photo of Martha with her perfectly frosted lemon cake, I began to feel inadequate in all areas of my life. (If I can’t get this dang cake’s icing smooth, how will I ever find a job, let alone start a solid career?!)

The FBGs are here to help (and hopefully save you from any of the above-mentioned self esteem snafus). We have a recipe that is so easy even the baking-impaired can succeed. And I personally guarantee its deliciousness. The muffins may not win in a taste test with Martha’s desserts, but you can make them in less than 30 minutes and maintain your sanity.

For the Punk-in Muffins (”punk-in” has a double meaning here, acting both as slang for “pumpkin” and as a verb: punk-ing desserts Ashton-Kutcher style), you take a regular box of spice cake mix and mix it with only a 15-oz. can of pumpkin. If you can find a reduced-sugar spice cake mix you get bonus points.

Two important points to remember:

1. Only mix the cake mix and the can of pumpkin together. Do not—and I repeat do not—add eggs, water, oil, etc. The batter will be thick, but it’s right. Girl Scout’s honor.
2. Do not use a can of pumpkin-pie filling. Get the plain, pureed, boring regular can of pumpkin.

Mix the two ingredients together well, and spoon batter equally into 12 regular muffin tins lined with paper or sprayed with non-stick spray. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. Eat and enjoy guilt-free. Each big muffin has about 180 calories, 2 grams of fiber, 2 grams of protein and 4 grams of fat, and is filled multiple grams of pumpkiny spicy goodness.

And if you’re feeling extra adventurous, try the same base recipe with different flavors of cake mix. Lemon cake mix creates a fun, summery orange sherbet flavor, and any type of chocolate cake mix is delicious. You really can’t taste the pumpkin with the chocolate, and it’s super fudgy and moist. I made these last weekend during an intense chocolate craving. You can see the deliciousness!

{Originally published on SUSIEJ}

At my annual check-up this week, my doctor pulled out that little stick, drew the blood like a vampire and certified that I am low in iron levels; a major contributor for my exhaustion. So, together, we worked out a plan of foods, herbs and supplements she approved of, to help me feel energized and happy.

So far, I’ve emailed portions of this list to many friends, other tired women who say the same thing, “I’ll do anything to feel better.” And they mean it.

We’re sick and tired of walking around exhausted, while our kids are running circles around us. So here, is the list, hammered out with the help of my doctor, to bring my energy levels back up to normal. My favorite? The greens… instant energy in a powder. Another benefit — it makes me feel full, so I end up eating less. Enjoy!

1. Herbal Teas: Anemia (low-iron levels in the blood) is common among women, with side affects of fatigue. Your doctor can preform a blood test to find out if you have this or not. If you learn that you are low in iron, one safe way to restore your iron levels — and energy — is through teas made from the following roots; now widely available at whole foods. These herbs are the roots of yellow dock, burdock, dandelion, and Chinese wild yam. Gather a teaspoon of any or all of these dried herbs, and pour boiling water on top, cover and let steep overnight. Strain and drink.
2. Greens: Sometimes, the last thing we need is another supplement; what we really need is healthy nutrition. None of us eat enough greens, yet their full of vital minerals and vitamins. Greens Plus, is a powder that you mix with water or juice, and it provides you with the benefits of greens in one drink. Don’t even bother with the chocolate-flavored powder- it’s horrible. Berry is a much better alternative; but don’t get me wrong, the stuff is not going to be one of your most favorite-tasting beverages; but like most Moms I’ve talked to have said, “I’ll drink anything to feel better.”
3. Carrots: Carrot juice also assimilates iron quickly in your blood stream. Carrot soup, or a vegetable-based soup of carrot and beets, will increase your iron levels naturally.
4. Watch the Tea: Black tea, my favorite bevereage, unfortunately does slow down the absorption of iron. So monitor your intake. So, instead of making yourself another cup of tea in the afternoon, make your self a drink of greens plus.

{Originally published on What’s Cooking?}

This is Darrin’s (my bestest friend in the whole fat world) favorite breakfast. He fell in love with this simple, yet delicious breakfast since the very first time I made it for him. This breakfast consists of scrambled eggs with chorizo, avocado, queso fresco and corn tortillas (fresh hand made tortillas are the best).

Mexican chorizo is different than Spanish or Portuguese chorizo. There is a similar kind to those sausages called longaniza, but I haven’t seen it anywhere here in Ohio.

Originally published on Three Bright Stars.

I go to the gym at least twice, and usually three times a week now. It’s enough of a habit that I feel okay telling you about it. I’m not about to quit any time soon, even though some of my gym co-members are odd and frightening. I have to tell you about one in particular.

To the casual eye, she is young, thin and blond. She has an unmatched dedication to the gym, and is always there when you arrive, and still there when you peel yourself out of the leg press and crawl off to the showers. She hangs on to the machines with cruel strength, works them in strange positions, and glistens from head to foot. Her concentration is magnificent. She must be, you expect, a specimen of physical perfection.

In time, you become accustomed to her presence. She only takes the elliptical machine marked “C.” She is always there, reliable. You call her Elliptical-C. You immerse yourself in your own workout, switch your iPod from Joss Whedon’s latest musical hit to Black Sabbath’s Sabotage, feel a surge of energy, and move past the 20 minute mark on your own elliptical machine.

Only when you achieve a certain level of physical exertion and mental focus do you begin to glimpse the truth of Elliptical-C. Out of the corner of your eye, you notice an anomaly. There is a strange convergence of details in your mind. They form up gently, but clearly, in your focused mental state.

Elliptical-C is not human. She is the Elliptical-C creature. She uses the elliptical C machine to send communications to her fellow creatures, who are trans-dimensional space creatures of immense age, intelligence, power, and malevolence.

{Originally posted on Zen Habits}

Every Friday is Health Tip Day at Zen Habits.

I have to admit that I have my ups and downs with the exercise habit.

So I know that it’s not the easiest habit for most people, and most
people’s experiences consist of starting and stopping and starting again. Which is fine — don’t beat yourself up about it. The important thing is starting again.

I’ve written before about how to build the exercise habit (and even have a guest post on it), but today I thought I’d revisit the topic for those who still have trouble.

The Main Problems

So why do most people have trouble making exercise a regular habit? Well, there are probably a number of factors, but here are the main ones as I see it:

1. Too difficult. People set out with a lot of ambition and enthusiasm, and start out with a big goal. “I’m going to go to the gym for an hour a day!” or “I’m going to run 30 minutes every day!” The problem is that the goal is too difficult to sustain for very long. You can do it for a few days, but you soon run out of energy, and it becomes a drag to do it.

Originally posted at Morning Cup of Joe.

Sure, it’s tough
to commit to regular exercise. There are just so many other things that
require our undivided attention. Or maybe it’s just easier to feel
sorry for ourselves and find something better to do.

“I don’t have time”

“My elbow/knee/back hurts”

“It’s just too hard”

“I didn’t sleep well”

“(enter your favorite exer-scuse here)”

I admit, there are days that I consider skipping my workout. But I
have a li’l trick for getting past the “poor, busy me” syndrome - I
think about some of the people I met who had every possible reason to forget about training, yet they soldiered on…

– One guy was in a wheelchair, his shriveled legs resembled
overcooked linguine. Since squatting and running were out of the
picture, he competed in bench press contests (quite successfully, I
should add). He’d train just as hard as any able-bodied person would -
probably even harder. I remember watching him with awe as he did rep
after rep of pull ups with his wheelchair strapped to him.

Did he have a valid excuse to not exercise?

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Originally published on Gild the Voodoolily.

Last weekend Scott and I went to the coast for the night. I had been having an uncharacteristic jones for the hubbub of Seaside and its bumper cars, corn dogs, caramel corn and salt water taffy, but we couldn’t find a room there and so settled for Astoria. A couple of hours of walking around Seaside and taking in the delicious smells of childhood was enough to sate me, and the crowds made me glad for our reservation in the sleepy history of Astoria.

Our hotel was adjacent to the marina, and if you wanted to spend ~$200/person and 12 hours on a cloudy sea you could partake of a charter fishing trip for tuna, salmon, halibut and/or dungeness crab. Even better, you could just walk down the pier and buy fresh albacore from a dude on his boat for only $1.50/lb. Having had some foresight, we had packed an empty cooler and bought an 18-lb schoolie from the guy.

“You want me to fillet it for you?”

“Nah, I think I can handle it,” I say smugly, having seen that one episode of Top Chef where the Quick Fire Challenge was to fillet fish.

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Originally published on The Great Fitness Experiment

Well, you can’t trust them. That’s the first thing. They’ll lie to your face, tell you anything you want to hear, to protect their compulsion. It’s not that they’re bad people. It’s that they’re scared and the eating disorder is their coping mechanism. They already think they’re nothing. Without it, they’re worse than nothing. At least that’s what the voices tell them.

But don’t give up - they need you. Incidence of eating disorders are rising among almost every group, with a surprising (or not, depending on your level of media consumption) surge in adult women. It has a 6% mortality rate. It has only a 50% cure rate.

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Originally published on Kalyn’s Kitchen

This time I’m writing about one of my very favorite summer vegetables, spagetti squash (also spelled spaghetti squash), so it’s luckily for me that WHB can be about any type of herb, vegetable, plant, or flower. I learned from Wikipedia that spagetti squash is also called vegetable spaghetti, vegetable marrow, noodle squash or squaghetti. Squash is something I’ll be eating a lot of over the next few months as my garden starts to produce it in copious amounts.

Squashes are divided into winter squash (which ripen late in the season, can be stored through the winter, have hard outer rinds, and must be eaten cooked) and summer squash (which can be eaten rind, seeds, and all, and which can be eaten raw.) I like every type of squash, but in my garden I mainly grow summer squash since the winter squashes produce huge vines and take a lot of space. Winter squash is something I’ll be buying from the Salt Lake Farmer’s Market later in the season.

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Originally posted on Former Fat Guy Blog.

Today’s weight loss tips are about exercise and how
to best use your time in the gym to get more work done, stimulate more
muscle and burn more fat. They say that building muscle while burning
fat can’t be done, and that you should focus on one or the other, never
both. That said, what if you just wanted to burn fat as efficiently as
possible, end workout boredom make your time in the gym as quick as
possible. These three weight loss tips are the very thing to take you
in that direction.

Weight Loss Tips

1 Focus your training on the largest muscle groups:
The largest muscle groups of the body are the legs, back and chest. By
working the largest muscle groups, primarily, you end up putting a
larger demand on your body for energy and nutrition. Then a larger
demand on your body for repair of that muscle tissue. You burn fat
twice, first when you’re actually training and secondly when your body
is busy rebuilding the muscles.

Arms (tricep and bicep) are smaller muscles, and where training
certainly makes them look good and allows you to work harder on pushing
and pulling movements, they don’t burn as much fat as the larger
muscles.

As my trainer says, even if you don’t specifically train arms, they
still get worked when you’re doing chest and back movements.

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