Shoutout to Kira Lynn Sands for inspiring the title of today’s post (Get well soon!) and Happy October to all! Now you can officially break out the pumpkin spice everything…including this?!

 

I’ll have to research whether this is real or just a joke but either way it sounds disgusting. Would any of you actually drink this? And more importantly, is it required for you to wear Uggs and leggings while doing so?

 

This month came in strong though! I’ve already had to turn my heat on a few times…followed by a fan and then the A/C. Ah yes, it’s that awkward time of year again where you need a hoodie in the morning but a tank top halfway through the day.

I love this month though, especially with my favorite holiday coming up – Halloween (which is also my actual birthday)! I see that some stores are already selling Christmas trees and ornaments but hold on peppermint heads! Christmas season doesn’t officially begin until Santa waves at the end of the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade. Until then, keep your nativity figures in storage, no skipping my birthday!

Anyway, I just got back from a wild goose chase. Wait, since I currently live in The South, it might be necessary for me to explain that I mean that metaphorically. No, I wasn’t actually chasing geese, I was chasing down these Snickers Shakes that hit my newsfeed the other day! Behold! Bask in their gloriousness…

 

 

I had no idea these were even “a thing” until the other day. Needless to say, I was going to “sacrifice” and try them “for you” all in the name of “science” 😉 so I set out to find them yesterday.

After several aimless laps around my grocery store, like Don Quixote chasing windmills, I came back empty handed.

Goose egg (yes, that was also a metaphor and no, I have no idea why I keep mentioning geese today but there’s likely to be a “golden goose” reference at some point later as well…). Nada. Zip, ziltch, zero.

If my research is correct, these shakes are only sold in Europe – which is shocking because very few things sound more American than a fattening milkshake made from chocolate candy bars!

That appears to be the unfortunate reality however, so my Snicker shake dreams are going to have to wait. I will reach out to my friends overseas though to see if one of them can at least provide me with a review.

However, I did manage to find another curious food item that’s been flooding my newsfeed recently. It’s called Real Good Pizza from Real Good Pizza Co. and boasts healthy, all natural ingredients! That’s right, it has no grains and no gluten plus 25 grams of protein versus 4 carbs. All while supposedly tasting delicious?

A healthy, protein-packed pizza that actually tastes good too? This I had to try…and so I did. Here’s a brief review…

 

The website says that they have 2 different sizes – large and personal. I only spotted what I assume is the personal size though and it was a whopping $6.99!

 

That was a hard pill to swallow when I could get a much larger pizza from any of the chains for that price. There was literally a Little Caesars next door and even in the frozen foods section there were much larger pizzas for only $3!

It always amazes me how “healthy foods” always cost so much more. Apparently, this company started out online though so ordering in bulk through the website would actually save you a few dollars.

Honestly, if I wasn’t reviewing it, there’s no way that I would pay nearly $7 for a frozen pizza…especially for one that was smaller than my hand but hey, I’ll take one for the team so that you don’t have to.

With that said, this thing better be delicious!

Anyway, they had 3 different flavors to choose from. Uncured Pepperoni, Three Cheese and The Supreme. For most taste-tests I would have tried all 3 but there’s no way that I was dropping over $21 on these so I decided to just go with The Supreme since that would theoretically have most of the elements the other 2 have.

Plus “You Can’t Hurry Love” by The Supremes was playing over the store radio system at that exact moment so clearly I was being led in that direction by divine intervention…

I grabbed the box and flipped it around to check out the nutrition stats to see if they were legit. The answer was a surprising yes….and no. Allow me to explain.

The positives are that it fits a keto diet and does in fact offer 25 grams of protein and only 4 carbs per serving. The part that many people won’t notice is that the serving size they’re referring to is only half of the pizza. Again, this thing is the size of my hand so I can’t imagine most people being satisfied after only eating one half. So realistically, the pizza has 50 grams of protein and only 8 carbs which is still pretty awesome.

The 520 calories aren’t so bad either. The fat and cholesterol numbers are okay depending on the rest of your nutrition for that day but the glaring scary stat is the sodium.

Most frozen foods have high sodium since that often helps preserve their shelf life. This however, has a whopping 1,760 milligrams packed into that tiny pizza! Anyone with blood pressure or water retention concerns may want to stay far away from these. That’s ridiculously high!

I like what they’re doing with the low carb/high protein concept though so hopefully they can find a way to tweak the sodium and in-store pricing issues going forward. If they manage to pull that off, they’ll have the golden goose of pizza (yeah, I told you that reference was coming…)!

Preparation

 

The box actually recommends using the microwave which is opposite most frozen pizza companies who say it’s better in the oven. Since I was starving by the time I got home, nuking it seemed like the way to go though. Besides, waiting 27-30 minutes for something that tiny seemed a bit silly.

 

It comes wrapped in a plastic film so you simply cut that off and throw it on a “microwave safe” plate (it’s sad that companies have to specify that the plate has to be microwave-safe? I’d like to meet the person who made that warning necessary, I’m sure they have an epic story to tell…) and zap it for 4 minutes or so.

When I took it out of the microwave, it looked and smelled delicious!

As for the taste? Wait, before we get to that, let’s take a closer look at that hat!

Instead of wearing my pizza tank top for this one, I decided to rock my Ninja Turtle #NINJA Hat since they too are bald, love pizza and are into martial arts. Wow, I didn’t realize how much I had in common with them until I typed that out. I may have to join forces with them – I can be Darrelltello. #NINJA

Anyway, as for the taste, the first bite was pretty impressive! First of all, I had briefly forgotten that the crust was made from natural chicken breast and parmesan cheese. That’s where the bulk of the protein is coming from and it’s a smart idea. That may also make it a bit more filling for regular appetites (my appetite is far from normal though #TeamGreedy).

The other ingredients tasted as fresh and real as advertised so overall it was a great first impression. I did wonder if the crust would have been crispier had I used the oven but it wasn’t bad from the microwave.

The first few bites were great but by the time that I got about halfway through it, the sodium monster eventually reared it’s ugly head.

Since I tend not to use a ton of salt on my food, perhaps my taste buds are more sensitive to it than most but by the time I was finished eating this pizza it was all I could taste. I began to have flashbacks to when I got caught in an undertow and almost drowned in the Atlantic Ocean. It was saltier than the night shift cashiers at my local Walmart…

“It was saltier than the night shift cashiers at my local Walmart…” – Fat Darrell

Again, it wasn’t awful but for $6.99 I wanted it to be amazing…and more filling. After I finished it I drank about a half-gallon of bottled water and made a turkey sandwich since I was still hungry.

My overall impression is that Real Good Pizza Co. is an innovative company that uses great ingredients and they have an awesome concept. I just feel they need to tweak the execution and find a way to reduce the cost in stores.

The wholesale and bulk shipments include free shipping though so ordering them directly makes more sense if you decide to make these a regular part of your routine.
Since this one is more complicated than a “thumbs up” or a “thumbs down” like I usually do, here are the final grades for Real Good Pizza:

Concept: A
Nutrition for Higher Fat/Low Carb and Keto diets: A
Overall Nutrition for general population: C
Taste: B-
Cost/Value (in store): D
Overall Grade: C+

Speaking of Supreme Pizza, check out this sleeping bag that my friend Linda Meadows (aka Leeeeeenda) sent me a picture of!

Hmm, I’m not sure whether I should be flattered or insulted that people automatically think of me when they see this stuff but yeah, this thing looks pretty awesome!  I may have to get one of these and double down on my single status since it’ll take a special type of lady to ever want to cuddle with me inside of a giant slice of pizza!

Believe it or not, it does actually get worse though! Check out some of the other foodie furniture out there!

The stackable pancake pillows seem pretty awesome! Ha so does that hamburger sleeper! And the baked potato! Actually, they’re all pretty funny but I can only fit so much in my office. I try my best at “adulting” in the other rooms so a hot dog sofa won’t exactly match my living room décor!

But yeah, I’ll look into getting one of these and when I do, I’ll provide a full review. In the meantime, I’ll place the pizza sleeping bag on my wish list…I did mention that my birthday is on Halloween, right? (hint hint)

Before we move on, let’s close out this section with some valuable words of wisdom from my friend Lynda Lettice!

That’s sound advice (lol sound it out 😉)!

Since Jersey sarcasm flows through me, I constantly have to remind myself of this advice each day. Perhaps I should have that tattooed on my arm so that I don’t forget… (calm down Mom geez it was a joke!).

Okay, since I’m officially out of variations of the name “Linda” to give shoutouts too, let’s move on shall we?

Today’s fitness tip is a topic that I’ve visited in a few past articles but is relevant for today as well.

Always, always, always read your nutrition labels! And by nutrition labels, I mean the back of the package where the ingredients are listed, not just the front label.

The front of the package is merely designed to make the product stand out from the others so that you’re more likely to buy it. The truth lies on the back.

Pay particularly close attention to the serving size listed since the amount you’re likely to consume (ex: an entire can of soup) will often be more than they give stats for (ex: a third of the can of soup).

My old grade school math teacher used to tell me that I “wouldn’t always have a calculator with me” so I’d need to learn how to do math but she’s wrong! Everyone literally has a calculator with them all day if they have a smart phone so don’t be afraid to break that out and do the math before you’re misled thinking that a product might be healthier than it appears.

For a full article that I wrote on analyzing nutrition labels, follow this link. Also stay tuned for the separate My Fitness Muse blog and Facebook Group that will be coming very soon!

Do you have a fitness question you’d like to ask or an accomplishment you’d like to share? Tell us about it in the comments below!

So I may have struck out with finding the Official Ready to Drink Snickers Shake from Mars (the company not the planet genius) but I did manage to find a few recipes that should hold me over until I can get my hands on the real thing.

The first goes all out with ice cream and the works but for a healthier option, I’ve also included a healthy vegan recipe as well! Either way you can’t go wrong, these both look delicious! Check them out…

Better than Snickers Milkshake

Courtesy of Autumn Giles of Serious Eats
Serves 2, total time 5 minutes

Ingredients

3 cups caramel ice cream, such as Haagen-Dazs

3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

1/4 cup whole milk

1/4 cup smooth peanut butter

Caramel sauce, storebought or homemade

Whipped cream, for garnish

Chopped peanuts, for garnish

Directions

Combine ice cream, cocoa powder, milk, and peanut butter in a blender. Pulse a few times on high to begin breaking up the ice cream. Blend on high until smooth, about 30 seconds.

Drizzle caramel sauce on the inside of two glasses. Divide milkshake between glasses and top with whipped cream and chopped peanuts.

And here’s the healthy variation that’s gluten free, dairy free, vegan & paleo friendly!

Healthy Snickers Shake

Courtesy of Emily for One Lovely Life
Serves: 2 large or 4 small shakes

Ingredients

2 frozen bananas, cut or broken into pieces (Pro tip: Cut the bananas into pieces before freezing them. They freeze faster AND they’re easier to blend later!)

2-3 cups unsweetened almond milk (or sub whatever milk you prefer)

1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

3 scoops collagen protein, unsweetened vegan protein, or 2-3 Tbsp chia seeds

1 Tbsp PB2 (powdered peanut butter) or regular peanut butter

1-2 Tbsp vegan caramel sauce, or 1-2 dates, pitted*

Optional, for serving:

Chocolate chips

Coconut Oil

Salted peanuts

Instructions

Place all shake ingredients in a blender and puree until completely smooth, adding more milk as needed.

For serving:

If desired, melt 2-3 Tbsp chocolate chips with 1-2 tsp coconut oil. Drizzle on top for a magic shell effect, or rub on the inside of your cup by coating the back of a spoon and spreading the chocolate around the inside of your glass. Sprinkle with peanuts

Do you have a recipe, restaurant or food item that we should try? Tell us about it in the comments below and make sure to also join our exclusive Foodie group on Facebook “Phenomnomnomenal” by clicking this link!

Today’s Soundtrack

Shake – Ying Yang Twins ft. Pitbull

Shake Senora – Pitbull ft. Sean Paul and T. Pain (wow, Pitbull really likes shakes huh?)

Shake What Your Mama Gave Ya – Lil Jon

Harlem Shake – Baauer (Yep, I used a few of these in a past post that included shakes…but which post was it? Comment below if you know the answer!)

Piece of Me – Britney Spears (Pizza me? Yes please…)

You Can’t Hurry Love – The Supremes

Do have another song that fits today’s theme or that’s just so great that we should check it out anyway? Tell us about it in the comments below!

Before we shut this one down, my thoughts and prayers go out to all of the victims of the tragedy in Las Vegas. Each week there seems to be another tragedy. As I stated on my Facebook pages after I saw the news, hug your loved ones, travel, quit that crap job, try new things and be epic…life is way too short.

Also please do more than just pray, the victims of this and the horrific events of these past several weeks also need your charitable donations as well. Despite the endless stream of negativity, division and pain dominating the headlines lately, never forget that you have the power to help make a difference for a better tomorrow.

“Let your smile change the world but don’t let the world change your smile.”

Please don’t forget to drop a comment below before you leave, I love hearing your thoughts and feedback. Also remember to hit those buttons on the side panel to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and more!

Okay that about does it for this week. Hang in there everyone!

Until next time my friends, May the Fork be With You…

-Darrell