lauramich

...and yet have a hard time doing. I almost always flunk the freakin’ hematocrit. I’ve tried everything I can think of to boost my iron count, from making sure not to try donating at a certain time of month (ahem) to eating iron-rich foods paired with vitamin C foods before I plan to give.

But I’ve been on prenatal vitamins for a while, preparing to have a baby, so I should’ve been in top form to donate when the last blood drive rolled around a month ago. (The kicker? The blood drive was in the lobby of the building where I work, just steps outside my department’s office. Like, no effort at all to show up!) But since I was trying to get pregnant, and wasn’t 100% sure that I wasn’t pregnant, I decided to sit it out. (I checked the Red Cross site first and found that pregnant women are prohibited from donating until six weeks after delivery.) Wouldn’t you know? The next day, I got confirmation that I was not, in fact, pregnant.

Last night, I was smacked in the face with one of my biggest triggers for feeling deprived: Eating a meal that is less than satisfying. As long as I enjoy what I eat, I don’t feel a great loss in sacrificing fatty, sugary, processed stuff. But give me something that doesn’t satisfy, and I’ll start feeling cranky.

To put this in perspective, I went to two parties this past Saturday. Cake was available at both parties. I ate no cake. None. And I didn’t feel particularly deprived. I enjoyed healthier choices and – more to the point – socializing with my friends.

But last night, J. and I decided to make breakfast for dinner. Before I started eating healthier, we both would’ve had maple-flavored pork sausage with our meals. But I took one look at the fat content (13 grams for 3 lousy links!) and decided I needed a better choice. I settled on soy sausage, which had a fraction of the fat and some fiber to boot. I’d had it before and didn’t care for it, but I thought preparing it in the same pan as J.’s pork sausage, thinking that might impart some more flavor. It didn’t help. Still disgusting. Easily the worst “healthy” thing I’ve tried to eat. I choked down what I’d prepared, but contrary to my goal of wasting less food, I threw the rest of the box away.

I’m very lucky in that I genuinely enjoy a variety of healthy foods. I like most fruits and vegetables, skim milk, whole grains, beans, nuts, lean meats, and some fish (I don’t fully love salmon, except in sushi, but I do like shellfish, catfish, tilapia, mahi-mahi, and rare tuna steak.) I even like Boca Burgers! But soy sausage will never find its way into my grocery cart ever again.

From the NY Times: One Country’s Table Scraps, Another Country’s Meal. An estimated 27% of the food available for consumption in the United States goes to waste. Granted, a significant amount of that is commercial waste, like fast food restaurants discarding uneaten cheeseburgers and grocery store delis pitching rotisserie chickens. But American families waste a fair share, too.

I’m guilty, and I’m still working on this. I buy more produce than I can reasonably eat, or buy something on sale and am not able to use it all before it expires. Sometimes it’s something that I don’t even realize expires. Just last night, I was going to fix some cinnamon crescent rolls to go with dinner – something I haven’t done in ages since I’ve been eating better. (My plan was to eat just one or two, not four like before.) But the refrigerated rolls expired back in February. February!

Or, it’s something I buy for a recipe, and I don’t think through how to use up the rest of it. While rummaging in the fridge for those cinnamon rolls, I found a package of shredded Swiss cheese that had gone moldy. I bought it for a casserole dish; it’s not something I normally use.

So, yeah, still working on this. I need to (1) buy things only when I make a real commitment to eat it all; (2) think carefully, before trying a new recipe, what I’ll do with the leftover ingredients; and (3) check expiration dates carefully.

Sparkpeople has more tips for keeping produce fresh. And Wasted Food has more, period.