There are some great blogs out there. One I like is a local gal who write GoodBetterBestFood

Anonymous wrote:I have dedicated the vast majority of today to cooking (after the gym of course). I have most all of my meals cooked and ready for the next 5 days. None of my meals contain bread,white rice, or pasta. Much is vegan. Carbs are coming from legumes,quinoa, and wild rice. Fats from nuts,avocado, and lean meats. the good news is that since our new are done, the next 5 days will be very easy.

Give us a rundown. What did you make?

Let your kids take turns picking one of the vegetables you serve each night. A few nights a week, add a second vegetable that's new (or rare -- if you haven't had an artichoke in five years, that's almost new) to you.

Find blogs you trust about food and try their recipes for vegetables, even --or especially -- if they seem to focus on flavor rather than what's omitted (low fat, gluten free, etc.)

Treat it as an adventure, not dieting.

Notice how you feel when you eat this way. Maybe kale puts a bounce in your step, but only when it's raw. Maybe veggie-heavy soup isn't enough for lunch. Eat mindfully, not Puritanically.

I have dedicated the vast majority of today to cooking (after the gym of course). I have most all of my meals cooked and ready for the next 5 days. None of my meals contain bread,white rice, or pasta. Much is vegan. Carbs are coming from legumes,quinoa, and wild rice. Fats from nuts,avocado, and lean meats. the good news is that since our new are done, the next 5 days will be very easy.

Roasting veggies with your tenderloin or other meat makes cooking easy and the flavor from the meat flavors the carrots and other veggies. In the spring get the children to help plant some lettuces, carrots, squash, broccoli, cauliflower and at least one tomato plant. Eating what you harvest makes it more interesting. Having them water daily when it doesn't rain is a chore that gives its own reward.

Thank you for all the great tips!

Get the Eat This Not That books. Mostly pictures but it shows you what to buy at the grocery store. My kids loved the books and helped me shop for healthier food.

I love the Eating Clean magazines. I also love most of the recipes from Gwyneth Paltrow's cookbook. However if you are not comfortable in a kitchen skip GP.

I got the Forks over Knives book. It has a good collection of vegan recipes. Your library will also be a good resource.
Adding a salad to your meals would be an easy place to start.

Cooking Light magazine is good. I also like Ellie Krieger's recipes. I wouldn't try to a follow a particular "diet," just learn to make the stuff you like to eat in a healthier way.

Eating pasta isn't bad unto itself, it's really learning about portion size. Also, consider starting with a salad or homemade soup b/f your main meal.

If you don't know how to cook, learning a few basics through a class or just practicing at home (there are lots of TV shows) is really helpful. It frees you from having to rely on packaged foods that might be high in calories/sodium/fat/sugar, etc.

When I made some of these changes a bit ago, I started with the "more veggies" bit, trying to widen our repertoire before moving on to the "healthier" bit. So, sauteed and roasted the heck out of broccoli, brussel sprouts, kale in butter, garlic, salt, etc. Added cashews and such with the brussel sprouts. Jammed more veggies in stir fry (frozen works fine here), upped the proportion of peas in risotto and Carribbean rice dishes and generally got people used to a wider range of veggies so they weren't always picking the damn things out. And then sort of eased us onto a more Mediterranean diet that's a bit healthier but still lets me have the glass of wine with supper that makes me more patient when negotiating menus with picky eaters.

We love the Cooking Light magazine. They have a lot of quick and easy recipes that incorporate more vegtables and are overall healthier. It's rare that we don't like their recipes. They also have a monthly segment on healthy tips - eat more veggies, smaller portions, less fat, etc. Getting new recipes every month helps keep things fresh & interesting, build our recipe box, but it's not as overwhelming as paging through cook books. Plus each issue is appropriate for the season - what fruits and veggies you can easily find and grilling vs oven.

If you don't go to the farmer's market on the regular, I suggest doing that with your kids. Buy whatever they're interested in. Ask the people selling it how to cook it to taste best - they will know.

One thing we do in my family is that when dinner is ready, it's spread out on the kitchen counter, and we all put each thing on our plates, then sit down at the table and eat. Of course if someone is hungry for more they go back to the counter for seconds, but I think not keeping the food on the table for easy access cuts down on that a smidge.

Read the South Beach Supercharged book (you can even borrow it for free on your Kindle if you have Amazon Prime.) Even if you don't follow it to the letter, it will give you some great ideas on foods to eliminate, replacements to make, etc.

You should think of your dinner plate as divided into three parts, one half and two quarters. The "half" section is all vegetables, one quarter is protein (lean meat / fish) and the other quarter is healthy carbohydrates. This is how we were eating until I got pregnant. We all felt great. Now all I want is a big pile of pasta.

We got a lot of great recipe ideas from this woman's blog: http://www.kalynskitchen.com/2011/02/recipe-for-c.html I also would search for "low carb" on Pinterest and came up with a few things.

I also realized during the process that roasting a chicken or pork tenderloin is really not all that challenging. You can just throw it in the oven, steam up some vegetables (lots of them) and then the meal is kind of done. It's nice to have something in the oven that takes a couple of hours to cook because you can ignore it. And if you buy a large enough piece, you have leftovers. We would take the leftover turkey / beef / chicken / pork to work on top of large beds of greens for an easy salad.

Also, hard-boiled eggs make great snacks and are great in salads. (Even my 4 YO loves them, so that's a bonus.)

Help! I need step by step healthier eating habits for family of four, two ES boys.
We eat too much pasta, rice, meat and not enough vegetables.

If you have ideas, please share...this is my one goal for 2014. Also, if you have a good nutritionist to recommend, that would be great!

Thank you.