Compliance Project

[Idgie]

Plan for today (adjusted because I'm out of sweet potatoes and changed the Thanksgiving menu)

B: veg soup and hash brown waffle
L: fruits and veggies while cooking
D: fat-free mashed potatoes, vegan oil-free gravy, corn, whole-wheat rolls, cucumber salad
S: fruits and veggies

Up at 5 to nerdily plan my cooking for the day. I only have 2 burners and a small countertop oven, so it takes some planning. Here's my geeky list:

Menu:
Mashed potatoes
Corn
Vegan gravy (pre-made; just need to heat)
Maple-glazed carrots
Cucumber salad
Whole-wheat rolls
Lemon meringue pie
Pumpkin pie

Burner 1:

Mashed potatoes 1-1:30
Carrots 1:30-2

Burner 2:
Lemon curd made by 9:30
Gravy and corn last minute

Oven:
Blind bake piecrust (10 minutes)
Lemon pie: 10-11
Pumpkin pie: 11 - 12
Rolls: 1-1:30

No cooking:
Cucumber salad

Any time: peel potatoes, blind bake 1 pie crust, make cucumber salad
by 9, measure out all ingredients for bread and both pies
9:30 make lemon curd and meringue
10:00 turn on bread machine, bake lemon pie (meanwhile, put together pumpkin pie)
11:00 bake pumpkin pie
12:05: shape rolls and let rise
1:00 boil potatoes, bake bread
1:30 cook carrots, heat corn and vegan gravy
1:45 mash potatoes, take everything downstairs

[moonlight]

I love your geeky list!! Congratulations to making it to Day 4!! Woot Woot! Happy Thanksgiving, Idgie!

[Idgie]

Thank you, moonlight! Happy Thanksgiving! I didn't do great, but I didn't do too badly.

TMI: Something has been constipating me, and I've never had constipation before. My two theories are that it's either the metoprolol or the potatoes/sweet potatoes, since I've read that both of them can do it. Considering an all-rice elimination diet to see if I can figure it out. Except if I'm not fine on just rice, then it might be the drugs, in which case I don't know how to fix that short of eventually being off those drugs. Hmm.

[moonlight]

I feel pretty good about my day. I didn’t eat anything off plan until I got to my aunt’s house this evening. I didn’t realize a couple of dishes from my childhood, home made by my aunt... I’ve eaten a little extra today. I’m happy though.

For your ailment, are you staying well hydrated?

Happy Thanksgiving!

[Idgie]

No, I'm not. Thanks for the reminder!

[Idgie]

My plan today, which is both what I want and what I think will help with my digestion, is an all-soup day. I'm sipping tomato-vegetable soup right now, and I'll make a pot of something later, maybe lentil/garlic. We'll see.

Plan: just soup

Actual:
B: (a can of tomato soup mixed with a can of vegetable soup)
L: (Yellow split pea soup with vegetables)
S: A little taste of some soup I didn't care for, and a spoonful of black rice.
D: (same as breakfast)
S: "tortilla soup" which was basically the tomato-vegetable soup I've been eating most of the day with a pan-crisped (no oil) tortilla cut into strips and thrown in the bowl

Probably had wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy too much sodium today, but it was comforting, it was easy, and it was very low in caloric density, so it's fine for a lazy day. I'm gonna get up now and cook some potatoes and sweet potatoes for tomorrow's meals.

[Idgie]

Holy heck. Just for the hell of it, I plugged yesterday's "soup day" foods into my SparkPeople tracker. I was expecting high sodium because I basically lived on canned soup yesterday (and a little bit of homemade), but YOW. 13,458 mg.

However, having a "theme" yesterday was fun and made things easy and streamlined for me, so I'm gonna do it again. It means I don't have to plan a bunch of meals, because they're all roughly the same. Today is potatoes and veggies. I baked a sweet potato and a bunch of white potatoes last night, and I have a bunch of veggies around.

Focusing really hard on stopping when I'm comfortably satisfied today. One thing that does is ends up requiring less cooking, because for example, I only ate a third of my breakfast this morning, so now I already have lunch ready. I'm also resisting grocery shopping; we have tons of starches in the house, and a bunch of frozen veggies, and I need to use those up before I go stock up again. I find that if I have the house too packed with food, I not only eat more, but I lose track of what I have and some of it spoils, which is obviously totally wasteful.

B: roasted sweet potato; water-sauteed green beans with a drizzle of ginger balsamic

[Idgie]

Got too hungry yesterday with no prepped starches in the house, and basically ate a whole meal of fried stuff. Not my finest hour, but a reminder (again!) of how important it is to prep my starches. Right now, I have a butternut squash in the oven and five pounds of red potatoes in the steamer. Next, I'll roast some sweet potatoes.

1: 2 corn tortillas
2: steamed potato and cucumber salad
3: restaurant meal
4: butternut squash with pomegranate/persimmon salsa

[Idgie]

Weary of starting over, so...



Plan
1: turnip and taro cakes
2: potatoes and salsa
3: potatoes and salsa
4: potatoes or sweet potatoes and salsa

Actual
1:
2:
3: partner's enchiladas and red cabbage slaw
4: frozen cherries

[bunsofaluminum]

How delicious that plate of roasted sweet potatoes and green beans looks! Yummmy! Your food pics are DA BOMB!

[Idgie]

Thanks, buns!

I've decided not to be at the whim of my groove. Put plainer, I've decided I'm staying on my diet even if I don't feel like it or have a bad day. I foresee a lonnnng streak here.

Plan for the day:

B: Sweet potatoes and salsa
L: Sweet potatoes and salsa
D: Sweet potatoes and salsa
S: Sweet potatoes and salsa

Actual:
B: potatoes, sweet potatoes, and salsa
S: sweet potato oven fries and ketchup
L: sweet potato fries with ketchup and bbq sauce, potatoes, salsa, cabbage slaw
D: oil-free bean tacos with salsa and slaw, miso broth

Plan for tomorrow:
B: sweet potato fries
L: sweet potatoes and slaw
D: sweet potatoes and slaw
S: unfried ramen soup, fruit

[Mark Cooper]

Thanks, buns!
I've decided not to be at the whim of my groove. Put plainer, I've decided I'm staying on my diet even if I don't feel like it or have a bad day. I foresee a lonnnng streak here.

Awesome, Idgie! Love it.

In spite of the simplicity, those pics of todays food look REALLY delicious!

[Idgie]

Thanks so much, Mark.

Home sick today. Going off in a few minutes to get my thyroid tested. I suspect that's the problem -- as I lose weight, I keep needing less and less thyroid hormone. Taking too much of it gives me cardiac symptoms.

There's some TMI after the photos. Just sayin'.

Mom bought me a bag of Tootsie Rolls as a gift today. I didn't eat them; I'll put them in the snack dish at work tomorrow. I considered eating them for a moment, but I don't want to break my streak for any reason, much less for something junky.

Plan for today:
B: sweet potato fries
L: sweet potatoes and slaw
D: sweet potatoes and slaw
S: unfried ramen soup, fruit

Actual:
B: taro and radish cakes
L: sweet potato fries with spicy ketchup; slaw; seaweed snacks
D: chana dal, chana masala, spinach with mustard seeds, and brown rice
S: cup of mint tea
S: butternut squash with raspberry balsamic and pepper








Something's still constipating me. Might be metoprolol, in which case I probably need a plant-based doc to help me get off it. Might be potatoes/sweet potatoes, in which case I probably need an elimination diet. Will just be compliant for all of December and see if it goes away, and then if not, decide what to do then, and in the meanwhile, read a lot about the issue. Might go re-read Digestive Tune-up.

[Idgie]

Staying home sick is boring, but it's great for my eating, because I have all the time and leisure in the world to cook what I want. Made a bunch of compliant Indian food yesterday and now I have leftovers for today, along with 1 or 2 sweet potatoes in the fridge and some frozen hash browns, etc. Will probably also cook up some lentils today.

Today's plan:
B: Indian leftovers (brown rice and spinach un-fried)
L: sweet potato and slaw
D: lentil stew
S: seaweed snacks, fruit, radish/taro cakes

Today's actual:
B:
S: taro/radish cakes
L: heated up some sweet potato and slaw. Didn't love it, but it was okay, so I ate a few bites and then finished with a cup of vegetable broth.
S: an orange
D: dal and veggie soup (basically just threw yesterday's dal into a pot of veggies and water, and at the end added a squeeze of lemon juice to brighten it up)
S: air-popped popcorn with sprayed-on Bragg's aminos, garlic, and nooch

[moonlight]

Hi Idgie,
I hope you feel better real soon. The picture of the rice and spinach looks yummy!!