Okra

This is Okra:

This is Fried Okra:

After a garage sale, we went to celebrate our good sales by going to a local restaurant called Golden Chick. It's fried everything. It's a dangerous place. I didn't realize how much our attitude had changed until I sat down with the food. Everything was the same color. Golden. :)

My method? Peel off the fried skin on the chicken and enjoy. There was no way I was going to risk having a gallbladder attack or having a clogged artery, or anything else by eating a TON of fried everthing. I peeled the skin of my daugher's chicken as well. (We actually just got one entree for the three of us- the portions are big enough!) She wouldn't eat the fried okra. My husband would show her how fun they are, and she just wouldn't eat it.
So...
I peeled off the 'fried' part while she wasn't looking and put it on her plate. A minute later when she saw the green- she popped it in her mouth, loved it, and gave us a good laugh!

My thoughts:
1- don't visit restaurants too often- I want to know what I'm eating. (a past post on the subject)
2- COLOR, color, CoLoR!
3- Watch out for the portion size (this is how you can actually save money by eating healthy!)
4- eat closer to the 'natural' state. Okra vs. Fried Okra.

Buen Provecho!

My Confession

I love bread.

I eat bread.

I now make bread.

When my husband and I were first married we gained. We gained a new apartment, new jobs, new life, and new weight. I weighed more 4 months after we got married than I did full-term with my daughter.

What did it?

I blame Me. My weakness. My bread.

Hot Ham and Cheese Bagel for Breakfast,

Bagel with jelly for a Morning Snack,

Sandwich for Lunch,

Banana Bread for afternoon Pick-me Up,

And Chicken breasts with Bread Crumbs for Dinner.

Don't even ask about dessert....it wasn't pretty.....

Along my quest to be aware of what goes in my body, I found that buying bread was one of the hardest things to do. There was the healthy bread, but even that had HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) in it, and a whole bunch of other things that I don't recognize. I did find some natural stuff, but really.... $4 for a loaf of bread?

Yes, my bread addiction has been under control for 3 years now, but really, $4? It just wasn't in our budget. So...I began my search for a breadmaker! And FOUND ONE! (Brand-new Betty Crocker at Goodwill for $15)

I was hesitant that my addiction would come back. Reading in SuperSized Kids today, I found this quite fitting to my situation:

"Another patient...carefully preserved a picture of his grandma, a woman the size of the Titanic who had a great fondness for baking bread. He loved his grandma and he cherished that picture. Yet... [he said] time and again, "I just don't want to be like her." He love her, admired her, respected her- but he absolutely did not want to wind up morbidly obese, like her."

Meet more families studied by clicking here.

"Parents, the time to prevent or reverse SuperSizing in our kids is always now. Don't wait until the problem gets worse. Don't wait until serious physical problems appear. If your child has an apparent obesity problem, start today to deal with it. Why? An average-sized adult may have 20billion to 30billion fat cells; a moderately obese adult, however, can have 60billion to 100billion fat cells; and a morbidly obese person in excess of 300billion fat cells. Obese children can have five times more fat cells than children of normal weight!"

"Once formed, these fat cells can decrease in size, but they do not decrease in number....

"Today is the best day to start!"

My Buffet

A random sampling of facts and opnions. Please don't take too much, we all know what buffets can to do ya.....


I'm currently reading a lot of stuff- one of the books I'm reading is "Super Sized Kids: How to rescue your child from the obesity threat." Written by Walt Larimore, MD; Sherri Flynt, MPH, RD, LD; with Steve Halliday.

It's packed with super sized greatness. :) I haven't gotten through the whole thing but throughout the book they sprinkle in 50 ways to SuperSize your Kids. I thought I'd share what I've read so far.


#1. Believe that your child's SuperSize status is normal.

#2. SuperSize their portions.

#3. Let your kids eat frequently at fast-food restaurants.

#4. Give your kids lots of soft drinks!



A few points that I found interesting:

They did a study that followed obese children to obese teenagers to obese adults. Children in the study who were obese as teens died as adults at the average age of 46. Not only that, but a different study pointed out that the effect of obesity "significantly impairs quality of life."

"Severly obese kids have a quality of life similar to that of children who have cancer."

What has happened? What has happened that we as adults have become so lazy, unintelligent, and passive in our decision making.

Say 'yes' to knowledge. This is my motivation.

Underdeveloped societies suffer from: TB, malnutrition, pneumonia, parasites, typhoid, cholera....

Affluent America now suffers from: obesity, heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, liver diseases, drug addiction, alcoholism, divorce, abused children, suicide a murder.

Take your choice.

My last point(S):

• It's not about appearance. It's about health. I heard on the radio the other night that by the age of 2 a kid can recognize a McD's (or any other frequented fast food store) by their logo. How awful.
• As a person commented in my last post, wouldn't it be nice if HEALTHY restaurants had "playplace"s? That would be a good help.
• Wouldn't it be even nicer if we ATE at home (which is important what we eat there too...) and had our own "playplace"?
• I think it's awful how parents introduce their children (fat, obese or fine) to fast food so frequently. Maybe you disagree. That's fine. This is my opinion based on my observations. You can make your own. In fact, I encourage you to do just that.

Say, "yes" to knowledge and research it yourself.