Food on the mind (again)

One of the big reasons I've done June and July Challenges is to help myself get on track with my eating. I could probably easily eat my entire day's worth of calories in one sitting if I really get going. Or, when I go out, I could probably accidentally do it (have you ever checked out the calories in some restaurant meals - it's ridiculous!). So, one of my big things has been tracking what I eat and eating a serving size, rather than the portion I would normally grab. That's why you guys get to see a lot of photos of my food, because it helps me to visualize what "normal" looks like when I have to spend a weekend without my food scale.

Today for breakfast, I had a bagel thin.

This photo is recycled - I still didn't have my camera!

For my morning snacks, I had some organic watermelon and some organic strawberries I got this weekend at Whole Foods. Normally, I'd have a South Beach High Protein Peanut Butter bar. I like them because they're low in carbs, high in protein, and super delicious. However, Kraft has recently decided to stop making them. Gah! I don't know what I'm going to do now because granola bars really aren't good for you (according to Mark they're mostly sugar) and these were pretty cheap. Sigh. I may switch to Luna Bars, but I can't find them in large supply in Midland (hint, hint Ann Arbor friends!).


At lunch, I had my typical English muffin pizza with some fruit. I also added some turkey for a protein boost since I didn't get to have my protein bar.

I don't know why this shot refuses to rotate - sorry about that - my phone is not the best replacement camera. For my afternoon snack, I packed some more grapes and a Lemon Zest Luna bar (which actually has 10g of protein, but also packs a few more grams of carbs and 40 more calories than my SB bars).


After work, I got my new SD card so I had to test my camera immediately!

Bailey wasn't out yet, so my living room had to suffice as my photographic subject. Please notice how clean it is. That's because I spent an hour cleaning last night... Anywho, after setting up my new camera, I headed to the gym to work out with Mark. Fortunately, the cycling room was taken so we couldn't do the same intense cardio workout we did yesterday. Bummer. But hopefully we do it a few more times so I can learn it and do it by myself at school - ya know, in case I go insane soon ever get that motivated again.


Once I was home from the gym, I made some dinner: garlic shrimp and green beans. And because I'm trying to be healthy, I steam my green beans and just use Pam to spray my butter so as to use less.

Steaming the beans 

Sautéing the garlic in a spray of butter

Once my beans were steamed, I added some lemon juice and nutmeg to up the flavor. My mom has always made her green beans this way (plus some butter, which I left out to save calories).

It all came together pretty well in less than a half hour!

Yummy dinner

When I was done inputting all my calories (and found I still had lots of room for food!), I decided to make myself a bit of dessert: an oatmeal cookie of sorts. I got the idea from this blog. You use the following ingredients to make a healthy oatmeal snack.

If you go to the link above for the site I stole the idea from, there are step-by-step directions. However, instead of letting it sit overnight, I simply threw my cookie in the freezer for 20 minutes and then gobbled it up. 

Tonight was my first time trying it with vanilla protein powder rather than chocolate and I'm not sure which I prefer. I think the chocolate had more flavor, but it was a tad overpowering. The vanilla seemed more subtle. We shall see. I like both enough to continue making them. And they're not terrible for you!

The first column is calories, the second carbs, the third fat, and the fourth protein. I don't know that I could ever eat this for a meal, but I like adding it in as a snack.


Anywho, I spend a lot of my day obsessing about food if you hadn't already noticed. I'm pretty much either thinking about it, eating it, or logging the calories for it. And to help myself keep things straight (in case I can't log everything right away), I keep pads of paper next to my food scale so I can log it all later.

It's pretty tedious some days, but it keeps me in my daily ranges!

My daily ranges

And though I may be way under or slightly over, I at least have an idea of what I'm putting in my body and I think that's what really matters. I even have the SparkPeople app on my phone so that I can track when I'm away from my computer - I'm glad being healthy isn't inconvenient!


How do you control your portion sizes? Do you think about what you're going to eat this much?