Husband:  “What is this green slime you’ve hidden under my food?”

Me:  “Wrong.  Correct question is, ‘What is this finely chopped dark green leafy vegetable you have lovingly prepared for my nutrition?’

He:  “See, you knew exactly what I was talking about when I said green slime.”

Me:  “Eat it.  It’s good for you.”

He:  “But what is it?”

Me:  “It’s kale.  It’s even more nutritious than spinach.”

He:  “Uh huh.”

Me:  (silently to myself)  “Drat!  He’s on to me!  I was hoping it would go unnoticed. Perhaps I added a bit too much this time.  It was a brilliant trick to break up frozen kale leaves into tiny bits to hide among the other ingredients in a dish.  Just got carried away this time.”

We all face resistance when it comes to feeding our family in healthy ways.  The resistance might come in the form of finding the extra time needed to clean, peel and chop fresh vegetables or in the form of lack of appreciation from family members, ahem.  It may just seem too hard to include 2 cups of veggies in your menu every day which is the recommended amount per person.

Even though we don’t always hit that mark, I work hard at putting 4 cups of veggies on our table most days.  (There are two of us.)  Plus, we eat fresh fruit every day.  The recommended amount is 2 cups for males or 1 1/2 cups for females.  In general, one tree fruit is about a cup.  So one small apple, an orange, a banana, and a pear are each one cup.  We don’t hit the 2 cups every day, but we come close most days.

The first step for us in eating healthy is to have fresh and frozen veggies and fruit always on hand. Investing time to shop for high-quality vegetables is a priority.  We regularly buy our veggies at a fruit stand which is an unheated roadside shack some distance from our house.  I shiver the whole time I’m there except during a few short (2) summer months.  However, they offer local produce at fair prices, as well as good quality trucked-in produce.  We like supporting a local family business, besides.  Frozen vegetables we purchase at Costco in large bags for good prices and good quality.  Having a small chest freezer makes it possible to always be well stocked in the veggie and fruit department.  Altho we prefer fresh, frozen is an excellent back-up.  And besides, freezing our summer abundance just makes sense.  What tastes better in January than strawberries from last summer with biscuit shortcake or in a smoothie?

I’ve substituted sweet potatoes for regular potatoes due to a health issue, but actually, the orange ones are more nutritious so I don’t feel too guilty depriving Husband of potatoes.  We eat kale, don’t tell him, about 4 times a week and spinach the other 3 days.  I’ve substituted brown rice for white rice because brown has more fiber. I use raw honey instead of sugar in my hot tea because it is unprocessed and naturally has health benefits.  I used to cut the sugar by half in my recipes, but am finding that a quarter of the amount in most recipes is plenty sweet.  I try to serve some protein with sweets to help even out the sugar high.  So cookies have nuts, and desserts are accompanied by milk or cheese, if possible.  We keep sugar to a minimum in our daily intake remembering that is like poison to our bodies.  Dark chocolate at 60% cacao and above has so many health benefits, it’d take another whole post to enumerate.  Skin, mood, heart come to mind first.  Altho it is less sweet than milk chocolate, and therefore fewer calories, there are still calories and our challenge is to keep the quantity down!

Since we both eat our meals at home, it’s a lot easier to get the large amount of recommended veggies.  If we had to eat out, it would be much harder.  When my husband was working, he was willing to take leftovers to work for lunch and warm them up in the company microwave.  I realize many workers don’t have this option.  Funny story- three workers doing our sheetrock work- one of the few jobs we hired done- had this leftover thing down.  We were gone one morning when they were working on our sheetrock.  When we returned home, we went into the house to check on them.  To our pleasant surprise, they were happily enjoying their lunches in our soon-to-be-kitchen sitting on buckets with buckets for tables.  What made us chuckle was their mini microwave balanced on a pony wall.  They had each brought leftovers from their meals the night before and warmed them up for lunch.  Too expensive and unhealthy, they said, to buy lunch at fast food restaurants.  Smart men.