Last week, I posted my plan to change my way of eating to eat healthier and get into better shape. I am still working on figuring out the the nutritional info on what I eat and finding new recipes that are healthier. One thing I’ve been thinking a lot about this last week is snacks. After having chef’s salad for dinner and watching the food network I get that gnawing urge to snack. I’m not really hungry, I just want to eat something. My wife is happy to chomp away on carrots, but I can’t do it. I hate vegetables. Sometimes an apple, banana or orange will satisfy me but most of the time I’m looking for something either salty or sweet. I can easily sit and eat a whole bag of cheese puffs, potato chips, or a cold burger patty or four and not think twice about it. So what do I do for a snack that is healthier for me and still satisfies my taste buds?
Today most of the foods we buy come with the nutritional information listed on the package. I suppose if you are a dietitian or rocket scientist this information is useful, but for me not so much. I looked at the nutritional information on two snack foods that I really like: cheese puffs and cashews. Now just in thinking about which would be better for me to eat I would pick the cashews. These are naturally grown nuts and should be a good snack. Looking at the info for both however I find that the info does not seem to agree in all categories.
Cheese puffs:
Whole Cashews:
Watch any commercial for yogurt or a diet plan and they will tell you calories are bad. Read about most diets and they will tell you to reduce the calories you eat to lose weight. So what does all of this info really mean? By doing a side-by-side comparison it would seem that the cheese puffs are better because they are lower in fat and yet the nuts are lower in cholesterol, sodium, and carbohydrates.
So I started researching healthy snacks on the internet. Like everything else, there are lots of different places to look. I read about avoiding snacks that are high in simple carbohydrates (sugars) and going with snack high in complex carbohydrates ( whole grain breads). The more I read the more confused I get. The one thing that I have been able to get out of all of this research is to stick to whole foods instead of processed foods. Eating whole fruits, vegetables, and nuts are better snacks than cheese puffs, potato chips, and candy bars. So now when I want a snack I will grab some nuts and some vegetables. It will be tough to train myself to eat carrots, or broccoli, or celery for a snack. My wife is part rabbit so she enjoys nibbling on veggies for snacks. I am part bear so I want to eat the rabbit for a snack. It’s no wonder people fail at eating healthy. After all of the research I just want to buy a family size bag of cheese puffs, a box of snack cakes, and a 2 liter bottle of cola and watch bikini oil wrestling the rest of the night. I hope the oil is light virgin olive oil so it’s healthy.
Clacked by Jeff Love
on Jan 16, 2010 @ 15:46 EST5EDT
I laughed out loud reading this post … awesome! But informative too, and we’ve come to the same conclusion as you did — whole foods is where it’s at. I’ve been posting a lot of recipes for dips lately, so do a search for “dip” and maybe you’ll find just the thing to make your veggies appetizing. I love hummus and white bean dips with veggies.