"jmcquown" > wrote in message
...
> On 11/19/2013 11:53 AM, l not -l wrote:
>> On 19-Nov-2013, jmcquown > wrote:
>>
>>> First, best wishes for your husband's full and speedy recovery.
>>>
>>> Second, is there a dietitian on staff at the hospital? I'd be asking
>>> for a consult with him/her.
>>>
>>> Jill
>> +1
>> The smartest thing I ever did, related to health, was to consult a
>> Dietician; she asked about what I like, what I don't like, when I eat,
>> do I like an evening snack, etc. Then, she put together a strategy for
>> me to follow that allows most of the foods I like, when I like, with
>> seasoning alternatives to what I had been doing. That was 15 years
>> ago; I still have the chart/poster she annotated with MY strategy (she
>> got my buy-in through participation, not edict). The chart/poster is
>> attached to the door of my freezer as a daily reminder of that strategy.
>>
> Thanks for backing me up. Seems like most, even small hospitals, have a
> registered dietitian on staff. How could they not? Diet as related to
> health is not a one-size-fits-all scenario.
>
> And no, I don't think Nanzi and her husband will have to eat cardboard,
> wallpaper paste or bland food for the rest of their lives. A competent
> dietician will do exactly what you said, find out what you like and help
> you map out a plan.

I have been to many dieticians too but for diabetes and not heart stuff. I
too had that poster many years ago now. It's to the point now where they
don't really tell me much except that I seem to have a good handle on the
diet. I have also found that they aren't too helpful if you have food
intolerances. They don't seem to know much about food substitutes and all.
Not very helpful for vegetarian or vegan diets either.

I don't know where this notion of bland food came into play. In fact I had
to look up the word bland because I heard it said so many times in differing
ways that I didn't know for sure what it meant. As in I heard a chef say
that while some food she eating wasn't bland, it needed salt. I always
assumed that bland meant unseasoned.

So when I looked it up, it said that bland meant easily digested. And that
people were put on bland diets for varying stomach ailments. In fact that
diet that I am on for gastroperesis would likely be considered bland because
I have to mostly eat easily digested foods like white rice, potatoes without
skin, etc. I have no problems with salt, pepper and other seasonings.

Sometimes people are put on no/low salt diets and then they often turn to
something like Mrs. Dash or Spike to season their foods. My mom tried using
Mrs. Dash for a while but for most things, it wasn't a flavor that we liked.