Nutrition + Exercise is the key + kale chips?
I read an article today talking about combining nutrition WITH exercise. You can read it’s entirety here:
Dr. Steven Garner who was interviewed for the article tries to dispel the myth that just by exercising you are going to lose weight, he states:
The public at large hasn’t gotten that memo. Dr. Steven Garner, the chairman of radiology at New York Methodist Hospital, would like to change that.
The idea that exercise is the key to weight loss “is a myth, and I don’t know how it got started,” he says. “Exercise makes you healthy in other ways, but people like to attach it to other things, like losing weight.”
If we turned the clock back 30 years, Garner says, “about 20 percent of the population worked out, and about 20 percent were overweight. Now, 70 percent say they do some type of exercise – and two-thirds of the population is overweight or obese. It seems to have gone up identically with exercise.”
In the article, they profiled a woman who joined a gym, worked out 6 days a week and after seeing no results, and getting frustrated, she asked a nutritionist for a meal plan. By incorporating small changes, less fried foods, less frequent junk food, watching what she ordered at dinner, she lost 37 pounds in no time at all!
It made me think about when I was training for my first Chicago marathon in 2005. I was at my heaviest weight at that time (199!) and I was like, “this is going to be awesome!” I am going to lose like 50 pounds….easy! After training for 8 months, running several times per week and doing the longer distances on Saturdays, 5 miles, then 7 miles, then 10 miles, then 14 miles, then 16 miles and getting up to 20 miles (which we ran twice!) guess how much weight I lost??? NOTHING!!
I know its hard to believe that someone can do that, but with I think a lot of people who work out a lot, sometimes you think, “well, I just ran 10 miles, so I can have an extra slice of pizza”, or this bag of M & M’s won’t matter, I ran 20 miles this week. I am living proof that if you don’t change WHAT you eat when you are exercising, your spinning your wheels! Shelley has learned to incorporate exercise AND watches what she eats and has seen awesome results! Roni has added exercise to her routine too! And of course Carla from Ms. Fit is a huge inspiration in the exercise department!
So, if you are working out all the time and aren’t seeing the results you like, it’s time to look at what you are putting into your body and see if making some small adjustments here and there will make the difference.
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Now on to something I made last night……Kale Chips!!!
I’m pretty sure I can safely say I have not eaten Kale ever? If I have, it was when I was a kid and it probably was only once!
A few weeks ago I was reading Kath Eats and she was eating Kale Chips. She said it was like eating potato chips. I read all the comments, most people loved it, while other people (including one commenter’s husband said it was like eating leaves!) But I went in with an open mind. In fact when I went to the store, I had to ask someone who worked there where the kale was. Between the mustard greens, and other leafy vegetables, I didn’t know exactly what it looked like!
So, last night I decided to make it. Basically just wash the leaves and pat them dry. Tear off little pieces (you don’t need the middle stalk part) and place them in a bowl. Drizzle with a little olive oil and sea salt and bake at 325 for about 10-12 minutes. Keep an eye on it, because it can go from perfect to burnt pretty fast.
When you take it out of the oven, sure enough they are crispy like chips. I tasted one. I liked it! My son Mark (my picky eater) tried one, he liked it! My daughter Claire tried one, and she liked it!
I put them in a bowl and sprinkled a little parmesan cheese on top. We finished the whole bowl at dinner!
So, make your own opinion about that one, but I will be making these again!!