I'm a Breadaholic!!

My name is Beth, and I'm a Breadaholic.

I don't know when it started, but it's become a really big problem in my house. Almost to the point where we need to call the producers of Hoarders.

You see, we as a family buy almost everything in bulk. We have an upright freezer for the meats and other items (like bread), and we save a lot of money when we buy a lot a freeze it. I home cook, and it's nice to have that mini frozen food market in the basement when I get a hankering for something to make for dinner.

I stopped making dinners on a whim though- there's just too much of the same ol' meals going on, and I really need to crack open some cookbooks (which I also hoard) before my husband threatens (again) to clean house and send them to the recycling bin.

So I look in the freezer (as well as the one that's upstairs attached to my fridge), and saw a Shangri-la of baked goodness. Yes there was some meat, cheese and veggies in there, but there also was a lot of bread. Jesus could have fed at least another five-thousand without having to use any of His powers, had He seen what I had.

I had rolls. I had loaves, home baked and store bought. I had white, wheat, and rye. If bread was money, I would have been a millionaire. But there is only so much you can do with it all.

Of course I could have thrown it all out, but I hate wasting stuff. Anything frostbitten and stale went to feed the wildlife in the backyard, but the rest simply had to be used, or at least given away. And trust me, it's hard to give away bread that's already been frozen!

Mealtimes became flooded with sandwiches, dipping bread with soup, and meals with stuffing on the side. Burgers and hot dogs were also eaten, because I had a lot of rolls put aside just in case we had a massive cookout. We even made poor-man's panini's (think grilled cheese but with meat and veggies too- in a fry pan, not a press), so not only am I a breadaholic, I'm a bread hoarder too. I just can't throw that stuff out!

Even after all of those meals I still have a good amount of bread left- though I admit it's nice to actually find my meats and stuff now! So I've decided to stop the bread madness, and not buy or bake anymore.

At least for a month.

And then I looked in my fridge- I forgot I had a batch of pizza dough in there...but that shouldn't really count, right? It's not really bread unless it's fluffy. So I won't think those tortillas in the freezer would count either.

I think giving up bread is going to be harder than I thought!

Wait a second, you say as you read all of this...why would you have to give up bread completely? Good question, dear readers, I'm glad you asked!

I found out that anything with wheat flour makes me really tired and sluggish.

I went to the docs and got checked out, and though I don't have Celiac disease (or anything else other than hypothyroidism), I have noticed by trial and error that the stuff drains the energy out of me more than an SUV drinks gasoline. So I have to stop eating it, or find a different kind of flour to bake with.

So I either cut it all out, or eat so little of it that it feels like I cut it all out. That also includes pasta.

Lucky for me I'm creative (and immensely humble), so I know I'll figure something out soon. There are flours out there made of rice or nuts, and I'm sure once I finagle with some of them I could come up with some awesome recipes.

So maybe I can have my bread and eat it too. I hope.

In the meantime I'll make due with ditching the rest of the bread by making meals I know my family will love (because they can eat it), and making myself a big pot of something I can freeze into one-serving containers, so I can have something different without all the effort of making another meal entirely. It might take a while to get this all implemented, but once it's done, I should be able to keep myself from eating too much bread (and pasta), if at all.

I'm Beth, and I'm a Breadaholic. But with God and my family helping me, I'll give up bread, and not be so tired!