A Night Out

I spent all this time yesterday trying to figure out what I was going to cook for dinner - a low calorie dinner without compromising flavor.

I hummed and hawed over a handful of recipes and yapped with friends about which sounded better and how I could minimize the calories with various substitutions - I'm sure they enjoyed such thrilling conversation. Riight.

After spending considerable time trying to figure out how to make mongolian beef low cal, I accepted defeat and moved my thoughts on to another menu plan.

After writing my grocery list for the items needed, I decided it was too icky outside to actually bundle up the little ones and walk myself over to the store, buy the needed items, and then walk back. The walk would have done me good, but it was icky and I wasn't in the mood.

I tried to movtivate myself. I really did. And after much effort, it was not going to happen.

With my acceptance of staying in the house, I adjusted the menu for dinner yet again to include items that we already had in stock.

Then my husband called to let me know he's on his way home from work. I tantalized him with the low calorie meal I had planned, and although he was quite thankful for continuing with my diligent plan of attack to be healthy, he could tell in my voice that I wasn't ecstatic about it.

He thought it might be more fun if we go out - get me out of the house and get me something to eat that sounded better than "what we had in the house".

Although I told him ~I'd think about it~ vs. staying at home and let him know the decision when he arrived at the house - I was darn near ready to walk out the door with both kids in hand as soon as his keys hit the lock!

We had a really nice time at dinner. Despite the fact that we had two high chairs at the table (one with the toddler and one with the infant carrier), and we were managing sippy cups and snacks and crayons and and and...it felt like we were on a date nevertheless.

We were good too! We wanted to eat like cows, but we shared an appetizer instead and also shared an entree...and we shared a beer. The appetizer was 'Wok Seared Pan Asian Chicken and Lettuce Wraps' (pictured above) and the entree was a steamed rice with spicy shrimp and vegetables. We would have been fine with just the appetizer and beer..we ended up bringing home a lot of the entree as left overs.

Slowly we're piecing this new healthy lifestyle together. But it was rather comical when we both simultaneously grabbed our menus and without prompting showed each other the dessert we really wanted to dive in to head first!