<p>I’m going away with family as well and it will be challenging. Youdon’tsay, can you do some of the shopping for the week while you are visiting?</p>
<p>Thanks, NorthMinnesota! :)</p>
<p>My family eats better than I do:).</p>
<p>Alum, can I visit your family instead? :)</p>
<p>Since my post, I’ve already put a plan into action. I will definitely pack my breakfast oatmeal. This afternoon, dh will cook out a bunch of chicken breasts, which I can freeze, take with me and put on salad. Two days we’ll be at my MIL’s and with dh’s family, and they eat healthier than my family does. Gotta love their Mediterranean diet. They eat plenty of bad stuff, but there’s almost always a salad as well. What will also be there is my downfall – sweets that I just don’t keep in my house when I’m trying to lose weight. </p>
<p>Maybe my goal for next week is to just not gain. And I can use exercise as an excuse to escape the madness!</p>
<p>True also, that part of eating different as a lifestyle is that we have to learn to adapt to everyday situations, vacations, meals at other people’s homes, etc. So yes, while power to you for planning ahead and taking your own food, you may be surprised how you (now that you are developing some better habits) can look at the meal on the table, and make it your own.</p>
<p>Last night I marinated some chicken strips to make quesadillas. Others in the family ate the strips on tortillas with all the toppings. I ate the chicken too, but skipped the tortillas, put the chicken and toppings on top of romaine and mixed it all up. Instead of the bean dip with chips they ate, I made a very small dish of beans w/ some fresh onion and jalapeno mixed in and topped with a little cheese and ate it with a fork instead of with chips. I didn’t feel like I missed out and there is some pleasure in “figuring it out a healthier way” for me.</p>
<p>This morning I woke up to a large box of donuts on the table - long johns - the ones that are long, filled with whipped cream and frosted with chocolate. Husband somehow came home with them. I looked in the box and walked away. While I knew even a piece of one would taste good going down, it was more satisfying walking away and picking a better breakfast choice. With no regret after eating the healthy breakfast.</p>
<p>Came across this recipe, haven’t made these in awhile, but they are quite good and a better pancake alternative!</p>
<p>Maybe a good holiday weekend breakfast/brunch recipe! (I usually use 2 whole eggs instead of 4 egg whites):</p>
<p>[Oatmeal</a> Cottage Cheese Pancakes Recipe - Food.com - 43072](<a href=“http://www.food.com/recipe/oatmeal-cottage-cheese-pancakes-43072]Oatmeal”>http://www.food.com/recipe/oatmeal-cottage-cheese-pancakes-43072)</p>
<p>Has anyone paid for the MyPlate upgrade? I see that you can customize the nutritional info with the upgrade, and I’m getting frustrated with the charts that make it look like I’m way over on the protein and fiber and under on the carbs.</p>
<p>I found at some point in my life that sticking to reasonable food that you personally like is the only way to loose and maintain the proper weight for your height. There are many diets, but the common thing about them is that somebody has found out what has worked for them and was able to market that knowledge…but it might not be applicable to you personally and you might not stick to it if you do not like it. Then what? At the end, my apporoach was to identify the foods that are love that are not junky or just semi-junky and stick to it for the regular days, but allow yourself some room on birthdays, holidays, vacations…etc. It has been working wonderfully. I do not like to cook, I hate to follow recipes/instruction or spend any time on food preparations. I took this into account. There are others who love to cook, they might to choose more elaborate food preparation. This kind of approach gives you freedom. </p>
<p>However, I am the one who does not need to push myself to exercise, it is my priority #1 and I rarely miss a day. But again, it is important to identify your favorite activites, not somebody else’s who said that something has worked for them. It is important to try and see how it feels and choose what you love. I vary may exercises with season so I can look forward to it at the end of each working day.</p>
<p>Just came back from a visit from my brother who has just been diagnosed with diabetes. Being the engineer that he is, he has a GIANT spreadsheet of food items and their nutritional value (think the database at MyPlate, but he can make his own adjustments). Everything is calculated per gram and he has a digital scale on which he weighs everything he eats. </p>
<p>He’s having fun with it–pretty color charts and graphs, etc. I’ll be interested to see how long he keeps it up…</p>
<p>Who likes beets? I love them, DH does not (and he really eats just about anything I make). I have been cutting them up and roasting them, but I was wondering how other people prepared them. I roast them at 350 - not sure if I should do at a higher temp. </p>
<p>I am lucky because I really like things simple. I roasted some last night and I am just going to add to a salad tonight for me - none for DH :)</p>
<p>This summer, I am going to focus more on making sure I eat a variety of vegetables and try to find one new way to use each type. Last night I had mashed cauliflower. I cooked a head of cauliflower that I had chopped, drained the pot, mashed with an immersion blender, and added fresh horseradish (living in central PA we have homemade horseradish available at market) and freshly ground pepper. It was so good. </p>
<p>So - cauliflower on Tuesday, beets on Wednesday, hmmm…Thursday???</p>
<p>I roasted beets for the first time this spring - I liked them! I’m the only here who will eat them though. Have always loved my mom’s pickled beets!</p>
<p>I never liked beets until a friend who grows them in her garden served them roasted. What an improvement over the pickled beets I’ve grown up with over the years!</p>
<p>Mashed cauliflower…I have a bag of broccoli that I need to cook differently. Wonder if it would work for broccoli. [Must go get some horseradish and see…]</p>
<p>I looked into purchasing a food scale a while ago but my reason was for weighing tennis racquets and lead tape for customizing.</p>
<p>What I found while reading reviews is that they are used for three main purposes:</p>
<p>1) Measuring illegal drugs for packaging and sale
2) Dieting (as your brother is doing)
3) Cooking (to get accurate ingredient measures)</p>
<p>There are many that said that having a digital scale helped them in losing weight.</p>
<p>I use measuring cups for portion control but I eyeball a lot of other stuff where the measurement is in weight instead of volume. I don’t think that a scale is a bad idea for losing weight.</p>
<p>I have a similar spreadsheet (in Growly Notes).</p>
<p>I despise beets. They are the only vegetable I won’t eat. (They are only edible cooked like potato chips which can’t be healthy!)</p>
<p>I don’t worry about the Livestrong proportions. I’m always over on protein and under on carbs. I just try to keep my calories where I want them.</p>
<p>wnp, I’m happy that my family eats beets. I roast beets at 400 degrees, let them cool, them mix them with sliced fire-roasted red bell peppers and sliced purple omions, add salt, pepper, olive oil and balsamic vinegar to taste. I also make a fantastic Ukrainian borscht (Ukrainian = add as many different veggies as you can find in the fridge, and not just cabbage, beets and tomatoes). Another great way to eat beets is to mix finely sliced cooked beets, add some finely chopped apples and walnuts, salt and a dollop of sour cream.</p>
<p>Bunsen - those ideas sound great!! I am sort of an instinctive cook - and I was thinking I might like walnuts and feta with my salad tonight, so it sounds like I am on the right track. I must admit, I wouldn’t have thought about the red pepper. I will be heading to the kitchen shortly…</p>
<p>I am long overdue for a trip to my favorite vegetarian restaurant, Candle 79 in NYC. I LOVE to go there and let my imagination take off. I have their cookbook, but that isn’t the same as trying the food. If you are ever in NYC, it is an amazing restaurant - for carnivores and vegetarians alike.</p>
<p>Mathmom - I think DH has the whole pickled beets thing going on - he is in your camp!</p>
<p>I am not sure broccoli will work as a substitute for the mashed cauliflower.</p>
<p>"Just came back from a visit from my brother who has just been diagnosed with diabetes. "</p>
<p>-My H. has it for many years. Eating everything, more junk than I do. Measures his sugar very few times a month, always normal though. I suppose drugs whatever he is taking dong the job. He does not even like when I mention that he has diabetes. Most in our family on both sides died from diabetes, we all carry our weight around our waist. The only thing that H. does, but not because of diabetes, he started way earlier than his disease, he exercises every single day. His. doc said that if he goes down to normal weight, he will not have diabetes, nor he will have hypertension. H. does not want to bother with it. </p>
<p>On a subject of beets, one of my favorite vegetable. I eat tons when we go to Mexico. They even have freshly prepared beet juice, my favorite morning drink. Sometime I do beet salad, not often, it takes time and I hate to cook. But it is yummy. I love borscht also, but again, too much cutting, have not done it in years. Most important about cooking beets is to cook them in skin to preserve everything including taste. Even for borscht, cook in skin, grade and add to soup at the very end before turning it off. Do not eat canned beets, waste of $$, calories, they have no taste.</p>
<p>worknprogress, Alumother posted info on a cooking site, Slow Carbs, about 2 pages ago. There is a recipe, with video, for brussels sprouts which looks incredibly good. I am going to try your cauliflower recipe, it looks great. I wish we could get fresh horseradish. The waldorf coleslaw recipe on cookinglight.com uses horseradish, and it’s great.</p>
<p>I am not crazy about red beets - for one thing, they pollute and stain everything around them - but the golden beets are wonderful. I’m not rushing to eat beets, though, because I think they’re high in sugar, like bananas and carrots, and not great for people like me who are trying to minimize sugar.</p>
<p>Yes, beets are very high in sugar which makes them taste so yummy. Actually, some countries are making sugar out of beets, not other plants. Bananas are awesome also because they are so sugary. I personally cannot live without because my feet cramp if I do not have at least one banana / day. I do not like other sources of potassium. I love everything that is sweat. I do not see any reason to cut it, it makes me happy.</p>
<p>I have pretty much eliminated white sugar and have drastically reduced flour products - I figure I will never develop a beet addiction, but then again, you never know. What if I start peeling beets every morning? Oh, no! Just being silly :)</p>
<p>I am sticking to complex carbs, low fat, good fats, and fruits and veggies. AND almost an hour of exercise each day - I think that should work.</p>