Wine Country Mom » Food

Greek yogurt and arguing with my brain

WineCountry.Mom — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 22:06:03 +0000

Bathing suit season is right around the corner, and dang it, I'm wearing a bikini. Who's with me on shaping up for summer? And besides me, who's having a hard time motivating their body to get with the program? (read the article...)

The Family Meal

WineCountry.Mom — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 18:36:22 +0000

Family meals. A recipe for success? Or a recipe for disaster? (read the article...)

Weight issues in kids

WineCountry.Mom — Tue, 04 May 2010 16:55:14 +0000

“Mom, I’ve gained weight,” the Taz told me with a forlorn look on his face after weighing himself on the upstairs scale.

It’s true. Over the past year the Taz has packed on a bit of baby pudge on his once trim body. It probably has to do with the way he helps himself to thirds for every meal. It may have something to do with the obsessive snacking he does in between meals. Maybe it’s his need to sneak some money outside whenever he hears the jangle of the ice cream man riding by on his bike. It’s all of those things, but it’s also the normal weight shift that kids go through around the age of 9 when their bodies slow down for a second in growing before shooting up like a weed. His sister went through the same battle at his age, and only lost the weight this last year when she went through a growth spurt. But she had also helped along the process when she became aware of her own body for the first time, and decided that eating more healthy foods and fewer proportions was a better answer than constant snacking.

The Taz had finally noticed his body, and now wanted to make a change.

Weight issues in kids are a very slippery slope. You want your child to be fit, trim, and healthy. But you don’t want them so obsessed with their body that they develop self esteem issues or an unhealthy relationship with food that goes from love to hate. Somehow, as parents, we must help our kids to be healthy, but not give them impulses to starve themselves (which later turns to more bingeing, which then turns into more weight gain) to “fit in”.

“Am I fat?” the Taz asked me. (more...)

Getting off the Dieting Roller Coaster

WineCountry.Mom — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:26:26 +0000

Dieting. It’s in every woman’s vocabulary. And the meaning of this word varies.

1. Killing yourself slowly.
2. Starving strategically.
3. Skipping foods you like only to eat them later when no one’s looking.
4. Being really good for weeks (or days) on end and then bingeing like food is going out of style.
5. Trying every damn diet that is deemed popular until you give up because it’s not working. (see #3)
6. Losing the same 5 pounds over and over again.
7. Gaining more weight each time you introduce a new diet to your system.
8. Cutting out pictures of fashion models as motivation to keep from eating that leftover piece of pie in the fridge.
9. Thinking murderous thoughts about that fashion model as you eat that leftover piece of pie in the fridge.

Can you tell I’ve been on the dieting roller coaster? (more...)

A love affair worth mentioning.

WineCountry.Mom — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 07:09:48 +0000

So, you ever have some sort of food that makes you think you have died and absolutely gone to Heaven? Does it make you close your eyes, breathe in deep, and savor every ounce of flavor that has exploded in your mouth? Do you stay as silent as possible, not wanting to disturb your taste buds as they do the happy dance all over your tongue? People, I think I just had a holy moment – one of those “talked to God” moments. I think I can safely say that I have experienced the mecca of all meccas, the crème de la crème, what’s been hiding in Pandora’s box, and the ambrosia of the gods. I finally caved and realized I’m in love. And it’s the perfect time of year for this scrumptious kind of affair. I can only be referring to one thing. That’s right people. We’re talking Red Velvet Cupcakes. (more...)

Grocery Shopping on a Budget

WineCountry.Mom — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 01:40:55 +0000

There is a steadfast rule when it comes to grocery shopping. Never go when you are hungry. I remembered this rule as my stomach growled on the way into the grocery store parking lot. When you are hungry, it is so easy to succumb to the smells and sights of really good food that are whispering to you, “Buy me, you know you want me. Don’t worry that I am 5,000 calories per bite and cost twice as much as I should. I will love you more than anything else in this world.” My problem is that I was going grocery shopping because I had no food in the house. My son had made that abundantly clear to his teacher earlier today when the teacher asked him why he was spacing out in class.

“I didn’t really have a good lunch today,” he told him.

“Well, you might want to think about packing a bigger lunch for school,” the teacher told him.

“I couldn’t,” my son said matter-of-factly. “We have no food in the house.”

The teacher laughed and said, “Then you should get yourself over to a shelter and get some food.” He turned to me. “Isn’t it funny how kids can be so dramatic?”

I smiled weakly, still recovering from the teacher’s joke. I had just paid out a couple of unexpected bills that left my checking account in a precarious position, and any check I wrote today was going against a paycheck I hadn’t received yet. And the food situation in our house was at the bare ends since I had stretched it for as long as I could, which is why I was going to the store on an empty stomach.

You could say the economy is affecting this household. (Read more...)

Ready, Set, Bag! – benefit for REFB

WineCountry.Mom — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:21:24 +0000

Nerves were racking in Virginia’s Food City, the first setting of “Ready, Set, Bag!”, a documentary on competitive grocery bagging by Executive Producer and Pixar CTO, Oren Jacob, and directed by his wife Justine Jacob as well as Alex D. da Silva. The winner would be flown to Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas to compete in the National Grocers Association’s Best Bagger competition. Not only would the baggers have to be fast, the bags had to be packed properly – no squished bread or frozen peas below cans – and the weight of each bag had to be even.

States across the country held their own bag-a-thons to compete for the big event. Some held competitions reminiscent of rock concerts, treating the baggers like celebrities while they cheered them on under strings of lights wearing togas, referees and announcers called out the stats (California, where else?). Others kept their grocery store settings or held the competitions in banquet halls. (Read more...)

Thanksgiving Stuffing, minus the butter

WineCountry.Mom — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 23:18:00 +0000

My last Stuffing Recipe wasn’t met with much enthusiasm from people watching calories. One commenter even wondered if that was what I was feeding my kids. Only on days that end with a Y, washed down with a glass of egg nog. Kidding! While I’d love to have Thanksgiving dinner every night, I’d have to [...]

Thanksgiving Stuffing

WineCountry.Mom — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:59:44 +0000

Stuffing is one of the easiest things to make for Thanksgiving, and one of the easiest to embellish. Thanks to my mom’s creativity in the kitchen, I have never made a stuffing exactly like the package recipe, but instead add to it to make it my own and create an even tastier dish for Thanksgiving. Everyone [...]

Battling the Baby Bulge

WineCountry.Mom — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:35:35 +0000

I’ve been fighting the baby bulge. No, not the kind that you have when you are newly pregnant and possess a cute little bump that later turns into an adorable basketball on your tiny frame (uh, yeah, unless you’re me and even your ankles get a baby bump). I’m talking about the baby bulge you [...]