Lifestyle Change

Tyler and I are foodies. We love cooking. We love eating out. We love trying new food. Although our "go-to" channel these days is HGTV, we still love watching the Food Network. However, per the recent decision to change our eating habits, our meals including countless baskets of chips at Margarita's, creamy pasta from Habachi Hut and Pizza Hut pan pizza, are coming to an end. We decided to make a change for a few reasons.

1) I've been doing Crossfit since the beginning of the year. If you are unfamiliar with Crossfit, it is a core strength and conditioning program. Rather than spending a long time on an elliptical or other monotonous workouts, each unique session is broken into three parts.

• Warm-up
• Strength
• Workout of the Day

For the strength portion, we work on different lifts or focus on strengthening specific muscle groups. Then there's the WOD or Workout of the Day. An example is:

5 Rounds:

• 25 Double Unders (A jump rope excercize where the rope makes two passes per jump rather than one)
• 20 Kettle Bell Snatches (squat and lift 20lb Kettle Bell straight above your head - 10 per arm)
• 15 Ring Pushups (Rings are just above the ground, put hands on the rings rather than the ground and do 15 pushups)
• 10 Wipers (Straighten legs, move from left side of the body to the right side like windshield wipers)

THEN, rest for 3 minutes, and do the whole thing again backwards

5 Rounds:

• 10 Wipers
• 15 Ring Pushups
• 20 Kettle Bell Snatches
• 25 Double Unders

It is a great workout, and I feel like I'm in the best shape that I've been in, in a long while! But back to the lifestyle change, eating as you please and working out like that isn't exactly conducive. Tyler started Crossfit yesterday and we have decided to complement our workouts with healthy eating habits.

2) Tyler has acid reflux and other stomach issues that come and go. Some days, or even weeks, he takes a Prilosec in the morning morning and he's completely fine. But other times, he is in terrible pain and can't even get out of bed. Not good. We thought that he might be Celiac, or gluten intolerant. While it seems odd because he has always eaten food containing wheat, rye, and barley, Celiac's disease can develop at any point in life. Luckily, Ty got tested last week and the results are in, he does not have Celiac's Disease...thank God! However there are a lot of health benefits that go along with a gluten-free diet, so even though he's not gluten intolerant, we are cutting it out.

So we have our reasons for the lifestyle change, and have decided to try out the Paleolithic diet. It is commonly associated with Crossfit, plus the benefits include decreased digestive issues (great for Ty) and increased quality of sleep (great for me). With the Paleo diet, you cut out dairy, wheat, grains, legumes, processed food and sugar. Paleo stands for the Paleolithic era which was ended approximately 10,000 years ago with the development of agriculture. The diet is also known as the "Caveman Diet" since, in theory, you are eating what those pre-historic hunters and gatherers ate way back when. There are a lot of fans as of the diet as well as a lot of naysayers, but we figured that we might as well give it a shot for a month and then decide what foods we want to add back into our diet (I, for one, am really going to miss black beans, corn, and potatoes.)

We successfully completed day 1 of Paleo.

• Breakfast : Organic Sausage (Regular sausage is NOT paleo, so we chose organic sausage without gluten, preservatives or fillers)
• Snack : Nuts (excluding peanuts)
• Lunch : Chicken Avocado Salad
• Dinner : Steak
• Dessert : Homemade Fresh Fruit Smoothie

 The one thing I've learned about Paleo, is that the key is to plan ahead. Here are a few recipes for meals that I made for the week:

Breakfast "Muffins" (makes 12)

• 8 Eggs
• 4 Organic Sausages, crumbled
• 1/2 bell Pepper (you can use any veggies, this is what I had in the fridge)
• 4 Asparagus Shoots
• Splash of Water (to make it fluffy)
• Desired Seasonings

Heat oven to 350° Crack the eggs into a large bowl and whisk them together until all of the yolks are broken up. Add water, veggies, and seasonings - stir well. Pour the mixture into a non-stick muffin pan. Make sure to evenly distribute the batter between each muffin cup. If your pan has more than 12 muffin cups, fill the remaining cups with  water so that the muffins will bake evenly. Put the pan in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes.

I baked the muffins yesterday and put them in Tupperware, in the fridge. Today I warmed one up and ate it for breakfast - Delish!

Avocado Chicken Salad

• 1 package of "Smart Chicken" chicken breast tenderloins
• 2 Avocados
• 1 Lime
• A pinch of Salt and Pepper
• 1 tbsp of Cilantro (optional, I didn't have add it as I didn't have it in my fridge)

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add the chicken tenderloins and cook until no longer pink. Once the chicken is cooked, remove it from the pot and shred using two forks. Move to a bowl and add avocados. Squeeze the limes in the bowl as well, just be sure not to let the seeds fall in the mixture. Add Salt, pepper, and chopped cilantro. Mix Well. 

A healthy version of traditional chicken salad

1 day down, 29 to go...