Back In the Saddle
January 18, 2007

I had fun indulging over the holidays, did you? My favorite treat was a few sessions with a novel accompanied by mounds of chocolate almond bark and champagne. I think I got that suggestion from French Women Don’t Get Fat by Mirelle Guiliano.

Supposedly it takes 21 days to master a new habit. It’s almost 21 days since I made the New Year’s Diet Reform pledge and it’s not going so well. Sure, I’m out there exercising, running with John Mayer crooning in my ipod ears: “..gravity, stay the hell away from me, keep me in the light..” has become my personal exercise mantra. (Surely not his artistic intention, but everything is relative.) The problem is that the exercise is simply not keeping up with gravity’s evil twins, my saddlebags.

This is probably because my metabolism doesn’t have a clue about which food season we are in. Why am I running in 40-degree weather and eating broiled scrod when this is supposed to be the dead of winter? Shouldn’t we be slathering up the last dregs of beef stroganoff with tollhouse cookies or something? I feel more scrambled than the eggs for my chocolate soufflé.

Desperate for support and guidance, I decided to buy my first ‘diet book’. I abhor the word diet, but this particular book You: On A Diet: The Owner's Manual for Waist Management by Drs. Mehmet Oz and Michael F. Roizen is something much more. With a funny, relaxed authority heart surgeons explain that to change your body you have to know your body. In plain language they give you the skinny on body fat and physiology. They share what works (“Portions, People!”), blast diet myths, and dispense invaluable nutrition and recipe information.

Could over consumption of food be part of a larger social problem? You bet it is if I can’t fit into my dress jeans on a Saturday night. But seriously, it’s a Social Problem on a grand scale. The USDA recently released disturbing numbers about hunger in America: 35 million people don’t have enough food in our country, 12 million of them are children. Vermont has a disproportionate share of these numbers. That’s enough to kill anyone’s appetite and hopefully trigger some awareness about our penchant for gigantic portions and mindless eating.

It got me thinking: can we support others as we strive to slim our waistlines? I’m making my waist management program a matter of mind over muffins by putting my money where the nacho chips used to flow. I figure that at least 10% of my weekly food bill is superfluous junk; by contributing that dollar amount towards healthy staples for a food shelf box I can do some good while bidding my saddlebags a permanent good–bye.

Kim Dannies is a graduate of La Varenne Cooking School in France. She lives in Williston, VT with her husband, Jeff, and three college–aged daughters who come and go. ©2008