One thing that helps me when life gets hectic is to have meals in the freezer that I just have to defrost and heat up. I also use those for lunches. When I make chili, I freeze lots. Anytime I make soup or casseroles, extra goes in the freezer. Taco Bake freezes great! Just serve it over some salad and it is a fast and easy dinner.
Do you have a microwave? It makes reheating foods (even food that you haven't defrosted ahead of time) easy.
At least I'm lucky that Brian doesn't really like to eat out. He would rather eat at home.
What do you want more? Answer that every time you open your mouth to eat something,and you'll have the answer you need,and you'll know what to do. I would say...'good luck',but sweetie, it just aint about luck. take care,Choices~~
RE, the fast food. If you absolutely HAVE to go, go online and look at their menus. For example at Quiznos. Get a sandwich with lean turkey, or tuna and have them pile on the veggies. then scrape it all off the bread and just eat the "stuffing".
I would try making some really wonderful recipes at home and then maybe BF will want to skip the crummy icky fast food and will want to eat at home. Can you get him involved in the preparation? Tell him that you want to spend time with him cooking. He may find he enjoys spending the time with you in the kitchen. Cooking as a couple is really fun...Put on some music and dance while you cook!!
Last edited by femmecreole; 08-07-2008 at 06:40 AM.
Hi Mel! PLAN, PLAN, PLAN! I agree with Barb with using left overs in the freezer. Another thing I like to do is make use of my Crockpot! If you don't have one, GET ONE! It's worth every cent! In the morning throw ingredients in (if you have time at night cut, fry, prep the food to make mornings easier!) and when you get home at 9 at night you have dinner ready and waiting!!!!!
also, you mentioned that you get ravenous... pick up a jar of peanuts, and put it in the car! in the morning grab a cheese stick to put in your purse! Having healthy snacks on hand is key to avoid ever feeling "ravenous!" (makes note to do the same! hahahah)
As you noticed in one of my earlier posts, I plan two huge meals that will lead to left overs for the week, plus one for fish! So the remainder of the week when I get home, I open the fridge pop left overs in the microwave, and walla! One bag of frozen spinach lasted me four meals!
Budget? Hit up Aldi's or walmart! I am a "food snob"... (my sister named me that) meaning I like to go to Wegmans and get the best! But recently was on a shopping trip with a friend, she hit up Aldi's. I started looking at the spaghetti sauce, the salsa sauce both have no added sugar! I forgot to go there when I stocked up, but my friend said they are good! She trusts their veggies, but I don't know that I will. Anyway...
PLAN, PLAN, PLAN! As it was already mentioned, this isn't about luck, it's about choices! Read my signature, "heather's five c's." I liked that quote so much I asked if I could use it!
Loriann, don't fear Aldi's. I have been shopping there for most of our food the last couple of months. Pretty much everything I've had there has been very good quality. I love their nonfat plain yogurt better than any I've bought in the grocery stores. I rarely buy produce there because I prefer to get it from the farmer's market and our milk comes from a local dairy, but other than that, and an occasional trip to Trader Joe's, we mostly eat from Aldi's. I do check their produce too because they occasionally have good "local" products. Local in quotes because at Aldi's that means from the East Coast (for me), but not from the farm up the street. Mostly I love having a heaping cartload of food for about $100. I was in Giant Food recently and had half a cart full for the same price.
Belle Mer, my Bf is the same, thin and a carb junkie. (Especially in this order: sugary sodas, sugary junk food, fast food, and dog meat sandwiches, which I what I call the canned hash stuff he puts on bread. Ugh.)
Some of the SBD stuff I made he really enjoyed, such as the stuffed peppers and the chicken cheesesteak saute recipe by Grneyedmustang, but some of the other stuff he choked down (he just wasn't into the whole curried chicken thing). Good luck to you as well with phase 1.5, oh I definitely understand the temptation of a warm, fresh bread. I'm craving it right now.
Barb0522, I think my BF would really love the taco bake, I never got around to making it last month though, but plan to do so next week. I have been intending on freezing stuff but then never get around to it, I need to go get some more tupperware things to do so. Sometimes I'm so lazy about stuff. Freezing stuff to defrost is an excellent idea, I just need to implement the plan. I often just put the stuff in the fridge and think, "oh, I'll freeze it later," but a couple of days later, it's too late. This time around I'll make sure I do it ASAP. Yep we have a microwave, BF wouldn't be able to live without heating up those disgusting billion-calorie Hungry Man dinners and dog meat (canned hash) for lunch. I made a huge pot of soup last night (sbd compliant, so yesterday I had a Clean day, thank god) so I'm gonna go wash that tupperware and freeze half of it.
Choices, amen to that.
Femmecreole, yum, quizno stuffing actually sounds good. I wonder if I could request just the fillings without the bread, and just pay the $5 anyway. I'd probably get some strange looks, but oh well. I love to cook, I guess 'cause I love to eat, and fortunately Bf likes a lot of the stuff I make (and brags to his friends about how I cook) but he still has this itch for fast food. He eats it at work for breakfast and dinner and then if we have to go to town and we're caught by dinnertime, he'd rather grab a "quick bite to eat" as he calls it rather than wait for me to cook. (Such as yesterday, my soup wasn't quite done yet, and he kept whining and complaining and then asked his brother to go get him some of his brother's leftover pizza because he was hungry, and I told him absolutely not) So it is hard to control him as far as fast food, but I can control myself... or at least, make sure to order a salad and not give into any other temptation. Heh, my BF helping me in the kitchen? I don't know about that, I could always try... other times I've tried to get him involved by chopping things, which he hates... He's lazy. I could always try again and tell him the 'couple spending time together' aspect and see what he says.
Loriann, oh crockpots are awesome. Definitely very useful. Great idea to come home to a crockpot meal instead of grabbing some Fried Carbs & Grease for dinner. I will put some peanuts in the car, I just hope BF doesn't get to them first. I've gotta do that, plan two huge meals and stuff to have leftovers cause it's expensive to make something different every night! Walmart is about half an hour away but we've been there often to load up on cheaper groceries, but then, there's the gas to consider as well. But we do have to go to walmart next week so I may as well grocery shop. I like your signature, it's wise!
Ladybugnessa, Zeffryn, I plugged in my address on the Aldi site (I have never heard of Aldi's before) and the nearest one is like 3 hours away! So scratch that, heh, but I'll hit up Walmart this week, they are fairly cheap. Our local Food Lion is ridiculous in its prices, and the Piggly Wiggly used to be pretty cheap, but last month everytime we went to the store for just a few items it would add up to like $50, and it made NO sense! The grocery prices are ridiculous right now. The only thing about the Pig is that their meats are cheaper but I'm not sure its of the best quality, their meat section always smells funny and I don't like it. Zeff, I will let you guys know when I start again and probably will be posting a daily menu so whoever would like to can scrutinize it and criticize it because I want to make sure I'm doing it 100% correctly. I need to cut these bread cravings, I never knew bread was so important to me before.
They just opened an Aldis on the first of August about 3 hours away, so obviously they're expanding and stuff, so maybe soon there will be one nearer to me.
Last edited by Fat Melanie; 08-07-2008 at 12:47 PM.
Um, what in the world is wrong with me discussing things that do pertain to my original thread? I didn't go off my own topic at all. My bad eating habits, ways I can break them, such as freezing, crockpotting, ordering salads or 'stuffing', things I can cook, etc? It all pertains to my original thread, it was about getting out of this fast food rut and I was responding on topic to what the other posters suggested I should do to help me next time around. There was a lot of good suggestions there so I acknowledged them, I feel it will all help next time I do Phase 1 (that's what I have decided to do, this coming Wednesday, starting phase 1 again.)
* (When I wrote 'um' in my begginning reply, it was not a mockery of how you said "um" in yours, I didn't realize until I read my post)
Last edited by Fat Melanie; 08-07-2008 at 02:12 PM.
Mel - if you are interested in having just the "stuffing" from the Quizno's sammiches, just get one of their salads and ask them to leave the flatbread off. They have some great choices and most are great for P1.
Good luck and a wish for lots of willpower when you start P1 on Wednesday. I have a ton of recipes saved on my computer if you need any ideas...most are pretty budget friendly and DH/DS loved them.
Sorry for being prickly Ruth, I just thought I had done another thing wrong and wasn't sure what exactly (I have foot in mouth syndrome I guess, hehe.). I just need all the advice and help I can get! I have a folder on my computer entitled "SBD" and a subfolder for recipes, and another for tips and advice that I mainly get from you guys on this forum. I just wanted to make sure I had acknowledged everyone so they would know how much I appreciate everyone's advice. (I truly do.) I'm looking forward to restarting ph 1 with the help of this forum. (Just explaining my intentions.)
Zeffryn; in my "hungry! hungry hungry hippo! need sub!" mentality that day, I didn't even notice they had salads! I think I'll make another folder titled "fast food" and make a list of all the places around that might tempt me, and list what I can have at each place. Thanks for the tip... I can't believe I didn't notice the salads.
I've gotta do that, plan two huge meals and stuff to have leftovers cause it's expensive to make something different every night! Walmart is about half an hour away but we've been there often to load up on cheaper groceries, but then, there's the gas to consider as well. But we do have to go to walmart next week so I may as well grocery shop. I like your signature, it's wise!
