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Wine is back on the Menu!

 

All good things must come to an end… My husband and I have decided to end the Whole 30 a few days early. We gave it a great run! He ended up losing 23 pounds and I lost 11 pounds. That is more than enough for both of us. That is not why we have chosen to end it though. We have gotten some sad news from his family and he needs to go out-of-town for a few days. We had been so looking forward to eating together at a restaurant for the first time together since this started, so we will just be doing that a little early. I will not go crazy with the food (or alcohol) while he is gone and I don’t believe he will either.

I believe the Whole 30 or 27 in our case was a great way for us to get a jumpstart on a healthier lifestyle. We learned a ton about cooking with fresh ingredients, we tried new foods and we experimented a lot in the kitchen. We both have talked about doing a “Whole 7” or a “Whole 10” once a month or once every couple of months for fun and just as a smaller reset of our food habits.

I will not be spending hours in the kitchen cooking – so I can finally get together my favorite Whole 30 recipes. I will get that up this week!

I have also been working on my home office and plan on posting some before and after pictures of that which I am really excited about. The office before was always where we stuffed any random junk in to get out of the way before company came over – NOT anymore. It’s so peaceful in there now.

 

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The best (meat free, dairy free, gluten free) lasagna ever!!!

I have to share this – I made the absolute best Whole 30 meal yet off of Pinterest last night. It was a lasagna knock off – that wasn’t really lasagna because of course there is no cheese or pasta, but wow, was it delicious! It was so good that even my young kids who looked at it first and said, “it doesn’t look like lasagna” and “can I have just the sauce with real pasta?”  Or something else altogether – even they loved it!

You can find the recipe here:  https://www.pinterest.com/pin/AQMMCdJplNuKpo3NP52c877UjPrykwe_U3NsPO3dEQi3oWHA4SA8L8g/

On the recipe card it has a link for her homemade marinara sauce. I made that as well with a couple of tweaks here and there, nothing big. It was honestly the best thing I’ve eaten in 18 days! I took a picture, but it looks terrible,  you would never eat it based off my picture, so here’s this instead. 

I’m not sure you would eat it based off that either, but seriously, it was really good. Her marinara recipe was awesome and I think the cashew paste was the secret ingredient. I was just doing some research and I guess there are a couple of Whole 30 advocates out there who would be against using Nutrional Yeast to make the “cheese” paste as a cheese replacement. I’m not one of them – there are no banned ingredients in it, cheese is not my weakness and will not make me cave and I really needed a delicious meal to send me through to the second half of this journey!

Have you tried any delicious recipes lately?

 

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So Many Vegetables!

 

As it turns out, the Whole 30 is pretty time consuming. I spend a ton of time now researching, washing, prepping and cooking! So much more time than I ever did before. We eat so many vegetables now. I’ve tried so many new things and  it is hard! There is no grabbing fast food for dinner when you are out – if you do go out to socialize, you are pretty much forced to watch others enjoy their food and beverages while you sip on water. It’s ok though, I’m through the halfway point and I haven’t fallen off the wagon yet and neither has my husband. My 16 year old daughter on the other hand…

She’s another story and that’s ok. She’s 16 and hasn’t yet developed the will power that is necessary to say no to pretty much everything. She is also exposed to a lot more and has friends who are not as supportive. She did make it almost 2 weeks, which is pretty good.

I will say this, my husband and I both feel great. We sleep better, wake up feeling refreshed and we’ve both lost quite a few pounds. I’ve lost eight pounds and he’s lost 15! So a combined 23 pounds in just two weeks, that’s insane.

I’m sure we will gain a ton of that back shortly after our 30 days is done, but I’d like to think that this “reset” will get us on track to a healthier lifestyle. We are both looking forward to that. When I have more time, I plan on sharing some of my favorite recipes that I’ve found, there have been some delicious ones!

If you are interested in the Whole 30, I highly recommend heading to pinterest, there are great recipes there, I’ve only found a few “duds” so far.

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Whole 30 Day 1

So, today is officially Day 1 of our Whole 30 challenge. Basically if you haven’t heard of Whole 30, you go 30 days without eating sugar (including alcohol!), dairy, legumes, and grains- it’s a complete diet overhaul. After the 30 days is up, you slowly reintroduce foods into your diet to see if they’ve had any effects on your digestive system and/or energy levels. The added bonus is hopefully a few pounds lost.

My 16 year old daughter, myself and my husband are all giving this a shot from today until February 1st. Yesterday, I washed and chopped a bunch of fresh fruit and vegetables and meal prepped two meals. I made a breakfast casserole that we are going to use as breakfast and lunch and a beef stew for dinner tonight that is in the crock pot right now.

For week one, we spent $204 on groceries which included 3 boxes of kcups and some staples like almond butter, ghee and various oils and vinegars. Also, tons of fresh produce! My goal is to start posting some of our favorite recipes, especially those that were a hit with everyone.

Tomorrow, there will be more breakfast casserole. Thank goodness for that. Dinner will be grilled chicken and asparagus. I’m thinking about some sort of coconut milk, banana and almond milk smoothie for breakfast or lunch tomorrow. Or maybe I’ll mix my coffee in with that somehow. I’m just not sure yet. The Whole 30 program really does not encourage smoothies or snacks, but I’m still getting the hang of this program, and I’m not used to eating three meals a day anyways. I’m much more of a coffee with creamer kind of person and that’s the only thing I’m struggling with so far today.

Any advice? Words of encouragement? Whole 30 family friendly recipes so that I’m not making two meals?

 

 

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Slowly getting back into Fitness…

One of my biggest accomplishments in my “Finding Jenn” journey has been quitting smoking. Per my quit smoking app, as of this post, it’s been 246 days and 22 hours – not that I’m counting or anything…

Quitting has been tough! When I was at the peak of my “Slump”, I was using it as a crutch and using it to aid in an eating disorder I had developed. I’m in a much healthier place, but I’ve also gained a bit too much weight back for my liking. I’m going to try and lose the extra pounds in a healthy way, through diet and exercise, not cigarettes, coffee and not eating!

So, today I ate healthy and ran/walked, for the first time in awhile! It felt good! I only made it 1.7 Miles, but baby steps are ok with me.