Everybody on Weight Watchers say "Cheeseburger" Kinda

Tonight the guys who call this house home have gone to Tuscaloosa to see either Alabama put a basketball whuppin' on Auburn or Auburn put a whuppin' on Alabama. It means they are having fun and I am home alone. I kept thinking it would be a great night to run up to Mugshots and grab a huge delicious cheeseburger with all the fixin's and then thought " Oh yeah I am doing the Weight Watchers thing. It is not a horrid thing to do, but I had gone off of it last night ( Not really gone off but I had done a ton of point shuffling so I could have the "Hawaiian" at the Diplomat) I knew I had to stick with the program better today, but I wanted a burger badly. I sat down and started thinking of my options... steamed broccoli , have it don't want it. Same goes for cauliflower and asparagus. Dang it!!! I wanted a cheeseburger. I started weighing my options. I could run outside and throw a turkey burger on the grill and eat it on 2 slices of Nature's Own Double Fiber bread. Calculating using all fingers and thought "No that is too many points tonight cause I will probably still want something else besides just a burger" Then I thought of making a salad to go along with the turkey burger. But I really did not want a turkey burger either. I wanted cheese on my burger. Where were the points going to come from I don't mind doing the reduced fat cheese, but I am not going to use the fat free stuff. It looks , tastes and feels like someone cut a sandwich size patch out of an orange beach raft and called it food. Where to steal the points then... I picked up my quick fix Bible otherwise known as the Hungry Girl Cookbook and flipped through the pages thinking something would jump out at me. There on page 45 the angels started to sing and my eyes fell on the Big Chomp Cheeseburger Chop. OK so its not a real cheeseburger, in fact it's not a real burger at all. But it is a perfectly acceptable variation on a theme of cheeseburgerness. A simple process, perfect for doing on a single meal night. Sorry but there is no way I was going to spend any real time fixing supper just for me. I had all the ingredients on hand and was perfectly willing to use the additional points with the reduced fat cheese, which will actually melt, unlike the prefab fat free abomination.


Hungry Girl Lisa Lillien

Big Chomp Cheeseburger Chop

3 Cups Chopped Romaine lettuce
1 Original Boca Burger
1 slice fat free cheese ( NO WAY!)
4 pickle slices*
1/3 cup chopped tomatoes
3 tablespoons chopped onions ( 1 slice onion lightly grilled in the Boca pan, pre burger cooking)

100 Island Dressing ( It's so fake I can't bring myself to call it 1000 Island)

Mix equal parts fat-free mayo, low sugar ketchup and Dijonnaise ( I used 1 tablespoon of each) It is a little thicker than I like so I cut it with about a teaspoon of cider vinegar

Prepare Boca according to package directions. ( This means get out your non-stick skillet, give it a quick shot of Pam and cook it until it is hot and sizzles a little) Top patty with cheese slice and microwave about 20 seconds until the cheese melts. ( As I said the fat free crap doesn't melt so I opted for 1 oz. of super thinly sliced reduced fat cheese placed on the patty in the skillet. Guess what? It melts and looks like cheese.) Set aside.

Place the chopped (torn) roamine (mixed leafy greens) in the bottom of a large bowl. Top with pickles, tomatoes and the onion. Additionally, I seared about a half cup of sliced mushrooms in the pan after the onions and the burger cooked, 'cause I like mushrooms on my cheeseburgers. Cut the burger into bite size pieces and put it on the top of the salad. Drizzle the dressing on top of burger and enjoy
* If you like dill slices any kind will work, but if you are a bread and butter pickle junkie Mount Olive makes a pickle sweetened with Splenda rather than sugar. Personally bread an butter pickles on a burger in any form grosses me out, but I know some of you are out there because I have eaten with you and been repulsed by your pickle habits. But seriously who am I to judge?




The verdict? This really does taste like you are eating a cheeseburger that is too sloppy for the bun, so you are reduced to eating it with your fork. The Boca burger does not taste exactly like real meat, but the consistency is fine and the flavor is quite good. ( I admit I can eat a Boca plain so maybe I'm not totally objective) I also like dijon mustard so the dressing is fine with me. It tastes nothing like thousand island dressing but just tastes like mixed hamburger condiments. If you are a purist you might want to use traditional yellow mustard instead. I love the grilled onion. I cooked it to a crisp tender and it's nice and oniony without being as sharp as a raw onion. The mushrooms provide little in the way of actual flavor, they picked up just bit of the onion/burger flavor, but they provide some really nice "chew" . I am a tactile eater and the food has to feel "right" or I won't eat it (hence my banana revulsion) You have to use a really big bowl for this. The one I used is about 8 1/2 inches wide and 3 inches deep. The salad pretty much filled the entire bowl, and you need a little room to mix it up as you eat it so you get bits and pieces of all the components in most bites. I will definitely do this again. I can't imagine how good it would be with fat sun ripened summer tomatoes. I can see how good this would be with a reduced fat swiss and lots more mushrooms and onions. The only thing I am having with this tonight is a cold diet coke and it is all i want. This portion is HUGE! If I had thought of it earlier I might have done some oven baked sweet potato 'fries". I think it would have been a good addition and it's something I will try next time.

This is totally an aside but if any of you have a Kindle or Kindle app on your phone or computer, Hungry Girl 3 is available for pre-order for free from Amazon. So far I am 2 for 2 with the recipes from the original book. I have no idea what this new one will be like, but it is free so it really doesn't matter if it is as good as this one or not ( FYI you can get the Hungry Girl Cookbook at Costco cheaper than anywhere else in the city)

I am off to watch a movie I picked up at Publix. Can't beat a buck rental