Join this FREE 30-Day Challenge and learn How to Start Eating Real Food! Enjoy information-packed emails each day plus homework, with community support and encouragement from others in our Real Food Reboot Community Facebook Group!
Years ago, when my husband first told me he wanted to eat real food, I had NO IDEA what he was talking about.
I grew up on Kraft macaroni and cheese and boxes of zesty spaghetti. Soup came from a can and ramen noodles were a summer lunch staple. I even had a method of eating the ramen – drink the broth first, and then eat the noodles one at a time.
My husband grew up on 5 acres just outside city limits, where his dad had a ½ acre of land (at least) dedicated to his garden. Like me, he had cinnamon rolls from a can and biscuits from a box, but he also knew not ALL food came in a box.
I don’t think I ever had that realization.
How to Start Eating Real Food: Real Food Reboot
My husband and I were pinching our pennies hard to pay off our debt. It never occurred to me that the boxes of cake mix I bought for 25¢ or the meals of “just add water” weren’t real food.
I simply didn’t know any better.
So when he stood there in the kitchen, asking me if we could start eating real food, not only did I have no clue what he was talking about, I also had NO IDEA where to begin.
Blogs were a relatively new thing at the time, so there weren’t many people talking about eating healthy food. And of the blogs I did find, ZERO of them were talking about eating healthy food on a budget (which was a requirement for us).
The little information I found made me feel guilty for the things I wasn’t doing… like not buying raw milk and not drinking kombucha and not shopping at Whole Foods.
I didn’t like the way those people made me feel, so I quit researching and started doing things my way.
How Can I Start Eating More Real Food?
I figured, that if I made a few small changes at a time – like learning how to properly read an ingredient label, figure out which ingredients were the worst of the worst and start with avoiding just those, and learn how to find real food in my grocery store just down the street – I would eventually make progress.
And I was right.
What Are Real Foods?
Here we are, MANY baby steps and several years later and we no longer buy boxes of cake mix (here are my recipes for homemade chocolate and homemade yellow cake mix) or make biscuits from a box (here is a delicious recipe for homemade cheddar biscuits). We cook 98% of our meals from scratch and during the week, I’m able to get dinner on the table in under an hour, sometimes less.
For years, Crumbs readers have been asking me for a how-to guide on eating real food addressing issues like:
- How do you get your family on board?
- Do you know what to make versus what to buy?
- How do you stay motivated and have the energy to keep going?
- How do you get around the cost of healthy food?
- And most importantly, how do you avoid overwhelm?
That’s why I’m SO excited to finally share with you Real Food Reboot: a 30 Day Clean Eating Challenge!
I’ve taken all the baby steps and ideas I’ve shared over the years and put them in one place, organized in such a way where you can start from Day 1 and by the time you hit Day 30, you’ll be confident and comfortable planning, shopping and cooking real food for your family.
And the best news yet – it’s completely FREE!
What is a Real Food Reboot Challenge?
Here’s how the challenge is going to work:
- Every day, starting on the first Monday, I will send you an email with the day’s challenge. (Most challenges and homework assignments can be completed in 15 minutes or less.)
- Each challenge includes step-by-step instructions, a short video, and a homework assignment.
- Check-in daily to our Real Food Reboot Community Facebook Group and get support encouragement from others going through the challenge!
Doesn’t that sound like fun!?!
Remember, the challenge officially starts January 2, 2023! I HIGHLY recommend signing up ahead of time so come Day 1, you can hit the ground running.
Ready to Start Eating Real Food?
Enter your information below to sign up for our Real Food Reboot: 30-day Clean Eating Challenge:
Click here to start your 30-Day Clean Eating Challenge!
I’ve been working on these baby steps for MONTHS and I’m over the moon to be able to share them with you. Really truly, these steps are how my family has been able to not just switch from processed food to real food, but to do it AFFORDABLY. You can do it too, and I can’t wait to see you on January 2nd!
My boyfriend comes from a similar background of having been raised on boxed meals, whereas my mother was an immigrant and made all meals from scratch. It’s been a strange transition for him to move from his family’s premade meals to my home-cooked ones since mine have more vegetables, but he says he is feeling much better nowadays and chalks it up to his new diet. I love this post and agree with everything in it!