Food As Medicine

Probably one of the most amazing changes that we experienced when we switched from the SAD (standard American diet) to a nutritarian style of eating was the nearly immediate improvement in annoying on-going health issues such as allergies, colds, fatigue, aches and pains, high cholesterol and of course the obvious weight loss. My mom reported that her arthritis improved dramatically and she went off most her pain killers and cholesterol meds.

It really is amazing and you have to wonder why doctor's aren't recommending this to all their patients.

Here is a fascinating article about being obese in America and how one woman saved her own life. It really is worth reading.

Being Fat in America

Thanks to Sharon for sharing the link.

Vegan Bragging

We just spent 5 days with our 3 college kids (report here). They are darling and they are all taking good care of themselves. It was quite satisfying as they each complimented us on our healthy eating style and told us how they brag to their friends that we are vegans. We are not vegan. Vegetarian, yes. But not vegan. I would say vegan-ish. We mostly eat vegan but occasionally something will have egg in it or a bit of cheese and I will eat it.

We ate at lots of yummy healthy restaurants - college towns are famous for healthy trendy restaurants - and were treated to a few delicious healthy homemade meals. One thing that I am going to make is sweet potato hash browns: 

We ate quite a bit before I decided to snap a photo. Sweet potatoes, onion, and green pepper. Delicious. This was the same breakfast where I ordered the vegetable medley: 

It came with 2 vegan sausage patties and the sauce on this veggie dish was warm and comforting. I could taste a bit of cumin. It was a wonderful way to start the day and kept me full for a long time!

Here is a joke my son Gabe told me:

How can you tell if someone is vegan?

Don't worry, they will tell you.

Ha.

Normal Dinner

During dinner the other night Roland asked me what I thought about the way we eat now. I looked at our meal of steamed broccoli, green salad, and Garbonzo Delight and laughed.

"You mean, the fact that this is a normal meal now?" I asked.
"Yes." - Roland
"I think its great that this is normal. No cheese, no meat, no sugar, and we are happy and satisfied at the end of the meal. We don't even think about it anymore." - Me
"I think it is great too." - Roland
"We have changed our lives for the next 40+ years! Oh, the adventures we will have!" - Robin
Roland nodded his head because his mouth was full. :)

You can see why I haven't written a book. My dialogue is not very interesting.

Anyways - I realised this at the grocery store the other day when I had to leave the produce department for bag of brown sugar. How long had it been since I was in the baking isle? A long time. I realised that this lifestyle is normal now. We no longer think about it - well, okay, we do think about it and talk about it (and I even blog about it!) but only because we are so happy and pleased with ourselves for having tried it and we like to pat each other on the back and tell each other how great we are.

Its very satisfying.

Garbonzo Delight

How does one name a recipe? I am tempted to put my name on every single recipe: Robin's Soup, Robin's Salad, Robin's Dessert. But it seems a little obnoxious and not very informative.

Here is our latest invention. I got the idea from watching Good Eats when he had a special on chickpeas (garbonzo beans). Ike thought it looked like a good treat and begged me to make it. It can be served warm as a main dish or cold as a salad (I had a bunch for lunch yesterday with an orange on the side). It's a little salty because of the olives and artichokes and peppers. And it is not low fat - feel free to eat it with balsamic vinegar instead. We named it Garbonzo Delight. (Tempted to call it Delightful Robin's Garbonzos!  but that sounds like I am describing something else...)

Garbonzo Delight

• 3 cups chickpeas - cooked or from a can (Here are directions on how to cook them)
• 1 medium zucchini - thinly sliced
• 1 red pepper chopped
• 1 leaf kale finely chopped
• 5 artichoke hearts (packed in water) - roughly chopped
• 4 pepperochinis - thinly sliced
• 10 olives (your choice) sliced
• 2 green onions thinly sliced

Dressing:

• 3 T Veganaise
• 1 T vinegar
• 2 t dijon mustard
• dash garlic powder
• dash oregano

Mix the dressing and pour over ingredients. Mix and serve!

I made this with freshly cooked chick peas and served it hot. Oh! It was good. Because I doubled the recipe I have had it for lunch for 2 days.  I think it would be good with feta if you eat cheese. Also - perhaps a few pine nuts sprinkled on top!

Planter Fasciitis

Didn't the title of this post get you all excited!? Were you asking yourself, "Oh my! What could this be about? Looks super interesting!" 


Over on my other blog I posted about falling down due to my planter fasciitis. I have been complaining about here too and many of you have told me that you suffer the same pain.

Its so much easier to eat healthy when you can exercise and PF stops me dead in my tracks. But I have found a website full of PF exercises and have been doing them for 2 days now and I am starting to feel a little bit better!

For your PF pain here is the link: Heel That Pain!

Oatmeal and stuff

Some of you are experiencing spring right now. Here in the frozen tundra of Colorado we won't warm up until sometime in August and then a week later we'll have a blizzard. Not kidding.

So a warm breakfast is a must have for most of the year. My current favorite is oatmeal. Oatmeal lasts for hours - eat a bowl of oatmeal with a green smoothie and you won't even think about food for at least 4 hours. I use Coach's Oats (at Costco) with a dash of cinnamon topped off with a few crushed pecans (you can crush them right in your hand). Ike likes brown sugar on his but I am trying to transition him to honey. He is being a little stubborn about it. It isn't as easy as switching him to almond milk or whole wheat pasta. Roland is just happy to have a warm meal in his own kitchen. He travels too much.

He just got back from a trip to India and Singapore for 10 days - by the time he got home he had no idea what day or time it was. But thanks to his healthy eating ways he recovered quickly and reports that he didn't gain a pound. Yay!

Last night for dinner I whipped up an easy meal of spaghetti and salad.

Super Quick Easy Spaghetti Dinner :

Saute up 1 lb sliced mushrooms until they begin to brown. Toss in 3 leaves of kale (stemmed and finely chopped), add 2 patties of vegan sausage (morningstar is my fav) - crumbled, pour 1 small jar of Classico spaghetti sauce over all and heat until bubbly. Serve over whole spaghetti with a large dark green salad. 

Serve fresh pineapple for dessert! 

Smoothie Virgin

I've been distracted from the blog by work and by my master bedroom. I am redecorating and want it over quickly so all my spare time goes to the bedroom.

Ike has a friend staying with us this week (his parents are on a cruise) and all week long we have been gently teasing him about drinking a smoothie. Hey, he has been eating tons of vegetables, including brussel spouts, and vegan tacos and spaghetti and enjoying it all, so a smoothie is no big deal, right?

So, this morning I made a very mild smoothie with a banana, pear, apple 1 1/2 cup almond milk, 3 T flax seed, 1 cup frozen blue berries, and only 2 handfuls of spinach - it was one of the sweetest smoothies I have made.  I poured him a very small cup and he announced he would drink it. We were silent as he bravely took his first sip, made a face, and said it smelled like pumpkin and not in a good way. A bad pumpkin way. He tried to gag down the rest and I told him to not worry about it and eat his mango and vegan sausage instead. I was proud of him for trying.

I think Ike was proud of himself. He drinks a big, thick, dark green smoothie every morning. Its not his favorite thing to do, but he does it, and now I think he is proud of himself for being so tough every morning.

If green smoothies were pink everyone would like them.

I love them.

Junky Vegan

Oh! It feels so good to eat clean!

I have been a bit of a junky vegan lately. I've been vegan - but in a corn chip, Dr. Pepper, licorice kind of way. I blame it on the funeral and think it is a good blame. But I'm over that now and right back to Nutritarian Woman ( Ta Da!)!!!

What I ate yesterday:

• Big old green smoothie
• orange
• Huge salad
• leftover French Lentil Soup (I heart leftovers)
• Banana
• Hummus (lots) and cucumber
• Apple
• Quinoa Coconut Curry! (my own invention)
• Pero

I was really hungry last night and not sure what I wanted. This is what I did (so yummy):

You can find this at the supermarket. My son, Gabe, told me about it. Good Stuff.

Robin's Super Simple Easy Quinoa Coconut Curry!

Spray pan with Pam. Saute 1 cup chopped onion and one chopped red pepper until tender. Add 1 cup light coconut milk (from a can), 1 1/2 teaspoon green curry paste, 1 cup peas, and 1 1/2 cup cooked quinoa and stir until peas are tender/sweet. Try not to eat it all at once.

Ike even liked it.

I am the Unicorn

I feel like the unicorn after I exercise. And it is so much easier to eat well when you are moving your body! On Monday we joined Lifetime Fitness (tell them I recommended you so I can get more bonus bucks for training!). It doesn't open until May - but I am walk/running now. Still fighting with my feet about feeling good and trying to decide if I should just exercise through the pain or take it easy.

It's nice that the granny orthodics that go in my shoes make me look an inch taller. 

Yay for looking tall!

Dinner last night was French Lentil Soup. Recipe here.  I added avocado, of course. 

Champagne Mangoes are in at Costco - not organic at all - but oh so wonderful!

I'm Back! With lots of oranges.

So I took a week off the blog and now I have lots of exciting things I want to blog about. You should be gorging on citrus right now. I know we all miss watermelon and real tomatoes, but mother nature planned it so you can love citrus exclusively, not being distracted by cantalope or peaches.

I usually just peel an orange and eat it like candy. I used to smother my grapefruit with powered sugar but now I eat it straight or eat it mixed with orange. I can eat a pretty big bowl of this in one day. It makes me feel sunny and cheerful.

Here is a fun video on how to peel citrus. I don't cut out the segments - I just peel and chop. Make sure you use a freshly sharpened knive.

I got this one at Walmart 3 years ago for $30 and I use it on the JAHenkles knives we got as a wedding present 27 years ago - and it works great! A must have if you are constantly chopping up plants to eat.

When Things Don't Go The Way You Planned

Things don't always go the way you planned. When things don't go the way I've planned I feel disappointed. And, like many of you, I am an emotional eater.

Roland's father passed away on Friday and although we are happy that he is with his dear sweet Betty we feel sorry for our loss and are flooded with a large range of emotions. I have found that I want sugar very much. But I know it will make me feel sick and it will fuel a greater need for sugar.

In times of mourning it is important to be kind to yourself. This is not the time to fight the big battle. So, I am being kind to myself with food. Really kind. I'm being my own best friend to make sure I feel good. Rather than fight that sugar urge I am giving in with fruit and it works! It works much better than chocolate or Krispy Kreme! After eating a orange I feel refreshed and calm. After eating pineapple I feel clean and sunny! When have you ever felt refreshed, engergized, and clean after gorging on junk food? Never.

I'd rather go into this week of mourning/celebration of life feeling fresh and capable than feeling exhausted and distracted by cravings.

..............

Week one of the 6 week committment = 5 lbs lost! Yay!

"Meatloaf"

I'm not much for fake meat and my friend Angie warns me against too much soy. But this recipe is really good.

This meatloaf with a big green salad, and oven "fried" potatoes = real comfort food.

The only thing I did differently to the recipe was to mix the ketchup with some Braggs liquid aminos, some spicy mustard, and a few drops of agave nectar and spread that on the top. Ike loved it. 

Today my sweet baby boy (oh, he was such a cuddly baby!)

is coming home to visit Grandpa, who is not doing very well. Gabe has adopted a mostly vegan diet, (I am so proud of him!) and I plan to make this dinner for him tonight.

If you have a man in your life that would benefit from a plant based diet you might want to encourage him to read the E2 Book or at least checkout their website (lots of good recipes there).

http://engine2diet.com/

One Year Anniversary!

Exactly one year ago February 16, 2010 Roland and I started the Eat to Live diet. We committed to each other to give it a good 6 weeks and at the end of the 6 weeks we could return to our previous diet of prime ribs, cheesy bread, and fudge.

I didn't start blogging about it until I'd been on the diet for 2 weeks because I was afraid I wouldn't like the diet. But I ended up loving the diet and wanted to share our discovery. I hoped that this blog would provide moral support I felt I needed. But as it turned out, I didn't need moral support, kale was doing the job just fine. I felt so great and had such amazing success and this blog was a great place to share the good news.

Six weeks later and we were hooked. We had no desire to go back to the SAD (Standard American Diet).  Now here we are exactly one year later.  We have relaxed our standards a bit, allowing a few processed foods and a little bit of sugar, but we are still vegan - strictly vegan. It feels normal now. I don't even think about it - I just do it!

We've changed what it will be like when we are 60, 70, 80 + years old. We are on a completely different road then we were a year ago. I used to think that a sedentary lifestyle, pain, and illness would be a normal part of our aging process but now I see that we have busy, active, exciting decades ahead of us! Oh! I am so glad I married such a fun, intelligent, sexy, clever, adventurous man!

So, how do you celebrate one year of success? Well, mostly it is like any other day of the year, bills beg, phones ring, food rots, carpools call. But Roland and I agreed to start all over again at day one. We recommit to the original 6 week challenge. If you don't know what that is run out and buy the Eat To Live book. It will be the best $16 you ever spent.

Join us on our 6 week challenge! Starting today (or tomorrow [actually we started yesterday]) we will follow the Eat To Live 6 Week Diet. Strict.

Who is in?

Let's Talk About Chili

Chili is a big part of my life. I make it about once a week and eat the leftovers for lunch a few times. At first I followed a recipe but now I just wing it with whatever I have.

When I make chili I follow a basic pattern. All ingredients are to taste/what you have on hand/how many people you are serving.

Robin's Kitchen Sink Chili:


Saute chopped onion, carrots and green bell pepper until starting to soften. May need to add water for saute.
Add other veggies, whatever you have on hand: mushrooms, peppers, asparagus, brussel sprouts, green beans, just dig through the fridge and toss it in.
Add 3 cloves sliced garlic and seasonings and saute until veggies are starting to get tender.

Seasonings I like include: chili powder, smoked paprika, oregano, fresh ground pepper

Then toss in a can or two of diced tomatoes, a drained can (or two or three) of beans (I like black beans, northern beans, and large kidney beans) and extra water if needed and simmer for about 20 minutes.

Right before serving I like to add 2 cloves garlic - minced or pressed, a large handful of frozen corn, and chopped avacado.

Sometimes I will add a few tablespoons of balsamic vinegar for a little twang.

In this batch you can see that I added leftover brown rice. 

YUM!

Those Damn Girl Scouts

I always buy 3 boxes of Girl Scout Cookies from a darling girl scout in our neighborhood. If the girls scouts were hairy and stinky and surly it would be a lot easier to say no to them. This year I planned on taking them to a party or giving them to the teachers. But Ike opened the door and got the cookies first. He opened the Samoas. Have you had the Samoas? If not, please don't ever taste them or you will always feel like you need them. 

So I said I would have just one. One hour later they were all gone and Ike only had 2. 

I console myself by telling myself they were tiny cookies and only 15 in a pack. Eating a baker's dozen wasn't that bad, right?

I felt sick the rest of the day.

Here is a cute Valentine my BIL made for my sister (read her blog):

If you wear green today it means you want to be kissed!

Happy Valentine's Day!