How I won the war on food (and you can, too!)

by Sami Harvey

If your kids are anything like mine, at least once a day you’re forced to choose between giving them something healthy and nutritious­­—filled with vitamins and good stuff, and giving them something they will actually eat. It can be the source of much frustration and even more tears (mostly mine), and I mean honestly, as mothers, do we really need another reason to feel the dreaded ‘mommy guilt?’ Do you really want to add “force-fed my child strawberries and Flintstones vitamins” to your long list of reasons why Little Timmy will need ten years of psychoanalyzing in his forties?  Exactly. However, with Memphis being the top-ranking city in terms of obesity, I feel extra compelled to keep my family from becoming part of those statistics. So I had to formulate a plan…

I got down on my kids’ level and took a lesson from them: I got sneaky. I started plotting and scheming—scouring the Internet night after night, desperate to find ways to stick health where they would least expect it. (Insert maniacal laughter here.)

Here’s what I’ve learned: If one thing is true about our kids, it’s that while they may be crafty little buggers, they (thankfully!) aren’t quite smart enough to use deductive reasoning quite yet. They don’t know to put together the fresh-baked treats on the counter with the trash bag filled with empty black bean packaging. They don’t notice that when we have smoothies with lunch, empty bags of spinach, carrot stems and celery stalks are littering the counter, in uncomfortably close proximity to the just-used blender. They’d never guess that lurking in those warm, fluffy pancakes they love so much is a half-day’s worth of vegetables. I found a loophole. I won. (Continue maniacal laughter.)

What you don't see here are the masses of green, leafy things ground up and lurking beneath those friendly garnishes.
(photo credit: the Internet. Thanks, google!)

And while I am always willing to perform covert operations in the name of good health, I am not always willing or able to cook a full-blown meal and the first mutterings of “I’m huuuungry,” from the peanut gallery.   I needed a little help, so I set about demanding more answers from my wisest friend, the Internet.

This is what the Internet gave me.

It’s called NatureBox and it is totally amazing. See, the thing about me is that I totally love the idea of healthful pre-packaged goodness, but I will never be able to justify dropping more than a dollar on some boring single-serve bag of sweet potato chips made with 100% free-range, grass-fed potatoes. I’m glaring at you, Whole Foods. And apparently, the folks at NatureBox already knew that about me, because they do things a little differently. 

Long story short, once a month they send you a box with an array of “nutritionist-approved” treats that are made from real ingredients, with none of those added garbage-y things like hydrogenated oils and syrups, fake flavors and colors, and all of that other nonsense. They’re super affordable, too, which says a lot considering my ridiculously frugal standards. We went with their Family Snacker option, and it breaks down to cost less than $0.75 per snack serving. That’s cheaper than a damn snickers, y’all. Seriously. And the kids freaking love this stuff. Get some little zip lock bags and divide everything up into portion sizes, set them in the pantry, and the next time Bobby Sue is hungry, you can grab one and toss it at her. Underhanded, of course.

Click this link right here to learn all about how great they are. You can enter the code “SHARE” and get $5 off your order, which is cool. 

And because you were so nice and read all the way through this post, here is a recipe for my favorite black bean brownies. 

What you need: 

• 15-ounce can of black beans, drained and rinsed
• 3 eggs*
• 3 Tbsp coconut oil, melted
• 3/4  cup cocoa powder
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 cup of brown sugar
• nuts or chocolate chips or both or neither

*I've heard you can use 2 "flax eggs" in place of the eggs. To do that, you need to put 2.5 Tbsp of flaxseed meal and 6 Tbsp of water in the food processor and mix them together. I just use eggs because I don't raise chickens for nothing.

How to do it:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees
2. Put everything except the nuts/chocolate chips into your food processor or blender and process for what will seem like a noisy eternity. Scrape the sides and make sure everything is mixed well and blended totally smooth. 
3. Pour into either an 8" circular pan or into a muffin tin (If you pan/tin is old, take measures to prevent the brownies from sticking)
4. Bake for 25 minutes or so. 
5. Let cool just long enough to avoid burning your tongue before getting them out of the pan. They come out easier when they are totally cool, but ain't nobody got time for that. 

Now, get in your kitchen and get to baking. You can thank me later. I'll be waiting.

Sami needs to post recipes more often. Ooh, we should have Effin' Memphis potlucks! Only for the writers, of course. If you want to write about something for Effin' Memphis, just shoot us an e-mail at effinmemphis at gmail dot com! Then you can come to our super secret potlucks and also be in our super secret Facebook writers group.