Early risers at our house today! Don't my brothers know it's summer? For breakfast we had the long waited, highly anticipated homemade strawberry pop tarts. I am very sad to report that they were nothing like I hoped they would be. Trey gave it a fair shake, eating almost a whole pop tart, but he walked away from the table deeply disappointed. We clearly made up for it with the awesome lunch that we made. We prepared two balls of dough for whole wheat pizzas last night, which made for a quick lunch today. (Recipe for the dough is on 100 days of real food website but we grilled our pizzas instead of using the oven.) We began with rolling the dough out on the counter. This made six individual pizzas about six inches in diameter. The individual pizzas work best for our family because we all like our own toppings. We brushed olive oil on each side. Then were cooked one side of the crust on the grill with the lid open most of the time (they cook very quickly, in about 3-4 minutes.) Then I flipped each pizza dough over and put the sauce and toppings on immediately, leaving the pizzas on the grill and the lid open. We had to use a different sauce than we usually have. We used Eden Organic pizza Italian sauce which was very good. One can was enough for all the pizzas! We left the pizzas on the grill until the cheese was melted and quickly took them off. I thought there was not much difference in taste with the sauce or the whole wheat homemade crust and I would call the pizzas an outstanding success! On the side we had steamed broccoli (my brothers won't eat it raw), noosa yogurt with homemade granola and fresh strawberries. All five of us REALLY liked this meal!
This afternoon, we were outside doing yard work. The boys played hard and were ready for snack. We were all busy so we hesitantly sent them in to get their own snack. Much to our surprise, Trey came out with a bag of grapes and Ty was eating an apple! We were so proud of their good food choices today! They were still hungry after the fruit so we all came in to try out homemade granola bars. Although they are a little more dry than what we normally eat, they have a delicious taste! All 5 of us give the granola bars 2 thumbs up and plan to continue making them instead of eating store bought bars that have 42 ingredients in them. Our main goal with this challenge was to eat nothing processed, no high fructose syrup, no fast food and nothing with more than 5 ingredients and sugar could not be in the top 3 of the ingredients. Pretty simple rules but there are challenges! Planning ahead has become really important because one thing we have learned is that when we waiting until we were really hungry to eat, we just grabbed whatever was convenient which usually was not a good food choice.
For supper we ate chicken enchiladas, baby blonde potatoes, brown rice, cantaloupe, and steamed veggies. The enchiladas took a good amount of time to prepare but were definitely worth it! They were spicy but that was cured by some sour cream on top. My parents and I enjoyed the enchiladas while the boys did not like the spicy flavor. The baby blonde potatoes were a hit for everyone. Trey ate about six total. We dipped the baby potatoes in sour cream and they weren't as dry then. The brown rice was plain and simple but the boys kept asking for more. They always do a good job eating their veggie and our family tends to eat about 4 cantaloups a week.
Today went very good I think. The homemade granola bars are super yummy! They were a little dry so we drink a glass of milk to go along with them. Breakfast could have been better but we got a familiar taste of pizza and something new for our family. All of the recipes today came from 100 days of real food website. This includes the cheese crackers that we are right now in the process of making. The cheese crackers are not really specifically for a meal but for snacking on the go, at ball games or in the car. More to come on that tomorrow!
A few thoughts from discussions my mom and I had today….
A great resource to learn more about Sugar is called "Get the Sugar Out: 501 Simple Ways to Cut the Sugar Out of Any Diet" by Ann Louise Gittleman. My mom read it a few months ago and a few things really stuck with her that she shared with me today.
1) High Fructose Corn Syrup accounts for more than 40% of caloric sweeteners added to foods and drinks in the US with consumption growth matching the escalating rise in obesity.
2) Between 1970 and 2000 the per capita consumption of HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) int he US went from an estimated 0.6 pounds per person per year to 73.5 pounds per person per year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service.
3) Studies comparing the French diet to an American diet, the French have higher fat diet than Americans but they are much less afflicted by obesity and heart disease that we are. They found that the per capita sugar consumption in France is 5.5 times less than than in America.
4) OUR BODIES DON'T REQUIRE SUGAR, yet the average American will consume their body weight in sugar each year. YIKES!
5) I find this one very interesting… During World War II, when sugar consumption in the United States dropped, the number of cases of adult-onset diabetes also dropped sharply.
6) The rates of cancer have dramatically increased as sugar consumption has risen. Gittleman is not implying sugar causes cancer and it is not clear whether sugar actually causes healthy cells to mutate and become cancerous. Although, what has been proven through research is that once cells become cancerous, they feed directly on sugar, the way yeast organism does during fermentation, and sugar can accelerate tumor growth. (page 20)
Wow…. I could go on and on (so could my mom), but these are some of the hot topics we discussed today. We just finished a yummy snack of air popped popcorn with unsalted butter and are headed to bed! Thanks for reading!
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| Pizza on the grill! YUM! |
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| Lunch…. it was so nice to have a taste of pizza! |
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| The boys and their healthy snack choices! |
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| The homemade granola bars will be on the list of keepers. |
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| Supper was awesome! The chicken enchiladas were super (we used all organic sauces and tomato paste). Recipe is on 100 days of real food website. We think the cinnamon can be left out. |
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