Chelly,
Salads aren't the only "diet" food out there. Try not to think about it as dieting, rather choosing healthier foods. My next question is - what are the others eating and should they be eating it if it's not healthy?

Your whole family should be eating food that gives them energy and goodness. If you are serving chicken, roast off a whole chicken with some salt and pepper, maybe some rosemary or lemon. There's no need to fry or bread or batter dip anything.

It's just as easy to cook a fresh vegetable instead of something out of a box.

Some rice cooked with chicken stock (swanson's canned is fine, I certainly don't think the average home cook keeps fresh stock around like we do) is a flavorful side. Just sub the same amount of chicken stock as you would use water.

i went grocery shopping on fri. i spent 3164 at food lion. of that amount 299 was for 409 cleaner. the rest was for food

i got
3 vienna sausages 150
2 potted meat 79

fl creamed corn 60

ww bread 229

cream of wheat 379

peeled carrots 175
tomatoes 299
2 broccoli crowns 193
iceberg lettuce 199
lg green pepper 169

lg fl cheddar 549
milk 299

my menu last week was

sat salad
lasagne
pizza

sun cream of wheat
salad
maruchan lunch

mon grilled pbj
hot pockets
pizza

tue quiche, potato, roll
breaded shrimp
anytizers, stuffing, tomato, roll

wed salad
bean soup

thu salad
lasagne, roll

fri egg sandwich
pizza
lasagne, roll

sat oatmeal w banana
pizza
kielbasa, green peppers, onion

mary

Change of plans:
Thought DH was going to be home for dinner so I got stuff to make tacos which he loves. Turns out he won't home until at least 8 so since I have mashed potatoes and broccoli left from Thursday night, I roasted off the pork roast I had defrosted a few days ago. This way, I'll have dinner tonight and we can either make sandwiches with the rest or have it for dinner on Monday night.

Planning on waffles and eggs for Sunday breakfast and we'll have the tacos tomorrow night.

Canadagirl: On Fridays during Lent, Catholics can have fish or no meat meals. It used to be that Catholics wouldn't eat meat on Fridays year round, but then the Vatican changed it and it's now just during Lent.

It you're preparing snacks on Fridays hardboiled eggs, slices of cheese, wraps are fine.

_______
We were in a predicted storm on Friday evening, so I grocery shopped on Friday afternoon.

I have a fifty dollar budget. Earlier in the week I spent $6.00 for fruit, which brought me down to $44.00. Last week, I also had a $1.08 overage which brought me down to $42.92.

Here's what I bought.

Gallon of milk $3.60
Eggs 18 count $1.80
Sour cream 16 ounce $1.19

52 oz whole chicken $3.99
Sirloin Tip Roast 3.8 lbs @ 2.98= 11.32

Oranges 6 lbs @ .88= 4.40
Fuji apples 4 lbs @ .99= 3.96
can of pineapple 1.19
5 lbs potatoes $2.50

peanut butter 16 ounce $2.10

case of diet soda $6.50

This total $42.55 so I have 37 cents extra for next week.

I also spent a couple of hours in the morning doing a little batch cooking. I processed 2 pounds of black beans, and 1 pound of navy beans. I then put them in 2 cups bags and froze them. Now I have beans that are just as easy to use as canned beans are.

I also had two packages of chicken breasts with rib meat. I cut the breast off of the bones and made over a gallon of chicken stock with the bones. There was also over six cups of meat that came off of the bones as well.

I put four breasts in a teriyaki marinade and froze that. I then took 2 chicken breasts and sliced that for fajitas. I marinated that as well.

With the other two breasts I chopped for white chili. I left out some chicken stock, navy beans and chicken meat for that. I also made a 9 x 13" pan of corn bread to accompany the meal.

I also made a batch of coffee cake muffins.

Saturday morning we all had cereal and milk. For lunch I made French Onion soup with toasted baguette and cheese as a large crouton. My bowls are oven proof so I just put the cheese on the bread and broil. Then we put the broiled cheesy bread into the soup. Sunday we had some barbecue.

Sunday breakfast we had the rest of the french bread for french toast, bacon, and sauteed apples. I made extra bacon for a corn bread salad tonight. I need to chop some vegetables for the salad and will make extra for fajitas on Wednesday. Sunday lunch we had leftovers barbecues. Sunday dinner was white chili with cornbread. For dessert I took coffee cake muffins, topped with some ice cream and heated up the leftover apples and drizzled with a caramel sauce, YUMMY!

Today the kids had cereal and muffins. Dinner will be hamburger patties with cornbread salad and grapes.

Tuesday: We will have Sirloin Tip roast, twice baked potatoes, salad and glazed carrots. We'll have chocolate cake with chocolate icing.(DH's birthday on Wednesday, but he won't be home to celebrate.)

Wednesday: Chicken fajitas with salsa black bean rice.

Thursday: Hot Roast beef sandwiches with mashed potatoes, gravey, green beans, Oriental salad.

Friday: Shrimp fettucini alfredo, salad, and green beans.

DBF made stroganoff last night for us, but he cooks for crowds and only does leftovers for a lunch or two, so we are having leftovers with my DB tonight to use some of it up....it was awesome.

Scanning the sales papers for what to buy this week. 5lbs of baby red tater for $1.69 and 3lbs oniond for $1.49. will add that to the corned beef I will buy from the club I belong ot on Thursday(St. Pat's day buffet and they do great corned beef and sell the leftovers really cheap!)

Thanks ChefSam:) Would you believe all the times I have made rice I have never had it plain with just chicken broth in it? I've made meals where I've used chicken broth in the rice, but only with some type of casserole.

Most chicken we eat is baked or grilled. LOTS of grilled chicken when the weather gets nicer.

I think it's the sides that we have with everything that get me. Like last night we had spaghetti, with ground turkey and keilbasa in it.
And garlic bread. I probably should have had a small salad, a much smaller portion of spaghetti, and no garlic bread.

Tonight we had leftover spaghetti. No garlic bread, because we didn't have any:)I still should have a salad with it and less spaghetti, or just the salad.

Like with the chicken, we would have say mashed potatoes or broccoli cheese rice, and steamed veggies.Not really unhealthy stuff, but not the best(except the veggies:) Yet I will still take a big helping of mashed potatoes with my chicken and veggies, I guess just because it's there.? I really need to work on that.

I also need to get out of the mindset that salads are not"fun", or "good", or whatever my problem is. And you're right ChefSam, that there are so many other foods besides salads. I guess when I think "diet", thats my go-to.

Chelly, the other thing to think about is how to make the salads "fun." I try to put as much good stuff in a salad as possible. Veggies, nuts, dried fruit, fresh fruit, cheese (not big on meat in salads myself) and I have a weakness for croutons, especially homemade.

I LOVE croutons. Anything crunchy in a salad I like. I'm gonna try to mix it up a little.Make it fun:)

Toasted pecans!