Telework - Meal Plan - Bake Bread

I'm Teleworking from home today, something we can do about 4-6 times a month. There are the obvious advantages of saving on your gas bill from your daily commute, and for me that is about 1 hour of total travel time. l still get up early, and shower, dress casual, and make my breakfast, and lunch like I was going into the office. I could work in my P.J's if I wanted to. But what I like the best is, being able to sit at my desk, and feel the refreshing breeze coming in through the screen window, You can't get that in the office. It's an Ahhhhhh.... feeling! I must admit I do work harder at home, most likely because there are no distractions.

I've got to get back on my meal plan. For a whole year I was planning all my meals at least 3-5 days in advance, but usually 5-10 days. A great learning experiance too. I rarely had food go to waste, or forget that I had something in the refrig to eat. Now I took a break for a little more then a month, and I am back to eating candy, chips, cupcakes, ice cream instead of the fruit and vegatables I should be eating. I eat anything and everything on my meal plan, just in moderation, and not out of despartion, or being lazy. I use a program called Weightmania Pro of the same web site name, and it was about $60. I track sodium, sugar, carbs, protein..., and the percentages or ratio of the carbs/fat/protein in my daily meal plan, over a period of time from like 1 week, 1month, 1 year, or whatever range you specify. So this week I shall crack the whip and get back on track. The image below is a rolling 30 day pie chart, you can choose daily, 7 day, 14 days too. This is just one of the many data tracking abilities of this program.





Baking my own bread now since Februrary. I found out that most of the sodium/salt in my diet came from bread/cheese/pastries, and other baked goods. I found some recipes on a no sodium web site, and have been baking my own bread in the bread machine ever since. I also use honey instead of sugar and no salt margarine/butter. Sometimes I use the honey that is produced here on the farm. When I use the commercial honey I buy in the store, it gives the bread a browner color. The honey from the farm has no color. As for not using salt in the bread dough recipe, a lot of people tell me I have to use salt or my bread won't rise or bake, but I have found out different. I saw on a Food Network program, the host said you don't have to use salt, the bread just rises slower. Plus sodium is a preservative and used to flavor. So, later tonight I will bake a loaf, it takes 4 hours, and then time to cool. But oh is it so worth it...!

I found some things I like to eat every day, the foundation of my Meal Plan, and will elaborate more on that later, or in another post. I will also post one of my favorite recipes and explain how I developed it over a period of time.