Now I ask myself, why do I continue to eat all that bad food? The answer is, because its made to taste good. We are bombarded day in and day out with commercials leading us to believe that we have no time to make our own food, making us believe that its good for us. Because we have all eaten this, the information we are given makes us think of it and begins the process of desire. Not to mention the ease and connivance of quick processed foods is very very enticing to me and to all of us.
I have more research information about my journey into whole foods. But right now I want to share what my family has been doing the last 2 weeks.....
For the last 2 weeks, my house has been on a journey of exploring whole foods. Myself, Tim (my partner) and his son. I will be honest, eating whole foods is a lot of work. Both Tim and I work an hour from home, so we spend 2 hrs a day just driving. By the time we get home at 6, we are tired and ready for dinner. I won't lie, we have cheated a few days by eating out. But for the most part, we have stuck with this. We sit down and pick out 2 new recipes a week from our vegetarian books that sound good and made them. We also try and buy organic when its available. We live in a small town and our local Kroger doesn't have a huge organic selection. About every other week we have ventured to Whole Foods to help with some of the ingredients we need. Our meals are planned around vegetables, beans and whole grains.
We do rely on the ole standbys of Veggies Stir fries, and lots of salads. We have always loved veggie stir fry with some sort of meat, I just remove the meat now! With veggie stir fries, you can serve them all sorts of ways. I have served them stuffed in whole wheat pitas with hummus. Or mixed them with whole grain pasta. You can always make a vegetable fajita as well. Just get whole grain fajitas. We have been using our imaginations. I have also introduced black bean burgers into our house and they were eagerly accepted and they are on the keepers list. As well as baked felafel's too! We have made a dish or two that wasn't kept on the list. The fact is, we are trying to add variety and good nutrition to our lives.
Our salads are not your typical salads. We have found we love kale, there are many varieties too, another favorite is called dino kale (Lacinato Kale), cabbages, all the different peppers, broccoli,We use any raw vegetable we can find to make different salads. Don't be afraid to use herbs too. We love cilantro in salads, along with seeds and nuts! We have learned to chop up the salads and store in a good air tight bowl. This does save time.
We have also learned that it is a good idea to plan the meals and have the ingredients ready to go. We are also learning that we have to prepare and prep the vegetables and keep them in air tight containers and also in order to keep our produce fresh, we have to shop more than once a week. I sometimes get off work earlier and will stop and pick up some on the way home. It is not a major inconvenience.
We are also trying new homemade dressings. I have always been a creamy kinda gal, but that is chalked full of fat and chemicals, so I'm training my taste buds to like more of the vinegar ones.
Just in a short amount of time we have both found that we feel better and really not missing meat and dairy and processed foods all that much. We have also noticed that when we do eat what is considered "normal" we don't feel as good the next day. Maybe we are on to something?
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