Hi Friends! I hope you all had a great weekend! Mine was busy packing, working and running last minute errands for our trip. I also saw Dr. Chase from the show House and it totally made my Saturday. Sometimes I feel like a 13 year-old girl. (He is SO cute!)

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We are currently in Mexico, (probably on the beach, sorry) but I’ve got a few posts lined up for you while I’m gone. I’ll be back next week with some stories, pictures and hopefully a tan!

I wanted to share more about my experience with Paleta with you all so here are my final thoughts! I’ll definitely miss it, it was wonderful!

Thoughts: 

• 1,600 calories a day is a little low for me, so I went into it knowing that I would supplement it with more snacks (or chocolate) but I was usually surprised at how much food it seemed like. I did have to add in extra snacks every day.
• the system is amazing – they drop off your cooler of food in the middle of the night – you wake up and have a day of food waiting for you
• not having to pack lunches (especially on days when I don’t work at home) was AMAZING

Love: 

• restaurant quality meals for every meal felt like such a treat
• the great balance of protein, fat, fiber and fruits or vegetables at every meal and snack!
• every morning felt like Christmas – I couldn’t wait to see what was on the menu that day
• fresh fruit, especially the berries! I am typically lacking in the fruit department and rarely buy berries for myself, they always felt like such a treat!
• that you can let them know about food “dislikes” – I didn’t do this, but would next time

Wish:

• all of the packaging made me feel really guilty….it is recyclable, but maybe sometime soon they will use reusable packages for the individual meals
• I had more money, it is expensive, but for the quality of food, definitely worth it (ranges from $46-$59/day)
• they would label the foods that are organic so I would know how much of them are local/organic/etc.

Favorite Meals: 

• Spicy Shrimp Pizza
• Honey Yogurt, Grapes, Berries, Veggie Sausages and Almonds (simple but SO perfect!)
• Thai Chicken Salad
• Lentil Burger Snack
• Pan-fried Salmon Lunch
• PALETA Energy Bite

Thank you PALETA for such a wonderful experience! 

Todays post is all about Paleta. Paleta* provides home delivery of gourmet nutritionally balanced meals and I’m trying them out for the week!

It was an early wake-up call so I started the day with coffee.

Workout: I tried a new Jillian Michaels dvd (Banish Fat, Boost Metabolism) – I haven’t purchased any workout dvds in a long time, but since I’ve been working out more at home lately, I needed to change it up. I loved this dvd! It does not require weights, which is great if you are going to take it with you on a trip and is a combination of cardio, kickboxing, plyometrics in a circuit form. It was intense, got me sweating and left me tired. Perfect!

Breakfast: My first paleta meal of Honey Yogurt, Fresh Grapes, Veggie Sausage Patties, Chili Lime Almonds and Fresh Berries. So good, and surprisingly filling.

Snack: I was working over the normal lunch hour so I also had part of the snack on my way to work. I tried the Energy Bite (left corner) and I was really skeptical – I typically don’t care for those types of bars, they usually are filled with dates, too sweet for my taste, etc. but these were great – there was definitely peanut butter in it but I’m not sure what else!

Lunch: Thai Chicken Salad with Spicy Peanut Sauce (and the clementines above) – I was a little worried that the salad would be soggy, but it was great and much more filling than I expected! The dressing was delicious and the salad contained chicken, carrots, peppers, onions, fennel and celery – all over spinach.

Snack 2: On my way home I grabbed a snack from the store I was working at and when I got home I made some miso soup while dinner was heating up. I must say, it was wonderful to just throw dinner into the oven and not worry about anything else!

Dinner:  Lemony Cannelini Bean Dip with Cucumber and Carrot Sticks (they were designated as a snack) along with Snapper with Lemon Mustard Sauce, Roasted Zucchini, Brown Rice with Lentils and Slivered Almonds. Dinner was delicious!

Dessert: Chocolate x2!

I’ll be sharing my full review on Paleta with you next week, but I’m SO excited for the rest of the meals to come. I was so impressed with everything today!

Enjoy your Wednesday!

(*Disclosure: Paleta provided me with these meals free of charge)