Number 9

You are not going to believe this. With a test in a few days and cravings abound I decided enough was enough- I needed some chocolate. I know, I know, it's a little pathetic that I can't go two weeks without chocolate. But seriously, I did go from eating chocolate and sweets almost daily to completely cold turkey. Or I'm weak, sure, I'll throw that out there.

We cheated. Ok? That's not the end of the story here. We start driving to the candy store, and yes "THE candy store," there's only one anymore in my mind. Candyland in St. Paul is about 100 years old and makes all of their own chocolates fresh. The place smells amazing and they have any kind of chocolate-covered yummies you could imagine. Chocolate-covered potato chi

ps are my favorite. It happens to be really close to both work and home, which is super great. Anyway, we start driving (since it's getting late, otherwise we would have walked!), and all of a sudden it starts absolutely pouring. It was literally a monsoon out there! It's a little hard to tell by the picture, partially because it's from the iphone (ha!). It was like it was a sign like what the heck are you doing? How dare you?! Because as we left the store, after getting soaked entering and leaving, it stopped. Classic.

Needless to say, we kept driving. It was that necessary. We did manage to limit our intake, if you will, and actually Alex was nice enough to humor me and join in my splurge :)

Alex's creative photography work

It was wonderful, so rather than feeling guilty about it I think I'll just let that little treat carry me through for awhile! Wish me luck!

Days 7 and 8

We jumped into this plan with intense excitement and relatively high expectations for our bodies and our will power. I'll admit, before we fully emerged we should have considered the surrounding circumstances to ensure we were making this change at the right time. Not that any time would be easy, but some are certainly easier than others. It's possible that this was not the best time.

[Side note>> at least work is always interesting? See melon]

For instance, the MPRE (ethics portion of the Bar Exam) is this Friday. Hence the less than daily posting habits that I have developed. It would be nice to pass the first time without hesitation. With our bodies fully adjusted to the paleo plan I have no doubts we would be optimally functioning machines; as physiologically prepared to take the exam as we could be. However, the place we are at currently (ok, maybe I should be speaking for myself here...) is not near optimum function.

What I'm getting at is that yesterday was a rough day for me. It may even be safe to say that it was rough for both of us. The heat and humidity (in an air-less office no less) combined with the fact that I'm bad at softball, have rocking headaches, and suffer severe cravings to create a near-explosion on my end. Thank goodness we're in this together. We managed to pull through and avoid any and all meltdowns and plan-cheating, but it was a close call.

We've also been struggling a little to keep up with the cooking. It's difficult when lunches need to be transportable and easy and some dinners need to be quick. Clearly that's a problem with our society and the paleo plan generally. NEWS FLASH- it's impossible to eat healthy when you don't have time to cook! So it should be a priority. But then we go back to the many reasons why this may not be the best time for paleo: other things may actually be higher priorities. School, family, work, studying all take precedent over chopping vegetables and brewing chili. Yet I also realize that establishing healthy habits now are crucial to a healthy lifestyle in the years to come. Let's just hope it will become more effortless as our routines develop.

When I start to doubt what I'm doing I think about the benefits that could come with the changes we are making. Check out some success stories yourself.

One down, one to go

Week that is. We are officially one week into the paleo plan! First off, I should confess the happenings of the weekend, just get it out there right away. We "cheated" on Friday. Ok, so I put it in quotes because we didn't really cheat. I mean, we did, but there was one open day scheduled in the book that we didn't use at its scheduled time so we used it instead on Friday. And it was well worth the wait.

We went to the Blue Door on Selby and Fairview. It was one of the few places neither of us had been to in St. Paul. We had amazing juicy lucys and beer- whoa, it was a superb cheat meal. And considering we had 14 meals before that where we did not cheat AT ALL, I mean no straying from the prescribed menu, it was completely alright. Not that I'm trying to justify it to anyone (or myself...), but I should explain myself a little further. We were celebrating work-related good news and finishing cleaning and moving me out of my old house, which we had just completed Friday evening. Of course we were also celebrating the end of the week and we thought cheating in the beginning of the week would keep us satisfied through the weekend.

Alright, enough about the big cheat. One last thing... it turns out that cheating Friday night didn't exactly allow us to breeze through the weekend. We had our fair share of temptations. First we went to the como zoo with Alex's parents and niece and were surrounded by dripping ice cream cones, greasy cheese curds and kettle corn. We then went out to lunch and had to find something that we knew complied with the restrictions of the plan, which is really hard when even the salads have breaded chicken and the server automatically places bread on the table. To finish the day we went to a BBQ on our rooftop where we were met by a cold keg, homemade brownies, chips, and lots of questions.

We managed to get through Saturday and then Sunday we were saved by the farmer's market. There's something about walking through the aisles of the market that just calls one to be a healthier person. I'm sure anyone who has been to the St. Paul farmer's market, or likely any good sized farmer's market, knows the feeling I'm talking about. I have to say it's one of those eyes are bigger than your mouth thing, like you see a tray of 6 green peppers and another with 4 huge cucumbers and you think, "what? $2 for 6 green peppers? that's such a good deal!" Then you buy the 6 green peppers and 4 cucumbers and by the next Saturday you've only gone through one of each because they're glowing when see them at the market but look like lame vegetables when you get them home.

Overall the weekend was successful as we managed to stick to the plan besides our one cheat day. We're struggling a little at the moment with chocolate cravings for me (typical) and general "I'm hungry but don't feel like eating anything we have" cravings for Alex. For now, off to bed with high hopes for another week!

Day 4 already?

Nice, Alex, nice. He's got the theory thing down.

So it's almost Friday which mean it's almost the weekend, which means this will be harder for a few days. I think it's harder for everyone to eat healthy on the weekends, whether on a diet or not. Unless someone brings in cookies or doughnuts or bagels to work, then it gets tough to stay healthy at work. Thankfully that hasn't happened at my work yet but Alex has had to meander around a potluck at his work earlier this week. He did it! But said it wasn't easy.

There's no huge news for the day today; we had hard boiled eggs and a smoothie for breakfast, salad and melon, nuts and raisins for lunch, and tilapia for dinner. It seems like its already a routine- spending a lot of free time cooking or preparing, that is. I think it's helpful that we're learning how long preparation takes and what works, what doesn't, before school starts so we can be more streamlined in a month or so (AHHH, less than a month!).

The BIG news of the day, at least for me, were the BIG headaches I had most of the day. I mentioned them yesterday as well but it was bad today. It has to be from sugar withdrawal, or something of the like. I haven't had headaches like that since middle school when I ended up in the ER. Yikes, let's hope that doesn't happen this time! Alex told me to cheat and have a sip or two of pop to see if it helps. No way! I wasn't about to cheat on day 4! I'd rather be in pain and make him listen to me complain! Actually, I've found activity helps most aches and pains, so we played tennis for a few hours and now I'm feeling better. Let's hope that's the last of them!

Alright. Bring on the weekend...

So Easy A Caveman Could Do It

So Annie left her computer on, so I decided to sneak a post. Sorry about the title, I couldn’t help myself. The purpose of this post is to explain a bit about the Paleo plan, and the rationale behind it (some rationale does exist) because of the questions, and skepticism, Annie and I have received. First off, we are not trying to eat like cavemen. Although the diet has been dubbed the “caveman plan,” we are not supposed to literally eat like cavemen (and cavewomen of course). The idea is to match how our bodies are genetically engineered to the foods we eat. That genetic matching takes us back to before the agricultural revolution. From pre-agricultural revolution to present day, our genetic makeup has changed around .02%. Our diets on the other hand have completely changed. For example, estimates put our amount of sugar intake at around 141 pounds per year. Compare that to around 5 pounds a year in 1900. Also, in 1900 the sugar was raw, not high-fructose corn syrup, which is another issue itself. If you have an hour to kill, this video is well worth it and teaches you about fructose vs. sucrose and so on by a guy much smarter than I could ever be. Some of it gets a bit technical, but it is tied together nicely in the end. http://www.sugarshockblog.com/2009/09/sugar-the-bitter-truth.html

Okay, so here is the premise: If we breakdown how the body works and how the body uses and processes different foods, we can then match up the best types of foods to facilitate those processes as efficiently and healthy as possible. When those foods are laid out, the diet turns out to closely resemble (as much is possible and practical) a pre-agricultural, Paleolithic diet. Simple, right? See, there is some rationale here. Some of the things incorporated into this diet are, I admit, a bit out there. Like the no grain thing. However, these ideas are catching on. For instance, celiac disease now affects at least 3 million Americans, and 1 in 56 people are displaying symptoms. The idea of celiac disease, but not an actual diagnosis first surfaced around 1897. At the same time, grain started to be genetically modified and specifically bred. Where we used to have 3 types of grain, we now have over 27,000. At our current pace, it is estimated that 1 in 3 people will have celiac disease by 2060. This is a problem. So yes, this plan does include cutting out processed sugars and grains.

QUESTION: Alex, does this mean that you will never have another grain again?
ANSWER: Not a chance. Have you ever seen me at Olive Garden with those warm breadsticks? Phenomenal – I just don’t know how they do it, the little wicker baskets covered in cloth with butter and garlic, I mean it is just the complete package...



This is about moderation. For us, awareness is the first step. Just reading different points of view about diet and nutrition is a start. It is unfortunate that even though we can all agree that nutrition is very important to health, most of us don’t think twice about planning meals, the foods we are eating, or even why we are eating it. Point in case, the food pyramid. We all learned it, and without going into a conspiracy theory about it, I am betting that it will not only be redone within 10 years, but also completely abolished.

I have probably gone on too long already, so I’ll wrap it up. The Paleo Plan is a change in the way that we think about and approach the foods we eat. Is it the panacea of diets? Probably not, but it is most likely a step in the right direction. So we are giving it a shot, hopefully we do notice some changes, but if not, on to the next. There is a lot more to write about so maybe if Annie leaves her computer on again, or ever maybe gives me the blog password, I could contribute a few more times. But that is a big maybe...

Day 3

Wow! Alex and I both report feeling really great today! Actually, I had a few headaches throughout the day which I attribute to sugar withdrawal. I'm not sure if that's right, Alex says it's legit, but it sure makes things sound more dramatic. And who doesn't love drama?

So we sort of splurged for breakfast and made bacon and eggs. It was fantastic! I feel like strangely enough I'm craving salt more than sugar- totally weird for me. The bacon satisfied the salt cravings and made me completely full until like 1 in the afternoon. Last night I made salmon to have for lunch today and it turned out really well. We put lemon juice, dill, chives and lime wedges in with the salmon to cook and it came it smelling so nice I almost at it at 10:30 at night. But it made for an excellent lunch today.

Then there was dinner... Alex, cooking? What? Yeah, turns out we make a pretty good cooking

team. Sometimes I pull the control freak card and insist on doing things my way (unheard of, right?), but when we work together we really actually do work together!

We chopped up a lot of vegetables for this beef stir fry- celery, carrots, onion, mushroom, green

peppers, garlic (vegetable? not sure on that one...), I think that's it. It's really great having all of the vegetables you could possible want on hand at all times but we learned the hard way today for the first time that you definitely have to go through them fast.

We threw away our first item- an avocado that looked whiteish in spots and felt too squishy to eat. Avocados are the best too. Dang. Lesson learned.

This whole cooking thing is a bit time consuming. We can already tell that if we manage to keep this going, or at least keep a version of this going, we'll have to come up with something more efficient to keep the time necessary to cook these meals to a minimum. Not that I wouldn't like to cook instead of study, it's just that Alex will need all the time he can get ;)

It's been well worth it thus far- check out the completed dinner meal below... MMmmm.

Day number two

Feeling pretty successful about day number two. Had a nice little smoothie for breakfast, almonds and raisins for a snack (twice...) and mussels and buffalo burgers for lunch. What? mussels? Yeah, mussels aren't better than they sound. They're like oysters (which I don't like) only smaller and easier to slime into little veiny pieces. And sometimes you crunch on something that just doesn't feel right, like sand maybe? Alex didn't seem to mind them too much but I doubt we'll be eating those again any time soon.

Since it was 95 degrees with a heat index of 104 I decided I should start to finish moving this evening. That held up dinner for quite awhile and landed us at my parents' house at the end of the process. They are pretty healthy eaters themselves so we managed to find the makings for a salad in their fridge.

The WORST though was when we were offered hummus which turned into garlic toast which then morphed into fresh pie and ice cream. I mean really? It was our, at least MY, first true test of willpower. And we overcame! No cheating here... we are only on day 2 after all :)

Day 1!

Fhew. Made it through day 1. Though some may say barely... Turns out Alex and I both have a bit of a tummy ache this evening. Was it the tuna salad? Our bodies yearning for sugar and grains? I sure hope not on that second one.

So first things first- check out the fridge. Pretty impressive, right? Especially considering two days ago it was filled with beer, wine and smirnoff ice. Classy. Now it smells real nice in there too.

To recap the day, let's start with the morning. I can only hope it gets easier and easier to find something filling and satisfying to eat for breakfast. I'm usually one who could wake up, eat a few bowls of lucky charms and turn around and eat a bacon and french toast feast for brunch. Needless to say, this morning was a little rough. The berries and almonds held me over until 10 or so when I managed to force myself to stop thinking about food.

At lunch I had our homemade (which sounds sweet but really everything is now going to be homemade) tuna salad on top of a lettuce salad. Decent I guess but possibly made us feel sick so maybe we'll stay away from that for awhile.

Now dinner was impressive. So this book we're following and getting recipes from gives us basic ingredients and all that but doesn't really help with directions. "Saute this, brown that, stuff chicken and bake" is basically all we are given. Fortunately I'm resourceful so I took matters into my own hands and learned how to skin and stuff a chicken, improv style.

We look good together, I know. We stuffed the bird with apples, celery, raisins, white wine (oops, didn't have red), onion and CHICKEN LIVER. Yuck... chicken liver. Overall the dish turned out really well and despite upset stomachs we had a nice little juicy dinner!

Things of note as I wrap up the day:

1) Chicken skin does not get ground up in a garbage disposal. And it's disgusting to reach down and get it, so just don't put it down the sink in the first place, but DO take it off. I realized as I was cutting it off that it's pretty nasty that we eat that stuff.

2) We may be paying a visit to Ms. Betty Crocker in our near future if these recipes continue with basic instructions like "skin and stuff chicken." Hardly basic.

3) Always check expiration dates. Chicken liver is questionable to begin with so you don't want to be stuck with some that are 20 days expired (which probably did not help the stomach ache).

4) Probably a good idea to check and double check for the proper utensils and ingredients. First dinner recipe and we already missed red wine, flax seed oil and a covered baking dish. Oops.

And now for a goodnight smoothie...

Before we begin... Day 0

People keep asking me what I'm thinking by embarking on the paleo diet. It's tough to answer. After barely finishing a marathon and continuing to be in pain daily a month later, maybe it's to see if I can heal my injury without significant medical expenses. Or maybe it's to see if something will allow me to be alert and awake at the office past 2:00 in the afternoon. Actually, more likely is that I just want to see if I can do it and what it will do to me.

Alex and I heard about the paleo diet from a friend of his. I was predictably skeptical at first but after doing some of our own research (http://www.thepaleodiet.com/faqs/; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleolithic_diet) and picking up a book (The Paelo Diet by Loren Cordain), my mind quickly changed from it being an unthinkable and unnecessarily depriving "diet" to a potentially life-changing challenge.

Ok, so this is the last time I will use the word "diet" to describe what we're doing. We're thinking of it as more of a lifestyle change. So, the basics: The paleo PLAN is based on the theory that we are meant to eat only the natural foods that our ancestors ate and none of the unnatural, overly processed and refined foods that we have become so accustomed to. No refined carbs, very limited dairy, and NO unnatural sugar or salt. The theories are backed up with science and all that, but that isn't what I want to write about. Check out my sources above or google it if you're interested in that. I would rather share the experiences we have while trying the paleo plan; shopping for food, cooking, and of course the effects of the di.. I mean, the plan.

So far it's been quite interesting and we have yet to begin the actual eating. We shopped for food today, following recipes and meal plans provided in our book. Noteworthy tidbits:

1) Ever heard of pimentos? Yeah, neither have we. Turns out they are the little red things that are put in the pits of green olives. I'll let you know how that turns out...

2) Cub doesn't sell figs

3) If you're restricting your eating, obviously you're going to pig out the night before you start the plan, for us this meant chips and guacamole, plenty of good cheese, and imitation crab meat. Turns out we both have this weird weakness for fake crab?

4) Kiwis are (kiwi is?) super cheap this time of year- like $.25 cheap.

5) Just because you're eating healthy does NOT mean you're saving money. In fact, why did we think that in the first place? Fresh is expensive. So is seafood.

So, here we go, as of tomorrow we are all in for a serious challenge, adventure, and hopefully positive change. Our goal is two weeks of all-paleo, all the time. Wish us luck!