Sorry these are all out of order! Here’s all the prescribed food for Friday:
The menu is:
Breakfast: California Breakfast
Lunch: Deli Turkey Sandwich with Carrots
Dinner: Lemon Herb Chicken with Green Beans & Roasted Potatoes
Snack: Sunny Walnut Trail Mix
Plus 3 fruits (I have a minneola, an apple, and some pineapple here) and 2 dairy (yogurt & Babybel cheese).
What can I say? They’re pumpkin seeds. I’m really only mentioning them at all in the interest of journalistic integrity. It’s a small packet that appeals to my airplane food fetish. And it was a nice little snack. And it’s nice to have some whole foods. I do think it’s funny that they tell me to eat low-fat dairy products and then give me nuts and seeds, but what can you do? I suppose that works out — in a way!
We both ate this right after dinner. It’s a Kozy Shack sugar-free pudding sweetened with Splenda (ack):
It tastes only slightly weird because of the Splenda — taste-wise it’s not too objectionable, but I don’t think I would order it again because the whole concept of artificial sweeteners totally skeeves me out from a nutritional standpoint. Unfortunately there aren’t a lot of other sweet “snack” options with the basic meal plan. (I hear the “Signature” plan, which is more expensive, has cheesecake and some other dessert options.) There are honey roasted peanuts and a Nutri-Grain bar and a granola bar, all of which could MAYBE be dessert-like. Unless I missed it, it looks like this only comes around once in a 4-week period, so it’s not like I’m going to feel really deprived of chocolate pudding if I substitute it. I just feel a lot better about eating some nuts or something than an artificial sweetener.
I decided to get the whole day’s worth of food together so I could see what it looked like (and so can you):
Today’s menu is:
Breakfast: whole-wheat English muffin with peanut butter
Lunch: “beef & noodles” with raisins
Dinner: meatloaf with mashed potatoes and corn
Snack: sugar-free chocolate pudding
plus 3 servings of fruit (I’ve put out 2 apples and some leftover cut fruit mixture I have which is pineapple, blueberry, blackberry, & raspberry) and 2 servings of dairy (I’ve put out a yogurt and a Babybel cheese)
So there it is!
Now the nutritionist in me has to point out… there are NO GREEN VEGETABLES this entire day!! What is that about? There are corn and potatoes — both of which are really starchy and not super high in vitamins and minerals — not that I’m knocking them because I love them both, but where are my leafy greens?? And with the raisins, it’s more like 4 servings of fruit. Oh, unless those raisins are supposed to count for a serving? My printed menu doesn’t indicate that the raisins are a fruit serving, but my online menu doesn’t mention them. Dude. I need clarity, people!
I guess it doesn’t matter, though, because I am most likely going to eat all the fruit pictured today. My leftover cut fruit isn’t quite enough to equal a whole serving. I have fruit in my yogurt, too. It’s a lot of fruit.
I don’t really think their nutritionists are trained in creating actual balance in the meals beyond a macronutrient balance and a caloric balance over the course of the day. But… onward!
I was disappointed when I read through the information that arrived with our shipments and didn’t see any calorie or nutrient info. But when I poked around the DY website this morning, I figured out that I could get that information by going into my menu and clicking on each individual food item (a clunky way to get it — would have been nice if it had been more obvious). So I did a little math. It looks like the provided breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack adds up to about 950-1000 calories per day. Um, yikes. Adding the fruit and dairy they suggest would bring in about another 450-600, so that makes me feel better about it. Well, actually, that’s with full-fat dairy (which is what we’ll use); with non-fat or whatever it might be less.
That is NOT a lot of calories — and of course I do realize that’s the point, but at the same time, I don’t want either of us to pass out (or go on a crazy binge). I also think this food is pretty low on vegetables, so I may just supplement with some extra veggies. I won’t really know until we try. I’m still disturbed that Mr. Peanut and I are supposed to eat the exact same things. I really think he probably should have more food than I should have.
I’m also disturbed that DY says the food lasts 14 days in the fridge. Doesn’t that seem like a long time?? They must be putting some preservatives in there. Ick.
