Week 2 With the Green Giant Challenge

In case you missed last week’s post, I have teamed up with Green Giant and Dr. V from Bravo’s L.A. Shrinks in an effort to spread the word about eating healthy. Did you catch the Caught Green Handed videos yet?

This week I got my first feedback via email from Dr.V.

In case you can’t see the small print, it says…

Stephanie,

I see in your blog you mentioned you felt a little intimidated by me: The last thing I’d want is for you to feel intimidated. If anything, I feel a little intimidated by a lady who’s building a house, raising a family, making sure everybody eats healthy and HOW ARE YOU SO FUNCTIONAL AT 6 AM? You are a superhero. A superhero who maybe needs a little help planning meals, but a superhero nonetheless.

What I want you to do is this. Maybe if you can plan out your meals for the week ahead of time, it’ll help keep you from slipping back into the land of quick-fix, less-than-healthy meals. Perhaps even write it out before you go to the store, so when you’re loading up your cart you’ll know, “OK, we’ll get the Antioxidant Blend for Monday, Seasoned Steamers for Tuesday” and so on. That way when it’s time to eat, you’ll have your plan ready for action.

I have to know, do you have a nuclear powered core? You made this great video and wrote a thoughtful blog entry, and then the next day you posted a video of you laying a flagstone hearth. OK, it’s official. I’m intimidated.
Dr. V

She’s pretty sweet, huh? Back off she’s MINE. Get your own coach to stroke your ego.

That advice makes a lot of sense. I’m no stranger to meal planning, in fact, I’ve done entire posts about it. But, admittedly, I have gotten way off track with the planning while we’ve been riding this crazy train of house building. Time to get back on the meal planning horse. (Off the train and onto the horse? Or simultaneously ride the train and the horse? Is anyone still following these metaphors?)

This week while I was at the store I picked up several of our staple Green Giant favorites.

I also found these Healthy Weight options I’ve never noticed before. I’m planning on serving this one over brown rice with diced chicken breasts mixed in for dinner one night this week.

Since I’ve been paying attention to my “diet cheats” like it’s my job (because, literally, it IS my job right now), I’ve also noticed that when we indulge in convenience food I get a lot of extra calories from drinks, plus we spend a lot more money. I almost always get soda or tea if we are ordering out. That’s pretty stupid for a few reasons.

#1:  It’s not healthy at all.  

#2: Soda/tea/lemonade/milk at restaurants is expensive and water is free.

We were at a restaurant this week where the drinks were $2.56 cents each. Since there are 5 people in our family,  that’s $12.80 just for drinks! I can easily cook two or three entire meals at home for that much money. 

Each of those Green Giant options that are now in the freezer only cost $1.79 at our grocery store and the whole wheat pasta was $1.07.  I’ve also put those veggies over rice or potatoes, which are both also very affordable. They make really easy meals in less than 15 minutes.

I can’t promise that we will eat every single meal at home (I already promised Nicholas we could go to Cracker Barrel for his Gotcha Day tomorrow), but we can definitely try a little harder! 

Thanks for sponsoring this post, Green Giant, and giving us something to think about.