Shrinking Sisters

Burger King and 'Food Inc.' in the same day? Bad mommy!

My son had his first Little League game of the season, and while his team didn't win, they looked solid. My husband was umpiring another game so I told Little Slugger that we'd go to lunch after the game and that it was his choice.

He's 11 -- he chose Burger King.

Fine, whatever. We don't do fast food very often -- perhaps half a dozen times a year. So after our Whopper Jrs and fries (small), we got home and fired up iTunes because I wanted to rent the documentary Food, Inc. After 20 minutes my son was on the floor sobbing.

"I don't like animal cruelty!" he cried. Then he left the room.

I admit, the juxtaposition of a meaty burger and crispy fries with scenes of potato factories and "downer cows" was pretty jarring. It's certainly not the humorous activism of Super Size Me. But kids need to know how the sausage is made, literally and figuratively. He needs to know why I cringe and say no to cheap fast food (at least most of the time).

But will we never idle through a drive-through window again? Nope.

That's what got me into my big-butt predicament. There was a lot of finger pointing and "should you be eating that?" going on during my childhood, making the verboten seem all the sweeter and crispier and meatier. 

True story: I once came home to an after-school snack of thawed frozen rhubarb doused in Sweet 'n' Low.

(Try not to gag -- I did.)

My mom meant well -- she was only following doctor's orders. Those horrible, doctor-prescribed "reducing diets" would make anyone hate and resent food. And some of those genius snacks came from early copies of Weight Watchers magazine. Oven-baked canned mushrooms were "peanuts." White bread spread with boiled-down tomato juice and rubbery cheese was "pizza." Pureed green beans was "guacamole."

That wasn't food -- it was performance art. But it was the opposite end of the spectrum from the factory-farmed and produced garbage that we bought through the car window today.

Don't get me wrong, my son is not a slave to Madison Avenue. I've had healthy eating drilled into his brain since he was a Stonyfield Farm YoBaby-slurping tot. I told him the other yogurts had "paint" in them. He regularly reaches for fresh fruit and other whole, healthy foods.

I don't want him to ever eat a bowl of artificially sweetened rhubarb as long as he lives.

Groceries unplugged

I'm a big coupon clipper, and every Saturday night I go through my stash plus the weekly grocery circular to make my shopping list for the week.

(Exciting Saturday, I know. Jealous?)

But I've been tossing out a lot of coupons lately with my pledge to buy and consume fewer processed foods.

I've also noticed that when there are fewer packaged foods in the fridge or pantry it's less easy to grab a quick snack or meal. I have to think about it more -- a good thing.

Instead of an easy frozen "diet" meal or can of salt soup for lunch, I'll fix myself a sandwich or make a big salad. When snack time rolls around I used to reach for a protein bar. Now I shoot for Greek yogurt and fruit.

Having more "perimeter" foods in the house usually means more nutrients, more fiber, less preservatives, less mindless eating and more creativity.

Because I am a big stinking busybody, I surreptitiously snapped this photo during a recent trip to the grocery store. I was floored at how much overprocessed crap was in this shopping cart and how much money this person was going to spend on packaged garbage.

Fish gone wild

For some time I've made it a point to only buy wild fish at the grocery store. You're less likely to get a fish stuffed with antibiotics, crappy fish food and pesticides, and more likely to get a better tasting fish with higher omega-3s.

So for me that usually means salmon. Anyone who shops at Publix is lucky, in that the grocery chain pretty much always has frozen wild coho salmon in the prepackaged seafood section.

But today I tried something different. Broadening my horizons, I picked up some wild cod that was on sale this week. (I also bought a piece of wild flounder.) I had always thought that cod was one of those stinky "fishy" fish but I was wrong. With just a dribble of olive oil and a dash of lemon pepper seasoning the cod was flaky and not stinky at all. (I think it was a bad experience with perch that turned me off of anything but salmon.)

I know wild salmon is a champion of health and eco-friendliness but I wasn't sure about my dinner choice tonight so I hopped over to the Environmental Defense Fund's Seafood Selector.  Turns out, U.S. Pacific cod falls in the "OK" section. I'm not exactly sure where my fish came from, but I'm guessing it's Alaska.

Another fish I've been digging recently has been sardines (rated eco-best). Don't wrinkle your nose -- sardines are awesome! They're cheap, sky high in omega-3's and high in calcium (dem bones). They're also low in contaminants.

A new favorite snack is sardines on GG Scandinavian Bran Crispbread. This is a crazy hard-core healthy snack (and yeah, it's not pretty, but whatever).

A can of sardines in water is 150 calories and two GG's are 24 calories. Add a sprinkle of lemon pepper (I'm really into my bottle of Badia lemon pepper seasoning) and you're done. You get -- ready? -- 19 grams of protein, 25 percent of your calcium, 1.3 grams of omega-3's and 10 grams of fiber.

The road to hell is paved with barbecue sauce

I threw out a little stack of barbecue sauce containers that my mom insisted I have.

That smoky, sweet, sticky, syrupy stuff can be my undoing.

Sure it's just a chicken breast, but add a hundred calories of hickory-smoked goo and it becomes dinner and dessert.

Crap like barbecue sauce is what gets me into big trouble. Barbecue sauce, salad dressing, ketchup,  marmalade, Thai sweet chili sauce (oh, how I love it).  All those blasted condiments.

It's all mostly sugar, with a little fat thrown in for bad measure. It's not food, per se, right?

Those invisible calories have got to go. Because I don't do a little dab of barbecue sauce or ketchup -- I drown food in it.

To make up for the sauce sabbatical, I'm breaking out the Mrs. Dash and balsamic vinegar. No syrups, no salt but lots of flavor -- especially the Mrs. Dash chipotle flavor. 

Yet another thing I'm doing differently in 2010.

How much weight can I lose blowing my nose?

Yay, vegetables!

Some odds 'n' ends as I empty another box of tissues:

I've only had this cold since Saturday night but I'm thoroughly ready for it to go away. I've got a bunch of new workout DVDs that I'd love to try but when putting laundry away leaves me winded I figure I'll just chill on that until my breathing's better.

One task I did enjoy was compiling a list of 10 wonderful healthy blogs, in a guest post I did for Blogs.com. You can find that list HERE.  I'm pretty sure I have let everyone on the list know that they're included.

It's only 35 days until Fitbloggin' 10 begins and I can't wait! It'll be great to finally meet some of the bloggers who I've tweeted with and e-mailed in the past. So what happened to that 20 pounds in 20 weeks grand pronouncement? Eh ... so far it's only 5 but hey, there's still a month left.

Which leads me to calories -- I need to cut back on them, so my new plan is to load up on fresh fruits and veggies when I head to the kitchen. It'll give me more fiber and antioxidants for fewer calories than other snacky things.

Speaking of fiber and antioxidants, I've been reading The O2 Diet and the The F-Factor Diet, two great books by two of my Twitter favorites. And they're not gimmicky "diet books" -- they point the way to foods high in antioxidants and in fiber.

Keri Glassman's 02 Diet touts foods high on the ORAC scale, or Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity. It's a food's antioxidant capacity. Blueberries, cranberries, black beans and artichoke hearts are all high ORAC-scale foods. Herbs and spices, such as cinnamon, cloves and oregano are also high on the ORAC scale.

And many of the high-ORAC foods are high in fiber. I knew beans and berries were excellent sources of fiber but I was surprised to learn that artichoke hearts were also fiber superstars. I learned this in Tanya Zuckerbrot's F-Factor Diet book. The "F" of course is for fiber.

The book also reintroduced me to an old favorite -- GG Bran Crispbread. When I mean "favorite" I don't mean "mmm-mmm good" favorite. These crackers are hard-core high-fiber roofing shingles. But as a crunchy carb fix, they can't be beat. Each oversized cracker has only 12 calories but 5 grams of dietary fiber. A little smear of peanut butter or guacamole or a smooshed Laughing Cow Light on top makes them much tastier and only adds a few calories. A great little snack.

So it's superfoods and fiber as my primary foods -- clean, real food. You can't help but eat fewer calories with all that goin' on, right?

Checking out Nutrisystem's new foods

Sick as a dog -- that's what I've been this weekend.

(Although when my dog feels sick he goes into the back yard, eats some grass and pukes on the dining room carpet, so I'm not sick like that.)

I was guzzling Theraflu all weekend, taking advantage of the appetite-killing properties of the decongestant. So Super Bowl Sunday didn't cause any damage. Hubby grilled hamburgers, which I'm sure were delicious, but I couldn't really taste anything.

And being sick meant my husband did the grocery shopping, so now we have 5 pounds of baby carrots and seven heads of garlic -- overkill but greatly appreciated.

(Anybody have any garlic carrot recipes?)

Thankfully I have some soup to comfort me, courtesy of Nutrisystem. They sent me some of their new entrees to check out and some are really good, including their new wraps (buffalo chicken, Southwest chicken, barbecued pork, at right) and new soups (the chicken tortilla and creamy tomato are excellent).

The entrees have added fiber and protein to keep the glycemic index on the down low, helping to satisfy your hunger.

Their new breakfast muffins are a big improvement over past varieties. The blueberry and double chocolate muffins are great. And while the cinnamon bun (at left) isn't like anything you'll find at Cinnabon, it is a satisfying substitute. And what cinnamon bun do you know that has 7 grams of protein and 8 grams of fiber?

I also wanted to find out about their Jumpstart plan that's being touted in TV commercials. Part of that are Nutrisystem Flavorfulls, drink powders in lemonade and iced tea flavors that contain 3 grams of fiber per serving. The Jumpstart also includes a one-on-on phone consultation and a success packet with tips for success. The lemonade Flavorfulls were my favorite and were a good way to sneak in more fiber and take the edge off a grumbly tummy. 

And while I haven't been doing Nutrisystem 100 percent, I ate it for most of my meals and snacks last week and discovered that I lost 4 pounds -- just the jump start that I needed.

It's World Salt Awareness Week: Here's how I cut down

It's World Salt Awareness Week. Do you know what too much sodium in your diet can do?

Osteoporosis, stomach cancer, kidney disease, stroke, obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure.

Not to mention ugly bloating and those salt-overdose headaches and cotton mouth.

Added sodium is everywhere in processed foods -- even foods you might not realize. An innocent cup of lowfat cottage cheese has a ridiculous 760 milligrams of sodium. Most canned soups, even the "healthy" stuff, can eat up half your recommended sodium for the day if you eat the entire can -- which most people do for lunch.

Want to cut soup sodium? Here's my hard-core way. Short of making my own soup, I sometimes buy Healthy Valley Organic No Salt Added soups. An entire can of the NSA black bean soup has 60 milligrams of naturally occurring sodium. Their lentil soup has 50 milligrams per can.

I'm not going to sugarsalt-coat it: The soup tastes like organic baby food. So I add a teaspoon of Frank's Red Hot sauce. A teaspoon has 200 milligrams of sodium, which is still far less than a can of regular soup. You get some sodium plus the zing of hot sauce. You also get a slight metabolic charge from the chili peppers.

Once that's in, the soups are filling and loaded with fiber and protein. One can of the lentil has 16 grams each of fiber and protein.

Better than butter? A schmear of avocado

Remember the bad old days of dieting, when people were told not to eat avocados because they were "fattening"?

Thank goodness that nonsense is over. Avocados are a superfood -- full of monounsaturated fat (MUFAs), vitamins and fiber.

Avocados have been pretty inexpensive lately so I've been buying a few a week. Aside from guacamole, avocados can be a great substitute for spreads and sauces like butter, mayonnaise and cream cheese.

Take today's lunch. I had some leftover turkey chili from last night, which was virtually fat free. I like to make sure that my meals are balanced with protein, carbs and protein, so I added a slice of toasted sourdough bread (it's lower on the glycemic scale than other breads because of the acidity). And to it I added an ounce of mashed Hass avocado with a squirt of lemon juice and a pinch of my fancy-pants salt. (Yes, that's a Shrek plate.)

That ounce of avocado only has 45 calories and a bonus 2 grams of fiber. Take that, butter!

How many calories does a redesign burn?

I was reading an especially poignant post over at the blog See Sara Shrink. She wrote:

... I haven’t lost weight in awhile.  But it’s not like I haven’t been trying.  I wake up every day with the best of intentions, but by lunch I’m fighting the same battles I’ve been fighting for years.  The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

OK, who can relate?

(Raises hand.)

I've been holding steady since the end of the year, when I burned off a few holiday pounds. But I'm tired of holding steady and need to see the scale move again. 

I have to keep reminding myself that I did work on bettering my health in 2009. I got my cholesterol down from borderline icky to perfectly normal and dropped my triglycerides 100 points into the completely normal category. And I did it all with diet and exercise.

So that was 2009. Now it's three weeks into 2010 and I need to make more changes, primarily in calorie intake. I have already mentioned that I have to drop down to 1,200 for a couple of reasons. One, I have a slow metabolism (I had it tested). And two, that will help give me leeway for the "invisible calories" from supplements like fish oil, dark chocolate calcium and other good-for-me things that aren't really food. I really hate counting the calories of stuff that isn't food.

Step one is this redesign. When I first redid the logo I had in it a photo of my sister and me from 1991. That's not realistic, now, is it? So I freshened up the site and added current photos of us.

It's cleaner, lighter and brighter and I'm hoping that'll rub off on us. And you, if that's what you need.

Soup is good food

South Florida recently was in the throes of a cold snap (got all the way down to 65.)  I looked into my pantry to see what kind of stick-to-my-bones food I could serve for dinner, and spied the soup that my sister gave me. MyBlogSpark had sent her some new varieties of Progresso soups that are lower in sodium, calories and higher in fiber.

My daughter, the 9 3/4 year old food aficionado, concurred.  Soup was on.  

I was impressed that a 1-point meal of soup was as good as Progresso's Light Chicken Noodle Soup.  The chicken was REAL chicken (not little brown mystery cubes) and the vegetables were firm and tasted and looked like real vegetables.

My notoriously picky daughter gave it two thumbs up.

Progresso has recently offered no MSG varieties of soup to their product line as well.

The cold snap ended days ago, but the soup is staying in the front of the pantry.  I've started taking them to work for lunch; there are four new flavors that each have 7 grams of fiber per serving, which keep me full throughout the afternoon. 

Right now, Progresso is holding a "Souper You" essay contest -- the grand prize is a trip to NYC for a makeover. The sweepstakes is going on through March 15. While you're getting the particulars on the sweepstakes, you also can get a $1 coupon for Progresso soup at the same site.