My New Favorite "Flat Belly" Recipe

This wonderfully decadent chocolate pudding is the perfect snack at the end of the day and provides you with plenty of healthy MUFAs (monounsaturated fatty acids) an essential part of attaining a flat belly, though you'd never know it! I developed this recipe after following a more-complicated (and more caloric!) recipe from the "Flat Belly Diet" book for chocolate pudding.

Decadent Dark Chocolate Pudding

1 (1.4 oz) Jell-0 instant fat-free, sugar free chocolate pudding mix
2 cups skim milk
1 cup plus 2 Tbsp semi-sweet chocolate chips
6 small (1/2 cup size) tupperware containers with lids

Prepare pudding according to instructions on box. Melt 6 Tbsp (3/8 cup) chocolate chips in microwave on high for 45 to 60 seconds. Combine melted morsels with chocolate pudding (mixture will be lumpy). Divide pudding mixture between the 6 tupperware containers. Top each of the six puddings with 2 Tbsp chocolate morsels. Keep refrigerated until you're ready to enjoy them. I recommended heating it in the microwave on high for 20 seconds before eating...it's amazing, trust me...

Each serving counts as a "MUFA" and has approximately 215 calories.

ENJOY!!!

For more information about Cailen Ascher Design or my upcoming book, Well-Designed Living, visit http://www.cailenascher.bravehost.com/ or email CailenAscher@gmail.com.

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Flat Belly Progress Report

Well, the 32 day initiation to the "Flat Belly Diet" is drawing to a close. Tomorrow is our last official day of the introductory month, and I'm proud to say it was an extremely successful month. As of yesterday, my dad is down 20lbs and my mom is down 11lb!!! They are both so pleased with their results and love the program so much, we're going to stick to it without much revision for the next month. We haven't taken final measurements yet, but we're all anxious to see how many inches we've lost over the past 4 1/2 weeks (as of last time she checked, about a week ago, my mom's waist was already down 3 inches).

The best part of the "Flat Belly Diet" is the program's flexibility. You can really tailor it to your likes and dislikes. The recipes offered in the book are very good, and if you're diligent about portion control, including a MUFA (monounsaturated fatty acid such as olive oil, avocado, pesto, olives, etc.) and evaluating calories, you have the freedom to create your own recipes quite easily. I would suggest, however, for the first few weeks to adhere to the book's recipes, just until to get the hang of it.

I highly recommend this program to anyone who is looking for a healthy eating regimen to excite their appetite and refuel their energy for healthy living!

For more information about Cailen Ascher Design or my upcoming book, Well-Designed Living, visit www.CailenAscher.bravehost.com or email CailenAscher@gmail.com.

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Flat Belly Here We Come...

So, we're officially 2 weeks into the "Flat Belly Diet", and it's going quite smoothly! My mom is down 6 pounds, and my dad is down almost 15! (Yes, already...15 lbs!!!) They're both so pleased with their results and the effortlessness of the program. We're all really enjoying the "diet" - though I really hesitate to call it that. It's not a diet because there's really nothing restrictive about it. I prefer to think of it as a lifestyle.

The food is really very good (and we love to cook, so it's especially fun for us because we're constantly trying new "Flat Belly" recipes). The best thing is that you never feel deprived because you have a meal or snack every 4 hours. Eating at regular intervals throughout the day keeps you feeling satisfied - never allowing you to get super-crazy-hungry. Also, it keeps your metabolism running at a steady pace. If you don't eat at regular times, and allow yourself to get really hungry, your metabolism slows as it goes into starvation mode because it's not sure when you'll eat again. So, even though you might feel like you're strengthing your willpower muscles by skipping meals, avoid the temptation. In actuality, you're slowing your metabolism (a.k.a. fat-burner), to a crawl. Eating revs it up -like filling an empty tank with gas.

One of our personal favorite "Flat Belly" snacks that we came up with ourselves:

1 caramel rice cake (50 calories)
1 tablespoon natural, organic peanut butter (100 calories) spread over rice cake
1 tablespoon semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips (50 calories) sprinkled over top

Both the peanut butter and chocolate chips are MUFAs (monounsaturated fatty acids), which the "Flat Belly" program recommends you to eat at every meal and snack. This treat is easy to make and completely delicious! Try it sometime, and let me know what you think.

As you can see, with peanut butter and chocolate chips (not to mention avocados, nuts & seeds, healthy oils, and olives) it's pretty hard to feel like you're "on a diet". All of these foods are rich and MUFAs, are delicious, good for you, and leave you feeling satisfied longer. Not bad, not bad at all...

For more information about Cailen Ascher Design or my upcoming book, Well-Designed Living, visit www.CailenAscher.bravehost.com or email CailenAscher@gmail.com.

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After the First 4 Days...

So, as I promised, I'm writing an update about the "Flat Belly Diet". After completing the initial four day anti-bloat "detox", my mom is happily reporting a loss of 4 pounds, and my dad is proud to say he's dropped 9 pounds! Not bad, eh?

As I touched on before, the next phase of the program is focused on the incorporation of MUFA (monounsaturated fatty acids) into each meal. They recommend eating at least every four hours and consuming three 400 calorie meals a day and one 400 "snack" (bringing the total daily allowance to 1600 calories, a healthy total for most women). The meals should be healthy, balanced, and of course include a MUFA.

For breakfast today, my mom had a breakfast BLT - turkey bacon, lettuce, tomato, a slice of muenster cheese, with olive tapenade on a whole wheat English muffin. My dad enjoyed a toasted egg and cheese sandwich with tomatoes, lettuce, and basil pesto...Yum! For myself, I prepared a delicious bowl of cereal - Kashi Go Lean Crunch, pecans, and raisins with cinnamon, nutmeg and skim milk. Sounds pretty good, right? (*All the MUFA are in bold.) As you can see, you can really mold this diet around your specific likes and dislikes - there's a lot of flexibility.

The key with this, or with any lifestyle change for that matter, is that is has to be manageable. If your diet, exercise regimen, or any goal you set is too rigid and strict, you're setting yourself up for failure (or at least feeling like one). This program is working so well for my parents because it's not a huge deviation from how they normally eat. It incorporates foods they really enjoy, and they never feel deprived. Also, since we're all working together, it gives us all additional support and sets us up for success. Having people who believe in you and back you up is invaluable when you're attempting to change your life for the better. But remember, the first step is believing in yourself!

Best of luck with your goals for this year! Let me know how you're doing as the month progresses.

For more information about Cailen Ascher Design or my upcoming book, Well-Designed Living, visit www.CailenAscher.bravehost.com or email CailenAscher@gmail.com.

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