This Is Me Maria

Find out the nutritional information of your favorite McMeal.

Now if I could just get this info to appear on the menu at every fast food place, along with the list of “ingredients”, I’d have an automatic fast food deterrent in place at all times. I don’t know about you but I don’t read food labels of crap food if I plan to eat it. Maybe I should read them now when I’m not hungry so I’ll remember the ick when I’m about to inhale it.

-maria

For winter quarter I am taking a nutrition class. They shoved us right in by starting us off watching Super Size Me. If you haven’t seen this, you need to see it. I have new found motivation to resume my anti-fast food kick. My husband and children are not thrilled but the longer we can ward off things like liver failure, obesity, diabetes and colonoscopies - the better.

The thing that struck me the most was how much companies like the golden arches target and groom children to be lifetime consumers of their products. They do a good job of explaining that in the documentary. That part made me cry.

I stumbled across the entire Super Size Me film online so you can check it out.

So far the class is teaching me the reasons behind a lot of the things most of us already know. Just as with my biology class, the more I learn about the human body and how it works, the easier it is to make better decisions. Just as I said in my personal blog the other day:

“Be Cool. Stay in School!”

-maria

My kids love popsicles and truth be told, we really enjoy them on hot days. However I am hesitant to purchase any popsicles because they are so full of sugar.

A great alternative that I have enjoyed since childhood is to make my own popsicles from pureed fruit. In fact, I still have the Tupperware popsicle molds that my mom used when I was kid.

If you don’t have any popsicle molds, fill your ice cube trays with popsicle mix, cover in foil and then poke a popsicle stick into each one cube. You can also fill small paper cups, cover those with foil and then poke popsicle sticks or plastic spoons into them as well.

Here are some of our favorite fruitsicles.

• Watermelon popsicles; just puree watermelon chunks and pour into your popsicle molds. You’ll want to either use seedless watermelon, puree really well or just make sure to pick out all of the seeds. You could also run your puree through a strainer to make sure you got out all of the seeds.

• Avocado pops are a surprisingly filing and delicious snack. Puree avocado with milk, ice and a bit of sugar as if you are making a smoothie and then pour into your popsicle molds.

• A little bit of water or 100% natural juice mixed with blueberries, strawberries and raspberries makes a colorful and tasty popsicle.

• If you have a juice maker, just toss in your favorite mixture of fruit and maybe even a few rich veggies and you’ll have the perfect mix of fruit to pour into your popsicle molds.

• For older children you can even put little pieces of fruit or grapes into your popsicles for a chunkier popsicle with fruit surprises. I like to put little pieces of fruit into ice cubes too, they add nice little bit of flavor to all of the water being consumed this time of year.

Here is a link to some popsicle molds I found on Amazon. I recommend a sturdy plastic because the softer plastics will warp and become difficult to use eventually.

This post at That’s Fit is rather alarming. Seeing as both my husband and daughter seem to possibly be allergic to wheat, I don’t mind making the move to get it out the house permanently. We are already very happy with the spelt, flax and other whole grain products available at Whole Foods and PCC Natural Markets.

What do you think about this information? Any experiences with wheat products you would like to share?

We had a delicious pot roast with homemade bread for dinner tonight. I barely spent any time working on it though.

Last night while grocery shopping, I picked up a small pot roast and some frozen organic veggies.

I braised the roast, put in some water & beef bullion cubes (that is what I had around the house, was all out organic beef stock) and left it on very low over night in my dutch oven.

This morning I dumped in the frozen veggies, cut up the potatoes we had into quarters and dumped those in too.

I quickly tossed all the ingredients for french bread into the bread maker before breakfast was even done.

When we came home this evening everything was done and so very good.

Yesterday I FINALLY after 2+ years of living 10 freeway minutes away; visited PCC Natural Markets. It is similar to Whole Foods except smaller.

I am very glad I went and will go more often because Whole Foods is 15 minutes away; which is a long drive for someone who lives 30 seconds from a grocery store who has greatly increased their organic selection.

Anyway I bought a pound or so of organic popcorn corns in bulk. Tonight my husband popped them up on the stove with a little bit of butter and salt. It was oh so good. I would totally recommend giving this a try. We had very few unpopped corns.

Making your own popcorn only takes a few minutes.

Step 1: Make sure pan is fairly hot (medium hot).

Step 2: Butter bottom of pan.

Step 3: Cover the bottom of pan with popcorn corns.

Step 4: Cover with a vented lid.

Step 5: Stand over the pot and jiggle and toss every minute or so. Listen for the popcorn popping and toss or jiggle as it slows. When the popping stops carefully remove the lid.

Let it cool for a minute and enjoy or add a light sprinkling of melted butter and salt.

With in just a few minutes from start to finish; you’ll have great popcorn.