Whole30 Day Four

• Breakfast was three eggs fried, garlicky spinach, half a sweet potato this time, and half an avocado. Also some fruit leftover from last night. Still pretty full, so maybe the half sweet potato is better for me.
• Lunch is leftover meatballs, mashed potatoes and gravy and some broccoli that I cooked in the microwave at work. Also a hard boiled egg.
• Dinner was tomato sauce with leftover "meat"balls over spaghetti squash  with broiled asparagus for me and garlic bread for Leela. Ebon got Lasagna at Mikes!

I think I need to eat less, because I just feel so full all the time. Maybe this is normal, and I'm glad I'm full vs starving, but I don't like the way full feels all the time either.

Whole30 Day Three

• Breakfast garlicky spinach, with three fried eggs, a sweet potato, and half an avocado. I used olive oil again, but the eggs turned out a little better.
• I didn't eat a PreWO snack because I was still so full from breakfast, but probably should have. I felt a little sluggish near the end of my 30 minute run on the treadmill.
• PostWO I had a few bites of beets from the fajitas and mostly the white from a hard boiled egg (some yolk wouldn't separate easily, so I just ate that.
• Lunch at 2pm was leftover fajita wraps, avocado, and hard boiled egg.
• Dinner is mushroom walnut "meat"balls with green beans, mashed potatoes and gravy. I made the "meat"balls the night before, and was glad I did because they are a bit time consuming. I got the recipe from here. When raw, they are pretty "walnutty" and still were after baking. I think if I make these again - they were very tasty- I'll have to change my process to fix the texture, as in I'll pulse the walnuts first to get more of a fine meal, versus the larger chunks that I had from mixing everything together in the food processor. The gravy I made from this recipe, didn't turn out very good either. I used olive oil for the fat and water instead of broth. I also added a mushroom and spun everything in the blender. The flavor was fine, but it was just to runny, even after adding more starch. I'll have to keep trying a different gravy, or add more mushrooms, and maybe some nutritional yeast too.
• Snacks was a bunch of fruit after dinner - I probably didn't need to eat it, but it was tasty.

I roasted the spaghetti squash for tomorrow's meal last night.

Whole30 Day Two

• Breakfast was 3 eggs, a small head of broccoli, and a (white) sweet potato all cooked or warmed up in olive oil and half an avocado. I'm not sure I like having a sweet potato in the morning, but I was so full after eating this, I didn't really want to eat lunch or PWO meal. I also don't really like eggs, etc cooked in olive oil. I like the way things cook in butter much better, so I really want to get on top of making ghee. Tonight hopefully!
• Post Work out was a hard boiled egg, and a pear. Though I learned that fruit isn't a good PWO food. Oh well... I wasn't very hungry, but ate it anyway.
• Lunch was leftover avocado ceviche and zucchini boats from yesterday. Ate this at almost 3 because I was so full.
• Dinner was fajita wraps for me and burrito/taco for Ebon and Leela. This was so good. It had one onion, one yellow pepper, one zucchini, two portobello caps, and two medium golden beets sliced thinly. Not sure if it was just the beets, but it was sweet - but not too much- and delicious! Ate with half an avocado, tomatoes, lettuce leaves, and a side of pepitas.
• I didn't have any snacks today because breakfast kept me so full! I wanted some while I was doing meal prep for Tuesday, but didn't.

Felt kind of bloated in the morning, hopefully that all goes away.

Tonight - I cleaned the kitchen and got all the pots and pans washed, but I didn't get to make crock pot ghee. I did however make some mayonnaise. It was a bit salty, but I'll still use it to make some egg salad.

Mayo!

I made Alton Brown's mayonnaise for the first time and it came out pretty good texture-wise, but was a bit salty. I added some dill, which helped a bit. I'll reduce salt next time and maybe try a different citrus and/or vinegar next time.

Whole30 Day One

I've decided to plunge full force into this Whole30 fad - because, yes it is a fad. I just want to try it out to see if the foods I'm eating are really making me feel bad. Usually after eating a bagel, I have so much gas, its not even funny, so completely eliminating grains, sugar, dairy, and legumes from my diet will help me figure out what. I'm not super excited about the legumes part, because as a vegetarian, that's where I get much of my protein. So this experiment will be a challenge, but one I'm willing to take. I'm also hoping I'll loose a little weight. Starting (naked) weight is 157, but I won't step on a scale for the rest of this period.

• For breakfast, I had 3 eggs, half an avocado, a large serving of kale and beet greens, 3 olives and half a clementine.
• Lunch was avocado ceviche that I found here. I omitted the cauliflower, jalapeño, and cilantro and added 1/3 cucumber. It turned out great! Very flavorful and filling. I also ate some applesauce and a handful of almonds.
• Dinner will be ratatouille zucchini boats, I saw a YouTube video for it, so I'll have to look up an official recipe. Cheese for Ebon and Leela, but not for me. It consisted of onion, garlic, eggplant, the zucchini that came from the "boat," a bell pepper, and tomatoes. This was all cooked in a frying pan with olive oil then spooned into the zucchini boat and cooked at 400 degF for about 15 min.  I thought it turned out great, but Ebon took one look at it and said there are too many "weird" things in it. He ate soup from can instead. Leela ate a few bites. - Sigh.
• Snacks were fruit in the park with friends in the morning and lots of cashews in the afternoon and while I was making dinner - this is what I need to stop doing. I also had a banana after dinner.

I was a little bit hungry as it got towards the end of the day, but I wonder if it was just in my head.

Brownies!

 I made these brownies . They turned out pretty well, but of course I made some substitutions. I had a lot of chocolate leftover from fondue, so I used that (chocolate and heavy cream) so I left out the cocoa powder and chocolate for the chocolate fondue. I think I used just a few tablespoons of butter instead of the entire stick. The rest of the ingredients were the same. They turned out pretty well, but not as fudgy as is pictured on the web post. I can't complain because I didn't follow the recipe to a "t."

I won't be making anything like this for a little while because after much consideration, I am planning to do a "Whole 30ish" "cleanse or reset or whatever you want to call it. I say "ish" because I'm planning to stick to a vegetarian diet as well. It will be challenging, (no beans! no dairy! no soy! no grains!) but I can say with a lot of confidence that I'm addicted to sugar and refined flour and need this kick in the pants to get off of it. I'm also hoping to lose a little weight. There, I said it for the whole internet to read, even though I don't think anyone reads my posts. I have to do it now, right?!