Clean Eating- The jury is still out

Week 1 recap:

It all started with an insane trip tot he grocery store. To start, we made a couple of huge mistakes. We went on a Sunday Morning, in the snow, just hours before Winter Storm Titan was due to arrive. Our second major mistake, we had in tow two crabby toddlers. Makes for a rough trip even if we were just out for our usual items.

MEAT: I realize in the future I need to find a farmer and/or a butcher to buy my meat from. In the mean time, Giant Eagle carries a line called Nature's Basket which is hormone free and antibiotic free.

PRODUCE: For the most part, the produce was easy.  I am pretty familiar with a lot of fruits and vegetables because I have ben cooking pretty regularly for the las year. I was not able to find any Sun-Dried Tomatoes without Sulfites added for color. Not sure where to look for those.

BEANS & GRAINS: I stayed away from the canned things. The Chick peas were yummy, yummy dried versus the usual canned version.  Happy surprise.  I also discovered an entire section of The Market District with Grains, Oats, Nuts, Super Foods and Agave Nectar. I will be a exploring this section more and more.

DAIRY: Pretty easy peasy here. We already use Almond Milk, so we were familiar with it. It was, as I have found in the past, difficult to find plain yogurt.  I like the Siggi's brand, but they don't have it everywhere. I did find it there eventually.  We did not get the fancy cage free eggs mainly due to cost.

SNACKS:  We could not even look at snacks and things because the boys were pretty much done.

OTHER: Coconut oil is not liquid at room temperature.  It is still a great option for some substations, but I will have to make my oil spray out of extra virgin olive oil. The ingredients I needed to make cupcakes for Colin's birthday party were not all there. Plus, I figured out they would cost me $75. So I went with an on Etsy, and found a Vegan Bakery who made them for me.  They were Vegan, Soy-free and Gluten free AND delicious!

As for the actual clean eating.  The first 3 days, all I could think about was soda.  I had a terrible headache, and was pretty non-functional.  It was the worst. So glad I had solid plan in place or I would have completely failed. The Soda thing is still a battle, but it is improving. I do feel a little less bloated, and I am sleep really well at night (Except that for various reasons my kids have been waking up throughout the night).