Olive Oil Mayo And Other Health-ier Favorites

Since I have been struggling to eat healthy all week, I’d recap some of the healthier choices and substitutions I have made along the way and stuck with, even when I fall off the wagon in some of my other food choices.

The newest addition to my healthier eating routine is Olive Oil Mayo. I don’t eat a lot of mayo at all anymore, but when I do, I am a mayonnaise purist. No light mayo in my egg or tuna salad. No thank you. So I was really hesitant to give this healthier mayo version a try. Can I just say yum? It has a slightly tangier flavor than regular mayo, but the consistency and overall taste is great, in egg salad anyway. With half the calories and fat, we’ve got a winner!

Other food substitutions I’ve made and now can’t live without:

• Land O’ Lakes Light Butter with canola oil. Also half the fat and calories of regular butter and it’s spreadable. Can’t beat that.
• Laughing Cow Light Swiss Cheese spreadable wedges. These actually replace the mayo on my sandwiches most of the time. This cheese goes great with cold cuts on Pepperidge Farm seven-grain flat breads, with lots of tomato, cucumbers and lettuce.
• I could live on Thomas’s Better Start Multi-Grain English Muffins – 100 calories and 8 grams of fiber. And they don’t taste like cardboard at all.
• Babybel Light cheese rounds. Do you see a pattern here? I love cheese and without these lower-cal versions, I’d be in trouble. These make a great portable snack and it’s usually what I eat before any workout.
• Atkins Chocolate Delight Protein Shakes. I’m not on a low-carb diet but these are great when I need a quick meal fix. High in fiber and protein and low in calories and carbs (no sugar), they are filling and actually, really tasty. the “new improved” flavor is rich and chocolatey. I’ve never been able to drink Slimfast or any other shakes. These don’t upset my stomach.
• Weight Watchers Chocolate Chip cookies. Only 1 point and with 5 grams of fiber, these are tasty, moist and filling. And I love chocolate chip cookies, so these are a must in my routine. I wouldn’t be able to do this without them. They come individually wrapped and for some reason, with these cookies, I can stop at one!

Even on bad days, and bad weeks like this has been, my meals more or less consist of healthier food choices. I do really need to focus more on portion control and being mindful when I eat again. Reminding myself of some of the great good changes I’ve made will maybe help me focus again.

Tags: emotional eating, healthy eating, olive oil mayonnaise