Ingredient of the Week

Before I get to this week's ingredient, let me display my goods for the week from the Farmer's Market:

{cantaloupe, tomatoes, corn on the cob, garlic, carrots, green beans, and kettle corn}

This week's ingredient is tomato!

Tomatoes, although commonly known as a vegetable, are actually a fruit. They're a great source of antioxidants and are specifically rich in vitamin C and lycopene, among many other vital nutrients. Lycopene has many protective health factors such as building bone mass (especially important for us women), making skin less sensitive to UV light damage and reducing risk of cancer. Tomatoes are also important for promoting immune health (vitamin C) and vision/eye health, and they can even make your hair stronger and more shiny (thank you vitamin A!).  

All in all, plenty of reasons to eat tomatoes. And another little known fact - unlike many vegetables, cooking and processing tomatoes can actually make the lycopene more bioavailable. So feel free to cook up your tomatoes in sauces, soups, and any other way you may want to. Here are three ways I enjoyed tomatoes this week.

Baked Parmesan Tomatoes

4 beef steak tomatoes, halved horizontally

1/4c freshly grated parmesan cheese

1 tsp chopped fresh oregano

1/4 tsp salt

freshly ground black pepper, to taste

4 tsp extra-virgin olive oil

1. Pre=heat oven to 450 degrees.

2. Wash tomatoes and cut in half horizontally. Place in a baking dish, cut side up.

3. Top with parmesan, oregano, salt, and pepper. Drizzle with olive oil and bake until tomatoes are tender, about 15 minutes.

(source)

**I didn't measure anything for this recipe, just sprinkled and drizzled until it looked right.

 {before going in the oven}

{served with couscous and greens}

Bruschetta
5 roma tomatoes
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1/8+ cup fresh basil, shredded
fresh bread

1. Boil a pan of water. Remove from heat and cook tomatoes 1-2 minutes, covered. Remove tomatoes, discard water. 

2. Let tomatoes cool slightly; chop tomatoes, removing skin if desired. Place in medium bowl. 

3. Add next 4 ingredients and mix well. Salt and pepper to taste.

4. Slice bread and bake until crunchy at 350 degrees, or brown in a sauté pan using butter on bread (similar to making a grilled cheese).

5. Top bread with bruschetta.

(I don't know where I got this recipe from originally.)

{step 1}

{step 2}

{step 3, after mixed well}

{step 4}

{step 5}

Caprese Salad

beef steak tomatoes

fresh mozzarella cheese

fresh basil

extra-virgin olive oil

balsamic vinegar

salt and fresh ground black pepper

1. Slice the tomatoes and mozzarella into equally thick pieces.

2. Clip fresh basil into whole leaves, wash and dry well.

3. Layer tomato, mozzarella cheese, and basil. Sprinkle with salt and fresh ground pepper. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

 {pre-dressing drizzle}

{quick and easy lunch for work!}

Enjoy!

What Happened to Me?!

I sincerely apologize for my absence in blogging only 3 weeks after announcing the beginning of my food make-over. August got a little busy after my last post. If you didn't notice, I generally blog a summary of my week over the weekend as that is when I have the most time, and I was busy every single weekend in August. First, Donnie’s parents came in to town so we were busy showing them the best of Colorado’s front range. The next weekend I flew home for a spur-of-the-moment trip (no joke – I bought my airline ticket Monday and flew home that same Thursday evening). The next weekend I climbed the toughest 14-er in Colorado with my brother, David, and Donnie. The following weekend I went to Fort Collins to partake in Tour de Fat (a celebration of  local craft beer and alternative energy & transportation), and my best friend’s parents were in town, so I spent a lot of time with them. And this last weekend I was sick.  So that sums up my last few weekends and the reasons why I felt I didn’t have the energy to write a post.  Now, though, I’ll catch up on a few missed posts, and I’ll try to post about my other adventures soon too.

Back to food… I did capture some of the meals I had over the past few weeks, and I even have two “Ingredient of the Week” posts for you! Let’s get down to business.

This was my take home from the farmer’s market the week of August 5: cantaloupe, peaches, beefsteak tomatoes,  okra, mushrooms, green beans, corn on the cob and kettle corn (if you haven’t noticed, I get one of these almost every week for snacks and “desserts”).

One of the first meals I made for the week was one of my favorite dishes in the entire world – salmon with fruit salsa. YUM! With it I had steamed green beans & mushrooms, corn on the cob, and home-made garlic toast.

One of my other favorite dishes I made later in the week. This dish, a caprese salad, I enjoyed as a side dish with leftover salmon & fruit salsa.  My plate is not the prettiest presentation in the world; please forgive me. Also, this combination of flavors doesn’t necessarily go together super well; the salad may be better enjoyed as an appetizer prior to the meal. Me, though, I don’t mind the difference of flavors right next to each other at a meal because they are two of my favorites!

I didn’t take pictures of any other food for the week, but some meals I recall eating include: turkey enchiladas with home-made guacamole; egg whites, toast with jam, and fruit; grilled BBQ chicken, macaroni & cheese & salad (we went to a BBQ restaurant that served cage free chicken; I was so excited!); fruit smoothies; and my typical lunches of salads or dinner left overs.

The week of the 12^th I didn’t go to the farmer’s market because I knew I was only in town through Thursday afternoon and wouldn’t be back until the following Monday evening. Instead, I just went to the grocery store to pick up some essentials for the week and used left over farmer’s market goods.

I only took pictures of one meal from the week, but it is one of my favorite summer dishes because the flavors are just so, well, summery. It's pasta and veggies tossed in a homemade orange-cilantro pesto. Sooo good! I enjoyed this with some garlic toast and another caprese salad (Again, the flavors of the two dishes don’t marry well, but I didn’t want my tomatoes to go bad while I was gone, so I had it anyway.).

While I was home for a long weekend I enjoyed some delicious homemade meals, some fresh Midwest produce from my hometown’s farmer’s market, and also some meals out.  I also went to the State Fair, so admittedly I had a corn dog and some mini doughnuts. BUT, they are the only ones I will have all year, or maybe longer until I go to another fair.

Sadly, I didn’t record what I ate the rest of that week or the next three as they have been a total blur.  I’ll try to get back on track with the rest of this week and from now on though. I do have to say, I may not take a picture of every single thing I eat, but I will capture the pretty or out-of-the-ordinary meals for sharing and inspiration. I’ll leave you with this pretty meal, for example; shrimp salad with garlic toast and grapes.

Check back soon for Ingredient of the Week catch-up posts!

Tough Week

The past weekend and week has proven tough for me to follow my food rules.  It’s not usually a problem when I am home and making my own meals, but when I go out or if I’m with a group of people, it’s definitely more of a challenge.

I’ll recap Friday real quickly because it was fairly normal. We did have an Olympic themed party on Friday night – USA was the country of honor, of course. We all got decked out in our finest red, white, and blue, and cooked up an all-American meal. So here’s my day:

Breakfast: Banana and blueberry smoothie w/ milk and vanilla protein powder

Lunch: Honey whole wheat bagel from Einstein  Bros Bagels with honey nut cream cheese, corn on the cob and cantaloupe

Snack: Green grapes

Dinner: Cheeseburger with fixings, potato salad, baked beans, salad w/ Italian dressing, ½ corn on the cob, strawberry sorbet, and a glass of red wine

I know what you may be thinking, “I thought you were only going to eat junk food you made.” Well, I did make it. I bought an ice cream maker on clearance at Target for the sole purpose of making a berry sorbet I saw on the cover of Sunflower Market’s weekly magazine. Then I didn’t have all the stuff for the berry sorbet, but I did have strawberries so I made that instead. It is delicious, if I do say so myself.

But let’s move on to Saturday. This is where it fell apart. On Saturday, I knew I would be helping my brother move and then we were heading out to the reservoir to hang out and swim with some of our friends.  So I started my day with a fairly large homemade breakfast of eggs (1 whole egg plus an egg white), whole grain toast with blackberry jam, cantaloupe and skim milk.

I also made sure to bring a peach with me for a snack, but after that I was at the mercy of the foods available to me wherever I happened to be. After moving my brother, it was decided it would be quickest to order pizza before heading to the reservoir. I was at least in the company of other veggie lovers, so we ordered one all veggie pizza. I had 2 pieces for lunch before we headed out. At the lake, some of my friends brought a bag of Doritos, and I’m confident it was due to this self-imposed challenge that I didn’t eat a single one. Before, I definitely would have enjoyed a few.

At the lake I swam a little bit, which always makes me hungry, so when we got back I had a little snack. Unfortunately, all that was really available to me was the pizza, so I had another small piece. Then for dinner we went to Moe’s Barbeque. I’m sure you can see this is where it went downhill for the night. At Moe’s I got pulled pork, which came with corn bread and two sides. I chose macaroni & cheese and coleslaw. Honestly, I mostly ate the sides; I had a few bites of the pork, but Donnie finished the rest. I also had a Sunshine Wheat with my dinner, and a red velvet cupcake later that evening (we were celebrating my brother’s birthday after all). So, needless to say, not my best day.

The next morning started out better. We went to a local breakfast/lunch eatery in Colorado called Snooze. For breakfast I had an Italian version of eggs benedict, which included French artisan bread, some type of cheese, prosciutto, 2 poached eggs, balsamic vinaigrette, hollandaise (on the side), and arugula.  There were also hash browns on the side. And I had delicious coffee from Guatemala to drink. Yum!

After that, I kind of skipped lunch and had a bowl of cereal mid-afternoon. That definitely isn’t part of my food rules – skipping meals, that is. And for dinner I cooked up some more whole grain pasta with veggies so I could finish off my homemade basil pesto.

Here's my loot for the current week:

{bananas, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, apples, onion, tomatoes, peppers, avocados, broccoli, corn on the cob, and a jalapeño for a salsa} 

Monday, I started to get back on track. I’ll do a quick recap because this is getting long and the day was pretty normal.

Breakfast: fruit, yogurt, granola

Lunch: Salad with black beans, onions, carrots, zucchini, corn, peas, tomatoes,  and honey mustard dressing; and a peach

Snack: Kettle corn

Dinner: Tofu stir-fry with bell peppers in a homemade peanut sauce on top of  brown rice

Tuesday was another challenging day. We had a Mexican themed potluck at lunch for an employee whose last day is tomorrow. All the foods I ate were homemade and real, whole foods, but not especially healthy. I’ll try to recap everything I ate, but I’m warning you it sounds like a lot. I almost always have a little bit of every food at potlucks. Then that night I went to the Rockies vs. Cardinals baseball game, so my dinner wasn’t too healthy either. There aren’t too many healthy options at ball parks, let me tell you. So, here it is:

Breakfast: Berries, yogurt, and granola

Snack: Green grapes

Lunch: Mexican potluck at work – taco casserole; rice; beans; black bean & corn salsa with corn chips; guacamole; spinach salad with Italian dressing; watermelon; pound cake   

Dinner: Part of Donnie’s “monster nachos” (corn chips, beans, shredded pork, jalapenos, and cheese sauce – nothing real about that last element sadly), a strawberry & banana kabob drizzled in chocolate, and a Blue Moon.

Wednesday I went to the second game in the series for Rockies vs. Cardinals, but I ate managed to eat much better over the course of the day. I even found a “Field of Greens” salad bar at Coors Stadium for my dinner.

Breakfast: I honestly can’t remember, but it was either yogurt, fruit & granola or cereal

Lunch: Left over tofu stir fry in peanut sauce and brown rice

Snack: Green grapes & kettle corn

Dinner: Salad w/ spring mix & spinach, mushrooms, sweet peppers, peas, garbanzo beans, cucumber, and red win vinaigrette. And I can’t go to a ball game without having a beer; this time it was a Coors Light.

Today was completely back to normal. Here was my day:

Breakfast: Multi-grain cheerios in skim milk with strawberries & blueberries

Snack: Gala apple & a single dark chocolate square

Lunch: Salad with zucchini, carrots, onions, tomatoes, and honey mustard dressing; ½ grilled cheese; milk

Snack: Kettle corn

Dinner: Barley stuffed sweet peppers

Whew. Sorry for the length. I’ll be back soon with my “ingredient of the week.” Any guesses?

Ordinary Day

Nothing special happened today. It was a busy day at work, and Ikea was sold out of the awesome blue vase I wanted. Otherwise, pretty typical day. I was excited to find out a"quick eatery" (you know...not fast food, but not a sit down restaurant either) had whole, natural foods that I could choose from for dinner. That's a plus!

Here was my day in terms of food:

Breakfast: Strawberry Yogurt Cheerios (9g sugar/serving) with skim milk

Midmorning snack: A peach and 5 pistachios

Lunch: Salad with red leaf and romaine lettuce, white onions, carrots, black beans, peas and corn with honey mustard dressing; cantaloupe

Afternoon snack: Carrots dipped in red pepper hummus and a few green grapes

Dinner: Mahi-Mahi bowl at Tokyo Joes (wild mahi-mahi, pineapple-mango salsa, macadamia nuts, & teriyaki sauce on brown rice)

On a completely different subject, in the few minutes it took me to write this post, I remembered it actually could be a very special day.  My friend went in to be induced this afternoon; there may be a new baby in town soon! Yay!

Thank Goodness for Rule #15

In case you don't remember, rule #15 is "Break the rules once in a while," and I think this rule will be my saving grace that will help me to not feel like a complete failure throughout this challenge. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's go back to yesterday. (And please, excuse the poor quality of my photos. My apartment has awful lighting and I'm more interested in eating my food that getting the perfect picture.)

Tuesday, 7/24:

I did really well with my goals today.

Breakfast: Whole grain toast w/ natural peanut butter and a blueberry & banana smoothie. [The smoothie is very simple. I just took frozen bananas and blueberries from my freezer (bought fresh and frozen just before they went bad); put them in a blender; added milk, a little vanilla, and a few ice cubes; and blended. A couple minutes later...a delicious smoothie! Having frozen fruit is the key to a good smoothie because the frozenness gives the smoothie a fabulous texture, almost like a milkshake.]

Lunch: Left over whole grain pasta with zucchini, yellow squash and broccoli in homemade pesto sauce, and cantaloupe (I forgot to take a picture, sorry!)

Afternoon snack: Green grapes

Dinner: Salad with red leaf and romaine lettuce, white onion, carrots, black beans, corn from a cob, and lemon pepper seasoned shrimp (cooked in a pan coated w/ cooking spray) with Italian dressing, homemade whole grain garlic bread, and skim milk.

Today, 7/25:

Today I did well until dinner. And this is where rule #15 will save me. I was invited to dinner at my boyfriend's house for dinner, and while it was a healthy, well-balanced meal, it didn't follow all my rules. For instance, we had chicken, and I highly doubt it was free-range chicken. We also had instant rice, which had more than 5 ingredients, although every ingredient was an actual whole food. And then he offered a treat for dessert, and I couldn't turn it down. I told you I have a serious sweet tooth. 

Anyway, the point of this challenge isn't meant to make me a food snob; it's just to improve my awareness of what I eat, encourage me to cook more (even when I'm feeling lazy), reduce my sweets intake (my real goal is no more than 1x per week), and get back to eating more plant-based (I used to be almost exclusively vegetarian - except for seafood - and I'd like to get back to that frequency of meat intake). So, when I'm eating a meal someone else prepared, I'm going to eat it and enjoy it, and not worry about how many rules I'm breaking. Thus, rule #15 will save me.

So, back to what I ate today...

Breakfast: Two pieces of whole grain toast - one with natural peanut butter and the other with a little butter and blackberry jam, and instant Arabica coffee mixed with skim milk and Splenda

Lunch: Salad with red leaf and romaine lettuce, fresh basil leaves, white onion, fresh green beans, blueberries, walnuts, and strawberry blush vinaigrette dressing; and cantaloupe

Afternoon snack: Red pepper hummus with 6 whole grain crackers

Dinner: Chicken and sweet pepper kabobs, whole grain medley rice (brown rice, 2 varieties of couscous, and seasonings), steamed green beans, corn on the cob, and homemade basil lemonade. Plus a chocolate covered vanilla ice cream bar with toffee bits (only 170 calories - so not too awful).

My lunch and dinner look really pretty today, if I do say so myself. It's true, it really is more enjoyable to eat a pretty, colorful plate of food. So how'd you do today?

Challenge: Day 1

So I mentioned I started my challenge today, but really I started it yesterday by shopping at the local farmer's market for my produce for the week. Part of eating fresh, real food means that you need to buy smallish quantities, so you're able to eat it all before it goes bad. This is something I've always done; I buy fruits and veggies weekly, and then I get milk, dairy, eggs, cereal, bread and other grains as needed. One of my problems when shopping though is that all the produce looks so good I end up overbuying. I almost always end up throwing some of it away. I'm trying to do better with this because I hate being wasteful. One solution I've found is to buy all the fruit that looks good, and then portion half of it into a storage container to keep in my freezer. This makes for perfect additions to oatmeal, pancakes or smoothies. A similar way I've reduced my waste is to keep my bananas if they get overripe before I get to eating them. Usually I cut them into small chunks before freezing so they are perfect for making smoothies or homemade banana bread. It's also a smart idea to buy produce that's in season. It will likely taste better, be cheaper, and have less environmental impact because it didn't have to travel as far to get to the supermarket.

Anyway, I've gotten off track. Yesterday I stocked up on fruits and veggies (and a treat/snack) for the week at the farmer's market. Here's what I got:

Rocky Ford cantaloupe, Palisade peaches, Olathe sweet corn, string beans, okra, red leaf lettuce, romaine lettuce, zucchini and yellow summer squash, and fresh made kettle corn. Yum!

It may seem like a lot, but if I have a big salad at least 1x/day, I don't think it will be any problem to eat it all by the end of the week. And if I do have some left over, no big deal. I've got a start to my produce for the next week. :o) Also, unfortunately my apartment fridge is awful and has already frozen and ruined part of my head of read leaf lettuce. I'm salvaging any part of any leaf that isn't frozen, but that has already contributed to making sure it all gets used before it goes bad (or just helping it to go bad; however you want to look at it). I know you're probably wondering, why doesn't she just turn the temperature up on her fridge? The answer is I have, and it's already at a 3.5 out of 9 (9 being the coldest). I'm afraid if I turn it up too much it will ruin the food from being too warm. Plus, I had been dealing with it by just not putting food too close to the back of the fridge, but I guess I didn't get it right this time. Bummer, I know.

So, back to what I ate today...

Breakfast: low fat & light vanilla yogurt, strawberries and granola

Mid-morning snack: ~10 pistachios

Lunch: salad w/ romaine and red leaf lettuces, carrots, red onion, corn, broccoli, string beans & 1 tbsp honey mustard dressing (This broke a rule, but I had bought it before I decided to do this diet overhaul. So I'd rather use it occasionally than let it go to waste.) and green grapes

Mid-afternoon snack: red-pepper hummus and 8 whole grain crackers

Dinner: whole grain linguine with zucchini, yellow squash and broccoli in homemade basil pesto sauce, homemade whole grain garlic bread, a peach, and skim milk.

Overall, I think I met my goals. Good start, if I do say so myself. And now it's off to bed for as close to 8hrs of sleep I can get (lookin' like it will be 7 tonight). See you soon!

Au Naturel

Whatever you're thinking, I bet it's not what I'm about to write about.

I'm here now to talk about food. That's right. Real, good (and real good), whole, unprocessed, natural food. And a self-imposed challenge I have taken on to re-vamp my diet and get back to what's best for my body, my taste-buds, and the earth.

Yesterday I was at the mall and browsing the eye-candy that is Anthropologie. If you've never had the pleasure of perusing this store, it has everything from furniture and bedding, to kitchen accessories, to books, to gifts, to clothing and more. It's kind of quirky and definitely vintage-inspired, and also extremely expensive (for most things), hence the reason it is eye-candy (most of the time). You should really check it out to see for yourself.

Anyway, while wandering, my eye spotted a brightly illustrated book that just happened to be called, "Food Rules, An Eaters Manual." Being both a self-proclaimed foodie and a dietitian, I picked it up and started flipping through the pages. Initially I thought this was going to be a witty or funny book, not meant to provide any real helpful information. But turns out it had a lot of great ideas, tips and thoughts stated in a very simple manner that would be easy for anyone to understand if wanting to improve their diet. Some statements were so scientifically based, I began to wonder who the author was and what credentials he or she had. When I flipped back to the cover, I see that it's written by none other than Michael Pollan.

This is the same best-selling author who wrote In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto and The Omnivores Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, among others. I must confess here that I have not yet read either of these books in entirety, although I have skimmed them and read select chapters (for a research project on organic food production). Essentially, the latter of the two books describes the four basic ways that human societies have obtained food over the years, and he looks at each process from seed to table. Along the way he suggests that current food systems are not sustainable, nor are they in touch with natural farming cycles. In the other, he discusses the food advice given by the science community, primarily in the late 1900s. Specifically, he indicates that the reductive analysis of food into nutrient components is a flawed paradigm and calls for people to go back to basics with eating. Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Both of these books described above are heavy on science, research, literature and some politics, thus my surprise to see this simple book with very practical advice authored by the same man. However, after doing some Google research of my own, I see that was exactly his intent. To take the concepts from these other books and pare them down to simple, straight-forward, and easy to apply advice for a more healthful and sustainable diet.

The book is written in a witty manner, with short yet catchy "chapter titles," followed by a brief elaboration on the idea, and it's divided into three parts: Part I - What Should I Eat? (Chapter 1: Eat food), Part II - What Kind of Food Should I Eat? (Chapter 22: Eat mostly plants, especially leaves), and Part III - How Should I Eat? (Chapter 45: Eat less). I should mention here that most "chapters" are 2 pages, and they are simply the elaboration on the title, which is the key point. 

For example, Chapter 10 is titled, "Avoid foods that are pretending to be something they are not." The 1-2 page elaboration goes on to give the example that margarine is pretending to butter, but in a healthier form. However, margarine is just as bad as butter, if not worse. This is because almost all margarines contain trans-fats, which are worse than saturated fats, butter's worst offender. In this case, just eat the real food - butter - and watch amounts used and frequency of use.

Although I didn't stand there and read the whole book, I did take the time to flip through the whole book and read each chapter title, as well as the first sentence or two of the elaboration. I may even end up buying it because I could see it being used as a teaching tool. You know, have a client look at the chapter titles and pick one that sparks curiosity. Then discuss it. Anyway, some of my favorite "chapters" from the book:

- 2: Don't eat anything that your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food

- 7: Avoid foods containing ingredients that a third grader cannot pronounce

- 13: Eat only foods that will eventually rot (see this post from back in 2009 when I commented on this exact thought at the very end of the post)

- 19: If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don't

- 21: It's not food if it's called by the same name in every country [think Doritos, Cheetos, Coke and Big Mac vs. apple, carrot, coffee and bread (manzana, zanahoria, cafe, y pan in Spanish)].

- 23: Treat meat as a flavoring or special occasion food

- 27: Eat animals that have themselves eaten well (essentially, free-range or cage-free animals not pumped full of steroids and growth hormones)

- 36: Don't eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk

- 37: "The whiter the bread, the sooner you'll be dead."

- 39: Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself

- 43: Have a glass of wine with dinner

- 51: Spend as much time enjoying the meal as it took to prepare it

- 54: Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper

- 56: Limit your snacks to unprocessed plant foods

- 57: Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does

- 63: Cook

- 64: Break the rules once in a while (My favorite. How else is it supposed to be sustainable?)

**For a full outline of the book chapters visit this site. All credit, of course, goes to Michael Pollan, a man who knows how to eat well.

As a dietitian, I honestly have to say that I know, agree with, and teach every single idea in the book. However, sadly, I don't always follow all of the concepts myself, at least not to the extent that I would like. I'm pretty diligent most of the time, but every now and then I feel lazy and don't want to cook, and when I eat out I don't always choose the healthiest option. Thus, my challenge to myself: get back to basics with my food. 

Here are my "food rules" that I've chosen to focus on the most, some I already do well and others I could improve on:

1) Avoid foods that contain high fructose corn syrup, as well as any food that contains any form of sugar or sweetener as one of the first 3 ingredients

2) Avoid food products that contain more than 5 ingredients (excluding bread & cereal because I think that's pretty much impossible these days, but I will always choose whole grains and cereals with <10 g sugar)

3) Avoid foods containing ingredients that a third grader can't pronounce (which I think will naturally happen if I follow rule #2)

4) Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle (for me this will exclude cereal, pasta/rice, pasta sauce, salad dressings, peanut butter and jam, but I will still follow #2)

5) Get out of the supermarket whenever you can (especially during the summer's Farmer's Markets)

6) Treat meat as a flavoring or special occasion food

7) Eat only animals that have themselves eaten well (this will help me achieve #6 because free-range meats are expensive!)

8) Don't overlook the oily little fishes (my goal is to get back to 3x/wk with oily fishes - P.S. did you know that fishes is the correct plural when are referring to different species of fish? I didn't until tonight.)

9) Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself (I think this will be the biggest change for me; I have a serious sweet tooth!)

10) Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper (this will be a challenge to change from my typical breakfast of cereal, yogurt w/ fruit, or toast, but I'm going to try)

11) Limit your snacks to unprocessed plant foods

12) Treat treats as treats

13) Leave something on your plate

14) Cook (for me this means even more)

15) Break the rules once in a while

So there you have it. My self-imposed challenge. Feel free to join my in this journey. Visit the site with all the chapters/rules listed to pick your own or follow my list of 15. I plan to photograph my meals & snacks as often as possible, posting them daily or as frequently as I'm able as a means to hold myself accountable. I started today, so I'll see you soon with my first day's intake. Happy eating!