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Our food challenge is done!  I’m actually really pleased – it was a great learning experience for me.  The health effects for everyone were very nice and the challenge was definitely worth it.

Now that we’re done I can say that we’ll stick with the traditional foods style of eating.  Not 100% because that’s just hard in “modern” life.  But I learned some valuable lessons to help make healthy eating more do-able.  The biggest thing was to make sure that I have good meals in the freezer ready to go when I need them.

We ended our challenge and went ahead and ordered a pizza right after.  The end result of that was strange.  First, the pizza did not taste nearly as good as I remembered pizza tasting.  It just tasted sweet which really wasn’t pleasant.  I wanted a cheesy, saucy taste and it was just sweet.  We decided that next time we want pizza we’re just going to make it ourselves with homemade crust.  By getting pizza we’re already getting something with gluten anyways, and it may as well be healthier than ordering from a pizza place.

The pizza also gave me an upset stomach and tore my digestive track up from start to finish, so I certainly wasn’t endeared to it at all…  It got at least one of the kids too (evidenced by the fact that our kids sometimes forget to flush after going potty).  However, nobody wanted to confess forgetting to flush

Speaking of gluten – we’re a gluten-free home because Scott is gluten-intolerant – we did try properly prepared sourdough bread on the trial.  And happily it tastes not only delicious, but Scott is able to eat it with no ill effects.  I think that’s one of the biggest bonuses of eating well, and of eating so much soup, broth, and ferment food.  Those things have helped our digestion enough that Scott can tolerate sourdough (this is real sourdough though, fermented starter and allowed a slow rise – he still can’t eat the “fake” sourdough that’s sold in most stores).  We’ve been getting a loaf every couple of weeks or so and enjoying slices buttered.  I’m happy because this summer we may actually be able to have some picnic lunches with sandwiches.  My one lament about being a “GF” house is that the ease of sandwiches isn’t available.

The kids all did well and ate voraciously (as per usual) during the challenge.  Cassidy does seem to have gained some weight, which makes me very happy.  Her face looks a bit fuller and she’s getting some padding.  I think she could stand to gain a bit more so I’m still focusing on a good fat-rich diet for her.

So where are we going from here?  I’m going to keep working on a nutrient-dense traditional diet.  I’d like to keep up with about 90% or so of our eating being traditional foods.  I’ve gotten into the habit of soaking things and I think I’ll be able to keep that up.  Using dried beans instead of canned is quickly becoming a habit

We’re also going to try and focus on more local foods straight from the farmer.  We’re planning to sign up for a CSA for our summer and fall vegetables, supplemented with our own first gardening effort.  I’m looking forward to both of those things.  We try and buy our red meat locally too, from a local beef herd and also from a bison herd.  Once we get a freezer (if we can manage it in this house…which isn’t likely) we’ll probably buy beef by the half cow which will be really nice!

I’m also taking advantage of our local buying co-op to get good food in bulk (like our dried beans, rice, and oatmeal) because bulk buying allows for a good discount and gives us the whole foods to prepare.

I’m really pleased with how un-complicated our grocery lists are now.  Vegetables, grains, and meat and dairy and we’re pretty much set.  Canned tomato products and coconut milk are about the only thing we buy in a “processed” state.  It’s nice.

And of course the food has been delicious!  I feel like we’ve really enjoyed good foods, and I’ve learned to streamline some so I can enjoy them even more   I’ll continue to work on tweaking our diet and decided some further health goals for our family – the 30-day trial system is working well for us!