Dieting–sorta

This post is more “Betty Crocker” than anything I’ve ever written, but I figured I’d share it with you anyway:

Last New Year’s, I made a pinkie promise with Annie that I’d try to lose weight, even though none of my doctors think I’m fat (I wish they’d talk to the clothes designers, who apparently think I have the figure of a walrus. Either that, or they design their clothes to fit sixteen-year-old hipless boys).  Annie is doing far better with her diet than I am, but I did manage to lose ten pounds. Okay, I was in the hospital at the time, but I lost it. That counts.

I hate dieting–don’t really know how. Having been ill for a good portion of my adult life, I’ve never had to do it before. The list of things I can and cannot have while dieting is, to say the least, depressing. Of course, there is the theory that a dieter can have anything in moderation, but I doubt that “moderation” is defined as a family sized bag of M&Ms downed in one day.

To keep up with my diet (when I’m behaving) and still enjoy the things I love, I alter the recipes. This is one I tried last week, and the results were wonderful! But just a note: to compensate for using real butter, I made this pie without a crust, something you can do with custard pies since they brown on the bottom well enough to support themselves.

BUTTERMILK-COCONUT PIE (modified)

1 large egg and 2 egg-whites, lightly beaten

1-1/2 cups of Splenda

1/2 cup of flaked coconut

1/2 cup of 1% Milk + 1 tablespoon of lemon juice (I used this as a substitute for the buttermilk)

1/2 cup butter (or margarine)

2 tablespoons of all purpose flour

1 teaspoon vanilla (I use real vanilla, but the recipe calls for extract)

Mix this all together and pour into a pie pan (or into an unbaked 9″ pie shell), and bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Check after 25 minutes. If it’s browning too quickly on the top, cover it with foil.

I cut the pie into eight slices, but hard-core dieters would probably cut it into sixteen. I think I’ve already established that I’m not a true, hard-core dieter.

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