All You Need Is Lava...

After watching the Food Network Channel everyday, I finally found a recipe that I had to make healthier: chocolate lava cake!  Although this hot and gooey cake tastes incredible when you order it at a restaurant, it tastes even better at home.  This is because it has about one-fourth of the calories, and all the taste.  For this recipe, I used moist-style cake mix, diet hot chocolate mix, egg whites, semi-sweet chocolate chips, Splenda, salt, fat-free chocolate pudding, fat-free creamer, and light whipped butter.  The recipe made four individual lava cakes, each containing only 182 calories and 4.5 grams of fat! Compare that to the average lava cake that has 437 calories and 23 grams of fat.  Luckily, now eating this cake doesn't mean sacrificing your diet. 

As part of my research this week, I interviewed one of my closes friends, Karli.  I chose to interview her because recently she has lost several pounds simply by dieting and exercising.  She cooks dinner most nights with her parents, and through her weight loss journey has learned important tips for cooking healthy meals and ordering slimming dishes from restaurants.  As Karli shows by her daily eating habits, losing weight does not mean eating less.  Karli consumes about 240 calories every three hours to keep her metabolism working at a rapid pace, and to keep her from getting too hungry throughout the day.  She also emphasizes her belief that everything is okay to eat as long as you do so in moderation.  The major foods among teens that Karli feels are directly related to weight gain are alcohol and fast foods.  Karli was able to give me a perspective on losing weight from someone my own age, giving me more direction when researching weight loss and chosing what foods to cook.

This weekend I am going to continue cooking and researching as always.  I also plan on continuing my workout routine of running and going to the gym.  But for now, I am going to go enjoy my hot and gooey chocolate lava cake!

RANDOM FACT: When using various spreads, such as honey, it is best to use a runny spread so you will be able to spread it more thinly, and therefore keep your calories to a minimum.