Grown Up Chocolate Fudge Pudding

Hello all! Sorry it has been a few days since my last post.

This past weekend JL and I decided that enough was enough! No more silly excuses, we were just going to get in shape, once and for all! So he requested I make nothing but salads and we go running daily... Ok so maybe the salad thing will be adjusted but for the first week that is our goal :) I personally love salads and he likes most vegetables too so if we can just stick to something we actually like eating then all the better.

Now with dieting comes cravings, or urges as I have been calling them, at least for me. These typically are for sweets like chocolate and baked goods. Since I have been dieting a good portion of my life, I have found little tricks to get around this, one of my favorites is sugar free pudding. Now you may think that sugar free pudding will be gross and have a nasty after taste like diet coke but on the contrary, I can't really tell its sugar free at all! Just to make sure, I go for the full flavored kinds like chocolate fudge or butterscotch. For the recipe below I took boring sugar free chocolate fudge pudding and upped it a notch by adding some calorie free spices to it.

Grown Up Chocolate Fudge Pudding

1 small packet of sugar free chocolate fudge pudding mix
2 cups of milk (I used 2% because it is as low fat as JL will go with milk but you can use any type you want here)
Dash of cinnamon
Pinch of cayenne pepper (weird I know but you don't really taste it)

Combine pudding and milk and whisk for a minute or two, incorporating air in it only makes it more mousse like so burn some calories and whisk!

Add spices and mix in well.

Refrigerate for a few minutes until firm.

If you would like to jazz it up, a dollop of whip cream won't hurt, just adds a few more calories.

I personally love the cook and serve type of pudding too so to make this warm just microwave it for a few seconds and you have a warm chocolate pudding to enjoy.

If you need help with figuring out your caloric needs this article really helped me: http://weightloss.about.com/od/eatsmart/a/blcalintake.htm

Live, Laugh, Love & Enjoy Pudding :)