some meal reminders

I recently dropped my phone in the sink (while I was sick) and my reflexes were pretty slow.  I didn't get it out in time.  It died and I lost all my photos from September to now because that was when I last updated my phone to my computer.  We got a new phone for me and I have old pictures so I was looking through them and found pics of past meals.  Some I had forgotten about and  gave me fresh ideas...and even old ideas reminded.  I have changed my eating so much that I am always at a loss for what to eat.  So I am going to start posting some of these ideas to help keep them in my mind.  

This is a salad with lettuce, beets, tomatoes, olives and avocado.

Carrot noodles (shaved carrots) and peas in a creamy avocado sauce.

A tomato/eggplant stack with cashew cheese between each layer on a bed of lettuce and topped with parsley.

A blended raw soup of peas, carrots, avocado, almond milk and nutritional yeast.

Green smoothies and my weekend

This weekend seemed busier than it was, I'm sure. Adam had his birthday party on Saturday. So I spent Friday evening vacuuming and doing general clean up. Mostly, I didn't do much since I was distracted by watching America's Funniest Home Videos.

Adam came home from the PO box with a package for me from a friend in France. A Christmas card (we don't check the PO box very often) and a bag of organic, French spices. There was a recipe on the box to use them in but since I don't read French, I don't know what it is yet. She said she'd translate it for me. So a nice surprise to start the weekend. :o)


The world was still wet on Saturday morning. I love the look of wet wood.


To start off my weekend right, I had a green smoothie for breakfast. It's a great way to get your greens in. Plus it was so good! This one was lots of kale (my first kale smoothie in my new blender...worked much better than my last blender), peaches, grapes, strawberries, mango, pineapple and orange juice. It made two large glasses full. I drank every last drop.

I first started drinking these when I was doing the raw diet. I can't reccomend these enough. They pack vitamins, minerals, fiber and yummy goodness.

After I finished cleaning, I went for a bike ride. Get this, it's in the middle of January and I was wearing shorts and a short sleeved jersey! It was around 68 degrees!! I am loving the warm winter. But I had to pass the garden on my way out the driveway and found all these water bubbles. I really liked the looks of them.


Action shot.


Back in the subdivision at the end of the ride, the sun was shining down a side road. I had to turn around to get a shot of it...I couldn't go by without one.

To prepare for guests, the dogs had to be loacked out. They weren't too happy about it. I wasn't thrilled with it either since the ground was still wet, but the deck was fairly dry and it was plenty warm out so they were fine. But they still tried to convince me they would be happier inside.

Even my nephews came out. I didn't get any pictures of them on the phone camera (I used it to take all the pics on this post, except the top one) so I don't have access to them right now. I watched Samuel a while and also played Mario Kart with Isaac. That's his favorite part of coming to our house. He LOVES Mario Kart and we are the only people he knows who has it.

After they left, the dogs got to come back in and hang out while the rest of Adam and his friends and I played games. We had pizza and cake.

We played a game called Iron Dragon. It was fun but long. I think we played for 4 hours. Adam was on the verge of winning. He deilvered a commodity to me so I payed him just enough to make him win so we could quit. See him without his glasses?

Bear was creating trouble. He kept laying under the table and people would accidentally graze him and he'd let out a growl. He finally settled in behind me, out of the way.

The dogs said it was a long, tiring day.

Christmas baking

Just like every other Christmas, I waited until the last minute to get everything done so it was busy and hectic. Every year I say I have learned my lesson. I hope you were better than me and finished everything early so you could feel the joy of the season. It's always great to have family gathered close...and if I can't have mine close by at least I can have Adam's family.

I am still not eating sugar but I am happy to make sugary goodness for others. I made three different things. Toffee, mint brownies and a cookie bar type thing that I can't remember what it was called but it was the hands down favorite. I couldn't get a good picture of it for the life of me though. Here's the toffee.


I made about 15 plates and was able to deliver about 12 of them. I still have the other 3 in my car. I just ran out of time and now I think they'll be too stale so I guess I will just pitch them. I made the tags.


There is one family at church who eats raw food only and I wanted to do something special for them since the mom made a fireplace for the Christmas play at the party (still have more to post from that party). So I made these raw cookies which are supposed to be like macaroons but really aren't. They weren't sweet at all so I made a sauce from pureed strawberries and strained yogurt. I was able to have some of these since there was no sugar.


Aside from the sweets, I also did some bread baking. Besides the raw dessert I made for that family, I also gave them a portion of my sourdough starter. Since I pulled it out and fed it, I decided to make some of our favorite sourdough bread. I'll have to post the recipe some time. I made four loaves (yesterday morning). One is almost gone and another is at my in-law's. I imagine the other two will disappear before I have to freeze them.


And the other bread I made is my all time favorite. It's a soaked bread. I've posted this recipe before. No matter what, I can't get it to rise nice and big but it is always silky smooth and so yummy! I made some rolls with the same recipe for some bean/grain burgers a friend made for us.

Let the renovation begin (well...continue really)

Kitchen work is under way. Adam had to hoist the sink into the air while working on the counter top bases in preparation for putting in the marble tiles. He was going to mortar the wood for the tile backer but after taping up all the paper, he decided he would do that when I was gone so he could do it all at once so the paper had to come back down. The plan is for him to have the counters finished when I get back from vacation. He's hoping the back splash as well but that's a lot of work so we'll see about the back splash.

This is the "bar". It's just a raised wall in the middle of the peninsula. It is purely to keep the mess of normal dishes buildup from being completely on display from the doorway. I can still see over it wile doing dishes but it blocks just enough of the counter/sink that I don't have to feel self conscious every time there are dishes.

The sink raised in the air while Adam screws the bar into place.

Hard working man.

So, some more of what's gone on this week is, of course, some food. My favorites were raw brownies and guacamole.

I've posted a recipe for these brownies made of just walnuts, dates, coconut oil and cocoa before. I just love them and I can eat them because they're sugar free and white flour free. This time, for the first time, I added some of my drained yogurt cheese to the top as frosting. So good!!

And then for lunch today, I had guacamole made with avocado, chopped tomatoes, lemon juice, sea salt and cilantro with zuchinni rounds to dip in it. I love simple meals like that.

I got the dogs outside for a group shot. I don't like this one as much as past ones I've gotten but I still like getting more shots of all of them...especially when they're listening to me.

We actually spent quite a bit of time outside before heading over to babysit Samuel, enjoying the wonderful fall weather. I feel so alive when fall comes around! While we were out, snapping pics, we got this one of me and Jack that I really like. There aren't very many pics of us with the dogs. I realize the composition is horrible and my head is chopped off...but I really like it anyway. That's my Jackie boy.

And lastly... I have been wearing a jelly type barcelet (you know those Live Strong bracelet type things) for behavior modification. If I complain or criticize, I have to change the wrist it's on, bringing attention to my conscience thought of what I've just done. The theory is that if you recognize you're doing it, you will be less likely to do it. My record so far was going 5 days without changing wrists. The goal is 21 days. But I didn't really like that jelly bracelet. I was putting laundry away. I took some towels to the bathroom and looked at my jewelry box. I rifled through it looking for something easy to latch/unlatch for the more constant than should be changing of the wrists. I found something that I really like. But while looking through the box, I came across my 3 pairs of earrings that I've saved even though my ears haven't been pierced in a decade (I got rid of all the rest). Suddenly, I was filled with the desire to put earrings in. So I grabbed a bottle of rubbing alcohol and my sharpest studs. After about 10 minutes, I had pierced ears again. I was wondering how long it would take for Adam to notice and one of the first things he said to me was, "Why are you all girlified?" He said he liked it. The funny thing was he actually seemed excited that he could buy me earrings. He's only seen me wearing earrings once, on our wedding day, that last time I pierced my ears. I don't know how long it will last (mood or infection will eventually end it, I'm sure since just 3 hours without wearing them closes them back up) but I am girlified for the moment.

margharita pizza and raw brownies

Dinner...mmm. I'm so hungry right now that just thinking about it is making my stomach growl. Anyway, a couple of nights ago, we made dinner together. Adam had bought this log of fresh mozzerella and while we were snacking on it, I decided we needed to have a margharita pizza. It's our favorite kind, followed by hawaiian. After baking the crust, we topped it with a pizza sauce Adam made, chopped basil, pieces of tomato and small chunks of the fresh mozzerella. It doesn't melt very much like the hard blocks of mozzerella does. It was so good! Unfortunately, it didn't last very long. But the recipe made enough for 2 doughs so the other dough will be made into the same pizza in a night or two. Can't wait!

Then, for dessert, I made these raw brownies. I started making these when I was on the raw diet. I don't make them very often but they are good on occassion. They don't taste like brownies but they satisfy my sweet tooth.

It's a cup of dates, a cup of walnuts, a tsp. of cocnut oil (though you could sub butter, I'm sure) and 1/4 cup cocoa. You process it all in the food processor. The longer you proccess, the more dense they become. That's the way I prefer them. Then, you press into shape (I used a Ziploc container) and chill for an hour. Adam's never tried them.

Raw/living food diet

green smoothie for dinner...YUM YUM To make it, I put in enough spinach to fill the blender and enough water to make it a liquid. Blend up the spinach and then add whatever fruit you want. I really like it with mango and pineapple (which is what I did in the above pic) but it's also good with blueberries. That way looks like a chocolate shake with purple specks in it. The spinach has such a mild flavor that I really don't notice it much at all.

Since I lost my kitchen 4 weeks ago (almost 5 weeks) I started eating mostly fruits and vegetables in order to save dishes. I was carrying my dishes over to Lanette's and washing them there and then dragging them back so the less I had to carry over the better. Then there was the fact that I was having to use the tub to rinse out/off the dishes and bending over the tub scrubbing didn't sound like a lot of fun to me. I figured after about a week I'd get bored with it and have to figure out some other way of eating without dirtying up a bunch of dishes.

But the week went by and a weird thing started happening...I wasn't craving chocolate anymore. I mean, if I see it, it still looks good and I still salivate at the thought of it! But then I have a bite and it's not appealing. But I wasn't craving it all the time and even when I did see it I had some self control. Most of you who read this have known me my whole life and already know this but some of you don't. When I was 19, I made a deal with a friend. We both wanted to lose weight so we agreed that we would gve up all chocolate and sweets for a year. The person who failed first would have to take the other (and pay) to a place of their choosing. For me it was Lagoon and for my friend, it was a concert. Well, my friend failed just a few months into it and I decided that I was going to keep going. I never got taken to Lagoon though. :o( Anyway, the year ended and I really didn't care about the chocolate or sweets anymore so I just kept going with it. For 2 years, I hadn't touched a bite of choloatey or sweet goodnesses. Then I met Adam and he bought a peice of chocolate cake. I don't like cake at all, by the way, but I had some and the chocolate surged through my body and I've had trouble since then just as I had had before starting the bet. I have often wished I could do it again. I can look at chocolate now and not HAVE to have it.

My usual day in food looks like this:
breakfast - high fiber cereal with dried fruit and milk
snack - some type of fruit or veggie
lunch - BIG salad (the taste changes according to what I add to it) and chocolate milk
snack - almonds & dried cherries
snack - veggie or fruit
dinner - green smoothie
dessert - plain yogurt with fruit

Also, through the day I drink a lot of water. Not sure how much exactly but more than the 64 oz. they say you should get...but that hasn't changed with this new way of eating for me...I've always drunk a lot of water.

That is not what I eat everyday but it is almost everyday.

Anyway, as I was starting this, I was having some serious hunger pains. I was worried that I wasn't getting enough calories and started reading up on nutrition on a raw food diet. I started learning about things like amino acids (I knew what they were but not really much about them at all), enzymes, pH balance, free radicals, the macronturients (carbs, protien and fat) and how all of these things are connected to your immune system. I've only begun scratching the surface so I still can't tell you much about the different aspects of nutrition that I listed but what I have learned has intrigued me greatly. I want to learn more because learning about it is helping me gain a better understanding of my body and all the amazing things it does! There are so many things about our bodies that we are just learning through modern science and it's just amazing to see all the jobs our bodies perform. I still wonder if I'm getting all the nutrients/calories I need but since I'm still eating non-raw foods a couple times a week, plus dairy (also not raw) everyday which gives me protien I'm not overly concerned. No matter how long or short this diet ends up being for me, I hope to take some of the knowledge I'm gaining and continue to follow it.

The thing I thought would end this for me after about a week was food fatigue. When I eat a lot of one food for a week, I don't want to see it again for a long while. But I haven't experienced that! I vary what's in my salads and smoothies so they taste different every time. Plus, when I get hungry, I have fruit on my mind instead of a donut. In fact, the more I eat these foods, the more I want them.

I still have a lot to learn. I am trying to read from sources that are pro and con raw/living food diet as well as people who don't specify either way so that I get different points of view on it. But since I don't know much yet, I am not strict about not eating any cooked foods...I stil do, just not very often.

In the process of eating this way and doing no extra exercising beyond my usual dogwalking, ice skating and biking I have lost 7-8 pounds. Not sure what I was at exactly when I started this.