A Better Bag of Groceries

Summer Snackin’

Wednesday, July 7, 2010 at 07:09 AM

What did I learn last week?  A lot.  I’ll give you the Cliffs Notes version.

1. Real estate is not for sissies.
2. Life is much better when you pre-cut fruit and vegetables.

I will not bore you with the gory details, but we did not move last week as we had planned.  Through no fault of our own, the deal fell apart.  Well, I guess technically, we did move – out of our house, and back into it again.  And our next “move” is up in the air.  The good news is that since we had all of our stuff out of the house, I cleaned it top to bottom before everything came back in again.  And I am not allowing everything back in again.  It has to be something that we really need and use before it is granted permission to return.  Every day, more stuff goes into a bag for Good Will or a bag for Trash.  I can truly say that I have the cleanest and most de-cluttered house in town.

While the people who were supposed to buy our house were not very planful, I was.  That meant that I was all set for three days of living in limbo and getting our kids to their brand-new summer daycare/camp.  Getting kids into a new routine (one that is foreign to the parents too), is not easy.  I had to make checklists in order to remember everything!

In order to show up three days in a row at Camp with healthy, satisfying lunches for the kids, I spent some time one evening cutting up fruits and veggies and storing them in snack-sized ziploc bags.  For the rest of the week, whenever anyone needed a snack, they could just grab and go.  Why hadn’t I done this sooner?

As this week began, and things went back to “Normal”, I decided that from now on, I would spend a little time every Sunday night doing my Fruit & Veggie, Slice & Bag routine.  In fact, I made a little Party For One out of it.  I included my Ipod player with ’80s tunes and a nice glass of Chardonnay and I had a little Me Time while my husband handled Bath Time. 

All the bagged Healthy Snacks go into one of my Cleaner Than Clean produce drawers. 

It is sooooooo much better than chopping every night!

In the summer, when we’re always on the go, eating meals at the park, the zoo, the pool or summer camp, it is tempting to grab a bagged snack of packaged food from the middle aisles of the grocery store.  You know, Smartfood, Cheez-Its, Cheetos, Oreos.  Their NuVal scores pale in comparison to my Fruit and Veggie Bags:

• Red Grapes:  91
• Cucumbers:  93
• Green Beans:  100
• Baby Carrots: 99
• Watermelon: 94
• Green Apple:  96
• Blueberries: 100
• Nectarine: 93
• Plum:  99

Those scores are way better than some of the pre-packaged alternatives:

• Smartfood:  11
• Cheeze-Its:  9
• Cheetos:  6
• Double-Stuff Oreos:  8

I may have learned some tough lessons last week, but this week it is comforting to remember the lessons that NuVal has taught me – namely, that fruits and vegetables are nutritional juggernauts.  Yay for fruits and veggies – the best summer snacks!

Yesterday’s Winner

Congratulations to Commenter #19, Kim Piro!  Kim has won the much-coveted Teddie Peanut Butter Giveaway.  Please email me at abetterbagofgroceries@gmail.com with your mailing address so that I can get it out to you.  Thanks to all who entered!

Question of the Day

What is your favorite Summer Snack?

Posted by: Melissa 9 comments

Posted in: snacks

Tags: fruits, snacks, summer snacks, veggies