Becca's Fab Five Snacks.... and How Amazon Saves My Waistline!
We don’t snack a lot at our house. Generally speaking, we eat meals when we are hungry and then we don’t eat in between….as a general rule. But I love snacks. I especially love snacks when we are on car trips, when I am hiking, and when we are camping. Occasionally, I also find myself in a sticky situation where I really need to eat and a meal just isn’t an option. Enter the Snacks (complete with Superhero cape) to save the day!
When we do snack, I don’t want to feel like shit afterwards.I want to know that my kids are putting something worthwhile in their bodies and for Christ’s sake I want it to be yummy and satisfying. As a side note, I also realllllllly prefer to keep off the blood sugar rollercoaster that turns small children and stressed out mothers into feral monsters. I like to have choices- crunchy, chewy, meaty. salty, sweet, decadent. Here are the Fab Five Snacks that are working in our family right now. and how I keep tabs on just how much snacking and munching we are doing.
Epic Salt and Pepper Pork Rinds- I was never a pork rind girl. I still prefer not to think about what I am actually eating when I eat them. I prefer to just enjoy the crunch and the salt and the pepper… mmmmmmmm! I feel good about these pork rinds because they come from healthy pigs and they are fried in pork fat, rather than some seed oil. A serving of these brings 4.5 g of fat and 8 g of protein into the mix. My kids love them, too!
Simple Mills Crackers- When I stopped eating gluten, I missed it. A lot. Back then, the only cracker options were like cardboard with bird seed on top. Simple Mills has created a cracker that is truly delicious with just 8 ingredients that you can recognize! They have a sea salt variety (which I get) and a cheese variety (which is also delicious). I use these to transport sardines and pesto into my gaping mouth hole. They go great with soup or salad, and a cheese platter! 8 grams of fat and 3 grams of protein balance out the carbohydrate load.
Paleo Valley Beef Sticks- If you follow me on Facebook, you’ve heard enough about the damn meat sticks. But seriously, these are my biggest life saver of all. I try not to force my kids to eat just because it’s meal time. So if they don’t eat, we tuck a few of these into the pack for wherever we are going. If I forget to pack food for work, I have beef sticks to tide me over.Teriyaki is our favorite flavor with Summer Sausage coming in second. I do not like the Turkey sticks and neither do my kids. Some of my clients do, though. One of my favorite things about these beef sticks is that they are fermented rather than chemically preserved. What a great bonus!
The link above is not to Amazon. HERE is the Amazon link, but you can save by ordering through PaleoValley as linked above.
Free to Eat Oatmeal Raisin Cookies- I can not even begin to describe the soft yumminess that is these cookies. It seems impossible to have a “clean” cookie that is also absolutely delicious, but here it is. This same company makes other cookie flavors, but I can’t speak for those. We love the Oatmeal Raisin ones.
Theo Salted Almond Dark Chocolate Bar- Chocolate…. almonds….sea salt…. I’m really not sure how you could possibly go wrong here. This company pays fair wages to the cocoa bean farmers and values high quality ingredients. Most importantly, though, it tastes so so amazing!
I threw some Tamarind in this picture because we enjoy these, as well! You can find them in the produce section.
… and How Amazon Saves My Waistline!
So here’s the problem, Snacks are yummy, easy to grab, and fun to eat. In other words, it can still be easy to overeat. I solve this problem with Amazon’s Subscribe and Save feature. All of these items (except the beef sticks), are available on Amazon. I have each one set to deliver at a set frequency:
Pork Rinds- 4 bags, once a month
Simple Mills Crackers- 2 boxes, once a month
Free to Eat Cookies- 1 box, once a month
Theo Salted Almond Chocolate- 12 bars, every 3 months
It’s easy to set up the Subscribe and Save. And notice the word “SAVE.” You actually save money when it’s on delivery. It’s so exciting when our snacks arrive at the beginning of the month. We also know that there’s no more coming. So we savor these snacks. When they are gone for the month, that’s it. They are gone. The Subscribe and Save feature also keeps me out of the center of the grocery store, the black hole of tempting foods that want to wreck all my hard efforts. Amazon for the win!!!