The Perils of Going Home & Getting Serious Again

It seems that I need a strategy to deal with travel, vacation and family visits, as far as my diet goes, since I have had set backs every time I have gotten out of my new routine. This has happened despite packing healthy snacks, and planning meals. It seems the triggers to eat badly still have quite the hold on me, and I need extra vigilance. Any suggestions?

So having bounce back a couple pounds during my time away, I am getting back on track.

Today I resisted a lovely looking cheddar scone for breakfast and instead had 2 bananas and a slice of walnut bread from Grateful Bread, and of course a cup of coffee, with skim milk.

Lunch I unintentionally missed due to a hectic schedule but breakfast carried me over.

For dinner for the family, I made a large green salad, with parmesan & lightly dressed, followed by a makeshift  Pasta  alla Bolognese, made with ground turkey (which was in the freezer).

In the interest of time, I partially browned the turkey but placing the frozen meat in a hot pot with few tbs olive oil, and scraped off the browned meat as it cooked and thawed. Midway thru I added a large chopped onion and 1 shredded carrot, & towards the end a couple cloves of diced garlic cloves. I added 1 cup milk (skim as thats what I had), and reduced it over med high heat.

The meat had a chunky texture which is not what Bolognese calls for, so before the liquid was reduced I used an immersion blender (the kind on a stick) and ground the meat finely in the pot which gave just the right texture.

I then added 1 can diced tomatoes, salt, 1 bay leaf and a bit of marjoram, a milder cousin of oregano. Because the kids were starving, I cooked this quicker than usual of med heat and stirred frequently for 10 minutes. Finally I added 90% cooked pasta to the pot with a ladle full of the pasta water and simmered it until the pasta soaked up the excess liquid.

Pretty damn good for mock Italian, fake beef, wham bam Pasta alla Bolognese, lower in fat than usual (no butter, whole milk or beef fat) and on the table from frozen in 30 minutes. 

And I didn't over eat! No more weight gain!