Immediate Improvement

Two days of eating whole foods and drinking some actual water, and I already feel the difference.  Not tired today, productive and perky.  Hmmm.  You’d think I’d learn.

I try not to snack between meals unless I am really hungry.  But now I’ve decided that I need to push out my dinner hour – I’m normally ravenous at 5pm, and that has led to some poor choices in the past when I got home from work and couldn’t figure out what to eat or why or where the ingredients were or….cereal!  What’s more, I try not to eat again after dinner, not until breakfast the next day – and 5pm to 8am is a pretty long fast.  So I’m moving dinner to 6pm, and I guess I’ll have to snack at about 3 or so.

I don’t know how people go 4-6 hours between meals, I really don’t.

Balance: someone show me it

It seems I either disregard entirely what goes in my mouth, or I’m tracking 1/2 tsps of olive oil used in cooking.

Following the first habit, I put back on 25# of the 60 I lost last year.  More than the weight, though that’s annoying too, is the way I feel: sluggish, headachy, low energy, poor sleeping, crabby.  On a round of antibiotics for some exotic version of a cold, I have decided I don’t want to feel this way, and it’s time to remedy my eating habits.  It might be sort of nice to drink some actual water, too.

I’ll be quite happy to lose the weight I put back on while I’m at it.

So I’m back to tracking at Calorie King, back to measuring portions, back to paying attention to how many grams of protein I get in a day.  Looking forward to feeling good again.

Tonight’s menu: roasted chicken breast, roasted turnips, carrots and onions that were first marinated in olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and water, then dusted with Garlic Gold, and a spinach salad.

Tomorrow I’m starting the day with a green monster and a 3 mile walk.

 

Something about cold springs in the PNW

makes me feel oh-so-friendly towards coconut.  Must be that laying about on the beach flavor it gives things.

I never thought I would dig smoothies, but oh…how they have grown on me.

My recent favorite is:

• 1 container “Coconut Desert” – which is nothing more than unsweetened, coconut flavored tofu
• 1/2 fresh mango
• 1 handful baby spinach
• 1 splash – probably 1/4c or so – orange juice
• 2-3 ice cubes

It’s so good, I sigh with delight every time I make it.

I’ve been on something of a coconut bender lately, and even tried Coconut Bliss ice cream, which is made with coconut milk instead of cow’s milk.  Three words for you: oh my god.  I had the dark chocolate, and again, there was moaning and contented sighing.  Recommend!

Diversions and Progress

I’ve been traveling and had friends visiting the last few weeks – it hasn’t been too great for my eating habits.  The problem is that when other people are around, it feels like a special occasion.  My friend Melissa came to town and we did the town tour of restaurants – pub food, pasta, seafood, microbrews.  It was delicious and rich and lovely.

Then I went to Boise for a professional conference and again, the tour of restaurants.  I was pleasantly surprised with all Boise had to offer, but came home feeling overdone and malnourished.  Too much rich and delicious, not enough basic and fresh.

Weight stayed under 160 in both scenarios.  Over the months I have lost, I notice that I hover at various points along the way.  I’ve been in the 154-159 neighborhood now for several months.  I think I’d like to lose some more and get into the 140s, but I think these times of hanging out at the new low are okay too.  And it teaches me to maintain a bit before pushing the next little way.

My outdoor field season is about to begin and this will be the first summer of new eating habits.  My goal is to take my lunch and liquids with me in a small cooler everyday – this no longer feels like punishment to me.  I prefer my own food and cooking to almost anything I can buy once I’m out.  It’s a little bit of an effort to do the planning and preparation every day (I get bored with consistency), but I’m going to set my mind to it.

I hope to be more comfortable in the field this year – less weight should mean I don’t feel the heat as acutely, better eating should mean more energy for long, strenuous days.

It’s so much easier now to “reset” myself to my usual eating habits – it used to be such a momentous occasion: “On Monday, I am going to get back to eating well.”  I did this over and over.  Now I can have one funky, low quality, unbalanced meal and hop right back on the next meal.  Progress.

Phone blogging

Test photo from my camera phone.  It’s a drag that I can’t upload directly to FB or Flickr, but I can email the photos to myself and then upload them to the blog.  Hmmm.

Sunday Dinner with Vox

An article in the NYT (subscription makes it easier to read) today: A More Healthful Dinner for One.  Although, they do make it sound like cooking for yourself is a sad and frustrating exercise in self pity:

“When it’s just you for dinner, whipping up an entire meal just doesn’t seem worth the effort.  A call to the local Chinese restaurant may seem easier than scrubbing pots and pans, not to mention dealing with a week’s worth of leftovers.”

Oh, come off it.  It’s not that difficult, and what?  I’m not worth the effort?  Also, I loathe the word “healthful.”  It’s right up there with “impactful.”  Please. /contempt

Anyhow, there are a couple of recipes included in the article including Portobello and Fried Egg Panino.  I fully expected one of the recipes to be Cereal with Milk or Loaf of Toast.

Tonight’s dinner at my house was Shepherd’s Pie:

• 1 lb pastured ground beef (organic, if it matters to you)
• 1 med shallot, diced
• Garlic powder, kosher salt and pepper to taste
• 1 c tomato sauce
• 3 russet potatoes
• 1/2 c milk
• More garlic, salt and pepper as you see fit

The beef is cooked with the shallots and spices, drained, mixed with about 1/2 the tomato sauce and placed evenly in the bottom of a casserole.  Dribble remainder of tomato sauce over the beef.  Boil and mash the potatoes; season; then dollop onto the top of the beef making a complete layer all the way to the edges.  Bake at 350 for 30 minutes until the potatoes are browning and there are little bubbles of tomato sauce here and there.

You could vege this up with zucchini, green peppers, carrots – pretty much anything you want.  You could also make this vegetarian by substituting Crumblers or some other soy product of your liking.  It’s a bit heavy (hearty?), and I eat about 1/6 of a 9×9 casserole pan size recipe.  I keep 1/2 of the casserole in the frig and freeze the other half for leftovers later.  It keeps well, and like many things, is better the second day…and beyond.

Note: the smell of ground beef cooking makes me lightheaded and nauseous.  How’s that for epicurean dishonesty?  Blech.

And right on schedule, I was hungry again

Lunch:

• Whole wheat pita, toasted
• Morningstar tomato & basil burger
• Tortellini pasta salad with basil
• 4 lg strawberries
• 1 c sugar snap peas
• Mineral water with lime juice

The strawberries are not the summer strawberries of Oregon, but they are good.  Sugar snap peas are a constant favorite and the tortellini salad came from the local coop, where they only use EV olive oil in their recipes, and the difference is appreciable.

I’m going to make Shepherd’s Pie from my mother’s recipe for dinner tonight and then freeze about 1/2 of it for the week spring term starts.

I like the contrast of the hot pita with the cold salad and pairing the bright sweetness of strawberries with something savory.

And now, laundry.  I needed the energy from lunch to heft my two baskets up and down 3 flights of stairs – twice.

Breakfast when I’m ready

After a 75 minute brisk walk (about 4.5 miles): hungry.  The smoothie held me over perfectly, and I was ready for actual food when I got home.

Oatmeal – it’s been awhile:

• 1/4c oats
• 1/4c each milk and water
• 1 tbs ground flax seeds
• 1 tsp each brown sugar, Bourbon vanilla
• 1 tbs slivered almonds
• 1 tbs almond butter
• 1 cherry granola cookie, crumbled

>500 calories – luckily I got some exercise.

1/4c of oats makes about 1c of cooked oatmeal.  Many people say oatmeal holds them over for hours and hours; I find it filling, but am usually ready to eat again when lunchtime rolls around.

It was delicious – I barely ate oats all winter, but it’s raining this morning and it was perfect.

Breakfast before I want it

I used to run or walk first thing in the morning on an empty stomach, but sometimes that would return me home sweaty and violently hungry – poor choices then followed.  It also made it difficult to stay warm for the duration, so it’s better if I eat a little something before I go.

Problem: I’m not hungry first thing in the morning.  I’m ready to exercise before I feel ready to eat.

So I’ll just have a little something-something.

Smoothie:

• 1/4c vanilla yogurt
• 2 small blood oranges
• Handful baby spinach*
• Splash of orange juice

Short run this morning, so this should get me out and back home before my blood sugar plummets and makes me all emo.

I may track food today since I’ve been a little crazy the last few days and am feeling the effects -> I has the tired.

* You can’t taste the spinach, I swear.

I don’t think I am the kind

of food blogger who will be photographing everything I eat.

First, I wonder how that works in public, particularly in dark restaurants or other people’s homes.  I would feel conspicuous.

But, I usually eat at home if I can, so I’ll have pictures from time to time.

Second, I am lazy.  My camera is large and bulky and downloading and uploading photos everyday…not so much.  Actually planning my meals takes enough of the time when I’d rather be eating them or doing something else I enjoy, so, yeah: pictures, sometimes.