Lavash pizza on the bbq

J loves pizza and we've discovered the great joy of making it on the BBQ. We've done it a few times now using lavash as the pizza crust. It's ultra-thin, which I love, and very low point, which J loves, so everybody wins. And they take no time at all to cook. We whipped up a few for a quick lunch today. Max 8 minutes cooking time on the pizza stone on the grill.

Here's mine. It was light bocconcini cheese, a few really thin slices of hot genoa salami, black olives, some thinly sliced onion, tomato and hot banana peppers from the yard. Dee-licicous.

Time to blog about it....

Sigh.

Double sigh.

It's been such a weird year.  So fresh on the high of having lost weight, I promptly forgot everything I learned, got ridiculously stressed out and depressed, and gained a bit back.  And by a bit I mean an entire stone.  I say a stone because I can't face the fact that I let myself gain 14 pounds back.

Ridiculous.

But I've learned, right?  I know what to do.  Weight Watchers works.  Exercise works.  When I work, it works.  And so slowly, I am getting back in the swing.

I've lost 4 pounds, I've run a 5K and an 8K race, and tried to stick to running 3 times a week and doing at least one Wii strength workout.  I can already see the difference in my body, and I feel better too, so I know it's working.

But for f-ck's sake, does it ever freaking end?  Is it ever just, "oh yes, there you are, normal weight, normal girl" life?

So while I relished the positives of it all...

Look at me, back in the swing!

And the post race amazing turkey sandwich, tomato and cheese salad, and potato salad...

I still feel like a giant tub o' lard.

So yeah, there's a million positives, but I still feel like a giant fatty who's kidding herself into thinking that she had ever made this whole weight loss thing work.  I mean, never mind the fact that I haven't been this weight (even THIS weight) for more than a decade.  Never mind the fact that as of my WW weigh-in this morning I am only 10 pounds over goal.  Never mind any of it.  I am just so freaking tired.

I read the book "The Amazing Adventures of Diet Girl"... have you read her blog?  So basically she lost half her body weight.  She looks amazing and has certainly had her share of ups and downs.  Parts of her story I completely related to and other parts just made me angry.  She dismisses doing Weight Watchers for the same reasons that I would never ever go to meetings, but also talks about how it is a crutch and she should be able to do it herself.  (And to her credit, she has done, so well done, mate!) but I find that I need that accountability.  I need to see those points moving along and tallying up.  I need that in order to know that I am on the right track.

One major change of the last almost two years on WW?  I love shrimp now.  I mean, this is a food that I literally would gag on and I absolutely love it now!  So score one for losing weight (while not 2 stones 2 pounds, I still can say I have lost 1 stone 2 pounds, which is pretty impressive)!

A little garden bounty

In our first garden in the new house, I planted just a few things and tonight's dinner includes a bunch. I made a potato and golden beet salad with veg from our neighbourhood farmers' market. But I dressed it with parsley and onions from our yard. Yay! Also along with our delicious hamburgers, we will have hot peppers also from our gardoonie.

Yay for Italian Food!

As mentioned in my last post on San Diego, G and I ate at Bencotto Italian Kichen twice.  It was amazing and while not cheap, it was worth every single penny and would have likely cost double had we had this same meal in Toronto.

Anyway, we read about this restaurant and decided that we absolutely had to eat there.  And we fell in absolute love.  So much so that when we were leaving, we made another reservation to return for our last dinner in California!

And what a dinner it was.

Sheesh man.

I started with stuffed squash blossoms.

Delicious blossoms stuffed with ricotta cheese.  They were then lightly battered and fried.  Served on a parmesan cream sauce that I would pay to just dip my fingers in it and lick off, it was amazing. The sauce had some sun-dried tomatoes scattered over the top.  Heaven!!!  Absolute heaven.

I was really excited about my second course.  Asparagus gnocchi with cream sauce, bacon and more asparagus.  Fan-freaking-tastic.

Oh yeah.  Every single bite of gnocchi was beyond amazing.  Seriously, it could not have been better had it been even much better.  Even thought it was a huge plate of food, I still cut each gnocchi into threes just to make it last longer.  I didn't realize that I was ordering two creamy dishes, but it happens.  And it was amazing...

If you are in San Diego, I highly recommend this place.  Our first time there, I ordered two appetizers, a glass of bubbly red (which I love), and a HUGE plate of baked pasta.  With another appetizer and G's main, our bill was still only about $70 or so.  Which is a lot, I understand that, but the quality is just out of control.

San Diego.

I went to a conference in San Diego recently and took an extra few days to spend vacationing with G.

What an amazing city!  First up, we knew we had to try fish tacos.  Staying in La Jolla, we were THISCLOSE to the beach, so off we went to a little beachside taco place to have the first round...

Tooooo yummy!  Lightly fried fish, avocado, fresh salsa and shredded cabbage wrapped in two corn tortillas.  Fantastico!

But this was not the only memorable meal in San Diego...

We also ate at this fabulous place called the Whisk N' Ladle in La Jolla...

I didn't take a photo of the food, but I had an amazing charcuterie platter followed by fish taquito's that were absolutely OUT OF THIS WORLD.  And this place has the same quote on their menu that I have on my blog, so they are obviously cool like me.  (As cool as I am, I thought you'd know this already...)

We also went to the famous Fish Market, which was really pretty decent, but the Bob Hope and Life Magazine photo tributes were better....

Super neat... we enjoyed the view while sipping some local brews...

I also had to try the local favorite, Hodad's for a good ol' fashioned American hamburger!  OMG what an amazing hamburger and fries it was...

We ate at the bar and just took it all in.  Really a great place but super small inside and we had to wait in line for about 15 minutes outside before we got a table!  But it's not too expensive (especially compared to the #1 ranked 'burger place in San Diego, the Burger Lounge), lots of fun, and a really nice vibe.  I enjoyed every bit of that burger.  (And didn't have to think to hard to figure out how I gained back a few pounds while in California!)

The conference hotel was near Little Italy, and so off we went to the farmer's market.  This is an AMAZING market and if you live there and haven't been, you really should sort it out and get there ASAP.  It's beyond fantastic.

We had some amazing tastes of local food, and bought a few treats.  I bought a vanilla macaroon that was the size of a person's head!  Only in America!

And the most amazing spicy green chile pork tamale...

Gracious, I could eat a few more of those right now!

I also almost got eaten by a shark...

But I survived.

And good thing to, because we discovered what could be my most favourite restaurant ever... Bencotto in Little Italy.  I am going to devote a whole post just to that big smackin' bunch of delicious Italian food like never ever in my life previously... Stay tuned!

Happy Canada Day!

Ahhhh, beach day.  We spent Canada Day hanging out with our fellow Canadians at the beach.  This is the end of our main street.  That's right.  10 minutes and this is at our feet.

We're too lucky by half.

Happy Canada Day and Happy July 4th!