Mandi and me posing with chicken nuggets.
This week I ground my own flour for organic apple muffins, let my kids eat Bugles, drove to a farmer’s market just so I could get their blue and green free range eggs, ate 2 cookies and a piece of cake in one night, refused to give my son the ultra-pasteurized organic milk from a restaurant and let him eat 3 Starbursts wrapper and all.
My healthy food journey is all over the place. I am totally convinced that eating organic, unprocessed, local food is the way to go–for your body, for the environment and even for our economy. But there is a disconnect when it comes to a party, a vacation or even going out to eat.
I don’t know how you can eat healthy ALL the time and still be a slightly normal person. I mean, there are times you have to eat out! There are times you have to eat a meal with someone and they serve something completely processed. You can’t get all holier-than-thou and not eat!
I’ve heard an 80-20 diet is acceptable–80% of the time eat healthy so 20% of the time you can eat whatever you want (and/or need to). So, if you eat 3 meals a day then a little over 4 meals could be “unhealthy”. I guess that’s not too hard. In fact, most of the time I only eat out once a week.
Last week, I was asked to eat out and try a healthy meal at Wendy’s. At first I thought, “Wendy’s? Really? Healthy?” But I decided to check it out because honestly, I have not been to a McDonald’s in 5 years. I haven’t opened the door of a Burger King in longer than that. The only fast food place I ever take the kids to is Chick-fil-a.
Me standing with Mishelle Lane at Wendy’s. And obviously, I look lovely.
Wendy’s is doing this new Pick 2 menu–with a half salad and a host of other sides. I met up with about 10 local bloggers to try out the menu and gab. I got there a little late and stood in line forever (they apparently didn’t know I was a famous blogger). By the time I got my food (and the kids’) almost everyone was done. I was shaking with hunger. Asa was sitting across from me eating chicken nuggets. When I got the 2nd bite of my apple-pecan-blue cheese salad in my mouth Asa began throwing up. Not just a little I-don’t-like-this-food, it was more like a heaving vomit. I run over to clean him up and suddenly hear Lydia whining/crying beside me. I turn to her aggravated like, “Your brother is vomiting! Do not make this about you!!” and then I look down, she has spilled her milk all over the table, the chair, the floor, herself and Evan (Mandi’s Evan was sitting next to her).
Mandi and the kids
Fellow ATL blogger, Lindsay rescued me with a few napkins. But my magical get-a-free-healthy-meal-with-some-fun-bloggers experience was just a little less exciting after that. Actually, the salad was pretty yummy. The lettuce was crispy, there were big pieces of cranberries, tons of blue cheese (my fave) and the pomegranate dressing was awesome! I asked for mine without chicken but they put it on there anyway. And it was actually really good!
The only “eh” part was the sides—you could pick from all sorts of things that just didn’t seem super healthy (or exciting) to me: a hamburger, some kind of chicken wrap, a bottled water, a frosty, baked potato, etc. I got the baked potato and it was good–according to Wendy’s website, they actually cook it in an oven instead of a microwave. Anyway, for a healthy fast-food meal (oxymoron), that salad and baked potato Pick 2 was a good choice! I love the idea of a salad being your main portion and the hamburger, etc. being the extra. It’s much better to focus on the veggies over the meat!
So, what’s your healthy meal-unhealthy meal ratio? How do you do healthy on the go? Out to eat? To those of you that eat healthy 100% of the time, how do you do it?!
{visit my facebook page to win a Wendy’s giftcard!}
Gorgeous photos by the fabulous Secret Agent Mama, Mishelle Lane.
This was part of a paid opportunity with Wendy’s & The Motherhood. Opinions mine.
Vader's Mom says
We are friends with the red head in this commercial. Too funny!!
Funkidivagirl says
I am like you…I try, really hard to eat healthy 80% of the time. But we do eat Chik-fil-A on crazy days. And only that fast food…I won’t eat any other fast food.
Amy says
Sounds like you had an interesting time. I “try” to eat healthy by eating more veggies, eating ground turkey instead of ground beef, making portion sizes smaller. I don’t do the whole organic thing, mainly because I can’t afford it. But my ratio of healthy to non healthy is bad, lol… right now, it’s about 50/50.
Tricia says
I try to feed myself and my family organic all the time. And I fail miserably. I WAS a vegan, then I became pregnant and I’m craving cheese so I’m on hiatus from my vegan ways at the moment (I fully plan on returning to that lifestyle once baby is here…I hope). We do not go out to eat…ever. We just decided that we’d stop going out to eat, and we don’t do drive-thru anymore either. But we will indulge and go to Subway; that’s really the only place we get “fast food”. We used to be McDonald’s fast-food people, but I read a book called Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer and it changed my life forever….until I got pregnant 🙂 I guess it took me reading something so shocking and disgusting that I COULD NOT bring myself to eat things that I had recently found to be horrendous for us, and bad for the people creating the food as well. WE ALL slip up, so I think you should keep doing what you’re doing because you are doing a fantastic job; much better than most, I’m sure!
Stephanie says
Call us the typical American family, I guess. We eat out a lot, as in at least two times a week. Hubby rarely takes his lunch to work, so he eats out more than the rest of us. However, I refuse to eat McDonald’s or Burger King. I cringe when I know my in-laws have given them McDonald’s nuggets because they are so processed and just plain gross. I give the kids organic milk, but at $6 a gallon, it’s expensive! My grandparents have a garden, so we do get fresh, organic veggies in the summer, but I’m the first to admit I’ll grab a can of green beans to throw beside some non-free range chicken and white (not brown) rice and call it a success. I think there is so much pressure these days to go organic and go free-range and go green, that as long as we just STOP and say a blessing and have a meal together, we’re doing pretty good by our kids.
oh amanda says
Steph: I totally agree! We don’t live on bread alone. 🙂
Kelsey says
I think this might be my favorite post on your site–because it reminds me of me. The day after we got our first CSA share this summer, we ordered pizza.
On an unrelated note: I love your hair! I cut my hair short two years ago and have gone back and forth between styles, and between love and hate. It’s a super cute style on you!
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