Consequences

Warning: some explicit and gross content - the squeamish should not proceed any further!!!

On July 25th, I went to a baseball game.

I had some wine.

Then I had some more wine.

At this point my judgement was impaired, and I started drinking beer and eating popcorn.

Then I really ruined my day by eating a brownie.

Now for any old person this would be bad enough. But for me, wheat gluten is poison. So, add up the alcohol and the gluten and the sugar and everything else, and you get a whole lot of poison ingested in one day. Let the record show that it took until TODAY, August 4th (10 days) plus a round of laxatives over the weekend for my bowels to return to their normal level of functionality. Last week my belly was so swollen that I actually thought about buying a pregnancy test. The fact that it was the week before my "special woman time" may have also contributed to the bloating, but I don't typically have very serious pre-menstrual symptoms.

Overall, I'm not sure whether I should say 10 days is fast or slow. When you think about what my body does when it comes across gluten, it actually seems pretty fast. My immune system starts attacking my intestines and literally breaking them down, or so I'm led to believe. I'm not sure if this recovery timeframe lends more evidence to the Celiac theory or the gluten intolerant theory (I never really found out which I am) but either way - safe to say that I should stay away from it unless I want to sacrifice over a week of my life to feeling like a bag of cement. When you think of it in those terms - and add in the fact that those 10 days were some of the nicest summer days that Seattle has ever seen - it seems like a very long time indeed.

In other news, I have been tweaking the timing of my Perfectly Produce meal plans in order to accomodate my evening gym sessions. What seems to be working for me right now is a small protein-laden snack first thing in the morning, then "Brunch" at 11:00 AM which is typically whatever the breakfast recipe was. At 4:00 PM I have my regular lunch, and then I have dinner quite late, after the gym, at 8:30 or 9:00.

I've had a bad habit in the past of "saving" all my calories up for the evenings in order to indulge in a fairly large pig-out session before bedtime. I always figured if I "budgeted" enough calories for this time, it would be ok to eat more then. I recently learned, though, that it's not just about calories in / calories out. It's about your blood sugar and all your body has to do to process what you eat, which is why the timing of the Perfectly Produce meal plans is so important. I always thought that yeah, it was probably not a good thing to go to bed with a stomach full of God-knows-what just because it would sit there all night, but that's actually not what happens. It doesn't sit there all night, your body has to digest it. So if you eat a lot right before you go to sleep, your body will spend all night digesting it, and it will never get a chance to do all the things it's supposed to be doing while you're asleep - like oh I dunno, rebuilding itself? Repairing your body at a cellular level? So next time you eat a big meal and go to bed, don't wonder what happened when you wake up looking and feeling like crap. You might as well have stayed up all night.



My parents used to do this thing on Christmas Eve where they'd leave all their gift wrapping until that night - and stay up until 2 AM or some other weird hour of the morning to get everything done. Thus, I imagine, putting a damper on their enjoyment of Christmas Day itself. I never understood that, so why should I do the same thing to my body? It might be a weird analogy, but don't make your body stay up all night digesting when you have a whole day ahead of you the next morning. You won't be able to enjoy it.

I've never been able to sleep if I'm hungry, but again, once you start evenly distributing what you eat and regulating how much you eat to a reasonable portion size, you can eat dinner a couple hours before you hit the sack and not feel hungry. If I - the notorious 900 calorie dinner late night binger - can do it, so can you. I went to bed entirely satisfied last night.

Feast or Famine

Hello all,

I am happy to report that things continue to go well as I follow the basics of the Perfectly Produce plans. I say the basics because I did minimal cooking this week - just a couple of my favorite items from the Spring recipes. I'm watching my cash flow like a hawk lately.

I also sorta freaked out about my weight recently. Broken engagement + friend in town + summer time + lack of discipline = I am now literally AFRAID to weigh myself.

I know it sounds silly but I think a lot of people can relate to that. I know that my approach to weight loss and body image probably isn't the dead spit of normality, but whose is? We all have our comfort zone. For me, mine is anything under 140 lbs. If I go over 140, I flip out. I stop weighing myself and flip the heck out.

Well, all this hit me as soon as a good friend of mine left for home - she stayed with me for over a week and I was kind of in the "ahhh the hell with it" mindset.

So since then, I have been spending 2-ish hours at the gym almost every night and sticking to meal suggestions at all times - NO snacking in between (yes, I am proud of myself, thank you very much). I tend to lose it at night, though. Particularly because it has been so hot here lately and I haven't been sleeping well.

Even that has been petering off, though, and I find myself beginning to swing in the opposite direction.

In college, I had a brief stint with some disordered eating. I won't call it an "Eating Disorder" - it was too short lived for that and it turned out I COULD actually stop when I wanted to, but suffice to say I didn't eat enough, or well, and sometimes didn't even keep it down. Show me a college coed who hasn't at least had one experience with this and I will show you a fibber.

Anyway, weight loss is addictive. I find myself tempted to skip meals, as in "oh, well I had that bowl of ice cream last night so I won't eat breakfast" or "oh, I just got back to from the gym and I'm so tired I could probably just go to bed without eating..."

Not good. The problem is, especially at night, once I start eating I can't seem to stop very easily. I think I just need to eat more slowly and do the "wait 30 minutes before grabbing seconds" thing, but I've always wondered why it's so relatively easy for me to be "good" during the day and such a crazy chow hound at night. I have a thing about trying to sleep on an empty stomach, too, but here's the really nutty part:

I know if I start eating I'll probably overeat, so I'm tempted not to eat at all. Nuts, huh? This is what results in my weight fluxuating up and down within the same 15 - 20 pounds my whole adult life. WTF?

On a positive note, I feel flipping great, and I haven't been giving in to the urges to skip meals - except maybe once or twice. My skin looks good too, I think that's a result of multivitamins plus water, plus healthy eating and exercise (go figure - it's the lifestyle, stupid!)

Now I just have to work on getting more sleep. It is literally the key to having a good tomorrow, if you think about it. It's a little tough right now due to circumstances outside my control (i.e. mother nature), but I have been good lately about making myself go to bed at a fairly reasonable hour (yay me).

We're on the up swing, folks. Also, something occurred to me at the gym today:

I am happy.

I am happier than I have been in a long, long time. I am living almost exactly the way I want to. I have a good job, I eat well, sleep well, exercise regularly, do fun stuff in my time off, have a career goal in sight, and yeah...all is well with the world. The last time I felt this good was college, I think. So this time around, I think I'd like to try a wiser, more balanced version of happy, please and thank you.

Cheers to that, folks. May you find wisdom and balance and happiness.

It's...ALIVE! Summer Week 1

Hello all!

I have been doing so well this last week or so. I worked out every day Sunday - Thursday. I ate only every few hours, and didn't snack in between. I've been having mostly leftovers from Summer - Week 1, which lasted surprisingly long and surprisingly well.

I have also been eating my every day greens, well, every day. I've been ad-libbing some dinners because I'm trying to save my cash and use up what I have stockpiled, so I've been dumping leftover beans on them, too. Tasty. I also recommend Newmans Own Oil and Vinegar salad dressing, if you prefer not to make your own (somehow mine always ends up with gross chunks of salt sneaking up on me).

I have not been so good about not adding in treats with dinner, but I'll work on that.

I want to share a few things I've learned in the last couple weeks with you:

1. Plastic containers that baby spinach comes in are great for storage. Save them. Do NOT put them in the dishwasher, because this happens....


2. The more time you spend making sure your greens are dried before they are stored, the more days you will be able to enjoy them fresh.

3. Canned salmon, while it might sound sketchy, is actually quite tasty.

4. A handy reminder E-Mail from the good folks at Perfectly Produce made me realize that I am storing all my nut butters and oils wrong. They should be refrigerated.

5. Teff flour wraps are a GREAT gluten-free substitute for more traditional wheat wraps. Not bad calorie wise, and decent fiber content. These should also be refrigerated.

6. The pico de gallo recipe for this week / month is FABULOUS and stays fresh forever. Warning: you may want a margarita with this. Fresh tomatos and cilantro with onion and garlic...what could be better???


That's all for now folks - stay fresh.

Keeping up with the Jones-ing

Every work day between 2-3 PM I start getting a hankering for a munch. What's up with that?

Chocolate mainly - I'm taking a multivitamin as of yesterday so we'll see how that affects it if at all. I'm thinking that should take care of it. It's less of an energy drain than just a little nagging voice in my head: LA-LA-LA-LA, MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH....

Although today I feel kind of tired. Probably 'cause I didn't get enough sleep and got up sorta early.

On the upside, I've been pretty decent the last couple of days. Yesterday:

Breakfast: Smoothie
Lunch: Pico de gallo with crackers, greek yogurt with raw honey and 1/2 peach
Dinner: BLT wrap with plums
After dinner snack: gigantic bowl of ice cream with chocolate sauce

Some little miniature chocolates were interspersed throughout, though I have eaten them all at this point so that's that. Also had a cup of coffee. I went to the gym for the first time in weeks, though. I did an hour of cardio and upper body weights (including abs).

So far today has been 100% to plan. I am getting really hungry though, and it's just before 3 PM. I think I might have skimped on the blueberry / grape recipe, I had a lot of celery leftover. This has actually happened to me previously, where I've ended up eating my 5pm snack between 3 - 4 PM. Maybe I'm doing something wrong?

Summer Bulk Cooking - Week 1

The theme of this week (and this month) is COLOR!

I am totally in a summer mood, even though Seattle is having some crummy weather today.

Tip for you: overbuy blueberries, cherries, and grapes. I definitely dipped into these as I was cooking this week! I have some leftover celery sticks to munch on this week, too. Spreading out the greens and produce cleaning helped the prep seem much less daunting, and I ended up breaking the bulk cooking into two days. However, this session was so easy and involved such minimal cooking that I kind of doubt it took 5 hours. Maybe it was that long, but it didn't seem that way.

The only item I couldn't find this week was the miso dijonaise. I asked at a couple different stores (PCC and Whole Foods) with no luck. However, I have plenty of mayo left still and I just bought some dijon mustard, so it should be ok.

Here are some pictures for you. I'll try to post more during the week because the combinations should be really colorful and yummy looking. Check it:

Ummm....

Sorry, we are having technical issues inserting pictures. Autosave is taking longer and I'm getting a werid error code: bX-rmpo7m, so we'll hope this is resolved soon because everythihg looks really, really good!

Month 2 - Week 1

Ok y'alls, pity parties are over, I'm back!!!

I did my shopping for this week and was super excited by all of the fresh fruit on the list, though slightly bummed by the lack of beans, it seems I will be getting plenty o' fiber.

I have a friend coming to visit for the week, so I bought some extra smoothie stuff...and some candy...and some gluten free brownie mix...special occasion stuff, ya know? I also got a little overzealous and bought two bunches of romaine and red leaf lettuce, since I've been trying to avoid spinach. I have plenty o' greens, which is good because I'm eating some now.

The only things I was unable to find were the poppy seeds, the miso dijon stuff, and scallion. I'm embarassed to say I completely forgot what scallions are. My friend Google just hooked me up though, and the key with this one is that they are also known as "green onions". I know, you more experienced chefs are shaking your heads right now - bear with me. This is a scallion, for other kitchen dunces like me:



So I'll pick this stuff up at PCC tomorrow. The shopping list for this week indicated I might not see the dijon miso stuff, but I couldn't find anybody in Whole Foods to ask. I hit the store at a busy time I guess.

All in all, without my additional stuff (I had to get some conditioner, some ice cream...etc.) I would say that I spent around $125 - $150 this week on list items. I overbought greens and I overbought flax and fruit because if I have a guest I want them to be able to snickety snack up on it if they are so inclined.

Take aways from this week



1. The stuff I thought was romaine lettuce is actually green leaf lettuce. Oops. I stand corrected. The bunches of romaine are much bigger too, so I got way more greens out of what I bought.

2. Don't go to the grocery store hungry. For reals. It's bad times. I got distracted in Whole Foods because I was spending like 20 minutes wandering around trying just trying to find samples, I was so hungry. Why? Cause I forgot to eat dinner, cause I'm not on the Perfectly Produce schedule this week. Bad doobie, BAD!

3. If you wash your fruit and stuff as you put it away, it will save you some annoyance. I don't like shopping that much, and sometimes it still takes me more time than a more experienced cook, so I figured I would get all my washing and greens prep out of the way tonight. If you've got a big date Friday night - which I don't - this works too.

4. Tearing lettuce up with your hands gives you green fingernails. Gross.

5. QFC greens are significantly cheaper than Whole foods. By at least 50 cents a bunch. Just saying. They are also not organic, so...pick your battles.

6. QFC always has unflavored Kefir on sale. I guess people don't buy it. And then I swoop in and get two for one, bee-yotch!

7. The checkout person usually makes some sort of comment on my purchases when I am buying according to the Perfectly Produce plan. Tonight I got a "you eat a lot of fruit and vegetables!" Why yes I do, I said smugly (just kidding I smiled and nodded). "You don't eat any meat?" This one I vehemently denied.

8. Very old people in grocery stores who look like they need help make me sad.

9. Google unfamiliar items on your shopping list BEFORE going shopping. Unless you have a sweet iphone.

10. If you wander around the Whole Foods produce section long enough, an employee might offer you a special sample. I scored half a peach today. It was damn good.

Accountability

Hi, kids. In an effort to hold myself more accountable, I'm telling you what I consumed yesterday.

Before I do that, an aside - as you may have gathered from previous comments, I am going through a very difficult breakup right now. That's all I'll say about it, but my method of handling stress (eating, not sleeping, not working out, watching bad television) is not good. I'm trying to change that.

Yesterday was an OK day. I made a smoothie in the morning and had that at work. I had some coffee, but not much. I drank water. All good things. I also had about 5 pills of Aleve because I had a migrane the size of New Jersey. Ended up leaving work early, talking to family, getting emotional, and then having a fairly appropriate lunch / dinner. So, in total:

Breakfast Smoothie (strawberry peach, yums)
3-ish Mini Snickers bars (why do I buy candy for my desk, WHY???)
Southwest Chicken Soup
An entire unidentified melon that has been sitting in my refrigerator for about two weeks (it was a very small unidentified melon)
Some fibrous, wheat free crackers
An apple

And I think that's actually it. While I know this isn't exactly balanced, it's a vast improvement from my eating habits of the last few weeks. I didn't work out, again, my brain was attempting to crawl out my ears and I spent a couple of hours on the phone with family and friends, trying to determine why life is so cruel to an unsuspecting, sometimes-undisciplined-but-overall-good-person such as myself. Boo-frickedy-hoo.

Today, I've started out with a nutritious breakfast of four-ish mini Snickers bars and coffee. Ugh. I did bring my last slice o' breakfast bake with me, though, so I'll have that in oh, 45 minutes or so when the Snickers have settled. I have a lunch date with a girlfriend, which should be pretty healthy. Later, I intend to either work out or clean my apartment, maybe both. We'll see. Wish me luck.

The Traveling Chef

Happy Fourth of July!

I love going to Bay City, MI for the Fourth of July. I've made it the last two years in a row. This visit was pretty quick-and-dirty: I landed in Detroit on a redeye at about 5:30 AM on Friday, and I head back tomorrow (Sunday) evening.



My Grandparents are turning 90 years old this year. Unfortunately, both of them were recently in the hospital. Fortunately, they are now doing just fine! My Grandmother recently had a pacemaker put in, and my Grandfather had a partial hip replacement. At 89 years old, it was the FIRST time my Grandmother had ever been in a hospital since the birth of her youngest child - my Dad, who's going to be 59 in October. If that's not some inspiration to take care of yourself, I don't know what is!

Anyway, I wanted to do some cooking for my grandparents while I was here so that a) they wouldn't have to cook for me and b) they'd have some leftovers to last them for a while and save them some trouble for the next week or so. The bulk recipes were perfect, and my Grandparents loved them. I made the Spring Turkey Chili with Artichoke and the Chicken and White Bean soup with Chard. I was able to find all of the ingredients for both recipes at Kroger, except for the Chard, which I was able to find at Meijer. I was a little concerned about supply procurement because Bay City is such a small town - the nearest whole foods is in Ann Arbor, over an hour and a half away.

My grocery bill for all of the ingredients for both recipes (including spices excluding oils - I just used canola oil) was around $50. I made the Turkey Chili on Friday night, and the Chicken Soup on Saturday night. Both took very little time - maybe half an hour, and went over very well with the family. I am leaving my Grandparents with at least a week's worth of dinners in the fridge, so I feel like I did something helpful, at least.

I chose these recipes because they are two of my favorites, but also for the high fiber content. My Grandfather has been taking pain pills for his hip - which he LOATHES - in part because of the constipation they cause.

Anyway. These recipes travel well. You can find the ingredients you need in small middle American towns and make them cheaply. If you're on vacation for a week and you have a kitchen, cooking the Perfectly Produce recipes will definitely save you money, and keep you healthy while you're away. You might want to just throw some plastic containers in your suitcase (which you could, in theory, pack stuff in if you wanted to so they wouldn't take up too much space).

Happy Fourth!

Vacation Mode

Hello hello. I'm a day late, I know. This has been a week of impromptu trips. I took a weekend trip to Port Angeles last weekend, staying in a cabin on the lake for a couple nights, and this Thursday evening I've decided to fly out to Michigan to see my Grandparents. They've both had recent health issues and I haven't seen them since October or so. I had been saving all my vacation because I was supposed to be getting married this summer, but maybe it's just as well things didn't work out that way. My grandparents won't be able to travel anytime soon.



So, I decided...what the hell. I miss my family. I miss taking vacations and having fun. So that's what I did this weekend.

Now, regarding my nutrition:

I was doing ok last week when I packed for the cabin trip. I brought fruit and trail mix with me, some popcorn and gluten free crackers. I'm not so much concerned with scrutinizing my nutrition on vacations and weekends, but I AM concerned about my consumption of wheat, especially when traveling.

For those of you with food allergies, you can probably relate. It's easy enough for me to avoid wheat when I am on a schedule and a routine. If I have my meals ready go to, bring my lunch to work, and even when I eat out at restaurants, I'm usually just fine. Avoiding wheat isn't actually all that hard once you know what to look for.



What kills me, however, is being trapped in a small cabin with folks who are very lovely people, but don't understand my allergy. Now, let me clarify: I never expect random strangers to understand such things, but I do hope that my friends, family, and closer coworkers do understand. The most frustrating thing in the world is having to explain, over and over again, that I REALLY CAN'T have "just one brownie", because doing so will destroy my intestines. Yes, so will pasta. Yes, so will pizza. YES, SO WILL A DONUT. GOD DAMMIT WHAT DON'T YOU GET??? I get a little testy about it because I LOVE these foods and I miss them so much. What inevitably happens over a weekend like this is that I cave under the torture. I am surrounded by things I can't eat, constantly offered these things by people who don't understand that my refusal to eat them is NOT out of vanity or dieting...and finally, I give up. Screw it. I want a brownie. Sure. What the hell.

And that's exactly what happened. It started with a small piece of cake (I love cake). I figured that small indulgence wouldn't really set me back too far. Then I discovered that the peanuts I'd been snacking on that I thought were "safe" were covered in some sort of gluten coating. Then I had a piece of brownie. A pretzel. By this point my abdomen was starting to swell and I was starting to feel sluggish and really grumpy, mostly out of disappointment in myself but also feeling misunderstood. I know that gluten intolerance / celiac disease is a new concept for a lot of people but ugh. Do I EVER get sick of explaining it...over and over and over. I have a sneaking suspicion that a lot of people don't really believe I have an allergy to wheat. I think they assume it's a choice, and something I'm doing to get out of eating junk food so that I can feel superior, or something. God, if they only knew. One remark I got this weekend that made me particularly irritated was: "well at least you get to stay skinny". Yes. I get to stay skinny. It's no work at all for me, it's just a breeze. The fact that I exercise regularly and force myself not to eat food that is JUST AS APPEALING to me as it is to everyone else has nothing to do with it. Comments like this make me so angry, but what can you do. People don't get it, and they probably never will. I can't let it get to me.

But I do. So after coming back from my cabin weekend, I had a series of work parties centered around, you guessed it, food. By this point I just didn't give a crap anymore. I figured if I was already going to feel crappy I might as well make it worthwhile. I know how bad this sounds on the surface, but if you have a food allergy, I'll bet you understand. You go so long without being able to eat the foods you love and then you end up getting sick for some silly reason - might as well go down with a piece of pizza.



So anyhow. I've just finished my last piece of cake from the work party. Work events are difficult also, but not so much as travel and vacations. I'll try to be better when I go away this weekend, if only because flying is absolutely miserable when I am coming off a gluten binge. Hopefully, I can clear some of that by the time I leave Thursday night (not likely).

In the meantime, I probably won't be able to cook until the following weekend: July 10th, although I do plan on making my grandparents some turkey stew to have around. I've got a hankering for it right now, too. Getting my grandmother to let me cook in her kitchen is something of a challenge, but I'll see if I can sell it.

I am not going to post my stats right now because I can't bear to step on a scale. It's just too discouraging. We'll resume soon enough, and I'll continue with regular menu updating in the meantime, so keep checking back. I'm still here, and I'm still working on it!

So far, the most significant and lasting behavior change of mine so far has been BREAKFAST. I eat breakfast every day now and I feel decidedly weird when I don't. Today was the first time I hadn't had breakfast in a long time.

So if you're out there, staring down a long weekend full of picnic food and BBQ festivities, dreading the food you'll eat that you think you shouldn't - I hear you. It sucks. I'm sorry. There are more of us out there than you might think, and realistically...once probably won't kill you. While you can't expect other people to understand the way you eat or the way you live, for that matter, realize that in trying to be healthy and trying to make positive changes in your own nutrition, you'll find yourself better off in the long run. Can they say the same? Probably not.

Everyone has their challenges. While I'm sitting here griping and whining about people's lack of understanding, everyone has some kind of issue like this to deal with. I'm not special. It just seems sometimes like everyone is watching you and making some kind of comment about what you're eating. Yeah, that's true, but they're doing it to everyone else, too. The larger person who is finally trying to diet or improve his or her health gets scrutinized "Diet huh? How long is it going to last this time?" The smaller person who is trying to eat healthfully or who might be recovering from an eating disorder, for all you know: "Come on, just EAT something for Chrissake!" The Jew or the Muslim who won't eat pork, the lactose intolerant person who has to pick the cheese off of everything, the vegan who has a moral issue with animal products. All of these people have perfectly valid reasons for eating the way they do and we should NOT make it our business to comment. Others will, however, and all we can do is step back and know that our reasons are our own.

Likewise, when people offer us food, they're being kind. We can always politely refuse, but we shouldn't project our lack of willpower onto them such that their courtesy is unappreciated or misinterpreted as careless. It's quite the opposite. Thinking about it that way makes me feel sort of ashamed of myself, which I suppose I deserve.

Tomorrow is another day.

A Question of Comfort

So, I'm interested to know what you (my alleged audience) think of as comfort food. For me, I find that just about anything works to comfort me. My favorites being ice cream, chocolate, popcorn, and occasionally wine and cheese. Pizza is a big one (gluten free of course).

What are your comfort foods? Are any of them healthy? I find when I have a cold that chicken soup and oranges are my go-to's.

Your comments and suggestions appreciated, please share...

My company is in the process of being audited this week, so regular updates may be more brief than usual. We'll resume detailed menu and progress feedback no later than Monday, June 29th.

Setbacks

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Well. I deserved that. No really, I did.

Last week, I worked out once. Last night. For not very long. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday featured varying amounts of junk food - particularly ice cream and gluten free cookies.

Interestingly enough, I stopped taking Magnesium on Wednesday or Thursday of last week. I had been taking 400 mg between 8 PM and 10 PM, and while it was definitely curbing cravings and helping me sleep, it was doing something unfavorable to my bowels and I was feeling a little...ermm...backed up.

I've been told that sugar cravings can be curbed with a Zinc supplement, also, so I think I've come to a fairly obvious conclusion here: TAKE A MULTIVITAMIN. I'm going to try to strike a balance with the magnesium, maybe only taking 200 mg every other day.

I have a giant bottle of 8 million multiple vitamins that I bought at Coscto in late 2007 or early 2008. While the label says they should be ok, and there's some little packet of mysterious preservative substance in there with them, I'm a little hesitant. Plus, I'm willing to bet I can find a multivitamin of a higher quality than "Kirkland's Best". Not to sound snotty or anything.

So, while I am disappointed in myself, I am not discouraged. Yeah, I gained weight this week - but I know exactly why. I didn't follow the meal plans as I should have, and even when I did, I supplemented them beyond recognition with junk food. I think I just got cocky because my success in previous weeks came so easily.

I also haven't been checking on my blog as much as usual, which you may have noticed. Part of that is that I wasn't really eager to tell you how many trips I made to the vending machine on Friday, and why the spot where the Almond Hershey bars are supposed to be is empty when the rest of the machine is full. I'll try to be better about staying focused and checking in - accountability goes a long way.

So, all is not lost...and I feel great. I ran 2 miles this morning. I never run in the morning! I think I have seen the biggest improvement in my skin. I've actually gotten some comments on it, too. Like: "have you gotten sun?" (I haven't) and "you look really healthy". Cool.

SOY Confusing...

Hello friends,

This weekend was what I would call a ‘bad weekend’.

‘Kay, to put this in perspective, it was actually a GREAT weekend. I had family in visiting from out of town, I got to hold my baby niece a lot, and I went out to eat…A LOT. I worked out NEVER.

I had a lot of gluten free baked goods. Gluten free baked goods are marvelous for the wheat sensitive, but not so good from a Calorie / Glycemic Index / Nutrient Density perspective. Actually they are horrible from this perspective – let’s be honest. Take a bunch of rice and butter, and throw in some chocolate and eggs, and call it a cookie. Nine out of ten, they’re worse for your waistline than regular old glutastic baked goods.

This weekend also featured wine and ice cream and a bunch of other stuff. So in case you can’t tell – I’m laying the groundwork right now to explain why I probably will have gained weight this week. We shall see what the scale sayeth on Wednesday. I’m not going to get all worked up about it yet, I have a whole 48 hours of potentially good behavior to offset the weekend. Right? Right!

I had a bit of a funny thing happen to me the other day. In an earlier post I believe I mentioned the fact that my teeth aren’t that great, and that the trail mix I made was a challenge to chew.

Well, that may have been because I had mistaken dehydrated soybeans for dry roasted edamame. Mmmm…yes. That’s right. I had been eating soybeans that, in the words of the helpful friend who actually uncovered my error: “are intended to be rehydrated and then pressure cooked for an hour before resembling something that can be consumed.” I was eating them raw. It was like eating pebbles. I was just trying to troop it out, figuring my horrible eating habits for the first 27 years of my life had simply left me with weak teeth. The only thing I can equate this to, if you haven’t tried eating dehydrated soybeans (which I suggest you DON’T), would be eating little chunks of sidewalk.

So, let this be a lesson to you. When you are making your trail mix (which is actually quite tasty now that I know how to make it sans rock), be SURE you get dry roasted edamame. It should look like THIS:



It should NOT look like this:




DON’T GET THIS ONE. THIS ONE IS THE WRONG ONE. This one is not good. I promise. Your dentist will thank you.


So I’m on week three, and the adzuki bean casserole with dates is fantabulous, as is the breakfast bake. The breakfast bake is SUPER filling, by the way, and you can have it “on the go” so if you’re like me (rolling out of bed 20 minutes before you need to be looking reasonably human behind your desk) it’s great. And super tasty. It’s like a great big chicken oatmeal broccoli omlette. You definitely need to WATCH while it’s cooking, though, as the bulk cooking guide tells you. I peeked in at 6 minutes and it was looking good, by 8 minutes, this had happened:



Oops. It should be fine, though, just a little singed. I continue to demonstrate why IT IS IMPORTANT TO READ ALL THE COOKING TIPS. In case you didn’t get that, I’ll say again: IT IS IMPORTANT TO READ ALL THE COOKING TIPS. Get it?

Week 3 Progress Report

Ok people, I am a believer.

Much like last week, I started off this week with the best of intentions. Then life happened, hard. So this weekend I went out to dinner, I ate steak and ice cream, I didn't work out, and...well, a bunch of other stuff happened after that which I won't get into.

Long story short, I followed the meal plans pretty well, I didn't really do any late night pigging out (thanks, Magnesium)...but I definitely had plenty of treats (remember the cupcake story) and didn't really work out. I worked out twice last week. Not cool, but whatever.

Anyway, I was all ready to log in here and make a bunch of excuses, but it turns out I lost 3 freaking pounds this last week!!! Seriously y'all, the last time I lost weight this easily I had the flu. Perfectly Produce rocks. My discipline isn't great, but it still works.

Hopefully, this will be a better work-out week.

Leftover Week and Forbidden Fruit

Ok y'all, check me out:



So my shopping list this week included the following:

Greens
Kefir
Blueberries
Bananas
Apples
Honeydew melon
Pineapple
Peaches
Strawberries

And I think that's it! Somehow, despite my best efforts, Ben and Jerry did weasel their way on there at the last second. Those mothers are sneaky, ya gotta watch out.

Ok, I have to admit I was a bit skeptical when I pulled a block o' frozen tupperware out of my freezer and realized I was supposed to eat it the next day. I thought - really? How good can this stuff be when it's all defrosted and stuff?

Answer: awesome. I had the chicken and chard soup from week one at lunch today and it was as good as the day I made it. For serious. Hello awesomeness - every 2 - 3 weeks I get to do ZERO cooking. I actually might STILL have some stuff leftover at the end of this week! We'll see. For dinner I had a cilantro turkey patty and rice, with greens and pineapple. I ended up reversing the order of the apple and pineapple due to laziness and lack of preparation last night. Whatevs.

I have been taking 400 mg of magnesium between 8 and 10 PM every night and I am no longer hounded by chocolate cravings. However I do still get a hankering for sugar and for ice cream from time to time. I think that's more of a mental thing than a legitimate message from my body, though. I had the ultimate challenge this weekend, which I failed miserably:

I have been taking a 7 week long class through the University of Washington's Extension program. It's on Saturday mornings, and we had our last class this weekend. I mentioned the sugar cravings before - one of the things I love most in this world is fluffy, 100% fake, super sugary CAKE FROSTING. This is bad for the obvious reasons, but also because FROSTING usually implies CAKE which implies WHEAT. Which my intestines HATE, if you've been reading along.

Ironically, what does my instructor walk through the door with at 9:00 AM in the freaking morning? CUPCAKES. Cupcakes with MILES of frosting on top.

Friends, I felt like such a little kid at this point. I COULD NOT THINK OF ANYTHING BUT THOSE GOD FORSAKEN CUPCAKES FOR THE REST OF CLASS. Am I a freaking five year old??? I was having a war with myself. I was probably just sitting there trembling and staring off into space the whole time. We usually have a break about half way through, and I managed to resist until then. At that point I had convinced myself (get ready for this, it's a good one) I had convinced myself that it would be OK to take a cupcake and LICK THE FROSTING OFF. Good compromise, right? All sugar, no wheat? Riiight. So my friends, I confess to you I have no shame. At break time I took a cupcake and bolted for my car, and sat in my car and ate the frosting off this sad little cupcake. But of course I managed to like, knick the top of it with my teeth at which point it was ALL OVER AND I JUST ATE THE GOD DAMN THING. Uuuughhh I hate myself!

So then I drove to Starbucks, hoping that they might, just might have a gluten-free pastry that would save me from this slippery slope (cause once you have one you might as well HAVE ANOTHER). Of course the place was packed, and I only had 10 minutes or so. But lo! There behind the glass counter was an orange almond something or other that was GLUTEN FREE! Woo-hoo! I happily waited and proudly told the clerk that I would like one of THOSE, thanks so much, and...

wait for it...

Dippie McDoodlepants the barista looks at me with mock sympathy and whines "Like, sorreeee, I think we're all out, we don't HAVE any."

I almost punched her in the face. No, not really. I DID however almost point to the display pastry and say "Well then what about that one?!? Why can't I just have that one???"

::sigh:: Ladies and gentlemen, this is what happens when you don't eat breakfast. Let the record show that I DID have another cupcake, thank you VERY much, and it was delicious but disappointingly fleeting and now I can't poop.

Let that be a lesson to you.

Friday Update

'Kay folks, I'm thinking that unfortunately some gluten weaseled its way into my diet this week. The most likely suspect, since I have not hauled off and devoured any cheeseburgers or birthday cake, is the steel cut oats. I bought foreign grown oats, given that most US oats are those that are more likely to be contaminated. My guts are definitely behaving like I've fed them something I shouldn't have. Gory details include: god awful flatulence and less frequent / lower quality poo's. Darn it. Here is the brand of oats. I have been using Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free oats for the fiber mix that goes in the Perfectly Produce breakfast smoothies, with no problems. I guess everyone is different but at this point I think I will steer clear of McCann's. Bummer.

I also think I discovered a problem with raw spinach this week, which is terribly disappointing. Everytime I eat raw spinach my stomach gets really, really upset about 30 - 90 minutes later. Freakin' A. So if I have a legitimate spinach allergy, it may be that the oats are fine. I'll try them out again once my tum has time to settle down from all the excitement.

I played by the rules again on Thursday and got myself to the gym. Good stuff. No cheating. Although I did try a little experiment with the berries and cream that I recommend you DO NOT TRY AT HOME. I had a bunch of leftover cream, so I whipped it a bit and put some stevia powder in it. BLEH. Stevia powder is not good in cream. I think it needs some kind of acidity to balance it out. I don't even know how to describe the taste - it was like - if you put Equal or some other rat-poison type of fake sweetener on celery? Anyway, not recommended.

So, this week I'm attempting to skip a week of bulk cooking. My fridge and freezer are pretty full of leftovers, so I'm hoping to skate by with some greens, fruit, and vegetables to supplement. Oh, and smoothies of course. :-)


So, I'm going to attempt to tally up all this stuff in my freezer and build my own meal plan according to Perfectly Produce's example. We'll see how that goes, but I really don't think it should be that hard, since I've got both previous weeks to reference with the same foods.

Tonight, however, I am feeling a little "blah" mood wise, and it's really tempting to just order some junk or something under the patented excuse: "it's Friday". But I haven't caved yet. I gave myself a little talking to on the way home, telling myself that I would be a slack-ass loser hipocrite who would never get anywhere in life if I allowed myself to be so easily put off track, and so far that's been sufficient deterrent. The night is young. Wish me luck.

Thursday AM Update

For me, progress is it's own motivator.

Yesterday, I came as close to following the Spring - Week 2 meal plan as precisely as I ever have, though my meals were shifted forward an hour or so later than indicated (no biggie). I had zero junk food. I snacked a little between meals on raw green beans, since I over-purchased those this week. No chocolate, no candy, no nothin'. I also ran 5 miles after work, which felt good until the last 20 minutes or so, at which point my legs and feet reminded me that I'd spent the last month or so being way lazier than this.

I'm not planning on doing that every day, but still - I didn't feel hungry, I didn't feel tired, I just felt good, and ready to sleep when it was time. Ok, so it was time about an hour or an hour and a half prior to me actually turning off the light, but the season finale of Make me a Supermodel was on, so my priorities were clear.

Week 2 Progress

I woke up this morning and really didn't want to get on the scale. I was absolutely positive I would see weight gain, and maybe a lot.

I ate some salty food right before bed the night before. I have been eating chocolate and letting the midnight munchies get the better of me. I didn't even work out last night because I had a serious stomach ache, so that means I only really exercised twice last week. I know it might be silly, but I get really anxious about weighing myself because I find even the slightest bit of weight gain to be really discouraging.

But, I knew I'd made a commitment to check in according to plan, so I made myself do it. There's probably something wrong with me that I actually get physically anxious when I step on the scale, but whatever.

Anyway, my dear friends, it turns out I actually LOST almost a full pound from last week. SAY WHAT? Seriously! I think it's real, too, not just a fluke. You ladies in the audience know that water retention can throw things off pretty significantly depending on the time of the month, but if anything I would have expected that to work against me this week, too. So, color me happy, and more committed to following the meal plans. If I can lose weight without even trying (hello, the last time that happened I think I had the flu), imagine if I actually did everything right? Worked out 5 days a week and made myself go to bed at a reasonable hour instead of eating late at night? Umm, yeah.

Other updates - I have noticed that I seem to function better on the same or less amount of sleep. I am absolutely a converted believer in breakfast, now. My mornings are a lot less painful. I still have trouble getting out of bed, but once I do (and once I have breakfast) I feel really good. I don't feel like I NEED that morning cup of coffee. I still like to have it, but I actually feel like I could do without it if I wanted to cut out caffeine. I might think about this in the future but hey, one thing at a time. I will actually be late to work in order to accomodate breakfast.

I am less hungry. Really. I can focus better because I feel more...solid, I guess is the word. A couple of times this week I have felt bloated and heavy, due probably to massive fiber intake, but only a couple times. Usually, about an hour before a scheduled meal I get a little asterisk above my head that reminds me I'm supposed to eat soon. I can handle that.

My fingernails still suck, but that's nothing new. I have trouble with cystic acne from time to time, and I think I have seen a slighly quicker heal time on breakouts. I'd have to pay more attention to this to really verify.

It's easier for me to drink more water. I don't really feel hugely thirsty, but I don't have to make so much effort to get an appropriate amount of water. Maybe it's just more appealing not to have to drink it on an empty stomach.

TOILET TALK WARNING: I am WAY regular, if you know what I mean. Like, ALWAYS once, usually twice a day regular. It's, like, impressive.

All said and done, I'm very impressed after just a week of eating right. Not even all the way right, but a good solid base of healthy food with some junk added in. It makes me really eager to see what happens when I get the late night eating thing conquered and start hitting the gym consistently!

Week 2 Cooking

Week two’s cooking felt like it took about half as long as week one’s session. In reality I think it was about five hours, start to finish. I think that’s because I’ve got the flow of the recipes and ingredients down – oh yeah, and my garlic peeling time went from approximately five million hours down to about five minutes with the knife blade trick. If you are following the Perfectly Produce plan, READ ALL THE NOTES AND TIPS, they are there for a reason and they actually work! Promise.

Check out my Goulash, y’all! Doesn’t it look super yummy? It lives up to the picture and then some. Note that I used pearl quinoa as opposed to other varieties. I’m not sure what all other varieties exist, but apparently there are some options here. I grabbed what I could find on the shelf at QFC and that worked fine.

I haven’t tried the soup yet but that’s on the menu tonight! I’m excited to actually ingest the Okra of which there has been so much talk. So…The occasional chunk of corn that you see here is actually a mistake. I read the recipe too quickly and added yellow onions, but thought I was also supposed to add yellow corn. I pulled most of it out after I dumped it in and realized my mistake, just because I think that would throw the carbs off if I left much more of it in there.

For those of you who have not cooked brown basmati rice before, you are in for a treat. It SMELLS so good. I’ve never taken notice of the smell of rice before, but I wanted to eat this stuff just plain after smelling it. Weird, but good. Oh, and rosemary can join the Happy Nose club along with cilantro and dill. You know, you walk into bakeries and ice cream shops and stuff and you’re tempted by good smells, but they’re usually FAKE good smells, and there’s really only one or two varieties of the super good baked good / waffle cone odor. I am impressed by the diversity and complexity of smells I have encountered thus far using natural ingredients and fresh herbs that I have never really dealt with before. I’m reading this and realizing that I sound like a dog or something, what with all the emphasis on smells, but it’s one of those things that strikes you when you’re not used to it.


Think about it – your food SHOULD smell good. Have you ever gone through the drive through at a burger joint, only to find that your car REEKS for DAYS afterward, just from the greasy bag being in it for a few minutes? Think about that for a minute – that is SO gross and disgusting. Whatever was in that bag should not have been ingested by humans, certainly not as a primary diet staple. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll never stop loving (or eating) fast food French fries – occasionally. Occasionally would be the key.

So far this week, the only thing that I’ve had any trouble with was the apple maple greek yogurt breakfast thing. It’s super good, don’t get me wrong – but I think I portioned it out wrong, or didn’t use the right amount of yogurt. I used about 6 ounces of greek yogurt to make the dressing, but then I had some leftover yogh's sitting in my fridge (2 little cups of 6 oz each). I’m wondering if I should have used 6 cups? I don’t know. Anyway, I got two breakfasts out of the main dish and then threw a yoghurt cup on the side, so I’m thinking that should work.

The white bean avocado salad is way more filling than you might think, and really tasty. I find my stomach sometimes gets upset when too much raw spinach is in a recipe, so if that’s true for you too you might want to add a little more oil. That usually works for me.

Tomorrow I am due to weigh in which I’m not really too eager about – I think I will see some more gain. Not at all unexpected though, I only worked out 3 days last week and they weren’t very strenuous sessions. Also, I have not been disciplined in the Late Night Munchies department, though I have gotten some advice that Magnesium Glycinate a couple hours after dinner should help with this. Sorry about the link source, I had a little trouble quickly finding a neutral reference to link to on this. Anyway, I just got some today and will give it ago tonight.

Week 1 in Review and Shopping for Week 2

I'm a bit surprised, but pleased, by the amount of stuff left in my fridge at the end of this week.

Part of this was because I got lazy on Friday. Instead of making artichoke dill Bruschetta with strawberries, I threw some turkey chili and leftover apricots in my lunch pail. Also, I had leftover cilantro turkey patties and potatos for dinner isntead of making the cilantro pesto burritos. Both recipes looked great, but I was beat at the end of this week and didn't feel like doing much more than warming stuff up in the microwave. Since I had plenty of stuff do to this with, that worked out pretty well for me.

Also, I don't think I've been eating enough greens. I have a BUNCH of greens left, so much that I nixed shopping for all of them this week except for another bunch of swiss chard, which I saw is used in one of the bulk recipes. All said and done, I literally cut my shopping pricetag in HALF this week. Awesome. It still feels like a lot to me, but I know that's deceptive for the reasons I stated previously. Also, I bought another jug o' Kefir and an extra banana since I have opted for smoothies a couple more days than the menu indicated. LOVE me them smoothies, I do...plus they're quick and I'm lazy.

I have in my freezer: 4 cilantro turkey patties, 4 generous servings of chicken white bean and chard soup, and 2-3 portions of turkey chili. I also have plenty of gluten free breads left, eggs, cheese, extra onions, and artichoke hearts. Part of this is due to me over-buying last week. I also have a whole mango left, and about half a pineapple, and half a cantelope melon (I mixed this up with honeydew, which I think I was supposed to get. Oops.) The fruit leftovers are due to me being NON COMPLIANT with the night time snack suggestions. Color me shamed and guilty. I have trouble at night because I stay up too late and eat bad stuff. Swapping more sleep for the bad stuff is most certainly the answer, and I am working on this new, healthier habit.

Which brings me to a frustration I've experieced for the last few days: CRAZY, MANIACAL, ALL-CONSUMING chocolate cravings. I dunno what gives. I'm not one to pass up chocolate when it's offered, but I'm not normally one of those women who dreams about it every night. It's very weird. I'm wondering if it is a hormonal thing, or just sugar that I'm actually craving.

This week's shopping was not only cheaper, it went much, much faster. I knew what I was doing, man, I owned that grocery cart. I went to QFC instead of PCC (our local co-op) to do the bulk of my shopping, and most things were both more affordable and much easier to find.

The only stumbling blocks this week were dates and okra. I didn't even know what okra was, and I wasn't sure if the dates were supposed to be dried or regular. Either way, I couldn't find either after looking at two grocery stores, and I'm thinking I'm ok giving up on them at this point. I'm sure Whole Foods has some, but I really don't feel like going out again. I might try tomorrow.

So, about the Okra - I asked one of the purple apron dudes at PCC where I could find it. He looked at me and flushed (he was like 18) and asked me what it was. My response? "Umm, I don't even know." Yeah, I shoulda done some research on my own before I relied on The Beaver to figure it out for me. Anyway, Boy Wonder scampered off to ask his superior what this mysterious product was, and later returned to tell me it was: "A big, hairy vegetable thing with like bean in it or something. We don't ever have it, he says."

The produce Oracle hath spoken. I shall not find the big hairy bean like veggie thing that I seek here. So be it. I came home just chomping at the bit to look this thing up on Google though, based on that ever so eloquent description. Ready? Ready? I know you're excited.....

OKRA STATS


Ahh, so! It's not that weird. I know what this stuff is. It's pretty good, too, if I remember correctly! I'm probably going to have to go get some now. Note that the information in the link above more delicately describes our little vegetable friend as "fibrous" rather than HAIRY, with "seeds inside" as opposed to BEANS IN IT. It wasn't just the description the poor kid gave me, it was the hand gesture that went with it - you would have thought I was looking for a dachshund. Anyway, the high fiber content gets me pretty excited to go find some. We all know how I feel about fiber.

Raw Evil

Ok friends, I know I've been all sugar and cinnamon and praise about a lotta stuff lately, so here's the other shoe dropping right now.

'Member those "Matter of Flax" Whole Life Flax Krisps I told y'all about last week? How they're all supposed to be Raw Food and whatnot?

These things are the most disgusting chunks of nastiness ever to pass my lips, I think. Remember that I'm not a picky eater. I have never tasted anything so gross. They were freaking expensive too, and that kinda pisses me off. If you took a used teabag, dipped it in salt, and then ran it over with your car and left it in the street to bake on the asphault for a week and THEN ate it - the taste would be similar to but probably better than these things.

I just noticed this company also sells "no bean" hummus. WTF? What's the point of that??? You'll note that the Spinach "no bean" hummus is "back by popular demand" according to their online store.

Ok, I feel kinda bad now because this is clearly a small company doing their best and maybe I just got the wrong kind or whatever but MAN...

UGH. The kind I bought are "Herb Garden" flavored, allegedly. Be warned. Try a different kind or something.

Thursday (Day 4)

This morning was much, much better than yesterday. I got smart last night and prepped everything I could in advance for today, so that made my morning a lot easier. The only prep I really needed to do was pop a gluten free biscuit out of the freezer and into the fridge, and chop up some fruit. This morning I made a cheesy egg n’ spinach breakfast sandwich. It was WAY good, as evidenced by the picture. I don’t think many folks realize how substantial just two eggs can be for one person. The only minor bummer I ran into was due to gluten free substitution. I had selected some gluten free rolls and they have about twice as many calories per roll than a regular English muffin (330 vs. about 120, I think). So I cut it in half and did more of an open-face sandwich thing, which worked out pretty well. I think I might just use my tapioca loaf next time, although I just saw some interesting high fiber options on the Ener-G site. If I can find them in the store, that is.

BT-dubs, for those interested in GF alternatives, Ener-G brand gluten free pretzels are SO FREAKING GOOD. Seriously, I think they’re better than regular pretzels. But I digress.

This seems to be the biggest challenge I’m encountering so far: balancing the need for gluten free breads with a higher fiber content and not going crazy with too many calories (and not too big a price tag, please and thank you!). I assume the Glycemic Index is thrown off a bit too since most GF stuff seems to be rice based. Not sure about that, I’m not as well educated about GI levels. Anyway if that’s as tough as it gets I should be A-OK.

The breakfast sandwich and fruit left me feeling really FULL. I’ve never felt totally FULL and satisfied on my way to work, EVER. The smoothie is very filling too but I think the sandwich was a little more so. It made my morning so much better! I never thought eating a real breakfast would make so much difference, but I was off and running without bemoaning how little sleep I got last night (I didn’t get much, maybe 5 – 6 hours tops). Usually on this little sleep I am not anywhere near the top of my game, so this was pretty awesome. At about 10:30 or 11 AM it occurred to me that I still felt pretty good – not hungry, not even thinking about food. It’s kind of sad to think HOW OFTEN I thought about being hungry and wanting to eat before. God forbid I can actually concentrate at my job first thing in the morning, ya know?

For lunch I had chicken and white bean soup with chard and peas. Remember how I was talking about cilantro being a mood enhancer? Add dill to the list. I don't know if you can really TASTE the dill in this soup, but you sure can smell it. The flavor is really delicate and super good. I'm also impressed by how the texture of the vegetables has been maintained over time - the soup has been sitting in my fridge since Saturday, but the peas are still crunchy - well, crunchy isn't the word - they're "al dente" I suppose. Fresh.

So anyway, I was thinking about the mysterious slice o' avocado that has made its way into the meal plan's lunches the last two days, and two things come to mind: one, I never realized I like avocado so much. They're dang tasty. Two, what is so magical about an avocado that it's worth putting an eighth of one into my lunch bag? Now that the logistics of the plan and all the information has started to gel and become managable in my brain, I am curious about the role of different things I'm eating, and why I haven't eaten them before. I had no idea how narrow and boring my diet was before - I'm not a super picky eater so I just thought boring food was no big deal. Anyway, I did a little googling. It sounds like avocados are basically little multivitamins, though I'm sure the folks at avocado.org would call this a gross over-simplification. Whatev. Also, my boss offhandedly mentioned that peas have a bunch of fiber in them. Never noticed that. You never know where the good stuff is hiding.

I will admit that I fell into a little late night pig out session yesterday. Meh. It was more a behavioral issue than it was a hunger issue. Basically it was a 100% behavioral issue. I EAT FOR FUN AND I CAN'T BE AN ADULT AND MAKE MYSELF GO TO BED AT A DECENT HOUR, OK??? Judge me if you will, I'm not happy about it, but I'm working on it. Anyway, I found that with all this fresh stuff in the house, probably the worst thing I pigged out on was buttered gluten free toast and some leftover yoplaits that were gonna go bad if somebody didn't eat 'em. I had a bunch of toast and some fiber loaded crackers with peanut butter. So, yeah. A lot better than past experiences, in which I would actually down an entire container of Ben and Jerry's all by myself (no joke, there is an entire DAY'S worth of calories in one container, on average), usually supplemented by french fries or popcorn or something equally salty in nature to you know, "balance it out". And I'm surprised when I gain wait - dumbass. Oh, and like 8 gallons of diet coke. Before bed. Great idea. So when I wake up the next morning and can barely open my eyelids because my face is so swollen, I have only myself to blame.

Basically I'm saying that even if I deviate from the meal plan there is a kind of safety net in place just from having better quality options in the house.

Morning Rush Hour

You know that Ice Cube song, Today was a Good Day? That was one of my favorite songs when I was younger (I was probably to young to understand what all the lyrics meant, but it had a chill vibe to it that I liked). Anyway. Today was a Bad Day, unfortunately. Or at least so far, it's not even noon.

I woke up too late to make myself the breakfast sandwich that I was SO looking forward to and in fact, I barely had time to throw my lunch in a bag before running out the door. No smoothie, no nothin'. So instead I had some apple slices with peanut butter - I hope that's an OK choice. It's just regular old Kroger peanut butter, but it actually doesn't seem to have too much sugar in it (3g per serving). I hate, hate, hate starting my day off behind the eight ball and frazzled like that. EURGH I hate it. To make things worse I forced myself to get on the scale for the first time in a month and that's just never a happy experience. I know I'm well within normal limits but I've put on about 10 pounds in like, a month. I tend to bounce back and forth within the same ten or fifteen pound range, which is just enough to make finding pants that fit an annoyance every morning.

Anyhoo, I'm kinda of puzzling over my evening schedule right now. Typically I like to go to the gym right after work, but then I usually don't get home until 8 PM or so. I don't think I can really bring lunch AND dinner with me to work without feeling like I really have no life (and lugging a giant sack with me every day), so I'm not sure what to do about that. I thought about maybe eating both my snacks at 5 PM and seeing if that would get me through a workout. But does that mean I'm going to be eating dinner too late at 8 or 8:30 PM? Hrmmm. Tonight I'm going to try to stay on the menu plan's schedule for a 6:30 dinner, and then maybe work out afterwards. We'll see how that goes.

By the way, for those of you who have never done body fat testing, you're really missing out. After pinching the crap out of me in various tender locations, my trainer told me I'm about 23.5% fat. She said that's pretty good, and since she had trouble pinching fat off of me, I should be happy. I'll take her word for it. I wasn't about to disagree with anything she said while she had those skin pincher things handy, anyway. Just kidding. She was a really nice lady named Kathi who works at the Northshore YMCA (highly recommended - really nice facilities).

I'm not going to set a weight loss goal or anything like that right now, because that's not so much my priority. I'd love to shave off some fat, for sure, but I'm more concerned with FEELING better - having more energy, seeing improvements in my skin and nail quality, being less hungry, etc. I'll address progress in these areas as I move forward.

Night of the Living Deuce

A warning, before I continue:

If you are a squeamish person - do NOT read this post. If you are a sensitive person with tender sensibilities - DO NOT read this post. If you are a fairly inhibited individual who cannot find room in your heart for the observation of bodily functions as data points - DO NOT READ THIS POST.

Let me spell it out: I'm going to write about poop. If you don't want to read about poop, get thee off to cleaner pastures. Don't worry, there won't be any pictures, but there will definitely be an enthusiastic discussion of feces.

For those of you calloused, perhaps morbidly fascinated folks who stuck around, this is going to be interesting for you. A little background, before we begin:

I started to get real sick with something that nobody could seem to diagnose in late 2003. I was tired all the time, I got frequent migranes, I felt bloated constantly, and I always, always felt like I had to pee. This constant feeling of needing to pee eventually turned into constant bladder pain. It was also virtually impossible for me to go numeros dos. I took laxatives every day for over a year just to maintain some semblance of regularity. Not recommended. Try planning your day around when you think the Senna's going to kick in. NOT awesome.

What was going on inside my gut was anything but regular, and it took until late 2005 / early 2006 for someone to figure it out (thanks, Bastyr University). It turned out I am allergic to gluten. So, everytime I ate bread or anything with gluten in it, I was basically eating the protein equivalent of cement, as far as my intestines are concerned. This lead to...well...you can do the math. In short, the constant need to pee was mostly because my poor bladder was getting squeezed to death by all the inflamed, angry organs around it (and perhaps a Vitamin A deficiency, but that's just one theory).

As soon as I stopped eating gluten I got better. And that, my friends, was awesome. So, I am pretty happy - no, DELIGHTED - whenever I feel the natural urge to go number two. It totally makes my day to have intestines that work properly. Don't laugh! Don't you dare! Spend two years without 'em and you'll be pretty freaking happy too, thanks so much!

On to my point: YO. In the last couple of days I have been a very, very happy lady. Holy crap, have I been happy (pun intended). It is AMAZING to see not only the quantity but the quality that seem to result from a very high fiber, whole food diet. The thing is, with the Perfectly Produce meal plans - you don't really feel like you're eating a ton of fiber when you're eating it. It just tastes good. Plus the probiotics in stuff like Kefir are really good for intestinal health.

Let the record show that the poo-poo train is the only way cholesterol can leave your body, too. If you've never had problems with "irregularity", then at least you should be happy about this fact. All that baloney that General Mills tells you about Cheerio's lowering your cholesterol is so ridiculous that it makes me want to puke. A serving (1 cup) of Cheerio's has 3 grams of fiber in it. Only one of those is soluble. Compare this to 1 cup of cannellini beans at 11.3 grams of fiber. Not only that, but they have protein and will actually fill you up. I have to eat, like, a BOX of Cheerio's before I feel anything approaching full.

Just saying. Sorry, Cheerios. I'm sure there are worse choices out there but I highly doubt that ONE serving of Cheerio's a day is going to make a huge difference in your "heart health". Maybe if you're replacing a 6 egg omlette with bacon and cheese, but come on...let's get real, y'all. So anyway, if you add up one day of Perfectly Produce meal plans fiber contents, I bet you just thinking about it will make you run for the WC.

Review of Day 1 and Day 2 in progress

Ok folks, I have never been a breakfast person. Never mind breakfast, I’ve never been a MORNING person. Anytime I’ve eaten breakfast in the past, it’s been more out of obligation than anything. I normally have a really bad habit of downing 2-3 cups of coffee in the morning and waiting as long as I possibly can to have lunch. I’d occasionally have a fruit or a yogurt around 10 AM, and end up starving by the time noon rolled around. I’d feel like I “woke up” my digestive system just enough to get really, insanely hungry at a really inconvenient time. I love it when I’m sitting in a morning meeting and my stomach starts eating itself so loudly that everyone else in the room can hear it. Of course they politely pretend not to, but you know they’re wondering. It’s kinda like throwing one shoe in the clothes dryer and listening to it bang around until the cycle winds down.

Yesterday, I geared up for my first blueberry / banana breakfast smoothie courtesy of Perfect Produce’s handy morning recipes. “Recipe” is a little misleading because it took all of about five seconds to make. “Stuff to throw in a blender” is perhaps more accurate. My schedule was a little out of whack due to the holiday, but I basically just shifted all my meals forward an hour and a half or so, which seemed to work out ok.

This smoothie was so good I was actually looking forward to getting up and making another one on Tuesday. I’m the kind of person who hits the snooze button 10 times before dragging herself out of bed in the morning. I didn’t do that today. It was that good. Word to the wise – go easy on the Stevia powder. The tartness of the Kefir and blueberries is super good and I for one prefer not to mute it too much. A pinch really does go a long way. The fiber mix makes it really, really thick and filling, and the recipe gives you a little more than one big glass full. Another tip – rinse your glass and your blender ASAP after making this. The mixture comes right off when you rinse immediately, but when you’re lazy and let it sit in the sink all morning (not that I’m that kind of person ::cough::), it will be a little more work to get off later. At least soak your stuff in water while you’re out doing whatever it is you do all day.

I have previously sneered at smoothies, thinking they wouldn’t keep me full for more than 2 seconds, and that’s no doubt true for ordinary, sugary, unsophisticated smoothies that are no better than chunky Kool Aid. Not so for this puppy. I can actually go a whole morning without obsessing over lunch.

For lunch, I had an apple mango tuna salad with apricots and almonds. Sound funky? It’s awesome. I don’t know if the picture really does justice to the gigantic MOUND of salad allotted for lunchtime, but I actually kind of had trouble finishing it, which was also awesome. I had to double check both this and the smoothie recipe to make sure that I had divided the portions correctly.

Yup, this is one serving. Granted, the recipe called for “small” apples and I used pretty “large” apples, but I doubt that is going to make too big a difference. I hope not anyway, because I like being able to actually feel full. I was a little apprehensive about that when I started the plan, only because I am accustomed to overeating – a LOT. I figured I was probably in for a period of adjustment while my supersized stomach shrank back down to normal. So far, I’m not feeling deprived.

The one area where I was a little dismayed at portion size was my trail mix snack. It looked kinda skimpy to me. However once I munched my way through the dried soy beans, it actually put a pretty good dent in my hunger. I think the texture forced me to eat it more slowly, but that might just be me. I have really bad, sensitive teeth for my age. I might see if I can find some toasted soy beans or something a little less hard to chomp on for next time. Until then it’s fine, a nice salty-ish sweet-ish treat.

Dinner: I was so proud of my chili. I had company over and I was actually happy to feed them something I made in my own kitchen. That’s pretty much a first for me. I have occasionally made a successful plate of Duncan Hines brownies (that I’m allergic to) or a decent salad, but this was actual, real food that tasted like something homey and good that someone’s momma would make.

I supplemented my berries n’ cream snack with a couple gluten free chocolate chip cookies (c’mon, it’s a holiday, and they were really, really little I promise). Other than that, the only deviations from the plan were coffee and a couple hard candies. Oh wait, I lied, I had a really small glass of white wine with dinner. Today has been much the same (minus the wine, it’s only noon for crying out loud), and I’m happy to say that the morning hungry grumpies were conquered even though I was sitting behind a desk all day with a clock staring at me.

Tomorrow’s breakfast is some kind of sandwich-y thing that I haven’t studied too closely yet, but I’m looking forward to it. It occurred to me that the Perfectly Produce meal plans might do more for me than just nutrition and weight management – it might actually help me instill some order and routine in my life that is greatly lacking right now. I have a tendency to allow an unhealthy cycle take over my week: later and later nights mean more and more stressful and rushed mornings, and by Friday I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck. It’s a really bad habit that makes me miserable. Maybe this will help – I hope so.

This evening I meet with my personal trainer, who’s going to tell me how fat I am. No, really. I’d say I’m pretty average-sized, but I'm definitely not in the best shape of my life right now. It’s all in how you feel. What I mean, though, is that she's going to take body composition measurements. I promise to share this with you guys no matter how unflattering it is. I’ll also post my starting weight so that you can see any changes over time.

First Bulk Cooking Session

Conclusions from my first bulk cooking session:

Best advice that I foolishly ignored during this session was "clean your vegetables on Friday". This took longer than I thought, although when I think back to the huge cart full o' goodies I brough home on Thursday, it probably shouldn't have surprised me.

Cilantro makes everything better, including the smell of my house and my overall mood. Seriously, if you're having a lousy day, shove your face in a bunch of cilantro. It'll help you get to your happy place.

Waterboarding should be abandoned by the CIA in favor of garlic peeling. Of course, I came to that conclusion before reading the helpful hint about crushing the garlic with the flat part of a wide knife. I chalk this up to my unusually steep learning curve in the kitchen.

Everything I made was simple, straight forward, looked and smelled great, and I am really glad that I'll have a little extra for the week since I'm only cooking for one. I had to try a cilantro turkey patty last night, and it was fabulous. I used gluten free tapioca loaf instead of Ezekiel bread (I'm guessing a lot less fiber, unfortunately), and that seemed to work fine as a subsitute.

All said and done my cooking probably took about 8 hours total. Fortunately, I was in no hurry, and I can see many changes I can make to bring this time down next week (cleaning veggies ahead of time, for one). Also, I didn't multitask much. Part of that was the new-ness of it all, but part of it was also that I didn't print out my recipies, I had them on my laptop instead. If I had everything laid out side by side, it would have been more helpful (more good advice ignored).

I found that some other little things that I never would have thought would make a difference really slowed me down. I only have one large stock pot, so I needed to switch the order of things around a little bit. I also forgot to thaw my chicken - oops. Probably the silliest thing that slowed my work was not having a sink stopper! I moved into a new apartment about a month ago and I never noticed this. So I instead was cleaning vegetables in two large mixing bowls that I had - not a best practice, I'm sure, and pretty tedious.

I wish I had taken some before and after shots of my fridge. The first, before I did my shopping, would show a largely empty white box with an overwhelming ratio of condiments to real, actual food; a couple 2 liter bottles of diet coke, some yogurt, and something in a plastic container that had withered away beyond recognition and had become more fungus than anything else.

The second: my fridge more full than I've ever seen it with green, healthy looking food...and the last with everything looking way more organized than ever before, portioned out and full, but with some room to spare.

First Shopping Day

Let me preface this commentary by saying that I have never in my life successfully shopped - or even attempted to shop - for a whole week's worth of real groceries. My idea of weekly shopping is more like: 5 cans of Amy's soup, a few apples, some yogurts, and some powerbars. Maybe a salad for lunch the next day ‘cause you know, it looks good and fresh, all prepared and ready to go…and some chips...and some gummi bears...and...you get the idea. If I couldn't carry it out in a basket, it wasn't coming with me.

Consequently, my normal weekly shopping wasn't really weekly, it was more like every few days. It was frequently supplemented by vending machines, eating out, junk food, impulse buys, delivery, etc. I could go through my credit card statements and figure it out, but I'm willing to bet I've been spending a LOT more than I think on food, and/or crap that tries to pass itself off as food.

This weekend is the perfect time to start the meal plans. It's a holiday weekend and I have Monday off, and I'm just coming off a pretty disgusting binge. I have had problems with binge eating / emotional eating since I can remember. I tend to be very black and white - either I'm eating too restrictively or I'm cramming everything that doesn't run away fast enough down my gullet. That's part of the reason I'm eager to try this plan. This latest bout included some wheat products, too (by "some" I mean "a hideous quantity") and I can actually feel myself getting fat and unhealthy right now. Bleh.

All in all I ended up spending more than I expected on Week 1 shopping. I realize some of this is due to "startup costs" such as spices and oils. I also bought some containers and a blender. I must also account for being one person as opposed to a couple, so I definitely over-bought. If there were deals on bulk quantities I sometimes took it - i.e. the gigantic sack o' frozen blueberries was a way better deal per ounce than the little bitty one.

I'll be able to freeze stuff and have it last through the weekend, and I'll be able to cut quantities down next time, once I have a better feel for things. I might actually have company over for dinner every now and then, so that's good. Also, I did most of my shopping at PCC and some at Whole Foods. I was banking (literally) on PCC being more affordable than Whole Foods, but I would be curious to know what my total would be at Safeway or QFC. We shall see. Everything I bought was organic. Also, I bought some wheat substitute food that on average is literally 3x the cost of whatever I'm substituting. I am confident that once I learn how to shop intelligently and cut out all the extra crap I eat I will actually see a savings. But being as stupid about this stuff as I am, and having no frame of reference, I suffered a little sticker shock. It would be interesting to know what a realistic weekly budget would be, though I realize it probably varies quite a bit.

Mkay, so as I began my journey into the unfamiliar territory of the produce aisle, I realized this was gonna take a while. I have not felt so retarded in a long time. I'm sure it was hilarious to watch. Some examples:

• Shallots. No idea what these things looked like. Still don't really know what they are. Is it a root? Is it a weird kind of onion? It looks like a dried up horse hoof.
  
• Watercress. Took me 'till the second store to find this one. It comes with the dirt still on the bottom? Weird.
  
• "New" Potatos. This one had me completely befuddled. I saw Russet, I saw Yukon Gold, I saw Red...but I could not for the life of me find "NEW" potatos. Until I got to Whole Foods and I noticed (after puzzling over the table for about 20 minutes) that the tag on some of the potatos indicated they were a "New crop"! Then the light went on. Duh...I ALMOST asked someone about this but I'm glad I didn't for obvious reasons. Total Jessica Simpson moment.
  
• Fresh Dill. I found this stuff in a little plastic box but I have no idea how many bunches were in it, so I just got one and figured I'd make do.
  
• Nuts. It took me probably half an hour just to sort out the nuts, raw vs. slivered, bulk vs. packaged...yeah.
  
• Chard. Yo, I had no idea there were multiple color options on this stuff. I couldn't decide between red or green (and yes I spent a while looking for "Swiss" before I decided it was the same thing), so I got rainbow.
  

So the whole experience was quite educational. I am excited. It also occurs to me that because I'm shopping ahead of time and literally investing in my health in a way I will notice and will attach a concrete dollar value to - it will help me stick to the plan in order to get my money's worth.

Interesting gluten-free substitutions I found this week:

• Mary's Gone Crackers. The box says they "Taste Great!" Can't wait. They are made from brown rice, quinoa, flax seeds, and sesame seeds. I don't really know how they are made so I'm not sure if the flax will be intact. 140 kCal per serving (13 crackers, not bad) and 3g fiber, 3g protein. $3.99 for a 6 serving box.
  
• Matter of Flax (who comes up with this shit?) Whole Life Flax Krisps. They perport themselves to be ORGANIC Raw food. 120 kCal per serving (6 Krisps) and 5g protein, 5g fiber. $7.49 (ERRGH!) for a 4 serving box.
  

I did have some trouble finding Gluten free oat bran, but I did find regular GF rolled oats, so I figured those would do. Oats are another mysterious item for me - bran vs. steel cut vs. rolled...how many ways to sell oats can there be???

Anyway. Off I go. Tomorrow I shall clean and prepare for my cooking adventures on the weekend. I'm sure those will be full of bloopers too.