You get a food list after WLS of the foods you can and cannot eat. In most cases, once you get to the full solids diet and have a chance to add a bunch of foods back to your diet, you can have a pretty full range of foods, including meats, fish, dairy products, vegetables, fruit, healthy fats, and whole grains.

There are a lot of foods you CAN have, but they can look pretty boring when you see them in a list. So how do you get from a foods list to a meal plan? Do you just keep it simple, like have a quarter-cup of cottage cheese and a half-cup of cooked green Beans? Or do you try to develop recipes, like making low-fat, high-Protein green bean casserole?

How do you approach your recipes, and what are some of your favorite recipe sites and online resources?

Great topic. Can't wait for others to share. I fall into the category of making somewhat repetitive meals, but this site is always a great resource to expand what I make!

I pretty much eat a lot of what I did before, just in much smaller portions. I don't eat as much fruit as before. I could kill a cantelope or a container of strawberries in one sitting. I could make a walnut/oatmeal/blueberry/greek yogurt with FF milk of about 1500 calories and eat it in 2 hours. I have my healthy favorites and look on-line or in my healthy cookbooks every couple of weeks for something new. I am a creature of habit. I mostly order whatever I want when I go out to eat and just eat 2 oz of the insides of a buritto, or pick the meat off an entree. I'll order an omelet and short stack of pancakes and eat 4 bites of eggs and 1 bite of pancake and toss the rest. Sometimes I'll see where another member has posted something that looks good and I'll make it.

I like experimenting with cooking. I have never been one to follow a recipe to the letter so I was just play around with foods and flavors I like. I also like playing with seasonings and spices. Simple things like heating the spices before using them. Buying them fresh or whole instead of jarred changes the taste.

Right now I'm still pre-op but I'm playing around with my crock pot quite a bit and trying different meats and different cooking times and lengths. So far my in laws have been loving that they get soup every couple of days because they are old and don't like to cook