Six Small Meals a Day, 250 cals each

[goldfinch]

Another good low fat food is steamed fish, like halibut. Top the fish with fresh ginger and a bit of soy sauce. Maybe some onions, garlic and mushrooms if you can handle them. Steam for maybe 15 minutes.

[ny biker]

Another good low fat food is steamed fish, like halibut. Top the fish with fresh ginger and a bit of soy sauce. Maybe some onions, garlic and mushrooms if you can handle them. Steam for maybe 15 minutes.

I would skip the onions, garlic and mushrooms...

[emily_in_nc]

Ooops, you can ignore my question about your diet in your other thread. I see you've addressed it here!

[channlluv]

You ladies are brilliant.

Lph, that's exactly the kind of thing I was looking for. How you mix it up, keep it easy, all day, every day.

nybiker, I was wondering the same thing, especially when it includes instructions to eat margarine, for crying out loud. Who eats margarine anymore? And "avoid high fat foods" but beef is the dinner entree.

I've been so confused by all the conflicting - directly conflicting - instructions from this doctor and that doctor and that dietitian...I've literally wept from the confusion because they're putting it all on me to create my own eating plan.

Goldfinch, your quinoa recipe sounds good. Tangent, your almond oil sauce sounds good, too, but I don't think I can eat that kind of fat for a couple of months.

Szsz and pll, I was thinking the same thing - mixing up the caloric allocations a bit. That's a good idea.

Oakleaf, thanks for answering my question about tofu. Do you blend it first and get it creamy and then heat it up? I'm not going to be cooking white potatoes. I was thinking of cream of broccoli, or butternut squash, or tomato, or making a creamy spinach and onion soup with tofu. I have no idea how to cook tofu, though. I've never done it successfully.

I have two packages in my refrigerator right now, but I've been in here so long I don't know if they're still good.

I'd love to hear some more tofu recipes. I'm thinking I'd like to get away from eating so much meat.

I love the idea of cooking something that keeps so I can eat it several days in a row, just heat up a little bowl when needed.

I feel like I have the opportunity to reset my whole diet, but I may be overreaching. I really want to try some new stuff, though, and you ladies have some of the richest, most varied, healthiest diets of anyone I know.

And you'd never suggest I eat margarine. Geez.



Roxy

[channlluv]

Oh my god, Murienn, you just saved my life with that Clean Eating Magazine link. Thank you!

[Blueberry]

Roxy-

I've never had tofu go bad sealed in the package. And I've eaten it way out of date.

This sounds good as a start for a tofu "cream" soup. If I'm using it like that, I just heat it - I don't really "cook" it....

PS - Glad you're starting to be on the mend

[OakLeaf]

Well, my experience with tofu is the opposite ... it's never all that fresh in the packages from the grocery store, and it sours pretty quickly. Personally I wouldn't eat it if it's past the expiration date, or even if it's inside the expiration date but the water is yellow and bubbly or sour. Silken tofu in the shelf-stable packaging probably keeps a long time, though.

It depends on what you want to do with it. If I want a squash or carrot bisque with tofu, I just break up the cake into chunks after the vegetables are tender, throw it in and blend the whole thing with a stick blender (don't forget to pull out the bay leaves or bouquet garni before blending - btdt and it wasn't pretty ). For burgers, I drain it, then squeeze out as much water as I can by hand, then just crumble it and mix it with the other ingredients. Pretty much the same thing for quiche. For sauces or dressings, you'd want to blend it smooth first and then mix in your other ingredients and warm it.

Don't go overboard with soy though. It can aggravate PMS and other estrogen-dominance issues. Some is good IMO, but there's such a thing as too much.

[szsz]

Also, consider that perhaps one meal could be 400 calories and another just 150, like a soy yogurt or similar.

Instead of cooking with oil, I use a bit of white wine. You could sub lemon juice. I toss in my cooked quinoa and then spinach or tomato or squash or whatever is lying around.

I hope you start feeling better very soon!

[pll]

Also, consider that perhaps one meal could be 400 calories and another just 150, like a soy yogurt or similar.

The same idea came to mind. Also, the idea of dividing portions (ie, plan for 3 meals, but split them into two servings each). I suspect the idea is not to to eat much in any meal.

Can you have olive oil? The thought of margarine on perfectly good bread does not sound good to me...