What I've been eating since starting Tone It Up

Today we talk food because honestly, who doesn't love to stuff their face?  If you don't, we can't be friends because I like to get down with some food.  I refuse to starve myself with gross, tasteless food, so I've found some delicious, healthy meals to help me reach my weight loss goals.


This post has all the meals I've eaten so far on this plan and they are all yummy in my tummy!  The name of each recipe links to the recipe video or web page.  As always, let me know if you have questions. I'm happy to answer!

The Tone It Up Protein Pancake with all natural honey drizzled on top.

I normally don't eat the yogurt with the protein pancake (like in the pic above), but on Saturday I just combined my breakfast and my mid-morning snack as one meal.

Normally mid morning I have 1/2 C of non-fat Greek yogurt and 1/4 cup of bluberries.  I measure it the night before so it's easy to grab out of the fridge in the morning to take to work.  If you need a crunch with your yogurt, add a sprinkle of granola or almond slivers. Goodness, granola is good.

This is my absolute favorite Tone It Up (TIU) meal and it's what I've been eating for lunch this week.  What we have here is the TIU member-submitted Black Bean Tostada recipe, but I use the Ezekiel Sprouted Grain Tortillas (bake at 350 for 10 minutes, flip over and bake another 10 to get the tortilla crispy).  I also add nitrate-free chicken slices chopped up.

If I don't eat the tostada for lunch, I'll have a big salad with low sodium turkey from my local deli, lots of veggies and balsalmic vinaigrette as the dressing.

The easiest thing for me to do as an afternoon snack is a Luna protein bar and the S'mores variety is my fave flavor!  The ThinkThin and Lara bars are some of the TIU girl's favorites.  I'll drink some Green Tea with it if I'm feeling frisky.

For dinner I've switched between ground turkey and quinoa (pronounced keen-wa), chicken or tilapia with veggies or a side salad.

Mrs. Dash skillet baked chicken and baked green beans flavored with Mrs. Dash.  Mrs. Dash is salt-free and a fave of the TIU girls. 

I grilled chicken kabobs on the grill with veggies last Saturday. I just marinated the chicken with a healthy oil-based dressing for a few hours in the fridge, cut it up and added chicken and sliced veges to kabob sticks.  I also grilled green beans and mushrooms in a foil packed with a little olive oil and Mrs. Dash.  Easy and good!

Zesty Tilapia and mushrooms!  The recipe calls for some dried mushroom I've never heard of and didn't care to look up, so I just use regular button mushrooms and it's deelish.  This tilapia is SO easy and SO GOOD. Seriously, out of this world.  The recipe also calls for butter, so use olive oil instead.  

Quinoa (keen-wa) and ground turkey stuffed tomatoes. I kinda made the recipe up so if you don't love it, sorry!  Preheat oven to 350.  Cut the tops off of 8 to 10 large red tomatoes and scoop the insides out.  Brown 1 lb of lean ground turkey with mushrooms, chopped onion and minced garlic.  Add 2 low-sodium taco seasoning packets to flavor the turkey once it's browned (I used an all-natural seasoning packed I found).  While your ground turkey is browning, cook one cup of quinoa according to package instructions.   Combine the quinoa and ground turkey.  Place the tomatoes in a glass caseerole dish and fill with the mixture. Add about a 1/2 inch of water to the bottom of the casserole dish (steams the mushrooms while baking).  Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. If you want to add cheese to the tops, take out 5 minutes early, sprinkle cheese and bake the last 5 minutes. I don't eat dairy in the evening so I don't use cheese, but it's a good addition. 

If you are like, "What the hizzle is quinoa?", don't fret. I didn't know what it was either, but it is cooked just like rice, but it is actually a seed and not a grain.  It's super healthy for you and the TIU girls highly recommend it on the diet plan.

Your turn.  What are your favorite healthy meals?! Share them below.


p.s. I WILL have Friday Favorites tomorrow and you can link-up.