The MakeMeThinner Support Forum

[Gwenski]

cydj21 -

Welcome and thanks for the cool intro and photos. Cannot wait to see your progress and what wedding dress you pick! You are already beautiful and once your inside and outside match, they will see you from space!!!!

Congrats on making this commitment to YOU!!! Hit those books and keep shaking!!

[cydj21]

Gwenski, thanks for the support. Your most recent pictures are amazing. You are truly an inspiration today me in these first rough days. I even resisted pizza today from the best pizzeria in town. It showed up unexpectedly at a meeting I was at....but no fear! I just didn't take a plate and I felt really empowered by that and went home to eat my broccoli and chicken for dinner.

For anyone who might have some info, I do have a quick question about snacks. I've read multiple places that "two pickles" is considered a snack. Is this considered two average sized pickles, two mini pickles? And what about spears? I have pickle spears...would it just be two spears or are more acceptable? As a college student I stay up later studying than most people probably do and I tend to get real hungry later in the evening. I just want to make sure that my evening snack is staying within the confines of the program.

[Eander5696]

I usually buy the garlic pickles that are not the gherkin size, but are not the huge ones. I eat two of those. I also have lime pickle spears, and if I go with those, I eat two spears.

Speaking of...Im thinking that sounds pretty good right now. Im also a late nighter....I love being up at night when everything is quiet and I can think!

Anyway, hope I helped a little? My boyfriend just cooked a pizza (grrr ) and Im just going to hang out and eat my pickles !

Happy pickling!

[Nancy]

Yup, those good old regular size pickles, not the itsy bitsy tiny winy gherkins (I think they are pickle wannabes!). If I had gherkins, I have more than 2 of those...

This is so weird-o-lah...at this very schlurp! mo-crunch-ment, I am enjoying a pickle spear myself and they are rather large - about the length of my Tall Man finger. I love the no-sugar added Vlasic™ Bread & Butter Spears made with Splenda™. They have 5 cals each. I have 2-3 of them. (two to three spears) If you slipped in another, you should be just fine.

I remember trying to hold several of them together to see how many spears it took to make up a whole pickle then doubling that and I just about ate the whole jar…not wise!

Moderation, Nance. Moderation….

Warning: pickles and bouillon are salty. SOME of you may have water retention issues if you consume pickles and bouillon. Drinking will help to move it on down the road and if you have a day or two of weight-loss slow down and you have been munching on late-night pickle spears, we shall not go into Wacko Cwazy mode if the scale does not cooperate the next day. Eventually it will...

[cydj21]

Good to know about the pickles....yesterday I had two spears and later in the day I had one of those small sugar free JellO cups...I bet those things aren't even close to a full cup (anyone know for sure?) As previously noted, I had to toss out about half of the minestrone soup that I made for lunch. Needless to say I was starving yesterday and I knew my calorie intake was a little low.

Overall things are going well on day 3. I made some of Nancy's oatmeal cookies around 3 oclock for a little pick me up. They were super. Exactly what I needed!

[Nancy]

Oh, my! Such good ideas in this thread and I wanted to make a couple of comments, too

Eander5696 mentioned how bouillon improved the flavor of the soups - yep! I agree. I really like the bouillon granules because you can vary the intensity of the flavor as you wish.

Have you tried the Knorr™ brand of bouillon?

Long ago during one of my stupid DIEting episodes, I lived on that stuff.

I was on a VLCD and ate nothing but 4 ounces of shrimp per day (total daily protein consumption), 1 can of green beans and 4 cups of bouillon. Which by the way, was a dumb and dumber weightloss way to go, totally unhealthy, my periods stopped, lost my hair, got meaner than a catbox, became anemic, etc. go there!

Anyhoo...I digress, as I am wont to do...back to the Knorr™. I hadn't seen it for years. The other day I was at my local Safeway store shopping for a family from my church and I was looking at the canned tuna. I selected several cans and turned to put them in the cart and spied the Hispanic Food shelf section. I looked it over for some new hot sauce and what to my glazed green eyes, I spied the Knorr label on some bouillon! I do not read, speak or understand Spanish but I recognize logos!

There was a picture of a chicken sitting on three tomatoes!

I found it! I found it! My beloved TOMATO bouillon. I was elated!

Now I tell ya, I prefer the Medifast Robust Tomato Fast Soup as it has veggie bits in it and the addition of potassium but I whooped out a gladsome "Mama Ceeta" and did a little jig right there in the Hispanic section and tossed a few bottles of Knorr™ tomato bouillon into my cart and shuffled off.

Tomato Fast Soup or tomato bouillon is super in the Chili and in the Minestrone.

Guest, yes, indeedy doo, the Chili, Minestrone and Chicken With Wild Rice are excellent cooked on the stove top. They taste and smell like homemade and the texture is perfect. I hate to dirty up a saucepan for such a little dibble dab of soup so usually prepare two-three packets at a time stovetop method and then just nuke a portion when I am ready to eat them.

The Creamy soups cannot tolerate the heat of the stovetop; they get gloppy. That’s why I really don’t recommend adding hot water to them – the water in those ‘Insta-hot’ faucets that many homes and office cafeterias have seem to be too hot and make the soup into one big blob so I usually mix the Creamy soups with cool water, stir as best I can and then nuke for a minute and stir again. I let it rest for about 5 minutes and re-nuke but never bring it to a boil unless you need the paste for a wallpaper project!

Eander5626, the lime pickle spears are great, aren’t they? Have you tried those Vlasic™ Tabasco pickle spears? Yum! I love ‘em!

Hype Vlasics™ are now available in Canada! Yeow-sa!