WholeDave Posted July 4, 2015 Author Share Posted July 4, 2015 Oh there was sweet potato in the African Soup last week! I'm not averse to some baked sweet potato with s&f, cinnamon and chilli flakes either! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 4, 2015 Author Share Posted July 4, 2015 Day 35 - the trek yesterday was around 8k's but it took close to 3 hours given the terrain. Beautiful mix of coastal bush and beaches culminating at a fantastic lookout. Had a swim at a deserted beach on the way back. Chilly but bearable. Food for the soul!! Today will be another super clean day - a swim, some woodchopping (I'm a lumberjack and I'm o-kayyyy ) plus some general running around and getting organised. Tossing up whether to do a steak for breakfast or a chicken stir-fry....think I will leave the steak until later. I have a nasty little eye infection which has cropped up over the past 2 days - will have to find a chemist (drugstore) to get medication. It's been an ongoing problem for a few years - have never been able to get to the bottom of why the same eye occasionally has a problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 5, 2015 Author Share Posted July 5, 2015 Day 36 - I came back yesterday afternoon - normally I would get up at 5am Monday, drive the 2 hours from the coast, then get ready and go to work. But I decided I should be sensible given I have a long work day ahead plus a celebration dinner for a community project I have been working on for the past 4 years which opened on Friday. My strategy has already borne fruit - I've had a smashing 8 hour sleep and feel amazing this morning (apart from the eye which is recovering but is still not the best). Today will be a cracking fry-up for brekky, minestrone for lunch (so proud of my organisational skills sometimes!) and who knows what for dinner! I just checked the web for the Chinese restaurant and while it gets great reviews, I can't find a menu and am starting to worry about what I will eat. Obviously I will look for grilled meats and vegetables but I can't imagine there will be too much on a banquet menu that will be WholeDave compliant! Better sneak that emergency can of tuna into my bag! (and compliant jerky, I need to find some compliant jerky!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 6, 2015 Author Share Posted July 6, 2015 Day 37 - the Chinese experiment last night didn't go that well - I managed steamed fish and veggies and a couple of prawns - no rice, very little sauce. Not exactly strict Whole30 I suspect but I'm not going to beat myself up about it - it is what it is. Certainly a type of restaurant to avoid in the future. It's not like you can ask for a steak and salad! The rest of yesterday's eating was standard - minestrone, some late afternoon chicken breast pieces as a snack. My body continues to change - not fast enough of course, but then again that's why I'm doing an extended Whole program. My torso fat is the biggest issue, and will take the longest to lose, but I am fitting into clothes better and I'm not as constricted when I sit down or tie my shoelaces. Little things! I did notice yesterday when I walked up from work to the local cafe (which I hadn't done in a while) that my energy levels and fitness have significantly increased. Whereas before I would have been puffed from the effort (come on, it's actually not a long or difficult walk!), now I bounded up the street, feeling tall and stretched if that makes sense. My stomach muscles are starting to kick in and that's giving me some core strength which I had lost. Long way to go obviously but it's a good sign. The other interesting thing I'm finding is that because, for the first time, I'm "food-first" and not "exercise-first", even though I'm getting limited exercise, the exercise I am getting seems to be having a more significant effect. So my big walk on the weekend has flowed through over the past couple of days making me feel fantastic. I haven't had any significant soreness in the legs and everything seems to be strengthening on its own. Magic! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 6, 2015 Author Share Posted July 6, 2015 As an aside, can someone please help me with how to post images? I understand that I need a URL (so assume I have to post the photo to somewhere like Dropbox), but that doesn't seem to work. Am I missing something? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmcbn Posted July 6, 2015 Share Posted July 6, 2015 Chinese restaurants are a mine field...!!Re the adding photos thing, I use photobucket for uploading as do most people from what I know...When you've uploaded your photos on to the host site of your choice, you click on the photo you want to upload to here, and to the right of the picture there will 3 or 4 options for copying - you'll want to click on 'direct link'. When you click on it the text is highlighted in a pale yellow and it says 'link copied', you open the reply box here, and along the top just below & slightly left of the smiley face there is a square box that looks like a little picture, click on that and a new window appears, paste the link into the new window & click ok and the photo appears in the reply...Hope this helps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 6, 2015 Author Share Posted July 6, 2015 Many thanks!! Hope this works - it's sunrise the other day at the coast... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 7, 2015 Author Share Posted July 7, 2015 Day 38 - my sleeping patterns are still a bit on the weird side - 9:30pm asleep, waking at 4:30am, staying in bed until 5am then getting up. It's not affecting me during the day but 7 hours sleep a night is probably a bit light on for me. Foodwise, yesterday was all good. Chicken curry with cauliflower rice & broccoli for dinner. Minestrone for lunch. A couple of pieces of lamb in the stir-fry for breakfast. I'm still having a bit too much fruit but it's hard to get away from when it's so good. Nothing crazy - perhaps two pieces a day plus a couple of dried figs. Tonight is one of Australia's traditions - the 3rd and final game of the annual State of Origin rugby league between New South Wales and Queensland. Always a party night, this time it will be a non-drinking, non-sausage rolls, non-party pies kinda night. Won't stop me loudly barracking for the NSW Blues against the hated Queenslanders (they're not really hated, Australians just love to give each other sh&t when we can ) I purchased an Apple Watch last week which arrived Monday. Oh man am I a geek! Some of the best features are the Activities and Workout apps. The Activities app actually gives you a gentle prompt to stand up if you have been sitting for too long and tracks your movement and exercise. Certainly acts as an ongoing reminder to move more in general, and to workout in particular. Can't wait to give it a serious try out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 8, 2015 Author Share Posted July 8, 2015 Day 39 - last night I managed some serious pork, potatoes and salad - I was ravenous and snacked too much yesterday afternoon but still on Whole30 things. Need to address that pretty quickly! I had a veggie & pork hock soup for lunch but it wasn't enough. I then a can of tuna, a bit of fruit, olives, lettuce etc. Today will be a day of meetings, strategy and minestrone. The Whole program is embedding as a lifestyle which is great, but I still have a long way to reach my goals. Sustainable! That's the catch cry. Keep it simple, keep it whole, keep it sustainable. Think I'll update my signature block - not a bad ambition to have! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmcbn Posted July 8, 2015 Share Posted July 8, 2015 Day 39 - last night I managed some serious pork, potatoes and salad - I was ravenous and snacked too much yesterday afternoon but still on Whole30 things. Need to address that pretty quickly! I had a veggie & pork hock soup for lunch but it wasn't enough. I then a can of tuna, a bit of fruit, olives, lettuce etc. Today will be a day of meetings, strategy and minestrone. The Whole program is embedding as a lifestyle which is great, but I still have a long way to reach my goals. Sustainable! That's the catch cry. Keep it simple, keep it whole, keep it sustainable. Think I'll update my signature block - not a bad ambition to have! And keep it consistent Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 9, 2015 Author Share Posted July 9, 2015 Totally consistent!! That's what I mean by sustainable - keep it at a level that you can consistently achieve without needing or wanting to offroad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 9, 2015 Author Share Posted July 9, 2015 Day 40 - the consistency of writing in this log each day creates great certainty. In some ways it's just as important as the actual Whole program itself - it's one thing to plan and execute healthy whole eating, but perhaps it's just as important to share the journey. It helps develop affirmation, not from others (that's a bonus), but from within. Reading back through the posts confirms your progress, solidifies it, allows you to acknowledge the hard times, and continue to celebrate progress. Yesterday was a great day - plenty of energy and focus, a noodle-less Vietnamese pho (rare beef soup) as a treat for lunch, none of the frantic hunger from the day before. Dinner was home made cevapi (skinless sausages - a Balkan dish), potatoes, and a cabbage, tomato & olive salad. We are blessed in Australia where migration over the past 60 years has changed our cuisine forever. We have absorbed the recipes from many other cultures into our day to day lives and we're all the better for it. Today will be another simple day - stir-fry for meal one and minestrone for meal two. I'll need to plan meal three as I'm pretty much out of provisions. Market shopping day tomorrow (Saturday). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 10, 2015 Author Share Posted July 10, 2015 Day 41 - yesterday was pretty straight forward. I had an after work event where I had carrot and celery sticks and a couple of chicken wings. The minestone was delicious and the fry-up for breakfast was something to behold - beef pan fried first, the addition of cabbage and coriander to the usual, and it ended up being awesome. Fish last night for dinner. On the whole I probably ate too much so need to wind it back today. I'm hoping to get some more outdoors action in this weekend, although it's meant to be snowing (which is unusual for Canberra) today and tomorrow. I'll just have to add that fourth layer! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 11, 2015 Author Share Posted July 11, 2015 Recipe update - my soup for this week is a Potage à la Ménagère or housewife's soup. A hearty provincial French soup, it has a heap of veggies and interesting flavours with thyme, cloves & bay leaves. I added in some gypsy speck and filled with water rather than stock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 11, 2015 Author Share Posted July 11, 2015 Day 42 - 6 weeks! Feels like it has gone in a flash! I cooked a chicken & chorizo cassoulet for dinner (leek, chorizo, garlic, carrot, celery, chicken thighs on the bone, can of tomatoes, a little stock, bay leaves) for dinner which I had after a couple of freshly shucked oysters and a small bowl of fresh french soup. Decadent but delicious. Lunch was really light - a handful of cherry tomatoes, cucumber and some olives. That was because I had a feed of hot roasted chestnuts at the markets yesterday morning. Bliss! I'm not eating nuts at all other than the chestnuts (because I'm a guts and if I have a handful, I'll have a bucketful!) and so not only enjoyed the flavour but also the texture which is obviously different to anything I'm usually eating. I managed a 5k walk around the lake which was lovely and today I'm hoping to climb Mount Taylor which is 856 metres or 2,800 ft high. Depends on the weather though, we've had a lot of rain overnight and more rain, sleet and even snow is expected today. Food today will be a standard stir-fry for breakfast, some soup for lunch and maybe a roast for dinner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 12, 2015 Author Share Posted July 12, 2015 Day 43 - up early to do a 3.64km run around my local oval (field) - the first I've done in a couple of years. I alternated jogging and walking to get used to it and only did 30 mins. But what a great start! I'm sure I will feel it tomorrow! Yesterday I climbed Mount Taylor - again for the first time in a couple of years. The food-first philosophy has really worked for me this time - after 6 weeks I feel like I can start to increase my exercise levels. I also bought myself an Apple Watch which arrived last Monday. That's made a substantial difference to the amount of activity I'm getting by tracking and reminding me every day. It was another good day food-wise: a veggie stir-fry, a mini post-workout meal of chicken breast, sweet potato and spinach leaves, a bowl of french soup and then a pork roast with potatoes, carrots & brocollini. A couple of semi dried figs and a cup of chamomile tea. Yumbo! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 13, 2015 Author Share Posted July 13, 2015 Day 44 - leftover day. Cold pork, roast potatoes and salad for dinner, chicken cassoulet for lunch, stir-fry for meal one. I can hardly walk after my running & climbing efforts over the past couple of days - if anyone has an instant cure for lactic acid buildup in the legs that would be great eh! Closing in on halfway of my Whole92 (Jun, Jul, Aug). I can't see me wanting to stop when I get there at the end of August. I'm now thinking about a Whole183 to take me to the start of Summer. I figure to truly change my habits and get to the the place I want to be will take longer than 3 months. But no point getting ahead of myself - progress is great at the moment and I'll continue taking it one day at a time. Today will be a bit of a challenge - have a client dinner to go to tonight to celebrate our involvement with the Tour de France - I've said no grain, no dairy so I hope that will rule most things out, and I just won't eat dessert. It's hard being "the one" at a relatively small dinner and I have read up before about Whole30 dining out but it's never easy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmcbn Posted July 13, 2015 Share Posted July 13, 2015 ...if anyone has an instant cure for lactic acid buildup in the legs that would be great eh! Not instant per se, but foam rolling works a treat - it's a kind of pleasureable pain that I've learned to love... I'm interested to see how your Apple watch goes - I had a nike fuel band when they first came out & was totally unimpressed. Liked the look of the fit band but the one I fancied was always out of stock. I like that apple watch wll sync with all the other apple products but have to justify the expense to myself! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 14, 2015 Author Share Posted July 14, 2015 Ah good one thank you! I'll track one down. The Apple Watch has been a revelation - just the activity app alone (tracking movement, exercise & standing) is worth it from a motivational perspective. The Workout app is also great and builds up knowledge of you and your patterns over time and syncs back to the Health app on your iPhone. After that it's the sheer scale of functionality that is impressive - messaging takes on a new level, you can make phone calls from your wrist if you need to, Siri is super easy to use (and practical), you can use it as a remote control for your iPhone camera, plus all the various 3rd party apps and easy configurability. The best thing overall is that it is intuitive - put it on, pair it up with your iPhone and you're away. Watch some videos on the Apple site and it instantly becomes part of your life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmcbn Posted July 14, 2015 Share Posted July 14, 2015 Sounds good - must look into it a bit more & maybe consider gifting it to myself for Christmas!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 14, 2015 Author Share Posted July 14, 2015 Day where are we now - 45 - half a Whole90, a quarter of a Whole180, high as a kite this morning, which might be explained by a lack of sleep (getting in late, getting up early), or just the fact that I continue to feel better every day. Bursting out of my skin!! My body shape is significantly changing, I can feel my stomach muscles, I can even start pulling them in like a normal being The redonkulous lactic acid buildup in my quads is finally dissipating - been stumbling around like an old(er) man for days! I have a sore left heel which I picked up last Summer that seems to not have gone away - annoying when I'm wanting to walk and run more. I think it was from the climb on Sunday rather than the shuffle/jog/run Monday...need to keep an eye on it. Food yesterday ended up being pretty good. The client dinner last night was surprisingly compliant - the restaurant did a great job looking after me amongst 25 other people. A kingfish entree and barramundi for main, no dessert. If you haven't tried Australian barramundi you haven't lived! A fighting fish in abundance in Australia's north, it has a magnificent flavour and texture, meaty, succulent & sweet, with the right mixture between oily and dry. I didn't overeat so this morning I'm a bit peckish which is a good thing. Lunch yesterday was my french soup which was great but it left me pretty hungry after so I had a can of sardines - not to everyone's taste but it hit the spot in terms of protein. I then had an apple. My late afternoon middle-of-a-two-hour-mind-numbing-video-conference snack was a banana and a cup of green tea. Breakfast was the ubiquitous chicken stir-fry.Today will be a day of simplicity, talking and strategy, matched with a standard fare of stir-fry, the last of the minestrone and goodness knows what for dins. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmcbn Posted July 14, 2015 Share Posted July 14, 2015 I have a sore left heel which I picked up last Summer that seems to not have gone away - annoying when I'm wanting to walk and run more. I think it was from the climb on Sunday rather than the shuffle/jog/run Monday...need to keep an eye on it. Try rolling the sole of your foot, particularly the arch, on a cricket ball if you can, if not a tennis ball. Stand on your 'okay' foot & push down on the sore foot with as much pressure as you can rolling the ball around the surface of the arch. It will hurt but it will release tension fairly quickly - try both feet just to see the difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 15, 2015 Author Share Posted July 15, 2015 OK thanks again J - will see if I can find one in my sports cupboard! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 15, 2015 Author Share Posted July 15, 2015 Day 46 - halfway to the end of winter, not that I'm counting!! It's bleak and cold at the moment - certainly doesn't lend itself to light salads and barbeques! I wore a shirt yesterday that I hadn't worn since January's Whole30 or for that matter for a year to two beforehand. Fitted pretty well - I can certainly start pulling those sizes out of the wardrobe to try on. Still need to lose stomach fat but it's definitely getting there. I'm heading down the coast again on Friday - very much looking forward to a change of scenery (and temperature) and to my adventure trek. No doubt I'll hit the surf as well. Yesterday's food was standard - stir-fry, soup and roast pork spare ribs & veggies with the addition during the day of a cup of bone broth and a tin of sardines. I did pig out when I got home last night on cold pork and olives. Some days I just seem to need more food than others although there doesn't seem to be a pattern to it. I've also discovered Thai shrimp paste which looks compliant. Spread a little on a stick of celery - yumbo! Today will be much the same foodwise - stir-fry, french soup, perhaps fish for dinner. I have another function to go to after work - this one a staff party to celebrate our role in the Tour de France. I'm getting very used to looking for the carrot sticks if they exist and not drinking at all unless there's mineral water. I'll need a mini hit before I go - probably a can of tuna. Time to break out the recipes again - I'm getting bored. I might try Turkish or Moroccan this time to get some different spices and flavours on to my taste buds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WholeDave Posted July 15, 2015 Author Share Posted July 15, 2015 Recipe update - here's a Moroccan Goat recipe, served with roast pumpkin. I think I'll add green beans with garlic & cumin on the side. Plenty of spices, easy to make compliant - just need to avoid the honey and store bought harissa (a Tunisian hot chili pepper paste) and make it myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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