Hi all,

First of all, sorry about all my recent posts -- call it new member syndrome. I hope you're not too sick of me yet.

Today I found myself fantasizing about my ideal eating day. I don't mean pigging out, but a menu that honours my preferences and leaves me feeling orally satisfied, pleasantly but not overly full, and energetic enough to carry out my daily tasks with enthusiasm. Here's what I came up with:

Breakfast

Two slices of freshly baked whole-grain bread from our local boutique bakery, toasted with butter (300 cals)
Two scrambled eggs with gourmet salsa (250 cals)

Lunch

Large crepe with stewed apples and real maple syrup (500 cals)
Mixed greens with crumbled goat cheese, candied walnuts and homemade vinaigrette (400 cals)

Dinner

Glass of white wine (150 cals)
Two spicy salmon sushi hand-rolls (300 cals)
Asian vegetable stirfry on glass noodles (500 cals)
Ginger icecream (150 cals)

Snacks

Baked sweet potato chips (150)
A few squares gourmet chocolate (150)
Three cups of dark-roast coffee with milk and a little sugar (100)

Yikes! I just added it up and it comes out to 2,950 calories. I guess I can use it as a starting point and scale down.

If any of you are game to share your own ideal eating day, with gastronomic satisfaction and maintaining energy throughout the day being the prime considerations, I'd be very interested to hear.

Freelance

My ideal healthy eating day involves no calorie counting and no cooking!

Breakfast would be scrambled eggs and 2 slices whole grain toast. Scottish breakfast tea with stevia and milk.

Lunch would be a grilled chicken and mozzarella panini and a tomato juice.

Snack would be a hard boiled egg, baby carrots, and some smoked turkey.

Dinner would be a grilled salmon steak, large green salad with goat cheese, and a multigrain bun. Porbably have a glass of red wine.

Evening snack would be fruit - probably fresh cantalope and pineapple chunks.

Dagmar

For what it's worth, I have one day a week where I'm unrestricted and the cals are anywhere from 2500 - 3500 that day and I don't think twice about it. The restrictions you seem to be putting on yourself concerns me a little...why do you think you need to scale back your fantasy day? And why is it a fantasy? You can have days like that occassionally or often, you just have to manage how you eat the rest of the time

<<For what it's worth, I have one day a week where I'm unrestricted and the cals are anywhere from 2500 - 3500 that day and I don't think twice about it.>>

Wow, that's cool. How do you manage it? How much do you eat the rest of the week?

F.

I try to eat at a 250-500 calorie deficit M-Th which for me is 1500-2000 cals depending on how much I exercise, Friday and Saturday I eat at maintenance which is 1800-2300, again depending on exercise. Then Sunday is my no restriction day. Now to be fair I am a distance runner and run or cross train everyday so my calorie allowance is going to be on the higher side of normal.

Finding what worked for me in maintenance was a very long and complex journey for me and there was some regain along the way due to too much restriction followed by binging. I guess I just worry when I see you fantasizing about a healthy day, albeit high in cals. To me that indicates that there may need to be a little balancing done.

I also just wanted to add that I make sure I have a healthy "fantasy" everyday and that I look forward to most of my meals. Often times that's as simple as adding honey to my cottage cheese or full fat dressing to my salad. If I find that I'm not looking forward to my meals then it's time for a new recipe.

THis is what I want to be able to do. Maybe not every week as I don't have the desire to exercise an hour or more every day, but I hope to get to a point of exercising 5 days a week will afford me to have a high calorie day every couple weeks, so I can enjoy bigger helpings of meat or a dessert or some yummy sauce over something. It would depress the heck out of me to think I could never over indulge more than a couple times a year for the rest of my life like I've been doing the past year during weight loss.

I'm approaching 7 years of maintenance and I have always had at least one meal a week that is indulgent (not a whole day just because I normally start the day with an on plan breakfast every day).

I'm not sure what I would pick for a fantasy day - I guess I would start with the lemon polenta pancakes from Cafe Flora in Seattle. It's definitely a fantasy, since I now live in San Diego!

Add me to the list of people who indulge weekly. Even while I was losing I always had one meal a week where I ate whatever the heck I wanted without counting calories or worrying about it. Sometimes it's one day a week and sometimes only one meal, but I can't go through life feeling deprived and restricted 100% of the time. Eating healthy the rest of the week isn't so hard if I know I can eat a pile of cookies Saturday night if I really want to.

For me I don't live in a fantasy world in regards to foods! I live in a REAL world where 80% of the time I eat squeaky clean & 20% of the time I let my hair down & eat whatever the heck I want to eat!!! Can I eat whatever I want to eat 80% of the time & squeaky clean 20% of the time? Oh- HE- dbl hockey sticks NO, -NOT if I want to keep maintaining!!!! My maintenance is all about balance, not perfection. Yup no fantasy foods, I EAT the so called "forbidden foods" for realz!

Um, for me, this is one of the things I just don't do anymore. That is, sit around picturing for extensive periods of time what I'd eat, if I could. Seriously. It would make me crazier than I already am. And that is plenty crazy at times.

<<Yup no fantasy foods, I EAT the so called "forbidden foods" for realz!>>

I do too, just not all on the same day and in the quantities listed in my opening post.

F.

Amen Sister!


I remember back in my morbid obese days feeling deprived because I couldn't wear normal clothes and fit in most chairs. I felt deprived of life because I could barely walk up a flight of stairs or in the mall. I felt deprived because I was snickered at and and talked about. THAT is what real deprivation is TO ME, not if I can eat a freaking cookie or not. SOOOO, I quit playing the deprivation card and TRY to just live a life not centered around food.

Just to clarify: I wasn't fantasizing about my ideal eating day because I feel deprived or food-obsessed, but because... I like to fantasize about lots of things, food being just one of them. I'm always fantasizing about starting a new business, my next trip, my next book, whatever. And since this is a community centered around food...

F.

I don't really think this is a community centered around food, it's a community centered around weight loss where food is a component. Some folks are touchy about food, it's been a hot button issue their whole life. So, "fantasizing" about perfect days when you can eat whatever you want, borders a little bit on "food porn." Fun for some people, triggering for other people.