Dieting During Chanuka

On the good side, it takes me less and less time to set up my Start Fresh kosher diet menus. But the frustrating part is that they don't list all of the options each day.

I'm trying to catch on to that and save my "staple food" in the "favorites," but that's a new trick for me.

Today I planned in my head to have a dairy dinner with cottage cheese and salad. With it the "fat" would be a slice of avocado. Yes, that's what I'm still hoping to eat, but I had to click a different fat, since avocado wasn't an "official" option.

Of course, being "me," I immediately see that possibility and do it frequently, like clicking cucumber for breakfast, when I know that I'll be cooking its cousin squash in my omelet. I just have to remember to put avocado in favorites.

It would be a nice option to be able to click "all fats," or "all limited vegetables" when in menu choosing mode. Just a suggestion.

I may as well report here that I overdid the carbohydrates last night, at our family Chanukah Party, but not by all that much. Jerusalem's most handsome bachelor did the cooking in his abode overlooking the Machane Yehuda shuk. He made a real rich vegetable soup and very carefully kept the potatoes out of my bowl. And the latkes were like no other latkes I've ever eaten. There were all sorts of vegetables, mostly orange (the healthiest) and they were shredded, not finely grated. In addition, there were fresh basil and parsley leaves. Of course, when you live in one of the world's greatest open-air vegetable markets, you're not going to make your great-grandmothers' Belarusian potato-onion latkes.

The kids are very supportive of my diet, and so they made me a special batch with minimal oil on a covered Teflon frying pan. No sufganiyot were served, nor any dessert for the adults. I guess I raised the kids right.

G-d willing, bli neder (don't hold me to a vow,) pictures to follow.