Snacking & Grazing

So I have found out that what I do between the hours of 1:30pm and 4pm (generally) on workdays is called ‘grazing’ and not ‘snacking’ as I have been calling it.

Okay, that makes me feel like a total cow.

Who comes up with these terms?!

When you sit down with bag of chips and finish the entire thing during a movie, that’s grazing. The constant munch, without really thinking about what you are doing, grazing. A snack is more like a baggie of chips or a conscious mini-meal.

When they say eat 6 meals a day, they really mean 6 snacks.

Snacks in between meals? That’s cool, keeps you full. They say keep your snacks at 150 calories or all of a sudden it’s no longer a snack, or at least, not a healthy choice.

I have large Tupperware containers full of broccoli, baby carrots (sometimes), and cauliflower which I graze on (there is that ‘omg I’m a cow’ feeling again…) all afternoon. Which isn’t as bad as it could be, if I was grazing on something more high calorie… but still probably not a good habit to keep.

Now I remember reading this in ‘Eat This Not That’ but apparently if you are not hungry, snacking in between meals isn’t a good idea, since snacking in between meals is not proven to cut down on the amount of food you eat during your actual meal.

Would you believe, I’m writing this post while snacking on cauliflower? What can I say, I need my inspiration!

Now to help me with snacking while I am at home or on the go I always have pre-cut veggies in the fridge. I’m sorry but it makes it sooo much easier to make good decisions if you can just open the fridge pick up a baggie and snack.

If I didn’t have these prepped what do you think I would prefer? You know how lazy I am, if I hungry and had to eat something I would much rather make myself an omelette or Dukan muffins (going over my daily oat bran allowance) than to prep a green pepper. But if it’s cut up already, the decision is made for me, I don’t have to do anything so I’d might as well just go with the veggies.

I don’t ever buy pre-cut veggies though, too expensive. So I prep all my veggies early in the week all at once. I also prep my chicken breasts for the week all at the same time. Just makes it so much easier to make those good decisions.

I also eat a LOT of raw veggies, so I know they wont be going bad in the back of the fridge.
When I was eating extra lean ground turkey I would also make that, season, add veggies, in big batches and Prawn and I would just add it to our eggs, our grilled veggies, anything as a little added oomf.

It’s all about being more efficient with your time and making things easier for yourself.

Still hungry after that cauliflower, now moved onto celery and orange pepper. Would you look at that, all of a sudden I’m grazing.

Moo.

xoxo