Tomatoes, Pickles and Manhattan Mondays

I have been feeling a bit down lately, so I decided to do a few comforting and relaxing things for myself on my day off.

One of them being sitting on my couch and watching one of my favorite movies.



And another one of them being this fresh and yummy tomato salad that I made for lunch today...

one vine-ripened tomato*, small-medium, diced
one persian cucumber, quartered length-wise and thickly sliced
two small israeli pickles, diced
two scallions, chopped
one tsp, freshly squeezed lemon juice
sunflower oil, very lightly drizzled
a dash of salt and a dash of pepper


*As far as vine-ripened tomatoes go, which are my favorite tomatoes (next to heirlooms), they contain double the amount of vitamin C as a hot-house tomato and are much more flavorful.
 
So good! Especially if you like things on the sour side, like I do.

brown rice pasta with raw zucchini!

I modified this recipe from one of my favorite cookbooks.

I love for so many reasons. The chapters aren't split up by courses or types of dishes, but they are split up as aids to an ailment you might have. Whether you need an energy boost, a detox or something to uplift your mood. It also has tons of fun (at least I think they're fun!) facts about what you are getting out of the recipe.

This recipe was under the energy chapter. I made this recipe almost exactly the way it was written, except that I used organic brown rice pasta rather than a whole wheat pasta because I am still trying to refrain from eating too much wheat or gluten. I also used ghee instead of both the oil and butter.

1 pound/pkg of organic brown rice pasta.
2 raw zucchini, finely grated.
2 tbs ghee.
2 tbs Parmesan cheese, finely grated.
sea salt, to taste.
freshly ground lemon pepper, to taste.

This recipe was so simple. All you do is mix all of the ingredients into the pasta after it's been cooked. I will say that by using ghee as opposed to butter, this dish came out a bit more rich than I was expecting. It was still really delicious, but I think next time I'll probably use half the amount and maybe add a few drops of olive oil if I need to.

back!

Well, friends. It seems as though I've been neglecting this place for a while, but here I am. I've hit a few bumps during this journey I've talked about in my previous posts. Since my last, I had lost about another ten pounds, but I've gained back about six. So I'm still 24 pounds down from when I started. After all these diets I've tried, I decided that Lindora is not right for me. Too much protein, and the packaged snacks were making me feel not so good. I live in this beautiful city where the quality of food is high and accessible, so I've been taking advantage of it lately and I feel good again!

I wanted to try to add more miso into my life, so here is a recipe that I've made into my own, adapted from a Whole Foods beet and mint slaw.

I love the contrast of the golden and red beets in the first photo! Anyway, here is the recipe:

2 medium to large sized beets, red and/or golden, raw and shredded.
1/2  fennel bulb and fronds, thinly sliced.
1/2 bunch of green onions, chopped.
a few sprigs of fresh mint (I used about 6 or 7), chopped.

Dressing:
4 tsp mellow white miso
3 tbs brown rice vinegar
2 tbs agave nectar or honey (I used one of each)
ground black pepper, to taste.
 -whisked together in a little bowl and the poured over and tossed into the salad.

So yummy!

ketosis

i have officially lost 20 pounds.
it's taken me about six weeks. and i still have a long way to go, but i did want to take some time and talk about the "diet" i'm doing, as some of my friends have been concerned.

i am eating significantly less than i was used to. at the same time, i feel full and totally satisfied with what i do eat. i don't feel deprived, i don't feel weak, i don't feel like i'm doing something that is putting my health at risk. i don't know about you guys, but i feel completely in tune with myself and my body and if i felt like what i was doing was bad for me, i'd know and i'd stop doing it.

now, usually i do not end up eating more than 1,000 calories a day. and most days it ends up being just below that. i'm also eating about 100 grams of protein a day to 50 grams of carbohydrates (give or take a few). based on the results of my ketone testing strips, this is the amount i need to be eating to stay in ketosis. some people can eat up to 100 grams of carbs to stay in ketosis. i can't.

and as far as ketosis, from what i understand it is the state in which your body burns your stored fat for energy, rather than carbs (sugar). there is a question on whether or not being in ketosis is safe.

everyone seems to have something different to say. so here are a few things about the topic.

this is an excerpt of an excerpt. my friend sent me an email with this quoted from her nutrition text book:

"A diet that supplies enough digestible carbohydrates to prevent breakdown of proteins for energy needs is considered protein sparing. Under normal circumstances, digestible carbohydrates in the diet mostly end up as blood glucose, and protein is reserved for functions such as building and maintaining muscles and vital organs. However, if you don't eat enough carbohydrates, your body is forced to make glucose from body proteins, draining the pool of amino acids available in cells for other critical functions. During long-term starvation, the continuous withdrawal of proteins from the muscles, heart, liver, kidneys, and other vital organs can result in weakness, poor function, and even failure of body systems.

In addition to the loss of protein, when you don't eat enough carbohydrates, the metabolism of fats is inefficient. In the absence of adequate carbohydrate, fats don't break down completely in metabolism and instead form ketone bodies. This condition, known as ketosis, should be avoided because it disturbs the body's normal acid-base balance and leads to other health problems. This is a good reason to question the long-term safety of the low-carbohydrate diets that have been popular. The wasting of protein that occurs during long-term fasting can be life-threatening. This has prompted companies that make formulas for rapid weight loss to include sufficient carbohydrate in the products to decrease protein breakdown and thereby protect vital tissues and organs, including the heart."

in contradiction, here's a link:
what is ketosis?

what's your opinion?

pay attention! oh, and how do you feel about dieting?

i've never been into diets. i've tried so many, and every time i've been miserable, given up, gained it all back plus more. just like everyone else. but i feel like i'd go into something expecting to see results too quickly without doing any work. and as i am now motivated and determined to lose weight and be healthy, the things i've been doing over the past few weeks have been working out pretty well.

a few weeks ago, this older russian lady, lyuda who works for my parents had told me about this diet that she had done several times that worked for her. basically you eat very small portions at approximately 70-100 grams/2-3.5 ounces of food per meal, every two hours. you can only drink water or tea, and a cup of coffee in the morning, you can drink up to 15 minutes before you eat and wait at least 30 minutes to drink after each meal when you're thirsty. it's EXTREMELY strict. i wish i had more info about the origin, but there were a lot of things that appealed to me about it so i thought i would give it a try. but because this diet was high in protein i decided to add some meat and dairies back into my diet. i was still eating fish, so i added some chicken back in, as well as eggs, some cheeses and yogurts and cultured milks for the calcium and probiotics.

here is an example of one day during this diet.

8am - a cup of coffee*
10am - lifeway's lowfat farmer's cheese*
12pm - hard boiled egg
2pm - 3 1/2 ounces of tuna
4pm - cucumber with a little bit of fresh squeezed lemon juice and sea salt**
6pm - mozzerella stick
8pm - green apple*
10pm - 1 cup lifeway's organic lowfat plain kefir (cultured milk)*

*everyday musts
**can be replaced with a small tomato, carrots, lettuces or cabbages

also, the last thing you eat should be about 2 hours before you go to bed.

you eat this way for two weeks, and on the third you still eat small portions of mostly proteins but you can start combining your proteins with fruits and vegetables. i mean technically you can eat whatever you want, but the portions need to be small in order to maintain the weight you lose.

i finished the two weeks without cheating at all, and the third week of eating small portions. with doing about 30-45 minutes of aerobic exercise 4-5 times a week, i've lost 11 pounds so far.

after doing some more research, i found out that this is a bit more strict than the lindora diet. which i have started today (because i have a lot more i want to lose, and i do better when i have something structured to follow). from what i've been reading, eating small portions frequently speed up your metabolism. at the same time, when you eat more protein than carbs you start burning fat instead of sugar for your energy.

it's been a really interesting experience though. there are so many things i never paid attention to! like how MUCH i was eating. even though i would hardly eat all day, i would binge when i got home. also, how much i snack when i'm PREPARING my food. and i'd never take my time. how much can you really enjoy what you eat when you shove it into your face and it's gone in two seconds? i've learned how to really eat slowly. seriously, i think my proudest moment was taking half an hour to eat a hard boiled egg. but it's so much more satisfying and keeps you satisfied until the next meal.

wakame soba salad

so as this is the first recipe i'm posting, let me give you guys a little disclaimer. when i cook, i have a hard time not making TOO MUCH food, so be prepared to share! that or cut the recipe in half or something, because this will make a lot of seaweed salad!

one package of dried wakame

one package of 100% buckwheat soba noodles

one/third cup of brown rice vinegar

three teaspoons 100% organic, unrefined sesame oil

two tablespoons of 100% organic, unrefined extra virgin olive oil

one tablespoon organic agave nectar

two tablespoons organic sesame seeds, toasted

sea salt, to taste

red chili pepper flakes, to taste

put the wakame in a bowl and rinse it well. fill the bowl back up with water with an inch or two covering the seaweed and let it soak for about five minutes. mix the ingredients for the dressing, sans sea salt, red chili pepper flakes and sesame seeds. once you're done soaking, you want to drain your wakame bowl and then remove the excess moisture. i ended up just wrapping it in a few paper towels and the wringing out the water. then just toss the wakame with the dressing and add in your sea salt, chili and sesame seeds.

as far as the soba noodles go, i only mixed them together with the wakame in the bowl before it was ready to be eaten. your call if you want to mix everything together right off the bat.

i've mentioned before that i was getting into researching what my foods were doing for me. so,

in this food...

wakame contains more than ten times the calcium that you'd get from milk as well as four times the iron you'd get from beef, while buckwheat is  a good source of magnesium which relaxes blood vessels, helping to lower blood pressure and improve blood flow!

#2

i have four days left of master cleanse number three.
remember how i wrote about ten days (even though i'm only doing 7 days this time) without food being the easy part? so while i still know that eating and staying healthy after you come off the cleanse is much harder, there is nothing easy about this. my headache won't go away and i want to eat food. and surprisingly (unfortunately), i'm not as grossed out by everyone in the breakroom at work eating lunch from mao's kitchen.

i also ran into a problem this time that i've never had before. apparently it DOES make a difference if you start your cleanse off with the tea as opposed to the salt water flush. i totally went into it this time feeling like a champ, and actually with a little bit of arrogance since i completed 10 full days, twice. but i learned that each time is brand new, each time is just as hard and just as challenging. doing it twice before doesn't mean shit. so when i downed a quart of salt water after my last meal and it didn't come out, i felt like a complete asshole. and super bloated.

everything is back on track now, and with the end approaching, as far as it seems to be, i am getting more excited about cooking when i'm back to eating again. i can't stop thinking about roasted beets.