Food: You Have To Eat It

Food. To live one must eat food. There really is no other option.

Food. People fight over it all. the time. Eat this. Eat that. Don't eat this. This will kill you. That will help you. The next week it will kill you. 

Food. Some people claim that food is for sustaining purposes only. I disagree heartily. Food is so much more than just sustaining. Food can be beautiful, healthy, delicious, and full of love. Good food brings people together. Certain food smells evoke amazing memories of places and times. 

Since the fire, food has become something to stuff in my mouth. Stressed? Buy Cheetos. Tired? Order pizza. Sick of living at someone else's house or feeling like a nuisance? Go to a restaurant. The list could go on....for days. While this was not an inherently bad thing in the beginning, we are now at the point where it needs to change. 

But now....now it is time to buckle down and hunker in again. The time has come for chopping, sauteing, baking, blending. The time of massive quantities of sugar and grains has ended. The fat has been added to my midline. The fat needs to go. The bad food that makes my stomach hurt but is oh-so-easy to purchase has got to go out the door. Yuck. I consider it a good thing that my digestive system is healthy enough to be able to note and heartily remind me that the food I've been eating is bad. A few years ago this would not have been true, so some progress has been made.

Fall surrounds us, though, and I heartily adore fall foods. I enjoy eating at a table and not on the sofa. I sincerely love cooking a meal with my husband.

So, whether you really care or not, I'm going to write about this new journey. Why? Because I need somewhere to write about it, process it, and I need a reason to show the world something about it. In some small way, it is good accountability. Therefore, I have made a meal plan for the next two weeks. I am going to post it. I am going to post pictures of our supper and potentially breakfast. 

I am not really doing this for anyone else. I am doing this for myself. To remind myself of how good I feel when we eat healthy food. To remind myself that it tastes better, it looks better, it feels better. To remind myself that spending out to eat money ends up making me feel pissed off. And, really, all the food in these pictures is currently somewhere, preserved, in my house. So I clearly have enough food to eat. Please comment and follow along if you are remotely interested. I'd love to hear how other people work and walk through these journeys. Oh, how our world has messed up the beauty of food.

We're going to be gone this weekend, so Sunday night is the official beginning. I will link to any online recipe sources as the meals actually happen.

October 14: Supper: Calabacitas, rice, brussel sprouts
October 15: Breakfast: yogurt and granola, apple; Supper: Butternut Squash and Apple Soup, roasted beets
October 16: Breakfast: eggs with veggies, pears; Supper: Coconut Curry with veggies over quinoa
October 17: Breakfast: yogurt and granola, apple; Supper: Kale, Portobello and Potato bake, pears
October 18: Breakfast: eggs with veggies, fruit; Supper: Borscht, Marinated Kale Salad
October 19: Breakfast: yogurt and granola, fruit; Supper: Turnip and Leek Gratin, Spicy Salmon
October 20: Breakfast: cranberry walnut scones, smoothie; Supper: Venison Bourginon over potatoes
October 21: Breakfast: scones, smoothie; Supper: Potato Leek Soup, roasted squash
October 22: Breakfast: eggs with veggies, fruit; Supper: Brats, sauteed peppers and onions, sauteed turnips
October 23: Breakfast: eggs with veggies, fruit; Supper: Stuffed Acorn Squash, sauteed cabbage
October 24: Breakfast: baked oatmeal; Supper: Tomato Bacon Lentils, Honey Mustard Carrots
October 25: Breakfast: baked oatmeal; Supper: Roasted Red Pepper Salmon Bake with Spaghetti Squash
October 26: Breakfast: eggs, fruit; Supper: Black Bean Soup, Sweet Potato Fries

This menu plan is not any different from how we typically eat at our house. This is pretty standard stuff. I currently have almost everything in my house aside from milk, chicken broth (my chickens still aren't ready from the farmer so store bought broth - gross), and mushrooms. From the farmer's market we'll definitely need kale and hopefully more brussel sprouts. As you can see, we really love soup and simple breakfast. We don't really like things from boxes. We also don't eat a ton of meat. We choose to buy ethically raised meats, which means they are more expensive. I buy meat directly from farmers, so we just eat less of it.

See you Sunday.