Product (re)placement!

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I used to turn my nose up when shopping at the 'low fat' and 'reduced sodium' products on the shelves, figuring they must be 'low flavor' and 'for tree-hugging hippies.'

Being on this diet has altered my perceptions - necessity has led me to purchase alternate products and I have had other non-dieting friends and family taste some of them and give me opinions.  Amazingly, there's not that big a difference in some of them and they are so much better for you.  On the other hand, some of them taste horrible.

Here are a few of the rock-stars I've changed to.

• Heinz Ketchup - with 75% of the sugar removed. Tastes just like the 'real' stuff, to me and others who tried it.
• Fat-free sour cream - Not every store has it, Safeway does.  Tastes great! Just have to stir it a bit before use. I've been getting the Tillamook brand stuff, it's tasty.
• Nonfat Greek Yogurt - tons of protein, and tasty. Versus a regular yogurt with 45 grams of fat. We get Ciobani because it's the healthiest one out there, when comparing labels. But any nonfat green yogurt is better than not.
• Reduced-fat peanut butter - I'm not eating any peanut butter currently, but the Jif stuff is actually really good. I've tried it before just out of curiosity.
• Stevia/Splenda - mixed into stuff you cook vs. sugar. Splenda even has a 'brown suger' version. Haven't used this yet but it is widely used in diabetic and diet cooking.
• No-salt seasoning - especially Mrs. Dash, but just seasoning with herbs w/o much salt period.  The 'Organic No-Salt Seasoning' from Costco is also awesome, Leslie turned me on to that.
• Mustard instead of ketchup - Did you know Yellow mustard has 1/3 the sodium of Dijon mustard? However it contains fat in small amounts.  For that reason lots of the Dukan recipes call for Dijon. You trade one evil for another, but they are minor evils here.  Fats are more discouraged than salt on this diet.
• Plain non-fat yogurt as a sauce base.  You can mix herbs, seasonings, etc. into this and a little fat-free sour cream and make some pretty tasty sauces for food.  Versus using heavy cream, which is high in fat and has sugar content.
• Reduced sodium soy-sauce - tastes the same. Really.
• Reduced or no-sodium chicken bouillon.  Usually not available in cubes, but you can get jars of the powder and use as soup base or for sauces, cooking, etc.
• Fat-free cream cheese.  It's not bad - and again you can mix herbs in, and stuff it into chicken etc. I haven't tried this yet but I just bought some and plan to experiment.
• Vinegar - It's the only food item which actually directly taps the 'sour' part of our palette. It's also pretty healthy for you in small amounts and can add a lot of tang, used on salad, or in sauces, etc.

I'm finding new stuff all the time. :)

Food yesterday:

Breakfast: Ciobani Vanilla fat-free Greek yogurt w/2tbsp of oat bran
Lunch: Grilled chicken breast with Mrs. Dash, dab of mustard
Dinner: Turkey Taco lettuce wraps.


*Pic taken from Kalyn's Kitchen