Our Family's 100 Day Whole Food Challenge!

Towards the end of December (2014) our family decided, through a couple of discussions, we would do the 100 day whole food challenge.  We decided to do this as a family for a couple of reasons: 1- it would be something we could do as an entire clan and 2- help re-set our eating habits.  While we understood it was somewhat restrictive, we knew it was a short time and a good teaching/learning opportunity. And, who doesn’t love a good challenge?! Our reward will be a weekend at Camp Dakota! We decided to come up with our own rules: we would stick to whole foods only. No refined sugar, no white flour, things in packages could only have 5 or fewer ingredients. The kids could have birthday cake at birthday parties, but no candy and no soda. We didn’t exactly remember that two of the biggest candy holidays would happen during our challenge, but the kids rolled with it and we found ways to give them treats!

I felt like a newbie all over again- I found myself reading labels and having to put a lot of things back on the shelf!  

I noticed an immediate difference in our shopping trips and eating habits:

·        We rarely went in the isles, we spent most of our time (and money) getting veggies, fruits, meats, nuts and dairy

·        We spent more money, on average about $50 a week more

·        The bulk section and our family became besties

·        We bought a lot coconut oil, almonds and dates

·        Costco was a life saver for things like pure maple syrup and huge bags of organic apples

·        We went through, on average 15-18lbs of fruit and veggies every week, sometimes we’d run out on Friday (after shopping the previous Sunday)

What we learned:

·        We can, as a family, do anything we put our minds to!

·        Children will eat things you never thought they would when that’s the only option (spaghetti squash, acorn squash casserole etc.)

·        Reading labels is important! There is sugar in almost everything (not that sugar is inherently evil or bad, but it’s added to a lot of foods)

·        We learned how to make bread with 5 ingredients and tortillas and pizza dough with 3

·        We learned how to make knock off Lara Bars, because at a $1 a pop, that gets too expensive with a family of 6 (well 5 actual eaters)

·        There is literally ZERO need to buy pre-packed, full of junk, oatmeal when you can make your own oats in 2-3 minutes (cooking time included)

·        We learned how to make chocolate! Really good chocolate actually

·        Unless we were making our own almond milk, we weren’t going to be able to have it during the challenge- there are lots of added ingredients! (We never did make our own, we went without)

·        The first few days SUCKED. We all were coming off of a sugar filled Christmas and New Year’s; we really are addicted to sugar. Like Seriously.

What we will take away from this experience:

·        We probably won’t buy a chocolate bar again with how good the home made chocolate tastes

·        We really didn’t miss out on anything and neither did our kids- we made peanut butter filled chocolate hearts for valentine’s day, raw cashew carrot cake on Easter and peanut butter chocolate bars for deserts some days

·        Going anywhere took longer because we had to plan what we were doing for food (usually we packed fruit, nuts or homemade bars)

·        Our intention was NOT to lose weight; however Jessica and I lost a combined total of 41 lbs.

Would I recommend this challenge to anyone else? Yes AND be sure, if you are going to do it with your family, to include your partner (and children if you have them) in the discussion about what the “rules” and exceptions there will be. Use it as an opportunity to talk with your children about where food comes from, what types of food are most nutritious and what isn’t very nutritious but still delicious (hello maple syrup!).  Also, I would say unless you have amazing will power, doing this challenge when you have a family that won’t be participating (and therefore you will have all sorts of temptations around) will be difficult, probably really really difficult. 

Keep it real and set yourself up for success!