I'm one of the latter. Or, at least I was until last month.
My taste buds have always been pretty much non existent. That is, I really don't care what I ingest as long as I'm not hungry and have energy. The things that I would eat would make Annie and our kids roll their eyes and shake their heads. The only criterion I had with regard to food is that it didn't try to eat me back.
My genetic heritage predisposes me to atherosclerosis and high blood pressure. As the intensity of my summer training falls off the Chicago winters see me gaining 20 - 30 lbs, with all the associated risks. My eating, drinking, work schedule, exercise and sleeping habits are completely erratic 6 - 7 months of every year.
Some good friends related to me the wisdom of changing my eating habits:
One thing that has made a dramatic difference to us in the past couple of years is learning of the need for greens in our diet. In reality we should be eating about 1-2 lbs. of greens a day but we can't eat that much salad, so we make and drink two fruit/green smoothies a day. We learned this from reading the book GREEN FOR LIFE and THE GREEN SMOOTHIE REVOLUTION by Victoria Boutenko.
We start with 3 cups of water, 3 cups of any kind of greens (kale, chard, spinach, leaf lettuce, beet greens, etc.) pushed down into the water in the Vita Mix blender. Then add 2-3 pieces of cut up fruit (Usually banana, apple, pear, orange, melon, etc.) Top off with a cup or so of frozen berries (black, blue, straw, rasp, etc.) to fill the blender to the top. I sometimes add a little Agave sweetener or some dried raisins, cranberries, prunes or apricots. Blend until smooth.
We drink one smoothie in the morning before breakfast and another before lunch or mid afternoon. Because it contains so much fruit, it should not be mixed with grains like cereal or toast as fruit digests much more rapidly than grains. If you mix them, it ferments and causes gas. Because the smoothie is liquefied it can move almost directly into the blood stream for quick energy. Then, a half hour or hour later, your system will be ready to digest something else. The color of the smoothie changes depending on the kind of fruit you use. Sometimes they're light pale green, sometimes darker green, sometimes tan, sometimes red or plum or purple depending on the berries. Awesome. When we're traveling, we pick up quarts of Naked Juice or an equivalent from a grocery story. Our kids now know to have them in the refrigerator for us.
Since we've been eating this way, we've both had more energy, lost weight, no longer suffer from constipation, have clearer skin, sleep better, feel lighter and have lowered our cholesterol significantly. Mine dropped from 230 to 189 in a matter of months, with the other numbers falling into place as well. (Husband's) is even lower, having dropped about 40 points as well and he is now off virtually all his heart and blood pressure medication! Doc says he doesn't need it.
We take a few supplements: B12 (to make up for lack of meat), D3 for sunshine, Calcium Citrate for bone strength, Fish Oil to help keep cholesterol down, 1 baby aspirin for heart health, and a multi-vitamin. We used to take more, but have cut back as we've learned which whole foods give us what we need.
Since getting some borderline blood test results last month and finally being scared into recognizing my mortality - in spite of my athletic `prowess' - I've elected to eliminate meat and dairy products from my diet. It's been almost a month since I've been all vegetarian (with some tuna fish in water) and I've not missed it at all. NOT AT ALL.
Being the cheap Scot that I am it is also gratifying to note that our food bill has been cut almost in half.
Just sayin'.
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