Day 5 and Counting...

Hope you all enjoyed your Saturday! I had a whole entire day with NO AGENDA. It was perfect! I'm really enjoying this week off from work... maybe a little too much! Hmmm...

The kids were up nice and early this morning, so I got 'em dressed and we headed out to our local farmer's market. It was my first time there and I was mildly disappointed because there were only about 5 or 6 vendors. I wasn't able to find the few items on my short list (raw honey, pure maple syrup and pure organic vanilla with no added sugar), but I did score some fresh corn and tomatoes as well as some ground beef, sirloins and chorizo from a local meat vendor. Can't wait to give them a try!

Breakfast

After the farmer's market we headed home so I could get started on breakfast. I was SUPER excited about the recipe I was going to try out this morning: a whole-wheat oven pancake from 100 Days of Real Food. I'll admit I was nervous about using only the white whole-wheat flour, so I started us out easy by doing half white whole-wheat and half white flour. It's sweetened with honey and cinnamon, but I added half of mashed banana to be sure it would be sweet enough for the kids (and me!). I diced the apples (instead of cutting them into slices) to make them easier for the kids to eat, then sautéed them in butter with a sprinkle of cinnamon and about a teaspoon of honey. The batter mixture was mixed in a blender then poured over top of the sautéed apples. It cooked for a few minutes over medium heat before transferring to the oven to finish baking/browning the top.

It. Was. Amazing. As in, heavenly.

Healthy, delicious, sweet. Perfect!

Chase ate his up in no time! He was a huge fan, as were mommy and daddy! LO wasn't too sure about it at first but eventually finished most of it. She didn't eat all of her fruit, which I thought was odd. Fast-forward about and hour after breakfast and I found two empty packages of fruit snacks (the sugary, processed ones) under a pillow on the couch ((no wonder we've been having an ant problem isolated to the couch!)). I confronted her about it and she told me she's "always hungry when I get up in the morning before you and daddy wake up to make me breakfast." This tells me she's probably done this before. Hence the durn ant problem.

Ugh.

This explains why she didn't eat much breakfast. I had let the kids share a banana on the way to the farmer's market, so between the banana and two packages of fruit snacks, no wonder she wasn't hungry!

Lunch

Whoa. I was super giddy about preparing lunch today, too! What's gotten into me? Anywho, I was really excited to make Vegetable Quesadillas on Whole-Wheat Tortillas, both recipes courtesy of 100 Days of Real Food. And I enlisted some adorable help as seen below.

They were supposed to be rolling the tortilla dough into balls. LO was a huge help, but I just gave Chase a tiny little bit of dough to play with, and it kept sticking to his hands. ;)

The dough needs to rest for 15 minutes to an hour before rolling out the tortillas, so while I waited, I prepared the delicious veggies for our quesadillas.

What you saw there was 1/2 a zucchini, 1/2 a squash, about 1/4 of both red and green peppers, a handful of mushrooms and a bit of diced onion. I am very proud of myself here because I've NEVER purchased, cooked, nor eaten bell peppers ever before in my entire life! I tried a tiny sliver of a sautéed red pepper at dinner last Saturday before the Lady A concert, and it was mighty tasty! I figured it was time to add them to my repertoire as a home chef.

I already knew the kids wouldn't be fans of those particular veggies, so I made plans to make them a cheese quesadilla instead. I think next time I'll sneak some in anyway just to see what they do. I only assume they won't like them and it'll be a big fight, but they have surprised me before!

When it was time to roll out the dough, I called over "the help" and they got started. I needed all the help I could get because I doubled the recipe to make 24 tortillas so I could store them in the freezer to aid in quick and easy meals next week.

Helper #1:

Helper #2 (my apologies for the poor iPhone photo quality):

After the dough is rolled (I'm seriously considering this tortilla press for future tortilla making endeavors... rolling it out by hand was a seriously time-consuming effort), it was time to cook 'em up in a nonstick skillet. Pictured here is my new Cuisinart Green Gourmet 10-inch hard anodized skillet -- it has a water-based Ceramica nonstick surface that won't peel off, unlike the cheap T-Fal I keep throwing away. They do cook rather quickly (about a minute per), but when you double the batch I'd highly recommend grabbing a stool because it feels like it takes FOR-EVAH!

I cooked up enough tortillas to make lunch, then finished 'em up after we all ate. The kids had their cheese quesadillas (or "pizza" as we called it for Chase) with some apple slices and milk.

Hubs and I enjoyed our amazingly delicious vegetable quesadillas with some apple slices as well.

I highly recommend these recipes, both the whole-wheat tortillas and the yummy vegetable quesadillas! I made a whole one (approximately 8 inches) each for hubs and I, and while he was able to finish all of his, I was already full after half! I ate a bit more and ended up with 1/4 of my quesadilla left over, which has already been designated for lunch tomorrow! :)

Dinner

It probably won't shock you at this point, but dinner was mighty fantastic, too! I found a recipe for pork chops with bourbon-peach sauce, which I made with fresh peaches (and no bourbon), served along with diced roasted potatoes and a fresh salad!

Check it:

Yum, huh?

I realized that I've been cooking most of our fresh veggies for the past several days, so I decided to serve a raw salad with dinner tonight. You can see from my plating that I gave top billing to the salad, even though the pork and potatoes were nicely seasoned and super tasty. ;)

I was VERY impressed that BOTH kids ate this up quicker than I've ever seen -- with little to no complaining! LO even asked for seconds, which is completely and totally unheard of. I couldn't believe it when I saw Chase eating pork chops and roasted potatoes!!!

It's not surprising, but the kids quickly recalled our discussion from earlier in the week when I told them we wouldn't be eating dessert daily, but would save special treats for the weekends from now on. Lo and behold, they reminded me of the ice cream I promised them. I had whipped up a dark chocolate sorbet last night as our special treat, refrigerated the mixture overnight and popped it into our ice cream maker this morning after breakfast. It had been sitting in the freezer all day, awaiting its appointed time following dinner.

I will say that I was NOT pleased with this recipe. It called for a T.O.N. of brown sugar (1 1/2 cups!!), but honestly I didn't have the ingredients on hand to make anything else. I really wanted to try frozen yogurt, but I had no idea you have to put plain yogurt in a cheesecloth in the refrigerator and let it sit overnight, plus I didn't have any cheesecloth. This sorbet was so overly sweet and so overly chocolatey (who knew such a thing existed?) and just not great, and certainly not healthy. The only good thing about this sorbet is that hubs and I agree there's no way he can eat an excessive amount of it in a single sitting (SCORE!). ;)

Anywho, we all enjoyed a bit of dark chocolate sorbet for dessert after dinner tonight. The picture below is from one of mine and hubs' portions. The kids had an even smaller scoop (this stuff was RICH!).

Chase was a big fan of the sorbet. He ate it up in no time and asked for more!

Welcome!

In case the blog title didn't give it away, I'm a Mama. And a Foodie.

I've got two little ones, an almost 5-year-old daughter, who I refer to as LO (read "little one") and a 2-1/2-year-old son, Chase. My husband and I live in the beautiful southern state of South Carolina, and we are embarking on a real food journey.

I decided to start writing this blog to chronicle the process of taking back my family's health by eliminating processed foods from our diet. I'm a stay at home mama (with a part-time job for brief escapes from the children -- haha!), so I'm responsible for all of the grocery shopping, all of the cooking and baking, and all of the snacking. Since hubs and I were married in 2005, we've maintained the typical "American" lifestyle: junk food, processed food, and zero exercise. When our daughter was born 2 years later, we continued our lifestyle. When our son was born almost 3 years ago, we continued our lifestyle. I would occasionally jump on a bandwagon every now and then to eliminate processed foods and eat only whole foods, but it would last only a week -- maybe two at most -- before I was back to baking daily treats (brownies, cupcakes, cookies, etc.), running through drive-thru's for lunch with the kids, and dining out for dinner, enjoying oversized portions and an occasional dessert to boot!

Fast-forward to last weekend. I had gorged myself on a variety of unhealthy foods, and my body was NOT happy about it. My stomach was miserable for a good three days straight. It wasn't necessarily digestive issues, so much as a dull, aching pain in my stomach. For three days straight. It was like my body was finally sending me the message: enough is enough!

I came to my senses and started focusing my diet (and thus my kids' and husband's as well) primarily on whole foods and the elimination of processed foods. As of this writing, I'm only 5 days into our journey, but it has been a HUGE success and I don't see us going back to our old ways.

I've been buying TONS of fresh fruits and veggies, and have been avoiding processed foods. I haven't baked anything in over a week, which is a BIG DEAL for me. I love to cook (hence the "Foodie" part of the blog), so I've been trying out new, healthy recipes, as well as new ingredients I previously assumed my family and I wouldn't like.

I started this journey on my other blog -- Just Another Day -- but I've decided to devote my real food journey on its very own blog as I feel it's THAT important. I hope you enjoy following along on our journey as I post healthy recipes and food photos from our journey. Feel free to share your thoughts, insights, recipes, ideas, etc. here as well. I'd love the support and community from other healthy food foodies!

To get the blog started off on the right foot, I've grabbed the posts I wrote concerning our first four days of this journey from my other blog and posted them here so you'll have the whole picture of where we came from and what inspired me to start this journey. :)

Four(ish) Things (a.k.a. Day 1)

First of all, this has been happening a lot lately and I cannot get enough of it!

Granted it's extremely temporary, and only happens when there is entertainment provided via television.

I swear they smiled right after I took that photo. I think the unexpected flash got their attention, causing the "Whaaa?" look on their faces.

Secondly, I went to see Lady Antebellum (as well as Thompson Square and Darius Rucker) and LOVED it. I can't remember the last time I went to an actual live concert at an actual venue somewhere, but this one was very memorable! Great seats, a great friend, and amazing live music! YAY!

Seriously, our seats were awesome.

Darius Rucker! I didn't realize he was the lead singer from Hootie and the Blowfish until after my friend told me, and then all I could hear when he sang was Hootie. It was pretty cool. He even did one or two numbers from his Hootie days. Sweet!

You totally can't tell, but this stage has Thompson Square, Darius Rucker and Lady Antebellum on it. They did an incredible number that included all of them. Wicked awesome!

Thirdly, I am on a mission. Well, I'm attempting to be on a mission. One that involves healthier eating. Let me break it down for ya.

My kids eat dessert every day after lunch AND dinner. This is NOT a great habit to get them into (heard of the childhood obesity epidemic in our country??). Furthermore, their meals involve a good 80-90% processed foods with every meal. I mean, I'll add some fresh fruit and/or raw veggies on the side, but the feature is typically a PB&J, pizza, macaroni & cheese, or chicken nuggets with fries.

Mommy of the Year, yes?

((sigh))

It makes matters worse that mommy is typically partaking of the same fare as the kiddos. Healthy? Notsomuch. I've been trying/wishing/hoping somehow I could get the motivation and commitment to eating healthy, but it's never really stuck. I'm really hoping this ends now.

Long story short, I've had miserable, non-stop stomach pains since Sunday. Like the never-going-away-constant-dull-to-significant-pain in my belly. I couldn't help but attribute it to my body finally saying, "Enough is ENOUGH!"

Let's just say I'm pretty sure my darkest moment came Saturday night when my sweet friend and I had dinner before the Lady A concert. Let's just say we shared a dessert (quite likely large enough to serve a small crowd) that consisted of the following:

• A warm banana, encrusted with potato chips and deep fried (yes, potato chips and yes, deep fried);
• Ice cream;
• Whipped cream;
• Chocolate sauce;
• Caramel sauce;
• Strawberries.

Just imagine.

Let me help. Here's a pic from the restaurant's website...

OMG, right??

I was sitting there thinking, I cannot believe I am literally eating a banana that's been rolled in crushed potato chips and deep fried. Tasty and delicious? Sure. Healthy? Not even close.

Anywho, since I've been feeling miserable for a few days, I figure today I would start anew and try to eat only whole foods. I've been very successful -- for a day. We'll see if it can continue.

I know I didn't eat enough today but it's only because my stomach is still pretty upset. But I ate an apple around 10AM, then for lunch it was a few green grapes and the roast beef from Chase's sandwich (Arby's Junior Roast Beef -- he only eats the bread). I ate another apple around 2PM.

For dinner tonight, I made something that we've had often, but tonight I sort of recreated it using only whole foods. We used to do "taco night" with refried beans, loads of cheese, a ton of chips, taco shells, flour tortillas, etc. Not so whole foody, right?

Tonight I made ground beef, black beans (with onion, garlic and cilantro), lettuce, tomato and a tiny bit of cheese, with a side of grapes.

I used a smaller plate to make the portion size seem a bit larger, and promised myself beforehand that I wouldn't allow seconds. This worked out well today, again, because of my poor, ailing tummy.

Yummy, fresh, whole food! What a concept!

I'm already prepared for my late night snack attack (after the kids go to bed, so after 9PM -- the worst time to eat/gorge on sweet foods). Tonight it will be a banana or a small bowl of plain popcorn.

I plan to try to stick to my whole food focus (not diet), but I'm thinking breakfast and lunch will be much harder for me. Besides eggs, turkey bacon and oatmeal, I don't know what other options I have for breakfast (any ideas?). And lunch used to be whatever was quick and easy to make, but now I'm thinking it will involve some thought/planning. I already know tomorrow's lunch will be leftovers from tonight, which I'm super happy about.

I'm also planning to eliminate the desserts and baked goods (insert GASP! here). I told the kids we'd only have dessert on the weekends (Sat. and Sun.) and only after dinner. I think going from 14 weekly desserts to 2 is a pretty good improvement, right?

I will also be upping my water intake tremendously.

I'm pretty picky about food, so I'm not sure how well I'll do expanding my horizons and trying new foods that I previously wouldn't have ever considered. Take, for example, the fact that earlier tonight I quite literally googled, "how to learn to like eating fish." I figure fish is pretty healthy, but oh how I can't stand fish! Have I ever actually tried fish? No. But I don't like the idea of scales and skin and bones. I think I'll make it my goal to purchase, cook and eat fish ONE TIME before the end of 2012. I'll keep ya posted on that one. ;)

How much of your diet is real food vs. processed food? Have you ever wanted to incorporate healthier foods and habits to benefit yourself and/or your family? I would definitely recommend visiting Lisa Leake's blog 100 Days of Real Food for excellent resources pertaining to eating healthy, whole foods. She's got a ton of meal ideas and recipes that I'm certain I'll be referring to often!

My goal is to eat healthier, feel better, and set a better example for my kids (and husband). I'm hopeful that a little bit of weight loss will accompany these lifestyle changes, but I'm NOT making that my focus right now. The name of the game is getting healthy!

((Please note I didn't mention the evil word "exercise" in this post. That was on purpose. Exercise sucks. More on that later.))

Lastly, I'm taking this entire week off from work. It's wonderful! It's like life-before-my-part-time-job-got-in-the-way FUN! LO was VERY pleased to know I'll be home EVERY night this week -- to be able to eat dinner together as a family, to read her bedtime story(ies), etc. She hates it when I go to work but HURRAY for a whole week of family togetherness like it used to be!

Okay, one last thing... Speaking of time off from work, I was off this past Saturday so hubs and I (okay, mostly hubs) FINALLY put another day of work into cleaning up and organizing our garage. I'm happy to announce that ((...drumroll please...)) we can now officially park BOTH of our cars in the garage! Yay! Happy days!!

Okay, that's it for now. No, really. I'm out.

((sorry for the super-long post))

Now I'm out.

Another Day... (a.k.a. Day 2)

Another day down, and another day of real, whole food for me and my family (well, mostly just me and the kids since hubs still does his own thing for breakfast and lunch).
I'm very proud of myself and am happy to say I'm feeling So. Much. Better. even after eliminating all processed foods for just two days! It's amazing, and I can definitely see that eating only whole foods keeps me fuller longer.
I'm surprised to admit I haven't experienced any major cravings for sweets, which, if you know anything about me, you'll know that's a pretty big deal!
So I'm sure this is gonna be a pretty boring post for you guys, but I'm keeping myself honest here, so I'm gonna recap what I ate today.

Breakfast

I was quite proud of myself AND my kids this morning! I made bacon and eggs and the kids ate it up (as well as LO's gummy bear vitamin)! Well, LO went to town on it and Chase pretty much just ate the bacon (even though I slightly burnt it... oops!). But it's progress! Seriously, the kids are usually having frozen waffles or pancakes, Pop-Tarts, sugary cereal, cinnamon rolls or donuts for breakfast. See why this is such a big deal for me? Yay!

Morning Snack

I have to brag on the kids again here. We had a busy morning with class at The Little Gym, followed by a few shopping errands. But mommy was prepared! Normally snacks on the go consist of highly-processed fruit snacks, sugary cereal, crackers, chocolate chip granola bars, etc. But today they shared a banana and each had a little box of raisins -- with no complaints! They were happy to receive these whole food snacks in lieu of the junk I typically provide, and it made me so happy! Mommy had a banana for my snack, too! Yay, me!!! ;)

Lunch

Lunch was easy. For me, it was a repeat of last night's ground beef, black beans, lettuce, tomato and cheese with a side of grapes. Just as delish if not better than the night before! The kids shared a PB&J, some fruit, cheese and a fruit strip from Trader Joe's.

Afternoon Snack

The kids and I shared a large Gala apple for our afternoon snack today. And mommy snacked on additional fruit while I prepared dinner... ;)

Dinner

Dinner was fun! I decided to do something I haven't done before, and served a "themed" dinner of sorts... Dinner on a Stick! I made oven-baked chicken (seasoned only with salt-free Mrs. Dash and fresh ground pepper), corn cobs, fruit kebabs and cheese cubes. The kids LOVED LOVED LOVED the fun, interesting, exciting, different approach to dinner, and ate better than I've ever seen! They both cleared their plates in record time!

The kids had milk with every meal, and I had water. I was kind of bummed to hear LO had an ice cream sandwich in her class at church tonight, but hey -- whaddya gonna do, right?
YAY for 2 days of healthy eating!!!
So a quick point on my exercise plan: I'm not really focusing on any right now. People, you have no idea how easily I get overwhelmed when I try to do both healthy eating AND exercise -- it's too much and I just end up failing miserably. So instead, I'm trying to get my eating under control and then add the exercise focus later.
So sorry for boring y'all with this food post. I'll warn you that there will probably be more in the days ahead. After all, this is MY blog, right? ;)

Day 3! Yay!

Day 3 is almost complete, and it was another success! Yay!

Breakfast

I tried to get the kids to jump outside of their comfort zone this morning. I made them oatmeal, which they've never had before ((shame)). I eat oatmeal often, but more times than not it's the little flavored oatmeal packet you just add water (or milk) to. I decided we'd all try a new healthy breakfast option.

It didn't help that as I headed to the kitchen to start breakfast, Chase was shouting, "Pancakes!" while LO chimed in with, "Pop-Tarts!" Grrrr.

So I made some oatmeal using this recipe from 100 Days of Real Food. I've always used water with my oatmeal, but her recipe called for milk instead. The oatmeal was flavored with a dash of honey, a sprinkle of cinnamon and a splash of vanilla. ((Note: When I made myself real oatmeal a week or so ago, I used water but topped it with about 1/4 cup of brown sugar! And lots of raisins! It was amazing to eliminate the sugar and find out how sweet it still tasted with just a little honey, cinnamon and vanilla.))

Anywho, I served the kids (and I) oatmeal with a side of toppings for them to choose from: raisins, bananas and strawberries. I chose raisins and bananas:

And the toppings! I thought (hoped, prayed) that by letting them choose their own toppings and "helping" make their breakfast that they'd have more interest in this oatmeal stuff.

LO decided on raisins. I think we got off to a great start! She didn't do her typical complaining about how she "doesn't like it" before even trying it. I was keeping my fingers crossed...

Chase went with bananas and raisins. Again, I was really hoping they'd enjoy their new healthy breakfast option...

Chase took his usual cereal approach and dumped a bunch of milk into his bowl and then tried to drink it... only he wasn't a fan. "No like it," said Chase, over and over again.

LO wasn't a big fan, either. Long story short, they ate some of the banana, strawberries and raisins, but left the oatmeal.

Bummer.

But it's okay! I was super proud of both of them for trying it without any complaining. I'll definitely try oatmeal with them again, and hope for a different response. ;)

Lunch

Lunch was pretty similar to yesterday, and no pics because we enjoyed our lunch at the pool today! PB&J's, cheese cubes, grapes and apples, along with a fruit strip and some whole wheat pretzels from Trader Joe's. No surprise but I ate leftovers from Tuesday for lunch... again. ;)

Dinner

Dinner was super simple and quite tasty! I did break my "no processed foods" rule by serving whole wheat pasta, but at least it was whole wheat, right?

So I took one chicken breast (it was all I had defrosted and ready to go -- I would typically use two for a meal like this), cut it into bite-sized pieces, sautéed it in olive oil with some garlic, then added some fresh sliced mushrooms. Then I deglazed the pan with some white wine, reduced it slightly, then added a can of diced tomatoes and a few fresh cherry tomatoes, cut in half. Then I let it it simmer, covered, for about 10 minutes while I waited on the pasta to finish. The kids also had applesauce with their dinner.

I was sorry to see the kids weren't big fans of my dinner. LO ate up her chicken without any problem, but needed some serious convincing to eat her pasta (she's not a big fan of the regular stuff in general, much less whole wheat).

Today's snacks were a bit of a win-lose. I totally won when LO woke up from her nap, asked for a snack, and proceeded to suggest we share a banana and some strawberries. LOVE! The loss came when I sort of caved to Chase and let him have some cheese-filled Ritz Bits crackers. After dinner we enjoyed some popcorn while playing outside, uh, apparently... um, in our pajamas. Don't be a hater! Super Mom over here!!

This day was truly another huge success in my book. I measure success in the fact that I avoided processed foods for myself and my family, and that I'm already feeling So. Much. Better. than I was feeling when eating mostly sweets and highly-processed foods. :)

Day 4! Hurray!

I had the hardest time figuring out what to do with the kids today! It's supposed to be crazy hot, so we ended up spending the whole day indoors. Boo. But we did break out of this house this afternoon to hit the grocery store, and that was fun something. I had a proud mommy moment when we were in the baking aisle (selecting a white whole wheat flour -- not ingredients for "those" kind of baked goods... sorry to my local readers). LO was reading the episode descriptions from the back of a Dora DVD to Chase, and a random older lady (maybe 60ish?) stopped in awe and asked if she was really reading that?! I said yes, and she was absolutely amazed. She didn't even ask how old she was or if she was in school yet, but walked away chatting to her adult son/friend how she couldn't believe that little girl was actually reading that! I'm so proud of my little avid reader 4-year-old.

Anywho, here's where I'm keeping it real for myself (and those of you who care to follow along):

Breakfast

We had the classic (turkey) bacon and eggs this morning, with a side of fruit. I was sort of lenient with the kids and once they finished their healthy breakfast, I let them enjoy a small leftover pancake (Chase) and a Pop-Tart (LO & Chase). Seriously, it was hard not to allow it considering when I woke up this morning, Chase was standing next to my bed quietly whispering, "Pancake!" as his eyes lit up in excitement. I figure the goal right now is to incorporate more whole foods into our diets, and while I'm trying to stick to 100% whole foods for myself, I think it's okay for the kids to have an occasional splurge on something they were used to eating almost daily up until this week!

Snack

Our morning snack was a huge success. The kids had been asking for fruit snacks but I was able to redirect them with a healthier alternative. They had cheese & cracker stackers and grapes with -- get this -- WATER. My kids don't do water ((shame)), so this was a Big Deal for us!

I asked the kids what they thought of their snack. They were both all smiles!!!

My kids drinking water... on purpose... and enjoying it! I can't help but notice that when it comes down to it, honestly, kids will eat/drink what YOU as the parent set in front of them. They may have preferred milk or juice, but today, I only offered water and they went for it! Score!!

Lunch

Lunch was pretty low-key. A grilled cheese, apple slices, raisins, carrots, whole wheat pretzels and a yogurt for the kids.

I didn't really eat a lunch today per se. I snacked on some of the kids' apple and had a 1/2 cup of applesauce with a flavored water to drink. It's amazing how much less (much less? weird.) I'm eating now that I've eliminated processed foods and am only eating whole foods. I'm hopeful the kids are feeling the same way because they are eating a good bit less than I'm used to. I think we're on the right track!

Dinner

Mmmmmm. Dinner. As I mentioned, the kids and I hit the grocery store today and stocked up on fruits and veggies like you wouldn't believe! So tonight's dinner was a real treat, IMHO.

I made a pan-seared steak (put some olive oil in the pan 'til hot, sear steaks on both sides, add a pat of butter once seared) then transferred it to a 300° oven to complete cooking, basting it with the butter/oil mixture once.

I also placed chopped zucchini, squash and halved cherry tomatoes on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, then drizzled olive oil over the mix as well as some Mrs. Dash and fresh ground pepper. I placed the vegetables in the oven on a low broil setting for about 10 minutes. ((I had removed the steaks prior to this and allowed them to rest in the pan, covered loosely with foil.))

Finally, I had LO shuck me some sweet corn (YUM!) that we tossed into a pot of boiling water.

Ahem. See below.

This meal was delicious! So light yet filling and full of flavor. I was VERY impressed to see LO eat all of her (two bites) of steak and Chase even ate one of his (tiny) bites! Hubs and I had to coerce LO to try the squash and zucchini, but after she did, she said she liked it! WIN!

I just want to mention that my family has gone WITHOUT any form of bread at dinner for the week and actually survived! I used to serve canned crescent rolls, biscuits, or frozen Texas toast with dinner almost nightly, so this is another big win for us. I'm so proud of me and my family! :))

The weekend is approaching, and I plan to keep my word to the little ones. I shocked n' awed them earlier this week when I said there would no longer be daily desserts after lunch and dinner, but that we would save such indulgences for the weekend from now on. Lo and behold, we all survived! ((To keep it real, hubs isn't 110% on board just yet... he still has his nightly ice cream... but I'm working on that next!))

I've decided our first yummy weekend dessert will be homemade sorbet or frozen yogurt using our new Cuisinart ice cream maker. It rocked some (full-fat, full-calorie) vanilla ice cream a few weeks ago, so I'm certain it'll knock a sorbet or frozen yogurt outta the park! Now to find a good recipe to try...

Thanks for following along on our first week of healthy, whole food eating. I haven't decided if I'll keep going with daily food blogging or just hit y'all with random updates every once in a while... I'll leave it up to whomever chooses to comment in favor or against! ;)