Tuesday, September 22, 2009

green, organic, healthy

Organic.  It sounds a bit daunting.  O-r-g-a-n-i-c.  A little overwhelming. 

I grew up eating pretty much whatever I wanted.  My family would eat big, hearty meals full of red meat, white pasta, lots of salt and butter.  It's hard to break the habit after 22 years.  Since being married I have taken on the responsibility of cooking meals for my little family.  And with this responsibility comes a lot of pressure.  I want my husband and I to adopt healthy eating habits while we are still fairly young so we can pass these traits on to our children someday.  Walking into the grocery store for the first time after deciding to go organic was stressful, to say the least.  Did I have to carefully examine each item I buy?  What if there was no organic option?  What would I do?!  Then...I calmed down and took a step back.  A healthy lifestyle involves more than just healthy eating; it involves being as stress-free as possible and working out and exercising our minds and our souls.  Eating real butter every once and a while won't kill us.  But stressing and getting anxiety about these things can.  So we are going to reach our goal of a new green lifestyle little by little.  Over the past year I have made several changes to our diets.  I no longer eat red meat.  At all.  Danny still eats pork, sausage and steak every now and then.  We use lean ground turkey instead of ground beef.  We grill chicken breasts, boil shrimp, etc.  We try our hardest to eat minimally processed, whole food.  I also try to buy only organic on the vegetables that count and avoid the "dirty dozen" - the fruits and vegetables that typically have the highest amount of chemicals and pesticides.  These are apples, bell peppers, celery, cherries, grapes, lettuce, nectarines, peaches, pears, potatoes, spinach and strawberries.  Writing this down makes it all seem even more overwhelming, but I know that it is a process and takes time to change old habits.  It also takes time to convince my husband not to eat so much white rice.  Some things never change :)

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