The Last Day of Month One

We made it through a whole month of this new healthy thingamajig! I really haven't been hungry that much and have only had cravings a few times. I haven't had optimal energy at all times but I'm still working the kinks out and I'm really happy with how it is going so far. I'm down eight pounds too. I don't expect to keep up the two pounds a week pace though.

"Ice Cream"

 

Oh my goodness, this was so good! I've seen this recipe floating around the internet here and there and decided to try it. I chopped up a couple of ripe bananas and a bunch of strawberries and froze them, then put the bananas in the food processor, then added the strawberries. Actually, I have a mini food processor so I did it in small batches and transferred it all to a metal bowl a little at a time (I don't know that the metal bowl was necessary but it felt right) then used a hand mixed to mix it all together for a few minutes. I added a teaspoon of vanilla too. Then I put it in the freezer for about a half an hour. It was thick like ice cream and tasted so good! I'm going to have to keep my freezer stocked with sliced up, ripe bananas now.

Pizza!

The kids had pizza with cheese, pineapple and olives. Brent and I had this delicious veggie pizza. We've got sauce, green bell peppers, red onions, mushrooms and olives on a wheat crust. We decided to just top half of it with nutritional yeast and ground up pecans. It was so good with those toppings! I will definitely put it on the whole pizza next time. I had four pieces and figured it was around 500 or so calories for the whole meal. Not bad.

Spaghetti

These beautiful sauteed veggies went on top of spaghetti with kidney beans (for protein) and jarred marinara sauce.  I love me a good sauteed mushroom! We always use kidney beans instead of meat anyway. The veggies really make the spaghetti since you can't use parmesan cheese on top.

Breakfast-y food

Another smoothie. This one had spinach, chia seeds, pineapple, mango and strawberries.

I did put a teeny bit of syrup on these pancakes and it wasn't real maple syrup. They weren't too bad. I made up the recipe with Bob's Red Mill gluten free flour (about 2/3 of a cup), almond meal (about 1/4 cup), frozen blueberries and water. Topped with strawberries. They were quite heavy, slightly bloat inducing and I just can't get past that vague bean taste from the Bob's gf flour. It has chickpea flour and fava bean flour, which makes it healthier (though it has starches in it too) but it comes at a price.

It worked! sorta

So I have this weird thing for chicken salad sandwiches. I usually make them for Christmas dinner and once in the summer. I've had this image in my mind for a while. How could I give up meat and never have my delicious chicken salad sandwiches again? So I wondered if I could replace the chicken with something else. Perhaps chickpeas and cashews. I went to Whole Foods the other day and picked up some vegan mayo. You really aren't supposed to have a lot of fatty stuff like oil and mayo, but once in a while...

I had the vegan mayo and I thought I'd give it a go. I was just really curious about how it would turn out. I mixed it all up and it smelled really good, just like it usually does (it's the tarragon). Everything was ready so I opened the vegan mayo. It did not look right....It did not smell right...I mixed it in the salad mix, hoping for the best, and it most certainly DID NOT taste right! Turns out I don't eat vegan mayonnaise because it is disgusting. At least the brand I bought is disgusting. So what do I do now? My beautiful fake chicken salad was now ruined. Then I thought, what if I rinse it all out? There was nothing in there that couldn't go under the faucet: celery, grapes, pecans, chickpeas, red onions, tarragon, cashews, lemon juice. It would all make it through the wash. Okay, lemon juice wouldn't but I could add more, no problem.

I rinsed it all out, added more lemon juice and put it in the fridge. Today we made the sandwiches for dinner. Added mustard, tomatoes, lettuce and spinach. It was very crumbly but it really did taste pretty good. Not as good as the original chicken salad, I'm not going to lie to you. But it was still good, and now even more healthy without the mayo. I was thinking maybe next time I will leave out the cashews, because I don't really think they were necessary and it already has pecans, and mash up the chickpeas like hummus and add everything else in. Then it would stick together better. The kids even liked it but I promised Zoe I would still make chicken salad sandwiches for Christmas ('cause she loves them too.)

Fathers Day

So I told Brent I didn't know what to make for dinner on Father's Day since all the usual options were out of the question. He told me he wanted a burger and went to the internets and found the recipe he wanted to try. He wanted to try this recipe for "spicy bbq chickpea burgers" and told me I must STICK TO THE RECIPE! Because I usually don't do that. Though we did leave out the pepita seeds. (I had to look that one up, I guess it's the Spanish word for pumpkin seeds.) Oh, and I left the optional kombu out of the chickpeas. I just used canned chickpeas anyway. It turned out pretty good! A little squishy in the middle but pretty tasty. A little on the spicy side, of course. It was just nice to eat a burger!

She also had a recipe for oven baked fries that I made and let me tell ya. That is the best recipe for oven baked fries I've ever tried! Tomorrow I'm going to try it with sweet potatoes. Then we finished the meal off with a gluten free, vegan apple crisp. It was a little too sweet, I think my taste buds may be getting used to less sugar. Hmm.

Becoming burgers! Doesn't it all look pretty?

I also got this for Brent for Father's Day. I usually get him some candy with whatever I get him and this is on the okay list (in moderation, anyway) because it's 72% cacao. I had a piece too. I don't like to get all cliche about chocolate but c'mon, you have to have a little chocolate once in a while.

three weeks gone by

Ha! You probably thought I'd given up and abandoned the plan, but I am still here!

I got this recipe for "oat snackles" from here. They weren't too bad. I used sweetened coconut because that's what I had and I used plain old sugar instead of maple syrup because who do you think I am? A Rockefeller? They all want you to use pure maple syrup but sorry guys, I'm sticking with sugar 'cause that's what I have and it's cheap. They were okay, a little too sweet. Too much of that refined sugar I guess.

Baked potato and homemade vegetarian chili. Kind of an unappetizing picture but it was good enough.

And, blackbean, corn and green chili enchiladas. Thumbs up!

We survived another week!

There were a few low blood sugar moments. I thought I was going to die one day outside the grocery store only a half an hour after dinner (slight exaggeration). Some banana and peanuts did the trick though and keeping an apple or nuts and raisins on hand at all times is recommended! I also realized I have a slight B12 deficiency but that started before the new eating plan began. I had doctor confirmation of this, not just my self-diagnosis. We made a tasty "sorta sorbet" one night with a banana, frozen strawberries and pineapple and a little soy milk and water. I forgot to take a picture. A Subway sub on wheat loaded with veggies and mustard is good stuff. Lastly, I had enough energy to make it through 4 hours of standing up at the They Might Be Giants concert last night so I am not withering away to nothing. Yay!

Beans and rice (and corn) with salsa, spinach, canned beets, and dinosaur kale. Also called lacinato kale but I prefer dinosaur, of course.

We finally ate some tofu! In a yummy stir fry. Added some cashews to it too.

Quinoa salad. Quinoa, garbnanzo beans, kidney beans, tomatoes, red onion, olives and Italian dressing mixed in. Served on a bed of spinach. Also, strawberries (we eat a lot of strawberries) and tortilla chips with guacamole and salsa.

I guess we aren't being absolutely strict on this Forks Over Knives thing. I made pumpkin bread the other day with my gluten free baking mix that has milk in it and eggs in the recipe. I ate a couple of pieces, Brent abstained. I've also had honey a couple of times and oil is being used now and them. I still think we are doing good though.

Week one is done! (almost)

We've made it through the first week of this. It's been a good week but there have been many really hungry moments so I'm going to have to work on that. Here are more pictures! One reason I like the pictures is because I can go back at any time and find a whole slew of ideas, lest I forget.

What is that pile on that plate? Well it's quinoa and lentils sprinkled with roasted almonds and nutritional yeast, of course. Not bad, a bit dry though.

This was so good around day five when I was starving and needing a treat. I saw it on facebook. It said it's supposed to taste just like a Frosty at Wendy's which, of course, is not true but it was still pretty darned good. In the blender I put plain soy milk, ice cubes, cocoa powder, a banana and vanilla. The next night we made it again after we went hiking and added a little chia seeds for extra healthiness.

Fruit salad. Yummy, yummy. (We watched the Wiggles a lot when the kids were little.)

Just a simple burrito with canned, no fat, refried beans. Added a little garlic powder, chili powder and ground cumin and put it in a whole grain tortilla. Baked it in the oven for about 10 minutes. Topped with salsa, guacamole (yes, a lot of guacamole) and olives. Yum!