Ditch the 'diet'

I was raised in a family that loves burgers drenched in mayonnaise and cheese, meat lover’s pizza, and chocolate chip cookies. Throughout my childhood I was overweight; I hated my body, and I felt embarrassed about the way I looked and felt.

I believed that the only way to a “normal” body was restricting foods I loved, starvation, and misery. In high school I started to cut food portions, and I found this approach effective, but I always felt deprived and weak. In college, I moved toward “sugar-free” and “fat-free” processed foods. My roommates would tease me for my obsession with “low-fat cheese-its” “sugar-free” candy and “fat free chips.” (Okay, maybe they didn’t tease me…they just didn’t like the negative side effects caused by my eating habits).

My crazy food interventions did help me lose weight, but the process was complicated. In 2009, James and I moved to Portland and we started a Strout household food revolution: we ate real food. We ditched the fat-free cheese, 100-calorie packs, and spray butter and replaced them with real cheese, whole grain crackers, and real butter. Surprisingly, the new approach was easy, cheap, and effective. We enjoyed more energy; we lost and maintained weight, and felt full and satisfied throughout the day.

For many years, I had no idea healthy eating was so simple, and I am dissapointed that our culture evolved to today’s modern food dilemma. Michael Pollan, a journalist, set out to get to the route of our food crisis, and  his published work is a MUST READ!! My good friend strongly encouraged I read this book: Food Rules, and she is pretty smart and reliable, so I took her advice.

Pollan is not a nutritionalist, scientist, researcher, or medical provider. He has no affiliation with the healthcare system, the food manufacturing companies, or any other biased parties. He is a journalist, but I would like to think of him as a genius!

His book is an eating manual and given the racket in the media, you would think that this “food manual” would be at least 50000000 pages in length. But, this “manual” is much smarter and much simpler, all 140 ½ paragraph pages!

I will share some of the food “rules” from Pollan’s book that make me smile:

· Avoid products containing ingredients a third grader cannot pronounce

· Don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of your milk

· Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself

· Cook

· If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t

· Avoid foods pretending to be something they are not

I read this simple manuscript in a couple of hours, and laughed out loud through the entire experience! The rules make sense, they are easy to follow, and you don’t have to hold a PhD in food science nutrition to understand the concepts. Eating is fun and easy, and I am relieved!

Below is an innovative recipe that I created for James’ and my superfoods eating plan. The recipe follows Pollan’s rules: cook and eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself!


Super-Delicious Lasagna!!

½ pound raw spinach

1 tomato

16 oz black beans

1 diced orange pepper

1 8oz can tomato paste

1 jar all natural tomato sauce

½ pound broccoli

1 cup yogurt

1 cup fat-free ricotta

1 egg

1 1/2 cups low-moisture mozzarella

2 garlic cloves

Pepper

Italian seasoning

1 box lasagna noodles- OR 1 mid-sized spaghetti squash

1. In a large mixing bowl add beans, spinach, broccoli, tomato sauce, tomato paste, garlic, and spices

2. In a mid-sized mixing bowl add yogurt, ricotta, 1 cup mozzarella cheese, 1 diced orange pepper, and egg.

3. Grease a 9X11 pan and layer vegetable mix, lasagna noodles or spaghetti squash, and cheese mixture. Top final lasagna with ½ cup mozz cheese.

4. Cover lasagna with tin foil and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or follow the directions on the lasagna noodles.

5. If you use spaghettie squash: cut the squash in half and bake for 30-45 minutes at 350 degrees. Once the squash noodles cool, gently separate the squash strings

and use as your lasagna noodles.

6. ENJOY!