There are all sorts of scale victories and non-scale victories that happen during the course of weight loss. But, someone long into maintenance (2 years, and going strong), they don’t happen very much anymore for me.
That’s why I always find myself smiling while walking around the grocery store when it’s time to replace a spice on my rack. It feels like such a tangible reminder that I am a healthy person who has built healthy habits. In comparison, I can remember moving from apartment to apartment in my 20s, bringing the same box of a few spices that never really ran out. Paprika (the spice I happened to need to replace today) might as well have been in r/buyitforlife -territory for me.
Before losing weight, I never had habits healthy enough to support cooking interesting dishes frequently enough to require buying replacement spices. I always ended up with a weird spice rack too: a bunch of stuff to flavor cookies, a jar of garam masala that I bought to make some random recipe I found (and, of course, made exactly once). Honestly, the food I ate (way too much of) was genuinely boring.
Learning how to cook, and how to add something to my food to flavor it besides fat (I go through a LOT less olive oil!) has made my life better in so many ways. Of course losing weight was awesome on its own- but the expansion of my palette was such an unexpected gift.
Choosing to learn how to cook on a calorie budget/understanding what different flavors do to different dishes has had ripple effects: my day-to-day diet is more varied and interesting, and I am, in general, more adventurous about food. If I am at a restaurant, and know I am going to have an indulgence, I don’t want the boring version of something I can make at home (that just has three times the amount of oil/butter as I would have used)— I want the thing with spices I can’t pronounce, cooked in a way I had never thought of!
The most unexpectedly delicious way I have used spices to make food more interesting is to use Tajin (chili pepper, lime, and salt) on sliced fruit. It’s great! I’d love to hear your spice recommendations/pairings!
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