Diet

So, the word diet bothers me. In my opinion, a diet is a temporary fix, not a lifetime fix. I understand this fully because I use to be in the same mindset. However, I will re-iterate this, I am not on a diet. I have been through a lifestyle change for the past year and I continue to transform my eating habits into the best lifestyle for my body and my family.

The reason I am bringing this up is because I got asked recently "How long are you going to be on a diet for?" Sigh. While I am participating in a 21 day sugar detox, the word diet is not listed here might I add, all that means is that I am being 100% strict on my already ingrained eating habits with no treats or cheats. I am challenging myself to eat better and hoping to get long lasting habits that stay with me throughout the course of my life. I am not doing a detox to lose weight.

There are no quick fixes to lose weight, and if you find a quick fix, I guarantee that as soon as you stop whatever you are doing, you will gain the weight right back. In order to successfully lose weight and maintain a healthy weight, you have to transform your life by eating proper, clean meals & getting physical exercise - not starving yourself, taking diet pills, doing temporary food diets. Transforming years of bad eating and your life is NOT easy. It is very difficult at first but gets easier in time. You will constantly have temptations to eat the old crap you use to, because it's easier, but nothing worth having comes easy. If you want to feel better about yourself, evaluate what you eat, get rid of the crap, and start eating whole foods & adding in a walk here and there, and so on. I know I sound like a b word, but the truth is a cold hard explicit deleted. Strive to be healthy the right, long lasting way, not the easy temporary diet way. You CAN do this - you just have to decide if you really WANT to.

Take Two

My first meal today was fabulous - we woke up late, so it was brunch. I took one egg, and a little bit of almond flour. Seasoned the almond flour with celtic salt, pepper, cayenne, & garlic powder. Dipped the chicken in egg, then almond flour, then placed it on the stove in a small amount of coconut oil. I pan grilled it to perfection. I turned the oven on 350 & roasted the okra in olive oil & pepper, as well as the carrots in olive oil & cinnamon. The cauli mash was leftovers in the fridge. The pancakes were the following ingredients; 1 green tipped banana, splash of coconut milk, almond flour, flaxseed meal, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla extract, 1 cup of egg whites. I had originally planned on these to be waffles, but after an epic fail in the waffle maker, (it was too wet of a mix to come together), these became pancakes.

Dinner was the following - spaghetti squash w/marinara, grilled chicken breast, & sauteed spinach. Spaghetti squash can seem scary because you have no idea what the hell to do with this big yellow veggie, but I'll tell you a secret, the hardest part about preparing it, is cutting into it. I really need to invest in good knives. SO to prepare spaghetti squash, you simply cut it vertically in half & scoop out the seeds & strings. Face the squash face down (insides facing the pan) and bake for about 20 mins on 350. Pull it out of the oven and take a fork and scoop out the insides - Viola! So afterwards I seared the "noodles" w/garlic and celtic salt, then added gluten free/no sugar added Rao's marinara. I really liked this marinara sauce, it was pricey, but well worth it. I grilled the chicken breast stove top in olive oil & seasoned them with oregano, celtic salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, and thyme. One they were finished, I moved them over and sauteed spinach in the chicken juices. Easy, peasy! The finished master piece is shown below.

While I had dinner going, I looked through reviews of a bread recipe that I could give a try to make for my husband's sandwiches. I decided to go with this one at Elanas Pantry. I will let you guys know whether it was a nay or yay with the husband, but I can tell you, it smelled pretty good & was not stiff feeling. I couldn't taste test it because the 21DSD states no arrowroot powder, or maple syrup. Shown below is a picture of all of my ingredients before I mixed them up, as well as the after product. Looks tasty right?

•  Arrowroot powder
• Flaxseed meal
• Unblanched almond flour
• ACV (apple cider vinegar)
• Baking soda
• Celtic Salt
• Maple syrup
• Four eggs
• And I added sesame seeds to the top

Gluten Free Bread

Noms!

Lastly, I capped off my night with something I have been DYING to try since I first read about it. But before I tell you what it is, let me explain why you see a picture of Irish butter. I kept seeing people talk about "Bulletproofing their coffee" on different blogs I came across, as well as in the 21DSD forum on facebook. You can read more about this bullet proof coffee conundrum here. I will briefly explain what it is - basically you get organic coffee beans, beans that do not mold, grind them up and make the coffee. Then add 1-2tbsp of GRASSFED unsalted butter, and 30grams of MCT oil, blend and you get a frothy cup of coffee. When I read this, I died! Butter - in coffee? Har! However, I was intrigued. My thoughts; Pure, grassfed butter is more or less heavy cream. I love creamy coffee. This is a good way to get healthy fats in my system. Sure, I'll try it! So after doing research, MCT oil can be found in coconut oil. I already have that, so I'll substitute MCT for that. However, the only butter I have is ghee.

I went to our local Basic Foods and they didn't have this brand of butter. So on to HEB I went. Sadly, the only Kerrygold I could find was this whipped, low fat kind. Fail. I drove home hearing the charley brown song in my head with my head down. I was going to have to order this butter online and wait to try it! Oh the injustice! I researched what site to order this butter from and almost ordered it, but decided to check at HEB one last time after reading that it could possibly be located by the cheese. I did a quick scan and didn't see it, but right as I was going to turn around, I spotted the gold and silver Kerrygold packages! SCORE!!

So, it was too late to have coffee so brewed a cup of my chai green/black tea mix. Added 1tbsp of kerrygold butter & 1tsp of coconut oil & blended it. I cautiously took a sip and oh mah gerd, it was this frothy goodness!!  Please note the creaminess of the the cup! I can NOT wait to try this in a cup of coffee tomorrow morning. I have not been drinking coffee at all lately, so we shall see. Again, to learn more about this bulletproofing your coffee - visit google or Bulletproof Exec Website.

~Until next time,

Ruby
Day 16DSD

Absence

Day 16 of 21DSD!

So, my sister informed me that I am slacking on my blogging. I will not disagree with her.. LOL. I've been a bad blogger, a bad, bad, blogger. I've just been busy living my life.. sigh. But I promise to do better ;)

Six days have passed since my last entry. I've posted a slew of pictures to let you know what kind of foods that I have been eating. I can tell you, my favorite thus far was the bangers and mash - sausage w/mashed cauliflower - AMAZING.

My meals have basically been; eggs and a meat with chai black/green tea blend, water, acv/lemon/water, pumpkin pancakes, banana pancakes, fish/veggies.

As of right now, I am making spaghetti squash w/spaghetti sauce and sauteed spinach and chicken. NOM!

Day 16 Meals:
1. Banana pancake, pan grilled almond flour chicken, roasted carrots, roasted okra.
2. Water
3. Water, lemon, ACV
4. Chai green/black tea mix w/coconut milk & cinnamon
5. Spaghetti squash w/gluten & sugar free spaghetti sauce, spinach, grilled chicken
6. 1 cup coconut water

Activities: Tennis, Brisk 1 mile walk, 30 push-ups.

 

This is what I have been doing in my spare time instead of blogging ^ so be angry at the book ;)

~Until next time,

Ruby

Untitled

Day 9 of the 21DSD!

What what! 12 more days left of my sugar detox. T W E L V E! And as the days are dwindling down, I am discovering new ways to make food taste fabulous! I am very satisfied with the meals I had today and right now, I am quite stuffed!

I have been slacking on working out, a fear complex has set in. I am forcing myself to get over it starting tomorrow. I need to get back on the wagon and do what makes me feel best about myself. Time to get serious and re-evaluate what I want goal wise.

Meals:
1. Two egg omelet w/tomato, spinach, onion, steak & pumpkin pancakes
2. Grassfed beef & cabbage sautee w/carrot smash
3. GT citrus kombucha
4. ACV, Lemon, Water
5. 1 cup of hot water  w/lemon
6. 1 cup of coffee w/coconut milk, vanilla, cinnamon
7. 1 green apple w/toasted pecan, coconut, cinnamon in coconut milk
8. Water, water, water!
9. Cod liver oil
10. 1 cup of bone broth

~ Until next time,

Ruby

Things are looking up!: Day 4 of the 21DSD

So I realize that yesterday I was in severe turmoil over the fact that I couldn't have a bowl of sugar crisps, sugar crisps for effing sake, I haven't had those in a VERY long time, but today is looking up! I know right now I am being very 'cray cray' because my moods are switching from extreme pessimism to optimism.  I keep checking my calendar to see if it's that time of the month, if you know what I mean. However, flow isn't expected right now. Yes, I am sure you wanted to know that.

It's hard to believe that food can effect a person's moods in such extremes! Have I read that it can? Sure - who hasn't? It just seemed like some scholar malarkey to me, that is, until I experienced it first hand, as in right now. I am feeling moodiness, irritability, and fatigue. Today I came up with a million excuses not to work out, I had myself convinced that I should not go. At the last minute, I forced myself out of the house to go to Crossfit and I am SO glad that I did. It definitely helped me mood wise and my motivated for that 1/2 cup of sweet potato helped as well ;). Oh sweet potatoes, how I have missed you! (Can't have sweet potatoes while sugar detoxing unless you are doing an athlete modification, then 1/2 cup is allowed on the day of the work out)

Well, enough of my up and down babbling. It's 11:38pm and I am tired, well sort of. I keep getting these random bursts of energy that come and go. For instance, right now. But I shall not go to the dark side, I will get some sleep!

My meals:

1. Scrambled eggs in Ghee (clarified butter) w/bacon & roasted carrots

2. This epic salad featured below - Steak, Bell pepper, cucumber, tomatoes, onion w/balsamic vinegar

3. Lamb meatballs, salad w/olive oil & lemon, and my beloved sweet potatoes (Look how sexy those sweet potatoes are!!)

4. Tons of water! Seriously, every time my glass is empty, I refill it!

                               

~ Until next time,

Ruby

Day 3 - 21DSD

For those of you who haven't read my past post's, I'll do a short recap; DSD means Day Sugar Detox. I am participating in a 21 day sugar detox - http://the21daysugardetox.com . I have also decided to give the paleo eating lifestyle a try to see if it helps me with some stomach issues that I have had, as well as getting sick so often.

So, today marks day 3 of the sugar detox and I gotta say, I am craving fruit in the worst way. My mouth is watering for something juicy and sweet. (FRUIT, ya pervs!) Am I going to survive this? Yes, I will, but it won't be easy. The only thing that is keeping me going is the fact that I am feeling so light right now, also, I'm very competitive and consider this a big challenge that I want to conquer.

So on top of the fruit cravings, I am pretty tired and irritable today. My husband and I went to a pizza place for lunch. I got a salad from the salad bar that was so completely unsatisfying that it put me in a negative mood. I felt very disappointed in my lunch because the salad and veggies tasted less than fresh. That being said, I didn't eat much of my lunch at all! :(

After lunch we went by starbucks and I got an iced green tea (unsweetened of course silly!). The green tea was fresh and cool and even tasted sweet to me. It was just what I needed. My husband took a sip of it, gagged, then proceeded to sip on his vanilla bean frapp with satisfaction. The bastard!! hehe
I felt my mood shift drastically while drinking my tea. Maybe it was washing away remnants of the sub par salad I had for lunch? Or maybe it was fabulous to me because I usually have a warm cup of coffee every morning and today I did not? Who knows - What I do know is that the green tea curbed my sugar craving for the day! Yay!! :o)


In a nutshell, that was my day. Here's hoping that this gets easier. I did read that by day 5-7 you start to feel better when sugar detoxing, so I just gotta keep swimming! :)




Day 3 Meals:
1. Egg scramble (3 eggs, spinach, red onion, tomato, mushrooms), 2 slices of bacon,  oven roasted carrots
2. Salad w/spinach, eggs, sunflower seeds, cucumber, tomatoes, cauliflower, onion, bell pepper, green olives, mushrooms with vinegar and olive oil. (went to a pizza place so I ate from the salad bar)
3. Almonds & coconut flakes
                                          4. Iced green tea (unsweetened)
                                          5. Left over chicken tortilla-less soup
                                          6. Lots and lots of water!!



~ Until next time,


Ruby

Reset!

So, in lieu of  more than a few crap food choices that I recently indulged in, I felt the need to detox my body of crap, aka sugar. I know what you are thinking - CRAZY! A few years ago, I would have totally been with you on that one. However, things have changed, and now that my eyes are open, I realize how badly sugar is the enemy. I have been feeling extremely run down, lazy, moody, and just flat out bleh! I believe that the culprit of these craptastic feelings has a lot to do with the fake food that I have been eating, as well as my lack of working out.

It's a new year, which means that we all get the chance to start over, aka RESET.

My new year has gone off smoothly with two crossfit classes last week that my husband and brother in law attended with me! I was stoked that my husband gets to try out crossfit (Our local box is offering two free weeks to anyone)! Needless to say, that after 2 1/2 weeks of not working out, I am horrendously sore, but in a good way ;)

I signed up for the 21 day sugar detox that one of the bloggers that I follow is doing. Not really sure if I could detox my body from sugar for THREE weeks or not, I waited a few days after she started to read over the documents and pump myself up.  I had planned on starting on Monday, but after going yesterday with no sugar, I decided that would be day 1 and jumped in feet first. I am not on day 2 and feeling pretty good. Basically what this 21 day detox entails is no sugar (breads, fruits, potatoes, sweeteners, etc). I found out last night that I really crave sugar the most at night. I was strong though and drank hella water to pull through!

Today marks day 2. I drank half a cup of coffee with coconut milk, cinnamon, and no sweetener. It was a fail. I am so use to having my stevia sweetened coffee. So, I do believe coffee will be out of the equation for me and I will try to do green tea w/ginger & lemon. If not, then all caffeine is out for me.

I should add that I am also on Day 3 of Paleo eating. Lots of challenge's at once happening here!

Meals so far-

Day 1:

1. Steamed snow crab legs, roasted veggies, salad (oil & vinegar dressing)

2. Steak smothered in bell pepper, onion, mushrooms w/avocado & sauteed garlic spinach - cooked in organic extra virgin olive oil 

3. Almonds & coconut flakes

4. Lots of water

5. Kickin kombucha (first time to try this drink and it was.. interesting)

Day 2:

1. Egg Scramble (eggs, red onion, spinach, mushroom, tomatoes - cooked in bacon fat), 2 strips of bacon, and side of avocado

2. 1/2 cup of Coffee - coconut milk, cinnamon, no sweetener.

3. 3 cups of lemon infused water

I'll keep you posted! 

To learn more about the 21 day detox, visit their website http://the21daysugardetox.com

To visit Amber's blog to see how she is doing on her detox, visit http://exsoycise.com

Want to know what the hell Kombucha is? Visit the website to learn - http://www.kickinkombucha.com/about/

What the hell is paleo? http://robbwolf.com/what-is-the-paleo-diet/

http://cavemanstrong.com/food/paleo/