Day 28

For breakfast, made Creamy Greenie Smoothie from Eat For Health. It was very green. I only had time to take a bite or two before we ran to church. Church starts at 8. whoa.


A few days ago the older kid requested a pink smoothie. I put in as much greens and flaxseed as I could without making it not pink anymore. It has strawberries and banana and sesame seeds and almond milk.


For dinner, made Cabbage Raisin Soup from Disease-Proof Your Child. Recipe said cut cabbage into big chunks, boil for a while till soft then remove with tongs and puree. I couldn't get all the cabbage out of the pot to put in blender, so pieces of cabbage were still in the soup. The walnuts in it seemed weird. Okay, actually this was like, almost, vomit soup. Everybody hated it. Levi took maybe two bites, and he kept taking drinks of water. He was going to vomit, I'm almost sure. This soup was WEIRD. and it's getting BLACKLISTED. i'm really glad I could pull my exhausted self off the couch to slave over this for an hour and a half so that we could dump it all down the disposal. Dang, tonight's dinner sucked. And tonight I am mad at whoever put that recipe in a book.

A Trick Discovered

Maybe it's not a trick, but more like a strategy. But I've been thinking, "Okay, I've been doing this ETL diet for a while now, pretty consistently, and not really lost much weight, I don't think." And it was true. I weighed myself at the YMCA and I really hadn't lost much at all. So what was up? I discovered it is my habit of eating a lot at night. I can eat almost nothing all day, but when night comes around I tend to eat lots and then go to sleep. This makes for an uncomfortable feeling of my stomach having food in it when I go to bed. It also makes for a less restful sleep. It also means I wake up not hungry at all, and not even feeling like my blood sugar is low. But I figured out, in just a single day, that I can drop multiple pounds if I eat according to true hunger cues, and don't eat a bunch at night out of habit! Just eat a little dinner and leave it, because I'll be going to bed soon, what the heck would I need to eat a bunch for? And know that in the morning, when I'm hungry, I can eat breakfast, like normal people do in the mornings. And I'll actually want and be able to enjoy eating breakfast! And I'll find that I've lost multiple pounds! I'm now 3 pounds away from Dr. Fuhrman's recommended weight for people of my height, which is just an estimation because people's bodies are different, but I'm using it as a guideline. I actually felt better about 5 years ago when I weighed 7 pounds less than that (10 pounds less than I do now). I was pretty thin. I was running regularly, and doing some strength training. And I felt great. It would be nice to get back there.

So that's the trick: DON'T EAT AT NIGHT. Pay attention to true hunger, and eat only to fulfill that, then stop, and you'll wake up finding your body feasted on your extra fat stores during the night. I shouldn't phrase this like it generalized to other people, because it may not. And it may well only work best for people who are also running during the day, and eating according to ETL. I really don't know. I'm just psyched to have discovered it. It's going to make things a lot easier, if I can just break the habit!

Day 25

Breakfast was a fatty ol' green smoothie with blueberries, mango, good stuff.

Lunch was sorta...I snacked on some raw snap peas we got at Costco. I ate some baby carrots, later some apple slices. Made myself a salad at one point.

Dinner was leftover cabbage mushroom soup, leftover eggplant stuff with a little whole wheat spaghetti and tomato sauce, and a little of some lentil vegetable soup I made.

Then I just had an orange and I'm going to eat the other half of this smoothie from this morning.

Day 24

Good day today. I'm paying attention to true hunger cues. It's enlightening.

Here's this Mushroom-Barley Soup with Cannellini Beans and Cabbage that I made a few nights ago.


I'm working on trying to get the kids to eat healthier, looking at recipes and seeing what looks good to try. The younger kid ate a good smoothie that was pinkish-green the other day. I hid flaxseed and beans and spring mix greens in it. And the younger kid also ate a good sized salad today. The older one is frustrating me lately, but we will get there.

Tonight, Husband made a sauce with some wine and seitan to serve over whole wheat spaghetti, and sauteed some asparagus in olive oil. I was thrilled that the older child seemed to really enjoy the asparagus and ate a lot of it!

I didn't eat any asparagus, b/c I didn't want the oil. I was bent on my goal of a pound of raw vegetables and a pound of cooked.

I made this stuff I really love, Creamy Peanut Kale, except without the oil. I couldn't tell the diff, flavor-wise, without the oil. Tasted fantastic to me. I cut down on the Bragg's, too. I upped the ratio of spices to peanut butter. This is just so good. I ate 14 ounces of cooked kale this way, and felt, and still feel, fantastic. My stomach is so happy.

I used to eat this over brown rice, with more salt or Bragg's on top. But tonight it was wonderful just as-is. Plenty salty. Didn't wish for rice. Liberation!

Lunch was the same salad I've been eating the past several days. I'm not tired of it. Was wonderful. My bin of Spring Mix is on its way out, so I need to put the rest of it in a smoothie tomorrow. Food today also included grapes, baby carrots, apple slices, an orange, and a couple raw almonds. Life is good.

Day 23

For lunch, had wonderful salad of romaine and spring mix with goddess dressing, and then some eggplant casserole. For dinner had leftovers: veggie burger with lettuce and mustard, grapes, pineapple, baby carrots, some more eggplant casserole. Then we had family night and ate apples.

Day 22

Made Mushroom-Barley Soup with Cannellini Beans and Cabbage for dinner.

I'm so listening to real hunger and gaining insight into the difference between toxic and true hunger. I literally didn't feel any true hunger all day long, until I think close to dinnertime. I know I definitely didn't feel any true hunger before about 5pm. After that I'm not sure. But I had a bowl of the soup and felt satisfied.

I subbed Great Northern beans for the Cannellini beans, because that's what I have and as of yet I can't tell the diff. I don't think Levi was real thrilled with this. But I think when I'm really hungry that anything nourishing tastes good. I liked it. So there. Kids ate their little bit of soup, and then had brown rice with Bragg's.

I also made Creamy Creole Eggplant Casserole. I didn't eat any of this because I had filled up after the soup. Levi had some, but didn't say anything about it, so maybe he hated it. I will probably love it. When I made the breadcrumbs for this by toasting a piece of bread and putting it in the food processor, big chunks of the bread were obviously not toasty enough to turn into crumbs, and would not process, so I picked the chunks out of the food processor and tossed them into the sink, and just put the rest of the crumbs on top. This was kind of time intensive, and I get impatient easily, like waiting for the eggplant to be cool enough to handle to get the guts out after baking it. And I baked it for a long time, and then peeled the skins off like a sunburn, and the insides were soft but still in one piece, not completely mushy. I squoze out some of the water from them and chopped them up. That seemed to work well. It was fun. It's always fun to cook. Even though I feel bad that my kids are watching some stupid show or movie while I do it. They are getting a healthy dinner, so why should I guilt trip myself over it? A person can't do everything.

So yeah, I feel good now. Worked out today at the Y. The younger kid played in the babysitting place, and seemed to have enjoyed himself. I ran three glorious treadmill miles, much of it on a speed 6.5 or 7, which felt incredible. I feel like someone else when I run. I ran in my $8 water socks...my budget minimalist footwear. And then I did a couple weight machines. I feel all calm and nice now.

Day 21

Breakfast: An orange. Then we went to church all early.

Lunch: I made Balsamic Glazed Chickpeas and Mustard Greens and ate the whole thing myself. Yum. I don't care how many calories it is, it makes me feel AWESOME.

Dinner: We totally BS'ed dinner because we'd gone to the zoo this afternoon and were tired and didn't feel like making dinner. We had veggie burgers from the freezer.

Here is some stuff we've been eating lately...pics that were on my camera:

another green smoothie






pretty hot pink chopped swiss chard stems


Savory Swiss Chard Pie that didn't turn out like it was supposed to, was too watery


piece of above pie, see how watery? i think my tofu wasn't firm enough or something. looked like vomit. i totally ate it anyway.


my kid with green smoothiestache


what 5 oz of raw spinach looks like in my 96 ounce blender jar


after I put in the rest of the ingredients for the Chocolate Smoothie from the book Eat For Health


this is how much the chocolate smoothie recipe makes


a cup of chocolate smoothie

i loved it. the kids tried some and liked it okay but were not in love and asking for seconds. of course they were biased by the valentines candy the older kid brought home from school, psh.

older kid with chocolate smoothiestache

Day 20

Day 20 was yesterday. It was Saturday. What did I eat? Honestly I can't even remember. That is a sign that I should do this every night and not ditch out and think I can remember the next day. For dinner we had friends over and I made Cassoulet from the Moosewood book. I made roasted asparagus, from the same cookbook. I can't remember breakfast or lunch. I buttered and toasted sliced baguette but I didn't eat that.

Day 19

Breakfast was a green smoothie and I had it really late, so it was kind of lunch, also. Had some pineapple while I was making dinner, and for dinner we had Fat Tuesday's Skinny Red Beans (from Moosewood) which were rather bland and boring, brown rice, and California Creamed Kale (one of Dr. Furhman's recipes).

List of Benefits of Eating to Live

I've been surprised at the number of positive benefits that have resulted from Eating To Live for me so far. I'm going to list them here, in no particular order.

~ no more irritable bowel or stomach cramps
~ no more premenstrual headaches (or any other headaches)
~ lighter, almost pain-free periods
~ feeling happier
~ able to do more stuff in a day without crashing
~ arthritic 'old man' pain in my knees all gone
~ ugly belly fat is going away
~ not getting any coughs, colds, flu, sore throat, or anything
~ my back never hurts anymore
~ greatly diminished cravings for junk food
~ my eyes and face look healthier
~ better skin

Day 18

I think there may be some connection between eating grains, or too much of grain products, and pain in my knees. Weird huh? We've had a couple rough days, food wise and otherwise. We ate leftovers, and I had granola a couple times when I shouldn't have, and made some cookies that weren't all the way bunny-friendly, but we've been doing okay.

Breakfast: green smoothie

Lunch: salad with Susan's Goddess Dressing

Dinner: Savory Swiss Chard Pie from Fat Free Vegan Kitchen blog, brown rice rotini with red sauce

Day 14

Breakfast: Did not eat.

Lunch: Salad of romaine with miso ginger dressing from Moosewood Low-Fat cookbook, and orange.

Dinner: A couple raw baby carrots. Spicy White Bean and Sweet Potato Stew with Collards. Balsamic-glazed Chickpeas with Mustard Greens (except I subbed kale for the mustard greens). Roasted chickpeas.

Today I messed up by eating granola in the late afternoon, and by eating a few brownies (vegan and with no refined sugar, but still not ETL-compatible) after dinner, with the justification that it was a holiday so it was okay. It tasted good, but I just don't feel as clean and energetic when I do that. It is my first mess-up in 14 days, though, so I am not going to feel too bad. It was just a reminder that I feel better eating according to plan. I don't think I would have eaten the granola if I had eaten breakfast that morning, and if I had eaten more for lunch. I also need to chew my food better, so I can digest it better, and so I can more easily tell when my body is satiated.

My lunch salad about made me gag. That salad dressing has too much ginger in it, or something. Dinner was good, though. I need to slow down and pay attention while I'm eating.


Dinner, the only changes I made to the stew was adding fewer tomatoes than the recipe called for (because I had half a can of leftover ones in the fridge I wanted to use up), and cooking it on the stove instead of in the Crock Pot. It turned out well.

Day 13

Breakfast: Smoothie with spring greens, banana, pineapple, blueberries, strawberries, almond milk, water, flaxseed, hemp seeds.

Lunch: Leftover Harira, Veggie Patty on a Sandwich Thin with mustard and lettuce.

Dinner: Tofu and Broccoli with Pineapple Sauce, Balsamic-Glazed Chickpeas and Mustard Greens, leftover Carrot Orange Salad.


So I figured we didn't need another picture of my smoothie. It looked like the others. It was pretty and tasted really good.

I think Harira is even better as leftovers than freshly stewed. The Sandwich Thin was my serving of starch for the day.

Levi gave the Tofu and Broccoli with Pineapple Sauce 4 stars. I give it 5. Loved it. But I love tofu and broccoli and pineapple anyway. And this was very simple to make. Levi and the kids had it over brown rice. I had it as-is because I'd already consumed my starch for the day, but I didn't think, "Aw, I wish I could have rice." This was great as it was.


And I made the mustard greens dish because I had bought these mustard greens about a week ago when the store was out of kale, and had put some in a smoothie and hated it. I wanted to give the rest of the mustard greens another chance with me, and I didn't want them to go to waste. So I made this dish and I am SO GLAD I did. It was very addictingly good. I give it 5 stars and will definitely make it again. Nobody else had any, which is just as well. I went heavy on the chickpeas and ended up having leftover chickpeas but no leftover mustard greens. I've got some kale, though, in the fridge, that I'll cook the same way and have with the rest of the chickpeas tomorrow or the next day. Yeah! Mustard greens are cool after all!

I think I cooked the mustard greens too long. I had a kid asking me to snap the snap on his pants, and another asking me to write her name on her water bottle and cut the tag off something we bought earlier today, and the oven beeping for me to take the cover off the baking tofu, so I'm not a slacker. ;-D

Good day. I think one thing I need to work on is not eating too much at dinner. I tend to eat until I'm stuffed, and I should stop when I'm just plain full, not stuffed. I also totally didn't eat a raw salad today. I had raw greens in my smoothie, but not enough of them, really. I need new salad ideas. Overall things are going great, I'm feeling invincible.

Day 12

Breakfast: Green smoothie with spring greens, flaxseed, hemp seed, almond milk, strawberries, banana, frozen grapes, blueberries, water.

Breakfast smoothie before.


Breakfast smoothie after.

Perty color. This one was very good. This made enough to fill 2 1/2 cups. I drank one and froze the rest.

Lunch: Leftover Carrot Orange Salad. Salad of romaine and spring greens with some more Carrot Orange Salad dumped on top, and this miso ginger dressing from the Moosewood book I've been using a lot lately. Leftover vegetable-tofu stir-fry stuff.

Salad.


Dinner: Some raw baby carrots. Tofu and Vegetables with Lower-Fat Thai Peanut Sauce, slightly modified.

Traffic and the trains and buses are all crazy tonight because the roads aren't all cleared of the storm, so Levi's commute was delayed and we had a late dinner. So the kids and I ate baby carrots while we waited for Daddy to come home. The vegetable dish was supposed to be steamed, but I don't have a steamer big enough, so I put some water in the bottom of our wok and put a lid over it and steamed them that way. It seemed to work fine. And then, because the Eat-to-Live six-week plan says you aren't supposed to have very many nuts (or nut butters) and this sauce had peanut butter, I cut the amount down to two tablespoons and cheated by using arrowroot to thicken the sauce. The baked tofu tasted SOOO good. I could easily have just eaten all the tofu myself for dinner. I cooked some whole wheat spaghetti and brown rice, so Levi and the kids would have a choice of starches as a bed for their veggies and tofu.

Here's the yummy stuff.

Levi and I used to rate new recipes on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being super yummy and 1 being yucky. We gave this recipe a 4, although it might have gotten a 5 if we'd been able to include all the chili sauce (we leave spicy stuff out frequently for the kids' sake) and peanut butter.

Day 11

Breakfast: Nothing. Was not hungry.

Lunch: Salad with balsamic dressing.

Dinner: Some baby carrots. Carrot Orange Salad from Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites. Harira (from the same book).

From the Eat-To-Live Yahoo group I asked the other group members if they had any ideas for how to make salad dressing thicker (without oil). One of the great suggestions was to blend in flax seeds. I never would have thought that this would thicken salad dressing, but it sure did! I added too much flaxseed, though. It thickens a lot more as it sits in the fridge after you're done blending. Look how thick the salad dressing got when I put it on my salad today.

Other suggestions for how to thicken salad dressing included adding xanthan gum or chia seeds. I would like to try those too.

Levi did not like the carrot orange salad. I think it's good. Not fantastic, but good.

I will eat the rest by myself.

The Harira was delicious. So nourishing. I will need to double this next time.

Day 10

Breakfast: Leftover green smoothie I had frozen the other day. The one with mustard greens in it. Too spicy! Drank it anyway.

Lunch: A few apple slices. A couple baby carrots. An orange. A big salad with cut up carrots and a creamy cashew dressing the recipe for which was posted on the Eat To Live Yahoo Group. Another orange.

It is fun making dressings in the blender.


The salad I had at lunch:

These salads are all starting to look the same. Ha.

Dinner: Creamy Broccoli Soup the original recipe for which comes from John Robbins' book May All Be Fed. A vegetable-tofu stir-fry. Two more oranges. (Yeah, four oranges in one day. That is a lot of oranges.)

I left out the cashews and went heavy on the broccoli for our soup. That soup is better with russet or yukon gold potatoes, and I used red ones tonight. It tasted kinda slimy to me. Next time I'll go back to a drier potato. But the family ate it. It's one of the kids' favorites.


Last week when I was on a hunt for miso that didn't cost a fortune (like the miso at Whole Foods) we discovered a really fun place called Duangrat's Oriental Food Mart. I decided while I was there to ask if they had seitan, and the lady said she used to carry fresh seitan, but demand wasn't high enough so now they only have canned. I bought a few cans in different flavors. They did have miso for about 1/3 the price of miso at Whole Foods. And then my eye caught a bag of little heads of this baby bok choy and I just could not pass it up.

We had some in our miso soup a few days ago, but there was some left over. So tonight I made a stir-fry from garlic, the stir-fry frozen mixed veggies from Costco, the baby bok choy, and half a block of tofu. I made the stir-fry sauce from miso using this recipe. It turned out well and I was grateful, because I was going to gag on the soup. Very strange because that soup usually turns out great and we all love it.

Vegetable and tofu stir-fry with miso sauce.

Day 9

Breakfast: Leftover smoothie I froze a couple days ago.

Lunch: Salad with cut up apples and balsamic vinaigrette. Leftover Feijoada (that stuff is finally all eaten!)

Dinner: Apple slices, one of these veggie patties on one of these sandwich thins with mustard and lettuce, leftover chickpea spinach stuff.

What a cop out day! I don't have a single photo to post.

Day 8

Breakfast: Green smoothie containing mustard greens, collard greens, flaxseed, hempseed, almond milk, water, banana, strawberries, mango, blueberries.


So we were at Whole Foods yesterday, and there's been all this snow dumped on the DC area over the weekend, which nobody's used to, so the stores all got bought out of food before the storm hit, and weren't restocked yesterday. So pickings were slim. But I needed some green leafy stuff. And my usual kale was gone. All the varieties. So I thought what the heck, we'll try mustard greens for fun. So I got mustard greens and collards. I'd heard before that mustard greens were a little strong so to mix them with a milder green the first time you put them in a green smoothie. I am very glad that I followed that piece of advice, because I could TOTALLY taste those mustard greens this morning. My smoothie was still good, though. It just tasted like I'd gone and picked some weeds and threw them in there. Mustard greens taste like weeds. They look like weeds too. My husband said, "They are weeds." So if I purchase mustard greens again in the future, I will probably use them in smaller amounts, or in another application. But I'm glad to have tried mustard greens. Now I feel I've had the whole mustard greens experience and I can move on.

Lunch was a salad. A salad? For real? Yeah, with apples and balsamic dressing I made that is too vinegary. But oh well. The salad was still good. And then I had a little leftover Feijoada. I can't believe how much leftovers that recipe made. It should be gone by now. But it hadn't gone bad yet, and is good and filling.

Look, his and hers salads. Aw. My husband said, hey take a pic of both our salads. Ok, I said. Yah, mine's bigger.


You wanted a close up of my salad, didn't you? I thought so.


Dinner: Adzuki Bean Stir Fry over brown rice. Strawberries. An orange.

Here is the stir-fry with some brown rice.


The other thing we got at Whole Foods yesterday was adzuki beans, because I was planning on making this stir-fry. I was excited to buy them because I have never bought, cooked, or eaten adzuki beans before. I think they're really cool looking, and cute. They're a little smaller, I think, than black beans or navy beans. They're different and fun. I cooked them in the pressure cooker. They didn't have to be soaked first...nice.

Day 7

Breakfast: A smoothie made of spring greens, carrots, grapes, strabwerries, half a banana, flaxseed, hemp seeds, almond milk, and water. Turned out a real pretty pink color.


Lunch: A salad made of spring greens and romaine, grapes, apples, balsamic vinaigrette. Then I had some more grapes plain.


Dinner: Miso soup with baby bok choy, snow peas, tofu, green onion, and a small amount of leftover seitan that needed to get used up. Then for my serving of starch I had a cup of whole wheat thin spaghetti with this miso-tofu sauce that's one of our favorite foods (kids included). Tonight was my first time making miso soup. It was also my first time making dashi or using kombu. Before a few days ago I didn't even know what kombu looked like. It's cool stuff. This was fun. And the soup was husband-approved, and I thought very satisfying and nourishing. Oh, and I ate some apple slices while the soup was cooking.

Miso soup closeup.

Day 6

Breakfast: not hungry, skipped

Lunch: handful of baby carrots, leftover Feijoada, salad of spring mixed greens and romaine with orange and Ken's Lite Accents Italian Vinaegrette dressing, and another plain orange (though the orange was anything but plain...I love oranges)

Lunch salad.


Dinner: leftover tamale pie, leftover chickpea spinach stuff, apple slices, grapes

Day 5

Breakfast: A green smoothie containing flaxseed, hempseed, almond milk, water, spring mix greens, raspberries, blueberries, half a banana, mango. It was a little tart, and very good. I ate the whole thing.



Lunch: Salad made from romaine, spring mix greens, carrots, kidney beans, and Tofu Island Dressing.


Dinner: Tamale Pie from the Moosewood Low Fat Favorites cookbook.

I decided to try making cornmeal by grinding some popcorn in the Blendtec.

By golly, it works!


The finished Pie isn't so beautiful, but around here we're of the opinion that taste IS beauty. And this scored quite high on the taste scale.


If they kids ate as low-fat and low-carb a diet as I'm eating right now, they wouldn't get all the calories they need, so the way I've been handling dinner prep is to make whatever recipe I'm making as a main dish, that I can eat, and then either making extra of the starch (brown rice, whole wheat pasta, etc.) we're having as a side dish, or else just making a separate carb-heavy thing for them to eat. Then we give each of the kids a small amount of my main dish concoction, which they must eat all of in order to have their more starchy food. It's been working really well, and my husband approves of this method.

My daughter asked, tonight, "Mom, why are you always taking pictures of your food?" I said, "Because I like to. I think it's fun, just like taking pictures of you!"



What would I do without a great husband to help blow on the kids' food every night?


Tamale Pie.