Each year, my goal is to grow enough produce for my family to eat all year. Each year, I get closer to this goal. It is a bit of a trial-and-error process each year to answer the age-old question: how much should I plant in my vegetable garden? In this vlog I’ll walk you through my process of assessing what’s left from our preserved home-canned and frozen foods to decide how much I should plant in this year’s garden.
Some plants have a more direct correlation of seed-to-food ratio, like beets, carrots, and cauliflower where each seed produces a single unit of produce. Others produce many units of produce per plant, such as squash, zucchini, cucumbers, or green beans. Healthier plants, of course, produce more while less healthy plans produce less. Because of these varying factors you will find there is no magic answer to knowing how much of each plant to put in your garden, it takes this sort of year-by-year assessment and adjustment to get as close as possible.
If you don’t succeed on your first try – welcome to the club! I’ve been gardening for years and have yet to hit that nail perfectly on its head, but each year it gets a little easier and I get a little closer and I’m happy with that! We’ve greatly reduced our reliance on the grocery store and a few years in (with some seed-saving knowledge) we have also decreased our grocery budget by quite a bit. Here are a few tips to help you succeed:
Plant What You’ll Eat
Every gardener does it – inevitably you will end up planting too much of something your family won’t eat. I’ve got a freezer full of turnips from 3 years ago that we are still working on for this exact reason. I just couldn’t resist how picturesque and farm-y they looked growing!
By all means, plant things you enjoy and try new things – but save the majority of your space for well-loved staples that your family traditionally eats plenty of.
Plant Extra if You Can
Decide how much you think your household might eat, and then plant a few extra if you have space and resources. Seeds are cheap and it’s pretty common to lose some plants to disease, pests, or just the garden gremlins that inexplicably leave your plants sad and wilty. Having a few extra means you’ll be much more likely to hit your mark
Start With Growing for Summer
If you’re a beginner gardener, and especially if you haven’t preserved food in the past, a great goal is to aim to grow the food your family will eat fresh during the summer months. You will have plenty to learn and do as you plant, tend, and grow your first garden. Preserving and canning are amazing and incredibly useful skills, but you don’t have to overwhelm yourself by planning to do all of it in your first season. Eating produce all summer from your garden is incredibly rewarding – give it a try!
Have a Preservation Plan
If you’re looking to preserve the produce from your garden, have a rough plan in advance of how you’ll preserve it. Will you can, freeze, or dehydrate? Do you have space for storage? Do you need to learn these skills before your produce is ready? Make sure you are prepared when the time comes…your produce rarely waits for you and it is a heck of a disappointment to put in all the work to grow a winter’s worth of produce and watch it go bad before you get to it!
One of our greatest frustrations with healthy living is dealing with the normal obstacles of life – the things that can stand in the way of our best-laid plans. My clients are often eager and ready to come up with their “plan A.” The “if everything works as it should” plan. The “this is how I really want things to go” plan. I also encourage them to come up with contingency plans. What if everything doesn’t work as it should? What if things don’t go how you really wish they would?
Having a contingency plan helps prevent the all-or-nothing feelings that can come into play when we don’t seem to be able to make plan A work. If plan A is all we have in our healthy tool belt, then we end up defeated when it won’t work for one reason or another. Your plan failed…guess you can’t be healthy today.
Not so!
Life is often not going to work out the way you hope, so be prepared! Have a plan for when the plan doesn’t work. It’s not defeatist – it’s realistic. Have a contingency plan. This is how I usually describe them:
Plan A: This is your best-case scenario. It is the plan that is designed to help you meet your health goals and fit into your (and your family’s) lifestyle at least half the time. If you make a plan A that rarely ends up ever working, it’s probably not the right plan A for you. Remember that it’s okay to try changes out before committing to them (in fact you should!) and it’s okay if a change doesn’t work for you. Keep looking for your best fit!
Plan B: This is your “oh shoot, I didn’t have time for plan A” or “we can’t afford plan A right now” or ______insert reason plan A doesn’t work this time_____. This is not as ideal of an outcome as plan A, but still keeps you on track with a decent second-best. Ask yourself what might stand in the way of your plan A, and consider how you might adjust. Plan B options sometimes require a little bit of advance preparation, but then they have your back when needed.
Plan C: This is your hail Mary. The “well…nothing went the way I planned so we will do the best we can with what we have today.” Sometimes you actually have a third-best option, and sometimes your plan C is just to let it go and try again tomorrow. Either way, make it an intentional choice, not an automatic response to a plan A roadblock. Plan to take a day off if plans A and B fall through, and don’t feel bad if they did. This mentally helps us stay away from thought patterns like “well, I didn’t complete plan A today, so I guess I’m not being healthy anymore.” It sounds dramatic when you say it out loud, but it’s the way a lot of our brains think. I can’t tell you how many stories I’ve heard from clients about healthy changes they did great with…until that one day, then they gave up since they had “broken their streak.”
Here are some examples of contingency plans my clients have made:
Cooking at home
Plan A (best-case-scenario, works at least half the time): Make a meal plan each week and cook at least 5 dinners at home.
Plan B (second-best option, has your back with a little advance preparation): This client felt her most likely roadblock would be not having time to make the dinner on her meal plan, so her plan B was to buy pre-cooked salmon fillets and a vegetable/red potato medley to keep in the freezer so she could always have a microwave back-up option if she got stuck in traffic on the way home from work.
Plan C (do the best you can with what you’ve got, no preparation required): If she comes home late and her kids have a nighttime activity, she usually needs to bring something home or take the kids out on the way. We selected 3 different restaurants that her kids would like and where everyone could customize their own healthful option.
Strength Training
Plan A: Go to the gym before work to strength train three times per week.
Plan B: This client’s gym is very busy in the afternoon, so his biggest roadblock would be getting his workout in if he missed going in the morning. If he didn’t make it to the gym before work, we selected a Youtube body weight workout he could do at home in the evening.
Plan C: If he did not want to work out in the evening when he got home, he could either try going to the gym a different morning that week, or take a day off and try again on his next scheduled gym day.
The point is, that making the plan ahead of time helps prepare you for challenges and makes any of the options okay. It allows you to realistically navigate life’s curve balls while still keeping focus on your goal. All while avoiding a defeated attitude when life just doesn’t play nice. So hang in there! Make a plan, and another, and another. And don’t beat yourself up when plan A and plan B don’t work! It happens to everyone – now you can be prepared.
Seed starting is a key piece of getting more from your garden sooner, especially if you live somewhere with a shorter growing season. This video will give you all you need to start seeds indoors and get a jump on tasty fresh produce!
Japchae (pronounced jap-chay) is a savory, umami Korean noodle dish I always get whenever I visit a local Korean day spa. It is one of my favorite things to eat and always conjures feelings of healthy, relaxed self care for me. 🙂 Typically, japchae is made with sweet potato glass noodles (you should definitely try it that way also!) but I’ve made this spaghetti squash version because I have piles of spaghetti squash in my winter food storage left over from my summer garden.
It’s also a great dish to practice your chopstickin’ skills on! Enjoy – and let me know in the comments if you tried japchae for the first (or 50th) time!
Japchae-Inspired Spaghetti Squash
Japchae is a delicious, umami Korean dish typically made with sweet potato glass noodles. This spaghetti-squash version is a great seasonal option since spaghetti squash stores great throughout the winter. Serve with a scoop of brown or white rice and enjoy!
1/2 large spaghetti squash
3 stalks celery (chopped)
3 carrots (cut into thin strips)
4 garlic cloves (minced)
1 medium onion (sliced thinly)
3-4 mushrooms (sliced)
1/2 head cabbage (shredded)
3 chicken thighs (sliced)
1/4 cup low-sodium soy sauce
2 Tbsp brown sugar
3 Tbsp sesame oil
2 tsp sesame seeds
sesame seeds, green onions, cashews (optional – for garnish)
Carefully slice spaghetti squash in half and scrape seeds and pulp. Place half in a microwave for 15 minutes.
While squash is heating, mince garlic and slice onions, carrots, celery, mushrooms, cabbage, and chicken.
In a heated skillet over medium-high heat, brown chicken pieces on all sides.
When cooked through, add garlic, onions, and celery. Cook for 2-3 minutes until onions begin to be translucent.
Add carrots, cabbage, and mushrooms, and gently stir fry until cabbage is softened.
Add soy sauce, brown sugar, sesame oil, and sesame seeds. Stir until mixed through.
Remove cooked spaghetti squash from microwave with a towel or pot holder (it will be very hot). Place paper towels or a kitchen towel on the spaghetti squash and press the extra water from the squash.
Use a fork to scrape the spaghetti squash strands into the skillet with the rest of your ingredients. Stir to combine.
Optional: garnish with sesame seeds, chopped green onions, and cashews
This recipe may contain too much sodium if you are on a low-sodium diet. To reduce the sodium by about half, exchange the soy sauce for coconut aminos.
1 serving contains 271 calories, 14.3 g protein, 22 g carb, 15.8 g fat, 742 mg sodium, 123% DV of vitamin A, 44% DV of vitamin C, and 33% DV vitamin K.
Of course you want to be healthy – but everywhere you look, diet culture’s miserable mandates run wild. How are you to know what healthy really looks like? Look no further.
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One of the great joys of being a dietitian is dispelling wellness-related myths. These bits of misinformation make people feel as though being healthy is unattainable, unrealistic, or downright impossible. Not to mention miserable! What is the point of being healthy if you’re living a miserable, restricted life? In the end, constantly hearing these myths leaves people feeling trapped! If they can’t meet these strict (and let’s face it, no fun) standards, then why even try to be healthier?
This list includes the wellness-related myths I hear most frequently from clients. I love to talk these through with my clients, explain what is actually true, and help them find realistic, healthy lifestyles they truly enjoy. Hopefully some of these explanations will give you a giggle and who knows? Maybe they’ll empower you to rock a healthy life you enjoy.
1. Carbs are bad for you and cause weight gain
This is probably the big kahuna and the myth I most frequently hear. Most of this is just couched in misunderstanding of what carbohydrates are and what they do in your body. Carbs are any food that breaks down into blood sugar. For some reason, society has collectively decided that blood sugar is evil. In fact, blood sugar is the fuel that our bodies use for energy. The truth is, if we undereat carbs, we are underfueling our brains and bodies. Often that underfueling leads to brain fog, slowed metabolism, low energy, depression, and/or anxiety. Also sadness, because carbohydrates are delicious. The metabolic effects of low carb diets lead people to gain more weight afterward than they ever lost in the first place, and that restriction is tough on our relationships with food. The solution is not to eat low carb.
Carbs themselves are not the problem. Overeating carbs, just like overeating in general, can lead to weight gain. The reason carbs get such a bad rap is because they are so easy to overeat. They are shelf stable, tasty, and not very filling. It is completely possible to regulate weight and blood sugar while including several portions of carb-containing foods per day. The key is to balance those carb foods with more filling foods like protein, healthy fats, and fiber to keep you full and fueled without weight gain.
2. Salad is pointless if you put toppings on it
Or any other incarnation of this statement – what’s the point of a healthy dinner if you eat dessert? Why bother ordering a water to drink with your burger and fries? Umm…because they are healthy options. Why not choose them? Having something that’s higher calorie or less “perfect” to eat does not eliminate the nutrition of something you eat with it. Adding croutons and dressing does not vacuum the vitamin K out of your greens or the fiber out of your snap peas. Eating dessert does not neutralize the healthy nutrients from your balanced dinner. The burger and fries do not somehow make healthful hydration irrelevant. Honestly, I would rather someone eat veggies with some butter or salad dressing than not eat veggies at all!
I frequently encourage my clients to prioritize the foods they love and make healthful changes in areas that they don’t hold as dear. Don’t discourage others (or yourself) from making the healthful choices that you prefer and choosing the delicious foods you enjoy. These are perfect examples of balance.
3. Fruit has too much sugar (carrots too)
This one is an offshoot of #1. Fear of carbs = fear of sugar. Most fruits and vegetables have some naturally-occurring sugars. Some believe they are to be avoided, primarily out of fear they will cause weight gain or blood sugar spikes. The good news is that the amounts of carbs and sugar in a serving of these foods is completely appropriate and does not cause these problems for most people. For example, most people need 30-60 grams of carbohydrate per meal, and 1/2 cup of most fruits contains 7-15 grams. One cup of carrots contains about 10 grams. You’d have to eat a LOT of carrots to exceed your carb needs – most people don’t have that problem!
On top of that, fruits and vegetables tend to have a built-in blood sugar buffer – fiber! Fiber has a complex structure that slows digestion and helps carbohydrates go into the blood stream at a much slower rate. That helps prevent blood sugar spikes and fat storage. Fear of sugar is no reason to pass up the vitamin and mineral benefits fruit has to offer. The take-home message: don’t fear fruit!
4. Fitness “doesn’t count” if you aren’t sweating
This one really torques me off. I recently had a sedentary client with chronic pain whose doctor told her that her newly established walking habit didn’t “count” because she wasn’t sweating for 30 minutes, 5 days per week. She came to me feeling so defeated (despite the fact that in two weeks she had worked up from 5 to 15 minutes of walking and had lost 7 lbs)! This isn’t the first case I’ve seen where people feel that because of their pain or fitness limitations that there’s “no point” to exercising. Even small bouts of movement carry myriads of benefits! Plus, when you haven’t been exercising regularly, your body is not efficient with movement and burns more calories doing less activity. As you gradually work up to more time or intensity, you adjust to your body’s needs. It’s a well-designed system. 🙂
5. Eggs are bad for you
Ahh the great misunderstanding of the 1990s. It’s pretty cut-and-dried at this point: egg yolks have a lot of cholesterol. We used to think eating cholesterol would raise our blood cholesterol. Turns out it doesn’t! Plus, eggs are a great complete protein source. Scramble away!
6. Eating “clean” and the all-or-nothing mentality
What does “eating clean” even mean? And how subjective a term is that anyway? Terms like that have formed this idea that being healthy is a wagon that you are either on or you’re off. This is SUCH a damaging mindset because it sets us up completely to fail. If we expect that we’re going to eat perfectly and completely eliminate anything with sugar or with flour or whatever the “clean eating trend” of the minute is, we’re liable to “fail.” I say fail with quotes because it is not a failure to eat tasty food. Plan to include all kinds of foods. Plan not to exercise every single day. That way, you can just continue on without guilt for eating a completely reasonable treat or taking a day off to lay around.
Somewhere along the line came the idea that if protein is good for you, more protein must be better. More protein, more protein, more protein. Whether your goals are weight management or muscle gain, there’s someone out there who will push protein on you like it will be the magic wand to solve all your problems. Some bodybuilding blogs and forums recommend that those who weight lift regularly should eat 2 grams of protein per pound of body weight! Meaning, a 150-lb woman should eat 300 grams of protein per day. A deck of cards size of meat contains approximately 20-25 grams protein. Can you imagine eating that 12 times over…every day??? A 180-lb man would be aiming for 360 grams protein per day! Nuts!
For satisfaction, weight management, and muscle maintenance, you need much, much less than that. Studies show that you can maximize muscle gain/maintenance with 30 grams protein in a sitting.1-2 Any more than that and the extra protein gets filtered out by your kidneys. Basically, you’ve got really expensive pee and a lot of extra kidney stress.
8. Healthy food is more expensive
This one may not be as directly obvious, but it comes down to satisfaction and nourishment. 10 cents per ramen brick is pretty dang cheap, but how long does that sustain us? With very little protein, fiber, or healthy fat, most will find themselves hungry again in a short while, as is the case with a lot of the more processed foods. Nourishing whole foods like produce, lean proteins, and healthy fats may be more expensive, but will meet our nutritional needs and satisfy hunger for much longer than cheaper foods. If planned well, you can spend very reasonable amounts on healthful meals. Here is the first in a series I wrote about eating well on a budget, and how I feed our family of four on $100 per week. You can eat well on a budget!
9. Dietitians eat perfectly
It seems that everyone believes dietitians eat only organic sprouted raw cardboard – forget it! We are normal people who love ice cream and chips and cookies, as well as a delicious serving of roasted veggies or a great smoothie. Health is about balance, not restriction! Check out my series on what dietitians eat in a day here, here, and here!
Diet culture is determined to tell you that you have to be miserable to be healthy.
That couldn’t be more wrong.
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