Anyone else get bored of food?

I look for ethnic foods to try to make, Indian, Middle Eastern, African, Korean. Anything with a different flavor profile.

How did you eat before you started dieting? Did you also eat the same meals? Did you also feel bored? More often than not, "bored" when you're dieting is a result of your meals not being mentally satisfying or the diet feeling like a grind which bleeds into how you feel about your food choices. You can try to spice things up for a while, but it gets a bit tiring after a while. If you don't address the real issue behind it, the feeling of boredom will return.

Why are you afraid of eating what you "shouldn't"? Could the "shouldn't" be the issue? How will you feel if you included these foods into your diet? Are you falling into a rut because you have a small number of go-to no brainers that you feel comfortable with? How about expanding your go-to arsenal and including some of your "shouldn't food" every now and then?

I personally just eat what I feel like eating. Most day for some meals this means the same small selection. I don't feel bored with it because that's what I feel like eating. If I feel like eating something else every now and then, I do that. I also go through bouts of experimental eating. Not feeling pressure to eat a certain way just makes it all feel natural, even if I make the same damn sandwich for breakfast every day for a month.

I see two issues - not wanting to spend a lot of time cooking, and being bored with your usual foods, so will address both.

For the boredom, another vote for ethnic foods. For more complicated ones, you can make big batches of these on your days off and freeze some. I have Thai soup and Thai basil chicken and rice in my freezer ready to go in case of severe "not feeling like cooking."

For not wanting to spend a lot of time, usually once a week we have breakfast foods for dinner. This is fast and requires little brain power on my part.

Also fast (and yummy!) are fresh raviolis. These can be pricey so I wait for sales. We're having that tonight with chicken. I haven't decided on the vegetable yet - could be spinach, broccoli, or a salad. (I would overeat these raviolis if I didn't add more protein and veg.)

I go through phases with my foods. For example, for months on end I will bring the same kind of sandwich and snack to work and LOVE it and then one day I just don't. So I will make something else for a while.

I do the same with dinner. Sometimes I meal prep the same 5 recipes week after week and am into it. And sometimes I want to switch it up.

This month for example, as a household, we decided that we were going to go mostly meat free (except what we already had available in our freezer, so we are purchasing no new meat items) this has forced me to be more creative with getting our evening meals together. We've been having a lot of beans and lentils. I've made a lentil chili, a lentil dahl, a sweet potato and lentil curry, a miso-ginger squash soup. It's been fun to try out new recipes and I've been looking forward to making a new one every few days.

I used pinterest to look at different kinds of foods or recipes including a specific ingredient and then only "pinned" things that had a cook time of 30 minutes. On sunday we chopped and prepped any veggies we would need this week and now when I get home I just have to chuck it into a pot. A lot of what we want to try are soups, stews, and curries because it's fall here so it's been working perfectly.

I have the added challenge of making everything gluten free, tree nut free, coconut free, and egg free. So far none o the recipes have taken me longer than 30 minutes, it just took a couple of days for me to search for what sounded good and make a list. Now we have basically enough recipes for the entire month and the only thing I'm going to have to go buy mid month is milk.

alexandravictoria88 wrote: »

Thats actually a good idea. I think a lot of the times simple meals are the best as its not too complicated especially for people that work long and sometimes dont have the time to cook complicated meals with strange ingredients lol. I tend to get bored of the same simple meals, however it could also be my fear of eating too much or not eating what i shouldnt. Just need to try and add some oomph into my simple-ish meals

A simple start on this is to look for good-quality pre-made condiments, sauces, or spice mixes, or a couple of simple-to-use but complex-flavored key ingredients adapted from some ethnic tradition. Some of these are pretty low calorie. This way, you'd just be buying one or two things in a small amount vs. a long list of ingredients. A fully home-made version might be a little tastier, but you'd get an idea what you might like from going this route, and it's very easy.

Off the top of my head, some bottled options would be harissa, sriracha, miso + toasted sesame oil (small amount/lots of flavor), yuzu hot sauce - big grocery stores or health food stores seem to have some of these now, if there aren't ethnic groceries or "gourmet cooking" shops nearby. There are also lots of one-bottle (or bulk) spice mixes you could try (from Penzey's if you can't find good ones locally, Trader Joe's has some good stuff if you have one close).

I get bored with meat -- especially red meat.