Whenever I’m asked what I’ll be eating for a meal the stock response is ‘the same old crap’.  It really is a drag feeling like if I eat things wrong I’ll die soon, so out has gone red meat, butter, cheese (except on very rare occasions), booze, and salt.  Fortunately I’ve always been a pretty good cook and, if anything, now I have to scramble desperately to discover and unlock flavors.

Seriously, cooking without butter and salt is a bitch.

So this is a pretty common meal lately.  It works for lunch and dinner, and with the ‘ancient grains’ I’ve been using, I can use them for cold or warm breakfast and snack with some skim milk as well.

This is fresh pressed garlic, onion, a Serrano pepper, yellow bell pepper, beautiful huge brown mushrooms, spinach, olive oil, cracked pepper, salt-free curry powder (in my opinion if you’re buying curry powder with salt you’re buying the wrong stuff anyway), kamut, and a squeeze of lemon.  The drink is water with the rest of the lemon squeezed in.  And yes, I know the table’s dirty.  This is my work/compose/play/solder and occasionally eat station.

All told this meal is fresh, lively, super fulfilling, bright and texturally varied, delicious and, most importantly, almost entirely sodium, fat, and cholesterol free; the only real fat content coming from the tiny bit of olive oil, which we’re generally told is the good stuff.  This is also low GI due to most of the carbs coming from the 100% whole grain base.  For dinner I will often accompany this with a broiled chicken breast or filet of fish, using complementary spices.

This and becoming a gym rat are a huge part of why I’ve lost 50 lbs in the last 7 months.

Note:  There’s so much sodium hidden in sneaky places I’ve really learned to be obsessive about labels.  When I eat chicken it’s organic and not injected with brine/water/solution (the labels say different things but all mean salt solution).  Do some reading next time you’re in the poultry section.  The difference can be staggering.  The stuff I buy has very little compared to the bigger ‘regular’ brands.

As a final note, to zest things up occasionally I’ve been using Harissa from Mina.  It’s about 60mg sodium for a tablespoon, but flavorful enough that 1/2 tbsp is more than enough to brighten up a whole dish.  It’s been a godsend.  Seriously, 1/2 tbsp stirred into a bowl of brown rice is good enough to be a meal in itself.