Super Bowl Party for a Super Body

Conventional Super Bowl food and football look like this:

But the people in the Super Bowl look like this:

or like this:

Here’s a menu and recipes to help you have a great time while you avoid heart burn, weight gain and feeling like crap.

Chips and dip

There are a lot of dips you can choose from:  salsa, baba ganoush, and guacamole, are my favorite.  I just go with the better store bought stuff because I rarely have the time to make it myself.

#1.  Baked Rutabega Chips

These don’t come out all that crispy, but they are still very good and you can spoon pretty much anything on top of them.

Ingredients

1 Rutabaga, peeled and sliced into thin “chips” (a food processor makes this quick and easy)
1 TBS olive oil + 1 TBS to coat your baking sheet
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp Old Bay Seasoning

Directions

Preheat your oven to 425 F.  Mix all the ingredients except 1 TBS of olive oil that should be left over for the baking hseet.

Coat a baking sheet with the remaining olive oil, and then spread the seasoned chips out in a single layer.

Bake for about 30 minutes, turn them once or twice.

#2. Low-Carb Cheese Crackers

Ingredients

4 slices (approx 1 oz each) cheddar cheese (pre-sliced from a grocery store – I’ve used several brands and they all seem to work fine.)

Parchment paper

Directions

1.  Take cheese and fold into quarters (you end up with 4 pieces of cheese that are about ¼ the size of the original slice) and place on baking sheet that has been covered with a sheet of parchment paper.

For best results and crisp leave the unbaked cheese out overnight.

2.  Preheat oven to 400 F, and put cheese in oven when the oven heats to 400.
3.  Bake for 8min

For a crisper cracker – leave the cheese on the parchment paper for an hour or more to help it dry out.  The longer it sits out the dryer it gets and the crisper your cracker.

Nutrition

Makes 4 servings of 4 crackers

Regular cheese crackers – 18g net carb per 1oz serving
These cheese crackers – .5g net carb per 1 oz serving (4 crackers)

#3.  Raw veggies

I know.  This is very anticlimactic, but it’s also probably the easiest one to do.

Pizza

Low-Carb Pizza Green

1 La Banderita (there are other brands too) low-carb tortilla (you can get them at Safeway, Harris Teeter and probably other places)                               5g net carb
2-3 tbsp pesto (fresh is better, watch for added sugar)       1g net carb
1 handful spinach                                                                        .5g net carb
½ cup cooked chicken                                                               1g net carb
½ cup mozzarella cheese                                                          1.5 g net carbs
Pinch parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

Low-Carb Pizza Red

1 La Banderita (there are other brands too) low-carb tortilla (you can get them at Safeway, Harris Teeter and probably other places)                               5g net carb
2 tbsp no sugar added pizza sauce                                          2.5g net carb
4 slice tomato                                                                                2g net carb
½ cup cooked chicken                                                                1g net carb
1 small handful fresh basil leaves
½ cup mozzarella cheese                                                         1.5g net carb
Pinch parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions – Same for both (ingredients are listed in ascending order: tortilla first, next thing on top, etc.)

1. Pre-heat over to 400 F and lightly spray large baking sheet.
2. Place tortillas on sheet and add ingredients (Ascending order – so tortilla 1st, then pesto, then spinach, and so on)
3. Bake for 8min, cut up and enjoy!

Nutrition

Green = 9g net carb per pizza
Red = 12g net carb per pizza

Quesadillas

Ingredients

2 x 6” La Tortilla Factory low-carb tortillas
1/4 cup plain, cooked chicken breast     (optional – you can put anything else inside or nothing except cheese)
1/2 cup     Salsa
cooking spray

Instructions

1. Heat skillet with cooking pray
2. Place cheese and chicken between the tortillas, and cook until brown on both sides and cheese is melted.
3. Eat with salsa, and a side of raw veggies like peppers, cucumbers, celery or carrots.

Jalapeño Poppers (not deep fried)

This one is all new and from a client.  It turns out that you don’t have to batter and deep fry a jalapeño to make it taste good.

Ingredients:
- jalapenos
- cream cheese
- bacon (you can also use turkey bacon, and I guess some sort of veggie “bacon” would work too)
- toothpicks

Preheat oven to 350.
Cut jalapenos in half and de-seed with a spoon.
Fill jalapeno halves with cream cheese.
Wrap 1/2 slice of bacon around each filled jalapeno, then secure with a toothpick.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until the bacon starts to squeeze the cream cheese a bit (I use a baking drip tray to let the grease drip off).
Eat. They are addictive.

And for dessert Pineapple & Cream Crepes

Ingredients
1-2 oz mascarpone                                                 125-250 kcal (.5-1g carb)
2 oz super thin slices of pineapple                     27 kcal (5g carb)

Instructions

1. Cut off top and bottom and sides of pineapple, and place in freezer for 10-15min.  With a very sharp knife and careful technique, or preferably a mandolin (you can find one for a good price online), slice 2oz of pineapple.  This should yield 3-4 thin slices.

2.  Take half the mascarpone and put into center of pineapple, and roll around.  Enjoy!

Nutrition Facts

Makes 1 serving @ 152-277 kcal , and 5.5-6g net carb per serving

Josef Brandenburg is 2010, Washington, DC  Personal Trainer of the Year Nominee for both Personal Fitness Professional Magazine and The Washington, DC Fitness Association, The DC Fitness Advisor and the Fitness Expert for the PCOS Challenge TV Show. He shows normal people with hectic lives and average genetics how to create the bodies they want in the time they actually have. To find out more about the 7-Day Free Trial click here. You can also pick up a FREE copy of his brand new CD – “Why Eat Less and Exercise More is The Worst Advice Ever” here.

Josef’s Quick and Easy Mock mashed Potatoes

After I dropped my 45 pounds of body fat I thought that mashed potatoes would be off-limits to me. And they are. BUT, I have found a really, really good substitute for them made of cauliflower. Before you turn up your nose, give them a try. You won’t believe how good they actually taste.

Ingredients

1 small head cauliflower, quartered & steamed	66 kcal
2 tbsp butter	204 kcal
3-5 cloves of garlic, chopped	20 kcal
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Steam cauliflower for 5-8min. While cauliflower is steaming, sauté the garlic.
2. Place everything into a food processor and process until all chunks have been removed. This may take some stirring.
3. Enjoy.

Nutrition Facts

Makes 4 servings at 73 kcal per serving

Josef’s Mom Presents Her Butternut squash & Coconut soup

I like butternut squash. I like coconut. Together they are even better. This is a great appetizer or snack or even a side dish for a meal.

Ingredients

1 tbsp peanut (or coconut) oil	120 kcal
1 small onion, chopped	30 kcal
1 heaping tbsp Thai Kitchen green curry paste	10 kcal
1/4 cup white wine, sherry, or rice vinegar	97 kcal (75% boils off as alcohol)
1 tbsp Thai Kitchen red chili paste	50 kcal
1 cup veggie or chicken broth	10 kcal
1 can light coconut milk	320 kcal
6 cups peeled and cubed butternut squash (the equivalent of one small butternut squash)	380 kcal

Instructions

1. Chop veggies.
2. Sautee onion in oil until soft and translucent. Deglaze pan with wine, sherry, or rice vinegar
3. Add remaining ingredients. Simmer until squash is tender (the smaller the cubes, the faster this happens).
4. Puree and serve. (A hand mixer or food processor work best. A blender will do too.)

Nutrition Facts

5 servings at 188kcal/serving