Welcome to my newly instated food blog!
So, why a blog about food? Those of you who know me
understand that I am a huge foodie: basically, I. Love. Food. And it’s as
simple as that. However, in light of recent events, healthy food has started to
take increasing precedence in my life (these shall be detailed later). Not that
I grew up eating unhealthy food (well, except for the occasional hash browns
and cinnamon rolls from McDonald’s when I was a kid – I’ve been McDonald’s free
going on three years this March, and even before that unfortunate bite into a cheeseburger,
I hadn’t had Mickey D’s for at least two or three years). My parents made sure
that they cooked healthy meals for my sister and I, and ensured that we ate our
vegetables, as disgusting as they were at a young age. Now I am beyond thankful
for the way I was brought up, and value the time my parents put into telling me
to eat my peas and beets. And now I simply adore
beets! My parents must be so proud.
Now onto recent events (which are also reasons):
Reason #1. I am currently studying abroad with 70 other
students from Pepperdine University in Lausanne, Switzerland. Since we don’t
have a fully functional kitchen or fully employed kitchen staff, we eat out
three nights a week – Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. And since we have
three-day weekends to travel, we have Thursday night through Sunday night to
fend for ourselves (with the exception of breakfast, which is served daily). At
the beginning of the semester abroad, I stocked up on pasta and rice for the
weekends I wasn’t traveling, as well as Thursday evenings, when I was always
home. Pre-made pizza and tortellini were also popular choices. Since I had been
eating homemade food all summer, the transition into greasy and unhealthy
restaurant food made me feel like complete garbage. I felt slow, overweight
(even though I knew I wasn’t), clogged by grease, unhealthy, and unhappy with
my personal health. As I realized just how terrible these foods were making me
feel, I began looking for a better alternative to restaurant food and carbs all
week: cooking for myself (and two boys who joined me on my cooking crusade in
order to learn how to cook) with lots and lots of veggies, with healthy Pinterest
recipes as my inspiration.
Reason #2. At the beginning of Christmas break, I stayed
with a family in Geneva that has a son that attends Pepperdine. One night I had
a long discussion with the mother of the family about her gluten-, sugar-,
GMO-, and dairy-free diet. She told me about how these products are harmful for
you body, and her doctor’s advice on eating sans these products (dairy and
sugar I had heard about from my mother, but I didn’t know about gluten). I
won’t get into the details, but I came to realize that her lifestyle change was
a wise choice. I’ve been trying (unsuccessfully) to get myself off of sugar,
but it’s been so hard, especially since I love sweet foods, sweet teas, sweet
anything. Her determination to keep sugar out of her house was inspiring to me.
And the whole time I visited, I never put an ounce of sugar in my tea (not like
there was any around).
Reason #3. My dad is allergic to practically everything
food-wise: wheat, sugar, yeast, pumpkin, cashews, garlic, and mushrooms, just
to name a few. So sometimes when my mom cooks dinner she has to make two
different dishes – one my dad can eat and one the three of us girls can eat
(this mostly regards wheat). However, after eating gluten-free bread for a week
(which I understand had yeast in it), I felt healthy from and happy about my
temporary diet. This pushed me to seek gluten-free alternatives for meals, and
to find some great gluten-free blogs on the internet.
Reason #4. Two of the girls studying abroad with me are
highly allergic to gluten. Of the four different restaurants we frequent
throughout the semester, they can only comfortably eat at one, which is a sad
excuse for a Mexican restaurant (I’ve even stopped going because it’s so
disgusting). Since I want to cook gluten-free meals, and want to build
community in my house, cooking meals with them on weekends is the perfect way
to start my crusade against unhealthy foods! Plus, they’re amazing girls, so
why wouldn’t I want to cook with them? As they say, community is built over
food.
Reason #5. Very recently, as in very early this morning, I
got food poisoning. From what, my friends keep asking me. From the
quintessential place to get food poisoning: from a buffet restaurant. I went
because the woman whose apartment we’re renting for the week said it was a
cheap and tasty alternative. I don’t know what she got. For the most part, I had a pretty big salad, with a little
bit of fried chicken. And overall, the meal was less than satisfactory.
Compared with the most delicious salad I’d had just two days prior, this was nasty. But it was lunch and we paid for
it, so I ate all that I could handle. I’ve never gotten food poisoning before,
so I didn’t really consider it to be a risk. Plus this is Switzerland.
Everything here is expensive, so why would they have food poisoning-inducing
food? Turns out I was very wrong. I’ll spare you the gruesome details of my morning,
but man that food has left me feeling sicker than a dog. Even a small gulp of
water makes me feel like I’m about to hurl. But that said, this food poisoning
came at the most opportune time: just last night I was telling two of my close
friends about how I’m starting a food blog, because I want to keep myself accountable
for eating healthily, and to maybe spread some ideas around about how eating
healthy in and of itself can make you feel oh,
so amazing! Take, for example, the first full weekend I stayed in Lausanne
and cooked healthy food: after just a day and a half of eating real, homemade food, I was feeling more
energetic, healthier, happier, skinnier, more like my real self. Of course,
there was nothing I could do about the restaurant food: my parents had already
paid for it, and Pepperdine was then paying for it, so I might as well keep
going (I’m considering working out a different option this next semester so
that I can cook and get my CHF 20 back every night to shop for groceries
instead).
Reason #6. At our final banquet for the semester, I was
awarded with “The Next Rachael Ray” Paper Plate Award for always being found
cooking in the kitchen on weekends; naturally, I have to make that come true!
Last, and definitely most importantly:
Reason #7. Food is our sustenance. It keeps us going, it
gives us energy, it makes our growling tummies happy, it makes us healthy. I’m no expert on nutrition, but
I know that eating right can be the
difference between feeling like a summer slug and feeling like a dashing deer.
If you’re good to your body, it’ll be good back; none of this starving yourself
to get skinny! That is complete and utter rubbish! And none of this stuffing yourself
as full as a turkey with fatty and sugary, and even healthy, food because
“there’s no point in limiting myself – I’ll never be skinny.” That’s complete
and utter rubbish too! In fact, I believe that the whole aim of being
Hollywood-skinny is complete and utter rubbish. I do confess to thinking that
I’m not skinny enough – it’s hard not to, and I can empathize with you, because
I’ve gone through these phases myself. You were made the way you were, and
quite frankly, there’s nothing you can do about it, except to maintain your body and keep it healthy. I was born with
an athletic body – I’m short and stocky – and while I’ll never, ever be tall or
slender enough to be a runway model, it is my duty to instead focus my energy
and attention onto doing what’s best for my body: eating the right foods. Sure,
there are many other factors included in maintaining a healthy body, such as
exercising (in moderation!! Side
note: I tried doing Insanity this past summer every single day to make sure I could complete the sixty days the
day before leaving for Switzerland – i.e., I didn’t take Sundays off, as
instructed – as well as running three or four times a week and doing yoga, and
ended up with shin splints three weeks in, which I still have, five months
later. I actually started it a week after “recovering” from minor shin pain. In
my opinion, running and insanity is not necessarily the best exercise, especially
for those prone to back problems. If you’d like to know more about my opinion
on exercise and what will do your body an actual service, feel free to ask!),
drinking lots of water (which I need
to make a better habit, admittedly), and sleeping enough – as in going to bed
and waking up early instead of staying up until the wee hours of the morning
(I’m sure there are studies on this, but from personal experience I feel much
more energized when I don’t fall into a late routine). All of these things are essential
to living a healthy life, and depend on one another to keep a healthy,
energetic, and fit body. But until I recover from my nasty shin splints, I’m
going to be working on my eating and drinking habits. Like I said, my attraction
to sugar has always existed – after meals I’ll crave something sweet. Which is
fine. But now, instead of reaching for that delicious Swiss chocolate, I’ll
reach for an orange, or an apple, or a peach instead. Additionally, I don’t
like water. Why? Probably because it’s not sweet; it has no flavor, and
sometimes it tastes dusty to me (I have sensitive taste buds – at least that’s
what my family has decided). The only way I’ll really drink it is with lemon. Mmm. Give me some of that and lemon
water will be the death of me! (Fun fact: you can actually overdose on water. I
never considered it to be an actual possibility, but it can happen) So drinking
water has been a challenge for my entire life. And I intend to cure myself of
this aversion to water.
Goals:
- Cooking healthy foods for a cleaner, healthier, livelier
me!
- Drinking water!!!!
- Eating a greater variety of whole grains
- Avoiding eating out as much as possible, and ordering the
healthiest meal possible on the menu
- Cutting down on meat, and perhaps beginning a vegetarian
lifestyle
- Avoiding using dairy products (so hard when all the
amazing recipes seem to have cheese)
- Trying to keep
GMOs out of my diet (this can be hard, since not everything is labeled, and
since so much of our food is GMO
these days)
- Limiting my sugar intake to every once in a while
- Eating fruits instead of sugars and desserts
- Using different natural
sugars, such as beet sugar when a recipe calls for cane sugar (and none of that
nasty chemically-produced sugar like Splenda!)
- Absolutely NO
processed foods!!!! (Not like I eat any in the first place)
- Reading nutrition books, and doing research on foods and
their health benefits (I highly suggest The
Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan)
- Starting out with healthy recipes, as found on gluten-free
blogs and in cookbooks, then eventually being able to create my own yummy
recipes!
- Keeping myself accountable for when I stray from my new
lifestyle, yet understanding that the transition into this new lifestyle will
be hard at first, and knowing so, not beating myself up when I do eat foods
that I’m cutting down on – hey, it’s totally fine to have an occasional burger
and chocolate (especially in Switzerland!)!
- Becoming a healthy Leigh!
Note: While I am aiming for reduced consumption of gluten, I
am by no means completely cutting it out of my diet; I just want to add more
variety to my meals, particularly by not eating wheat as often, and especially
because my dad eats gluten-free pastas, etc. to avoid eating wheat (he’s not
allergic to gluten).
À bientôt!
