Cooking takes time. That is why so many of us don’t eat as well as we would like or should. Because we don’t have the time. Well, you actually do have the time. But you have to find it.
This week I learned the hard way what happens when you don’t plan ahead. The healthier I eat, the more reluctant I am to eat crap and undo all the hard work I have been doing. But finding myself in a pickle more than once, I resorted to pre-made junk food – granola bars, crackers, deli salmon-and-cream cheese sandwich. Even though I pick quality ‘junk food’ that is still what it is: food that you don't know anything about, how it was made or what's really in it. Or who made it. It's disconnected food. It's junk food.
Nothing catastrophic happened, but nothing really remarkable did either. I didn’t have the little hum of ‘green’ energy that comes with eating very healthful foods and I was really starting to dig.
So I am doing a little pre-planning this week. I bought enough fruit for every breakfast and have planned out my lunches:
Monday – Leftover Chard, bean and corn salad, heirloom tomato
Tuesday – Whole wheat pasta with zucchini, mushroom, tomato sauce, side of spinach
Wednesday – Fennel, bean and kale stew
Thursday – Homemade cabbage and potato soup (frozen)
Friday – Baked squash and greens
Also, just because it's in a health-food store, doesn't mean it's not junk food. As I continue to try and ween myself off refined sugar and also experiment with wheat and gluten (a real slower-downer for the digestive track), I bought some sugar-free gluten-free choco chip cookies. I gobbled away and ate handful after handful. No sugar! No wheat! Who cares! Next morning, there was a rumbling in the tummy, a spring to the bathroom and a few hours of stomach cramps. WTF?! I looked at the label again. The cookies had maltitol, a sugar substitute notorious for it's laxative effect. It kind of sucked. Whatever that product is, it's awful and I say avoid!
Before this makeover, I had gotten into a rut of always buying the same things at the grocery and invariably my default for healthy ingredients was broccoli and brown rice. Now it’s chard, kale, cabbage, zucchinis, green breans, snap peas, spinach, black beans, wheat berries and – drum roll – amaranth. We got down to the business of cooking this grain this week. I found a recipe online for popped amaranth with lemony cabbage and leeks. With a hot hot pan, the grain toasts like popcorn – exploding into a nutty little ball. Very tasty. Last night I also made another simple meal: broiled flounder with basil, olive oil and sea salt; sautéed chard with garlic and an heirloom tomato. (pictured)
I have been losing weight slowly but surely, my skin has never looked so healthy and my hair is also becoming quite shiny. All in all, I am impressed that at week 4 I can already see some positive results like this. I am looking forward to start wearing some clothes that I "grew" out of.
