Resolutions

The New Year's Resolution diet overhaul is obviously cliche and contrived but every year I find myself writing lists and plans of how good I'm going to be- getting to work on time, vacuuming on a regular basis, and of course drinking less, eating better and exercising more. I'm generally pretty healthy (I eat like, a ridiculous amount of fruits and vegetables) but the holidays messed me up more than usual. I think it has a lot to do with drinking sparkling wine like it was water for 2 weeks, having cheese for dinner far too many times, and going to the gym about half as often as I normally do. I'm not losing sleep over it, I expected to slack a bit and indulge a bit. But I'm kind of surprised by the results. I didn't gain any weight, my jeans fit exactly the same, but my body fat percentage went up by 2%. I bought a bio-electric impedance body fat analyzer a few months ago and I think it's awesome. It was like, $20, too. It's very validating. I don't own a scale because I don't think it's really helpful. And the body fat percentage correlates so much better with changes in how I'm eating and exercising.

I read an article by Mark Bittman recently where he said every January he gives up all alcohol and all meat. That's probably not going to work out for me; I get kind of cranky and rebellious when I make rules like "don't eat that, ever". If I ate entirely based on impulse with no regard for my health, I'd probably eat grilled cheese and prosciutto with half a bottle of wine every night. On the other hand, I could probably go 6 months without eating any red meat and not miss it. One of my New Year's food resolution is to eat more protein, so I won't be making any effort to cut meat out of my diet.

Instead I'm not eating bread for the month of January. It might be kind of a challenge, especially eating out. I really love bread and have no intention of giving it up for the rest of my life. Same with wine, but it's so much more enjoyable when I have it once or twice week, not every day. The last few glasses of champagne on New Year's didn't really taste awesome since I'd been living on the stuff for a month.

I think "Low Carb" recipes are the stupidest thing ever. Figuring out what to eat this month is the easiest part. In my fridge I have- salmon, a whole chicken, shrimp, salad, spinach, cauliflower, green beans, spinach, carrots, celery, parsnips, cucumber, bell pepper, hummus, prosciutto, chorizo, smoked bacon, apples, oranges, grapefruits, bananas. New Year's food resolution- eat more fruits and vegetables. Easy.

I also have every kind of grain imaginable- most of them barely touched since I moved in. White rice, brown rice, red rice, Israeli couscous, barley, bulgar, quinoa, whole wheat pastas. Other New Year's food resolution- eat more whole grains. Quinoa and barley are great and I haven't made enough effort to come up with ways to cook them that I like enough to keep making.

Looking for Bittman's quote about laying off the meat and the booze for a while, I found this instead, from last January. Gorgeous picture. While I'm glad he validates my love of prosciutto, sherry vinegar and frozen shrimp and my disgust with dried herbs and minute-rice, I don't think I'll ever give up canned beans, bottled lemon juice or canned chicken stock.