Real Food Challenge: Day 10... the end!

Ah the last day.  Breakfast and lunch were simple (yogurt and sandwich variety of things), but here's where you find out that I really am fighting against my terribly picky childhood self.

See, I hate fish.  Before I married Daniel, I had had the occasional fish stick or popcorn shrimp in childhood, but had pretty much sworn off all fishy things since then.  Daniel; however, really enjoys sea food, and when Anni was struggling to gain any weight, a medical professional suggested we add some fish to our diet every once in awhile.  So, I have, on occasion, done alright with the fishy variety.  The one time we made it during pregnancy, I ended up hunched over the toilet (not that that was exclusive to fish), so my last experience left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth.  Hooooowever; apparently I was in a mood on Friday, and despite the fact that my dear, sweet, hubby made a lovely dinner while I worked, I couldn't bring myself to eat it.  Yep, I admit it.  That being said, Daniel and Anni both ate a beautiful meal of salmon, quinoa and corn.  The end!

Things we learned during the challenge:

1) Real food can get kind of expensive... especially we you eat lots and lots and lots of fruit.  I think the most expensive part was the local meat.  Here's hoping for a big ole' deep freezer in our future home for a half of a cow or something exciting like that!

2) It wasn't a huge departure from what we usually eat... it just meant pooling the real food recipes I was already using and throwing in a few extras for fun.  The biggest difference was having to make the conscious decision to *not* get take-out just because we were tired or it had been a long day or the baby ate all afternoon and I didn't get a chance to get the dough started.  It was really good for me to make myself figure out a meal even when I didn't want to... definitely a little kick in the pants for me as a homemaker.  It helped quite a bit that we have been slowly introducing a lot of baby steps toward a less processed diet for a long time.  

3) I couldn't tell you if eating real food changed how I felt in terms of energy, etc, as I've been working late into the night to stay caught up with things and, well, I do have a three year old and a newborn.  However, I did actually lose a few pounds... which was kind of a big deal as I haven't been able to lose anything since Lettie was two weeks old.

4) While there was definitely some extra prep time in there, I got a lot of satisfaction out of making more of our food from scratch.  Sure, I was tempted to put it off, knowing that it was hard work (I am a world class procrastinator), but the reminder that I couldn't take the easy way out and still have dinner for my family usually spurred me along.  In the end, I generally enjoyed that time in the kitchen.  It did mean a lot more dishes (Daniel usually tries to do them all for me, but I did a lot more clearing out the sink during the day just so we could stay on top of them... those mixing bowls take up a lot of space, and mine can only be hand washed).

In the end, I'm really glad we did this.  We saw that it's really not impossible, and definitely something we can do more than a majority of the time.  I'm excited to see how it will shape our eating in the weeks to come!

For more info on the 10 Day Pledge, head over to 100 Days of Real Food!  My other favorite "Real Food source" is over at Kitchen Stewardship if you're on the hunt for more yummy recipes and ideas!

PS I admit to eating breakfast burritos (just one, but we all had one) the morning after we finished... at least they were from an authentic restaurant and not McDonald's.  On that note, just don't try to eat McDonald's breakfast burritos, or really any of their food... not worth it.