Clean eating while pregnant

Eating clean while pregnant has been a serious struggle for me. This pregnancy has turned me into a carb loving machine. I am talking pancakes, French toast, potatoes, rice, pasta. I love it all and if I could bathe in it I would….kidding! I have a plan to eat more REAL food and less stuff that comes from a package!

So I have made the conscious decision THIS week to start eating cleaner and letting my old carb ways fall to the wayside. I am not going to give up carbs, that would be silly but I am going to try to portion them out better instead of having meals consisting of nothing but carbs! I am also going to incorporate vegetables into our daily meals.

So this week I will post my meal plan and what I plan on eating so that you can catch a glimpse into what it is that I eat. I try to K.I.S.S (Keep it simple stupid) but there are times when I crave flavor and umph (Top Chef style cooking) and chicken broccoli and brown rice is JUST not cutting it. It’s bland and it is “diet” food if I must say so myself. 

When I was losing the baby weight after I had my son chicken, broccoli, and brown rice was a staple in my home as well as

*baked chicken with sweet potatoes and green beans

*foil wrapped tilapia with broccoli and spray butter

*baked chicken with a salad.

It worked and it did the job but damn was my palette craving more. Especially now that I am pregnant my body just wants an explosion of flavor and I am not going to skimp on that. Granted, when I first gave birth to my son was when I was REALLY unknowledgeable about health and nutrition so I ate the easiest things but they weren’t always tasty. Actually my husband now refuses to eat chicken brown rice and broccoli ever again. Not to mention my husband kind of hates chicken because we ate it so much LOL. I digress.

I have started drinking green smoothies lately because my vegetable intake is really low. I mean I went from eating the stuff every day to maybe eating a vegetable once a week…..sad I know. How I have been able to keep my weight down is a mystery to me, I will say that we can thank the workout gods for that one.

I am also going to start packing my lunches. In the beginning of my pregnancy I could not tell you what I wanted to eat so my husband and I spent a ton of money on eating sandwiches and Chinese food because I clearly had no idea what I wanted to eat. Now that I am okay and not so sick anymore packing a lunch seems more attainable than it did before. Part of me can’t wait to be “normal” again.

My meal plan for the week:

Grilled steak with green beans and a chimichurri sauce

Grilled chicken with balsamic roasted kale

Turkey sausage with peppers and potatoes

Breakfast for dinner

“Chipotle” steak bowl with rice, beans, lettuce, salsa, and guacamole.