I've had a really busy week so far due to the start of my small creative business. I'm selling the sequin and pom balls I've been making as a hobby for the last few years at Leaping Lotus in Solana Beach (http://www.leapinglotus.com/). This is a coop retail space where 120+ vendors sell everything from furniture, clothes and crafts to photographs, artwork and books. I love this store and I'm thrilled that I've taken a space there. Pictures of the decorative balls will be in a separate posting immediately following today's post.
FOOD
Today was a little tough for me, mentally. I found myself thinking about eating the old fat-laden foods that got me into bad health in the first place. I think this is normal given that I made such a drastic change to my diet about 4 weeks ago without allowing myself to think about it. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't have ordered or bought food that wasn't appropriate for my new diet but I thought about pizza covered with cheese and sausage, hamburgers, french fries, the cobb salad sandwich at BJ's Brewery, chorizo and eggs, and Mexican food with lots and lots of guacamole.
Eating fat free vegan means no avocados, nuts, coconut or any type of added oil/fat. This is very strict but to abide by Dr Esselstyn's prescribed diet in order to stop and reverse heart and artery disease, I have no choice. For the most part, this hasn't been an issue but I get bored very easily in life and this new challenge of eating healthily isn't too much of a challenge any more now that it's near the end of 4 weeks. I'm not being impatient at all - just bored with the food, etc.
I do think it's healthy for me to have these thoughts from time to time after all I'm bombarded with the wrong food on television and in stores all the time. It's good for me to have to work it all out in my head so that I'm reminded of why I'm doing this in the first place - TO SAVE MY LIFE. Enough said about this...
Today I ate lunch and dinner at a restaurant - lunch was at The Counter in Encinitas' Forum. You pick the type of burger or salad and then all of the fixings - it was much more limited in the way of salad ingredients than I thought. I used to eat at the one in Palo Alto a few years back but I was eating "low carb" so it was no problem ordering a turkey burger in a salad filled with cheese and mayonnaise (or so I thought in those days). Today I used dijon and yellow mustard as the dressing because they didn't have a fat free option. The salad was fine but I knew I would be hunger within an hour of eating it since there wasn't much substance to it.
Dinner was much easier because I ate at Niban with my mother - it's awesome that she loves sushi and Japanese food, in general. I ordered the kappa maki (cucumber sushi roll), edamame and plain brown rice that I put low sodium soy sauce mixed with wasabi and fresh ginger on. I actually felt stuffed for the first time in a very long time. I knew to drink a lot of water to help dilute the sodium even though I used a low sodium version of the soy sauce.
For a snack I had honey-coated air popped popcorn. To make this I drizzled the honey on to the popcorn immediately after it was popped and still very warm. It's so sticky that I already came up with a different version - also knowing that to be truly vegan I shouldn't eat honey (poor bees getting their limbs torn off during mass production...). I'm going to melt turbine/raw brown sugar into water, add cinnamon and then put it into a culinary sprayer. I'm not 100% sure this will work - I envision having to work quickly with the warm substance and then rinse the sprayer/nozzle very well to make sure it doesn't get clogged. I would still add it to the popcorn when it's warm with the hope that when it cools it will harden somewhat so it won't be so sticky.
When I got home tonight I decided to make up a batch of my fat free Spanish patatas (potatoes) so I'll have it ready for tomorrow. This originated from a dear old friend of mine, Alicia. I adapted the original recipe I have used for years which is very similar to the FF Spanish Rice recipe except the potatoes are substituted for the rice and the potatoes are dry pan fried after they are steam cooked in the pan. The recipe is at the end of this post, if you're interested.
What I ate today:
- Red grapefruit
- Seedless watermelon
- Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal (dry)
- Mixed Euro greens salad with dijon and yellow mustard dressing
- Rice crackers
- Pretzel sticks
- Soy cappuccino
- Honey popcorn
- Kappa maki sushi (cucumber)
- Japanese white rice with soy sauce, wasabi and ginger juice
- Edamame - steamed with soy sauce
- Chipotle mustard (I squirt it on to my finger and eat it plain now...that's what its come to)
- Pickle spears
__________________________________________________________________
RECIPES
FF Spanish Patatas
Ingredients:
- Potatoes - Yukon Gold or Russet - cubed to your preference (I like smaller - 1/2 to 3/4" dice)
- Onions - any type - diced (I like a fine dice but any size is good)
- Garlic - minced or smashed/chopped
- Cilantro - finely chopped
- Tomato Paste - 1-2 tablespoons (I like the flavor of 2 Tbsp)
- Vegetable Broth - FF - enough to cover the potatoes
- Garlic Powder
- Tomatoes - fresh and diced (or you can buy a can of Ro-Tel tomatoes with green chillies/jalapeno/habanero - depends on how hot you want it)
- Jalapeno - fresh and fine dice (omit if using Ro-Tel with chillies)
- Cumin - just a pinch (optional)
- Hot sauce - to taste
Instructions:
- Dry saute garlic, onions and jalapenos until there is a little translucence around the edges - move the vegies around quickly so as not to burn
- Add tomatoes and tomato paste - mix well with other ingredients
- Add potatoes and broth - enough to completely cover the potatoes
- Add all the other ingredients - mix well and bring to a boil
- Decrease the heat to low and cover
- Cook until potato cubes are done in the middle - 15 to 20 minutes for 1-1.5" cubes, 25-35 for larger cubes
- Turn off heat and uncover to stir the potatoes to be sure the liquid is completely absorbed (it's ok if there's a little moisture left - it will cook out in the next step)
- Pour potatoes into a hot fry pan to dry fry them - allowing them to get a little crispy around the edges
- Serve and eat!
Notes:
- To make this faster you can use a fresh made salsa with tomatoes, jalapenos, onions and cilantro
No comments:
Post a Comment