How To Eat a Delicious Baked Potato (without ingesting too many calories and fat)

So one of the best things to eat is a baked potato but what is a baked potato without butter, cheese and sour cream? 

Here is how I now eat a baked potato-

• Use fat free ranch dressing instead of sour cream or
• Use plain fat free Greek yogurt instead of sour cream.
• Use low fat cheese instead of regular.  I read the package label and measure the cheese.
• Use about a teaspoon of olive oil instead of butter.
• Add pepper and/or one of your Mrs. Dash seasonings.
• Another option is to use salsa.

 I used fat free ranch dressing and low fat mozerella on mine. Try it!  It's really good.

I'm just so bursting with ideas for this series on healthier living, it's hard to come up woth some sort of sensible order to present them.

Today I'm going to address sodium intake. I feel that cutting down on salt is extrememely important to healthier living.  I'm not going to advise anyone on how much sodium should be eaten in a day.  I'm just going to tell you how I lowered my salt intake. 

Here are some tips I have come up with to lower sodium intake:
1.  Read labels on foods.  Processed foods have so much salt in them.  I try to buy products that have lower sodium levels.
2.  I make as many foods as I can from scratch and I do not add salt.
3.  There are many canned vegetables that now come prepared with no salt.  I drain many vegetables and wash them before cooking.  Some vegetables obviously cannot be drained or rinsed (i.e. tomatoes and creamed corn) but green beans, kidney bean, black beans, etc. can.

4.  Mrs. Dash, baby!  I have a variety of flavors and use it like salt.  As you can see, I have several bottles beside my stove.
5.   Trader Joe's actually has many products with lower sodium.

I've been successful in cuting my sodium intake.  I now find that foods that are heavily salted just do not appeal to me.     

First Steps I Took To Healthier Living

One of the first things I did after the heart attack was change my eating habits. Your state of mind has to be that it is not a diet, it is a way of life.

Here are some of the things I changed immediately-
1.  I quit eating biscuits.  Bisquits are made with crisco and it is not good for your heart.
2.  I do not eat bacon.  Sometimes I use vegetarian bacon to flavor a recipe that calls for bacon.  Have you noticed that restaurants put bacon on everything?  Ask them to leave it off.
3.  I drastically cut the amount of cheese I eat.  If I make a recipe that calls for cheese, I use fat free cheese or low fat cheese and I carefully measure the amount I am using.  Sometimes you just don't realize how much you are eating.
4.  I eat an apple and a banana everyday.

This is a good starting point.  Stay tuned!

Healthy Living

So about one year ago I had a heart attack.  It was a big surprise.  I guess everyone says that.  I was only 60, about 20 pounds over weight.  It changed my life.

You see, I have grandchildren and children that I would like to spend more time.  Best of all I have the most wonderful husband in the world.  I feel like God is not finished with me and that's why he gave me a second chance.

I'm going to do a series on changes I made to my life so it would be healthier.  I think I can help other people who are not living a very healthy life become healthier and it is not really all that hard!  Well, some of it is.