It is never too late to be what you might have been.

Clean eating is a new concept for me. For the past three years, I have known ABOUT clean eating but never attempted to eat clean because (a) it isn’t always the most convenient option when you’re a rather new mother (AKA it’s so much easier to make some instant mashed potatoes and pop some chicken fingers in the oven than it is to make a meal from scratch) and (b) it seemed hard/impossible!

What is eating clean, exactly? According to the Eat Clean Diet website:

“It is eating the way nature intended. You eat the foods our bodies evolved to function best on, and that makes you feel – and look – fantastic. When you Eat Clean you eat more often. You will eat lean protein, complex carbs, and healthy fats. These practices keep your blood-sugar levels stable and keep you satisfied. The best part is that if you need to lose weight it will happen almost without you having to try. And yes, you can have a treat now and again.

Best of all, Eating Clean keeps you feeling great and full of energy. In fact, you can forget all about the days when “dieting” meant feelings of hunger, lethargy or deprivation.
Eating Clean is not a fad; it’s a way of life.”

TJ and I have been eating clean for two weeks now and I have come to a few conclusions.

1. It is FUN to find new and healthy recipes to try out! I have a whole binder full of “Chantelle’s Clean Recipes” now and I look forward to adding more recipes to it as time goes by! I do have one of the Eat Clean Diet cookbooks but I’ve found that a lot of the recipes in there are kind of intimidating due to amount of ingredients needed for the recipes and the types of ingredients. I will say this though, Old Fashion Foods is an amazing place to start looking for those obscure ingredients you’ve never heard of!

2. In these two weeks, I have not felt guilty after a meal. This is a huge accomplishment for me. There used to never be a day that went by where I didn’t feel some degree of guilt after a meal. But since we started eating clean, I have felt nothing but happy after meal time. I no longer feel bad about feeding my body crappy foods.

3. Before we started eating clean, we ate healthy most of the time. But there were some days where I’d use a box of stuffing or Uncle Ben’s 90 second microwave rice to round out supper which isn’t obviously the best choice but it was convenient. Now, I don’t even have the urge to use these convenience foods because natural food is just that much better!
I will admit though that there are times it is hard to feed TJ and myself as well as Melina while eating clean. She’s 2.5 years old – she doesn’t eat salad. But we make do. I have to make a little extra food sometimes but it’s worked for us.

I will be honest here though. We have had a ‘free day’ since the beginning of our eating clean adventure. Instead of derailing our progress like free days usually do, it’s kept us on track. We went to Regina over the weekend and treated ourselves to a supper out and a movie (which, of course, we *needed* to buy popcorn to feed TJs popcorn demons ;) ). And, again, instead of feeling guilty about treating ourselves, we didn’t because every other meal of the week we ate clean! I read in another blog somewhere the other day where the author admitted to eating “80% clean, 20% dirty” and I think that’s something completely doable within our family for the time being.

Im not trying to come off as an eating clean expert because I’m really not. At all. But it’s just so much fun to be doing a good thing for my body that I am excited to hopefully become better at this eating clean business one day! I have had a few friends inquire about clean eating since I started posting about it on Facebook and I love knowing that the healthy choices my family makes may make a difference in the way another family chooses to fuel themselves.

Today, I made chocolate chunk almond butter cookies. They. Are. Amazing. I may never go back to regular cookies, ever again. The best part? They’re made of clean ingredients! It’s definitely a treat though. There’s no way I can keep a constant stash of these bad boys in my house because, let’s be honest, I’ve had more than my fair share today. But it’s great to know I can satisfy my chocolate craving with something that is concerned clean, even if the cookies should be viewed as a treat!



Want the recipe? Check out this website. http://www.cleaneatingmag.com/Recipes/Recipe/Almond-Butter-Chocolate-Chip-Cookies.aspx This website/magazine is an excellent source for people wanting to check out some amazing clean eating recipes.