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Road Food…Decadently Healthful Style

As you’ve read, we took a family road trip last week. In addition to all of the carseats and clothes and beach toys and books and crayons and Leapsters and the stroller and pack and play, I also crammed a cooler and a bag of food into our overloaded SUV. Of course I did. Why? Because it’s the best way I know to ensure that we are able to eat healthfully while on the road (and because if our 3 year old isn’t “fed and watered” every 2 hours he turns into a little monster – a cute monster, but you get my point!).

Since I often get questions about how to eat healthfully while on the road, I thought I’d share what we took with us this time, plus a few things I wish we’d taken.

For many of us, road trips are viewed as a chance to indulge in a host of “forbidden food” favorites, in fact, there’s an entire website devoted to Roadfood! However, for many people, travel is a rather frequent occurrence, and it’s all too easy during those trips to un-do all the good you’ve done at home! I used to think of travel as a chance to indulge, but I’ve learned how much better I feel if I stick to my basic healthful eating approach even when I’m on the road. Even my husband now agrees (as long as he can squeeze in the periodic fried food fix during the trip!).

Packing for healthy eating on the go involves just a little advance planning but can really be a lifesaver when you’re faced with the airport food court or the aisles of a convenience store along the highway. You can make some good choices in those places, too, but having some tried-and-true options in your back pocket significantly eases the anxiety of mealtime or snacktime.


For our trip, I tried to choose foods that could be eaten in the car or the hotel room without making a total mess. I made choices that gave us a good mix of sweet and salty, crunchy and creamy, carbohydrate and protein, fruit and vegetable. I made sure we had FIBER rich foods with us (because, you know, I’m a big proponent of fiber as discussed here). I tried to balance fresh foods with nonperishable foods and to focus on things we couldn’t easily find on the road.

Since we had access to a cooler (and to several refrigerators throughout the trip) I could have a bit more fresh food than some other trips might allow  – that was a nice luxury!

These foods were largely for breakfast and snacks – we had lunch and dinner in restaurants or with friends or family every day – so don’t think for a minute that this was ALL we ate! 

So here’s what we took with us:
A loaf of high-fiber whole wheat bread
High fiber cereals (Fiber One Original and Fiber One Shredded Wheat) 
A container of cut-up carrots, celery, cucumbers and radishes
Apples and Nectarines
A half gallon of organic skim milk
Roasted almonds 
Dried Tart Cherries
Annie’s Cheddar Bunnies
Back to Nature Graham Sticks
Kashi TLC Granola Bars
Gnu Bars
Clif Z Bars
Water!

What I wish I’d added:
Hummus
Almond Butter
Mozzarella Cheese Sticks
Cottage cheese or Greek Yogurt in single serve containers 

Net, in general, my packing served us really well. But…I was light on protein-rich foods and really wished I’d had them with us at several points during the trip! The “I wish I’d added” list above would have provided the protein I felt like we were missing – live and learn! Next time, they’ll make the cut! 

As for the next time you travel, try packing a few of your favorite healthful foods and see how much better you feel by the end of your trip!

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Living In the Moment

At the beach! (And yes, he’s eating bread…)
Well hello again! I’ve been traveling for most of the last week – 18 hours of total cartime with my husband and our (now) three children (still can’t believe that!). And what an adventure it was.  I have a few thoughts to share about a realization I had during our travels – one that has inspired me to strive to live more “in the moment” and that I hope will inspire you to do the same. Before you tune out (“yeah, yeah, live in the moment, I hear this all the time”) I may not be using that phrase in exactly the way you’re thinking, so read on…

First, a bit of background…
The main reason for this particular trip was to attend a memorial service for my cousin Patrick, who died this year at 42 after enduring a nearly lifelong illness. His mother, Judy, who had been his constant caretaker for his entire life, ensured that the service was a celebration of his life rather than a mourning of his death. The service culminated with the release of 101 baby blue balloons on a breathtakingly sunny hilltop as the song “I’ll Fly Away” by Jars of Clay played into the open air. Standing there holding my infant daughter and looking down upon our 3-year-old and 5-year-old, I cried tears of gratitude for the overwhelming blessings in my life, and tears of compassion for Judy’s loss of her own son. I silently resolved to do a better job of cherishing these days with young children, knowing that as challenging as they may sometimes be, I’ll undoubtedly recall even the most difficult days with fondness as the kids grow up.
After the service, we traveled to northern Ohio where we visited with my husband’s grandmother (and his aunt and cousins) and then spent two days tucked away at a Dirty-Dancing-style family-friendly resort on the shore of Lake Erie. Our 5 year old REALLY wanted to go to the beach this summer and this was our best opportunity – hey – she’s only 5 – a lake beach is still a beach to her! The kids had a blast participating in all of the family activities offered and, yes, they got to play on the beach. Next year maybe they’ll even see an ocean…
As we traveled from destination to destination, and the children napped in their carseats, my husband and I had the rare opportunity for long, uninterrupted conversations. What a pleasure! During one of them, I made the observation that vacations are so different now than they used to be when it was just the two of us. Back then, we had the WHOLE TRIP to ourselves. We could indulge any whim, accommodate any detour, wake, sleep and eat whenever we chose. Now, of course, as any of you with children know, it’s not like that at all! We live by their schedule, indulge their whims, accommodate their moods and needs. And while it’s wonderful in its own way, it seems there should still be a bit of time for us too! And that’s when it struck me that this, too, might actually be a lesson about living in the moment.

See, while we may not have an entire trip to relax and unwind, moments still open up in which to do so. Moments that are just for us…that fit into the spaces in between stretches of being a mom or a dad. 
Moments like these:
  • An uninterrupted conversation while the kids nap in carseats
  • A nonfat decaf Starbucks latte from the lobby coffee bar savored while the kids are in a coloring contest
  • A run on the beach while the family is still asleep 
  • A Fast Company magazine read in the room while the 3 year old naps and the infant nurses and your husband has the 5 year old on the “beach” 
  • A hot shower before dinner with the door locked (and your spouse watching the kids in the next room)   
  • A glass of wine (or dish of ice cream) eaten on the deck off the hotel room when it’s finally quiet
  • A PTI podcast and Diet root beer in the car as you drive while 3 kids AND your wife nap (that one’s for you, honey)

None of these moments may last very long, but they may be even sweeter because of it. Kind of like this phase of life with very young children.


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What are you craving?

In The House at Pooh Corner, A.A. Milne wrote that for Winnie the Pooh, “Although eating honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn’t know what it was called.”

Geneen Roth, author of Women Food and God: An Unexpected Path to Almost Everything, included this quote in a recent O Magazine email and I was so struck by its simple truth. I’ve certainly experienced that moment of anticipation that trumps the actual tasting, and I’ll bet you have, too, if you really think about it.
We crave all sorts of things, from sweet to salty, cold to hot, creamy to crunchy, yet only rarely does the eventual indulgence live up to our imagined bliss. That’s one reason why its so important to understand the source of our cravings. 

Most of us try to deny our food cravings and so we test our willpower in an effort to avoid caving in to the desire. Sometimes that’s a good approach, but other times it’s actually not! Biologically-driven cravings are often worth listening to; they are one of your body’s ways of telling you what it needs. Psychologically-driven cravings are trickier, and it’s especially important to deconstruct them to determine whether or not to listen to them. Giving in to a psychologically driven food craving almost always results in disappointment as it doesn’t truly address the desire.

In my studies, my work with clients, and my own experience, I’ve observed at least four major sources of cravings; two are biological and two are psychological.

Biological Sources of Cravings

Imbalance
These cravings that are driven by a nutritional imbalance in your body. Your body sends you a signal (in the form of a craving) to tell you how to equalize the imbalance. For example, if your body needs iron, then you may crave beef or if you need potassium, then you may crave a banana. These are the cravings you definitely want to pay attention to, as “giving in” to them will help to restore the balance your body is seeking. You’ll know it was an imbalance driven craving if the food tastes WONDERFUL and you literally feel better after giving in to it.

Habit
These cravings are based on what your body is used to eating. On a cellular level, we really are what we eat! Therefore, we crave more of what we already have in us. Here’s how it works. You may not have eaten Thai food in 6 months, then you have it, and then you want it again 3 days later! That’s a habit based craving. And the more you have one food (peanut butter toast for breakfast, pizza for lunch, dairy, Twizzlers) the more your body will demand it. This can make it hard to change bad habits, but there is hope! The habit principle works just as strongly with healthy foods, so once you have good habits established, those will also be the source of cravings! Heirloom tomatoes, anyone??

Psychological Sources of Cravings

Emotional
These cravings are driven by an unmet emotional need. For example, someone craving intimacy can develop intense cravings for sweet foods – isn’t that fascinating?! When I was first out of college, single, and living in Atlanta, a city where I knew no one, my sweet cravings were at an all time high! For months, I ate my way from one sugary fix to the next, but never connected what was at the source of those cravings. I would have been far better off spending my time making friends than shoveling down Swedish Fish and frozen yogurt, but I hadn’t yet made the connection.  Live and learn!

Nostalgic
Nostalgia-based cravings are rooted deep in our memory. These are the cravings for creamsicles in summer because you always had them at the public pool when you were growing up or for roast chicken and mashed potatoes on a wintry Sunday because that’s what Mom used to make. There’s no biological reason to give in to a nostalgic cravings, and when we do, the food often just doesn’t taste right. That’s because what we’re really craving is the experience that used to surround the food we’re craving, not necessarily the food itself. And sadly, those experiences are awfully hard to recreate.

Cravings are not the enemy and they don’t make you weak; they’re just a normal part of every day life. The key to managing them is to determine what is driving them and then to use that knowledge to make good decisions about when to feed them…and when to exercise your willpower instead to make a healthier choice.

So, what are YOU craving? Can you figure out WHY?
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