Smugly overweight??

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that, while fat is fat, high-calorie, fatty meals from scratch are healthier than comparable processed meals.

Also, I really, really love to cook, too. I'm great it. However, being a great cook doesn't mean you have to serve high-calorie meals. Why not put those skills to use in a more healthful way? Grab some vegan cookbooks. Try your hand at ethnic foods. I'd suggest Indian or Asian, since these seem to be lowest in fatty, unhealthy ingredients. Trust me, making delicious, healthy meals that are nice to look at is not easy. This way, you could still show off your talents, but without all the unhealthy ingredients. Save the homemade breads and fatty sauces for special occasions.

no such thing as better fat. i too cook things from scratch. i don't want my kids filled with preservatives and chemicals. so when i decided to lose weight, i realized that i was actually being a better mom by teaching my children healthy eating. don't get me wrong, we still use plenty of fats - i prefer butter to margarine, etc. but we've scaled back the sugar and flour. whole grain bread is still ok for the kids - i don't eat it anymore. baking is out - except the occasional fruit crisp with oats.

as for time, i work outside the home 60+ hours a week and I still find time to cook healthy meals, count calories and go to the gym 4 x a week. it's not easy, but if i can do it, a stay-at-home mom should be able to eek out a little time.

I'm not going to weigh in on if your excess weight got there by better means or not.

The simple conclusion is if you continue to eat the foods that you do, in the quantities that you do, with the level of activity that you have, you will remain overweight, and likely continue to gain a bit of weight over time.

If you're happy with that, continue on. If you're not, something's gotta give.

I don't think you likely have to change WHAT you eat (unless you want to). But I think you really should know how much you're eating. If you build a recipe as you make supper (add butter to the bowl? Add it to the recipe on MFP), after time most of what you make will be in the database for you, and logging becomes that much quicker. Want a second slice of that thing you just made? Sure. But at least know that it'll cost you xxx calories.

If you're interested in losing weight, you're best to get on knowing how many calories you're consuming.

5 pages of responses and not a single one of them from the OP after the initial post? Or did I miss it?

I cook, I LOVE to cook..I bake and I'm good enough at it to do it as a side job on occaision. I got fat because I didn't follow portion control and didn't know how to say no. It has nothing to do with the type of food I was making. To say it's because you are such a good cook you can't push your own plate away is rationalization.

It's cool though..almost all of us here have been there..or we wouldn't be here..You're in the denial phase...You'll snap out of it soon enough. :flowerforyou:

Anytime I've caught myself smugly justifying why I'm not like everyone else who needs to lose weight, I've realized that I am making excuses for myself, and not holding myself accountable for the decisions I (and I alone) make in my eating. Once I realized I was doing this, was when I finally started to make progress with weight loss.

There's nothing wrong with being smug because you can make kickass food. Just don't use pride in cooking well as an excuse for why your weight is "okay." Cooking is a wonderful hobby, but does not justify eating as a hobby.

Being such a good cook should mean that you should be able to figure out ways to make the things you love healthier, and still taste great, and you should be able to make smaller portions too, so that there isn't so much to eat if you don't have any will power.

Personally It does not matter to me how I got fat, whether from homemade food or restaurant food. Point is, I ate too much of it, all of it. Fat is fat, no matter where it came from.

I am worth the time it takes me to log everything I eat. At this point in my life it is what I have to do to keep up with my new lifestyle.

I realize it may take you a little extra time to log everything when you cook as you do for a family, but it is up to you to decide whether it is worth it or not.

Good luck in your journey.

One of the lame, pamsy reasons I put off starting "a new healthy lifestyle" is because I'm a cook. I'm a damn good cook. I love delicious food. I love chef-driven restaurants. I cook nearly every meal my family (of three!) eats. I make my own bread every weekend (which is weird, since I actually don't eat it, but my husband and son do).

If it wasn't clear: I love food.

And that love made me fat. Really, really fat. Because I ate WAY TOO MUCH of that good food. I also felt that my love of food meant that I could eat out all the time, and enjoy beer and wine whenever I wanted, and eat as much of my delicious baked goods as I could without exploding. Because I had made it, and therefore it was better for me than munchkins from dunkin donuts.

But - SPOILER ALERT - that was bull****.

I started logging calories. I took the 10 minutes a day to input my recipes into MyFitnessPal, changing the exact quantity of the item as I cooked to adjust it to my choices in food preparation. I decreased my portion size and started eating like a healthy person instead of an obese person.

So, same food, but more mindfully prepared and more mindfully eaten.

Like magic, I weigh 133 pounds less and we still cook and eat amazing food. I still make elaborate 6-layer cakes for birthdays. But when the birthday's done, it gets wrapped up and put in the freezer for an occasional indulgent treat instead of a non-stop cake-eating extravaganza.

It's possible to be a kitchen goddess and a healthy weight. You're simply choosing not to.

I was searching malnourished and Obesity & came to this discussion. I think it's idiotic to call obese people malnourished. Malnourished refers to people in third world countries who are starving and don't get enough to eat. I think of malnourished in a negative way, who on earth started saying obese people are malnourished? Dumbest thing I have ever heard of.