What did I eat that was so bad? I did not eat a lot of fast food. I probably had fast food no more than once a month. Brian may have ordered pizza or made a frozen pizza about once a week for dinner. He also liked to make cheesesteaks and french fries about once a week. Sometimes he made ravioli. He makes a really good meatloaf but he buys the cheapest ground beef to make it so it is always very fatty. When he was not home and I had to cook for myself I usually ended up eating a package of Knorr pasta or rice side dishes. I do know how to cook but I am not a big meat eater so most of the dishes I cooked did not contain meat. I guess Brian does not get filled up unless he has meat so I let him do the cooking. A lot of the things he cooked had a side of french fries. He loves his fries.
Cookies...Brian would buy cookies, donuts, swiss rolls & other snacks "for the kids" and since they were in the house and I liked them I could not help myself. Sometimes I would sit there and eat 10 or more Oreo or Chips Ahoy cookies with a glass or two of milk while I sat at the computer playing games on Facebook. Those cookies were very addicting. I think a lot of my problem was portion size. If I had eaten one serving of cookies instead of 5 servings I might not have been as bad off as I was. After Halloween I probably ate 5 or more Reece's Peanut Butter cups a day until they were gone and I am thinking the kids got at least 30 of them. Looking back now I can see I was eating way too much sugar and processed foods.
I was given a wonderful Christmas gift. It was a book called Eat This, Not That! and it was very helpful in getting me started on the right track. If you have not read this book I think you should. It is filled with helpful information on how to make better food choices.
I used this book to create my first "healthy food" shopping list. I had to stock up on REAL foods such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean meats, fish, nuts, and other foods that didn't contain a list of ingredients that were very hard to pronounce. This was all new to me so I figured I would take baby steps and using my book I made this list of "better choice" foods:
| flavored greek-style yogurt (I don't like plain) Chobani |
| blueberries |
| sunflower seeds |
| almonds |
| regular Cheerios |
| Post Shredded Wheat Spoon Size Original |
| Thomas' Multi-Grain light English Muffins |
| Triscuit Thin Crisps Original |
| Triscuit Original- hint of salt |
| Nabisco Wheat Thins Fiber Selects Garden Vegetable |
| Reduced Fat Nilla Wafers |
| Orville Redenbacher butter popcorn |
| Wishbone Bountifuls dressing Tuscan Romano Basil |
| Stouffer's French Bread Pizza |
| Kashi Five Cheese Tomato Pizza |
| Budget Gourmet Mac & Cheese w/cheddar & romano |
| Budget Gourmet Ziti Parmesano |
| Ronzoni Smart taste thin spaghetti or Healthy Harvest |
| Classico Tomato & Basil |
| Amy's Low Sodium Organic Marinara |
| Campbell's Healthy Request chicken rice |
| Dr McDougall's Vegan Tortilla with baked chips (soup) |
| Kraft singles 2% milk american |
| Sargento light string cheese |
| Sargento classic mozzerella |
| Laughing Cow light |
| Kraft Mayo with olive oil |
| Martin's whole wheat potato bread |
| Mission white corn tortillas |
| La Tortlla factory smart & delicious low carb whole wheat wraps |
| Gortons Grilled Fillets Garlic Butter or any flavor |
| Bird's Eye Viola! (complete frozen meals) |
| Ore-Ida Potatoes O'Brien |
| Fudgesicle no sugar added fudge bar |
| Low sodium V8 |
| Smart Balance |
| Hint of salt or low sodium saltines |
| potatoes |
| eggs |
| skim milk |
| carrots |
Now I did not buy everything on this list. This was just a list to use as a guide to help me learn to shop better. I am sure that upon closer examination of the food labels today I would choose not to eat some of these foods. Remember that this is a new learning experience for me and I was just getting started.
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