You're What?

I have to laugh whenever I tell someone that I’ve changed my eating habits to vegetarian. So many seem to say the same thing and I don’t blame them. I was always skeptical of vegan and vegetarian menus, too. So it’s fun to see myself in them and have a laugh at their reactions.

Food is a comfort for me, sometimes, I admit. In the past, whenever I have been really stressed out I wouldn’t eat for half the day, then I would become suddenly famished and eat whatever I could find or go get fast food because it’s quick and filling. Or sometimes I would just eat because I was bored.

When your body craves junk, it’s a huge sign that you are not eating well and probably should change your habits. And sometimes those habits are not easy because of things such as:

-being addicted to something such as caffeine

-becoming used to specific foods and the feeling they give us (and thus feeling a sort of “craving” for them)

-we have grown up with certain ways of eating and schedules, such as “cleaning your plate” or only having 3 meals per day or not wasting anything you have taken

-we have been conditioned by marketing or misinformation that we should eat certain foods, that they are good for us, and that we can’t get certain nutrition any other way

-loving a particular food so much that we cannot give it up, even though it is unhealthy for us.

The list goes on, of course, but these are just a few things to think about.

Going vegetarian/vegan wasn’t an easy decision. Lee and I have been on a downward spiral for some time over the years; eating out a lot, snacking late at night, eating seconds, taking bigger portions than we need, eating in front of the TV - many bad decisions regarding food. Our bodies have already started to repel some of those things naturally; we have become lactose intolerant and can’t eat ice cream or any milk products much any more. But this wasn’t enough.

Last year we participated in a health clinic at Lee’s work. Both he and I had some eye-opening news.

Lee’s blood pressure was high and he was at risk for quite a few illnesses. His cholesterol was really high as well.

My blood work came back with mixed results. I was pleasantly surprised to find that my liver count was good and that a couple other things were great for someone my age. But I was at-risk for diabetes, my blood pressure was climbing, although not alarming yet, and a few other numbers had me worried that I needed to change.

As I have begun to study health and find out information on what really makes our bodies tick, I have had to re-learn things and change my view. Without an accepting attitude and a willingness to change, I have started to understand, I will die an early and uncomfortable death. Heart disease scares me as much as cancer does, and if there is something I can do to prevent it, I am now ready to say that I am willing to do it.

Yes, I love bacon. Meat is great and has a great place in my diet. But it is also not a necessity to my diet and I could keep eating what I want and loving the food and the way it tastes so good but that was not going to change how my body felt like it was falling apart from the inside out. In fact, as I have found out, it is actually contributing to my decline in health and increase in pain.

The other choice was to change my diet to something healthy (although it sounded boring at first), start exercising to keep my muscles and joints in shape (and I am not a big fan of working out) and change some lazy habits that were only making things worse.

Lee and our little grandson Haden.

And then something else happened: we became grandparents. We have a sweet little 7 month old grandson and another one due next month. When I look into that beautiful face and eyes, I realize that although I may be “old” enough to be a grandma, I wasn’t old enough to be feeling so ill and immobile because of my poor choices. I am 49 and feel like I’m 89! That’s just not right.

So when some people laugh about my change in eating, I just smile on the outside because I understand. I thought it was crazy, too. But I cry a little on the inside because I know that a few of them don’t understand that this could save them. There is a possibility that they could stop taking pills for high blood pressure or other illnesses simply by giving up a few items of food that they think are so essential!

I would much rather enjoy my grandchildren than eat a piece of bacon. After all, I gave up a scar-free, slim body and went through hours and months of pain and discomfort to get my children here, would I not give up a few things for my grandchildren as well?

So when I say I am vegan, I am not saying that I am simply “giving up meat,” but I am saying I love my family enough to give up a few things in order to live more fully for them.

And if you are following this blog for the same or similar reasons, I am here to help and encourage you. Let’s get healthy together!

Hugs and cheers!

Denise

Post note: I tried the Coconut Key Lime Pie and it is sooooooo good! Expensive to make, but so worth it! I used a regular almond crust instead of the dates and lime one, but it was very decadent and delicious. Even my teenage boys loved it!

Go to chefmamanise.blogspot.com for today’s recipes. See ya there!

Change in Attitude

Lee and Denise
Hiking in Yellowstone Nat. Park

As I talked about in my first post, a healthy lifestyle and diet need a healthy mental attitude. Your body depends upon your soul to keep healthy just as much as your soul needs a healthy body.

I have wrestled with depression off and on in my life. I finally learned how to control it years ago without the use of drugs and have come to realize that my physical well-being was a big part of that.  When my body is unhealthy, my emotions and mental well-being are also unhealthy. The same for the other way around. When I start falling into negative attitudes or being lazy or stressed, my body would slip into lazy eating habits and general laziness physically. They go hand-in-hand.

One of the things I have wanted to do for a long time is the change of habit and improvement of virtues that Benjamin Franklin wrote about in his autobiography. (Read “The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin” for more information.) He wanted to improve himself so he listed 13 virtues he wanted to work on and would focus on one a week. In this way he would work through each one 4 times a year. The idea, he said, was to develop the habit of using these virtues and to work on them one at a time so as not to try to change all at once.

I decided to do this to go along with my new diet and exercise regime. That way I would be working on my mental health as well as the two physical aspects (what I take in to my body and what I put out.)

Here is the list of Benjamin Franklin’s virtues along with the “precepts” (or guidelines) for each:

(some words have been corrected in spelling from the original)

Temperance (Eat not to dullness: drink not to elevation)

Silence (Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation)

Order (Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time)

Resolution (Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve)

Frugality (Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e. waste nothing)

Industry (Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions)

Sincerity (Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly)

Justice (Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty)

Moderation (Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve)

Cleanliness (Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation)

Tranquility (Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable)

Chastity (Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation)

Humility (Imitate Jesus and Socrates)

My list is slightly different, but I have the same intentions of developing good habits, as did Mr. Franklin. Here is my list:

Service: Do something of service for someone outside my family at least once a day.

Order: Organize my home and keep it organized and clean.

Gratitude: Express gratitude to others, every chance, and in my journal each time I write.

Happiness: Be a cheerful and positive person at all times.

Faith: Become more holy and re-dedicate my life to living as a true Christian woman.

Humility: Be humble, overcome pride, learn to control anger and not control others.

Friendship: Make new friends and nurture relationships with old friends.

Health: Exercise, eat healthily, and promote a stress-free lifestyle.

Mentor: Teach others, listen to the needs of others, teach them to learn for themselves, be a good example.

Preparedness: Be prepared for the future: get food storage and emergency plans in place.

Learning: Further my education by studying, reading, searching and using the information I obtain.

Partnership: Improve my marriage by feeding the partnership with love, selflessness and devotion to the one person who holds my heart.

Frugality: Avoid excess spending, be a better homemaker, provide home-cooked, healthy meals and grow, store and use my own food.

You can choose your own habits and qualities that you want to work on. My only suggestion is that you pick things you know you need to work on and don’t just choose things that would be easy. Some of my own virtues I listed are things that may not be really hard to work on, but are things I definitely want to be better at doing. I also picked a few things that will be hard, but are very much needed, such as frugality. I love to spend money, but I know I should be thrifty and smart with my money.

Being positive also helps with my own internal vision of myself. Experts will tell you to envision yourself thin and you will become that vision. When you are happy and positive, it is easier to envision yourself thin. You tend to see yourself at your optimum, which includes being fit, thin, happy and otherwise perfect. So I would encourage you to make being positive one of your choices for improvement, even if you are already a happy person.

I have tried to make a habit of writing in my journal, too. This seems to help a lot, especially when I want to stay focused on goals and keeping positive. One of things I do is to write 3 things I am thankful for each day. I do that first. Then I tell about my goals and all the things happening in my life. I also keep myself accountable for goals I have set by keeping track of them, writing down my progress so far, and expressing my feelings about what I am doing. This keeps me focused and happy. If you don’t like to write in a journal, here’s a suggestion: get a small notebook (or find an app on your phone or tablet!) and write 3 things you are grateful for each night before you go to bed. Sometimes this is all I write, but when I do this every day, I am so much more positive and happy!

And being cheerful has some other benefits, as well. People like me better. They want to spend time with me or chat with me because I am not being negative. Even when you hurting, if you express your negativity too much, it weighs down those around you. Keep your negative thoughts to just a couple close people who can handle it and let the rest of the world think “how does she stay so cheerful even when she is going through that trial?” Believe me, they will look up to you and want to help you more than if you were complaining all the time. (Especially on Facebook or other social apps.)

And one final word about Facebook and the like: remember that it is a social site. It’s like an online party. Would you air all your complaints and dirty laundry at a party? Would you be so negative if all those friends were in the same room with you and celebrating happy things? I hope not!

Have a happy day and find something yummy to make your taste buds happy, too, like this:

Coconut Key Lime Pie

Good luck!

Hugs and cheers!

Denise

What's For Dinner?

Mushroom Crepes

Someone asked me the other day if I eat bread on this diet. The short answer is Yes!

But that got me thinking: which is harder, going without meat or going without bread?

I tried a no-wheat-product, mostly-meat diet awhile back and the first few days I did great. I felt better and lost a few pounds. Of course, I also quit drinking soda at the same time and I always lose a few pounds just by doing that.

I found that there were lots of choices with meat and that I could still eat sausage and bacon and chicken and taco meat, which I love, but it was so hard to stay away from English muffins, waffles, sandwiches, muffins, pretzels, brownies (the list goes on and on ...). Not that I eat a lot in the way of cupcakes or cookies, but I do enjoy one now and again.

Now that I am eating a mostly vegetable and fruit diet, I stay away from meat but I can eat all those things I listed above and more! I went out to lunch with my kids and got an avocado, tomato, lettuce sandwich on sweet French sourdough bread. Mmmm. It was marvelous. So marvelous that we went out to lunch at the same place twice more. If I had been on the meat diet, I would have had to go without most of that sandwich. And then I’d have eaten more fat and felt less full. And I would have felt gross as well. Meat seems to make you sluggish and slow.

I actually feel like I have a lot of freedom on this diet plan. I can still eat my delicious snacks when I want. And I can have a cookie or something sweet once in awhile without feeling guilty! The funny thing is, I don’t really want to eat junk food so much. I have naturally quit craving it!

I have found ways to make yummy things like muffins and substitute healthier ingredients (see recipe in my 3/28/14 post and  also on my recipe blog: chefmamanise.blogspot.com).

And I don’t really have to do those substitutions, that was just extra. If you want to go vegan, you can use the substitutions. If you are still using dairy in your diet, you don’t have to. But one of the things you can do either way to make it healthier is to add 1/4 cup white bean puree to the wet ingredients. It sounds crazy but it doesn’t even make it taste any different at all! (Just make sure the beans are all pureed; you don’t want to find one in your muffin like my daughter did.) This adds protein to your muffin without having to gag down a bunch of beans. (I know I’m rather hard on legumes, but I really am coming to like them a bit more.)

So for those of you who are looking for a new recipe, here’s what we did for dinner:

Mushroom Crepes with Alfredo Sauce

Crepes:  (vegan subs in parentheses)

1 1/2 cups milk (1 1/2 cups rice, almond or soy milk)

2 eggs (see egg substitute chart)

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 Tbl olive oil

1 1/4 cup flour

3 Tbl sugar (omit when making savory crepes like these)

1/8 tsp salt

Mix milk, eggs, vanilla and oil. Sift together flour and salt, then add to milk mixture.

Heat an 8 or 10 inch pan. Spray with oil, if needed.

Pour 1/4 cup mixture into hot pan and spread around by tilting pan until it forms one large cake.

Cook on medium heat for about 3 minutes, or until sides begin to brown.

Remove from pan.

Creamy Mushroom Filling:

2 Tbl butter (olive oil)

1 1/4 pound mushrooms

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp chopped fresh rosemary

1 Tbl flour

3/4 cup half & half (1/2 cup rice milk plus 2 Tbl flour, mixed)

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

3 tsp parsley flakes or 3 Tbl freshly chopped parsley

Melt 1 Tbl of the butter in a large skillet over medium heat.

Add mushrooms and salt. Cook, stirring frequently until mushrooms are browned, about 10 minutes.

Stir in rosemary. Transfer mushrooms to a glass bowl and return the skillet to medium heat.

Melt remaining butter. Stir in flour and cook, stirring constantly, about 1 minute.

Stir in half & half, stirring until thickened. Return mushrooms to skillet and stir in nutmeg and parsley.

Topping:

Since I didn’t have anything else, I used Alfredo sauce from a jar. You could also use some kind of gravy (using a vegetable broth base) or whatever else sounds good to you.

For lunch, Lee made a salad, as usual, but he made up his own dressing.

Lee’s Salad Dressing

(Makes about 2 servings)

2 Tbl olive oil

1 Tbl balsamic vinegar

1 Tbl red wine vinegar

Ground fresh pepper corn, to taste

Pinch ground cayenne pepper

Pinch chili powder

Dash Italian seasoning

Let me know if there are any recipes you are interested in learning. I am finding new things all the time!

Hugs and cheers!

Denise