Dear Diary

Food diary, that is.

Today I cooked two meals for myself, even though my husband was home. When I cooked breakfast, he was out for a walk getting breakfast elsewhere. When I cooked dinner, he had already gone to bed. It’s ok, there will be leftovers for him tomorrow. What I figured out today was that half the secret to being a good cook is having the right tools.

Over Christmas, I had asked for, and mom had sent, good omelet pans. I’ve never been a fan of egg-based dishes, but my husband loves eggs and always orders an omelet when we go out for breakfast. So, I started doing research on them around the same time I started having a 2-egg breakfast as part of my “at-home breakfast” weight watchers routine. Cooked without fat, 2 eggs are 4 points and really work as a “filling food.” (My preferred on-the-go breakfast is a Fiber One oats and chocolate bar, but I’d really like to figure out what aspect of those things upsets my lower GI tract sometimes and figure out a decent substitute with the same filling power. )

Anyhow, back to the eggs. As I ate eggs more regularly, I found myself experimenting with them more, and became very curious about making omelets. Enter Mollie Katzen’s Sunlight Cafe, a lavish cookbook focusing exclusively on breakfast, which recommended that readers get a good omelet pan and learn how to drag a spatula through the center of the cooking eggs while tilting the pan to get the uncooked egg to flow through. That made no sense unless you cook omelets too, but anyway. I hadn’t figured out the trick even with the handy guide, after trying since Christmas, to making a real omelet. Which I did, today. It was filled with Cabot reduced-fat cheddar and Canadian bacon, and when I loosened the edges and folded it all together it was a work of beauty that flipped right out onto my plate.

That, along with some buttered toast and jelly, made for a hearty 11 point breakfast–late as it was, practically a brunch. So when midday — 4ish–arrived I actually had the Fiber One bar and a quick low-fat hot dog for a 5-point “lunch,” and I snacked on radishes and carrots through the afternoon as well.

But then I got it into my head to make Skillet Cincinnati Chili with Spaghetti out of The Best Cover & Bake Recipes, and it did not disappoint! Redolent of cinnamon, cocoa, chili powder, allspice and cayenne, it certainly packed the promised wallop on the taste buds. Best of all, a single serving is 8 points… and of course I couldn’t resist adding more of the Cabot reduced fat cheddar to it as well, for 2 more.

At any rate, 26 points for the day and I feel very well-fed. Even spoiled. I should have had more vegetables than the snacks, to be sure, but tomorrow I’m going to make my super special balsamic chicken and avocado salad.