Find your comfort food--without the guilt

We all have it.

That one food that makes us feel like everything’s going to be OK.

Pretty safe to say that broccoli is not among the foods on your comfort list.

One of my comfort foods, living in the USA, is Spaghetti-O’s.  I guess the taste reminds me of a simpler time.  A time when my biggest worry was who was I going to “call on” after school.  The smell of those little pasta shaped O’s in the creamy tomato sauce has a tranquilizing effect on me.

But because the traditional Spaghetti-O’s contain not-so-good-for-you ingredients:

Water, Tomato Puree (Water, Tomato Paste), Enriched Macaroni Product (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Ferrous Sulfate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), High Fructose Corn Syrup**, Contains Less than 2 % of: Salt, Enzyme Modified Cheddar Cheese (Cheddar Cheese [Milk, Cheese Culture, Salt, Enzymes], Water, Disodium Phosphate), Vegetable Oil (Corn, Cottonseed, Canola and/or Soybean), Enzyme Modified Butter, Oleoresin Paprika, Spice Extract, Citric Acid, Nonfat Dry Milk.

**the high fructose corn syrup content is equal to 3 teaspoons of sugar per serving!

….and because of the recent recall of 15 million pounds (yes…that’s MILLION) of Spaghetti-O’s because of “under-processing” (gotta process the be-jezus out of those O’s) and because I have not eaten anything as un-natural as this since my cancer diagnosis, I have not felt the comfort of this product for a while.

Luckily I found an alternative:

the better-for-you-than-that-other-nasty-stuff stuff

If you live in the USA there is a great store called Trader Joe’s.  They carry wonderful products that give you great options for typical American grocery store items.  This version of O’s has no high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), and is made with all organic ingredients.

Thanks to them, I can have my comfort food!! Thanks, Joe!

I can just taste my childhood....

The point of this post is that just because you want to change your eating habits to a more healthy diet, does not mean you have to give up the things you love.

This is the time I get sad....:(

Now if your comfort comes in a martini glass with 2 olives, that’s a different story.  But if it is something like brownies*, or chocolate, or mac and cheese*, you can get all the pleasure, without all the guilt, it just takes some ingenuity and creativity.

What is your comfort food? Maybe I can help!

*soy yogurt can be substituted for dairy in these brownies

*you could change the macaroni to whole wheat…this one has tofu and cheese, but that’s what makes it so creamy…you could sub out the cheese for soy cheese if you want to be really good