Sunday, February 12, 2012

So, okay, this healthy eating thing

First things first.  Breakfast.  I am a notoriously bad breakfast eater.  I hate breakfast foods. I would much rather eat last night's leftovers, or a sandwich, soup, anything other than your grits, eggs (ick), bacon, sausage special.

However, I have recently realized the validity of the "most important meal of the day" statement.  What I eat in the morning really does set the mood for the rest of my day.  If I start off with a bag of potato chips and some white chocolate peanut butter cups (omg, must have some now), then I feel like crap for the rest of the day.  However, on the days I start out with even a glass of milk, Greek yogurt, or a smoothie with my daily assortment of vitamins, I feel SO much better, and energized. That being said, I need something a little more substantial to fill me up, and also economical, as I'm on a tight budget, and bottled all-natural smoothies are damned expensive.

So, I've been looking at different recipes to try out that fit my equal parts protein/carbs requirement, and that I can make with relatively cheap ingredients.  I've discovered the following two that I think will work, that use a lot of the same ingredients, but are different enough that I can switch them up without becoming bored with the same thing every day.

First off, Bircher Muesli:


Sounds good, right? Like a healthier granola.

Next, a Banana-Oatmeal smoothie:


So, that's breakfast, done.  Next...lunch...not as much of a challenge, but I have decided to go with the "make lunch your biggest meal of the day" philosophy, because I do believe that a lighter dinner is better for digestion, and the hope is I will wake up feeling less weighted down, and "oogy" to use a technical term.

It's probably important to note that I have a difficult time with digesting certain foods for reasons that may or may not be revealed at a later time.  Not necessarily a bad thing in that my system can't really process dry or stringy substances such as chicken, pot roast (unpleasantly realized a few days ago), or spaghetti noodles (other small, tubular noodles or shells are just fine). So, again, bearing in mind that I'm on a budget, I think I'm going to go with something like ground beef stew, meatloaf, shepherd's pie, chili, or beef stroganoff.  Nice, hearty, filling, and great protein/carb ratio if served over potatoes, or noodles (small, of course).

For dinner, I'm going to have a salad.  I have been known to tear through a staggering amount of salad in one sitting, so believe me, this will fill me up.

So, that's my three main meals, done.  The other things I need to work on are snacks.  I do love chips, cookies, ice cream, everything and anything that is bad for you.  Being that this is not so much a diet as a lifestyle change, I'm pretty much going to snack on whatever I want when the mood hits me, but I'm going to concentrate on portion control, which has always been an issue for me.  What I will divulge is that 11 years ago, I had a gastric bypass, and though I did stretch out my "pouch" at one time, since my illness last year, my stomach has again significantly decreased in size, though that realization does not seem to reach my eyes or my brain.  To circumvent this, I'm going to either measure my snackage by ounces, or by number (ex:  1 c. ice cream, or 20 chips).  I'm fairly OCD, so this will satisfy that need of control as well.

So, hey, Kathleen, you may ask yourself, how's this going for you so far? Started yet?  My answer: No, I haven't, get off my back why don't you?  I just came up with this plan, damn.  It's still in the planning stages.  It also is not helping that I am currently staying with my mother before moving into my new house, and whenever I'm at her place, I'm like a starving Ethiopian child when the first UNICEF food delivery shows up.  I go batshit crazy eating everything and anything I can stuff into my face.  A free-for-all, so to speak.  But the gravy train to unlimited Foodsville is about to end, so it is time to put the Meal Plan into place.  Plus, in my new house, I have a full, massive, could-rent-out-as-a-separate-apartment kitchen, so I'm going to be a  food preparing maniac.  I can't wait.


























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