Eating Right All About Choices

I’m going to firmly plant my dietitian’s hat on my head and climb up on my soapbox. Hear ye, hear ye, it is National Nutrition Month. All ye wishing to make nutrition come alive, step right up!

This year’s theme is “Make nutrition come alive. It’s all about you.” It’s simple advice to take responsibility for your nutrition and health.

We have so many choices that we don’t realize how all the little ones add up to a lifestyle. You can decide if you want to eat potato chips and drink soda pop. You can decide that dinner is scarfing down fast-food pizza. You can decide that a cup of coffee is your breakfast.

But you can also decide to serve brown rice instead of white rice once in a while. And you can select extra-lean ground beef or ground sirloin at the meat counter instead of regular ground beef. Stop at McDonald’s and you can decide to buy a chicken salad instead of two cheeseburgers.

The conscious decisions you make about eating can make nutrition come alive in a personal way.

“Maybe if we keep putting the message in different words, people will catch on,” says dietitian Cathy Armacost, National Nutrition Month co-chair for the Greater Spokane Dietetic Association.

Armacost is working with Michelle Krenitsky to get nutrition information to the public. They have set up displays and reading lists at area bookstores and posted information at several health clubs.

Be realistic about the way your family eats, be adventurous in trying new foods and be sensible in selecting foods that do a body good. Now make your own “Healthy Eater” hat, plop it on your head and climb up on your soapbox. A healthy National Nutrition Month to one and all.

Vegetarian Fajitas

From “Authentic Family-Style Mexican Cooking” (Meredith Custom Publishing, 1997).

1 tablespoon oil

1 cup (1 small) onion, quartered and sliced

1 cup (1 small) red, green or yellow bell pepper strips

1-3/4 cups (15-ounce can) black, pinto or kidney beans, rinsed and drained

1/2 cup whole-kernel corn

1 (1.25-ounce) package fajita seasoning mix

1/3 cup water

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro or parsley

6 (6-inch) fajita-size flour tortillas, warmed

Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and bell pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, for 3 to 4 minutes or until vegetables are tender.

Stir in beans, corn, fajita seasoning mix and water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low; cook, uncovered, 3 to 4 minutes or until mixture is thickened. Add in cilantro or parsley. Serve in tortillas.

Yield: 6 servings.

Nutrition information per serving: 236 calories, 5 grams fat (19 percent fat calories), 11 grams protein, 39 grams carbohydrate, 8 grams dietary fiber, 3 milligrams cholesterol, 208 milligrams sodium.

, DataTimes MEMO: The goal of Five and Fifteen is to find recipes where you can do the shopping in five minutes and the cooking in 15. Merri Lou Dobler, a registered dietitian and Spokane resident, welcomes ideas from readers. Write to Five and Fifteen, Features Department, The Spokesman-Review, P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210.

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