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I have decided that I need to start eating better not a "diet" but more lasting lifestyle changes about the foods we eat, how we prepare them, etc.

Here's where we are now: We eat chicken about once a week, red meat probably once or twice a month, some turkey, usually in chili or as meatballs. I'll eat fish when I can get it at a restaurant as my husband doesn't like it and I've never learned to cook it. I eat very little dairy, really just the Italian cheeses I use in cooking, mozzarella, ricotta, romano, and occasionally some yogurt in a smoothie. I don't drink milk, I can live without ice cream, but please don't make me give up my cheese

I don't like to eat breakfast, but I know it's important, so I usually either make a fruit smoothie or drink a ready-made or powdered protein shake.

For lunch, I usually have things like soups, salads, occasionally a sandwich and on rare occasions pizza. If I'm at school, they make a really yummy spinach and ricotta pizza.

For dinner, this week, we're having: chicken, usually stir-fried with veggies, although once it gets warmer, we'll grill more; Homemade pizza with veggies; Omelets or frittata; and pasta either with veggies or turkey meatballs.

I try to keep lots of fresh fruit and veggies around for snacks, but I admit that my biggest weakness are salty, snacky foods like popcorn, tortilla chips, veggie sticks, etc. I like large quantities of snack food. I'd much rather have a big bowl of popcorn than one small serving of sorbet or whatever. My other weakness is bread, hot and dripping with butter, although I have been cutting down tremendously lately. There is also my stash of chocolate hearts and jellybeans that Dh bought me for Valentine's Day that I munch on every day, or the secret stash of frozen (homemade) cookie dough that is used to make emergency chocolate chip cookies every 28 days or so. My other vice is I drink one can of coke a day. It's my addiction, and I'll admit that, and since I've gotten it cut down to only 1 a day, I'm okay for now with that. I drink no coffee, gave that up 4+ years ago, and most of the time, drink water, seltzer, mineral, regular or teas, usually herbal. For the past several months, we've been trying to buy more organic, natural foods when we can afford them and trying to make some changes to our diet and so it's good to know that we're on the right track.

My husband doesn't like beans and veggie-base dishes, but we talked about it, and he says he's fully supportive of me making these types of dishes for our family for dinner, and on those nights, he'll just eat a sandwich or scrambled eggs. Often, I don't make these foods because I don't like making a dinner that he won't eat, but now that I've got the go ahead, I'm open to all kinds of suggestions and ideas.

I hope that's enough info to work with. I guess I really need more dinner ideas (I really feel like we are in a dinner rut) and general ideas for eating healthy while still eating some chicken/poultry, and very little red meat. We'd like to eat even less if we could, but we need ideas for what to eat instead.

THE RESPONSES:

• I don't eat any meat or eggs, but other than that what you are eating sounds pretty similar to what I eat and cook which I think is fairly good. I have a long list I made of meal possibilities that I made up when my daughter was a baby so that it would be easier to plan our weekly menus and shopping lists. Popcorn isn't that bad as long as it isn't smothered in butter.
• That doesn't sound too bad to me either.

  Here's an example of the way we eat:

  Generally we have cereal or eggs for breakfast. my husband makes me french toast once a week usually (however, I'm sure this won't last after the baby has arrived).

  Lunch is usually for me where I get my protein so I'll make a hamburger and a salad. My son eats ham and salad sandwiches (just ham and lettuce) or peanut butter and jelly and or hummus/chips usually.

  Dinner, if my husband is cooking is either spaghetti or stir fry or something of the sort. If I'm cooking I'll make vegetarian things like a casserole, soup or something. I have a ton of recipes we cycle through.

  Generally the way we maintain the healthy aspect is to: always buy organic where we can. Substitute real cheese and dairy with rice milk, oat cheese slices, almond cheese blocks. Only lean organic cuts of meat if we use meat, which is rare although I'm going to have to start for my husband and mine health. Munchies like chips, etc. are all non-hydrogentaged oil, lowfat, natural products, no salt if we can find it. We use no salt in cooking or sugar or like added butter, instead we'll substitute with a good olive oil or something of the sort.

• What about drinking a more natural cola as a stepping stone? China cola (sold at most HFS's) is pretty yummy, no caffeine, and I *think* it's sweetened with fructose..
• You didn't mention eating greens. The one place I can see you really boosting your nutritional eating is to plan on having one large salad a day. Chose dark leafy greens - that weedy spring mix is really good, so is spinach, romaine is great for crunch, mix them all together and add more crunchy veggies you like and eat them with an oily dressing (aids in their digestion) Cooked dark greens go really well in pasta sauces and in casseroles as well.

  Other things you might want to consider - what kind of pasta are you eating? Whole grain and varied grains are better for you than white flour or egg pastas, they are more expensive but much more filling too! Would you consider replacing some of your pasta with other vegetables? Spaghetti squash works well as a pasta and you are getting your yellow/orange daily veg with it too. What about serving baked potatoes, baked squash, or baked sweet potatoes instead of pasta? I make baked squash cups and fill the cavity with pasta sauce and it's really good, we also fill potatoes with thick pasta sauce, or serve it over cauliflower.

  Switching to organic meat, eggs, and dairy is a really good way to improve your diet as well. You can easily cut back your dairy consumption by switching cheeses to stronger tasting versions too, if you want to cut back - cream goat cheeses are much stronger in flavor than creamy cows milk cheeses, old cheddar is stronger than mild, etc.

• Check out the book "Feeding the Whole Family"Read it. Memorize it. Live it. Love it. Or at least try a few of the recipes from it!

  Did I mention that I love this cookbook? I really need to get back to planning our meals from it -- we were eating quite well for a while there.

  Here's my review, from the attic

  Most everything we've tried has been at least pretty good, if not downright tasty. The baked goods have been more on the 'decent but not necessarily something we'd repeat' side of things, though. But overall it gives you some good, safe ways to try foods you might not have otherwise thought to taste.

  We have the definite advantage of living somewhere with a year-round farmer's market, and we go weekly to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, especially organic salad and stir-fry mixes, beautiful, fresh, washed greens going for anywhere from $2-$6/lb, yum. We try to snack on fruits throughout the day. My son won't eat vegetables except when I mince greens really finely and stick them in a scrambled egg, or disguise zucchini and carrots in his refried beans. Anyway, we usually have fruit and some sort of carb sitting at the table throughout the day, a piece of bread with almond butter, Aztec Grains cereal or organic Oatios, stuff like that. We do a lot of nutrient-hiding,putting the above-mentioned greens in his scrambled egg along with dulse flakes and sesame seeds; making our oatmeal with flax and sunflower seeds, coconut, raisins, dried apricots, fresh apples and spices. I also put flax seeds in just about everything I bake.