Thin Mint Mousse

Hi Everyone,

Today I got my Jillian Michaels Kickboxing DVD and I have to say it wasn’t to bad.  I found Jillian to be so much better in this workout compared to the past few.  Personally I found in the past workouts she was annoying.  She complained about Facebook and people saying her workouts aren’t tough, and then she kept favoring the girls, but in this workout her attitude was so much better.  She was tough, which I like, but she didn’t show favoritism and included you in the workout.  Also in this workout, it’s a classroom setting with a bunch of girls, not just the normal additional two.

The workout is broken down into 3 twenty-minute segments, upper body, lower body and abs.  Each segment has four circuits, which you repeat twice.  I did the upper & lower workouts, but couldn’t manage to try the 3rd.  For each circuit you really don’t need any equipment except for a light pair of dumbbells, which you really don’t use.  In her description of the workouts, she claims to use light weights, but in the actual workout she says use heavy weights.  I used 5lbs. dumb bells and I know I could have went heavier.  If I recall in the two segments I did, I think I used the dumbbells for two or three of the exercises.  This DVD is cardio based over strength training.  In the recommendations of the workout it says to add this 20 minute workout to your resistance training, 5 times a week.

For the upper body segment, I found it ok, not to challenging, but it went quick and I had a good workout.  As for the lower body, I found it complicated to follow some of the moves,  Jillian doesn’t give a good example of showing or explaining them.  She moves quick, and basically you have to try to catch up or figure it out, I went at my own pace so I could do them in proper form.  With that all said I was sweating bullets on the lower body workout.  That hasn’t happened in a while.  I figure a few tries I should get the moves down.  There is a tutorial on explaining the moves, but honestly I didn’t watch it, I figured I’ve been doing kickboxing long enough, that I know proper form.   So if you’re looking for a quick cardio blast this is a good DVD to get.  I like it because it went fast, it wasn’t boring and I burned about 400 calories in 40 minutes.  Not to shabby!  This is a good one to add in your cardio rotation.  Once I do the 3rd segment, abs, I’ll let you know what I think.  Rating from 1 – 5, I give it about 3.75 – 4.  I’ll definitely be doing this workout a few times a week.  I found this video from You Tube that shows the workouts, so you can see what the workouts are like. I’m not looking forward to the Ab workout!  Jillian Michaels Kickbox Fast Fix

Now that I did my workout, I had to have dessert to get those calories back that I burned.  Just kidding, but I did make a wonderful, pretty low-calorie dessert for dinner tonight.  But first my inspiration for tonight’s dessert, it was Girl Scout Cookies.  I told myself, no Girl Scout Cookies this year, and then I was leaving the grocery store with a few bags of healthy food and then I saw a cute little blonde girl look at me, and her face turned sad and she said “Would you like to buy some Girl Scout Cookies?”  I stood there telling myself, no, no, no and than her little face was looking so hopeful, I said ok.  So there you go, a 8 year old suckered me into buying cookies.  At least I only bought one box.  The box has been sitting in my cupboard for two weeks, and I kept thinking what am I going to do with them?  I don’t just want to eat them, there not very healthy for you, 4 cookies 160 calories, and who can only eat 4?  Well, it’s a treat, it’s once a year and it’s only one box.  So with that said I made this wonderful Thin Mint Mousse.

This is not the healthiest dessert in regards to ingredients, but it’s not bad for a mousse that includes Girl Scout Cookies.  It’s only 145 calories, and 2 grams of fat, I can live with that, especially since it tastes so good. Trust me, it tastes good!

This mousse is made with Jello sugar free White Chocolate instant pudding, Cool Whip, mint extract, Girl Scout Cookies and food coloring.  This dessert literally took me 6 minutes to make.  The taste is amazing.  The mousse, not including the cookie topping tasted like Thin Mint Cookies and than the added cookie topping was a bonus!  Big Bonus!!!

You should have seen Jenny and my Husbands eyes light up when they saw me taking pictures of this dessert.  They asked is that for us? Of course, but you have to eat all your dinner.  Sure enough they ate all their dinner and before I could even finish mine, they ran to the fridge and grabbed there dessert.  Geez, I never seen them eat so fast!  There review was O.M.G, this is so good!  They loved it.  My Husband doesn’t usually eat dessert but he was sure to grab one of these mousse’s, I had to ask him to please wait for me.  He didn’t want to, but he did!

If you’re a Girl Scout Thin Mint Fan than this dessert is for you.  It’s extremely creamy, not overly minty, just enough and a perfect little dessert for St. Patrick’s Day.  These would be so fun to serve in shot glasses for a party.  If you serve them, they will sure be a hit!

Thin Mint Mousse – Inspired by Girl Scout Cookies

Ingredients:

2 cup fat-free milk

1 1 oz box Jell-O Sugar Free, Fat Free White Chocolate Instant pudding mix

1 8oz container Cool Whip, Fat Free, thawed

1/4 tsp. mint extract

6 girl scout thin mint cookies, crushed

3 drops green food coloring (add more for desired shade)

Directions:

In a small bag or food processor, crush the thin mints, set a side. I used a rolling pin.

In a medium bowl Whisk the milk and the pudding mix together for 2 minutes. Fold in mint extract, food coloring and 2 cups of cool whip (half of the container) and fold/mix until the color is no longer white.

Time to layer.

In 6 small bowls, evenly layer the bottom of each dish with 1/2 the pudding mixture, top with the cool whip, add remaining pudding mixture and add crushed cookie.

Optional Toppings:  Whip Cream and a Girl Scout Cookie

Makes 6 servings (about 1 1/4 cups each)

Calorie per serving:  145,  Fat:  2,  Cholesterol:  1.7,  Sodium:  294,  Carbs:  26,  Fiber:  0,  Sugar:  10.7,  Protein:  2.9

That’s it for me.  Lots of dinner dishes to do and I honestly need to stretch.  With it raining outside, I never got out of the office and I sat all day and sat quite a bit at home.  So time to get my groove on.

I heard that voting ends on Monday, so as a friendly reminder, as you know I was nominated for Healthiest Eating Food Blog on Fitness Magazine and would love it if you voted for me.  So far I only have 40 votes,  if you like my blog, please vote for Peanut Butter and Peppers.  To vote for me, just go here. Thank you, much appreciated!!

Happy Wednesday, half way through the week!!!  Woohoo!!!