For example, my mom called me today and informed me that table salt has added -- yes, you got it -- SUGAR! Why? Apparently the process used to refine salt into "table" salt makes it bitter. Add some sugar (dextrose, specifically) and Voilà! Table salt!
I feel like I'm becoming a more informed consumer. I'm reading a book called Suicide by Sugar. In it, the author discusses different afflictions from sugar, the hazards and also the dangers of maltodextrin. Wikipedia defines maltodextrin as such:
Maltodextrin is a polysaccharide that is used as a food additive. It is produced from starch by partial hydrolysis and is usually found as a creamy-white hygroscopic spraydried powder. Maltodextrin is easily digestible, being absorbed as rapidly as glucose, and might be either moderately sweet or almost flavorless. It is commonly used for the production of sodas and candy. It can also be found as an ingredient in a variety of other processed foods.
What I get from this scientific paragraph? "Maltodextrin is bad and we should avoid it." (ok, maybe it's from a combination of not understanding more than 10 words above and the stuff I have read in the Suicide by Sugar book. :-))
So I'm slowly moving my family to whole foods - maltodextrin is present in almost every pre-packaged food I've looked at, from spice mixes to marinated pork tenderloin.
I'm really leaning on a local produce co-op that we've been using for awesome veggies. I'm looking forward to getting back to some fruit soon (2 weeks!) and we always get lots of great tasting stuff! I'm experimenting with different ways to make old favorites. I got a recipe from a friend for Oatmeal waffles that I'm just leaving the brown sugar out of the recipe. They taste GREAT now, with some pecans chopped up on top. My daughter loved them with applesauce and hubby had a little powdered sugar and butter. I made sweet potatoes for Thanksgiving - instead of putting in 1/2 cup of brown sugar and covering them in marshmallows, I used butter and cinnamon. They were a big hit!
My cravings aren't completely gone. I was making our Advent calendar for this Christmas season tonight and purchased a bag of my (formerly) favorite holiday candies -
Hershey's mint miniatures! (The dark chocolate/mint was my favorite) It was all I could do not to open every single one and eat them. So no, my cravings aren't GONE. But did I eat them all? Nope. Did I even eat one? Nope. Instead, I went and got some peppermint chocolate tea. NOT the same, but definitely satisfied the craving in a sufficient way!
So here goes week 6 in the journey. I will be posting some updated stats soon. I will say that as of my weigh in last week, I was 1.5lbs from my first weight loss goal!
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