It's true.
I just finished watching "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead" and I think it's changed my life, just as it was intended to do :)
I've already committed, as one of my new year's habit swaps (haha that's what I'm going to call them now), to eat more veggies and less sugar, but now I think I'm going to go even more gung ho, and try to get my siblings on board as well. Heck, we could ALL stand to eat a little bit healthier.
I got to thinking just now that it would be a good idea to document my meals, in case anyone is looking for something quick and easy that's filled with goodness but can't find the time or creativity to come up with a good meal. And don't get me wrong, I'm not creative.
I'm reading a book every now and then about "Nature Foods", which are basically what Joe defines as "micronutrient" foods in the movie. It's your fruits, veggies, beans, seeds, and nuts, and they've got everything you need and then some. So what I've been doing is just reading through the author's 50 favorite nature foods and coming across one that makes me go "Oh! I should try that." She has some recipes, but so far I'm just preparing these foods the way I like them. I'll do recipes when I get around to it :)
I'll have to remember to take pictures of my food to include, which I haven't done the past few days, but next time I make these foods I'll post them again with pictures.
So here we go, my week of veggie lunches. We'll work on dinner occasionally, but for now I know I am in complete control of what I eat for lunch, because I'm the one who makes and eats it. I'm not quite ready to jump the bridge to feeding my teenage siblings raw veggie foods, though :)
Monday
My mom got sweet potatoes a while back, probably close to Thanksgiving, and I've been meaning to do something with them. Luckily they last a long time. So today I ate one. Pretty simply, too. Here's what I did:
1. Peel potato. I have since read that the skin is FULL of nutrients, so I'm going to skip this step next time.
2. Chop potato into 1 inch pieces.
3. Boil potato pieces until very soft (I intentionally boiled it longer than necessary because I knew I'd have to mash it with one hand since my baby was being especially needy).
4. Mash potato. I just used a potato masher, no beaters required.
5. Spoon in 2 large dollups of sour cream. My sister made fun of me for putting butter on Brussels sprouts because then they're not healthy anymore. Here's my argument for that, take it or leave it. The veggie itself still has all the vitamins and nutrients that you want, no matter what you add to it. So if you need butter or sour cream or salt to be able to stomach the veggie in the first place, I say go for it. You can wean yourself off of it later. I did this with spinach a few years back. I started by steaming it and adding lemon juice, but each day I added less lemon juice until I just liked the flavor of spinach by itself enough that I didn't need to add anything to it.
Another thing my mom got a while back was Brussels sprouts, and we worked on those all weekend. Here's what I did with mine on Monday:
1. Steam Brussels sprouts.
2. Add salt.
And they were SO GOOD!! I've found I love deep green vegetables for their flavor more than anything. Asparagus, broccoli, and Brussels sprouts all have a similar rich flavor, so if you like one, try the others and you might be surprised.
So that was my lunch. And it kept me full enough that I didn't get that late afternoon hankering for a snack. I did get hungry while I was cooking dinner, so I ate a few handfuls of cashews. Nothing like good protein to fill you up quickly.
Tuesday
Today I stared and stared and stared in the fridge. I usually make my lunches out of leftover veggies, and we just didn't have any. All the good stuff in the fridge is for dinners later this week, so I couldn't use almost anything. I did know that there was a pepper that needed to be eaten, and I found half a bag of spinach (yipee!) behind the eggs, so that was a starting place. I decided that since my baby was once again (as usual) very needy, I'd make fried rice and I could feed him while the rice cooked. Here's what I did:
1. Boil rice. I always use brown rice when I have the time, because it is a billion times better for you than white. It does take about an hour, though, so like I said, time. If you end up liking fried rice like I do it might be a good idea to cook up a lot of it and keep it in the fridge, as it's not necessary for it to be freshly cooked to make it into fried rice.
2. Chop pepper. I also saved about half of it to dip in hummus that I'll make later this week.
3. Chop green onions. I love onions.
4. Drain and rinse 1 can of black eyed peas, but only use about half. That's a lot of beans.
5. (start this step when the rice is about 10 mins from being done) Grill onions and peppers together until they start to look crispy. Then throw the spinach in there and stir it around while it wilts. Then add the beans and let them cook a little bit.
6. When the rice is done, add it to the pan.
7. I seasoned mine with lemon pepper, then added parmesan cheese after plating.
Ok so if those two days of veggie meals aren't easy peasy, I don't know what is, because I have two needy children so everything I do HAS to be easy :)
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