I make my own quest bars with the bioneutra vita-fiber. 56 grams of vita-fiber plus 30 g of protein powder. Sometimes I add raisins or something. Check you-tube, plenty of recipes. The resultant bar is fewer calories than an already made quest bar. When I have one, I eat it at the end of my day, not the beginning.

Otherwise, when I need something sweet I mash a banana with two eggs, add cinnamon and cook in a non-stick pan like a pancake. I top with cottage cheese. it's an enormous serving, so I can spread out the eating. Seems to satisfy on a lot of levels.

I have trigger food cravings all day long. I don't have any in the house and am too lazy to go out and purchase them. I just ignore them and try to do something else. I don't suppose they will ever go away. Sometimes I give in, but find it doesn't taste as good as I think it will.

You know, a Quest bar has a LOT of fiber. Fear of impaction would keep me from eating one after the other! HAHAHAHA.

Also - I cannot keep peanut butter in the house. It was a trigger food in the past and still is - a spoonful here and there goes down WAY too easily. If I really want some, I buy an individual packet at Sprouts. I just can't keep trigger foods where I will be able to have easy access to them!

As far as other protein bars, my new favorite is Combat bars (Muscle Pharm). They are like a candy bar but the combo of texture and the feeling of fullness keeps me satisfied. Pure protein bars (peanut butter) are good. Not as tasty but maybe less of a trigger for you.

I keep some of the trigger type foods hidden so they become out of site, out of mind. There are other trigger foods that I just can't have in the house or even eat/drink in general. Dunkin Donuts flavored iced coffees was a big issue for me prior and I won't even have one. I know one small will soon become medium, then large then a daily occurrance. I don't even want to go down that slippery slope. I find that there are certain foods I can keep on hand at work but others I will eat just because they are there. I pack all my food for the day in a lunch bag and that is what I get. I plan the majority of my food the day prior and I have better compliance with that.

I am the same way - I feel like I could eat a dozen of the choc chip cookie dough ones (though after 2 I am a little sick/full), and it makes me sad at the thought of having to give them up altogether.

But I did find a little compromise... If you take one and break it into 8 pieces, then bake it in a toaster oven (not micro) for about 3 minutes, it makes good size choc chip cookies... 8 "cookies" eaten slowly (while doing other things so I just come back every few min for the next cookie) is very satisfying to me and I dont find myself immediately reaching for another. If I just shove them all in my mouth quickly, I will always want another.

You can also try drinking a protein shake (even just half a one) that has some fat in it (heavy cream is good) just before eating half a bar (immediately put the other half away as soon as you open it). Eat the half slowly. The fat in the shake is usually just hitting my "full" sensor right as I am finishing half the bar, and I honestly feel like I couldnt eat another bite. But eating one on an empty stomach is a bad idea for me!

Good luck

...where did the rest of my post go?

You guys are funny...I eat quest bars for the protein but can barely choke down one because it feels like a piece of taffy that got stuck in sand...I think my trigger foods are anything crunchy and snacky...I snack in nuts all the time at work and feel like I could eat a tree full of them but you do get full fast so that's the good thing

My trigger foods are ice cream and flavored chips (no not together!). I decided prior to surgery I was done eating ice cream, period. I have not reintroduced it at all and frankly do not miss it or crave it at all. That was a happy surprise. Even my recent new "wanting to eat sweets" does not include ice cream, it's cookies and plain or crunchy M&M's, things like that. I tried to do a small single serve bag of flavored chips in my 2nd year out and found that I wanted more badly, so now I don't do those either in any form. I know for me, trigger foods are just off the list of things I can have around. My husband's plain chips and peanut M&Ms don't bother me, I can leave them alone easily. Some people can do things in moderation, I can't. Some can have them hidden in the house, I can't. I know myself.

If Quest bars are triggering bad eating habits, my advice is to eliminate them. Find something else you can have with high protein and some fiber. No point in making your walk on this journey harder than it has to be.

I have this trigger foods problem with these turkey bites that I have been eating since surgery. I have to stop buying them though because I used to be able to stop at 6 and now I eat 36 (the whole bag) in one sitting. I think trigger foods are a moving target. Cut off one and another will rise up I'm afraid. Good luck to you.

My trigger foods are sweets. I am rarely satisfied with one; if I have one, I want more. That tells me that its more of a head hunger than real hunger. Ideally, I would not have sweets in the house. However, I'm not the only person living in the house so that doesn't really work. So, I have to try to distract myself and not give in to temptation-- and if I do, I have to own it by recording the calories. It just is not easy.

Just cook stuff you want to eat and he will either eat it or not...that's what I do...trust me men are pretty resourceful they will find their own food lol

I cook for a family as well and they all eat what I eat. The only difference is that I may occasionally make pasta, rice or have bread for them which I may have a small amount or not.

I don't keep much for "junk food" in the house. The adults and kids do not need them. I may have some treats such as pea crisps or quinoa chips, dark chocolate oven roasted almonds or the coconut ones, tons of fruit, homemade jerky or homemade fruit roll ups, granola and protein bars. If they want anything more than this kind of thing, they can buy it themselves.

I don't make protein bars a regular part of my diet -- they are for travel only, and that's pretty rare for me. I also find that the Quest bars are triggers for me. Generally, if they are in the house, I will eat them. Not good.
My mother has the opposite problem that I do when it comes to weight. She struggles to be normal weight when her body seems to want to be under weight. Her doctor told her that a good, healthy way to gain or maintain weight is to add a protein bar or two to her diet. And it works for her. So I am not a big fan of the "weight loss" benefits of protein bars to start with.
My best strategy for trigger foods is to just keep them out of the house. I try to avoid the aisles in the grocery stores where they are sold. I don't go into gas station convenience stores so I am not tempted by the aisles of candy there. But I do have a couple of kitchen safes that I use for things like nuts and dried fruit that are calorie-dense and I have a hard time stopping with:
thekitchensafe.com/
When I am struggling with almonds or dried apricots or whatever, I keep them in the kitchen safe and only have it set to open at a time of day when I know I can control myself -- usually early morning. Then I measure out my portion for the day and put the rest back and lock the safe again.
Relentless2121, I would encourage you to consider dropping bars altogether and switching to either shakes or snacking on high-protein items like tuna packets, cans of sardines, chopped chicken breast, or hardboiled eggs.

I always remind myself of the old Weight Watchers saying - you can't eat what you don't buy. So if it's a trigger food for me, I just refuse to buy it. I have noticed since surgery that my tastes have changed. There are a few things I used to love that just taste terrible now. So that's a good thing!