Weight Loss Through Enjoying the Kitchen

I'm really trying to enjoy my time preparing food in the kitchen, as part of this new outlook on nutrition and losing weight. I think part of my problem is the whole mindlessness of eating - you know, those moments whilst sitting in front of the telly, randomly popping in chips, chocolates, etc.

I think part of weight loss should be about creating a more joyful outlook - so I propose this: how about starting a group espousing the joy of a healthier diet?  (Discovering new recipes, preparing food and seeking out interesting, healthy ingredients)

Some talking points:
* Any recipe books/sites we should look at?
* What is something new you're doing in the kitchen as part of your weightloss diet?
* How do you feel about food at this point?
 

I love this thread! Thank you for posting it! It instantly reminded me of my mom!

My mom has always loved cooking! (At one point she was a caterer!) She really taught me to love the food I was making and had a whole philosophy that whatever you're feeling will reflect in your food. My dad would be able to tell if my mom was in a good mood or not, just from the taste of dinner! And then she became a personal trainer. So she always tried to make sure we only ate what would be good for our bodies too. She'd always make sure there was some sort of vegetable on the table and always at least 3 food groups represented.

So now that I'm on my own, I do tend to make my own food at home rather than go out all the time. I love that because I control exactly how many calories I get and whatnot.

Since I started my diet a few weeks ago, I placed all the sweets or more fattening foods and treats up high so I'm not tempted on a daily basis to gobble them all up! I keep fruits on the kitchen counter to remind me every time I walk into the apartment that I should try to eat something healthy before turning to fattier options. I also make more pastas and soups now, using a lot of chicken instead of beef or pork (hotdogs, hehe!).

And in response to the "mindless eating" comment, I always try to make sure I have berries or sliced carrots and celery close at hand for those times! They're the perfect little finger-food munchies, sweet, crunchy, and always so soo good! :)

I'm in!  So, what do you propose?  exploring certain types of foods or cuisines each week, or?  I really need to find new favorite foods!!!

This is a great idea. I'm in too.

In the spirit of this post, I would like to share a discovery. I have discovered a new way to eat grapes. Well, new for me. I read about it on another post. I now put them in the freezer. They're all nice and frozen when I eat them for a snack and, since they are also sweet, it helps with ice cream cravings.

I keep my kitchen clean, because it makes it a more pleasant place to be. Soon I'll be decorating it a bit, too - I've lived here for a year and still haven't done anything in that regard. Matching dish towels, magnets, that kind of thing.

I threw away all the convenience foods I had. I also bought small  fancy bowls and plates (from wal-mart and the dollar store). They discourage large portions, make small portions look like more, and just look more "gourmet" than cheap plastic or Styrofoam.

I cook almost every day, too, which is a bit of a pain. Sometimes I'll cook extra one day and put the rest in the fridge so the next day all I have to do it heat it up. I don't own a microwave; forcing myself to use the stove prevents a lot of unnecessary eating, since I'm only going to trouble myself to actually cook if I'm truly hungry.

YAY! great idea, duck! ( : Can we make it official?

I am the unofficial cook in the house, so my bf either eats what I'm eating now or fends for himself (not very well, aheehee). I have been experimenting at different combos of veggies and a little protein depending i.e. soups in my crockpot. I had great success with 2 of them so far---check my recipes if you like 2 cups of yummy veggie soup for less than 100 calories! ( : I add a big ol' salad or an open faced sandwich and feel like I had an awesome lunch or supper. I especially A) don't like heating up the house to cook so the crockpot is a fantastic tool for me and B) love, love, love the convenience of having lots of good tasting, good for me food ready to eat/frozen for future use.

cookinglight.com is a site someone recommended to me here, and I love it----they have a million and one recipes to peruse at your leisure.

Any other crockpot cookers? I'm interested (as I would assume you are too) in finding delicious, low cal alternatives to things like pizza or Mexican etc. 2 things I just laughed at in my head: 1) my bf dragged me to lunch at a Chinese buffet yesterday that 8 weeks ago would have been a real treat--like almost my favorite thing ever--and not only did it all taste greasy and gross, but it really made me feel sick the rest of the afternoon (good conditioning and motivation to keep up the healthy cooking!) and 2) I made a pretty mean low cal version of pizza without really thinking about it, just to share? --50 calorie garlic and herb tortilla (toasted in oven to crisp up), 1/4 cup tomato sauce, carefully counted pepperonis (just had to!), mushrooms, olives, and a little mozzerella---one ended up being 180 because of the pepperoni but really, I could have done without it looking back. It just sounded so good. ( :

Seriously--we should start a group!!! I would love to have a forum to check for new low cal recipes, info and advice!

Like I have 30 calorie cheesecake to offer as a recipe..... ( :

Keep fighting the good fight---cc is the best thing that ever happened to my big, math hating butt! =P --Olivia

PS: sorry I wrote a book

I love allrecipes.com just click on low calorie recipes! I have found some really yummy stuff!!!!!

What an excellent idea! The kitchen has always been the heart of my home, and I've been sad thinking that in trying to lose weight and be healthier, that I would have to cut that tie. Cooking and preparing/arranging food is almost like meditiation... so calming and grounding for me. I just started living by myself (no roomie) and it's hard to find good food to cook for one (soooo tempting sometimes to just Lean Cuisine it for meals). Anyway, I would love to share my recipe ideas/experiments and try out yours too!

My favorite kitchen appliances: 1) my George Foreman grill (I would marry it if I could!) 2) my toaster oven.

My newest favorite summer dish (great flavors, and sooo pretty too):

1 zucchini (cut in half length-wise and then sliced into 1/4 in pieces), 1 yellow summer squash (cut as the zucchini), 1/2 lb radishes (cut in quarters), 1/2 Tbs olive oil, salt and pepper to taste. Toss all till well coated, and roast in 450 oven for 20-25 min. (2 servings ~ 110 cal each.)

2 portobello mushroom caps sprayed with cooking spray, salt and pepper to taste. Grill (yay George Foreman!) for 3-5 min. (each cap ~ 46 cals)

(NB: I had never heard of roasting radishes until I tried this out... it totally mellows their bite, while adding glorious color to the dish)

missglendale: your bit about your mother reminds me of "Like Water for Chocolate"... how wonderful :)

magaroonie,

Like Water for CHocolate was one of my favorite books ever! I will have to try your radish suggestion too--I like them plain, but mellowed out would be even better and amen on the Foreman! ( :

Am so happy everyone's into this!

I just really want to live joyfully - it's been such a trying year, and it's wonderful to find so much support here. I find I gain a lot of weight during times of stress, or when I try to "fill up" the emptiness with even more empty calories.

magaroonie: Hubby and I really want to get some sort of indoor grilling appliance - we're apartment dwellers, so we do miss that! I JUST began to integrate radishes into my salads and vege plates - they're really pretty. On a similar color note, I'm hunting for a good low-cal recipe to integrate beets - I have some really nice memories of beets and potato salads - they were our "pink" salads! (great in a house full of girls!)

missglendale: Oh, your mom sounds truly lovely - Good feelings translate into good food in the kitchen for sure.  I think I'm in the worst mood when I have to eat a fast food meal. I feel..."processed." And I do miss my family completely - I live so far away from home, it would be nice to translate some old family recipes into something healthy for my own little family (moi + hubby + cat) to enjoy. :)

olivia77: I really like the freezing meals idea - especially since my hubby and I have such strange schedules. Sometimes he gets hungry so late after work, that there is no other resort except to order in...which is so NOT good most of the time.

And crockpot vege and meat stews are so tender...yummers!

(Ditto on the math-hating....numbers are a pain!)

carie87: Hey, let's keep a tally of all those recipe sites! It would be a great resource. :)

luzing: Yes! Let's explore! I was thinking of putting together like a couple of talking points a week - whether here in the forum, or directed journal entries (which would be cool - so we can all get to know each other too!)

For example:

1) POSTING POTLUCK:
Recipes/recipe sites - and how it felt to prepare it, and how it tasted - something really tactile so we can all be encouraged to try these recipes. When I hear chefs describe the color, the taste and the process of preparing a meal, I literally want to run to the kitchen to try it out.

2) HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT:
A new food discovery - anything! Let's become Magellans of the kitchens! New products, a little market down the road, a new low-cal cuisine experience, a travel anecdote...I think the great thing about the Internet is that we can really share some unique food points of view.

3) HAPPY FOOD MEMORIES - THEN AND NOW:
What do you LOVE - I think most of the time we're forced to eat food we really don't like in the first place, and eventually we break down because it's just...well...YUCKY!  Aaybe if we share some stories about what we love about food - the sensations of cooking it, the memories attached to it, etc - and THEN, how do we seek the same kind of experiences TODAY, translating it to a healthy lifestyle?

My best memories of living at home was breakfast - just a freshly-baked roll, fruit picked right off the tree, delicious coffee supplied by a neighbor's farm. I'm trying to start out now by having "memorable" breakfasts with my husband - instead of kissing him goodbye and swilling down a huge pot of coffee!

So happy to "meet" you all - let's keep each other motivated and share the joy!

YAY! (  :

Here's to eating breakfast with our loved ones! I always wished we had done this when I was a kid, but my mom always left for work too early and being a single parent family, it was up to me to get the little ones up, fed, ready and gone on time = my breakfasts were not the leisurely times of memory making. I need to make my boy breakfast more often--he eats the semi-healthy sausage/egg English muffins I make scads of at a time and freeze for his sleepy reheating pleasure. It;s saving us a stop to Mickie D's every morning--and we're buying a house, every penny count!

Anywho---what kinds of breakfasts do you like now, duck? I am learnign to spread my calories throughout my day for the first time ever, so I have a small one usually, but then eat again several hours later, all day long....Me:

sugarfree brown sugar and cinnamon oatmeal (100)
Special K with Strawberries (I think I will try chocolate next time) and light, vanilla soy milk (200)
banana or apple with yogurt
Egg Beaters with either whole wheat high fiber toast (plain, no butter) or a 50 calorie garlic and herb tortilla with a little cheese or salsa
YUM! heck I had an openfaced turkey sandwich with pickles and mustard today =P LOL I had to be somewhere, it was quick and good, and only 110 calories ( :

One of my favorite breakfasts EVER is eggs benedict, but it is a bit high on the calories. I'm thinking of using only egg whites instead of the whole egg (any cal effect here? anybody know?) and less hollandaise sauce. Also, I plan on trying my own recipes for the sauce so I will definitely post the final recipe after I perfect this challenge!

Memories with food? There are so many? My green dinosaur-shaped cake my mom baked for my 11th birthday, Sunday brunch after church of crepes and strawberries, even helping my mom stuff tomatoes for one of her fancy parties she was catering! But now it's just me and the boyfriend. We're busy as bees every day except Saturday we have together. Friday I work and he doesn't, Sunday he works and I don't! (Needless to say, I usually get a lot of housework done on Sunday, tehehe!)

I'm trying to make meals more enjoyable. I don't like buying pre-packaged, frozen, just-nuke-it foods because he usually gets stuck with eating that or fast-food for lunch every day. So whenever I do cook (at LEAST 3 times a week) I always make sure we have something good and healthy. I like making pastas a lot, my mom made a lot, she's Italian and all (couldn't tell, huh?). (BTW: Yes, I saw the movie Like Water for Chocolate and that's EXACTLY my mother; we both absolutely relished that film!)

But I try to have a nice sit-down-at-the-dinner-table meal a couple times a week instead of over on the couch in front of the television. And I always make it a habbit to make a good breakfast every Saturday. I look forward to it every week. My boyfriend and I sleep in and enjoy the morning lounging about, then I shower and start cooking when he hops in, and I'm usually pretty close to finished by the times he's dried off and dressed! Those are the best times and I look forward to Saturday morning brunch every week!

Great thread.

I am in.  I have some recipes to share.  I'll post them after my workout today. 

I like to try new recipes, but it is better if someone else has actually tasted it first b/c I hate to spend time on something and not like it.

I have some picky eater children who are learning to eat healthy instead of junk.  I'll take any suggestions you guys have that have worked for your kids.

A clean kitchen is definitely a happy place to be. 

I love the crock pot, post any favorites you guys have.  I actually have a pot that give me recipes.  But I don't know how healthy all of them are.

Miss GLendale ( :

Never been brave enough to try eggs benedict--always thought it looked...mayo-ish? Egg with yolk I think is 80 each, 1/4 cup (1 egg worth) is only 30 calories, so try it--can't hurt. I don't always go in thinking it's going to be exactly the same---I guess my goal is to make a version of my favorites that are yummy, good for me, and less calories. What;s the sauce made of usually? Could that be doctored up to be better for you?

Case in point---20 calorie a cupcake size cheesecake, anyone? ( : It's not exactly cheesecake like i said above, but it was close enough it made me pretty dang happy.

tlm--do your kids like any veggies or fruits already? like breakfast food? drink milk, juice, water, soda? I'd love to help--I was not a picky eater and I wish my mom had fed us better than she was able. ( ; The Next Generation--onward and upward!

Learning that cooking good healthy meals is actually enjoyable has been a Godsend for me! I'm in!

I don't really have any recipes to share... mostly I just randomly throw things together and 95% of the time it tastes good. The other 5%... er... not so much. lol.

I'll probably be lurking in here more than actually posting, but thanks for starting this thread.

now... tell me more about this 20 calorie cheesecake :)

Super easy!

Boil (I did it in the micro) 1/2 cup water. Dissolve any flavor sugar free gelatin in the water. Dump 2 cups low fat cottage cheese in blender, then the jello mixture, sweetener to taste, I even added a little lite whip cream, but I don't think it added much. Blend until all clumps are gone. I poured mine straight from blender into cupcake/muffin cups and refridgerate until set. I used strawberry jello and they turned out a scary pink color....I might use some other flavor next time or try out the cocoa powder variation I found here too.

2 cups low fat cottage cheese 160 calories
jello 20 calories
2-3 tbsp lite whip cream and/or sweetener (optional) (up to maybe 30 calories)
= 17.5 calories each--I got 12 cupcake size cheesecakes.

I made these for a birthday---a bunch of guys who don;t do diet food, so I didn;t tell them.....They loved them. We had cut up strawberries too and I skipped icecream and cake and had one of these and some frozen whip cream instead. I felt like i had yummy dessert AND didn't feel bad. ( :

(remember--it;s not exactly like real cheesecake, but it was creamy, sweet, and I was happy. ( : ) I even used them on following days as a delicious spread for my low cal caramel mini rice cakes!

low-cal cheesecake: okay, seriously yummy sounding!

Oh yes, my kids are already trying some veggies and fruits.  My middle child is most adventurous eater.  He has a big appetite and was the main motivator for me to really change their eating and not just my own.  As much as he eats, if  he ate only kid favorites, he'd be completely round one day.  He's the only one who will take the salad on his sandwiches, or even eat salad alone.  He loves carrots, grapes, basically all fruits.  He'll try anything as long as you tell him what it tastes like.

The other two sometimes try and sometimes don't they liked cooked carrots to my surprise.  My son liked seasoned veggies.  I never seasoned them before, so I have to try more of that.

They thought the grilled veggies were okay.  So, I figure it is a matter or trying new recipes and also continuing to offer them.  I used to just not offer it b/c I thought the wouldnt eat it. But they are slowly realizing it isn't just garnish.

My favorite food memory from childhood.... I'd have to say it is from when all of us kids (I have a brother and a sister) would help Mom make pizza from scratch. We'd help with the whole process, from making the crust to the toppings. Best pizza I've ever had. Probably the pizza with the most calories too. lol She would put two or three different kinds of cheese on a pizza, as many different meats as she could think of, vegetables, all sorts of good stuff. They would get to be two or three inches thick. We would laugh and joke the entire time too. We didn't always get to see a lot of her growing up, so it was really nice to have that time.

Now, my favorite food memories are any time dear hubby bakes something for me. I don't eat sugar whenever I can avoid it, so now he researches things he can make without sugar and bakes them for me. Pies, cakes, a blueberry grunt once (really, that's what he called it). Then we'll each have a piece. It always gives us an extra chance to talk and relax. Good times.

Reading through, this is such a great thread. 

One of my biggest issues was eating breakfast.  I found a quick fix for those rushed mornings.  I always have tomatoes and fresh spinach on hand so this one is simple enough for me.

Take a bit of olive oil and saute some garlic for 1 minute.  (I keep  a jar of pre-chopped garlic in the fridge for stuff like this.) Toss in 1 cup of spinach and as much diced tomato as you'd like. I usually use a whole medium-sized tomato.  Saute for 2 mins.  Crack open an egg, toss that in the pan and scramble it up.  If you are so inclined, add a bit of cheese. I often used about 1 TBSP of feta because it's potent and goes a long way.  The calories are pretty low.  You start the day with a couple servings of veggies and the protein in the egg helps keep you full.  If you need some carbs, a slice of whole wheat toast can round it out.

And homemade pizza is the best! 

tlm ( :

I am glad to hear you have one adventurous eater! Could he help you, by being the cool brother I am sure he is, and peer pressure the others just a little to at least try new things?

I have no kids, but like I said, I would have really liked it if my mom taught me how to eat healthy my whole life vs. convenience foods due to working so much/single mom. I am addicted to (don;t laugh) "Honey, We;re Killing the Kids!" The one I just watched hit close to home---single mom, 2 very bratty, lazy, unhealthy kids.....SHe did everything for them---and the coolest part of the whole show for me was when the doctor in charge asked her to have the girls HELP her cook in the kitchen. Do you know they tried and loved everything healthy thing put in front of them after literally not eating or barfing at the table every night before that one? I loved cooking with my mom when she had time----could you do this? Little ones can tear up lettuce etc or stir or help measure, bigger ones can maybe chop etc. This principle also applies in the grocery store---we always all had "jobs" (look for sale signs, can you find me an.....eggplant, watch for things we have coupons for etc) and it helped my wild at times little brother and sister behave themselves and we had fun as family.

Best recipe I saw on there (I tricked my bf with it) sshhhh, the mom sauteed a bunch of veggies on the stove (you could oven roast--yum!), blended up the results and called it spaghetti sauce. Ta da! The girls liked that one too. It was good.

One time at our church, they had a free/family "learn to cook" thing we all went to---super fun and it got us involved in making food choices. Anywhere like that for you--church, community center, nearby college? Could you and your mom friends put on one of your own? There's something about getting to wear funny hats that always makes for a good time...Do they have any kid favorites that could be modified to be better for them? My mom makes a mean chicken nugget at home--I was disgusted the first time I had a McNugget. It's all how you frame it for them! ( :

I didn't realize until I was typing this how very much I wish my mom had taught me better eating habits, how sorry I am that I waited this long to get healthy myself, how glad i am I found cc!