Resources

I’ve mentioned before that I found it difficult to find much information about being vegan on Weight Watchers while deciding if I wanted to join.  So, here are some resources that I found, and some that you gain access to once you sign up.

The best source of information that I found was SherylYvette.com, subtitled A Neurotic Glamour Girl’s Weight Watchers Experience and Fitness Adventures.  She wrote about her journey with WW while she was going through it (including information from and reflections on the meetings), and she has since met her goal weight and even been featured as a WW Success Story of the Week.  I read practically all of her archives related to Weight Watchers, and it was a major influence in my decision to join.

A more recently started blog is veganloser.  Brittany said that she was inspired by my blog to start her own, which was totally flattering!  There are plenty of other Weight Watchers blogs out there of varying quality, but I haven’t found any others which focus on vegan food.  Leave a comment if you know of any others I should check out.

LaaLoosh is a blog which lists Weight Watchers friendly recipes.  They’re not all vegan, but you can go straight to a listing of the vegan recipes here.  I haven’t tried any of the recipes yet, but some of them look pretty good.

An offline resource which I have actually owned for a long while is Weight Watchers Versatile Vegetarian cookbook.  I think I’ve actually had this book since I lost weight as a vegetarian, back in 2003-04.  While the book is vegetarian, many recipes are vegan by nature and most of the rest could be easily veganized.  The recipes are fairly basic and I’ve only made a few; one standout is the White Bean-Pesto Dip, which is really easy to make and a great party appetizer.

Of course, there are plenty of vegan blogs and cookbooks which list recipes that are or can be made Weight Watchers friendly.  A few that come to mind are Fatfree Vegan, Choosing Raw and Appetite for Reduction.

Once you sign up for Weight Watchers online, there are a bunch more resources to be found – recipes, guides to eating out, fitness articles, exercises, a science library, success stories, blogs and message boards.  There is a vegetarian message board which is fun to peruse; I’ve found the members who post to be generally knowledgeable, welcoming and supportive.

I made a rather resourceful dinner Thursday night.  I was practically out of fresh food and at a loss for dinner, and Dave suggested the taqueria down the road.  In the past my taqueria go-to was a 17 point burrito.  This time I bought a side of rice and a side of beans, added what I could find in the fridge and split it into two meals.

I topped the rice and beans with a bit of Food for Lovers queso, picante sauce and green onion.  On the side I made a little salad of shredded carrot and celery, lime juice, chili powder and cilantro.    This was more healthy and a much more reasonable amount of points than a burrito!

Thursday, 9/15/11

breakfast – Vega Chocolate Whole Foods Energy Bar
AM snack – banana, 6 almonds, coffee with coconut creamer
lunch – salad (lettuce, balsamic-herb baked eggplant, squash, soy curls and tomatoes, radishes, green onion, 1 Tbs hemp seeds, 1 1/2 Tbs goddess dressing)
PM snack – plain coconut yogurt with mashed banana, stevia and vanilla extract
dinner – rice and pinto beans with vegan queso and picante sauce, carrot-celery salad with chili & lime, 6 oz red wine

Exercise –  Couch to 5K Week 8 Day 2 (28 minutes running, 10 minutes walking)

daily points used:  29
weekly points used:  4
activity points earned:  6

Friday, 9/16/11

breakfast – grits with coconut drink and nutritional yeast
AM snack – banana, coffee with coconut creamer
lunch – rice and pinto beans with vegan queso and picante sauce, carrot-celery salad with chili & lime
PM snack – 1/4 cup wasabi wow snack mix
dinner – 2 bowls minestrone, 1/2 serving capellini pomodoro, 12 oz light beer, 14 oz red wine

Exercise – 30 minutes walking

daily points used:  29
weekly points used:  21
activity points earned:  2

Saturday, 9/17/11

breakfast – 3/4 cup multigrain cereal squares, coconut drink, sliced banana, 1 Tbs raisins
lunch (at a baseball tailgate) – veggie burger on a wheat bun with ketchup, mustard, grilled onion, mushrooms and roasted red peppers, 1.5 oz salt & pepper Popchips, an apple, 24 oz MGD 64, 12 oz light beer
PM snack (at the baseball game) – 1.5 oz salt & pepper Popchips, an apple, 16 oz light beer
dinner – 1/2 serving capellini pomodoro, 2 tostada shells, 12 oz red wine

daily points used:  29
weekly points used:  24
activity points used:  5

Weigh In Wednesday

I weighed in this morning at 167.2 pounds.  That’s 1.6 pounds lost since last week!  Of course, last week I gained .4 pounds, so I’m down 1.2 pounds total in two weeks.  Since I’m going to Vida Vegan Con this weekend, I’m hoping simply to maintain through my next weigh in.

I talked about the Points Plus program on Monday, so today I thought I’d speak more about the Weight Watchers e-tools.  You have access to the e-tools as soon as you sign up for the online program, and the tools include a Points Plus Tracker, Weight Tracker, Progress Reports, Find & Explore, Recipe Builder, Food Calculator and Activity Calculator.  I write this not to give away Weight Watchers’ secrets, but to let people know what they can expect by signing up for the online services.

The Points Plus Tracker includes food tracking and activity tracking.  You add the food consumed and activity done each day, and you can also save favorites for easy access.  And I don’t use these features, but you can track your hunger and add notes to help with journaling as well.  Another way you can save food is by using meals; if you make the same meal with the same ingredients often, you can that group of ingredients as a meal for easier tracking.  For instance, I always make grits the same way (two packets instant grits, 1 cup unsweetened almond milk, 1 Tbs nutritional yeast, lots of pepper), so I saved a meal called “breakfast grits” that is easier to add than the separate ingredients.

The Weight Tracker does just that, tracks the weight that you enter weekly.  You can choose your weigh in day when you sign up.  I chose Wednesdays because it gives me time to recover from the weekend, when I tend to use most of my weekly points.  The Weight Tracker shows you a nice graph of your weight loss, with a line indicating your current goal.  You earn milestones for special accomplishments (for example, I got a gold star when I lost five pounds), and you can track measurements if you like.

The Weekly Report section of Progress Reports shows you your daily breakdown of points used in a bar graph, and your weekly and activity points use in a pie chart.  (I love charts and graphs!)  The Monthly Summary section shows you your weight change for only the last month, as well as handy graphs with your points use and activity tracked for the month.

I haven’t really used Find & Explore yet, but it seems like a neat resource.  You can explore foods, restaurants, recipes and quick meal ideas by searching or browsing.

With the Recipe Builder, you…build recipes.  You add ingredients and enter the number of servings to see how many points there are per serving.  You can specify ingredient preparation, instructions and cooking time if you like, to store the complete recipe.  I’ve gotten in the habit of entering recipes I plan to cook before I make them, to verify the points amounts and better plan my meals.

The Food Calulator is a quick calculator to find the Points Plus value of a food.  Same for the Activity Calculator, it’s a quick way to see how many points you would earn for a certain duration and intensity of exercise.

You can also download the mobile app for free, which I have found to be very handy.  It can be a little glitchy sometimes, as apps tend to be, but overall it has worked well.  You can track food and activity, explore articles and recipes, and more.  There is a quick calculator which has come in very handy.  Just the other day I used it to determine while hungry at the store that I should have a Clif Mojo bar instead of a Green Machine for a post run snack.  More filling for less points!

Onto my food for today.

Wednesday 8/24/11

breakfast – 2/3 cup Nature’s Path Vanilla Sunrise cereal with 1 cup almond milk and blackberries
AM snack – banana, coffee with hazelnut soy creamer
lunch – Hottie Black Eyed Peas & Greens, creamed corn, red onion and patty pan squash sauteed in 3/4 tsp Earth Balance
PM snack – Mexican rice salad
dinner – Togo’s hummus sandwich on white bread with mustard and veggies

Exercise – Couch to 5K Week 6 Day 1 (18 minutes running, 16 minutes walking)

Daily points used:  29
Weekly points used:  1
Activity points earned:  4