I too have taken the Snap Food challenge and have had no peanut butter and jelly bread sandwiches.
Instead I was able to buy two nice cooked salmon steaks ($1.89) (two meals worth) some fresh hard tofu, lots of veggies, like broccoli and carrots. I bought one package of 10 tortillas for $1.69 and made great tofu veggie roll ups. Cottage cheese was a great addition to these. I cooked a pot of rice and added to main meals. I love smoothies as a meal and had one everyday almost for breakfast, within budget of $27.
I was able to eat well, however less than I normally would, but that to me is not a bad thing. I liked the challenge and may just keep it going in some fashion from now on.
I think for me, one takeaway from this is it is real easy to eat too much, or more than I need.
I also think you made a great point when you mentioned 'food anxiety'. I think that is a great part of what people experience, and to some fairly large extent has little to do with actual need and nutrition. It has more to do with feeling left out, like you did while watching others eat bigger (yummier) meals, even though your meal did likely fulfill the nutritional needs. Those feelings of anxiety can end up in the stomach not feeling full. Hunger is to some extent, an emotional condition. Food disorder people have a lot to say about that being quite true.
$27 per week is certainly not much, but it was enough. I will continue and see if I can get creative with it, especially since going forward, I do not have the planning limitation of '1 week."
I too have taken the Snap Food challenge and have had no peanut butter and jelly bread sandwiches.
ReplyDeleteInstead I was able to buy two nice cooked salmon steaks ($1.89) (two meals worth) some fresh hard tofu, lots of veggies, like broccoli and carrots. I bought one package of 10 tortillas for $1.69 and made great tofu veggie roll ups. Cottage cheese was a great addition to these. I cooked a pot of rice and added to main meals. I love smoothies as a meal and had one everyday almost for breakfast, within budget of $27.
I was able to eat well, however less than I normally would, but that to me is not a bad thing. I liked the challenge and may just keep it going in some fashion from now on.
I think for me, one takeaway from this is it is real easy to eat too much, or more than I need.
I also think you made a great point when you mentioned 'food anxiety'. I think that is a great part of what people experience, and to some fairly large extent has little to do with actual need and nutrition. It has more to do with feeling left out, like you did while watching others eat bigger (yummier) meals, even though your meal did likely fulfill the nutritional needs. Those feelings of anxiety can end up in the stomach not feeling full. Hunger is to some extent, an emotional condition. Food disorder people have a lot to say about that being quite true.
$27 per week is certainly not much, but it was enough. I will continue and see if I can get creative with it, especially since going forward, I do not have the planning limitation of '1 week."
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