Zucchini Chips and Mindful Eating Update

Zucchini Chips

I’m so into veggie chips. Kale chips, sweet potato chips, and most recently: zucchini chips. Pull out your mandoline (or go get one, you won’t regret it!) and enjoy a crunchy snack this weekend!

Ingredients:

zucchinis (however many you want, these do shrink down a lot)
coconut oil spray
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 225. Slice zucchinis very thinly on a mandoline. Lay parchment paper over baking pans and spray on a layer of coconut oil. Place zucchinis on parchment paper, making sure not to overlap. Spritz with coconut oil and season very lightly with salt and pepper. These will shrink and become quite salty if you overdo it. Bake for 1 1/2 – 2 hours. I noticed some of my chips baked faster than others based on where they are in the oven so you may need to take one pan out before others. Eat when cool and still crispy!

I haven’t been very on top of updating about my Mindful Eating Challenge. Between vacation and work I’m kind of impressed that I’ve eaten mindfully at all, let alone found time to blog about it!

My basic goals for April were to eat when I’m in a calm state of mind and to really focus on and enjoy my food without distractions. I’ve not been perfect 100% of the time but I’m really proud of myself for the majority of the time that I have stuck with what I was aiming for.

The biggest thing I’ve learned in the last couple of weeks is that if I’m not in a good head space before I start eating then I’m not going to be in a good head space after. Eating doesn’t actually fix things or soothe me beyond the moment food passes my lips. If I make sure that I’m present and in a positive space prior to eating then I’m less likely to be eating to comfort myself and I continue to feel good after I’m satiated. Not that food can’t be comfort or that it shouldn’t be pleasure- I find both of those things in a good meal! I’ve found it incredibly important, in fact, to make sure meal time is as pleasurable as possible, not just in the food but in the setting, company, and awareness I bring to it. Not to mention the tasty, tasty flavorful goodness, no miserable meals just “because it’s good for me”!

The other big thing I’ve really gotten in the last week came from a page in the book Meal by Meal I’ve been enjoying snippets of: the importance of ritual. I’ve discovered that it’s actually more important for me to center and ground myself after a meal than before. It’s so darn easy to keep munching my way through the evening, especially after a day of work! I usually walk off the airplane feeling rather jarred and disconnected from myself so my commitment has been to take a bath or shower as soon as I get home (even if I think I feel “fine”). Washing off the day this way helps me come back to my body in a way that feels a lot kinder to myself than eating right before bed. I also feel a lot better when I wake up and there isn’t any disappointment in myself for using food as an unnecessary way to relieve stress.

That’s all for now, I have a few days off and a big list of veggie goodness and mindful eating insights to come. Happy weekend!