This is a post I’ve been mulling over for a while now. Every time I think about writing it, I discard the idea because it just sounds too preachy to me. (At least in my head.) I decided a long time ago to not get on the preachy soapbox when it comes to food, because the truth is, what is good for the goose is not good for the gander. Meaning, it may be important to me to eat one way, but for my neighbor, something else is important.
And it’s all good. No two people are alike- I wouldn’t expect two diets to be alike. And yet… Recently, we made the decision that in our household, as much as possible, our diet was going to change slightly. We weren’t going to do anything drastic like become vegetarians or sugar-free or anything, or even go all organic. For us, we’ve decided that when it comes to what we put in our mouths to sustain us, we want real food. And that’s what I’m calling it, a Real Food way of eating.
What do I mean by real food? Well, it’s a loose application, but one example is with our dairy products. We made the switch a while back to whole milk from our standard 1% milk. I stopped buying lower fat dairy products as well. Everything we buy that is dairy is a full-fat dairy product. We then eat less of it, being mindful of the fat content. We know that some fat is good for us- and in fact, that’s what prompted the switch. My kids are so active, and eat so little fat, that the extra fat in the whole milk will be very good for them. But the good part about switching is reflected in the nutrition labels. Any time a dairy product is reduced in fat, it seems something else is added. Have you ever looked at a carton of low-fat or fat-free sour cream or cream cheese? Where there once was fat, there are now odd-sounding ingredients and chemicals. And that’s what I’m trying to eliminate as much as possible. Our bodies weren’t designed to eat chemicals, and the switch to whole milk products eliminates a vast amount of those chemicals.
We already tried to stay away from processed food anyway, so saying that we eat “Real Food” isn’t that much of a stretch from what we were doing, and yet… Yet it has caused me to shift my thinking a little bit. I’ve long been a proponent of the saying “all things in moderation”, and I still adhere to that. Along with the dairy though, I’ve been rethinking the way I think of fat in general. I’m not as hesitant to use a bit of oil or butter instead of spray. The thing is, we’ve so long been told that fat is the enemy, and I’m finding more and more how necessary that fat is. When we add fat to our diet- we don’t eat as much. Take a simple bowl of cereal for example. Andy is a big guy, and in order to feel satiated at breakfast time, it would take a good two bowls of cereal before he felt he’d had enough. Simply switching to full fat milk, he feels fuller sooner, but even better, the food sticks with him longer. Fat is key to satiety- to feeling full, and for that full feeling to last longer.
A hearty bowl of ratatouille is pretty much a fat free dish. A simple vegetable stew packed with flavor that is so delicious, and you gobble it up, only to be hungry again a few hours later. Adding a small drizzle of olive oil to your serving of ratatouille makes a world of difference! The thing with adding fat back in to our diet is that we try to be smart about it- we’re not sawing off slabs of pork fat and inhaling that left and right. But we are upping the olive oils and peanut oils, and adding the butter and bacon grease in small amounts when we want that flavor.
Real food, it’s just so simple, and as simple as it sounds. And it’s actually really been working in our favor in many ways. Lately we’ve set ourselves the mission of eating down our freezer as much as possible, because it really needs to be defrosted. My freezer is packed with vegetables and fruits that were frozen in a time of plenty. There are several wonderful cuts of meat to be used, and trying to combine them in new and exciting ways has been challenging, to say the least, but it’s been fun, and the freezer is slowly emptying.
It’s also been an adventure changing the way the snacks come up. You know how that is, we always have the best intentions of giving our kids good snacks if they need something between meals. But things like fruit snacks and granola bars and such are just too quick and easy. Yet, my kids love things like whole grain crackers, peanuts and dried fruit, string cheese, and pieces of fruit. By keeping these things on hand and as an option, it’s amazing how much less Zander comes up to me looking for something to eat. These are real foods- something that works in his body and gives him energy and sustenance.
Real food. That’s our story, and we’re sticking to it.