Weekend Desserts

I have friends staying with us for the weekend. For me, house guests equal cooking and baking. And baking for me usually means trying some new recipe that I've been intrigued by for some time. Extra mouths in the house, give me an excuse. Yes, I do try out new recipes on guests because it's just my husband and myself so I don't typically bake very much for just the two of us.

Anyway, this weekend I tried out a recipe for banana chocolate chip squares. I did what the recipe said which was to make them in a 10x15 jellyroll pan. The recipe also said it yielded 48 squares. It's tempting, when cutting portions that small, to go a bit larger, but no, I wanted to do it 'right' so I could then be certain of my calories. In this case, four dozen squares ends up being 110 calories each. They are small. Two bites worth. And they are incredibly moist and delicious. My guests fell all over themselves eating them.

I could 'afford' two last night for dessert. That was great. But this afternoon, with my friends and husband out of the house, I ate 4!! One right after the other. They were so yummy, I didn't want to stop and so I didn't. I also had them right after lunch, which is sooner than I would have a usual afternoon snack to get me through to dinner. This means I'm probably going to get hungry around 3p or 4p and I won't have the afternoon calories to "spend." Now, I have two choices.

I can either decide I've blown the day and eat four MORE of those little devilish squares, followed by a handful of nuts (to offset all that sweet), followed by a piece of cheese, etc., not stopping until I'm sick and feeling horrible about myself. You get the drill. Or, I can write down the 440 calories those 4 squares "cost" me, adding the number to my daily count and just keep things light this evening for dinner. The latter is what I've done and will do. It's all I really can do if I want to continue to sensibly manage my diet and weight.

By not writing down those extra calories, I would be hiding it from no one but myself. And there really is no hiding because it's going to come out on the bathroom scale and in the clothes I wear. It's important to remember that we all have weaknesses and moments of weakness. That doesn't make us bad people. It simply means we might have to work a little harder at controlling our behavior. But we can get a handle on this. We can control it. We do have a choice. Oh and one more thing to be certain, I'll be giving my guests a care package of squares to take home. That is also a good way to help control further temptation.