Just Like Grandma Used to Make

Sometimes, I think my subject lines are too literal.

For dinner this evening, I made a broccoli casserole that my grandmother used to make for me when I was a kid. It wasn't some Southern delicacy she learned growing up in Mississippi but one she got out of a popular woman's magazine like Good Housekeeping or something.

It was part of her effort to get me to eat more veggies, as I was not a fan when I was a kid. Most of the time, I'd eat the tasty casserole goodness, picking around the icky broccoli. But she kept making it, probably in the hopes that some of the broccoli would accidentally make it into my mouth.

This was the first time I've ever made it for myself (I substituted some things to lower the fat and calories) and it certainly brought back a lot of memories. My grandmother is a bit of a conundrum for me because my relationship with her was always positive and loving. I don't ever remember her raising her voice to me or anything.

But I learned later in life about the things she put my mother through as a child and it sort of boggles my mind a bit. It also explains a lot about how my mother ended up how she is. I won't get into specifics because I am sure my mother would kill me if she learned I wrote about it on the Internet for all 7 of my readers to see.

I will say that appearance was a big, big deal. Not necessarily physical perfection, but the idea that we must never show the world who we really are inside. You should always appear happier, more together, etc. than you feel inside, no matter what the cost. My mother learned to push those feelings down and hide them with food, then passed that skill on to me.

As I sat here eating my casserole, I wasn't really paying attention to the whole "stop when you are feeling a little full" thing. I wanted to eat as much of it as I could. Partly because I like the taste. Yes, now even the broccoli bits! But also because I wanted to get to feeling full as soon as possible. And when I got there, I wanted to eat a little bit more. Sometimes, I try to lie to myself and say that I just love the taste so much. But nothing tastes that good. I am not sure if it was brought on by memories of my grandmother and mother or just my general dysfunction.

I'll share the recipe right now but you have to promise to a)call your grandmother if she is still alive, and b)eat it mindfully. :)

Ingredients

• 1 10 oz pkg frozen chopped broccoli thawed & drained (I added a bit more as my bag was bigger and, to me, the point was the veggies)
• 1 cup fat-free sour cream
• 1 cup fat-free cottage cheese
• 1/2 cup Bisquick baking mix (I used the Heart Smart that really isn't that much smarter but that's all the store had so I went with it)
• 1/4 cup margarine or butter (I used Land O' Lakes whipped butter)
• 1/2 cup egg substitute (replacement for 2 eggs)
• 1 tomato, peeled & thinly sliced
• 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees
• Grease lightly a square baking dish (8 x 8 x 2")
• Spread broccoli in dish
• Beat sour cream, cottage cheese, Bisquick, butter & eggs substitute with hand beater for one minute
• Pour over broccoli
• Arrange tomato slices on top, sprinkle with parmesan
  cheese
• Bake until golden brown & knife inserted in center comes out clean (about 30-40 minutes)

According to SparkRecipies, if we consider it to make 8 small servings, the nutritional information is as follows:

Amount Per Serving
Calories 128.9
Total Fat 5.8 g
Saturated Fat 3.2 g
Cholesterol 14.1 mg
Sodium 217.5 mg
Potassium 192.4 mg
Total Carbohydrate 12.8 g
Dietary Fiber 1.3 g
Sugars 3.8 g
Protein 8.9 g
Vitamin A 18.1 %
Vitamin B-12 5.1 %
Vitamin B-6 5.0 %
Vitamin C 45.2 %
Vitamin D 1.0 %
Vitamin E 4.5 %
Calcium 14.0 %
Copper 1.0 %
Folate 9.4 %
Iron 4.8 %
Magnesium 1.7 %
Manganese 4.8 %
Niacin 1.0 %
Pantothenic Acid 1.3 %
Phosphorus 8.0 %
Riboflavin 4.1 %
Selenium 4.0 %
Thiamin 2.1 %
Zinc 1.4 %

Oh, also! Thanks for the lovely comments on my post yesterday. It is nice to know some people are reading!

So, like, I was talking about thzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Can eating better actually make you more tired? No? Maybe I am just special!

Actually, I probably have more energy at night and I don't give it an outlet, so when I try to go to sleep, I end up tossing and turning for an hour. Plus, no carb coma. Of course, I also have a tendency to obsess about what I am going to eat the next day/week/month/year during that time, too. Last night, it got to the point where I was dreaming about someone stealing the peanut butter on toast I was planning to have for breakfast.

Basically, it all adds up to me not getting a good night's sleep and being tired the next day. But I'm eating more fruits and veggies! Is that a good trade off?

I'd like to be the kind of person that can eat healthy without really thinking about it. But it's kind of like learning a foreign language at this point. If I don't study and do the word problems and read the text books and actually immerse myself in the culture of eating better, it will never be something I can just casually toss off at a moments notice. It takes a lot of energy for me to not grab fast food on the way home or actually cook something for dinner. Because I've spent the last 10 years at least doing those fast, easy and not-good-for-me things, so they are my automatic response. I have to literally reign myself in all day long at this point to even come close to eating healthy.

I want to do it because I want to be healthier and that's what drives my decision making. Unfortunately, making that grand pronouncement doesn't erase all the bad habits. I've read that it's easier to create good habits than break bad ones (or something to that effect) and, well, I am not sure I believe that!

The hardest part for me at this point is finding a middle-ground between eating whatever I want, when I want and obsessing over eating better every waking moment. It's a slippery slope either way and it kind of stresses me out trying not to get stressed out about it. It's not that I want to beat myself up for "failing" or anything, but I know that it will take me longer to get to the point of eating healthy being a habit if I continue to go to extremes all the time.

But I am doing the best that I can right now. I think that's important and I'm going to give myself credit for it and try to relax just a bit before I give myself a headache and a bacon cheeseburger.