Thursday 12 March 2009

A trip to Wilko's.....

So, as a truly PERFECT illustration of yesterday’s rant, let me share with you an experience I had this morning whilst foraging for food……

You see, today I am *apparently* having a day off from being my usual highly organised, border line OCD self, and completely forgot to bring any food to work with me whatsoever! Did not even enter my stream of consciousness until I got to work. Dedicated to my cause, aren’t I?! NOT!

So in the interest of avoiding the work cafeteria where I would most definitely succumb to the temptation of a baguette or a panini plus crisps and probably plus chocolate I hightailed it to the nearest food outlet type place, (because it was 9am and I was supposed to be at work so didn’t have time to run to Marks and Spencers where I KNEW I would find healthy options.) It’s called Wilkinsons and is kind of a weird shop (store). It’s like Home Depot (which I know all about coz of newlyweds: Nick and Jessica) and Wal-Mart (which again I know about because of doing Young Life Summer Staff, when we bought raccoon pee..but that’s another story…)

There’s quite a big food section and it tends to focus on cost effective/bulk bought foodstuffs, but there is a fresh/chilled section…….

So my challenge, then, was to find as healthy a day’s worth of food as I could to sustain me over the working day, keep within minimal points (as it’s my brother’s birthday today and this evening yes, there will be cake) and not add to my considerable fatness....

It was HILARIOUS! My choices were largely in the crisps (chips), sweets and chocolate family with a side of biscuits and a portion of cheese. There were fat and calorie laden, wholly unappetising, sweating pre-packed sandwiches – mmmm….nice! - and ‘sushi’ which looked as if it had been there for 3 weeks, cheeses galore, cheese strings, pasties, chocolate dessert thingies, peppermai, baked potato microwave meals (700 cals), so all in all complete and utter crap!

I used as my starting point the fact that I have cleverly secreted whole wheat crisp breads in my desk drawer for such a time as this, so I figured I’d get some laughing cow or philly to go on top….NO! They only had the FULL FAT options, cottage cheese? No - again, only the full fat option. No wonder people in this region have sinus and catarrh related troubles given the amount of dairy on offer!!

Maybe I’ll get a pre-packed salad? No – no such thing on offer.

Maybe a can of soup? Only had full fat cream of tomato – ew! Or something called ‘scotch broth’ which appeared to have actual bona fide dog meat in it. Appetising…..er…not!

So what did I come away with dear reader? The following:

A small snack pack of black grapes for 1 point
A protein filled, made with real chicken ‘tasty bites’ pack by Mattesons for 2 and a half points
A tin of snack pack tuna in brine (had to hunt for – all the others were in SUNFLOWER OIL OMG OMG OMG OMG!)
A four pack of ‘satisfied for longer’ yogurts for a point each


What a LOVELY day of eating I’m going to have! Those items really were the healthiest, lowest pointed items on offer…..for 5 of your English pounds!

Memo to me: NEVER FORGET YOUR LUNCH AGAIN YOU GIANT DOOFUS!!!!!!!!!

A bientot

BFP xxx

5 comments:

Sarah :) said...

*hahaha* Sounds like a challenge they'd have to complete on one of those Diet shows like Biggest Loser! "Concoct a healthy lunch out of this selection of absolute CRAP."

Sounds like you did pretty well, though! :)

Lizzie said...

ha! Cheers Sarah! I was a sight for sore eyes muttering away to myself about the bobbins that existed in that shop!

hey ho, i live to fight another day! Thanks for your comments lady - love it! xxxx

Jen, a priorfatgirl said...

I agree with Sarah, that totally sounds like a challenge - and YOU WON!!!

Yep, there's something to say for my relationship with my frozen meals! They keep me in balance!

Laura said...

Haha, I know that feeling!

Thanks for commenting on my blog! And yes, it seems that zucchini is a courgette. I had to look it up because I've never heard that before. I guess you really do learn something new every day. :-)

Anonymous said...

I don't know how people come to work with no snacks!

I bring like a grocery bags of cut up fruit, veggies, string cheese, yogurt, etc!!

Good for you to finding a better plan in a store full of not so good stuff.

That's the problem though, regular people just throw stuff in their cart and not realize all the bad stuff that's in there!