Weight Watchers Points Plus Breakfast

So I went to my first meeting last week. Yep, a real Weight Watchers meeting. It's been a while since I did the online thing WITH the meetings, and this time it's going to stick. I'm ashamed to say that I am the heaviest that I have ever been, and it's time for a change. In college I lost almost 50 lbs doing the WW plan, so this time I'm going to keep it all off. The new plan is different--more carb based, which sucks in one respect but in another, it's not half bad. You can eat as many fruits and veggies as you want for 0 points, you have a higher point value than on the old plan, and hopefully it works the same way!

Of course, in doing Weight Watchers, the key to success is still enjoying food, and not thinking of it as a diet. It's a healthy lifestyle. And guess what, kids? I can still eat delicious breakfast foods. In fact, I can make amazing breakfasts for less than 10 points a pop. And still eat cheese. Boo-Ya!

So I've made this omelet twice already because it's REALLY good and only takes about 10 minutes from prep to dine. As well you may have noticed, I'm a big fan of Mexican breakfast. My love for Chilequiles should speak for itself. Of course, tortilla chips would drastically raise the point value of my breakfast, so no mas for now.

Weight Watchers Mexican Omelet

• 3 egg whites beaten
• 1 oz sharp cheddar cheese shredded or sliced (you can lower the point value by using reduced fat, but I don't)
• 3 tablespoons black bean salsa
• 1 medium vine ripened tomato sliced
• 1/3 cup fresh sliced avocado
• sea salt
• ground black pepper

  Pour the beaten egg whites into a small, heated pan sprayed with PAM. Let the egg cook through until the top is almost cooked as well. Then, gently flip the entire egg. Add the cheese to one side of the round egg, and fold the other half over the cheese. Slide the omelet onto a plate with the sliced tomatoes, garnish with salsa and avocado. Then sprinkle the tomatoes with sea salt and black pepper. Voila! Breakfast is served.
Weight Watchers Points Plus Value: 7

The best part about my little weight watcher's omelet is that this will fill me up for a decent amount of time. I won't be hungry until lunch. And worst case scenario, if I am hungry, I can eat an apple or two without wasting any points at all. I call that a win.

Breakfast Sandwiches

Dear faithful viewers,

I have not been very dedicated to this blog. I have spent a  great deal of time writing for my work blog at ImIn. Of course, I haven't forgotten about the breakfast love. So I thought that this morning, I would post about one of my favorite things in this world:

The Breakfast Sandwich

Oh yes. I had one this morning (A Dunkin Donuts Turkey Sausage Flatbread is only 7 points in the Weight Watchers World--more about that later). It was sort of tasty (not going to lie...the flatbread tastes like cardboard.)

I've decided to inform you of my top orders at my main breakfast locations for the almighty breakfast sandwich.

In no particular order, here goes.

• Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Biscuit with the Round Egg instead of the Folded Egg at McDonald's
• The folded egg is gross. I don't know what they do to that thing, but it is not real eggy goodness
• I sometimes switch this up with the (Sausage McMuffin on a Biscuit instead of an English Muffin)
• Bacon, Egg, and Sun-dried Tomato Cream Cheese on Spinach Florentine Bagel at Einstein Brothers
• Occasionally switched up with Six Cheese Bagel or Asiago Bagel. *drool*
• Turkey Sausage Egg White with cheese on a Croissant at Dunkin Donuts
• Also delicious with additional meat (preferrably back, as they sometimes over cook the sausage)
• Bacon, Egg, and Giardinara Cream Cheese on a Jalapeno Egg Bagel from Jake's Bagels (Aurora)
• Dude this thing is massive. You'll need a fork and knife
• Bacon, Egg, and Cheddar on a Cinnamon Crunch Bagel from Panera
• I occasionally add extra bacon
• This thing is life changing, I swear
• Chicken Apple Sausage, Egg, and Cheese from Caribou Coffee
• No modifications necessary--It's that good

So those are just a few on the list of my breakfast sandwich joys, but try them out. Taaaaasty.  Of course I'm totally missing Potbelly breakfast--they had a pretty tasty breakfast sandwich as well. Wendy's did a terrible job in their brief stint with breakfast. Burger King needs to change the egg that they use. Gross. White Castle is barely edible (but remind me to tell you about homemade White Castle breakfast.

Enjoy!

Traditional Breakfast

My Breakfast: Eggs Over Medium, Ham off the Bone, and a Bagel with Giardinara Cream Cheese

The traditional breakfast consists of eggs, a starch, and meat. I covered all of the important food groups this morning with double protein (eggs & ham), starch (egg bagel), dairy (cream cheese), and fruit/veggie (OJ).

My breakfast was delightful, and I was super proud of the eggs, especially. I managed to cook them pretty darn perfectly. I thought it was kind of funny, though. I'm always spouting off on Yelp about how restaurants do or do not know how to properly poach an egg, and I rarely poach my own eggs anymore. I think it's faster sometimes not to, but it's just amusing that I'm such a poached egg elitist and I barely do it myself.

I really have to tell you about that ham, because it rocks. Ham off the Bone comes in the deli meat section, right next to your Oscar Mayer, Budding, and Hillshire Farms. It's in a little Tupperware looking container with a yellow lid. The BEST pre-packaged deli ham for your money. It tastes like that deliciously spiral cooked ham. It's awesome. Trust me. Just try this stuff.

The bagel is from Dominick's--my all time favorite grocery store. God, I love that place. Plus the bagels are always fresh and relatively inexpensive.

The cream cheese is from Jake's Bagels & Deli. I love this place, and get excited when I have to drop the BF off at the train, as it is conveniently located across the street. I feel super guilty that my bagel breakfast isn't from my favorite bagel shop when the cream cheese is (oh irony, you dirty devil, you), but I'm trying to pay off a credit card bill, and it was either get bagels or cream cheese...and Thursday I went with cream cheese. I love love love their Giardinara cream cheese, the salsa cream cheese, and I just tried the seasonal pecan swirl cream cheese. Oh wow. It's like dessert. Bring on the graham crackers.  I was a little sad to see the pumpkin cream cheese go, but hello, pecan swirl. :)

Sun-dried Tomato & Basil Chicken Sausage with Eggs

I know, I know, it's quite a mouthful, but so so delicious! I had this really tasty sun-dried tomato and basil chicken sausage that I bought at Woodmans. I sliced it up into small pieces, and nuked it. I was in a rush this morning, don't knock my methods! The nuker is designed to make things easier and more convenient. Then I topped the tasty sausage pieces with some shredded Romano cheese, as you know how I feel about cheese. I nuked it a little longer for melty goodness. I made some delightfully over-medium eggs to top my meaty cheesy goodness with, and voila! Breakfast!

Of course, I had a few mishaps...

I may have overcooked the sausage just a teensy bit. It still tasted delish. Also, I had mad issues with the eggs this morning. they wouldn't flip right, so it was just a big ole mess. Both eggs broke in the pan before I could put them on to the sausage. Of course, they still had some gooey goodness, but they didn't look pretty enough for a picture.

Guess I should have used PAM. ;-)

Chilequiles Are My Favorite Breakfast

 

Can I just say that this was pretty much a fiesta in my mouth. Fiesta. The flavors. The colors. The fun! 

Seriously, I savored every last bite of my newest creation. 

So, this morning, I did a mental inventory of what ingredients were available in the bf's kitchen. As always, chips and pico (a staple in this house) were among my options...

Chilequiles it is! 

I used the Tostitos Hint of Jalapeno for a little extra flavor in my breakfast (like I actually needed it). I softened them up in a pan with some of the pico (and all of the juice from the pico). Then, I put them on the plate, added some horseradish havarti and some queso crumble cheese (yum!). I melted the cheese on top in the microwave for 30 seconds. I cooked up some eggs over medium (I have seriously been having problems with cooking eggs lately! They kept sticking to the pan...I'm going to go buy some PAM and see what happens. 

I put the eggs on top of the cheesy tortilla chips, diced half an avocado on top, added the rest of the pico, and as a final garnish, a small dollop of light sour cream. I also used some medium garlic salsa (like I needed more flavor). 

Let's just say I was a happy breakfaster this morning.

Breakfast Recap

Sorry kids! It's been awhile since I've had time to write for my own blog...you know getting paid to write the ImIn.com blog kinda takes a lot of my writing time...Then there's my new obsession with Yelp reviews.. You can check my breakfast section for reviews of tasty and not-so-tasty morning meal eateries. I've been doing a lot of McDonald's breakfast, thanks to Monopoly: Both McMuffins, hashbrowns, and medium drinks are all on the game piece list....So of course I make the occasional breakfast visit.

This morning was pretty rockstar breakfast though. Now that I'm on a limited budget (Oh yeah, I got T-boned by a freaking doe on Monday night...and have a $1000 deductible), I have to spend well...nothing most of the time. So no more McD's for a while...maybe ;-)  So I did an egg scramble with egg whites, red potatoes, horseradish and chive havarti (thanks to-you guessed it- Rick and the Cheese People of Beloit, and called it a meal of JOY.

Another choice meal that I created for the bf and bestie, A last weekend:

Italian Breakfast scramble with canadian bacon, tuscan herb cheese curds (Thanks again Rick!), fresh basil, and topped with a drizzle of the tomato soup I made from scratch with the recipe from Alex's Day Off. I changed a few things (I added fresh basil chiffonade, and used white wine instead of vermouth. We also didn't do the melty cheese because we had grilled cheese and steak sammiches. Yum Yum Yum.)

I promise I'll stay motivated and write more. I will I will.

Italian Breakfast Scramble

Tuscan cheese curds. In my eggs? Delicious? You don't say. Well, you don't, because you don't know. You. Don't. Even. Know. But I do. And it rocked. Om nom nom. So I started with some fresh chopped red onion (a staple in the fridge) and sliced grape tomatoes from the Aurora Farmer's Market (also a staple in the fridge). Let it heat up in a pan. The add 3 egg whites, and let that cook up for a bit. Mix it up, top it with the Tuscan cheese curds, and garnish (yes, I said garnish) it with a fresh chiffonade of basil and voila! Breakfast is served.

The cheese curds, obviously from The Cheese People of Beloit, purchased at the aforementioned market...yum yum yum. Have you ever cooked relatively fresh cheese curds? Still freaking squeakin' in my dang mouth. Holy delightfulness, Batman!

I've had some pretty great breakfasts this past week, but haven't had time to log them all. Let's just say that the cheese and I are gettin' pretty creative in the kitchen. And I'm sure that you'll hear all about some of my tasty treats eventually when I remake/perfect them. *drool*

In other news, yesterday's breakfast was a homage to McDonald's Monopoly, which of course, I'm not too thrilled with...they changed the game on me. and there were kinks in the system. and it was un-fun. But last year, I won a $50 gas card to Shell...so I'll keep playing. Gotta get my SASE ready for mailin'! In case you're wondering, here is the list of breakfast items to get your grubby little hands on game pieces:

medium drink
McCafe bevs (smoothies and frappes, but not coffee!)
Egg McMuffin
Sausage McMuffin with Egg
Hashbrowns (2 for $1.49, people)
Oatmeal

I'm thrilled that I don't have to get any of the strange breakfast sandwiches and I can enjoy a less than terrible for me egg McMuffin of joy.

Breakfast Wrap

Last night, headed to dinner with V. So this morning, I had a bunch of leftover Flat Top food...the girl gave us a ton of roti bread to take home with our entree (apparently, you can take the food home for an extra couple of bucks (like $2.50 more than the unlimited trips price). That's a $2.50 lunch. sweet.

Clearly, I love turning my leftovers into amazing breakfast concoctions. It's one of my favorite ways to get creative with my breakfast. There are very few things that aren't improved upon with cheese or eggs. Very few. By the way, just wait until one day I tell you about my White Castle breakfast scramble. It's a heart attack on your plate but MAN is it good! One day, my friends. One day.

So, for breakfast, I took one of the roti breads, nuked it for 30 seconds with a little bit of water so it doesn't dry out. Then I topped it with my egg scramble. The egg scramble consisted of Mom's homemade giardinara (which by the way is a little like a spicy muffaletta with peppers, olives, celery, carrots, olive oil, and spices), turkey ham and 1 egg. The flavor combination was outstanding. I wrapped the scramble into the roti and ate the delightful breakfast like an Asian-Italian taco (talk about fusion cuisine!)

Overall, it was a really delicious breakfast, and I highly recommend you try something to the likeness of this joyous breakfast combination. More tasty early morning meals to come!

Have a great day, kids!

Grilled Cheese and Eggs

Imagine for a second this delightful menu item:

Gruyere, aged cheddar, mozzarella, Brie, roasted tomato concassé, fried
shallots, candied bacon confetti melted in parmesan crusted sourdough

Now imagine it open face with an egg on top. Yep. Pretty f*ing delicious. Excuse my language, but it was truly that delicious. Last night we ventured to Lady Gregory's for an awesome dinner and drinks. You can check my review at Yelp for the tasty experience that it was.

So this morning, I nuked it (got the cheese all melty and the bread all soft) and topped it with the aforementioned egg for an amazing breakfast.

Yesterday's breakfast was an Irish breakfast, as I spent the morning watching my first Irish football game at Gaelic Park with the bf and fam. This game is intense, btw. It's like football and soccer and rugby combined...hardcore fans and unpaid athletes. That's dedication!

Anyways...breakfast....eggs, potatoes, bacon, bangers, black pudding, white pudding, and Irish soda bread. I only nibbled on the bf's breakfast (basically, at the meaty stuff), as I had a baby shower to attend, but man it was good. For those of you who don't know...

Bangers= Irish breakfast sausage. Creamier than your standard breakfast sausage. Super yum.
Black pudding= Blood sausage that's been deep fried.
White pudding= Oatmeal sausage.

All of them are delicious and you should try them at least once.

Tastes Like Potato Pancakes!

The fine Cheese People of Beloit have yet again brought me another delicious cheesy breakfast concoction. Actually two.

On Wednesday, I made a delightful ham and baby Amish Swiss (of course from those brilliant cheesemongers of Wisconsin) egg white scramble. It was fast easy and undeniable delish. plus, with my light cran-raspberry juice, breakfast was only 6 points on the Weight Watchers scale. (Three egg whites is a whopping one whole point!)

Yesterday was cold pizza for breakfast, which doesn't have quite as much of a healthy eating ring to it, but cold pizza for breakfast rocks! I've been eating cold pizza as breakfast food since high school...and it's always there in all of its delicious glory. Dad and I had Roundheads the night before, so it was tasty pizza. The only prob was that there were a few too many onions and I had to swipe those puppies off due to my unnatural fear of botulism, which can be caused by eating leftover onions. (Usually only once they've been left sitting out, reheated, yadda yadda yadda...but I don't care about the fine print. Hence UNNATURAL fear.)

This morning was the best , though. With another delightful cheese from the Cheese People (a caraway seed gouda), I created a breakfast treat that I'm still day dreaming about. Frozen hash brown potatoes, a little ham, this amazing cheese, and 3 egg whites made an awesome potatoe-y scramble that seriously tasted like cheesy potato pancakes with eggs on top. YUM-O.  I was incredibly happy with my breakfast choice, and I highly recommend you check these guys out.

Apricot Brie and Egg White Omelet

This morning, yet another well-timed, perfectly made omelet of joy. I'm getting really good at this. (I remember when I was a kid and would try to make an omelet and end up with eggs EVERYWHERE from trying to flip the damn thing over in the pan. I now realize that the trick to making a perfect omelet is letting it cook mostly through before flipping and adding ingredients...In order to do that without burning the egg part, you have to let the uncooked egg slide under the cooked part, thus never crisping the outer egg. Then flip. Then add ingredients. Then fold. It's that simple.)

I use egg whites when I make omelets, because why use the extra cholesterol, when I'm not really going to taste the yolky goodness anyways. I reserve my yolk eating for when its runny and delicious. :D

So the cheese obviously came from my friends at The Cheese People of Beloit (where I buy my cheese at the Aurora Farmer's Market on Saturday mornings--YUM!) A tasty brie layered with a light hint of apricot (and I believe almonds). Awesome happy goodness.

The rest of the week was tamale from the farmer's market, Honey Jam, Juicy-O, BK, and McDs....yeah it's been one of those breakfast weeks.

Southwest Scrambled Eggs

3 egg whites, some fresh cilantro, red onion, and texochili cheddar from The Cheese People of Beloit (my favorites!) made up my delicious breakfast this morning. I garnished it, as you can see with some ripe on the vine tomato slices, avocado, black pepper, and sea salt. Yummy happy eggy breakfasty goodness. You know you love eggs as much as me...so try this one out. Is delightful.

Top 10 Breakfast Reasons Why I Haven't Posted...

10. Leftover Indian Food (Cold)
9. Just Cheese Curds
8. Cold Chicken
7. McDonald's
6. Dunkin' Donuts
5. Leftover Greek Food (Cold)
4. Non-standard Breakfast Sausage
3. Chips and Salsa
2. Cupcakes



And the number one reason why I don't always post about my breakfast...



1. Sometimes, I skip breakfast...


I didn't yesterday or this morning though!

Yesterday was delicious Chilequiles (one of my favorite breakfast delicacies.) Tortilla chips cooked in a sauce or salsa until they're a little soft. Then, I added Portobello mushrooms, cilantro, jalapeño, tomato, and red onion. Mixed it all up, like a Mexican breakfast skillet. Then topped it with cilantro and chive farmer's Jack from Rick my favorite cheese monger at The Cheese People and a delicious egg over medium. A dollop of sour cream to cool the jalapeño heat and voile! Breakfast of JOY.

This morning's breakfast was a simple conglomerate of sun-dried tomato sausage, a few basil cheese curds from the aforementioned cheese monger, and two eggs over medium. Of course, I managed to over-cook the eggs a bit...but it worked well with the sausagy goodness of my breakfast.