Let's Eat In! The Thirty Day Challenge

Picture in Palos Verdes during our 7-mile hike today!

I love a good challenge. In March I stumbled onto 100daysofrealfood.com, a blog that advocates real food. Given that Lisa is one of my inspirations for starting my own blog, I highly recommend checking out her various challenges! Her family did 100 days of no processed food, and she encourages readers to take on a 10-day challenge. That's where my husband and I started - a 10-day challenge to cut out processed food.

Now, I'm ready to create a challenge of my own: Let's Eat In! Thirty days of eating homemade meals. Here are the rules:

1. No eating out or ordering in. Even at work, we need to bring our own snacks and lunches (and no microwaveable Lean Cuisine, either - see #2).
2. No ready-made meals. We essentially cut out frozen meals and other ready-made snacks and meals when we took on the 10-day real food challenge, so we're hoping this part will be easy.
3. No processed foods. It makes sense that starting this challenge would also include past challenges, so we're back to eating real foods!
4. No cooking the same meal twice. We can eat the same meal, say, as leftovers, but we can't cook the same thing two times in the month. See below, "Creativity in Marriage."
5. Alcohol is the only exception. We have determined that this area will be our one exception - we can go to a bar or restaurant if we only order drinks (beer and wine only). After visiting London for our honeymoon, we absolutely love stopping for a pint and enjoying new bars!

The most frequent question our friends and family ask is, "What if your friends want to go out to eat?" While I can't predict everything we may encounter in the next month, here's my three-part response:

1. We can gladly pack up some dinners for ourselves and eat at a park or cafe and then meet up with the group after (or we can join for drinks after we've eaten).
2. We can suggest that the group eats in, and everyone can contribute a homemade recipe.
3. We don't have that many friends, so the chances of facing this issue more than once or twice are, regretfully, quite slim. However, the sheer number of people who are concerned that we are going to miss out on social outings makes us feel as though we are pretty pathetic homebodies...thanks a lot, guys.

A question I would rather hear is, "Why did you decide to take on this challenge?" Some jump straight to, "Oh, that'll save money!" but our reasons spread far beyond finances! I came up with the idea to satisfy three concerns.

Health

Nutrition, ingredients, and overall health have become a huge focus in my life. After reading two books by Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food and Omnivore's Dilemma, I absolutely cannot mindlessly eat the way I used to, and I'm encouraging my husband to more thoughtfully consider his food choices as well. Actively reading my favorite food blog keeps me motivated on an almost-daily basis, and seeing so many new blogs, books, articles, and discussions pop up about whole foods, farmer's markets, choosing unprocessed meals, and going homemade makes me hopeful that healthy living will eventually become the popular choice.

The health benefits to eating in can fill up an entire blog, but I'll focus on the ones we're aiming for:

• Knowing every ingredient we're eating. You can't get any more mindful than that when it comes to being conscious of what you eat.
• Choosing grass-fed, organic, or local. I've been learning more and more about these different aspects of our food chain, and I've noticed how few restaurants actually post whether their beef is grass-fed (which makes me assume it isn't) or which of their vegetables are organic. Rather than guess, we can make the choice to include these types of foods in our cooking.
• Limiting or eliminating unnecessary or unnatural ingredients. If I can't pronounce it, I don't want to eat it. Many restaurants make health claims but still use processed items that they omit from their menus. Again, it's all about knowing what we have in our kitchen.

Creativity in Marriage

Terry and I just got married in July, but we have been together for five years and living together for three. We always try to find exciting ways to spice things up...in the kitchen! Two years ago, we started New Sunday Night Recipes, a title that explains itself. We have an enormous recipe collection from cookbooks, health blogs, and magazines, but it was so easy to fall back on recipes we know and love. Cooking a new recipe every Sunday keeps us actively trying new foods, flavor combinations, cooking techniques, and odd ingredients. I have become a much more confident and creative cook, all thanks to our fun little Sunday tradition. Lucky for me, Terry loves to taste test and even jumps in on the cooking from time to time!

So, in turn, eating in will create more opportunities for us to try new recipes (see rule #4, above). We get to dig out the recipes we've been excited to try and still enjoy some old favorites.

Yes, Money

Who doesn't love saving money? Then again, who doesn't love spending it? While I fully recognize that, in most circumstances, eating in proves far more economical than eating out, that's not always the case. We spend more on groceries now because we always try to buy natural, local, real food when possible. For example, a regular pound of white, processed pasta costs less than a dollar at most grocery stores, but buying whole-wheat pasta costs around $1.39 per pound. Not a huge difference, but it adds up, especially in the produce aisle. Buying fresh, local produce at the farmer's market is generally more expensive than purchasing at a supermarket (but it's SO much better!).

Here's my favorite way of looking at this one: If you are going to spend a little extra on something here or there, wouldn't you want it to be your health and the health of your family? I'm willing to forego a night at the movies if it means we get to eat healthier, more delicious, more eco-friendly foods!

So here we go! Our challenge goes from October 10 through November 10, and we certainly enjoyed some delicious splurges this weekend in preparation! But don't worry; eating in does not mean we won't enjoy our splurges. I can barely last a day without a piece of chocolate, so I'll share how I satisfy my sweet tooth without Twist, our favorite local yogurt shop.