WW Project - Month 4

Month four of the WW Project was a big month for me - I'm excited to share that as of Aug. 23, I've lost 26 pounds. I'm back in the clothing I was wearing before leaving the corporate beast in 2009. I'm feeling good, I feel like I have a new wardrobe.

I should have hit the 30 to 40 pound might by this point, but I admit I had a few opportunities.

Opportunities ... one of the most overused words used by corporate professionals. In the fourth month, I found myself getting bored with the food I was eating. I don't crave things like I used to, but I was just getting to be too much of a creature of habit.

I didn't embrace vegetables like I had planned on doing, but I am drinking a lot of water. At book club, I decided I needed to start looking at eating veggies as a need not a want. I ate asparagus. It wasn't bad, but I will be shocked if you ever hear me say something like, "asparagus would really hit the spot."

My traditional lunch - ham and cheese sandwich with Baked Lays - has had a mini makeover. I changed it to just the ham, a Laughing Cow cheese wedge, a pickle and Baked Lay or Triscut Thins. It's less points and I like it just as well.

My emotional eating habits have changed a bit - I'm more alert to the urge to emotionally eat. I've started to somewhat reward myself by making it through the emotional eating days. I find that when I emotionally eat it tends to be a day long thing - anything within reach is fair game. Once I realized this, I decided instead of giving in to that and just eat something that really didn't satisfy me that would treat myself at the end of the day. My treat is an ice cream cone from Dairy Queen. I love a cones of chocolate ice cream. Oddly enough, I'm often 'over it' by the end of the day and don't follow through with the treat.

Until next month ...

Chocolate Chips Make Everything Better

My Pinterest addiction helped me discover a recipe for Brownie Batter Chocolate Fudge Cupcakes by Kevin & Amanda. I made them for the card night; they were delicious!

The next time I make them I will half the frosting recipe and use three trays for the cupcakes (making 36). The ones that turned out the best (by looks only) were the ones that had closer to 2 Tablespoons of cake mix and a drop of brownie batter. They are also great without frosting.

I had so much frosting left over from making the Brownie Batter Cupcakes that I decided to try a little something.. With a few tweaks of the original cake recipe, I made French Vanilla & Chocolate Chip Cupcakes with chocolate frosting (scroll down to the frosting recipe). I used a Wilton's 2A Boquilla tip - bought them at Walmart in a set.

As a kid, my favorite birthday cake was chocolate chip with chocolate chip frosting.
Making these cupcakes brought bake a lot of great birthday memories!

French Vanilla & Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. 

Line cupcake pans with 24 to 30 liners. I used the Reynolds Baked for You - Stay Bright Liners. I found them at Walmart in the aisle with the Ziploc bags.

• 1 French Vanilla cake mix (I used Betty Crocker)
• 1 box French Vanilla pudding (3.4 to 3.9 oz box)
• 1 cup sour cream (I use regular)
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 cup milk (2% or whole)
• 1 1/2 to 2 cups of semi-sweet mini chocolate chips (I used Nestle)

Mix the cake mix and pudding mix (just the dry - you don't actually follow the recipe on the boxes) - set aside about 1/4 of the mix in a separate bowl with the chocolate chips. 

Pour a big glass of milk and enjoy! These are moist and the
frosting is rich.

Mix the remainder of the cake mix, pudding, sour cream, vegetable oil, eggs, milk and vanilla bean paste for about 3 minutes on 'stir'. I use a Kitchen Aid stand mixture, but you can easily use a hand mixer on low speed.

Stir the bowl of mix and chocolate chips to 'coat / dust' the chips with the mix. This helps keep them from sinking in the batter. Then fold in to the cupcake batter. 

Spoon or scoop the batter in to the cupcake liners. Fill 1/2 to 3/4 full. Be careful not to overfill.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Let cool and top with frosting.