Hot and Hungry!

I am officially on my fourth day of the Whole 30 Challenge, and so far, so good! My only observation thus far is that I am hungry all of the time, and I have been unsually hot the past couple of days. I actually had to step outside to cool off this morning because the house felt insanely hot!
Other than that, I am not sure I have much to report regarding the challenge, and so instead I will point you to a couple of great resources if you are considering taking on this challenge.

This link is to Darcy's blog. Darcy works out at the same Crossfit location as me and completed the Whole 30. It's a great reference as she lists what she ate every day. I took lots of notes:

http://darcyfranklin.blogspot.com/



Here is the Whole 9 website that is the foundation for the 30 day challenge:

http://www.whole9life.com/



Here are a couple of sites with lots of meal ideas that conform to the Paleo way of eating:

http://www.wholelifeeating.com/


http://www.sweetcheekshq.com/2010/03/stuffed-sweet-dumpling-squash.html



I think I may have some more links that I can dig up. I'll search and post them later.

I have decided not to intentionally blog daily about my food or how I feel during the Whole 30. This has all been done multiple times and so I will just try to continue to point you towards good resources as I find them.

Instead, I thought it might be good to tie in some cost-of-food related discussions. This topic is not only relevant to my journey, but it's such an important concept because cost is many times a deterrent to eating well. Hopefully my examples, ideas, successes and failings can help to generate thought and inspiration for my friends out there who are interested in this.

I have heard it said many times that it is too expensive to eat healthy. I both agree and disagree with this statement.

I agree with this statement because often times sustainably, quality grown produce and properly raised meat is more expensive than more "commercialized" food when compared pound for pound and dollar for dollar.
I disagree because:

1) it is possible to find things at the same price, or sometimes even cheaper that the commercialized products, you just need to learn how to use your resources.

2) It often seems more expensive at first because when you are transitioning to fresh produce and meats, there is a tendency to overbuy, overuse and waste food. But after time you learn to buy smaller quantities and use things more efficiently, which cuts costs.

3) there is a lot more involved in the cost-of-food equation than the price of food. This is our health, people! Why is it so easy for us to devalue our bodies for convenience? I'm not being preachy. I do it too. I just want to stop it.

When trying to "clean up" your food you have to choose your angle and create a plan of attack. If you are uneducated about food, nutrition, environmental factors, and resources, then wiping out your entire cupboard would not only be costly, it would also be overwhelming and unproductive. How can you replace ALL of your "bad" food with "good" food when you aren't even certain what "good" food is?

So, if you feel overwhelmed or too cheap to make a change, I suggest starting small. I did this a couple of years ago, and in that time I have grown my circle of knowledge and continued to eliminate or be aware of what is going in my cupboards and into my body.

I first suggest doing some things to educate yourself on what things constitute good food, and what constitutes bad food. The labels of good and bad can be applied to many different things. We have all heard the buzz about High Fructose Corn Syrup, Corn Fed Beef, Refined Sugars, Hydrogenated Fats, Preservatives, Artificial Sweeteners, etc right? Choose some of these buzz words and go to work! Learn how they make Hydrogenated (and partially hydrogenated!!) fat and then decide if this is something you want to put in your body. Then go look at your cupboards and take out everything that has it (Crisco, Oreos, salted nut rolls, FAKE butter, Cool Whip... the list is ridiculously endless!)
That doesn't seem nearly as overwhelming and expensive as cleaning out your cupboards in one fell swoop, does it? :)
Let me know what you plan to tackle to make yourself healthier, or what you are doing to make eating well more affordable.