Lamb, Sausage, Chickpea Stew

I'm starting a new book that will take place in the region of Albania. In my research I've found foods that are a fantastic blend of the regions rich crossroads history. Lamb and chickpeas are a staple in the area. I stumbled across a recipe for a lamb and Chickpea stew. Since I couldn't find Albanian sausage, I used Italian, Portuguese would also work well. Any savory sausage will work.







1/2 lb of Italian Sausage
1lb of lamb meat, cubed
1 ham hock
3 Celery stocks-sliced
1 Red onion-diced
1/2 Green pepper (diced)
6 Garlic gloves or the whole garlic for more flavor
1 Yam, peeled and cubed.
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
3 Cans of Chicken stock or Veggie stock
Seasoned flour for dredging lamb
1/2 tbs of garlic powder
1/4 tsp Cayenne pepper
1/4 tsp Paprika (Smoked)
1/4 tsp Turmeric
1/4 tsp Cumin
1/4 tsp Garam Marsala
Tie together in a bundle sprigs, of rosemary, thyme & tarragon.
2 Cans of Chickpeas (drained and rinsed)
Salt and Pepper to taste

Dredge lamb in flour and brown. Remove and place in slower cooker or pot. Cook onion and garlic in the same pan, until onion is clear. Add to lamb. Brown sausage, add to pot. Add all other ingredients. Saving Chickpeas to add the last hour. Deglaze pan with some of the broth and add to pot.

I cooked my stew in a slower cooker, for 5 hours, adding the chickpeas last. If cooking on a stove, I'd simmer for at least 2 hours to really release the flavors. If you're on a diet, this is not a low fat stew, because of the meats. I trimmed fat from the lamb. The original recipe called for a lamb shoulder. That can be fatty, so I opted for leaner lamb. I found it in a local grocery store. Severed the next day, it's even better. I thickened the broth with flour before serving.

A blog tour

I'm particpating in a little blog tour about what my book is about. Here are the questions I answered for my next release, due out at the end of this month. 

1. What is the working title of your book or story? A Reckoning for Alisha
2. What is a one-sentence synopsis of your book? A mother seeks justice for her daughter's death.
3. Where did the idea for the book come from? Not sure. It just popped into my head.
4. What genre does your book fall under? Suspense.
5. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? The Heroine would be Angelina Jolie 
6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? Self-published. I'm a Indie.
7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? An embarrassing 9 months. 
8. What other books would you compare this story to, within your genre? Can't think of any right now. I guess its original.
9. Who or what inspired you to write this book? I was just compelled to write the book. My inspiration usually just comes out of nowhere.
10. What else about your book might pique the reader's interest? My heroine is a Interpol agent who is from Northern California's lost coast area. She is also from a band of very reclusive Gypsies, who don't encourage their young women to leave home and pursue careers. This puts my heroine at odds with her clan and her family for the choices she's made in her life.

Check out www.jilljameswrites.com as I pass these questions on to her.

Light beef Stew

This recipe is taken from a common French Stew, Boeuf Bourguignon. It's very light, and easy to make and it's very tasty and my take on it. French cooking is actually very easy if you stick to the rustic country dishes.It's not the prettiest dish, but it is tasty.

You can use large cut of beef or beef stew meat. 

1lb beef or more depending on how many people you are serving
5 sprigs of thyme
3 sprigs of rosemary
6 gloves of garlic
1/2 yellow onion (slice)
1/2 red bell pepper (slice)
1/2 cup of sliced mushrooms
1 cup of baby carrots
3/4 cup of red wine
1/2 cup of water
flour
salt and pepper to taste

Keep meat in large pieces and dredge in flour and brown in olive oil, like common stews. 
In the bottom of crock pot or Dutch oven, lay down the sprigs, rosemary, and garlic. Lay meat over the top. Lay sliced onion and peppers over the top of the meat. Pour wine and water over the top. Cook on high in Crock pot all day or at least 5hrs. In Dutch oven heat over to 275 degrees for 3hrs. The last hour of crock pot add the carrots and mushrooms. The last 1/2hr of dutch oven add carrots and mushrooms. 

If preparing in a crock pot in the morning, cook on low heat for all day. 

When you serve this dish, don't thicken the juices. This is a thin stew. Serve with bread for dipping in juices. The meat should fall apart with a fork.

Week Two: Dieting and into the rhythm of exercise

I’m into week two of changing my eating habits. I weighed in on the 7^th, and had lost 6lbs. This isn’t uncommon. The stress of the holidays not only can cause weight gain, but cause water retention. Stress, eating out, eating foods you normally don’t eat, eating a lot of sugary foods, drinking more alcohol than normal, and family. Yes, having the stress of family around and off your normal routine can cause water retention. All of this can cause weight gain and a lot of water retention, especially the alcohol.

Last week I gave up alcohol. I did fall off the wagon. We bought a new car, and it was an emotional situation, because I traded in my mother’s little car that I had been driving since she passed from this life, 6yrs ago. I still miss her terribly. She was such a rock in my life. To let go of her car was necessary and extremely hard. I love my new car, but came home and had a glass of wine and cried. I immediately regretted it. I gained 30lbs since her death, and know it was a sorry excuse to take a drink, which with dieting is always the excuse to go off the path you chosen to take, some sort of stress or bad day. It didn’t affect my weight loss, I’m fairly certain, but it did affect my mental attitude.75% of your diet is mental.

I’m now into my workout routine. I started something new, working out with hubs at night. He needs it. I’ve developed a routine for him, he’ll do. It’s a combination of light weights, and walking. For myself, I’m running again. I run more this time of year than summer. I love my bike and am on that all summer. The weather keeps me on the treadmill or running close to home. I decided to do a marathon this year or maybe two. Last August I tore a tendon in my ankle. It was extremely painful, and left me barely able to walk. I could ride my bike after a week, but running and walking was definitely out. It wasn’t until January that I felt I was healed enough to run, without doing further damage. I’m no spring chicken so I really can’t afford to hurt myself like that again. It took six months for me to be able to run. I was pleased. I ran 3mls, with a middle walk of 5mins. Riding my bike really helped my endurance more than I imagined. So if you don’t like to run, or treadmill, try a bike.

This week I eliminated red meat and pork. Now I’m eating fish and chicken, which I love, but I’m eating it only 4 days a week to start. As I move on into my diet, I’ll probably will become more vegan. It’s difficult, to just jump into something so restricting and find success. Pick a diet that you can live with. Vegan takes a lot of research and planning. Whatever you’re doing keep with it.

Check in next week. Hopefully, I’ve lost more weight.    

Honor our Veterans

I'm at Two Indie Ladies today, honoring our Veterans and their dogs that serve along side them. Jump over to www.twoindieladies.wordpress.com

Why do Women wear PJ's in public?

For the past two weeks almost every day I see a woman out in public in her PJ’s. Like the, ya know the flannel bottoms with the cute prints on them, obviously for sleeping. Hell, I have a pair myself, that are cute, pink with funny little animals all over them. I avoid the princess print, because I’m not such a princess type. This is my favorite winter lounge around the house after dinner style. Never do I venture out into the real world in my comfy PJ’s, because they’re just not that attractive, and my husband would disown me, and probably never go anywhere with me again. It’s hard enough getting him to go places as it is.
 

Every day for two weeks and I kid you not, I’ve seen women in the store in PJ’s. She comes from all sizes, ethnic backgrounds, and areas of town. The PJ wearing woman covers all demographics. I’ve seen her in the Best Buy store, looking at televisions. I guess hers broke that morning and she didn’t have time to shower, comb her hair and dress because she just had to replace it right then and there. Maybe it was a rush to catch football. In the grocery store, with fuzzy cute matching bunny slippers, her hair was put up in a messy ponytail, wondering aimlessly up and down the aisles. Maybe not all the sleep was out of her head yet, although it was afternoon. At Starbucks getting coffee, I guess she wanted to feel like she made it. At MacDonald’s getting breakfast, before they stop making it at 11 o’clock. The reason behind that appearance I assume is the same as the Starbucks one, it’ just homier. Then there was the one in the Apple store. Yes, the Apple store. I was picking up my new iphone, I don’t know what she was doing, but she was there in her hot chili pepper print PJ’s,(my daughter-in-law has those but would never leave the house in them), who looked like she literally rolled right out of bed. Messy hair, fuzzy slippers, matching top, no bra, (yep I dared to say that), talking to the nice young man in the blue shirt who works there, who was desperately trying to answer all her questions to get her out of his face and out of the store, in her hot chili pepper print PJ’s. She stood out like a neon light in their bright white clean store, with people in blue shirts.She was one hot mess.

I’m still trying to figure out why women would roll out of bed and go out in public dressed in their PJ’s. Sometimes, I’m assuming they didn’t come directly from bed because there doesn’t seem to be any certain time of the day they make their appearance in society. It’s an all-day anytime occurrence. They’re not selective about time. What I also find is everyone is very accepting of it. Unless they're like me and wonder in silence standing behind them at the butchers waiting for pork chops.

I’m beginning to wonder if I’m I missing a new fashion trend or something, because sometimes I see them in pairs. Mom and daughter, sisters, cousins, best-friends going out after a sleep-over, and roomies who are too lazy to make coffee. I’ve even seen them in diners. Not so much restaurants, but little diners. Restaurants can refuse service. Diners can too, but usually they just ignore it. I’m also wondering if it’s a California thing. Back east winter comes in cold. Here it’s a slower transition from warm weather to cold, so maybe they just forgot to dress. That might be it, the local weather. Whatever it is, I find it a conundrum.  

I like the Hot Mess PJ's. I'm going to have to get me a pair of those. But they are not for public consumption. Just for writing blogs. 

Ghost, Spirits and Hauntings. Do you believe?

Do you believe in the other side and that those who have passed before us can communicate?

There is a keen interest in the occult, paranormal, and ghost hunting appearing on television and in movies. With modern equipment, cameras, ways to read electro waves and images appearing on the internet. We have a closer relationship with the other side. It’s right in our faces, making it real. This of course is nothing new. It’s just become more modern the way we approach the possibility of seeing a ghost, communicating with those who have passed, and experiencing hauntings.  

Misty images appearing in photographs, is as old as photography. Those who’ve seen those dark mists moving across a room, is as old as storytellers. Families have their stories of Aunt Sally seeing grandma standing in the hall, waving right after she had passed. Every society has their ghost stories, and names for those who continue to cling to old places they once occupied in life.

In my life, I’ve had several experiences that have shaped my life and beliefs in the afterlife. As a child when my grandmother passed unexpectedly when I was ten, for a year afterwards, I could smell her around a large overstuffed chair where she would sit and knit. After a serious injury, I incurred while working in Law enforcement, (I was under the influence of very strong painkillers) I saw my other grandmother who had passed a few years prior. She stood over me examining my injury. Over twenty-five years later, I can still recall how she looked as if it happened yesterday. Her image still clings to my memory, as she smiled in a mauve colored rain coat with a plastic old lady rain cap on her head. Her glasses were spotted with rain drops. There had been a bad storm the night I was injured. She then said as clear as if she was in the room, “You’re going to be fine.” I was, although, during those frightening first hours after the incident, I wondered, as did my surgeon, who put me back together. Obviously, I am fine. 

My mother passed from life six years ago. I wasn’t with her when she passed, but knew the moment she did. I had the most incredible moment of internal peace. Two minutes later my sister called to tell me she was gone. Since then, I’ve had more than just a few incidents where I either saw my mother in a room or strongly felt her presence.

I had an incredible incident recently. My father’s behavior since my mother’s death, has been erratic and often childlike. We’ve had many difficulties with him due to his attitude towards us. I mentioned in a blog a few weeks ago, he’s making me crazy.

It all centers around a lady friend he moved into his house. Our concern, she brought nothing into the relationship of value. No property and no money. Apparently, her children are in the same situation.

One day, I had the strangest sensation. Someone whispered in my ear, when there was no one around me. I was in the middle of a conversation with my husband and turned away from him towards the voice. He said I had the strangest look on my face. The voice sounded like this odd hissing noise, as if someone was trying to communicate words through the tuning of a old radio. I felt this buzzing right on the ear. There was a moment of very light dizziness. My mother instantly came to mine. Later, I was told that my dad had bought his lady friend a ring that very afternoon right at that time. What I felt was like a rumbling in my universe. The emotional lines that connect me to my father vibrated as if strummed like a out of tune guitar. This situation is hard to put into words. That is all that comes to mind. This was like there was a disturbance in the force.

It didn't end there. The next day I was having brunch with a group of friends. I had tried to describe what had happened. It was so hard. When I left them I had my hands full, a favorite muffin for my hubs, I got into the car and I noticed my phone was dialing. It was calling my dad! I tired to stop the call, but my phone wouldn't cooperate. So I let it continue until my dad's answering machine picked up. I left a message for my dad telling him I loved him, and hoped he would come for Thanksgiving. He had been refusing, because of the influence of his girlfriend. She doesn't like him to be around us. This situation has been very heartbreaking and consuming. Before I left the house that day, I had asked my mother to leave me a sign as to what to do. To tell me something I'd recognize. I guess she decided I needed to call him. 

I’m a true believer that those who have left us stay connected. Although, there is no solid scientific proof, I don’t know anyone who hasn’t had an experience of some sort.

Are you a believer and what was your experience?

The Writer’s Guide to Cauliflower, the super veggie

I try to eat cauliflower at least once a week. Over the years it was, I have to admit, an acquired taste. It’s the paler cousin the broccoli, which I love. The reason I kept with this veggie, is it is a very high quality product that is excellent for the liver. It’s a detoxifying veggie, that has a lot more power then it appearance give us. Eating a combination of broccoli and/or cauliflower once or twice a week can boast liver production and help with preventing cancer. Here is two of my favorite recipes for cauliflower that changes it without stripping its vitamin punch.  
 

Mashed Cauliflower

1 head of Cauliflower/ steamed until tender

1 pad of butter

Garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste

Cut Cauliflower flowerets from stem and steam in a vegetable steamer until tender. Drain off all liquid and place flowerets in a blender. Add butter, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Blend until smooth. Taste and add salt, pepper or garlic as needed. This is a great substitute for mash potatoes especially if you’re on a low carb diet, or a diabetic. The cauliflower taste light, smooth and is only about 100 calories per cup of mashed cauliflower. That’s a lot for such a small amount of calories. It is very filling, and goes great with gravy, just like mashed potatoes.

Cauliflower, almonds and raisin

I love this tasty easy dish.

Steam cauliflower until ‘almost’ tender.

¼ cup of raisins

¼ cup of slice almonds

1 bunch of green onions (shallots)

1tbsp of olive oil

Cut cauliflower from stem and steam to ‘almost’ tender. While the cauliflower is steaming, sauté, onions, raisins and almonds together in 1tbsp of olive oil until tender and onions are clear. Add the cauliflower and toss in the oil, onions, raisins and almonds until cauliflower is showing some golden brown. The raisins add an sweetness to the cauliflower, the almonds crunch, and the onions flavor. Salt and pepper to taste. Per average serving 50 calories. 

Racing towards the RWA Conference

I’ll be leaving for the RWA conference a week from today. I’m excited as I make plans with friends and hope to see many others I haven’t seen in a couple of years. I’ve done pretty good on my diet. I’ve lost 11lbs. I was hoping to lose more, but like all of us, I’ve had my good days and a few bad. On the bad days, I just do my little u-turn and work to do better.

My goal was 15lbs by this date. It is only halfway to my full blown goal of 30lbs overall. To lose the final 4lbs in the coming week, I’ve beefed up my exercise and tightened up my diet. I’d love to lose a lot of weight very quietly. Since I started this process too close to the conference, (just out of pure laziness) I’ve had to live with the reality of the situation.

Like everyone, I’d love to lose a lot of weight over night. It is possible to lose weight very quickly with a lot of craziness and strict dieting. I’m against that, as much as I’d love the results. The reason being, losing a large amount of weight quickly means one thing, to stray from the diet will mean very rapid weight gain. To lose 1 or 2lbs a week is reasonable and healthy. It’s easy to maintain and do a little u-turn when those bad days or weeks occur. And they will happen, because life happens.

I watch a lot of weight loss programs, such as the new program ‘Body Make-over’. I study what they are doing to lose so much weight so quickly and safely. For one thing, those individuals such as on the Biggest Loser, are obese. They often lose a whole person in weight. Does it make losing weigh easier for them? Not really. They are doing grueling workouts daily. They burn as many calories as they take in. So if they have a diet of 1,500 calories, with those workouts they are easily burning that much or more. It equals losing 10lbs or more a week, at least in the early stages of the program. Once they start to gain muscle, the weight loss slows way down, but they continue to grow smaller.

When I said I beefed up my exercise, what I’ve done is add an extra hour to my regular workout. I’m retired and have the time, especially this week with my grandkids away on vacation. I’m also trying to mix things up. For example, this morning instead of a run and swim, I road my bike for two hours. I hit the streets and road as hard as I could around my small town taking as many hills as possible. My estimated burn was around 1,000 calories. Tomorrow, it will be a short half hour run on the treadmill, at 5.0spd, with three sprints at 6.0spd, holding it for one minute. I’ll ride my bike to the pool to swim laps for a 1hr. When I’m finished I ride for an hour around town. That is a lot, but I’m determined. I do have to be mindful of injury while I ‘beef’ things up. Which is why my run is shorter right now, and my non-impact exercises are longer. I’m no spring chicken. Fortunately, I’ve been active my entire life, which helps with my muscle memory.

There is a downfall to all this exercise, I get very hungry. I have increased my caloric intake with healthy foods, like fruits. The natural sugars in fruit help to keep my body’s sugar levels even without spiking while I burn energy and hopefully fat. I’ve had too, so I can maintain this amount of exercise.

I’m also writing a lot these days, which has me in my chair in front of the computer for hours as I push to finish my next book. This in itself makes me crazy. I want to be active. I like to be active and moving around. To help with the feelings of caginess, I take a break and have been lifting light weights in front of the television for an hour.

My diet over these weeks has been very clean. I don’t eat processed foods. I’ve cut out anything that is processed or out of a can. My hubs and I have also limited eating out. I can’t tell you the last time I ate fast food. I make everything from scratch. It is more time consuming, but all those chemicals and crap in those types of food encourages the body’s metabolism to slow, which particularly for women keeps the weight clinging to us. By taking the time to make healthy foods, is so much better. You know what is going into your body. And the food taste so much better.

By Thursday I hope to have a report on how all this is working. Then on Thursday how to survive National and the all the foods especially chocolate and alcohol.

The Writer's Guide to a Stalled Diet

One of the biggest problems most dieters face is the stalled diet. The reason behind this is your body has suddenly become use to your diet and exercise program. It’s settled in, you’ve lost weight, and now it seems like your just maintaining your new weight.

The first part of your diet is the greatest weight loss. Part of it is water, and then the body adjust to no more fatty rich foods, and the weight comes off. Then suddenly stops. You stay the same weight for weeks.

The best thing to do, if you’re not doing this already is eat six small meals a day. Look at your caloric intake, what you’re allowing yourself in calories, and divide into six. Say if you’re eating 1200 calories a day, you have six 200 calorie meals a day, with lots of water in-between. Yes, you’ll be running to restroom often. But you need to flush the system of toxins released by your sudden healthy eating.

If you’re already doing the six meals, try this. Reduce any other fatty items you can in your diet and reduce carbs. That little piece of chocolate might have to go for the time being. Then increase your caloric intake with a healthier item, or replace less carbs with lean protein. Yes, increase, do not decrease calories. Then add, if humanly possible another 15mins of aerobic exercise, such as a longer faster walk or run. The body will kick start again and the weight will start to come off once more.

It’s important to stimulate your metabolism with healthy food. By not eating enough of the right food, the body will hang on to the fat. It’s often called the ‘starvation mode'. For a dieting body to go into starvation mode, it takes a long time of not eating enough, or not eating enough of the right food. The body has a mini rebellion and refuses to let go of fat.

To get the body going, add more healthy foods to your diet, increasing the caloric intake and reduce carbs or anything with added sugars. The body will automatically respond, by working to burn those calories, which in turn burns fat. 

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way with fatty foods. If you increase your caloric intake of foods that are high in sugars and fat, like a fast food hamburger, all you do is feel sluggish and bloated while the body tries to fight through the garbage to digest it. Once you get done, you feel like crap, and hate yourself for eating it. The moral of the story don’t try to stimulate the metabolism with unhealthy food. The key is feeling sluggish after eating too much of something unhealthy. The body is trying to tell you something, like its fighting to digest it.

How to solve the problem:

• Increase caloric intake with healthy food.
• Reduce carbohydrates and increase lean protein.  
• Increase meals to six a day.  
• Eliminate any remaining fatty food from your diet.  
• Reduce dairy products.
• Increase aerobic exercise.

Another reason for stalled weight loss, is gaining muscle weight. If you are working out in a gym in combination of aerobics, machines and weights, most likely you're gaining muscle. This is a good thing, because muscle is smaller, but heavier then fat. If this is the case, start to measure yourself, and that's were you'll see the changes, not on the scale. Still look at your diet carefully, to continue to decrease size you might need to reduce carbs and add more protein in the form of lean meats and protein shakes. Read the labels on protein shakes carefully, they can be high in calories and sugar for energy.

Next week the detox or cleanse. Do they work? 

The Writer's Guide to adding Exercise to your diet regiment

In the past few months I’ve fallen completely off my exercise routine. I was editing She Cried Wolf, making it my whole focus. When the book was released, then it was blogging, guest blogging, promoting and just dealing with life. I got lazy.  

It is unusual for me to ignore regular exercise, such as riding my bike, running or hiking. I did do some, but not seriously or on a regular routine. When I was recently in Trinidad in Northern California I was surprised how well I kept up my nieces, nephews and grandkids on hikes. But- I know if I don’t get back into it soon, that won’t be the case.

I’ve been on my Caveman or Paleo diet for over a week. I’ve lost another 4lbs on top of the 5lbs I dropped preparing for the diet. I believe the first 5lbs was simply water weight. Something to consider, the first weight you lose will be the easiest and most likely water weight as the body naturally detoxes as you ingest healthier foods. The body will react positively to the lack of the usual fatty and toxic foods.

Now that you’ve started to eat healthier and have hopefully lost a couple pounds, it’s time to step things up with exercise. Since I haven’t run seriously since May, I’m currently walking to build up to running. In one hour of brisk walking you can burn over 300 calories. Running or jogging of course burns more in the same amount of time, up to 600 calories, depending on the length of time and speed. This is why long distant runners are skin and bones.

When starting an exercise routine, take a good look at it, and examine how realistic it is for your conditioning. If you haven’t exercised in years, take it very slow. I suggest starting with walking a couple of times a day, slowly adding light weights and an exercise ball. You want to build up to a 1hr exercise program 5 to 6 days a week, for weight loss.And you've got to SWEAT in order to burn fat.

I’m not big on joining a gym right away. Gyms can be intimidating, noisy, and discouraging. You walk in and the first thing you see is a cute little girl behind the counter who is in perfect shape. Depending on the gym, there is the body builders, big, noisy and hog machines and equipment. All the classes offered are fun, but again, it is awkward, when you’re stumbling around the Zumba class feeling foolish.  

There are smaller gyms geared towards just women. Those can be much less intimidating, but can be just as expensive.

It is easy enough to start a program at home, with CD’s, walking and an inexpensive workout ball. If you have a treadmill, clean off the clothes hung there, and walk it. Once you have gotten into a regular routine, and are losing weight at a steady healthy rate, and feel better about your body, a gym might be the way to go. Make sure it’s something you’re really going to use. They usually require a contract for a year or two.

One thing I don’t advice, is push too hard in the beginning. I’m a regular fan of the Biggest Loser and am in awe of the contestants and how hard they workout. But-they are under constant doctor monitoring, with trainers, with a regular specialized diet. They lose large amounts of weight in a week, like up to 10lbs. In the real world that is unrealistic, those individuals workout up to three or four hours a day. In the real world, we have to work, deal with family, plus write, without the benefit of a luxury ranch where we’re locked away from life, and live and breathe diet and exercise.

Either find a calorie counting book, or use an app for a smart phone. The apps can be free and update regularly for products and restaurants. If you are counting calories, depending on your weight, taking in between 1000-1200 of healthy calories is considered the way to lose about 1-2lbs a week. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s considered the healthiest reasonable weight loss. The faster you lose weight, the faster it will come back on if you fall off the wagon. Think Oprah, when she went on a liquid diet, within months she was bigger than when she started the diet.   

If you are counting calories, and considering calories burned in exercise, my advice is not to consider the burned calories. What can happen is, “Oh, I burned 300 cals on that walk, so I can eat 300 extra cals.”

What happens, you’ll start to just maintain your weight, rather than lose it. Just consider the intact, not the burn.

Take your exercise easy, build up, let your body adjust before hitting it harder and you'll lose weight. Exercise should be part of a healthy lifestyle. All the way around it's good for you in moderation until you can handle more difficulty. 

Next week, what to do when weight loss slows to a stop.