Vegitable Confusion

[Nymeria]

Hi Everyone,

 

I've been lurking on here for a few months. I almost successfully completed a whole 30, and then, thinking I was being good asked for some vegitables to go with dinner at  a friends house one night, and ate a whole plate of mixed vegies which contained corn. Oops. I am a total perfectionist, so I declaired the expirament a disaster and "quit". I kept eating healthier, but not as well. After a month of that, I decided to go in for round two. (Now a week in)

 

I have been pondering this question since I started the first one, and finally decided to get some other thoughts. Background first:

 

I don't particularly like vegitables, especially the green leafy variety. I don't mind Kale, or Spinach if it is fresh, or broccoli.

I LOVE sweet potatos, kohlrabi, carrots, cucumbers, onions, spicy peppers, plantains, tomatoes, and, if properly prepaired, squash etc...

 

My question is: My list of LOVE "vegitables" is dominated by root vegitables and fruits. I do my best to also eat greens (I try to eat a couple salads a week, and lately I have been expirimenting with new vegitables, specifically kohlrabi (yum) and turnips (not so much). Both of which have edible greens that I eat along side their fleshy parts.)

 

I make sure I include a healthy serving of "vegitables" with each meal, including my less favorites sometimes.

 

Growing up, I always heard that leafy greens were where it was at. Am I doing myself a dis-service by eating primarily roots and vegitable-fruits, with leafy greens as a suppliment, or could I, hypothetically, never eat another leaf of lettuce, or turnip green in my life?

 

My second question is: If tomatoes, peppers, and squash are really fruits, why are they included on the vegitable list? Do they have some super secret awesome power that other fruits don't which make them ok to have routinely? What makes me eating a pile of tomatoes and cucumbers with my lunch better than eating an apple and a grapefruit?  I know the book said that fruits don't provide anything that vegitables can't and vegitables some times provide more, while not providing the sugar fix that fruits do. BUT, since there are fruits that are counted as vegitables, is the distinction really more psychological? If I ate tart fruits like grapefruit and passionfruit to avoid the sugar sensation, COULD I sub them for vegitables? (Purely curious, I can't even get passionfruit here.)

[Moluv]

That whole meal template thing is just the suggestion. You could do a w30 and eat nothing but fruit, technically. I have no idea how much sugar a tomato has compared to a grapefruit, that's an interesting question though. I do know I had a time where I could hardly digest any fibrous vegetables and I are mostly meat with fat and sweet pots or butternut squash and I felt great and healed my digestion to the point I could eat many vegetables I hadn't tolerated well in a long time. So I don't know, eat what you like. Make it your own. Don't let striving for the ideal keep you from enjoying the program or your food.

[Tom Denham]

I try to eat leafy greens in at least one meal per day and they are typically kale because my farmer typically has kale 10-11 months of the year. One of the ways to measure the value of vegetables is with their ANDI score that reflects nutrient density. Kale scores 1000 while apples score 72. Veggies beat fruit when it comes to nutrient density by a long shot. As long as you are eating, you should get as much nutrition as possible. For a little more on ANDI scores, see http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/healthy-eating/health-starts-here/resources-and-tools/top-ten-andi-scores

[Vian]

Also, while squash and tomatoes are scientifically categorized as fruits, in the cullinary and nutrition world, they are considered vegetables as they do not have all the sugar of fruits like apples or peaches, etc. It's not that they have something special that other fruits do not, it's more that they don't have something that other fruits do (sugar)