The New Atkins Made Easy (12 page)

• Pan-fry a skirt, minute, or other small steak and serve with veggie leftovers.

• Roll up sliced ham or another meat and/or cheese and a few other ingredients for a quick, satisfying, and portable breakfast. (See “Design a Roll-Up” on page 86, for more options.)

• Whip up a breakfast smoothie in no time in a blender, using sugar-free protein powder and unsweetened, unflavored almond milk, soy milk, or coconut milk beverage. Add sugar-free cocoa
powder or syrup and/or instant coffee granules. You can even hide some raw spinach or another leafy green in the mix. Pop in some ice cubes for a great frothy texture.

• Enjoy waffles and pancakes made with soy flour, flax meal, or coconut flour. Okay, pancakes and waffles are made with eggs, but I've never heard anyone turn them down for that reason! Check out Zucchini–Pumpkin Spice Pancakes (
page 251
) and Chocolate Waffles (
page 253
), and Buttermilk Cinnamon Waffles and Orange–Sour Cream Waffles (hold the Fresh Blueberry Sauce until you move to Phase 2) on
atkins.com
. You can make waffles or pancakes on the weekend, freeze, and then defrost in a toaster oven for speedy weekday breakfasts.

Frozen fully cooked pork or turkey bacon or sausages save time and minimize cleanup since most of the grease has been removed. Bacon comes in strips, Canadian-style rounds, or bits; sausage can be found as crumbles, patties, and links. Some frozen omelets are also available, but do check the ingredient list and Nutrition Facts panel to ensure they contain no added sugars or other unacceptable ingredients. Avoid bacon and sausage products cured with nitrates.

Many of the breakfast recipes on
atkins.com
and several of those in this book are ideal candidates for making in quantity and freezing in individual portions. For best results, keep the following in mind:

• If you're baking in muffin tins instead of a pie pan, reduce the oven temp by 25 degrees or so and the cooking time by 15 minutes and check for doneness at that point.

• Let quiches, muffins, and other baked goods come to room temperature before wrapping in plastic wrap and then aluminum foil and freezing for up to three months. Label and date each package.

• Remove the item the night before and let it defrost in the fridge, to reduce reheating time the next morning in a microwave or toaster oven.

The midday meal isn't the major hurdle that breakfast can be for most Atkins beginners. The simplest choice is an Atkins frozen meal—they're formulated to make it easy for you to stay on the plan. To reduce the carbs in most traditional lunch choices:

• Instead of, say, a turkey club sandwich, ditch the bread and order a big salad topped with sliced turkey.

• Or have several roll-ups—they're as portable as a sandwich—using sandwich components minus the bread (see “Design a Roll-Up” on page 86). Your turkey club could morph into a roll-up of slices of turkey filled with cheese, shredded lettuce, and sliced tomato. Yum!

• Deconstruct a cheeseburger or burger (toss the bun) and accompany it with a side salad. Some burger places now offer burgers wrapped in lettuce leaves.

• Any main-dish salad with 4–6 ounces of protein in the form of meat, poultry, fish, or shellfish makes a great lunch that can be prepared in minutes. If you put one together at a salad bar, be sure to pass on the chow mein noodles, raisins, corn relish, and other high-carb offerings. Our recipe developer has come up with five salad zingers, starting on page 270, suitable for all phases of Atkins. Also check
atkins.com
for more main dish salads.

If a salad leaves you wanting a little something more, a cup of hot broth may do the trick, as would any soup made with foundation veggies and/or protein, but minus noodles, rice, potatoes, or other starchy veggies.
A smaller salad and a light soup such as Cream of Broccoflower Soup (
page 278
) make a great combo too. A hearty soup, chowder, or stew such as No-Bean Chicken Chili (
page 279
), Taco Soup (
page 280
), or Salmon Mushroom Chowder (
page 283
) makes a complete lunch. There are plenty more delicious main-dish soups in the Atkins recipe database.

When ordering soup in a restaurant, ask about the ingredients. Many places use flour or cornstarch as a thickener and often sugar for flavor. Likewise, check the ingredients list in canned or packaged soups. The Atkins Carb Counter lists a few acceptable choices.

Dinner is actually the easiest meal to deal with as you move away from the standard American diet full of carbs. Rely on Atkins frozen meals on hectic evenings. When cooking from scratch, simply replace the potato, pasta, or rice you used to have with a second veggie serving or salad alongside your protein choice. You'll find lots more ways to make meals easier in Part III, “It's All About Food.”

In addition to an Atkins Advantage shake or bar coded for Phase 1, the five snacks in the recipe section, and the old Atkins standbys of olives, half a Hass avocado, jerky (cured without sugar or nitrates), and pork rinds, here are some easy and satisfying alternatives. None contains more than 3 grams of Net Carbs per serving.

• A serving of bell pepper or zucchini slices, cherry tomatoes, radishes, or almost any raw foundation vegetable with 1 tablespoon ranch, blue cheese, Italian, or other low-carb dressing

• An ounce of string cheese

• Celery stuffed with salmon cream cheese

• Cucumber “boat” filled with tuna salad

• A lettuce leaf wrapped around grated Cheddar

• Shrimp cocktail with no-sugar-added cocktail sauce such as Trinity Hill Farms or Walden Farms

• Two slices of tomato topped with chopped fresh basil and grated mozzarella and run under the broiler for a minute

Here's another week's worth of delicious, easy-to-prepare meals suitable for Phase 1 (Kick-Start), one with Atkins products and one without. You'll continue to follow the first rung on the Carb Ladder (
page 16
), eating protein, foundation vegetables, and acceptable Phase 1 dairy products. Review the suggestions in this chapter for modifying the Week 1 meal plan with recipes in this book and the online database. Or substitute any meal suggestion from the earlier meal plan. The shopping list for this week's plan (
page 92
) includes only six new items, which appear in boldface italics. You'll also need to replenish your supplies of fresh foods and perhaps some other items. Be sure to adjust your shopping list if you've modified the meal plan.