Getting Ready for Lent

Happy Mardi Gras!

It snowed during the night here and the temperature is quite cold.  I do hope I can go grocery shopping this afternoon.  I hope the plow guys are out doing their job.  God bless them!

The plan is to have pancakes and sausage for dinner tonight.  Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday and thus Lent begins.

Lent is going to be a bit complicated food-wise.  I am giving up sugar and refined carbs and Becky is also.  But Sean decided to give up meat.  I can't dissuade him.  So I've got to do some planning.  I've done this before, we've gone through periods of being vegetarian, except for Sean.  It really will be a sacrifice for him because he lives for cheese burgers, his absolute favorite food and also he lives for Chipolte's chicken.  We've been in the very bad habit of having Chick fil e every Tuesday for lunch and eating out at Chipotle every Friday.  I suppose he can now just go vegetarian at Chipotle but it will be hard to go there and not eat his beloved chicken!

I've been trying to cut back on sugar and refined carbs and doing a very poor job at it.  So, hopefully, with the extra muscle that Lent lends to will power, I can conquer my stupid cravings.

I am still going eat fruit and I am still going to use honey on my yogurt or occasionally in tea.  But that's it.  All bread and pasta will be whole wheat and all rice will be brown.  Except on Sundays!

Because we aren't cutting out dairy, eggs or fish though, it really isn't as bad as all that.

Breakfast:
oatmeal
breakfast cereal (not for me but for others)
eggs
plain yogurt with fruit
breakfast sandwiches (whole wheat English muffins and no ham, etc)
cheese, bread and fruit
bagels and cream cheese

Lunches:
peanut butter and honey (or just plain pb on whole wheat crackers)
peanut butter and fruit (bananas or apples)
vegetarian soups
grilled cheese
cheese quesadillas (whole wheat tortilla)
tuna salad
salad with nuts, cheese
vegetarian burrito (whole wheat tortilla)
egg salad

snacks:
nuts
fruit
tortilla chips
popcorn
veggies with hummus

Dinners:

Potato cheese soup with salad and whole wheat bread on side

Mac and Cheese (whole wheat macaroni), veggies and applesauce

Salmon fritters, potatoes, salad

Broiled fish, rice or potatoes, veggies

Baked fish, baked with veggies, rice or potatoes (maybe sometimes I'll sub sweet potatoes)

Shrimp 

Egg fried rice, stir fried veggies

Omelets with fried potatoes and fruit salad

Stuffed potatoes, with vegetarian chili, broccoli

Beans and rice, lots of Mexican toppings

Quinoa salad  - this will be a new recipe

Fettuccini Alfredo with caesar salad and some good wheat bread from bakery

Gnocchi (frozen from TJ's) with veggies

Vegetarian lasagna

vegetarian ravioli

Peanut butter/sesame noodles

As you can see from above. we aren't really going to be too deprived!  But I will have to plan better.  I would like to cut out white potatoes too but my whole family will go into revolt. So the no sugar, no meat, only whole wheat thing is enough for now.

The big thing I have to do is pay more attention to cooking vegetables well.  Actually most in my family like raw veggies, but you can only eat so many sliced cucumbers, baby carrots and the occasional celery stick.  They don't even like tomatoes.  They will eat sauteed mushrooms and sometimes will eat some roasted veggies.  Lately though they have been eating hardly any salad, which used to be something I could count on.  So I need to somehow freshen up the veggie department here.  I need to remember to eat the veggies first and to make sure they are half the plate.  And I need to have plenty of either fruit or veggie at each meal.  And while I will eat some whole wheat bread, I plan to cut down on bread altogether.  Also, while I don't plan to cut out butter and such, I should be very careful with portions.  I go way overboard with butter!

Tomorrow for Ash Wednesday I plan to start two new books:  Year of No Sugar to help with my fast and Jesus:  A Pilgrimage by Father James Martin.  I am looking forward to reading both of them.

I wish I were strong and could give up something like coffee for Lent.  That would be so hard!  But I am not quite up to that!