What I Ate Wednesday #58

 

We made it through the first gluten free vegan week! Yeah! I was surprised how easy it was.  I thought bread would be an issue, but it was nothing a few lettuce leaves could not replace.  In stead of just sharing what I ate on a particular day, I choose some of the meals we had through the whole week to share.

The results so far that I have noticed in myself being gluten free for 10 days now are, clear skin, two+ pounds weight loss, a little more energy and NO headaches.  I usually get a few a month, but none since gluten free.

To be sure I am meeting all of my nutritional needs, I do use an app on my iphone to track everything that goes in my mouth.  It often surprises me to know where I am lacking, or notice if I ate too much sugar.  Those sneaky little numbers add up!  I also use it to track my exercise.  Cardio and weight training can factor in my bonus meals, or some evenings enjoy air popped pop corn.  I am a scientific minded person who enjoys numbers and stats, so I find great pleasure in using these apps!  What did we do before apps?   I told Andy just yesterday, my ipad is solely responsible for my exercise.  I read 1.5 hours a day on the elliptical or bike, and I use You Tube to watch workout videos, do yoga or HIIT programs. I plan on doing a post of my favorite videos and their links.  

Onto the meals! Shakes have been my primary breakfast, but on Sunday, I did make a nice cast iron skillet breakfast with potatoes and tofu scramble.

Most of my shakes consist of water, ice, 1/2 banana, 1 scoop protein powder, 1/2 scoop ground hemp powder, 1/2 cup berries, and sometimes some almonds. And, yes, it was snowing in the background, March 25? What the heck, I am ready for spring.

Sunday tofu scramble…

Lunches for the week were various salads and I made a big pot of veggie soup. Amy’s gluten free vegan Sonoma burgers were a great lunch, once on top of salad, one with Boston lettuce leaves as buns.

My favorite lunch was TVP chicken salad I picked up at Whole foods. Mya loves it as a treat. I spread it on a baked corn tortilla with spring mix, tomato, onion, and avocado spread.

 

Dinners were varied as well. We had brown rice, quinoa, potatoes, and corn pasta as some of our carbs, and tofu, tempeh, and beans were our proteins. 

Favorite dinner recipe: I worked on this week was definitely gluten free vegan “meatballs”.  This is a work in progress, it took some tweaking, the recipe is close to being ready to post, but not quite yet.  The gluten free version was made from a blend of lentils, mushrooms, tvp, walnuts, oats, garlics and herbs & spices. They formed nicely, I refrigerated and baked them off before adding them to my sauce.

A few fell apart, but for the most part, they held up pretty well in the sauce. They tasted so much like my grand mothers Italian meatballs!  I was surprised and very happy with the results.  Andy even commented that I have to make them again.

Snacks this week included hummus, veggies, fresh fruit, popped corn, shakes, and my favorite kale chips.

Recipe for easy Kale Chips:

• 1 lb. Kale, rinsed and dry
• 1 tbsp. melted coconut oil
• 1 tsp. low sodium Tarmari or soy sauce

Pre heat oven to 350. On a cutting board start by removing the hard stem from the kale leaves.  I cut mine down both sides.

Then break into pieces about 2-3 inches.

Place leaves into a bowl, then pour on melted coconut oil.  Massage oil into leaves. Add tamari and again massage onto leaves to get a little on them. 

Transfer leaves onto a baking sheet that has been sprayed with no stick cooking spray.  Try not to over lap the leaves. 

Bake in oven for 12 to 15 minutes until crisp.

Remove from oven when the edges are crisp.  Taste is the best way test to check for desired crispiness. Serve along side burgers or just as a snack.  I can eat an entire pound of kale myself in one sitting prepared this way!

The whole family enjoys kale chips.  Hopefully it wont be long before I am growing the kale instead of having to buy it!  Can’t wait! Kale chips everyday!

This week, besides numerous superfood shakes, I tried to replace a couple of cups of my beloved dark rich organic coffee with some tea.  I always have white tea decaf at night, but I tried some green and black chai as well. I thought during the day I could swap out a cup.  Although it was good, I like the spices, coffee it was not.  Maybe I will try again this week.

I hope I can keep up the gluten free meals another week to see if I experience any other changes, or if they were coincidental. Andy, whom I started this for, says he does not feel any different. He has not noticed any changes.  For me, my skin seems to have gained the most benefit.  More clarity and less inflammation.  Coincidence?  I don’t know.  Anyone else gluten free notice skin changes?

Check in next week to see the progress. Any vegan gluten free meal suggestions would be welcomed.

Have a great Wednesday!

XOXOX

What I Ate Wednesday #57

 

& Gluten Free

That’s right, we are participating a gluten free week as an experiment. Because of my nutrition background and study of visual diagnosis, I have had a suspicion that Andy might have a gluten sensitivity. We are trying a week or two gluten free to study the effects of not having it in our system.  Many people have asked me about gluten issues in my sessions, so I was curious if being vegan, I could accommodate both without going raw.  I have gone raw in the past, but I don’t feel for me that it is doable in cold weather.  I enjoy it much more when the produce is growing in my yard.  I do eat a lot of raw food, so this might be a good combination to try. The meals here are from yesterday, day two being gluten free. 

I woke up at 4:00am to coffee, that goodness that has no gluten!  After a bit of writing, I journeyed to the basement for cardio.  Then back up for a 7:00am breakfast.

Frozen Fruit (defrosted), berries and mango, with soy yogurt and protein powder mixed in, topped by hemp and chia seeds.

After breakfast, I knew I had to go to the store to stock up, if two weeks of no gluten were ahead.  So I packed my bags and headed to Wegman’s with dad. I picked up tons of produce, bean noodles, tofu, tempeh, frozen fruit and veggies and other meal essentials.

I left there quite disappointed, not just because they were out of my favorite bagged kale, because, I probably ended up spending about $80 more than if I had drove 9 more minutes to Trader Joe’s.  Other than Dayia cheese and Vegenaise, I can get pretty much everything at TJ’s. Just since the two weeks I had been there last, so many of their items went up in price.  I budget probably double what most people do for groceries, and I was even shocked.  I don’t mind spending money of good healthy organic food, but, if I wanted to spend that much, I would have gone to Whole Foods and got even better options.

My most exciting find had to be strawberries.

I know they are not quite in season yet, but when I saw they had organic strawberries, I just could not help myself.

Mya screamed with joy when she got home and saw these!  She ate half of them as an after dinner snack.

I was quite hungry after shopping, I had a coffee before we left the house, and now I was ready for lunch. I picked up a bag of their Asian Salad, I love this mix, especially the cilantro.  Andy does not like cilantro, so I pick it all out of the bag, then put it all in my bowl! It came with almonds and Chinese noodles as topping.  I gave the dogs the noodles, and we ate the almonds mixed in.

 

Right after lunch, I threw together Mya’s after school snack. Peanut butter brown rice syrup rice treats with chocolate chips.

This recipe was adapted from an episode of Andrea Beaman’s Fed Up.  I did not write it down, I just remember the basics.  So I melted some peanut butter in a pot with some brown rice syrup. I poured it into a bowl of puffed rice, not as good as crispies, but I was all out, then I added the chips at the end before pressing it into a casserole dish to firm up.

After refrigerating it for an hour, I cut it into squares.

After lunch, I made up for my weight training I missed in the morning.  My arms were killing me by the time the last set was done!

Dinner was my take on Asian lettuce cups.  I never made these before, but I thought of all those fresh veggies I had, plus a block of Asian baked tofu that would be perfect to add in as the “meat”.  These savoy cabbage leaves were stuffed with a mixture of cooked brown rice, Asian baked tofu, shitake mushrooms, onions, peppers, snap peas, carrots, a drizzle of gluten free shitake mushroom sauce and some peanuts on top.  They were super delicious and I was stuffed after one and a half! Very filling.

After dinner, I had a hot cup of decaf Dark Magic with cinnamon!

At 6:45pm, I made my way to the basement for another 1/2 hour on the elliptical. I was a little hungry because we ate dinner pretty early. I ended the night with a strawberry protein shake and some stove popped pop corn.

So that was the end of our day two of gluten free.  I would also like to share my favorite snack of the week.

Grilled Asparagus with lemon cashew dipping sauce.

I roasted one pound of asparagus at 500 degrees for 5 minutes with a drizzle of coconut oil, some garlic seasoning, and a dash of lemon juice.

While it was roasting, I made my sauce. 

Half cup raw cashews, 2 tsp. lemon juice, 1 tsp. agave and 1 tbsp. water blended in the Vitamix until a creamy thick dipping sauce was formed. YUM!!!! Perfect combo.

I will update you on our progress of gluten free eating next week!  Have a great Wednesday, and eat a piece of bread for me!  Just kidding, I have not craved any yet, it has been three days. 

Enjoy your day and stop by again soon!

XOXO