Last night's dinner was simple. It put me over my calories, but I was still under maintenance. We had ham, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, brown gravy, corn bread stuffing, shells and cheese, and dinner rolls. Yep. Horrible. What makes it worse is that ALL of it was prepackages. Every last bit of it. Well, except the potatoes that I hand peeled and boiled. I used a shrink wrapped ham, canned green beans, Campbell's cream of mushroom, those french's fried onions, powder gravy mix, Velveeta mac, Merita dinner rolls. I don't think I've had a meal that prepackaged since...well, since last holidays because we make most things ourselves. I normally make my own cornbread for stuff. We've even gotten into make our own mac and cheese. I buy frozen "fresh" green beans. None of that last night. At the time it was delicious and comforting after yesterday's mental roller coaster and chilly weather. I had the same (except shells and cheese) for leftovers in smaller portions. The thing I noticed the most? I can taste so much salt!! It's giving me a headache, actually, as I type. It's insane. Dry storage like stuffing and gravy powder doesn't need that much salt! Ridiculous. It doesn't taste as good as homemade stuff either. I guess the key thing is that we hardly ever do that, "that" being cooking prepackaged food and also having that many carbohydrate rich foods in one sitting.
Per habit, I must include something positive. I have slept really well the past two nights. I have successfully and quite happily not taken a nap AND have gotten to sleep at a decent hour. Wonderful!
That dinner had me excited until I read that it was prepackaged. :) Although I try my hardest to cook from scratch all the time, I find myself sometimes reaching for "convenience" foods--even if they're organic or made without preservatives. You're right--they taste like crap. Even Amy's frozen meals are horrible. But sometimes even the mere thought of cleaning the kitchen after a large [and delicious] homemade meal has me running out to eat. Very bad choice, indeed.
ReplyDeleteHowever, that's why I've accumulated so many kitchen gadgets from local thrift stores on the very cheap. My $6 bread maker is amazing, as is my hand blender [for smoothies and baby food]. Either way, that sounds like an awesome spread. I'm hungry now. :)
Indeed. I was pretty disappointed in myself :P And of course the load of carbs and minimal protein for leftovers left me hungry before my shift was over. Pretty sucky. I definitely prefer scratch making everything if time and resources allow. Gadgets certainly do help! I love my food processor, but I am quite jealous of your bread machine. I don't have the time or reliable oven (I have to baby sit for temperature) to bake bread like I used to :( I must point out that I initially typed "time machine" because I'm responding while watching Doctor Who :P
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