Empty Calorie Foods

Definition of empty calorie foods: everything I love. Also any food that doesn't do your body a bit of good; crackers, cookies, Popsicles, ice cream, 100 calorie snack packs etc... Here's my take on empty calorie foods. If you're serious about losing weight, I mean if you really want to get the weight off and keep the weight off then get that crap out of your life. It's as simple as that. And for some people it is.

For me it's not. I can't part with empty calorie foods. That's like asking me to part with excess everything. No more Cling Wrap binges at Target. No more pouring over the purses at T.J. Maxx just for the fun of it. No more emergency pedicures, no more splurging on clearance $4.97 hanging pots of petunias at Home Depot when I don't need any more hanging pots of petunias.

Asking me to give up empty calorie foods is worse than a life spent making lemonade out of lemons. That's life with no lemons. That's a life trying to make lemonade out of powdered lemons. Unsweetened powdered lemons. Blech. No life at all. I enjoy consuming empty calorie foods. And I enjoy shopping for no reason. And buying things I don't need. But I'm just as happy binging on store brand freezer bags at Tar-jay as I am trying to justify a $98 pair of shoes at Nordstrom's. For real.

I figure if I can learn to be happy pairing down on my shopping. I can learn how to be happy pairing down the list of empty calorie foods I allow in the house. This works for me. The list of empty calorie foods I used to allow in my house went from enough food to supply Walt Disney's employees with food for the season to not enough food to make me gain half a pound between grocery visits.

Basically I keep pretzels in the house. And I don't make any attempt to keep them from going stale. On purpose. Because as soon as they're stale, exactly three days from the day I open them, I won't finish them.

I have a tendency to want to stock more than pretzels and "blame" it on the fact that my nieces are coming for sleepovers and "they aren't on a diet so why should they suffer" which would then make me a big fat liar when I tell people at speeches that no one "needs" to eat empty calorie food and that bringing that stuff into the house is only going to sabotage your efforts and kids can get "treats" other places and they won't "suffer" if you don't buy them cocoa puffs and cheese-ohs.

Donut Paparazzi
In these cases, I call someone from the junk food aisle and tell on myself. Or take pictures of the food with my camera phone and send it to someone who will be mortified at my weakness yet able to lovingly talk me off the ledge without making me feel humiliated. It's accountability. It works. Without self imposed checks and balances my eating easily gets out of balance.

Junk eating is comprised of junk eating habits. Easy to do. Fun to do. Hard to quit. Not fun to quit. Mr. Devil's Food Cake is texting and calling me every five minutes. Just thinking about caving feels good. Falling into a sea of velvety dark chocolate frosting sounds so good. So inviting. So welcoming.

But there's no cake, no dark chocolate, no nothing in this house that even remotely resembles anything other than a pretzel. And they're stale. Who needs cake when you have a counter full of ripe peaches and nectarines, sweet cherries and blueberries and a giant wedge of watermelon in the fridge just waiting to be cut? Tomorrow's Saturday. There are two farmer's markets to hit and I can't wait! You couldn't pay me to eat empty calorie foods this time of year. Okay well maybe a vanilla child's cone at DQ after a good walk around the lake.

kd@chefkathleen.com