Eating Food -- Day 1

Right off, we had a problem on the first day of the "Eat Food Challenge". C bought chocolate donuts with sprinkles for the kids. Boo! That's okay though. It's the first day, and it's a little hard to get into the habit. Here is a rundown of what I ate today (what C ate is pretty close; the kids had the same except for school lunch, a popsicle each, and the very last of the graham crackers):

Breakfast:
oatmeal with raisins & milk, coffee
Lunch:
beans & rice, chard
chocolate
homemade bread with organic strawberry jam
Snack:
banana
Dinner:
baked tofu
couscous curry
salad with homemade balsamic dressing
more chard!

It was a lot of veggies, but it actually wasn't too hard. I came home to a chocolate donut sitting in the middle of the table, but since I had some happy chocolate in the cupboard, it was easy to resist.

I ate a ton of food today (as you can see), and discovered that baked tofu is the GREATEST -- it totally eliminates the problem of tofu squishiness that has previously turned me off. C and I polished off the tofu in just a few minutes (the kids had a taste & then opted out). I just marinated it in a sauce I made & then baked it at 400 for 30 minutes. It did seem like a lot of oven use for not very much food, however.

What was a problem? Salad dressing. I have a favorite balsamic vinagrette that I use, but it is full of weird ingredients. So I made my own. I just mixed up some balsamic vinegar, some olive oil, a little salt & some grapefruit juice. It was delish. I also got excited about DIY salad stuff and made croutons from some weird bread I made the other day. They were a hit.

But.... dinner caused a kitchen explosion. I used a ton of bowls, pans, and the chopping board was like a veggie explosion.

The homemade bread may seem like over-achieving, but it's really easy. I feel like a cheater because I use a bread machine. It takes maybe 2 minutes to put the ingredients in and then 3 hours and 10 minutes later -- awesome bread! We started making bread because we were inspired by some friends of ours. We couldn't believe them when they told us that they don't buy bread at the store. Now... neither do we! The breadmaker has been totally worth it even if only to make pizza. The pizza that we make at home is better (not to mention healthier) than most delivery pizza and is very economical to make. What's also nice is that we almost always have the ingredients -- bread stuff, some sort of tomato sauce, cheese, and random veggies.

What's funny is that a lot of the things that seem way out there to me (like making all my own bread) are pretty normal for a lot of other bloggers. It just shows that you can be an example to others--maybe even somebody that you don't know. After a while, what seems weird starts to seem normal, and hopefully the world gets a little greener.

That's a lot of chard
Yep. Sure is a lot of chard. We still have some more to eat. And artichokes (all 7 of them)... and more lettuce... and cabbage. Tomorrow is going to be another veggie heavy day because we have another CSA box on Wednesday. I'm still up in the air about continuing CSA after this trial month.

How much does CSA run in your area? Do you think it's worth it? How much more are you willing to pay for local food?

Kids
I think this challenge is pretty hard with kids, unless you love to cook. We are out of snacks now, except for pretzels. So, it's either fruit or toast or .... fruit. The morning is tough too -- the kids are addicted to Honey Nut Cheerios. We'll see how tomorrow goes.