My secret to eating what you want and losing weight

A big part of my life is cooking and eating great food but, believe it or not I have been eating what I want and losing weight.

I share a great many recipes on my blog because I love food and I love to eat. However, in the past year I have managed to lose over 20 lbs or about 2 1/2 dress sizes. I recently bought a pair of jeans in a size I have not worn since Nixon was still President!

I know it sounds contradictory that I share very calorie rich recipes and yet I still have managed to lose weight. I do not believe in diets, the minute I put myself on a diet I get hungry and obsess over food I think I should not be eating. What I have done instead is to make choices about what I eat.

I evaluate what I eat and I try to make a rational choice about what I put in my mouth. I have lost weight by doing the simplest things: I eat less and I exercise more. We need so many calories a day to live and if we consume more calories than we need our bodies store it somewhere for another day.

I know that sounds too simple to be true but it is. I do not eat until I am full at any meal, I stop at the point I am no longer hungry. I also try and add another 10 or 15 minutes at least of cardio every day than I want to do. Plus I really push myself on my cardio workouts. If I am not sweating I am not moving hard enough. I have also found that for me running is my ideal cardio workout. It helps me feel good emotionally, it challenges me and I can set real goals around challenges to continually get faster or increase my endurance running.

My knees and back seem to agree that less of me to carry around is a good thing. However, I want to strike a balance. If I cannot enjoy the foods I love I will lose some of my passion for life. I know that it sounds crazy to some but I think you can have the pleasure of eating ANYTHING you want and still maintain your weight. It is really about portion control and eating because you need to refuel not to entertain yourself.

I think so many people are told you can enjoy food or you can be thin but I am sure that you can do both if you are careful about the quantity of what you eat.

As an example, I ate out recently and I really wanted to have some fried Calamari. Which is not a low calorie food, plus I ate the tartar sauce on top of it. I ordered the dish and ate only until I was not hungry. My waiter wanted to know if I did not like the dish because I ate so little of it. I loved it but I only needed a few bites not a 1000 to enjoy it!

So with "Food Season" upon us find ways to eat what you want but make sure you are eating to refuel not to entertain yourself.

See you at the gym!