Healthy Holiday Recipes
Hey All
Here are some healthy holiday recipes from my friend Nutritionist Tamika Shaw. These recipes were made as part of the community program that I run to help busy parents learn how to stay fit eat right and show their kids how to do the same. We have given some popular recipes a healthy makeover so try them out and let us know if you liked them. We sure as hell did!
Derick
Apple Maple Cheesecake
Makes 10 servings
Ingredients:
1 ¼ cup Graham wafer crumbs
¼ cup Non-hydrogenated margarine
250g package light cream cheese (brick not tub), room temperature
2 eggs
2 cups plain fat-free yogurt cheese (see recipe below)
½ cup real maple syrup
¼ cup apple butter
½ tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350º F (180º C).
2. In a medium bowl, combine graham wafer crumbs and melted margarine with a fork. Press mixture into the bottom of a 20 cm (8 inch) diameter spring form pan. Place in the fridge while you make the filling.
3. In a large bowl, combine cream cheese, yogurt cheese and eggs. Beat until smooth. Add the rest of the ingredients and beat until combined.
4. Pour the cheese mixture over the crust and bake for 50 minutes.
How to make yogurt cheese
Place a paper or basket coffee filter over a fine sieve. Place the sieve over a bowl. Pour one, 750 mL tub of fat-free, plain yogurt into the coffee filter and let sit in the fridge for 24 hours. The water will drain out and you are left with a very thick yogurt.
Nutritional Information
Calories: 254 Protein: 9 g Fat: 12 g Saturated fat: 4 g Dietary cholesterol: 57 mg Carbohydrate: 29 g Dietary fibre: 0 g Sodium: 314 mg Potassium: 105 mg
Source: Eatright Ontario www.eatrightontario.ca
Equipment list
Cheesecake Equipment List
8 inch spring form pan
mixing bowl, 1 large, 1 medium and 1 small ramekins
hand mixer or stand mixer
measuring cups and spoons
fine sieve
fork
food processor
coffee filter
Apple Raisin Fruit Crisp
Makes 12 servings
Ingredients:
10 cups apples, peeled and sliced
4 tbsp raisins
Topping:
1 cup rolled oats
½ cup all-purpose flour
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350°
2. Divide fruit between 2 medium baking dishes.
3. In a bowl, mix the rolled oats, flour, brown sugar, cinnamon and butter or margarine until combined. Sprinkle over the fruit.
4. Bake for 40 minutes or until the fruit is tender.
Source: Toronto Public Health
Apple Crisp Equipment List
Vegetable peeler
Knife
8 inch baking dish
mixing bowls
measuring spoons and cups
cutting board
Baked Whole Wheat Samosa
Makes 12 samosas
Ingredients
Dough
2 cups (500 ml) whole wheat flour
1/8 tsp (0.5 ml) salt
1 cup (250 ml) plain non-fat yogurt
Filling
2 cups (500 ml) mini new potatoes, skin on, cubed
1 cup (250 ml) onion, chopped
1 Tbsp (15 ml) canola oil
1 clove of garlic, chopped
1 Tbsp (15 ml) ginger root, peeled and grated
1 tsp (5 ml) cumin seed
2 tsp (10 ml) curry powder
¼ tsp (1 ml) salt
1 cup (250 ml) frozen green peas
cayenne pepper, optional
canola oil for brushing
Preparation
Dough
Mix flour, salt in bowl. Add yogurt. Form into a ball. Knead adding more flour as needed. Wrap tightly. Place in the fridge until ready.
Filling
Boil the potatoes 15 minutes or until tender but not mushy. Drain. Set aside. In the same pot, heat oil over medium heat, add onion, oil, garlic, ginger, cumin, curry powder and salt. Cook until the onion starts to soften. Add peas and cook until heated. Remove and add the potatoes. Toss to blend.
Assemble and bake
Preheat oven to 425º F (220º C). On floured surface, roll dough into a long rope. Divide evenly into 12 pieces. One by one roll each piece into a circle. Place about 2 Tbsp (30 ml) of filling on each circle and fold over. Dampen inside edge with finger dipped in water and crimp edges with a fork. Brush sparingly with oil. Place the samosas on greased baking sheet and bake15 minutes. Remove from oven. Reduce the oven temperature to 350º F (180ºC). Turn samosas over and bake for another 5-10 minutes.
Serve with your favourite dipping sauce. Makes 12 samosas.
Nutritional Information
1 samosa; 130 calories; total fat 1.5 g; sodium 90 mg; total carbohydrate 24 g (dietary fibre 4 g; sugars 3 g); protein 5 g
Source: Heart and Stroke Foundation www.heartandstroke.ca
Samosa Equipment List
Measuring cups and spoons
Large pot
Mixing bowls
Pastry brush
Baking sheets
Knives
Rolling pin
Spoons
colander
I am proud to announce that this year I will be a facilitator Dr Roz’s healing place Fit-A-Thon For Life. This is for a great cause and I hope to see everyone out to help put an end to violence. The details of the event are below. I will be bringing around a sign up sheet this coming week for all QuikTrain trainees but all are welcome. So bring your family and friends and lets help put an end to this problem!
Click the link below for event details:
These circuits are meant to push your cardiovascular system, increase your metabolic response and shred the fat! You will be using just one pair of dumbbells so gauge the weight you choose on the high pull exercise as this is the hardest one. By week 8 you should be able to go 3 times through this on your own. You can watch a video of the demo of the program at the end of this post.
Do this program every other day with cardio in between. Shoot for 3-4 total sessions per week.
Circuit 1: Dumbbell Complex
Plie Squats: 30
High Pulls: 30
Hindu squats: 30
Bent over rows: 30
Front Squats: 30
Push press: 30
Circuit 2: Bodyweight Circuit
Walkout negative push ups or Regular push ups: 10/15
Reg squats or tuck jumps: 30/ 20
Shoulder butterflies: 15
Mountain climbers: 100
Plank ins and outs: 60
Alt front lunges or jump lunges: 20
Abdominal Circuit
Angry Cats: 10
Superman opposites: 30
Leg lifts: 30
Crunches: 30
Opposite toe touches: 50
Let’s keep it real here – there wasn’t always a McDonalds or Burger King on every corner. It was much more difficult to acquire food even 100 years ago, so sometimes we simply had to wait. That’s a major reason why we have survived as a species – our ability to be able to thrive in the absence of food. The fact is our bodies were meant to deal with a variance in the availability of food and there is plenty of evidence that suggest there can be many health benefits from calorie restriction. More and more in the fitness and weight loss community you hear about Intermittent Fasting (IF) as a method of weight/fat loss, so I’ve decided to put together 4 reasons why fasting may work for you as a fat loss tool.
The Natural Cleanse
Our bodies go through millions of cellular reactions at any given time which lead to cellular wear and tear. Accumulation of cellular garbage leads to further destruction within the cell and has been linked to accelerated aging and many types of chronic disease. The process of autophagy deals with garbage cells by recycling them within the body. The only catch: you have to be in a fasted state for this process to work really well. The hormonal response from the introduction of even a tiny amount of food immediately blunts the process. That’s also the reason why adequate sleep slows the aging process; because sleep essentially is a fast! On the flip side prolonged fasting can lead to the degeneration of muscle mass, bone tissue and overall weakness in the body. A healthy balance of these two processes will lead to a body that can essentially cleanse itself while continuing to build and repair tissues efficiently, leading to increased vitality and longevity.
Improve Your Relationship With Food
Being able to say no to food is a powerful fat loss tool. Dr. John Berardi says in his e-book on intermittent fasting, “Hunger is not an emergency, it is a feeling… one that’s nothing to panic over.” When you learn to defer food gratification you start to understand the difference between psychological (mental) hunger and physiological (body) hunger and you unlock the key to the biggest reason why people gain excess body fat ; eating too much too often.
Fat Loss Simplicity
The most important factor to dietary success is compliance. Brad Pilon, author of one of the best IF resources available, says, “a bad diet that you can stay on is more effective than a good diet that you can’t”. Most of the popular diet plans like Atkins, The Zone and South Beach are just different methods of reducing caloric intake for weight loss. Most versions of Intermittent Fasting provide greater simplicity than traditional diets allowing you to stay on track longer, getting you better results over time. A particularly good book on IF is Brad Pilon’s “Eat stop Eat” and can be downloaded here.
Portable Fat Loss
I often get asked the question “what I should eat when I go on vacation to continue to lose fat?” While you should always be eating nutritious whole foods, there are times when this will be more difficult or you may just want to splurge! Planning at least one fast can minimize the damage to your fat loss goals when on vacation or in any situation where good food choices are not readily available. Intermittent Fasting does not require any special food to work so you can stay compliant anywhere on the globe.
If you would like to do any additional reading on the topic check out precisionnutrition.com for great articles on the topic. They also have a free e-book which gives a complete overview of intermittent fasting. It can be downloaded here.
Yours in good health,
Derick
There are some great benefits to doing chin-ups. If you haven’t tried to do them, I suggest you try them and incorporate them into your routine. You can use a strength band to assist you like in the video below. Some of the benefits of chin-ups and pull ups are:
Improved strength to weight ratio
If you can lift your own body weight it means that you carry an efficient bodyweight for your strength. Low body fat is a prerequisite for this challenge as well as strong back muscles and a good grip. I have yet to meet a woman who could do chin ups or pull-ups that wasn’t lean enough to show some abdominal definition. If you are not there yet they make strength bands that you can buy to assist you. Getting “toned” is a function of getting leaner and stronger. As you get leaner and stronger your chin ups and pull ups will improve.
Balancing effect
Chin-ups will strengthen the back. Strengthening the muscles in your back will also have the effect of pulling your shoulders back and greatly improving your posture. Commonly the posture of people is compromised because of sitting too much, carrying extra weight in the chest area, carrying children or general imbalance from doing too much in the frontal plane. This slouchy posture not only looks bad but also causes shoulder problems like frozen shoulder. Increasing your strength in “pulling” movements will correct this imbalance and give you a great looking back!
Quiktrain core exercise
Since chin-ups involve so much effort doing few sets of chin-ups a week is enough to maintain a great deal of strength and tone of the upper body without a lot of time invested. It also keeps you in check about your body fat as carrying extra body fat will make it very difficult to complete this exercise. Once you get to this goal, you save a bunch of time on your workout by making it a staple and I promise, you will get better at it but it will never become easy. That is a Quiktrain exercise.
Check out the video below to see one of my clients first attempt at a chin up using band assistance.
The first quarter of 2012 is officially over and I am happy to say that lots of goals have been met. As a team, we are truly a bunch of losers… losers of pounds, clothing sizes, old habits and bad attitudes! If you didn’t get exactly what you wanted out of the first quarter, Stay persistent. Change exists just beyond the moment of the greatest frustration. Never give up! There is still time until the warm weather hits. What will your wardrobe look like in July?
Quiktrain is getting better with some exciting additions:
Personal consultations with a registered nutritionist. Fill out in detail the 3 day food journal and send it back to me asap – Just click here to download it. My nutritionist will sit down with you and make recommendations on how you can maximize your results with personalized eating strategies that work for you! The first session is scheduled for Sunday April 15th. This is completely FREE!
Quiktrain cardio club – Looking to run your first 5k, 10k or half marathon or do you just want an extra session to maximize your fat burning? Cardio club workouts are for you! We will use the most effective interval protocols and tools like kettle bells, skipping and running to blast extra calories and carve out that nice flat tummy we all want. These sessions will be 45 minutes once a week. This is also completely FREE!
Quiktrain Referral Program – Refer a friend and save $$ on training!
- Refer 1 friend receive $25 off your next payment
- Refer 2 friends receive $50 off your next payment
- Refer 3 friends receive 75$ off your next payment
- Refer 4 friends receive $100 off you next payment
Note: Email me if you are interested in the cardio club and what times work best for you (am or pm + Weekend or weekday + preferred time) We will try to determine a time that works for everyone.
Thank you sincerely for an awesome first quarter of 2012. Its inspiring to me to see everyone working so hard and getting results. Now it’s time to go even harder than ever before.
See you soon!
I’m not necessarily impatient. I’m not the guy cursing under his breath in the grocery line at the woman who can’t find her reading glasses to sign the Visa slip. I’m not that guy. However, I am the guy that likes to get the things I need to get done quickly so I can do more of the things I want to do. I recognize that with so many demands on the average person’s time such as work, family, and friends, fitness, especially getting rid of unwanted fat, goes to the backburner. So you live with it. You might not remember your 10 pound friend hanging around from day to day, but you certainly remember when it’s time to shop for new clothes, when you run into old friends, or in the middle of the day when your energy is low. I had a client whose wakeup call came when her 6-year-old caught her in her skivvies and asked, “Mommy, why is everything jiggly?” She wasn’t what you would have considered overweight at the time but given her “all cardio” approach to weight loss, muscle tone was nonexistent. Even worse was that by adopting an all cardio approach she was actually lowering her metabolism and increasing her chances of gaining the weight back plus more!
One of the top reasons motivated people fail at permanent fat loss is because they take a majority cardio approach and half-ass the weight training.
Prioritize your fat burning activities to elicit maximum results in the least amount of time. Strength coach and world renowned fat loss expert Alwyn Cosgrove talks about the hierarchy of fat loss. He lays out the activities you should be focusing on in order to achieve the best fat loss results for your time. You’ll notice that resistance training ranks at the top of the list and aerobic training falls toward the bottom of the list. For those allergic to change, you can stop reading now and continue on in mediocrity. If you want to lose fat fast, read it, know it, apply it!
Before I go on you must know one thing: Fat loss will not happen if you take in more calories than you burn. It just won’t. A diet that contains a balanced amount of protein, carbohydrates and fats is a must. You must burn more calories than you take in. Oh, and just because it’s healthy doesn’t mean that the calories don’t count against you. If you overeat 800 calories of veggies it elicits the same results as overeating 800 calories worth of cheese burger and waffle fries at your local greasy spoon. The excess calories will be stored as fat. Buying organic won’t save you from this fact, too.
Cosgrove breaks down hierarchy like this:
1) “If you have 3 hours – high-intensity resistance train only.” This type of training kills calories on three fronts: calories burned during exercise, calories burned during recovery (up to 31 hours) and calories burned by adding muscle. You can do it in three 60 minute sessions or 4 forty-five minutes sessions. Focus on full body circuits using compound exercises that combine multiple muscles within the same movement, for maximum muscle stimulation.
2) If you have 3-5 hours – high-intensity resistance training and high-intensity anaerobic interval training. This type of cardio training burns more calories than steady state cardio and it also maximizes post exercise calorie burn. An example of this would be interval sprints at close to maximum effort on land or on a bike for 30-60 seconds followed by a rest interval. Note: this is a difficult interval. Beginners should build up to this gradually under supervision of a certified personal trainer.
3) “5-6 hours – add aerobic interval training.” This burns a bit more than steady state aerobic interval training. An example of this would be moderate intensity and low intensity intervals (2:1, 1:1) on an elliptical or treadmill that are continuous for 25-45 minutes.
4) “7-8 hours – add steady state high intensity aerobic training.” For those cardio junkies, steady state has its place; it just falls lower in the pecking order. Prioritize this activity and you’ll be cheating yourself out of post exercise calorie burn and metabolism increase from increase in lean muscle. Under this umbrella would be any cardio activity done at a constant pace for 25 minutes or more.
5) “8+ steady state low intensity cardio activity.” These are just the little activities that come under the umbrella of moving more. It doesn’t make a huge impact on fat loss but it doesn’t hurt either.
There is no magic here. Do the harder stuff before the easy stuff and you will get to your fat loss goal faster and maintain results.
I am currently putting together a program called Quiktrain 3x that integrates the hierarchy of fat loss along with principals of good eating and lifestyle in an 8 week package. I’ll be posting the details on the blog in the next couple weeks.
In the meantime, stay healthy and strong,
Derick
I love this. I definitely understand that the girl on the right is gifted genetically and potentially digitally enhanced however I have seen this many times in real life. The body on the left is typical of working out to “lose weight” and the body on the right is indicative of someone who trains with weights. This comparison illustrates the point that “losing weight” will not necessarily make you look better.
Resistance training has the ability to sculpt the body so you not only lose weight but also look better naked! P.S. The girl on the right probably weighs a lot more too!
So go hard in the gym and don’t be afraid to lift weights that challenge your muscles and push you outside your comfort zone. This approach will make sure you metabolism revs hot enough to shred the fat and build the strong defined body you can be proud of.