Eating Out:
On the "good" side, I have needed to look at menus differently. Overlooking things that I would normally order, I found grilled cheddar with blueberries on sourdough to be amazing. Boise Fry company has a great black bean burger. Made even better with blue curly fries with blueberry ketchup.
The hospital across the street from where I work serves a Bistro Bowl where you get to pick the ingredients. I veg mine up and use both the tofu and peanuts as protein, topped with chimichurri sauce. It's pretty yummy.
Everything else eaten out has been horrible. It probably doesn't help that our usual haunts are biker bars and small town cafes. This was a black bean and quinoa burger with texture and flavor of saw dust. Twice in 1 week I was served "stir fry veggies" with so much teriaki sauce that my tongue was numb for the rest of the day.
So mostly if I'm eating out, I've found soup and salad to be one of my few reasonable options (besides 1000 calorie bowl of mac & cheese or alfredo pasta).
Postitive:
On the bright side, I am eating a lot more variety of vegetables and more whole grains than before. And probably more calcium too since complicated grilled cheese has become my norm at home.
Grilled Havarti on Multigrain with tomato, cuke, spinach & basil.
Grilled Provalone & Gouda with mushrooms on dill rye.
This was my favorite experiment: Papparedelle pasta mixed 50/50 with shaved carrots the same shape. Tossed in a little bit of cream sauce and enoki mushrooms and topped with basil & green onions.
I've tried tofu a couple times. Squished and highly seasoned, it's edible but not exciting.
Unfortunately, the carnivore at my house is NOT on board with this plan. Subsequently, I pre-prep a lot of ingredients that can go together to order. Oh, and he is using it as an excuse to eat Fruit Loops.
So in conclusion, I will continue on. Mainly because I am seeing results in the 2 areas I started this for initially. My weight is down about 4# and my BP down 5 points.
