9 Days of Dinner

I’ve had a lot of people ask me more about food when it comes to a balanced life. I wrote a blog about my approach a while back, basically, I view each day as a bank account of food and try to balance what I eat throughout the week, not just a day:

If you have a scrumptious, sugary baked good for breakfast, try for more veggies at lunch and more protein for dinner. If you start your day with a protein-packed omelet, go ahead and grab that ice cream bowl after dinner. The same goes for portion sizes, more at one meal, less at the next.

Then of course, I use my cardinal rule which if you’ve been following along you’ve heard a lot, Know Thyself: There is absolutely 100% no such thing as a “one size fits all” approach to wellness.

To achieve balance, you absolutely HAVE to stop listening to what “they” do, and start listening to your own body. Just because one person drinks butter for breakfast and has a ton of energy from it, doesn’t mean you will (and it might, in fact, make you feel sick). Cutting carbs may give your friend endless results, but might make you tired and miserable. You simply have to tune in and get real about what YOUR body wants—using mindfulness helps a whole lot.

For me, that means I eat the vast majority of my daily food at dinner. My stomach doesn’t like large meals for breakfast and lunch and neither does my energy. I’m a pretty boring breakfast and lunch eater actually.

Breakfast: 90 percent of the time, breakfast is a protein bar or cereal. I prefer Aloha bars (low sugar, high protein, keeps me full). For cereal, I look for low-sugar, high fiber, options. I am currently loving Heritage Flakes with unsweetened almond milk, some sort of fruit and a splash of honey.

Lunch is typically a salad with some sort of nuts, cheese and fruit with balsamic vinegar and apple juice for a dressing (oil doesn’t work for me during the day). Second option is a slice of Ezekiel bread (I’m not gluten-free, I just like it :)), half an avocado and some sort of lettuce or shoots on top, plus a small bag of a crunchy snack (popcorn most of the time, sometimes Pop Chips, Veggie Straws, Pirates Booty, you get the idea :)).

Snacks: Most of the time I have a snack between all meals – an apple, chocolate dipped almonds (I adore chocolate peanut butter Skinny Dipped Almonds), or I’ll save the crunchy snack for my afternoon snack and eat a little more with my avocado toast like some cottage cheese, an egg, fruit or nuts. And always something sweet after lunch—a piece or two of Dove chocolate and/or what people make fun of me for calling “sucky candy” (aka hard candy).

Dinner! On to the main event! This is where I shine. A. I adore cooking (see this blog), it relaxes me and is very much a form of meditation for me. B. Eating a big dinner also relaxes me and almost feels like a mini celebration for making it through the day. C. I make damn good food—there I said it.

So here’s a picture of nine days of eating, I’ll outline what each one is below.

A few things to know first:

1. My husband and I went full veg when we eat at home at the beginning of the year. We started eating less and less meat and we just both really prefer vegetables. Is it healthy? Yes, of course. But our main driver was really food preference and if we end up lowering his genetically highish cholesterol in the process, that’s a bonus. We also get our veggies from the best farm share ever! So we get a TON of vegetables, and to use them all before they go bad you gotta cook a lot of them for one meal. We eat meat when we’re out for dinner or at other events, we aren’t vegetarians.
   
   
2. I adore cooking with a glass of wine, but I try to balance it by either having wine while I cook or dessert after dinner, not both. Dessert is pretty much always Kemps frozen yogurt (Moose Tracks to be exact). And if I have wine, I usually still nibble on a few more pieces of candy after dinner, my body definitely craves sweets after meals.
   
   
3. With dinner I drink Zevia and water 80 percent of the time, the other 20 percent, a splash more of wine. I drink a ton of water throughout the day, coffee only in the morning sadly or it will keep me awake—usually 2-3 cups with a little oat milk (or a Starbucks, I can’t help how much a coffee with soy from there warms my soul).
   
   
4. I fully recognize I don’t always eat the most affordable options, and my diet is not accessible to everyone. I believe most people choose a few things in life where they invest the most money, food is that for me. I value food so much, I spend a lot on it, and I buy my jeans at Old Navy. However, I am beyond blessed to have achieved the level of success that I have AND have fought (and continue to fight) my depression to get there and to stay there.

Here’s 9 days of dinner:

Day 1: Saturday, watching the football game. Homemade nachos with all of the fixings and tons of veggies (cabbage, garden tomatoes, radishes), homemade salsa leftover from another meal and homemade guacamole. This was more of a lunch meal since the game was early but my main meal for the day.

Day 2: Soup Sunday, most Sundays we have soup. I make a mean veggie soup if I do say so myself and usually raid our fridge for whatever veggies might go bad the quickest. I think this one had summer squash, peppers, corn off the cob, tomatoes, some almond milk to make it a little creamy and some fresh cilantro. Soup in our house always comes with cheesy bread and for some reason, I love to eat pickles with soup. I try to buy cheese that is lower in fat naturally so I usually buy an Italian blend.

Day 3: Whole wheat pasta with Trader Joe’s autumn pasta sauce (hooray, it’s back and I love it), with a side of sauteed kale, summer squash and eggplant.

Day 4: Jackfruit with barbeque sauce (I love this local bbq sauce), on an Ezekiel English muffin with cheese, grilled potatoes and corn on the cob (we use Earth Balance for our day-to-day “butter”) and lots of salt of course.

Day 5: Veggie chili, veggies and ranch (we eat Bolthouse yogurt-based ranch), soup crackers.

Day 6: Tomato soup (Pacific brand); kale salad with strawberries, blueberries and blue cheese (someone a while ago turned me on to sesame oil, honey and vinegar as a kale salad dressing and I can’t get enough of it), and more cheesy bread (NOTE we don’t usually eat soup three times in one week but I wasn’t feeling great :)).

Day 7: Charcuterie and scones from Fariner Bakery in Ashland. Those scones…I’m still thinking about them, they were magnificent. This was more of a late lunchtime meal but was my main one that day.

Day 8: Deli fried chicken and deli bean salad, broccoli salad and pasta salad. Another Saturday game day meal, I was SO HUNGRY that day, I almost ate everything on this plate.

Day 9: Another soup Sunday, this time spicy eggplant stew with chickpeas, kale and tomatoes. A new recipe I will 100% be making again. (PS I don’t use a lot of recipes, but I’ve been using more than I normally would now that we’re all veg at home, trying to keep it a little creative).

So there it is, more than you probably wanted to know about how I eat in this balanced life. I really enjoyed taking these dinner photos, I might keep it up. 🙂

Here’s wishing you a week of wonderful, nourishing food, and whatever else your soul might be craving to keep enjoying your version of balance.

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