I have a confession to make. I, the Healthy Diet Police. I, The Crunchy Coach, said to my husband the other night, “I’m tired of lettuce.” To which he responded, “It’s getting a little old for me, too.”
(Ah, the joys of being in agreement with your spouse.)
This wasn’t such a huge shock. After all, we eat some kind of large salad at least once a day, usually lettuce, sometimes clover sprouts. I also sometimes put lettuce in our morning green smoothies as well. There is such a thing as overkill, even with healthy food.
Especially vegetables. Did you know that every kind of plant contains some sort of toxin or other to keep wildlife–or so researchers believe–from eating a particular plant species to extinction? The toxins occur only in small amounts, but enough to eventually make a body say, “Hold on. I don’t want any more of that right now.”
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I guess that’s what my body was saying. “Excuse me, but if you put one more bite of lettuce into me, I am going to have to do something you will regret, because I have gotten overloaded with XYZ toxin.”
So, how do you prevent such an overload and still maintain a healthy amount of vegetables in your diet? Here are my ideas:
1. Go without lettuce twice a week.
You could also try rotating different kinds of lettuce, but my husband and I were tired of any and every kind of lettuce. Eating steamed beans and spinach that evening was like taking in a lungful of mountaintop air.
2. Have part raw and part cooked vegetables.
Every striving for perfection in my diet, I try to eat raw plants when the main entree is cooked meat. But from now on I will plan sometimes to have a bit of cooked vegetables and a slightly smaller salad with dinner instead of just a large salad.
3. Have sprouted grain tortillas with raw cheese and tomatoes.
The raw cheese and tomatoes provide enzymes. The tomatoes provide antioxidants and vitamin C. Because the grains in the tortilla have been sprouted, they have a much higher nutritional value than flour-based tortillas.
And if you have kids, you won’t have to fight them to eat their veggies during this meal!
4. Eat a salad with “vegetable-fruits.”
Cucumbers, tomatoes, and bell pepper are botanically fruits that we consider and use as vegetables because they aren’t sweet. Nevertheless, they contain no toxins (except perhaps in the skin of a bitter cuke). So when you’re tired of eating lettuce, a vegetable-fruit salad adds the perfect raw crunch to dinner.
Now I just have to figure out what to eat for lunch, as I’ve grown tired of my usual celery and sprouted mung beans…