Simply Start Meals

WW rolled out the Simply Start program for 2014.  Basically if you are a new WW member they wouldn’t start you out right away counting your points.  The Points program is still there but instead WW wants you to just focus on certain foods for the first two weeks of your program.  After that, you can switch to counting PPVs, where you will learn more about that, or you can move into the Simply Filling Technique, which is what Simply Start is based off of.

Most of us “old” WW members are trying out the Simply Start as well.  WW has given us two weeks of meal ideas so that makes it really appealing!  Plus there is no tracking, weighing, or measuring your food.  Instead you focus on eating to satisfaction and paying attention to portion sizes.

It can sure feel like after a while a change-up is good!

I have been toying around with Simply Filling, making some of the recipes, and trying to clean up my eating.  What I like about Simply Start/Filling is that if the foods you are eating aren’t a WW Power Food then they are an Indulgence and therefore you have to count points for them.  I don’t eat many fat free products so in that case my half and half, sour cream, and cheese are indulgences.  Peanut butter would also be an indulgence.  So would chocolate.  So if you have to pick and chose only 7 PPVs of indulgences a day you have to be really sure you WANT that food.  So in that aspect it has been nice.

It has also been kind of nice not having to weigh my food, although it is a habit, and not have to measure everything that goes into a recipe.

With that being said, here are some of the Simply Start meals I have been eating.

There is a recipe for veggie soup served with a cheese sandwich English muffin.  I am not a fan of tomatoes so my version is a mini pizza with veggie soup.  My mini pizzas are an English muffin with some tomato paste and gouda cheese.  Yum!!!  I need my veggie soup to have some staying power as well so I added kidney beans and a little bit of whole wheat pasta.  I also used carrots, celery, and zucchini.  You add chicken broth and canned tomatoes.  Make sure you check your tomato cans.  It is amazing how many have added sugar in them.

 

While this isn’t a Simply Start recipe, I have also enjoyed the Mexican Polenta recipe from one of the WW Weekly handouts.  It is mostly Power Foods.  This recipe combines ground beef with a can of drained Ro-Tel tomatoes, frozen corn, and cumin.  I added black olives, sour cream, and salsa.  You serve it over cooked polenta.  It is really good.  I just mixed it all together when I got to work.

 

I have also been eating cottage cheese again.  I like to have cottage cheese with peaches or other canned fruit (no sugar added and drained/rinsed).  I also like mixing some cottage cheese and fat free yogurt with the fruit.  I even got some shredded wheat to go along with it.

 

I made pork chops and roasted a sweet potato and served with green beans.

I love popcorn and air popped or 94% fat free microwaved popcorn are both part of the Simply Start/Filling program.  This is my favorite part!  I love to pop my popcorn at home with olive oil so I can get in my healthy oils.  Or at work the micorwave popcorn is a nice snack.  I find popcorn doesn't hold me over though so really I turn to it for boredom eating!

 

Having my meals prepped and ready to go before I started my work made for a very smooth week of meals.  It also helps keep me on track the last few work days before vacation so I don’t slip into “vacation mode” too early