1 June

Nutrition: The Lunch For Me

by Jon Katz
The Lunch For Me
The Lunch For Me

I’m not sure I’ve ever put my lunch up on the blog before, but this one seems important.

I eat very well, I think, especially in the past 15 or 20 years of my life, as I have learned more about nutrition and the food I was buying and eating. My diagnosis of diabetes seven years ago was a landmark in my education about food and nutrition and since that, I continue to pay attention, look for good foods, educate myself about food. I have essentially given up on supermarket shopping, buying my food at co-ops, farm stands and organic outlets and markets.

I am not a vegan, not a vegetarian, but I rarely eat red meats, I do not eat any fried or processed foods,  I have little breads, and only multi-grains, I have a diet focused on protein, low-cholesterol foods and fruit and vegetables. I have not eaten processed sugar in years. Understanding nutrition is a continuing thing, our knowledge of foods and the things inside of them changes all of the time. It is so easy to be fooled by the “organic” section of supermarkets, if you read the labels carefully, as I have learned reluctantly to do, you learn the that all kinds of foods are labeled healthy and organic that are not.

This week, another step, I often eat at the Round House Cafe, my friend Scott Carrino is determined to make  healthy food inexpensively, and his food is delicious as well. This is a combination I have rarely found in my eating life. This week, he steered me towards a new salad I might like, and the minute I saw it, I knew this was the perfect lunch for me. It is a Greek Salad, with a scoop of tuna fish, lined with avocado, seasoned with feta cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers and boiled egg, among a few other things. I even eat the flower.

It is not only a good meal for a diabetic – I almost never use dressing –  it is a good meal period. It tastes great and fills me up. Learning is the joy of life for me, when I stop learning it will be the first death. In America, good food is a complex, elusive and confusing thing. I love this lunch, this is the lunch for me. And in the summer, I can often make it myself. Neat.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Email SignupFree Email Signup