21 Days and Polo

21 Days, no chicken, beef, or pork for me and a dramatic increase in veggies/fruits, green smoothies, no to sugary pastries. For Eddie, no alcohol, decrease in meat, More veggies/fruits, no night eating, and less processed foods. I can't say it's been smooth sailing completely. Eddie's beer is still sitting in the fridge untouched. Me, saying no to cookies (Chips ahoy, Keebler, anything!) was tough this week. It's not the meat I miss, it's sugar. Symptoms for me, fatigue, stomach aches, and headaches. I'm going to up my calorie intake with more veggies this week since my research shows that some of this might be caused by a calorie deficiency. I also read it can take up to year to get rid of all the toxins caused by animal products.

Going back to what you know.
I am eating more vegetables and fruits than I can remember, except for when I was a kid. As a youngster, every meal was loaded with veggies, and fruit was typically dessert. Eating this way reminds me of how far off track I had gone from eating what I knew was intuitively good for me.

Withdrawl is real.
I have read so many articles about the withdrawl symptoms up to the first few months such as cravings, flu-like symptoms, breakouts, etc.Withdrawl is a constant reminder that food choices matter. Overtime, I had trained myself to eat unhealthy foods, and now I have to train my body to eat healthy foods. I find it so odd that broccoli would wreak so much havoc, and yet our bodies can tolerate junk food.

Know that it's making a difference.
My initial motivation was to upgrade my health. There's also a bigger picture. I can make conscious choices about what I eat and be less influenced to a lesser degree by the food industry machine. Who wants to go back to waking up in the am to chase the Starbucks addiction?
http://vegetariancalculator.com/vegetarian-calculator-monthly

 It was a sunny and slightly overcast day at the polo fields with some adventurous friends who invite us to join them. Funny thing is, we know nothing about polo going in and even less going out .  No one was particularly interested in watching the game, not even people that were attending who knew people who were playing, and grassy fields turned into what was kind of like a Vegas night club with VIP and reserved areas, fashions were interesting and even flamboyant with men wearing white pants and handkerchiefs in suit pockets, ladies with hats. Note to self - wear wedges, digging into the dirt with heals was no fun. We do look quite comfortable posing in front of this BMW with a glass of champagne (it's all part of a healthy diet - not! oh well I'm not perfect).



We clean up well. Eddie donning Polo at polo.

Palm Springs and a Veggie Panini

Heading to Palm Springs on vacation, we didn't know if we would revert to our old ways and make bad choices. I almost fell out of my chair when Eddie ordered a Veggie Panini. I never thought my meat loving husband would every voluntarily choose to order this, but Eddie does continue to amaze and surprise me despite being together for four years now.

Dairy will be the toughest for me to give up. I love eggs and ice cream occasionally. I may source some local farm eggs at the farmer's market moving forward. I may not give up fish. I do feel better in my heart and body having eaten no chicken, beef or pork in the past 3 weeks. This will be a work in progress.

We stayed at a new hotel, and we lounged at the pool practically the whole day in 100 degree temps. Any fantasies of living in Palm Springs were dashed by the sweltering heat this past weekend. It was nice to get away, and seeing that we're both looking to change to healthier lifestyle, I was glad to see us making better choices, not just to shed a few pounds here and there, but to really treat our bodies well from the inside out. One documentary I saw talked about how we spend so much money putting on make up or buying expensive creams to make us look better, why not treat yourself well from the inside out. What a concept.

Going Veganish

We are going Vegan or Veganish. Don't attempt to adjust your screen, you heard correctly.

It all started a discovery that Netflix offers documentaries. I came upon Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead, one man's journey to cure himself of illness by doing a 60 day juice fast. The results - no more medications, glowing skin, and a clean bill of health. I was hooked and began watching a whole slew of food related documentaries, which pointed to process foods and animal fats as the culprit for the decline in the obesity epidemic. I learned about the ways animals were treated in today' meat production industry and how hormones and other drugs were used to combat unsanitary living conditions.

Sick? Nearly dead? But that's not us, after all, we run half marathons, we're "healthy". Even active people are not immune to stressors, work, commuting, household chores, relationship, etc. So eating the Standard American Diet (SAD), of dairy, meat, carbs, processed foods, this is what I was experiencing:

• 7lb weight gain (despite doing more challenging workouts)
• Chronic lethargy
• Coffee Addiction (need it first thing in the am or I'm cranky)
• Insomnia
• Unable to taste food (tastes were muted, this would come and go, but my doctor had no remedy and pointing out that my 7lb weight gain suggested there was no real problem with my appetite - gee thanks)
•  General sense that I was being pulled by addictions versus providing myself with real nutrition. See below.
• Blood tests showed I was healthy.

Here's a typical day:

• 6a My fix - Starbucks iced coffee/pumpkin bread (40g sugar)
• 10a. Starving
• 11a Lunch - salad, bag of chips, diet coke to give me energy
• 2p Afternoon crash, cookie or a granola bar, or most of the time nothing
• 4:30p Hungry and tired, I go shopping at the grocery store, buy a bag of cookies I can snack on before dinner.
• 6p Dinner - Meat with a side of veges, and rice or potatoes

So here's what I did:

• Breakfast - Green Smoothie (Large Handful of Kale, 1 banana, 1/2 green apple, 1 cup soy, water, 1 tsp Better n' Peanut Butter)
• Lunch - Salad
• Afternoon Snack - Green Smoothie
• Dinner - Mostly Veges, beans, some grains

First day, I was terribly hungry. I had a brain fog some of the time, and I drank coffee since I felt I needed it to get through the day. Each subsequent day, I felt less hungry, and felt more energetic.

After three days, I was shopping for groceries, I just HAD to have cookie, after all I'd been so good up until then. So I bought it, I went home, opened the cookies and ate one, and it tasted gross. My taste buds had changed. My body now wanted better foods. I also realized I only bought the cookies, because I was hungry.

After 9 days, I actually began forgetting to drink coffee in the morning, and preferred tea instead if anything. I had lost 7lbs, and felt lighter, no longer bloated and tired.

At Week 3, I'm am continuing to find more Vegan and plant based recipes to make for dinner. Today's dinner, a vegan pizza, was an epic failure, but my Banana Muffins were a winner. Over all, I would say the biggest gain from this is realizing that you can have a say about what you eat, not just succumb to what's available - it just takes a little preparation.

We'll keep you posted on our progress. Eddie hasn't stared doing the smoothies, but he's committed to not eating processed foods, eating less meat and more vegetables, and drinking 1 cup of green tea a day.

Proudest Moments

It's funny how a small thing can make you feel like you're finally grown up. I suppose getting married, or buying a home are milestones, but those decisions on its own aren't indicators of maturity. How many married people still act like kids? And buying a home? I find myself missing our little beach town apartment from time to time, having traded the freedom of dirty floors or knicks on the walls as renters to the constant maintenance and preservation of home ownership.

Making wontons has always been a family tradition. With the kitchen being an adult zone where real work was done not play, these little allowances meant a great deal. It was a time to share jokes, stories, and life lessons. With every swoosh of a spoon, every tuck, and pinch, "less filling", "more filling", it seemed like in those moments, our family was unbreakable, time would stand still, and the only people that existed or mattered were my dad, my mom, and my brother.

At 36 years old, I made wontons with my husband last week. We'd made them once before in our old apartment years ago when we were dating. The healthy recipe found online was bland and dry. But today, I found myself wanting to do something out of the ordinary. I didn't follow a recipe nor did I try to recall the exact ingredients my parents used. Instead, I allowed my senses to guide me to ingredients I was familiar with growing up, ginger, green onions, the sounds of sounds and smells make me smile as I'm dicing away. But wait, Dad would never put ginger in wontons. I added a bit of soy, some rice wine vinegar (just because), and generous portions of salt (a no no in a salt conscious family) plus frozen spinach, (totally unheard of), no shrimp (I didn't feel like it).

Somehow riffing on a family tradition became a parable for a bigger life realization, that as an adult, sometimes making decisions different from my parents might not just result in a better dumpling, but maybe a happier and more fulfilled life. It wasn't that the previous wontons were bad, but that is' okay to create something new, and there's chance that the result might be better than you could have ever imagined.

 As we were giving each other some ribbing on which ones looked better,  I realized that it's come full circle. As husband and wife, Eddie and I are not only remaking family traditions, we are starting our own. It's as if the scene in the movie shot to my family's kitchen in 1988 and flash forwarded to our kitchen in 2015. The main protagonist takes a moment of self-reflection as the camera pans in for the final close up. After scoring my breakfast at a 9, Eddie gave the wontons a 10. Yes, they were that good.

1/2lb ground turkey (don't use lean)
1 box frozen spinach
1 egg
3 stalks green onions
2 tbsp. diced ginger
1.5 tbsp. rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp. soy sauce
1 tsp. salt
1 pack of wonton skins (you can also use egg roll skins cut in 4)

Boil enough water to cover the dumplings. Add wontons. Be careful not to add too many at once as they stick. Use a ladle to separate wontons. Bring to boil. Boil for 5 minutes. Serve with hot chili sauce or soy sauce.

A Birthday in Seattle

Eddie's belated birthday celebration could not have gone better. Not only did we celebrate his big day, the trip also landed on our first wedding anniversary. While you can say we ate our way through Seattle, we also walked 4 miles a day (thanks fitbit). Our hotel was centrally located downtown so we were close to all of the attractions. My brother had generously bought Eddie tickets with really great seats to the Yankees game.

We surprised ourselves with the vast amounts of walking we did, staying out late, watching a couple of movies, Pitch Perfect 2 (not as good as the first one) and Poltergeist (not too scary), and even playing games at a local arcade. Despite the fact that this is my fourth visit to Seattle, it seemed like the first time in a lot of ways, since I had never done any of the tours. Celebrating our first anniversary on a trip together was icing on the cake. We shared so many laughs on this vacation and had the best time together. Can't wait for our next trip!

Day 1 - Lakeside Cemetery, Bruce Lee/Brandon Lee Gravesite, Top Pot Doughnuts. Blue C Sushi
Day 2 - Duck Tour, Dog in the Park, Blue C Sushi
Day 3 - Seattle Bites Tour, Mariners/Yankees Game

Do not attempt to adjust your screens. This is Eddie reading. (Top Pot Doughnuts)

A little nourishment after a 2.5 hour flight as we plan our trip.

We had a taxi take us to Lakeside Cemetary, just a 10 min cab ride.

1 Adult Ticket with Quaker please, a fun 90 min land and water excursion with  Captain Marty Graw.



Two hungry guys, Eddie and Neil, hoping Crumpets are filling breakfast food.

On our food tour on a cold and rainy day.

Our tour guide with 80% meat no filler sausage samples. That's Eddie on the right. Nice wrist action.



Maybe our best doughnut in Seattle, sugar dusted, warm, and chewy.

Eddie shaking the hand of the Orka as we bid farewell to Seaattle.