Surviving the Salad Bar

One part of my diet that has come as the most shock to me is that I get these uncontrollable cravings for fresh produce.  (Sidebar, I once ate a can of green beans and only a can of green beans for lunch because it sounded tasty, that was a humorous dieting low for me.) As well as one aspect of the eating disorder that still pulls at me is the desire to eat large quantities of food just because it's in front of you.  So today, I did just that for lunch, I combined both. 

But, before you judge, here's how I have learned to curb the desire for the food to come back up.  I literary ate a POUND of salad from the local chain grocery store.  While at the store I quickly realized how out of control, and how fattening a salad bar can get.  My healthy intentions were suddenly being tempted by mounds of blue cheese, bacon, croutons, and  a variety of candied nuts my fiance suggested I should add  to my "salad"  that would quickly rival a McDonald's Big Mac meal.  Hell, even one of those items has the potential to crash a super healthy intention.  So what I did instead was pile on what I knew was good for me.  I knew that all veggies on the Weight Watchers points system (I follow the old system, not the knew points Plus system) were 0 points so I added piles of mixed greens, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, red onions, broccoli, mushrooms and my ever favorite, banana peppers.  The result?  A delightful lunch that left me feeling full and guilt free.

The large salad left me able to enjoy some left over pizza I took home with me from the night before and  Bing bang boom, I'm full, HAPPY, and have probably only used 10 of my 23 points for the day.  When I got home I found this helpful Salad Bar tool online that lets you create a salad and then gives you the nutritional information at the end.  The only downfall is it leaves a lot of ingredients out that are on a typical salad bar (mushrooms) and some that I just can't live without (banana peppers).  But, until I find a better tool it is quite helpful. 

Happy Salad-baring! (I also used Fat-Free Ranch Dressing- 1 Weight Watcher point)