When I was young, I struggled tackling my vegetables. I would swallow them without chewing, attempt to hide them in my napkin, or toss some to the dog and hope he would eat them before anyone noticed. I suppose that is relatively normal for kids – to dodge the vegetables. Yet, my mother…the good mom that she is, wanted me to eat vegetables and be healthy. So, she opted to find ways to make vegetables more appealing – add some cheese.
Honestly, you smother any vegetable in cheese, and I would eat it. I would still probably eat it now. My mother used cheese to trick me into vegetable eating. And it worked. I have loved cheese since I was little – I can eat sliced cheese, melted cheese, queso, cheese sticks, blocks of cheese, shredded cheese…pretty much cheese in any form or fashion. The downfall to this is that cheese is not the most healthy option. Veggies = great. Cheese on veggies, makes the healthy factor go down a few notches.
For those of us attempting to scope out healthy alternatives to our diets, many people would recommend removing most cheese from our diets. For someone like me, that isn’t realistic. I love cheese and removing it, will only make me want it more. I will be at the grocery store at 2am snatching up Doritos and some jalapeno cheddar dip. So, my only option is to limit my cheese intake or tap into the most healthy cheese options I can.
Fortunately, most brands offer low fat cheese options. Kraft offers a fat free cheddar cheese option (shredded). If you are like me, tapping into these healthier options simply allow you to enjoy having it in your diet. For me, that is important. The easiest way for me to stick to healthy eating, is to allow myself to feel as “normal” as possible. I dodge most cheese options – I will avoid adding cheese to a salad or a sandwich. But there are times where a little cheese is all that I want. And thanks to Kraft, Weight Watchers, etc., a little cheese is what I get.