Until Next Time, Whole30

January 16, 2018January 16, 2018 by spoonfulofjun ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

My nine-day streak on the Whole30 ended last Friday. Late in the morning, my husband cooked all of the leftover vegetables in the fridge and scrambled it with some eggs, which we scarfed down before heading to the O’hare International Airport. We were on our way to Breckenridge for a weekend of skiing, and with the layover in Cedar Rapids, we knew we wouldn’t be able to eat until we landed in Denver. Once we got to Cedar Rapids, we looked around for some food, but all we could find was a sports bar with drinks and apps. Luckily, we had anticipated this and packed dried apricots and cranberries. The cranberries were far too sour to eat on their own, so we stuck to the apricots. I only intended to have a few pieces so that I can manage my hunger until we arrived at our destination, but my husband has a habit of not being able to stop eating until the whole bag is gone. I was influenced by him, and had nearly half of the bag myself. We later regretted this when our stomachs ached from too much fiber. We were still Whole30-compliant. So far so good.

Once we arrived in Denver we rented our car, I asked my husband to figure out where the closest healthy restaurant was. We found a Tru Food in Denver, so we started driving there. I knew that most of the food on the menu were not Whole30-compliant. I knew that there was the option of telling the waiter to make our food simple, without any sugar, without any soy. But we couldn’t justify paying what we were paying to eat plain food, and it felt silly to walk into a restaurant to make all of these extra requests. Plus, we were on vacation. We gave in, and ordered the edamame dumplings and albacore tataki to share, and the Moroccan chicken for him and Pad Thai for me. The meal was delicious, and we had no regrets about breaking the Whole30.

Breakfast the next day was Rxbars which we had packed plenty of. We both took lessons, but since it was my husband’s first time skiing, we were in different classes. The chili I had for lunch was the perfect meal to warm me up after a morning of skiing. I couldn’t help but notice the beans, the cheese, the sour cream, the bread… and for a second I was afraid that my body wouldn’t accept all of these ingredients that had become foreign over the last couple of weeks. But I was completely fine and continued to ski well the rest of the afternoon. That night, my husband and I went to a local sports bar and indulged in local beers, chicken wings, and pizza. Again, I didn’t intend on finishing the pizza, but with my husband eating so fast and so much, I felt peer pressured into eating more pieces than I was comfortable with. Breakfast and lunch the next day were the same, and at dinner, we again checked out some other bars for beers, burgers, and macaroni and cheese. Monday was our last day of skiing, and since we had to drive two hours back to the airport, we skied for half a day. Mid-morning, I turned over to my husband as we were sitting together on the ski lift and said, “My body is so cold. I really need to go in after this run.” “I’m so glad you said that because I was feeling the same way,” he said. My body was craving something warm and sweet. We had hot chocolate with a generous handful of marshmallows, and I had a big chocolate croissant. It was exactly what my body needed after depleting all of my energy in the cold. We went back out and skied for another couple hours before returning our ski rentals and driving to the airport. Before going through security, we ate at Panda Express – something I hadn’t eaten in a few years. My body felt fine throughout the weekend – no bloating, no gas, no aches, no abnormalities, which made me realize that perhaps I’m not actually lactose intolerant at all.

We arrived at home past midnight, and since we had eaten dinner at 4pm we were quite hungry. Instead of heading to the food pantry to see what biscuits and crackers I could find, I found myself opening the refrigerator to see what vegetables we had left. I found one egg, some leftover spinach, and a couple of tomatoes. I cooked the spinach and eggs in some olive oil, and sliced up the tomatoes. It took all of five minutes to prepare. Before going on the Whole30, I wouldn’t have even thought about cooking after such a long day. But now, it felt effortless. The program has no doubt changed my behavior towards food and cooking.

I would like to complete the entire Whole30 program one day. But with a holiday party coming up this weekend and a couple of ski trips left this season, I’m not sure it’s worth it to start again now. But I did meal plan this week using the Whole30 book and Whole30 cookbook. I’ll probably start eating rice and beans and wheat and yogurt again, but I will try to eat as whole as possible, staying away from packaged and processed foods. The program made me realize how little protein I was getting, so I’ve become a lot more conscious about that. Come to think of it, I didn’t have a single dizzy spell since I started the diet – something I have been getting quite frequently over the past year. I’m thankful for what I learned through the Whole30, and am excited to continue eating and cooking Whole30!

Whole30 Day 5

January 8, 2018January 9, 2018 by spoonfulofjun ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

A few days ago when I had my low-energy day, I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a very pale face. This morning, my face was glowing. I take care of myself and am pretty obsessive about skin care to begin with, but my skin is getting visibly better. Could it be that I’m feeling more positive and therefore have more self-esteem? Maybe, but I do truly believe that what I’m putting into my body has everything to do with it. I started my morning with an arms workout from the Kayla Itsines app. Even though arms are my least favorite and I didn’t eat a snack beforehand, I felt good throughout my training. I listened to my usual NPR Up First, New York Times The Daily, Marketplace Morning Report, and an NPR Planet Money episode on Bitcoin. Yes, I missed out on it. I had told best friend how crazy she was for investing in it, and now, I’m feeling the pain. Once back home, I grabbled the already chopped up vegetables from the fridge and scrambled some eggs with it. And of course, I couldn’t forget the berries.

Work was fairly busy but I didn’t once feel like I wasn’t going to be able to tackle everything. Lunch was leftover vegetables with roasted red pepper sauce and a piece of salmon. I love the frozen fish fillets from Whole Foods. They are individually vacuum packed so they’re quick and easy to use. I usually put one in the microwave for a minute, then transfer it to a skillet and cook for a few minutes on each side.

In the afternoon, I had a rather unpleasant work call with two other teammates. I immediately noticed that one was in a bad mood, sensing from how he defensively responded to the other guy on the call. Once it became clear that I was agreeing with this other guy, he started attacking me too. It wasn’t common for him to be acting this way; he’s usually a nice and relaxed guy. Any other day, I would have taken this personally. I would have played it cool while secretly hurting inside. But today, I was able to distance myself and recognize that he was having a bad day, and remained calm and collected.

After the call, my husband and I made a quick trip to Whole Foods to stock up on frozen fish and some fruit. As we were checking out, I saw protein bars from RXBAR. I had seen these before, but never bothered to pick one up. I turned it around to look at the ingredients – Whole30 compliant! We ended up buying a couple – mixed berry and blueberry – and split one as soon as we got home. Not too bad.

My husband cooked dinner tonight. He made cute little sliders made of sweet potato, eggplant, and portabella mushroom buns. What a creative replacement for the pretzel buns we usually like. We layered small beef patties with slices of avocados and tomatoes. So good. More than anything they were fun to look at.

Eating a Whole30 diet doesn’t feel hard. When a Tastemade video for a butternut squash gratin made from heavy cream and various cheeses pops onto my Facebook feed, or when I see a sign in our building elevator about a hot chocolate party, of course I think about it, and for a second, want it. But as long as these foods are out of my sight, I don’t have any desire to eat outside the Whole30 diet. I also feel good mentally. I feel like I’m getting stronger inside and can tolerate uncomfortable situations with more ease. I am hopeful that the Whole30 will change me in a positive way, both inside and out.

Whole30 Day 3

January 6, 2018January 9, 2018 by spoonfulofjun ♥ 1 Comment

Today was rough. We started our day with a healthy breakfast of scrambled eggs with onions and bell peppers, avocado, and blueberries. We had a 10:30 reservation for a Penguin Encounter at the Shedd Aquarium, which my husband had gotten me as a Christmas present, and I hadn’t exactly kept my eye out on the time. As a result, we had to walk extremely fast to make it. I felt sick. I felt tired. I felt like I was going to faint. But I also couldn’t wait to meet the penguins so I powered through. The penguin experience was amazing. We met an 8-year-old named Sparrow, when I petted her, I was surprised to find that she was so soft. Then, we watched a dolphin show and looked around the aquarium for a little bit. I could smell popcorn in the air. It’s funny how I don’t think about foods when they’re not there, but when they’re in my sight, I think about how much I want it. We have a ton of beer left over from a party we threw last week. Every time I open the fridge, I badly want one. But if I don’t see it, I don’t think about it.

We came home for a late lunch and pulled out the leftover slaw from the fridge, put together a simple salad, and cooked some frozen salmon. I was hoping I would feel better after the meal. But no. I still felt tired. I needed to work out, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Instead, I spent the rest of the afternoon meal planning for the week, while my husband put away our Christmas tree and ornaments. On our walk to Trader Joe’s, we had a serious conversation about whether to continue the Whole30 or not. Some things feel silly: how restrictive it is, the removal of legumes, the need to avoid replicating your favorite dishes with Whole30-compliant ingredients. We stepped into Trader Joe’s and removed our gloves. “What should we do?” I asked. “You’re completely neutral?” my husband asked. “Yeah,” I answered. “We have our ski trip coming up; Is it really worth it to skip out on the hot chocolate or beer after a long day of skiing?” I continued. After debating back and forth like this for about five minutes at the entrance, we finally decided that we would buy the ingredients we had planned on and see how we felt at the end of the week.

Dinner was fun to make. I made the Shepard’s Pie out of the Whole30 book, and it was so good. Absolutely delicious. The sweet potatoes on top balanced perfectly with the savory meat and vegetable layer underneath. Every cell in my brain was lighting up with satisfaction. For a second, I thought this meal was all I needed to recover from my misery. Ten minutes after dinner, I felt tired and helpless again.

I haven’t been waking up in the middle of the night multiple times to go to the bathroom like I usual do. My wedding ring slips on and off a little bit easier. I feel less irritated than I was feeling a few days ago, but I can’t tell if I’m just too tired to care about the little things. In some ways, it feels like the KonMari Method – once you tidy up your home, or in this case, once you clean up your eating habits and reset your body, the rest of your life falls in place. Many claim it’s life-changing, but it doesn’t have scientific evidence.

Tomorrow will be a better day.

Whole30 Day 1

January 4, 2018January 9, 2018 by spoonfulofjun ♥ 1 Comment

On a beautiful summer day in Chicago, I caught up with my friend over an early dinner. She ordered a very simple salad at an already healthy café. “I’m doing this program where I eat a lot of whole foods. I’m staying away from sugar, dairy, alcohol, wheat, soy, even legumes.” She had gone to her sister’s wedding the week before, and the bride looked great. When asked what she did, the sister explained that she had done the Whole30 diet for a couple of weeks. Inspired, my friend decided to do the same. A couple of months later, I remembered this and decided to invest in the Whole30 book. When I hosted a New Years party for a group of friends and announced that my husband and I were starting this program, I was surprised to discover that half of them had tried it before, and a friend even offered me her Whole30 cookbook.

The reasons I’m doing this are to see if changing my diet can 1) improve my sleep, 2) stabilize my mood, 3) help me cut down on snacking on sugary foods, 4) identify whether I am lactose intolerant or not, 5) awaken the six pack lying underneath my layers of fat. First, I occasionally go through periods of time where it’s difficult to fall asleep, and it’s not always necessarily when I’m under stress. Second, I’ve been feeling a lot more irritated lately, which makes me wonder if the recent overindulgence in holidays foods had anything to do with it. Third, my habit of eating every two hours have started affecting my body in ways I never imagined it would. Last year, I went into the dentist and discovered a cavity. When I asked how that happened, since I have good dental hygiene, the response was exactly the same as what my dentist had told me several years ago: “you don’t leave enough time between meals, so your mouth doesn’t have time to neutralize.” Fourth, on the rare occasions that I have milk or icecream, my stomach doesn’t feel well. My grandfather was extremely lactose intolerant, so it’s possible it’s in my genes. Fifth, I’m pretty diligent about working out and am pretty sure I would have a six pack if I didn’t eat so poorly. So, I’ve decided to give this Whole30 thing a shot and see where it takes me.

Day 1 felt easy. Well, it actually didn’t start off very well. I proudly took out my spinach frittata out of the oven, set it on the stove, and set down the hot pad. In the two seconds I used to set down the hot pad, I had forgotten that the skillet was still hot and accidentally grabbed the handle with my bare hands. That combined with my rushing to hop on a work call prevented me from eating no more than a quarter of the frittata. An hour later, I realized my hand was swollen up and I was starting to feel nauseous from the incredible pain, so I headed to the immediate care center. I was nervous that I was going to have to take some medicine since the ingredients might interfere with the Whole30, but luckily, I was only prescribed a cream that eased my swelling and pain. I rushed back home to continue working, and realized it was already past lunch time. I attempted to make a protein salad with homemade ranch dressing, but lacking on time, I stuck to just mayonnaise drizzled over my lettuce and avocado, and salmon. I also ate a banana, which was completely unnecessary. I was already full, but I ate it because I felt like I needed to make up for what I didn’t eat for breakfast, and just in case that extra potassium would be good for my burn. In the late afternoon, I had another quarter of the frittata as a snack. For dinner, my husband and I made ground meat, tomato sauce, and roasted spaghetti squash. After a couple bites, I said, “I can’t eat anymore. I’m so full,” to which my husband replied, “you’re probably not used to eating this much protein.” A few bites later, I again mumbled that I was too full, and my husband said, “You need to stop eating if you’re full. You can’t just eat a lot of food just because it’s healthy.” He was right. I set my plate down and saved the rest for breakfast.

What I realized today was that cooking all of these meals was a tremendous amount of work. Cooking a full breakfast on a work day made me feel like I was starting off the day in chaos. Dinner took over an hour to prepare. We had to run the dishwasher three times. My husband and I decided that going forward, we would make food for the week on Sunday night.

I didn’t notice any changes in my mood. I was still stressed out about the same issues at work and my career. Perhaps because of my burnt hand, I kept clumsily dropping things and almost slipped off of my chair when trying to store my backpack at the top of my closet. Alone in my apartment, I said out loud, “today isn’t my day.”

Overall, the Whole30 didn’t feel hard. The meals were filling and I didn’t have any cravings for foods I couldn’t eat. Let’s see how tomorrow goes.

Spoonful of Jun

Tag: food

Until Next Time, Whole30

Whole30 Day 5

Whole30 Day 3

Whole30 Day 1