Hey chicks,
Hope you’re having a FAB day! We sure are because today is one of our most exciting blog posts of the year!
Source: www.eatshrinkandbemerry.combandwagon…
The crew at FIT CHICKS have been long-standing fans of the Looneyspoons sisters Janet & Greta Podleski. The two sisters from St. Thomas, Ontario are the authors of three blockbuster bestselling cookbooks, Looneyspoons, Crazy Plates (a finalist for the James Beard Foundation Cookbook Awards) and are best known for the Eat, Shrink & Be Merry (announced as the top-selling cookbook of the last decade by Chapters/Indigo.)
Enterpreneurs, healthy eating advocates and funny as heck, these lovely ladies built a delicious food empire based on making healthy choices and recipes into a whole lot of fun. And not only that, they’ve also developed food products and even have their own TV show on The Food Network called “Eat, Shrink & Be Merry!”
Our favorite part? The Looneyspoons ladies agreed to do an interview with FIT CHICKS so we can share with our chicks some of their tips on healthy eating and working out !
Why was it so important for you to create healthy recipes that were fun, easy and nutritious?
Janet & Greta: Our mission was to make the popular (but sometimes intimidating!) subject of healthy eating fun and easy to understand, so that’s why we used
humour in all three of our cookbooks. We hoped our casual style would help get people on the healthy-eating bandwagon
and once they were interested, we had to knock their socks off with great-tasting recipes. Let’s face it, taste is still the most important characteristic of food to most people. If the lasagna’s healthy but tastes awful, no one’s going to eat it, so what’s the point?
FIT CHICKS loves that Janet has a Nutrition background from the Canadian School of Natural Nutrition. How has this allowed you to look at nutrition and healthy food differently?
Greta: Well, Janet is now a Registered Holistic Nutritionist, and it’s the holistic part that’s important. It’s about looking at a person’s health from the perspectives of mind, body and spirit (what’s going on in their life as a whole, not just what’s going on with their waistlines). We still want to help people lose weight, because that’s obviously critical, but our focus now is probably more on overall health and vitality and wellbeing. We’re trying to steer people away from grabbing convenience foods and toward “real” foods—whole, natural, unprocessed. Today’s obesity problem isn’t about eating too much food, it’s about eating too much that ISN’T food!
Alright, ladies. We all have a guilty food pleasure. What’s yours and how do you make it healthier?
Greta: I have a man’s appetite! What I mean is that I crave foods like burgers and chicken wings, not sweets. For our Food Network TV show, we created boneless honey-garlic wings which were a huge hit with taste-testers by using skinless chicken thighs, cutting them in half, and making them look and taste like wings. They’re even served with a lower-fat blue cheese dip. Yum!
Janet: I wish I could eat pizza every day! And the thinner the crust, the better, in my opinion. This cuts back on carbs and calories plus it just tastes better when it’s thin and crispy. And though I’m a fan of pepperoni on pizza, I always try to add veggies, too: mushrooms, tomatoes, bell peppers…to add some nutritional value.
At FIT CHICKS we know how important it is to have a healthy snack before and after your workouts. (Boot camp takes a lot of work!) What do you recommend as a great pre-workout and post workout snack?
Janet & Greta: We don’t like to load up on food before working out, but neither one of us can tolerate exercising on a completely empty stomach either. A handful of almonds, a couple hard-boiled eggs, a peanut butter-and-banana-roll-up (slather whole grain tortilla with peanut butter or almond butter, insert peeled banana, roll up and enjoy!) or a protein smoothie are good choices before OR after working out.
You two are incredibly busy ladies – what’s your motivation to make nutritious meals and your health a priority?
Janet & Greta: We truly believe that you are what you eat. When we eat well, we feel well. More energy, better sleep, fewer illnesses, clearer skin, better digestion…and the list goes on. Plus, we honestly PREFER the taste of healthy foods over unhealthy ones. Given the choice between a fast-food cheeseburger and fries or a colourful, veggie packed salad with salmon or chicken and a delicious homemade dressing, we’d pick the salad every time. Well, maybe not EVERY time! But MOST of the time!
At FIT CHICKS, we train with high intensity interval training to burn the most calories in our boot camps to maximize our time. What is your “save time” tactics / tips in the kitchen?
We also prefer interval training! Janet says “It’s better to work out in short bursts than in burst shorts!”
When it comes to cooking, we all need to do MORE of it and cut back on meals that come from packages, boxes and bags. This means being prepared, deciding what types of meals you want to make this week, and shopping for the ingredients on Sunday when you have some spare time. That way, you won’t have to stop at the store every single day on the way home from work to pick up something for dinner. Now that you’re prepared, you should cook once, eat twice! We always make extra of everything to freeze or to take to the office for lunch. If we’re going to mess up the kitchen, we might as well get two meals out of it!
Source: www.eatshrinkandbemerry.com
Everyone at FIT CHICKS was so excited to have the opportunity to do this interview with Janet and Greta Podleski! Thanks so much, Looney Spoons for taking the time and sharing your views on weight loss, healthy eating and exercise with our chicks! We hope to see you at a FIT CHICKS Bootcamp one day. 😉
PS: Don’t forget that March FIT CHICKS boot camps are just around the corner, chicks! Be sure to sign up at one of our locations today!
Have a super fab day,
FIT CHICKS
