"Light", Fat-free and Sugar-Free CRAP

So I mentioned yesterday that I wanted to address the topic of "diet foods" which just seem to get more and more ridiculous as time goes on. Don't even get me started on the 100-calorie packs that have taken over the shelves of our local markets!

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First off, I'd like to state that my childhood may have been different than most. My baby food was homemade, my veggies came straight from our garden and there were many local orchards where we picked fresh fruit in the summer. My parents never had any sort of diet foods in the house. We had pure maple syrup on our homemade pancakes, Adam's peanut butter on our wheat toast and never once did I see my mom substitute applesauce, Splenda or a "flax egg" in place of the real thing while baking. The only thing I remember her scaling back was the amount of sugar in recipes - which both she and I still do to this day. There were no diet pills or magical elixirs in our cabinets. No sugar-free condiments or fat-free packaged foods. Food was always fresh, whole and homemade. It was outside of our home where my fascination with "diet foods" began.

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I will be the first to admit that I have fallen victim to the pull of "diet foods" various times in my life. I have memories of riding the bus in middle school and my best friend and I would each bring a Yoplait yogurt for breakfast to eat on the way to school. She always had the light versions and to me that was "better" than what I had. My mom tried to teach me the evils of aspartame even then but why would a 12 year old girl care about artificial sweeteners? All I wanted was to fit in and eat the non-fat and sugar-free versions of foods that all of my friends did.

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I would go over to that same friend's house where her mom kept packs of Dexatrim and other weight loss supplements in her cabinets. I remember thinking it was so strange to see a house full of light mayo, nonfat cookies and sugar free everything and yet she still had to use Dexatrim? It just didn't fit.

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But I still had my own battles to fight. In college I lived on fat-free dressings, sugar-free artificially flavored yogurts, cheap low-fat mac & cheese, Ramen noodles (had to put that one in there!) and rice cakes topped with sugar-free jam or lowfat peanut butter. I also learned that none of those foods did me any good. I crave whole foods now and I can't even imagine getting a lowfat version of nut butters! I eat them just for the fat now! :)

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I bring this topic up because on my recent trip to my mother-in-law's house I saw some disturbing things. Her refrigerator had light mayo, Smart Balance light, sugar free maple syrup, Sara Lee low cal bread and reduced fat peanut butter. Dave remembers his mom measuring & weighing everything she ate when he was young. He said she was ALWAYS on a diet. Diet soda is their drink of choice and I tell you this honestly, when there were 12 people sharing one house I was the ONLY one who drank water. Even our little 2 year old niece was given Capri Sun, juice boxes and Dr. Pepper to drink when I could tell all she wanted was water. Same with our 6 year old nephew - he wasn't given any water the whole weekend. Just pop and juice (although I hardly think Capri Sun qualifies as juice.)

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It was so sad to see them eating their pancakes Sunday morning covered in sugar-free maple syrup (HFCS!) and drinking diet coke. For breakfast!!!! I tell you what, my kids will never know what fake sweeteners taste like. They will grow up just like I did. Fresh foods and no fake, processed crap. The only potentially fattening food I purchase in non-fat form is dairy!

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Ok rant over! Sorry about that. I may have gotten off track a little there but the real reason I bring this up is the same reason I would love to be a nutritionist. To help get these products off the shelves! If I could sit down with my MIL and tell her just how bad those foods really are and what they are doing to her body I would. I just know how hard she's trying to lose weight and I wish I could tell her that if she just went back to basics instead of buying all that deadly processed food she would drop those extra pounds. Anyone else agree?? I know many of you are just as passionate as I am about this!

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Speaking of whole and delicious foods, let's look at some shall we? Breakfast yesterday was a fancy bowl of oatmeal. Ok, not so fancy but I had just the right amount of yogurt left to mix into my oats so I just decided to use one less dish. Topped with blueberries and cashew butter.

Mid-morning snack: peach and a couple of hairy kiwis

Lunch: sweet potato topped with laughing cow & hummus - Can you tell I need to go grocery shopping??
Well, grocery shop I did and here is the loot. I haven't done a grocery post on here in a while so here goes:
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Produce: baby spinach, zucchini, bell peppers, kabocha, broccoli, carrots, broccoli sprouts, avocado, bananas and apricots.

Bars: some of these are for Dave....
Other assorted goods: raw bulk almonds, frozen chicken burrito (for Dave), Annies mac and cheese, roasted turkey breast, Kashi Go Lean, Oikos, canned salmon, Thai peanut sauce, Bengal Lentils microwave meal and PB&Co's Cinnamon Raisin.

This is my first PB&Co product so I was really excited to try it.... I opened it and proceeded to eat a couple servings straight from the jar with a butter knife. :) This could be bad...the cinnamon is to die for and those little raisins are so addicting.

I also had a protein/fat plate to snack on since my day was pretty carb heavy. Turkey, pepper jack cheese, mustard and avocado.

I made lettuce wraps for dinner. They came out ok but I wish I had the sauce that they give you at PF Changs, that stuff is incredible!

Head lettuce from our garden. I sauteed zucchini, a green bell pepper (also from our garden), onion and mushrooms with some vegetable stock and garlic powder. I added some shredded boiled turkey breast at the end and then topped it with some chopped carrots for crunch.

There also may have been some more avocado thrown into each of my wraps :)

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Dessert: 2 fresh apricots - YUM

I hope everyone is having a great day, eat your veggies and fresh foods. If you do anything for yourself this week try to cut out one vice that you wish you didn't have. My goal this week is to eat less carbs than I have been lately, especially at dinnertime. It makes me feel run down and then I just crave them more!