I was one of seven children and my mother would make huge pots of food to feed us.  Every day when I came home from school I was hungry and I remember pushing my chair to the stove and going for it:  I'd dig into that pot and fill my plate.  Later when I was trying to figure out why I ate so much, I was faced with a portions challenge--this skinny little girl with a registered dietitian degree sat some utensils and dishware down and told us to show her what a serving was.  She cautioned us to be honest and so I complied.  When I was finished serving up my portions the room was full of gasps and Skinny D was shaking her head in surprise.   "You're eating too much," she  surmised.  Oh my, was I excited, she was a genius as well as psychic.  I was given a set of cup and spoon measures and told to buy a food scale and oh so relieved to finally realize the error of my way.  Like I was going to go straight home and have a half cup of pasta and a teaspoon of mayonnaise.  I did give it a whirl, though, I did the measuring thing and saw how much I needed to eat and was faced with the frustration of knowing I'd rather not eat pasta than to just tease myself with a half cup.
       The first time I successfully lost weight I did it with a fast; I drank coke and iced tea and had an occasional cup of soup.  How I survived that diet I'll never know, but the 68 pounds I lost were most welcome, but when I tried to maintain the weight, I just couldn't--and when I tried to go back to the fasting, I got sick and because of my low blood sugar, I was given to fainting.  So I knew that would not work, once the weight came back I had to find a way to get it off again, but unless I was fasting, I was not losing weight. My habit of large servings and too much condiments did me in every time.  So I finally realized I had to learn how to eat small quantities of food or find foods that I could eat large quantities of.  That's when I discovered free vegetables, fresh, raw green leafy vegetables and how can I forget the wonderful cabbage soup that I could eat endlessly?  I managed to find food for the bottomless pit but soon it lost it's luster and I found a new passion--recipe modification.  I started with guacamole, how could something so green be so fattening as my beloved avocado?  I was going to a party and I wanted to wow my church friends with a light and delicious right and nutritious chips and dip so I got to work.  I made guacamole with peas--that's right, green peas thrown into a food processor with all the right seasonings and spices and when I served it that night with my freshly oven toasted tortilla chips they were a hit.  I even put a little post-it sign on them letting everyone know what the calories and fat grams were and did the church women love me that night.  They beat a path to me eager for the recipe.  I discovered two things that night--green peas were really good masked as a Mexican dip and I wanted to give that modification thing some work.   I did such a good job I won awards for several of my recipes when I entered them in the Health Styles Way to Health recipe contests.  So now that I am making a run for health, I'm determined to get my recipe modification mojo back.  That means I will be sharing some of my favorite holiday favorites on here starting with my favorite cranberry creation--cranberry pineapple chutney.

One 16 ounce bag of cranberries
1 can of pineapple chunks (in it own juice)
1 cup of orange juice
1 small package of cherry sugar free gelatin
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon of salt
2 tablespoons of grated orange zest

wash cranberries.  Place berries and all of the ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat.  Once the cranberries start to pop, lower the heat and let simmer for eight minutes.  Take off of the heat and let cool.