Motivation: Making It Okay To Eat

There are three steps in developing a guilt-free relationship with food. First and most importantly, we need to eat foods that are healthy (for the most part; I don’t mean that you can never, ever again indulge in a chocolate dessert or a cheesy hors d’oeuvres — just not every day). We need to get more in touch with flavor, and there are millions of flavors in the world that are interesting and natural. One of my biggest objections to the “diet industry” is that so much of the food called ‘dietetic’ is full of chemicals. Fresh and natural is always best. They’re better for you, and don’t come with a high sugar or salt count. A little exploration of herbs and spices augments basic taste rather than conceals it. Leave the fancy sauces and dressed-up dishes for special occasions. An added benefit is that going with what’s in season allows for the delicious anticipation of seasonal foods which always taste so much better because we know they are not around twelve months of the year. Okay, so with our global transportation system, we can get any food at any time of the year, but produce out of season is shipped from far away (South America? Asia?), often loaded with pesticides, and picked long before its time, so it never ripens as it was meant to. My invitation is to develop your palate to the point that wonderful, ripe, local produce is at the top of your list.

The second point — and this is most critical — is that we need to get acquainted with what constitutes a real portion of food. I’m not sure what has happened in this country, but boy, we over-serve ourselves. I don’t know about you, but I tend to eat what is on my plate. If it’s small or medium-sized serving, and it is satisfying, that’s fine. If I’m given a plate the size of a garbage can lid, and it’s filled to the edge, well, yeah, I’ll chew my way right through all of that too. Why in the world are we rigging the game against ourselves? If you ever see museum exhibits of average rooms 50 to 75 years ago, you’ll see that the placesettings on the dining table are significantly smaller than what we are used to now. (The eye-opener for a friend of mine was at Warm Springs, Georgia, where President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s china was laid out for breakfast. She noticed to her horror that her cats eat from larger bowls than he did!) We don’t have to go cold turkey and starve ourselves, but scaling back portions is better for our bodies. The servings of Home Cuisine food are approximated by what we need. Getting used to the reality of need rather than mindlessly overindulging ourselves is a building block in feeling free to enjoy our food.

The third key is exercise, which I have little to say about. It’s necessary. It is definitely part of good health, but I’m a chef, not an exercise professional. My thought is only that we are better at doing things we like than things we don’t like. I think we’re better at managing our eating habits when we like what we’re eating, and it’s the same with exercise. If you absolutely hate using a treadmill, skip it and find something that you’re willing to do on a regular basis.

I may not be an exercise professional, but like everyone else, I need the exercise, and I want to know more about it. In the future, I’ll have some information on it here from a professional. In the ongoing battle of the bulge, I signed up at Urban Active for help. I’ll be sharing some of what I’m learning, because it’s fascinating. If I can get out and get moving, anyone can!