Whole Living Detox Cleanse Day One

Lately, I've been struggling with a lot of headaches, and some knee and SI joint pain that has been creeping back. It's only the first week of my tri training and I'm already struggling. I knew I needed to take a look at what was different. I started tracking my food, and really, to no surprise, it became pretty clear. Too many grains, too much meat, too much sugar, NOT enough veggies. I tried to get myself back on track, but there were just too many distractions. And then, last Friday, in an issue of Whole Living that I'd picked up weeks ago and hadn't looked at yet, I saw this cleanse.

The Whole Living 2013 Action Plan

After reading through the menu and recipes, I decided this was actually a healthy detox. There's no protein shakes or supplements, you eat real food, and you pretty much eat as much of the prescribed food as you feel like.  And so, I set out to the grocery store with a plan.

Today was day one...  I started out the morning (6 AM) with this Blueberry Smoothie! YUM! You can bet that this smoothie will be on the menu all summer! I added a half of a grapefruit to my breakfast (Not the smoothie) because I know that I'm a "Food" person- I like to chew- not sip- my meals. I think this helped a lot. I didn't get hungry again until about 9:45-- that's pretty good for just having a smoothie! I'd packed a baked sweet potato (with sliced almonds) as a snack. Perfect! (Sorry no picture)

Lunch (11:30 AM) was this fabulous Mango-Pine Nut salad! Now, I've had this recipe for EVER, and stumbled across it the other day, and with mangos on sale this week, it was a no brainer... the fact that it fit into the program was perfect!

Around 2:30 I broke into this Coconut trail mix. While I wasn't that hungry, I knew I was going to work out after work, and thought I should put something in my system.

Dinner was Broccoli Soup. Honestly, I REALLY wasn't sure about this one. I like broccoli enough, but I've found these pureed vegetable soups to be less than satisfying, if even edible. I made this with store bought veggie stock, and I waited to add in the avocado. I LOVE avocado and I thought i didn't want to waste one on a soup that wouldn't make it past one bowl.  I tested the soup, and it was really good! So, I pureed in the avocado-- it made it SO MUCH BETTER! Creamy and delicious! I added some pumpkin seeds, for crunch!

It's the end of the day, and I'm feeling really good! Tomorrow I face my first challenge... of course it had to happen, someone planned a birthday lunch! I don't want to miss time out of the office with my friends, so I scoped the menu and found a salad that will work pretty close with the plan. It's not perfect, but I'm ok with that! I'll make it up somewhere else, I'm pretty proud of sticking to day one!

Greens and Beans Soup!

I am trying to get back on the "bring your lunch to work" bandwagon. I've discovered that the easiest thing for me to bring is soup! And since I need to break in my new dutch oven (thanks mom!), today was the day to whip up something new. This recipe is the culmination of a few I found. One of them was very similar, but also included browned sausage! I chose not to add meat, but if you did, I would add 1 lb of sausage to the first stage of this soup... mixed with the onions and garlic.

Beans and Greens Soup

Ingredients

2 Tablespoons Olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

7 cloves of garlic, minced or grated

1 head escarole, chopped

2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 tsp dried oregano (thyme or rosemary would also work here)
4 cups fat free chicken stock

1 cup water

1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese

1/4 teaspoon lemon rind

3  15oz cans Great Northern Beans, lightly drained.

salt and pepper

Directions:

Warm the oil in a large pot of medium-low heat. Add the onion and garlic and cook for 10 minutes, until veggies are soft. Stir in the escarole, sugar, and oregano, cook for another 10 minutes.

Add broth and water, and heat until boiling over medium-high heat. When soup boils, reduce heat to low, add the cheese and lemon rind and stir continuously until cheese is melted (enjoy the wonderfully fresh scent with the lemon hits the hot soup!). Stir in the beans, season with salt and pepper, and let simmer for 20 minutes to several hours!

Apple-Cheddar-Squash Soup

I saw this recipe on the Food Network facebook page one day, and thought it sounded SO good. But, when I saw there were 34g of fat per serving, I freaked! That's a whole days' worth of fat in one little bowl of soup!  I will post the recipe as published by the Food Network with notes as to what I did differently.

Ingredients:
5 Tbls unsalted butter (I used 1T of butter and 1T grapeseed oil)
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
2 medium apples, thinkly sliced
1 large white potato, diced
1 1/2 cup chopped peeled butternut squash, fresh or frozen (I used frozen pureed squash, it was fine)
Kosher salt & Freshly ground pepper
1/2 tsp dried sage
2T all purpose flour
1/3 cup apple cider
4 cups low sodium chicken broth (I use Stock)
1cup milk (I used skim)
2 oz thinly sliced prosciutto torn into pieces (I used 1 oz)
2 cups grated Cheddar cheese (I used one cup, and a little for garnish)
Chopped chives, for garnish
Crusty Bread

Directions:
Melt 4 Tablespoons (I used the butter/oil combo) of butter in large pot over medium-low heat and add the onion, apples, potato and squash. Season with salt and pepper and cook until the onion is soft, about 8 minutes. Stir in the sage and flour. Add the cider and cook over high heat, stirring, until thickened. Add the broth and milk, cover and bring to a boil; reduce to a simmer and cook, stirring, until the potatoe is soft, 8 to 10 minutes.  (If you are using the box of frozen pureed squash, I suggest adding it after the onions are soft, and before the sage and flour)

Meanwhile, heat the remaing 1T butter in aa large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the proscuitto and cook until crisp, turning occasionally, about 2 minutes, drain on paper towels. [ok, while there isn't a ton of fat in prosciutto, I always cook bacon like meats on a broiler pan in my toaster oven. No need to add extra fat]

Add cheese to the soup and stir over medium -low heat until melted (DO NOT BOIL). Puree in a blender in batches until smooth; season with salt and pepper. Garnish with the prosciutto, more cheese and chives. Serve with bread.

Apple-Cheddar-Squash soup, with Sixx, my feline "helper".

Here's my healthy tips! You don't need 4 tablespoons of butter to saute a few veggies. Be smart! There are a lot of veggies here, but halving the butter/oil cuts out 20+ grams of fat! (about 11 per tablespoon).  Cheese is another kicker! Lots of fat there! I wasn't sure it would be good with half of the cheese, but it was! And those were the two big changes I made that dropped the fat from 34g to about 12!! Without losing taste!

Vegetable Beef Soup

A good healthy vegetable beef soup can be made with your pantry staples (if you consider hamburger a pantry staple!). It's an easy, go to soup for me.

Ingredients:
1 lb lean ground beef
1 medium onion, finely chopped

1 can of petite diced tomatoes

1 can of cannelini beans (drained and rinsed)*

1 box of low sodium beef stock

2 cups of chopped fresh or frozen veggies**

1 cup chopped fresh Spinach

Heat 1 Tbls of Olive Oil in a large stock pot over medium heat. Add ground beef and onion and cook until meat is browned. If you are using very lean ground beef, the extra fat will just be absorbed into the meat and onions. Add remaining ingredients (except Spinach) and bring to a simmer. Simmer until veggies are tender. Add Spinach, stirring into soup until it wilts. Serve!

* Draining and Rinsing canned beans eliminates nearly 40% of the sodium content. This can be done with any canned veggies you may use in your cooking as well.

**Use any combination of veggies you like; carrots, corn, peas, mushrooms, green beans, zucchini. Even small potato or sweet potato could be used.

Cauliflower- Carrot Soup

Last week I was on vacation. Where I read, in full, 3 "diet" books~ while sitting on the dock, listen to the waters of Lake Vermillion splash against the shores. Mostly I read them for the nutritional information, and occasionally for a fun recipe. Inspired by my friend Jess' recent kitchen experiment (she's having facebook friends randomly and unknowingly choose recipes from her 119 cookbooks and making them--- check it out at http://icajelleats.blogspot.com/), I decided to start making a few of the fun recipes that I find in all of these diet books.  So here goes the first one; and and just let me tell you how hard it was for me to stick to the recipe exactly, I knew this would be weak, but I did it anyway...

Cauliflower-Carrot Soup from The Body Ecology Diet by Donna Gates


Cauliflower-Carrot Soup



Ingredients:

1 Tbls. butter

1 head of cauliflower, chopped

4 cups of chopped carrots

1 large onion

1 Tlbs of dried Tarragon

Water to cover



Sea salt to taste

1. In a soup pot, warm butter, and add tarragon

2. Add onion, sauteing until translucent

3. Add carrots, cauliflower, and water

4. Simmer until tender (approx. 25 minutes)

5. In a blender, puree (I used a stick blender)

6. Return soup to pot adding sea salt.

7. Simmer for another 10 minutes

Results:

While I am not a big fan of either carrots or cauliflower, this soup was pretty good. And better the next day for lunch!  Would I make it again? Yes? The same way? No. Here's what I would try.

* Use Vegetable or Chicken stock instead of water for more flavor (but yes, more calories)

* Add a Sweet Potato (or regular potato) to the mix to give it a thicker texture

* Add a few shakes of red pepper flakes (I did this to my pot afterwards)

I think any one of those options would be great... I'll keep you posted if I try it!