School/Work Lunches

It's that time of year again! Back to school/work (unless you work year-round then your life is one never-ending spiral/new month). It's part of the daily struggle to pack your lunch everyday (I know you could just buy your lunch but who's made of that kind of dough?). EVERYDAY. Unless you have leftovers that you are psyched to eat, the idea of packing a lunch can put you into a funk before you even leave your house. Here are some ideas if you are stuck and want to save dolla bills from eating out. Also, I'm not vegetarian and neither are these, but I'm sure you could substitute here and there.

Even though it's fall, one of my favorite lunches is chicken salad. I know, I used to think it was sick too (ie gross summer potlucks). But hear me out. It's cheap and can be made in advance so you don't have to think about meals for the whole week. A grocery store (Harris Teeter) usually has rotisserie chickens on sale at least once a week (Sunday & Thursdays) so buy one!

Take out the chicken, mix in some red grapes, some heated nuts (pecans), and a small amount of mayo (I don't like mayo, but sadly it is necessary and I will eat it in this), salt, pepper, and honey. That's it! You're set with an entree all week. Go crazy with your bread choice - the bagel thin and sandwich options are numerous these days. Throw it on an english muffin if you're truly wacky!



Some days you want to feel like you eat healthy. Caesar salad is your answer. I think you can throw anything in it? Mine includes a mix of romaine,iceberg, and spinach together with garbanzo beans (you can toast these before work with cayenne pepper/chili powder if you want more of a crunch) and then add crunched up pita chips for extra saltiness. Top with a store bought creamy Caesar dressing. This is a salt salad like you've never had and it's delicious.

This next salad option is labeled gross by some, salty and delicious by others. It really fills you up. Any type of lettuce (spinach is great), tuna, cucumbers, tomatoes, feta cheese, salt & pepper Texas Toast croutons, and half or a third of a hard-boiled egg topped with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Seriously this will make you full for a week. I'm particular about salads because I do not like everything to touch before I eat. The cucumbers will get soggy and gross along with the lettuce. So this is one to tackle if you have a lot of prep time or Rubbermaid containers to separate it all out.

Let's talk prepared food. An old standby is Smart Ones Fettucini Alfredo. I get weary of the Lean Cuisine's with meat and I've found the Smart Ones actually taste better. With that said, these are only a monthly buy for me. I get sick of them pretty fast and I only keep them on hand when my brain just can't function in the morning.

Recently though I've been introduced to Amy's frozen meals. These are delicious! Do yourself a favor and go purchase Amy's Indian Vegetable Korma. Trader Joe's is also in the frozen biz. The Chicken Tikka Masala with basmati rice is good and spicy, even if it's a little small. I'm sure for some people they could eat two of these and still be hungry. Or you could pack some naan on the side. The chicken enchilada's are also good. Easy to reheat, add some salsa and you're done.



These are some standbys of the moment. Feel free to give us your best lunch suggestion!

Photos credits: chicken salad and caesar salad

Vegan Experiment Finishes

The saying goes that if you do something for 21 straight days it becomes a habit. After 21 straight days of a vegan cleanse diet, I can say I am in the habit of hating the vegan cleanse diet.

That's not quite true. The experiment is over, and the results are dramatic.

1) I have new appreciation for water-that it's there and really cheap to drink. I spent about $30/month on alcohol, money I didn't spend during the diet. Money I normally spent on soda and juice (I'm a fiend for OJ) stayed in my pocket.

2) I learned about new tasty foods. Did you know that kale is a thing? It is! The cabbage-like plant is about the healthiest thing you can possibly eat, unless you consider Cadbury Eggs a healthy thing.

And if you're going for those filling grains, many substitutes for rice exist. Quinoa cooks fast and at least three of its letters are pronounced as they should be. You can get white or red versions. Red quinoa is red in the way hair is red, in that it is not red. Couscous cookscooks eveneven fasterfaster.

3) Do not eat an entire can of refried beans with your dinner. They taste great, but your body will not forgive you.

4) I like whole grains. I used to buy white pasta and white bread, without realizing that they bleached all the good stuff out of it. When I hear "bleach" I think "Yum!" Now I will be buying strictly whole grain bread and pasta, except those rare times when I won't.

5) I weighed 174 pounds the morning I began the diet. I weighed 163 pounds on the morning it ended. That means I lost one pound every two days, without the benefit of strenuous exercise or watching the amount of food I ate. The weight loss amazes me. I didn't do the diet to lose weight, but that's exactly what happened.

Now the challenge will be maintaining that weight. Wish me luck.

Vegan Update

Five days to go on the vegan diet. The first 9 days of the diet I felt weird, off, empty. It's hard to describe the sensation. I suspect my body was used to the way and things I eat, and needed that time to adjust. Day 10 and on I felt great, with an increased pep in my step and slimming waistline.

So far I've lost seven pounds, and without exercise. At first I didn't have the energy, and now I'm still not doing it enough but the pounds melt away anyway. Word from the wise: Exercise will not help you lose weight! (The author is not qualified to make that statement.)

As for the food, well, I'm pretty damn sick of water. I need a beer! I've already started planning my reward meal on Monday when it's all over (thinking pizza).

Going vegan

In high school I called myself a "meatatarian", before Wendy's went and made the term uncool. Slowly I transitioned to what I am, as of last week, a full-fledged, card-carrying Commi--sorry, vegan.

Exhale, it's OK. I'm engaging in a three-week experiment where I eat no meat, no dairy, no eggs--no animal products of any kind. But wait, there's more! I also cut out processed foods. No chips, no bleached flour in pancake mix, no white bread. But wait, there's more! The diet is a cleanse diet, meaning get those chemicals out of me! So no juice, no soda, no coffee, no beer.

So what can I eat? Well, aside from the delicious grass growing all over my backyard and the bark trees wear, I can eat some good stuff. Tons of veggies, tons of beans, and tons of grains.

The 21-day Vegan Kickstart, created by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, publishes suggested meal plans for the entire day, each day, including a few snacks and desserts. Today is Day 9, and I'd say they're batting .950 so far. Makes Ted Williams seem like he was one-armed.

So what's to gain? Well besides losing 4 pounds in one week without watching how much I eat and without exercise, and besides feeling the increases in energy and regularity, and besides the thicker wallet because I can't buy alcohol, well besides those things I've seen no benefit.

I still have a week and a half remaining, and I'll keep JOP updated on my progress, feelings, and cheese cravings.

Another Post About Issues

This week's issue is new dietary guidelines!

One of the comments on the above article really made a lot of sense to me. Maria in Texas writes:

A lot of this started when the government put out the food pyramid. Experts said it was wrong, had too many carbohydrates (since it treats fruits & veggies as one category and breads & cereals as another, and they are they same type of food source - carbohydrates) and people would gain weight. The government ignored this because of the food and sugar lobbies, and that is exactly what happened. Double the amount of carbohydrates you tell people to eat and they get fat. This still needs to change.

The other major contributing factor is the food industry. If a company does not produce 18-20% growth, it is not "hot" or in demand by Wall Street. Therefore, companies pursue this 20% bogey at all costs.

International opportunities are limited as most of the rest of the world would never consider eating the over-processed, over-salted, and over-sugared food that is the standard diet of Americans. Population growth doesn't help much, especially since the fastest growing demographics in America is immigrants, and the first generations generally continue to eat as they did in their home countries. They can't get a lot of pricing on food either - maybe a couple percent a year, but that doesn't help nearly enough.

So that leaves food companies trying to get 10-15% plus volume growth per year in a stable population. They spend millions of dollars trying to figure out how to get people to eat more sugar, pasta, breakfast cereals, cookies, potato chips, and ice cream. The sad truth is, the food company bosses can't get their bonuses unless they come up with new ways to get Americans to eat substantially more food every year. Clearly it has worked.

Another contributing factor comes from restaurants. There is a perverse logic in food pricing. If a restaurant (and that includes all categories - from fast food to 5-star) sells you a reasonable portion size, they make very little money. They need sell you 2-3 times as much as you should eat to cover the costs of running the restaurant and make profit - especially if they can't sell liquor. Most people eat whatever is put in front of them - I can't tell you how many times I've seen a single person eat an entire pasta bowl that had enough food for a whole family, and then remark (proudly?) that they've finished the entire bowl. Then the restaurants claim these large portion sizes as great values for the consumer. Once again, in order to keep their jobs and get bonuses, restaurants must encourage people to significantly overeat.

In addition to the millions spent trying to convince consumers to eat more, there are millions spent lobbying to keep healthful, truthful information out of the reach of consumers. Just look at the sugar lobby. Study after study links increased consumption of sugar to increases in obesity, but the sugar lobby insists that eating more sugar does not result in weight gain. Really???

Of course individuals have a responsibility for what and how much they put into their mouths, and their activity level. We now have an active food culture that did not exist even a decade ago. One of the unfortunate and perhaps unintended consequences is that people now feel that they are experts in food and nutrition from all the information they get on food television channels and internet website, and many of them cling fiercely to their mis-information and un-truths with an almost religious fervor. Which will likely make the clearly necessary re-education of the American population virtually impossible.

The sad truth is, no matter how big a proponent of personal responsibility one is, one has to admit that there are a lot of very powerful forces that have strong vested interests in making sure that Americans continue to eat too much of the poorest quality food possible. And until someone has enough guts to publicly call these obesity pushers out, point out their ridiculous claims (sugar lobby, anyone?), there is very little hope that this situation will be arrested, let alone reversed anytime soon.

What do you think?

Dinnertime!

I just saw these over at Food in Real Life and couldn't believe my eyes. Look at the hilarious little wisps of photoshop steam! The disgusting marble of meat and cheese! The name Sideshots!

Would you eat these if they were free?
If they were $3.99?
If somebody gave you $3.99 and Sideshots on the house?

Dishes

I enjoy certain food blogs (if the writer/food isn't to annoying), but lately I think it's not just for the recipes. The plates are really catching my eye. It's fun to see what dishes people own (probably because I hate my own hand-me-down set so much). Half of the time I don't even care for the food being displayed. That aside, food presentation is fun to check out. Isn't it strange/awesome that we've reached a point where people are saying "Wait, don't eat just yet! Gotta get a pic so I can blog this meal."

photo Normally I don't like to see actual humans in these pictures, but I'll make an exception because Fiestaware plates are my all time favorites.

photo In this one, I think we can all appreciate the great use of the counter top as background.

photo

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Inquiring Minds

Have any of our loyal readers tried BaconSalt? If so, is it good? I'm really curious! Even though they are the makers of Baconnaise "Everything should taste like bacon", I feel like BaconSalt would be more promising.

Dealz, Dealz, Dealz!!

In an economy like this, its all about the "steals and deals", isn't it? I have always been a fan of good stuff for cheap--and since my rent has gone up in the past year, I have really kicked it into high gear.

You gotta love the discount stores--I'm talking Big Lots, and if you live a little bit more up north, Ollie's (the BOMB for books) and Ocean State Job Lot, which my sister is a huge fan of. Yes, it looks like something exploded when you first walk in, like your brain can't take in that much data. But imagine what you can find!!! And you always end up finding it. Like a DVD of Stand By Me for one dollar. At a Big Lots in Virginia I bought a kajillion Vitamin Water 10's (a discontinued flavor) for 35 cents each!!!

Lately I've been turned on to Coupon Kim. Yes, I always wondered how you can go to Harris Teeter and get six cans of soup, four rolls of toilet paper, two boxes of cereal, yogurt, and frozen broccoli for 32 cents. Its a little something called coupon websites and super deals week where they double your coupons.

Clothes...I'm almost done going to regular stores at this point. I like clothes CHEAP. Sometimes I think even the thrift store is trying to rip me off. For me its all about finding decent stuff from Anthropologie, Urban Outfitters, and J. Crew at Rugged Wearhouse. I'm not trying to brag, but this is done frequently by me. I'm saying I want a t-shirt for three dollars and a dress for under ten. And a good thrift store (especially in a rural area) is like finding a gold mine sometimes, isn't it? You have to be willing to frequent these places regularly though. I'm not going to lie, a few shots of espresso help before going into any discount stores. You definitely have your tactics and rules figured out for tackling places like these.

Now, I'm not saying I never buy anything kind of expensive, and I like quality. Shoes, for example, are hard to find fashionable, high in quality, AND cheap. You just have to cave sometimes. But with all the money you've saved, its not a big deal!

Express Lane Slow-Down

We haven't had a good rant in a while...here comes one.

I bought a few items at the grocery store this evening, and I wanted to get out quick. Normally I follow Apu's Rule of Checkout: Always pick the line with the most single men who aren't old. They, like me, want to be out of that store (any store) as quickly as possible before they spend more money.

Luckily, Food Lion has an "Express Lane" for customers with 12 items or less. This figure is explicitly posted on the aisles. I had 12 items or less; I went there. In front of me stood a father and his son, holding a bottle of Crisco and an onion. "Jackpot," I thought.

In front of them stood a woman with a shopping cart. The cashier proceeded to ring up 22 items. All I could do was shake my head and watch it happen, like a man in handcuffs watching the police beat his friend.

Combined the woman and the man purchased 24 items, which worked out in the end, but that is no excuse for breaching the rule. A murderer cannot say to a judge, "Between you and me we have averaged less than one murder, so really the murder didn't happen."

If you have 13 or more items, get out of the Express Lane, before the murderer and the judge take you out.

this time o' the year

There are many things that I love about this time of the year. First off, lets give a hearty shout-out to Thanksgiving. The original "Thanksgiving story" for one thing-you have to love that even though I'm sure its nothing like we think it might have been. Secondly, just family and good food and necessary reflections of gratitude. None of the expectations that seem to overshadow the Christmas season. Three days off for me- let's give it up for Thanksgiving!!!

The colder, crisper weather also helps us to indulge in the creature comforts. I personally love the sound of the heat cutting in and out as I'm drifting off to sleep. I also love getting a blanket and hovering over a heat vent, trapping the heat into a cocoon. Although I must say its trance-inducing and ends up being very hard to pull yourself away.

Thirdly, I'm really into pumpkins. Pumpkin food is always really enticing and seems like it must have a lot of vitamin A. I also found out recently its high in tryptophan-the stuff in turkey that increases serotonin. I recently picked up some pumpkin pancake mix from Trader Joe's-tastes like a chai pancake. Also, pumpkin spice lattes from Weaver St.- just sweet enough, all natural, two shots of espresso, you can't not like it!! Let's not forget pumpkin pie, gnocchi, and roasted seeds.

Monday is not working out

I wanted the Leonardo da Veggie bagel at lunch...and I get the new Bruegger's girl who has the nerve to tell me it won't be good on a bagel. WHAT?? I've eaten this before and know that to be totally false. Then she makes it with this sick tapenade instead of the garlic cream cheese spread. I did not find that out until I was back at work. This Monday is just not working out!








Good thing I have these to feast on later:

How great are they????!!!!???

NC State Fair

YAY!!! I love the tallest Ferris Wheels. I love the fried dough. And I adore the Village of Yesteryear. What is your favorite part of the Fair?

Gel from Heaven

Do you guys know what this stuff is? Seth Fisher generously brought me back 2 tubes from his trip to France earlier this year, and it's re-fueled an old addiction...an addiction that left me crying, by the side of the road, and 50 pounds heavier, once upon a time.

Just kidding, but it is hard to stop with this stuff once you get started. Picture this: vanilla, chestnuts, sugar, water. In a paste, but there's nothing to it so it looks like a gel. Stir it into your yogurt. Fill a crepe with it! Slather some on a cookie. Eat it from a spoon! Things get out of hand really easily!

I know it's a little early, but if anyone's wondering what to get me for Christmas, they're selling it on Amazon. Shipping is $5.00, so you might as well get 3 or 4 while you're at it. Just saying!

Blog of Note

I found this blog yesterday worth checking out: Food in Real Life. Pretty good read for all my frozen food needs. When I'm too lazy to make my lunch I go for the Smart Ones Fettuccine Alfredo. Nothing can beat it, it is delicious alfredo. They should serve it in restaurants!

The blog proves what I've always thought about frozen lunches - Weight Watchers Smart Ones are the best overall. Lean Cuisine may make food look good on the packaging, but it's a farce. Lean Cuisine made me start avoiding all frozen foods that included any type of "meat" (term used loosely).

Heirloom Tomatoes: WTF!

I go to Whole Foods all the time when I'm hungry, and it's so stupid because I always walk out with $200 worth of vegetables I have to work around the clock to eat before they go bad. But everything looks good and I'm helpless against the temptation of "the wild bunch" mushroom pack and $4.99/lb cherries.

So last night I walked out with a bag of heirloom tomatoes. The best description I found was on this person's flickr page: "A true heirloom tomato is a cultivar whose seeds had been nurtured, selected, and handed down from one family member to another for many generations. What allows it to maintain the heirloom name is that no genetically modified organism (GMO) can be used in its production. It conjures up an image of backyard plant grown from hard-sought seeds, of rare fruit bursting in summer's heat."

I got home and sliced one up, and I was totally unprepared for what was inside. The exterior of this plant was green fading into red, and the interior was pretty much the same except it was black. Black, as in rotten? But the black flesh wasn't crumbly or mushy like rotting fruit is; it was as firm and clean as the rest of the tomato. Humm, must just be the color, I thought, and ate a mouthful of black tomato. Wrong! It was very, very bitter. And weird. So my next thought was: is this normal?

Let me do some more investigative work and get back to you.

List of things I'm into

Saltine crackers. I'm eating them right now!

Lesley Arfin. I just finished Dear Diary and she's a Vice contributor but I don't care if people are supposed to be too cool for that or whatever. Stuff like this is my dream reading material when I'm fooling around on the internet. Reading about her writerly hopes reinforced my secret writerly hopes when people like DFW and Nabokov dash them. Which is to say: there's more to lit than unattainable genius and thick cross-referencing. Her book is entertaining, it's about drugs, I relate to her adolescent problems, and I learned a lot about rehab. out of 10, it's 8.3.

David Foster Wallace. oh baby, the real star of my dream! I was watching Lost last night and one of the characters looks like him (if only Horace would pull his hair back and put on a bandanna) and that's when I realized I have a tiny lil' fixation on DFW. I'm only 100 or so pages into Infinite Jest but so far it is astounding. I was sad when he died in September and I'm even sadder now. Infinite Jest is so far a 9.4.

Not drinking alcohol--I've had some drinks since Lent began but overall I feel like my liver is thanking me for giving it a break. I tried to give up coffee at the same time and switch to yerba mate but yesterday I gave in and made some at home in the morning. When i got to work i drank yerba mate as has become my habit and I was wiggin' out! But it felt good, sort of like the time freshman year I went to Tate St. with Aislinn and drank a bunch of espresso at 10 pm without thinking, and spent the rest of the night fighting with my boyfriend and writing a paper. and I think there was also a meteor shower that night that I watched on the soccer field.

Making plans for spring. As you can see! I'm excited to jog outside again and sleep in my room without 50 layers of blankets and thermalwear. It's also fun to be wearing clothes that you like, like colorful skirts without leggings. And everyone's in a good mood!

Gay beach. Is always good somehow (only the best for american apparel, i guess!). so nice to listen to at work and at home. you might have to just go to the viva site and find "gay beach" in the contributors.

the perfect food!

What makes food good for me is that it is delicious, has high fiber/protein content, is cheapish but not too cheap, lasts a long time, goes with many other foods, and is good for the environment etc. Is there any food that exists with all of these? Apples? No! There's no protein in apples. Pasta? Boring! Bread? Lasts for like 5 days, then gets moldy! Realistically, not much can do all of this. Except.

This!!
Which is all of this:



Yesterday, after not being able to find these lil' treasures for what seemed like years, they popped up in the freezer section at Whole Foods. I think they're like $3.79 there, but in the past, I've found them at Trader Joe's and Target for more like $2.49. But just between you and me, I'd still buy them if they were $100.49. Because they are so super-good.

Last night, we cooked some with green beans and mashed potatoes and it was, even with a nice beer, cheap (about $7, split 2 ways) and pretty quick. Not to mention fun!

While I'm thinking about it, here are some of my other favorite meat substitutes:

-Whole Foods mock chicken salad (regular and barbeque)
-Whole Foods vegan crabcakes (which are, I just found out, made from mock chicken salad)
-Quorn Gruyère Cutlets
-Morningstar Sausage Patties

Of course, you can't compare these to real meat--except for their main-dish status in a meal--or you'll always be grossed-out and/or disappointed. Or not. For me, the texture of all of these is better than that of real meat, because i don't have any guilt or weird feelings about biting into muscle fiber and other tissue. But in any case, even if you're a daily meat-eater, these riblets are as close to perfect as any food i've ever encountered.