Best Kayaking, Best Fruit Stand

Yesterday was one of my favorite kayak rides.  I had done the same route 2 years ago when I was here.   On this route and a few others, you spend part of the time navigating through narrow tunnels in mangrove trees.  Here's a pictures of these trees--before it becomes very narrow.  Once it becomes narrow, I'm too busy driving to take pictures:

The tricky part about this is the wide paddle that kayakers use.  It's nearly impossible to use in these tunnels!   So when I returned home after my last trip to Florida, luck would have it that there was this giant paddlesports exposition in town that weekend (called canoecopea).  I scoped the place out and found the paddle I needed, a child's canoe paddle.   Here's a picture of me returning from my trip.  The little child's paddle is in the front under the elastic straps:

 I got really good at swapping between the paddles.  It was a very enjoyable trip with different scenery and lots of big birds to view.    We are entering the dry season as you can see by these mangrove trees:


This is the first time I've seen snails in a long time:



I thought for sure this was a crocodile:

It was bigger than any gator I've seen--saw it all the way from across the lake, and there was supposed to be a croc in this lake.  But after reading up on them, I can't tell from the picture.

Okay, that had nothing to do with nutritarian eating.  That was an aside.  This does though:  The hotspot of this town (Florida City) is the Robert is Here fruit stand.  And he's still there after 52 years, ringing up your order and finding you the best ripe produce.  They have live music on weekends, and crowds all the time.  It is the place to go!  Granted, most people go for the milkshakes, but I'm here to tell you that the mangoes taste as good.  I have never had better mangoes in my life, except for the last time I was here.  These are Kent mangoes.  They slice them up for you to eat on the spot.  Here I am eating around the seed:


Of course, there is lots of other produce, so I'm enjoying great salads, surprise.  Here's the festive place from the outside:

I've got two more days to enjoy the mangos and other produce before heading up north again.

Day 14 of the 6-week Challenge

Two weeks into the challenge, and the first day of my vacation.  I forgot to bring my food scale.  At first I was disappointed, then glad.  I'm tired of measuring my food.   I know how much to eat.   If you aren't sure, you can measure your food.   I think it's great to do for 2-3 weeks if you've never done it before.  If you are trying to lose weight, it gives you an idea where most of the calories come from; and if you are trying to build muscle by working out (the only way to do it), it helps you see where the higher protein foods are (green veggies, beans and nuts, not fruit).

Now everyone handles food on vacation differently.   I prefer making my own food to trying to find something in restaurants, and my travel companion doesn't want to waste time in the restaurants either.  You can make good time on the road by eating in the car.  So it's sort of like camping only we'll be staying in hotels this trip.  Here's my food for a few days.  At right is an electric cooler, which plugs into the car electrical outlet.  Picnic basket has utensils.  The other bags (insulated) have today's food and some extra food that didn't fit into the cooler.

Oh, and can't forget the beans:

Today's meals were

Brekky:  salad and baked sweet potato.  That's the last of the sweet potatoes for this trip because I won't be cooking, except maybe oatmeal.   The salad was: cabbage, kale, bok choy (a bit too strong tasting), lettuce,  broccolini, sweet red pepper, pear, peach, apple, zucchini, mushrooms, edamame, peas, seed mixture, and that really expensive sweet balsamic vinegar.  That's like sugar, definitely something to eat in small quantities.  I made a giant batch and split it into 3 big bowls (8 cup size!) for each meal.  Here's my breakfast:

Lunch was salad and carrots.  Dinner was the same.    That's kinda how it's going to be on this vacation, the same old thing every meal.  But the salad fixings will vary.  In fact, it's fun to see what I can make up from the different stores I visit.   

Great food in Springfield, IL!

Thanks to one of the members on the Fuhrman forums I got great advice for getting good produce while in Springfield this week.  The grocery stores are not especially memorable but the farmer's market is excellent!   And the season is further along down here so I got things I don't usually get in Wisconsin until July.  Awesome.  At this stand,

I got lettuce, kale, kohlrabi (yum!), lots of sugar snap peas (yummier!), and spring onions.  

And here I got strawberries!

I also got some mushrooms at another stand.  That plus my current stock of beans, seeds, carrots, and fruit will get me home tomorrow.

I have to remember that on my next trip.  Find the farmer's markets!

usual trip salads

I'm on a mini-vacation at a Golf tournament with friends.  Fortunately I have my awesome Coleman electric cooler since we couldn't get a fridge in our room (oops sorry about the bra in the picture, ha):

It plugs in both to the car and the wall socket.  

I contacted a nutritarian from the Fuhrman forums who gave me the scoop on where to get good produce in this town.   It seems the farmer's market is best.  I brought enough fruit to get me through the trip and will stock up with greens and veggies tomorrow at the farmer's market.   

Here are my salads the last few days.  The greens are lettuce and spinach.  For the breakfast salad, just add seed mixture, balsamic vinegar, 1/3 can of beans, and fruit of the day.  Lunch and dinner salads also have onions, mushrooms, cauliflower, broccoli, red cabbage, tomatoes (along with the lettuce, spinach, beans, seed mixture, and vinegar).  Oh, you can see my roommates' food to the top-right of the salad.  They are SAD eaters.  

I also am eating carrots and sugar snap peas.  Most of the produce ran out today so my new salads will be whatever I get at the farmer's market.  My fruit is super yummy:  Strawberries on Thursday, blueberries, and raspberries today, cherries and small peach tomorrow, and grapes and orange Sunday.  I had some grapes for dessert tonight and maybe will tomorrow too as there are more than enough for Sunday.

my salads

I'm in Palmdale California resting up before my all-night flight on SOFIA.  Take-off will be 7:40 pm, landing 5:45 am.   Here's what I ate yesterday:

I try to get only organic produce so my choices are limited at Trader Joe's but it makes it kind of fun to get things I don't always get at home.  Bottom layer is watermelon and blackberries; then romaine lettuce, herb salad mix, mushrooms (cooked in microwave), cherry tomatoes, and broccoli.  Topped with balsamic vinegar.  Yummy.  Note:  when the fruit is on bottom and the veggies on top, I like to wait to put on the vinegar so it doesn't all go down to the bottom.  I like the vinegar best on the veggies.  I would put the fruit on top but I like to eat it last.  I ate 3 of those babies, a banana, cucumber, and lots of carrots and sugar snap peas.  And I mean lots.   Here's a side viewing showing the treasures that await me for dessert, at bottom.  There's the Dr. fuhrman forums in the background, heh heh.

Today's salad has strawberries, blackberries and banana on bottom, topped with romaine lettuce, herb salad mix, mushrooms, broccoli, and for breakfast I included a generous serving of edamame.  

I decided to lay off the edamame for lunch and dinner since I'll be on an airplane all night and don't want to have to expell gas in close quarters, heh heh.   I'm bringing carrots, sugar snap peas, and an apple on the plane ride tonight.   Expert nutritarians may have noticed I didn't mention nuts and seeds.  I forgot them!   I could have bought some but the bags were way bigger than the amount I wanted.  That's okay, I'll have an extra treat when I get home.

Oh, what the heck, here's an airplane picture, NOT the one we'll be flying tonight.   At left is an SR-71.  At right is an A-12.  My dad was flight engineer for A-12s from 1965-1968.  He had a fun job!

After tonight's flight I'll rush off to LAX and hope to get there in time to catch my flight to Wisconsin.  Funnily enough, we will fly over Wisconsin tonight on Sofia.  So hopefully I'll go there twice in one day.  I'll be pointing the telescope to a massive star forming region and collecting infrared photons and turning them into images that will hopefully tell us about the nature of the source--how the outflows are shaping the envelope cavity for one thing.  And by combining these data with those at other wavelengths, we'll understand better the evolutionary stage of this source and add to our knowledge of the processes that form very massive stars.

For tomorrow I have carrots, sugar snap peas, and an apple to get me home.  Then I'll probably buy some luscious berries and local spinach for dinner, oh yeah, and maybe some brazil nuts!  I'm hoping that eating carrots on the way to LAX will keep me awake.  I will try to drive very carefully!

How do you like that mixture of food and astronomy?  ha.

Traveling again

This trip is easy so far as a nutritarian.  I didn't check baggage, so this is all the eating utensils I brought:

I rented a car, brought my GPS, went to Trader Joes, got prepackaged food, went to my hotel, and put it in the nice fridge:

It should only take a few minutes to assemble my salads tomorrow.  Of course I did plan this all in advance, finding the Trader Joes, bringing the GPS, and finding a hotel with a fridge.   The fridge has a freezer so I can buy some frozen edamame tomorrow.   I was disappointed that Trader Joe's didn't have organic strawberries.  They are grown right here in California!  I guess I'll have to wait until I get back to Wisconsin to have some.  How silly is that?  Oh well, I got some watermelon and organic blackberries which will be yummy.  

Grand Canyon Salads

I was going to call these salads "6WP in a bowl" because they include everything Dr. Fuhrman recommends in his 6-week plan (from his book Eat to Live).   But they started turning into what I felt were masterpieces, because of my layered approach, and it reminds me of the geologic layers of the Grand Canyon, which I happen to be visiting this week.   So I call them Grand Canyon Salads.   I start by putting fruit in the bottom.  I bought 6 days worth of food at the Whole Foods in Albuquerque so I got fruit with staying power:  oranges, apples, and bananas.   So one orange, one apple, and 1 banana gets cut up and put into 3 large bowls (breakfast, lunch and dinner, yes I am boring).   I top that with a can of no-salt beans.  Then spinach, arugula, lettuce, and kale.  Then 1 Tbsp of fruit-infused vinegar in each bowl.  Then scallions, mushrooms, seed mixture, red cabbage, then 1 Tbsp of fruit-infused balsamic vinegar, then broccoli and cauliflower.  Then smash down and put the lids on.  Oh, on the first day I had a tomato and used strawberries and banana for the fruit.    Here's what one looks like:

First you eat the raw veggies with a nice slight vinegar taste.  Then the mushrooms and seeds and scallions and leafy greens with some more nice vinegar taste.  The romaine lettuce and kale stay crisp but the spinach and arugula get a little soggy which I like--sort of like they have been sauteed. The dessert is the fruit and beans with a little of everything else mixed in.  It reminds me of some desserts I got in Taiwan that were made with beans and fruit.

Here I am eating my lunch at the Desert Watch Tower

and dinner at Mather point:

I'm also eating a bunch of raw carrots.  

I can verify that being a nutritarian transforms your body.  I hardly notice the altitude or get out of breath walking up the canyon, partly because I'm slowing down for others.  

Tomorrow's food

On the road again and having fun of course.  Here are my salads for tomorrow!

Here's what in them:
1 head romaine lettuce, 221 g, 38 calories
spinach, 121 g, 28 calories
kale, 71 g, 36 calories
cauliflower, 232 g, 58 calories
broccoli, 184 g, 63 calories
mushrooms, 205 g, 45 calories
1 medium red bell pepper, 128 g, 40 calories
purple cabbage, 223 g, 69 calories
1 apple, 178 g, 93 calories
1 banana, 114 g, 101 calories
4 Tbsp flavored vinegar, 60 g (normally I'd have 3 but I miscounted), 32 calories
1 can chickpeas, 360 g, 428 calories
1 oz seed mixture, 28.5 g, 159 calories

Total calories is 1158, total protein 55 g (14%), total fat 22g (17%), carbs 219 g (69%).   I'll also eat a bunch of raw carrots, and maybe some fruit after we go to the grocery store.

The breakdown shows that 377 calories came from veggies (33%), 194 calories came from fruit (17%), and 587 calories from beans and seeds (50%).   Normally I eat fewer beans and more fruit.  Most of the fat comes from the chickpeas and seed mixture (17 g).   Most of the protein comes from the chickpeas (17 g)  and mushrooms (6 g) and seed mixture (6 g).  Next is broccoli (5 g), cauliflower (4 g), cabbage (3 g),  spinach (3 g), lettuce (2 g), kale (2 g), and peppers (1 g).  Of course, the protein per calorie is highest in the veggies, with mushrooms the winner.   By weight, the veggies total 1385 g or 3.05 lbs, and the fruit totals 292 g or 0.64 lb.  Normally I have 1-2 lbs fruit.  I'll get more tomorrow at the store.

Time to prepare the food: 1.5 hours.  On the other hand, we didn't spend time in restaurants. I ate the meals in the car.  We had a lot of distance to cover.  Cost:  probably as much as a restaurant.  But the quality is way higher.

tomorrow's food

Tomorrow is my all-day trip home, yea!  Trader Joe's makes it so easy!   Here's the food selection (sorry, bad lighting and old iphone):

That's (from bottom left going up and around) mushrooms, broccoli, spinach, romaine lettuce, seed mixture, strawberries, onion, orange, sugar snap peas (really good), cabbage and carrots.
The salad's are prepared in a jiffy:



I'll eat one before I go, and pour vinegar on the others in the morning.  For show and tell, I packed them in their bags,



and into the carry-on bag:




But for now they are back in the fridge until tomorrow.

I calculated this is 1100 calories, which is usually not enough for me, but today I had 1300 and was overfull.  I'll eat something when I get home if I'm still hungry.

Think I'm crazy?   You know, after seeing many of my colleagues on this trip that I've known for years and seeing their health problems, I don't care.  I am so happy eating this delicious food, and having my health.

The best food on this trip were the strawberries and sugar snap peas, so I had them every day.  It's really hard to beat that at any restaurant.

traveling

I'm on a whirlwind business trip to California. I've been working every waking hour for a couple of weeks and I am happy to say I have the evening off tonight. Even though I have to work this weekend, it will be easier than it has been the last few weeks, so I'm feeling pretty relaxed again. Food prep has been really easy. My hotel room comes with a nice sized fridge and there is a Trader Joe's grocery store not too far away. Trader Joe's is great when you are traveling because they have all this pre-packaged produce (not good for the environment I admit, but oh so convenient when you can't bring all your own supplies with you). I'm loving the salads I've been making. They only take about 5 minutes to make because everything is prechopped and in convenient-size bags. Here's my favorite right now:

This is romaine lettuce, spinach, edamame, mushrooms, onions, broccoli and cauliflower. The only thing I had to chop was the onions. I bought some balsamic vinegar to pour on top which is really good. This is a really hearty, filling salad. I've eaten two foods I've never had before, well, sort of: fresh edamame and fresh English peas. I've only had frozen before. The peas are very different fresh. Very interesting--more hearty in some way. The edamame is scrumptious fresh, but unfortunately, I discovered too late that they have salt, so I will not be buying them again, wah. If it were just a little that'd be okay but it's a fair amount. The other super yummy thing right now is fresh strawberries! They are especially sweet. I think this is peak season in California. I'm eating a pound a day. And I'm eating blackberries too. So I'm eating like a queen. I feel a little self conscious around my colleagues because I prefer to bring my own food and not eat the catered food (we're in meetings all day). It does make me feel odd and wonder if I'm crazy. But then I see something like what I'm going to post about next, and I really don't want to change. I do like fitting in, being the human social creature that I am, but it's just not going to happen in the eating department. Plus, I've been an oddball all my life so I should be used to it by now at the ripe old age of 51.

today's lunch and dinner

...and tomorrow, and Sunday. See yesterday's post for more description. It's repititive, but easy, yummy, and even looks Christmasy! At right is my bean veggie soup from the freezer. I'll be off the internet unless I get to escape to a coffee shop, but that's not likely. So see you on Monday.

My trip to Besancon France

I got back from France last night. I slept on the train, plane, and bus, and then slept another 9 hours when I got home. So I feel pretty good today.

It was easy being a nutritarian in France. There was a grocery store near my hotel, and numerous fruit stands. The produce listed the country of origin so I looked for stuff from France, which there was plenty of: apples, carrots, lettuce, pears, which were all good. I forget where the persimmons was from but it was the best I've ever had! It was ripe, juicy, and sweet. I tried some dates and figs and they tasted same as we get in the US. Fruit, lettuce, canned beans, and nuts & seeds provided plenty of food.

Then there were the restaurants. I found it difficult to be a nutritarian in a restaurant. I would have preferred not to go to them at all but I enjoyed socializing with my colleagues. So I compromised and went out 2 nights out of 4. The first night I got a salad without half the stuff listed on the menu. Then at the banquet, they made a vegetarian meal for some of us. I decided to go for it and enjoy the French cuisine even if it wasn't nutritarian. In fact, I apologize to the animals, it wasn't vegan either. It was very good and I did enjoy it. Of course, like always happens when I stray, I paid for it overnight. I couldn't sleep all night. The bread and sugar made me hyper, but worse than that, the wine made my heart go crazy. Actually I didn't know what was making my heart go crazy, I thought maybe it was the sugar, but I asked on Dr. Fuhrman's forums, and Dr. Mullin replied and said it was probably the wine. I was very warm all night long and my heart felt funny so I monitored my pulse and it was all over the place. The base was about 70-80 (usually 50!), but it was also irregular. I hate when that happens. It used to happen to me a lot before I became a nutritarian. I drank 3 small glasses of wine spread over 4 hours. I guess that is a lot for someone who never drinks anymore. Here's an explanation from some random doctor on the web:

Firstly the effects of alcohol on human heart rate are not due to direct effects on the heart, but due to the activation of a reflex response. Alcohol is a vasodilator, which means that it makes the peripheral blood vessels relax allowing more blood to flow through the skin and tissues. This is why people who have had a drink look red faced and feel warm. This means that the blood flows round a larger volume of the body, which results in a drop in blood pressure. Therefore, to maintain sufficient blood flow through the organs of the body the heart rate increases to accommodate for the increased volume that it has to send the blood round.

This makes sense because my blood pressure is already low, so dropping it lower suddenly was probably a shock to my system. Sorry, heart! I suppose in retrospect, I shouldn't have had the wine or bread or desserts, and I still would have enjoyed the meal (still not nutritarian but limited in its side effects). But I was curious to know how much I was missing with my eating style. So, let's review the meal. Appetizer: some yucky pickled salad. Of course, they can't compare to my salads, so forget that. Champagne. well, that was the best I've ever tasted by far. But even so, I can happily live without that, now that I know what it does to me. Next course: cream of mushroom soup. really really good. But I could make something just as good with cashew cream. Bread. nothing to write home about. Main course: I barely remember so it must not have been that good--a small portion of veggies, of course that can't compare to what I can do with veggies. oh yeah, some mashed potato thing that tasted sweet. It was good, but I can do better. there was something else but I can't remember what it was. white wine and red wine. it was good, but forget that from now on. There were 4 tiny desserts altogether: some cream whipped so thick it was almost solid, creme de brule, a two soft chocolatey pieces, and a fruity tart thing. The fruity thing was yucky, the chocolatey thing was what you'd expect, chocolatey and good. The creme de brule was fantastic, and the whipped cream was very good. Today I was curious how a healthy dessert compares so I made some healthy strawberry-raspberry-banana ice cream. I actually found it just as satisfying, perhaps even more so because I didn't get the yucky after effects that sugar gives me (hyperactive buzz). I made cashew cream in the process (cashews, water, and date syrup), and it tasted just as good as the whipped cream. Now I don't know how to make anything like creme de brule. That one won. I'm glad I had it this once. I don't feel the need to have it again. If I'm ever in France again, I might be tempted, but not in the US. I've had it in the US before and it wasn't nearly as good.

Since this is a blog about food, of course, that's all I focused on here. But I had a great time, despite the rain, and delayed flights, and missed train stops. The meeting was great, it was fun seeing friends and colleagues, the banquet was very fun, it was fun walking around downtown, shopping, buying a new suitcase after mine was destroyed on the trip out, buying gifts at the Christmas market.

my trip

I'm heading off to France today. I'm expecting it to take 30 hours to get from my house to my hotel. I hope it's not longer than that! I packed up 5 big servings of my "microsalad" and 5 little bags of sliced carrots. Am I a crazy nutritarian or what?! Here they are packed in my bag along with a frozen thingie to help keep them cool, a spoon and 5 napkins:

It's the green bag on the left:

Here I am at the bus stop:

I had a little trouble getting the food through security, but after careful examination of it and myself, they let me through.

I'll keep you posted about what a crazy nutritarian does in Besancon, France for food. Keep in mind that other nutritarians aren't as crazy as me. I gave up trying to eat healthy at restaurants but others are more successful.

Eating Out

I ate out a lot while on vacation, though not in restaurants. :)

Saranac Lake, NY

Thunder Hole, Acadia National Park

Jordan Pond, Acadia

It was a little chilly this day so we ate in the "Taurus cafe". But we had a "table with a view" of Bar Harbor, Maine:

Otter Point, Acadia

Watkin's Glen, NY

Allegany State Park, NY

tomorrow's meals

I’ve enjoyed all the fabulous local produce we got in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, but it was all gone by today (except the carrots, yea!), and I was hungry. So I admit I was looking forward to buying some California berries and pomegranates, Columbian bananas, and New Zealand kiwis at the Whole Foods in Portland, Maine—fortunately they also had a lot of local produce too, which I bought. My travel companion just got a small container of potato salad, and I asked her how she can resist buying and eating everything in sight. She said she prefers my salads to anything they prepare there. Now after preparing tomorrow’s feast, I think she’s right. These babies contain the following (from bottom of the bowl to top): kale, broccoli, cauliflower, purple cabbage, juice from a lime, bok choi, romaine lettuce, cucumber, kiwi, raspberries, strawberries, banana, chick peas, pumpkin seeds, sugar snap peas, celery, and carrots. Yum!

Total calories for the three meals will be: 1391, protein 66 g (19%!), total fat is 25g which comes out to 17% which might be a little low for me.

hotel food prep

I'm on vacation and preparing my meals in hotel rooms. Yep, I'm such a fanatic, I haven't eaten in a restaurant yet. Well, I just don't think restaurant (healthy) food tastes as good as my own, thanks to the fabulous local produce I've been getting. Anyway, who has time to eat in restaurants when there is hiking, biking and kayaking to be done? Here's how I do it. Clean off a desk, or bathroom counter or kitchen counter, depending on what's available. Set out the bowls and utensils. I find most useful a chopping knife, smaller paring knife, can opener, and lime squeezer thingie (second picture below). The apple corer is not really needed.

I use an electric cooler to keep my produce cool (see this post). On this trip, I've been lucky to find outstanding locally grown produce in Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire: all kinds of lovely varieties of apples, as well as kale, lettuce, spinach, broccoli, cabbage, cherry tomatoes, and carrots! As one store employee said, the carrots taste like candy! I've been calling them carrot candy. So of course, I've based my salads on these. I layer the bottom with the cruciferous veggies: kale, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage (whatever I happen to have on this day), and squeeze lime on that. That will marinate overnight at the bottom of the salad (I make the meals at night for the next day so we can get up early and go!):

Then I add the spinach and lettuce. Then fruit: apples, maybe an orange, cherry tomatoes, maybe a grapefruit. I scored 5 small pomegranates at a fantastic co-op in Vermont, so have been eating pom seeds in my salads for the last 5 days. They add great flavor! I just added the last one tonight. I haven't come across many fresh berries so haven't bothered with those. Then I add a can of beans and 1 oz of seeds or nuts:

Today and yesterday were heavy exercise days, so I also added a can of Dr. Fuhrman's soup. It added a nice flavor. Then I top with carrots. These I eat for dessert when I'm done with the meal, because they are like candy!

Then I clean up my mess and try to make it as spotless as possible, and tip the room cleaners, because I don't want hotels to start banning food. The main evidence of my food prep is the trash bin, a pretty dirty washcloth. and all the towels are used (but they aren't dirty).

Then I enjoy my meals in nature's restaurants, like this one:

travel, travel, travel!

I planned a few too many fun and work trips this summer. Even fun trips can get tiring. Next year, I'm going to stay home all summer, because I really love where I live. My recent trips have been by car so I've been able to bring my electric cooler with me, and can shop whenever and wherever I need to (having a car). Here's the cooler in my hotel room loaded up with greens, veggies, and fruit:

Here's a typical meal I had this week: lettuce & spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, lime juice, ground seeds (I ground up a mixture of flax, sunflower and hemp to bring with me), apple, pear, orange, black beans. This was usually lunch and dinner. Breakfast was snacking on carrots, kohlrabi, and sugar snap peas while preparing lunch and dinner. I packed lunch and dinner and ate with people at various places, all informal enough not to matter that I brought my own.

This week I've been in Minneapolis where they have a great co-op grocery store. Today I ate the best raspberries I've ever eaten (local and fresh!). oh my god. When I ate those, I thought, you couldn't find anything more delicious than this in a restaurant! For one thing, they wouldn't spend the money on fresh, organic, local berries! I have another box waiting for me tomorrow. I'll have that for brekky along with some blackberries and a banana. I had some great local strawberries today too.

(to the burglars: there's someone at my house during all these trips--really).

Last weekend I was at a family wedding. It was quite easy to be my crazy self. I met my parents in a restaurant for lunch after I ate, and just had herbal tea. The wedding reception was buffet style and it was easy to sneak my own salad on my plate while the others at my table were at the buffet. The only thing that made it less than discreet was how tall and overflowing the salad pile was on my plate. My tupperware bowl held quite a lot!

Next weekend I go to NYC. That will be more of a challenge but I'll be with a friend who is trying to eat healthy and says she wants to copy me. Our other friend will just have to put up with us, me anyway. I think we'll go to some fancy vegan restaurants so I suspect they won't let me bring my food with me. I'll just have to drink tea, and eat before or after. I'm willing to compromise if it's me who wants to compromise, but I'm not willing to do it for others. So if I feel like compromising okay, maybe I will. However, I haven't eaten SAD food (refined grains, oil, salt, sugar) since Jan. 20, so I may not want to break the streak. Plus the following week I'll have an appointment with Dr. Fuhrman at his Health Getaway. So I'm kind of inclined to eat healthy right now.