Rollie Pollies on a Log

Here is a yummy twist on the good ol' Ants on a Log. Personally, I am not a fan of raisins but as I was sitting there with my son having an apple snack I asked my son if he would like to try some peanut butter on his apples. He declined because he loves his apples au natural. Peanut butter always reminds me of celery and that always brings me to Ants on a Log but I remembered my tub of freakishly large blueberries that I bought at Raley's and I thought, "Hmmm... I bet those would be good on celery with peanut butter...". Uhhhh... yeah! They were!

My son adding the "rollie pollies"

Vegan Chocolate Pudding

So, I haven't been posting due to... life. Anyway, instead of making this exclusively for juicing because the name of this blog emphasizes ENHANCED not EXCLUSIVELY and also since I haven't been tracking it. I'll throw in some healthy recipes that I have been making at home for me and my family. As far as juicing goes, I still juice daily but as a supplement. I still eat food.


Anyway, on to the point of this post... Vegan Chocolate Pudding. The term "vegan", I have heard, encompasses many things. Such as raw, unprocessed, organic, and non-animal derived. Whatever. To me it means absolutely no animal products. No lacto-, ovo- crap. I'm not a vegan by any means, I have just been working on reducing my animal product intake, as well as my family's. This recipe was inspired by a class presentation while I was in college and I have been making it for my family often.

Day 4 - 1 lb gained

The consequences of eating. I swear this is what would make someone become anorexic. Don't worry... Not me. I love food way too much.
Today I got my juice ready for the next day....
Recipe
12 leaves of kale, about one bunch
1 whole bunch of celery
2 whole cucumbers
4 golden delicious apples
5 medium sized carrots
1 good sized price of ginger
1 whole lemon peeled with some pith remaining

That made about 64 fl oz which is 8 cups.

Cost me about $7... You gotta love living in the agricultural center of the world

Day 3 - 0 lbs lost

I juiced once today and that's because I wasn't home to juice and I don't have one of those nifty batteries that you can put in the trunk of your car so you can juice on the go.

I need to work on juicing my stuff the night before...

Day 2 - 1 lb Lost

Slowly but surely...

I'm not complaining. This juicing thing is a lot easier after you've gotten past those first couple of days. Today I juiced as well as have my dinner. We were STARVING by dinner time because we were working on weeding the backyard all day in that hot weather! Not to mention being on edge because all the wasps are out and about.

Day ONE - Check!

Day 1 - I am HEALED!

So, I can walk on my ankle again and I am officially back on the Juice Fast! Woo hoo! I honestly couldn't wait to get back on it! During my hiatus, I have only gained 4 pounds. I was expecting a lot more but the week-long fast totally changed my appetite and I haven't been craving the "no-no" foods.

Okay, so I'm back on... stay tuned...

Day 8 - 1 lb Lost

Bad news, I rolled my ankle badly last night as I was going down the stairs with my son. I misjudged what step I was on and before I knew it, my heel slips off the last step and I land on my ankle. It happened so fast that I don't even remember what happened to the child that was in my arms. When I recovered from the shock and the pain set in, my son was at my side asking me if I was okay. With the help of my significant other and my sister, I hobbled over to the couch, elevated my ankle, and I was there for the rest of the night. I wanted to go downstairs to get my nail polish so I could put them away. Well, they're still down there.

I have decided to pause this diet and concentrate on getting my ankle back to normal. That means, eating balanced meals that include protein to help heal my muscles and ligaments that have been strained.

I will still be juicing and updating. Stay tuned for some Juicy Recipes!

Day 7 - 0 lbs Lost

Total: 12

That's okay. I was bad last night. I had some fish filet with salad. The outcome? Since the second day, I have had this unbelievable energy and this morning, I was so groggy, lazy, and I didn't want to get up. That is what I get for cheating. I was so confident in the juicing thing that I didn't remember, the juice alone won't help me lost weight. I need to be strong and remember why I'm doing this. To get back to my pre-pregnancy weight.

Some good news, I was able to relieve some complaints that I had yesterday. Specifically the bathroom issue. I made a carrot, beet, & apple juice last night and it helped wonders.

By the time I remembered to take a picture I already put 5 carrots through the juicer. 

I have never had a fresh beet before and this was the first time I peeled on. Man, is that stuff saturated! It stained my hand for about a day but it did add some sweet color to my juice and a little sweetness. What else it added was the taste of roots which I didn't mind too much.

This made about 12 fl oz of juice...

Constipation juice 
5 carrots
1 beet
1 apple
half a lemon

Day 6 - 2 lbs Lost

Total: 12 lbs

I have a confession to make. I ate last night. I mean, I chewed actual food. It was two small bowls of spring mix salad with cucumbers, tomatoes, and roast chicken breast. All topped with a balsamic vinaigrette... but I still lost weight! LOL

This juicing thing is really working! One very notable difference in that I have so much more energy! So much so, that I have to drag myself to bed because I don't feel sleepy at all. When I do manage to sleep, it's more refreshing because I'm not waking up in the middle of the night. Sleep went from "sleep" to "slumber" and it's oh-so-wonderful.

One other thing, is my skin! When I looked up at myself in the mirror one morning I noticed that it looked more luminous, radiant, and my skin tone is starting to even out.

My mom has had the same juicer for more than 5 years. She's had it forever and she would always try to get me to drink juice from that thing. I did not like the idea of carrots, celery, and apples all in one cup. So, I watch a documentary and my life is starting to change for the better when all I had to do was listen to my mother. Eff me. By the way, I have apologized to her. This morning, as a matter of fact!

I'm still debating whether or not to eat tonight. I'm not starving like I was yesterday, but my motivation to keep going is still strong!

Day 5 - 4 lbs lost

Total: 10 pounds

That's right. FOUR pounds. How? I don't know. Juicing, I guess. How's the other one doing? He lost SIX. Over night? I don't get it! It's not like we incorporate any sort of physical activity into our daily routine! I'm not complaining, don't get me wrong, but I majored in this. Nutrition shouldn't baffle me! I will have an answer to this... eventually.

I want to talk about something personal. I want to talk about going NUMBER 2 and the lack there of. I should have Googled "juice fast complaints" because then I wouldn't be questioning why I haven't gone in about 4 days. I honestly anticipated the bathroom horror but it never came. So, be warned, if you want to try this, be prepared to take some herbal laxatives to help move it along.

As for today, it was torture. I sorely miss the act of putting food in my mouth, tasting it, chewing it, and then swallowing to make my belly happy. You don't understand. I love love love food. It's the whole reason why I wanted to make a career out of it but I understand that this pain is a comfort thing. I just don't want to think about it anymore! For some reason, I really wanted some garlic fried chicken and I don't normally crave for that. Ah well, the day's almost over. Score one for me because it was successful!

Day 4 - 1 lb Gained

I was so afraid to weigh myself today after yesterday's Easter feasts. The outcome isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be because I thought I did some major damage yesterday.

Drinking juice all day wasn't very challenging because I did my best to stay away from places with the enticing aroma of food. It also helped that I was in school all day to occupy my mind. Except... when I had my last class. One presentation done was a food demo. Before I knew it, I had an empty cup and a candy wrapper sitting on my desk. I didn't realize that I was fasting until I was staring at the garbage on my desk. "SH*T!" is what resonated through my mind. I was doing so well, too! It's okay. It wasn't like it was yesterday's meals.

On the way home, I brought my partner in crime to Costco so she could buy herself a juicer and thank goodness there weren't any samples! 

We made some fruit juice for dinner tonight as a treat.

The juice had cantaloup, strawberries, mango, carrot and lemon but it was mostly comprised of cantaloup and it wasn't very sweet so I added a couple of golden delicious apples. It was delicious.If you need a little sweetness, add some apples!

Makes about half a gallon
1 cantaloup
6 strawberries
1 mango
1 carrot
1/2 lemon
2 golden delicious apples

As the day comes to a close, I am just glad I made it through another day.

Day 3 - 1 lb Lost

7 pounds! Not bad for two days! In the past I have struggled to lose that much weight in one month!

I juiced twice today.

I also went to two Easter gatherings. There was ham, potato salad, baked AND fried salmon, pasta, pancit, lumpia & lumpiang shanghai, sweet & sour meatballs, strawberry trifle, chips & salsa, arroz con maiz, pinakbet (my favorite), hot dogs, hamburgers, mushroom risotto, and of course, Easter candy. I didn't have everything but I might as well have. I'm a little nervous to see what the damage will be tomorrow.

Day 2 - 6 lbs Lost

When I woke up the next morning, I actually felt "lighter". So, I hopped onto the scale and it read that I was down 6 pounds. That can't be right. So, I hopped onto another scale in the house and two scales can't be broken. Explanation? Water weight. That's all that is. I'm not stupid. If I ate my normal food I would gain all that back in one sitting.

Today wasn't so bad. I barely thought about food but then we went to Costco. And what's there? Samples, and lots of it. As a starving student, I would often go to Costco on it's busiest days and get full off of samples. When they're busy, they can't tell if you've already had one helping! Not one of my proudest moments. Anyway, we fed our 3 year-old son the samples and we would ask him how it tasted. "Yummy!" would be his response. Yummy, indeed. I could only imagine... because I'm juicing. We went home and juiced right away because we were starting to get grumpy from hunger.

Easter is tomorrow. We decided to go ahead and eat with the family. We figured since we're not that far into our fast it couldn't do much damage. I guess we will find out...

Day 1 - 0 pounds lost

So, I saw this documentary, "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead", while I was painting my nails. What did I do the next day? I bought a juicer. I came home and told my significant other, "We're going on a juice fast." We officially started out juice fast the very next day. Note, he hasn't seen the documentary, but went along with it anyway, with some convincing, of course. I bought the necessary veggies for our detox juice and and jumped right in.

Recipe - About 12 fl. oz of juice with a Jack LaLanne Juicer
6 leaves of kale
4 celery stalks
2 golden delicious apples
1 cucumber
1/2 lemon with some pith, no skin
A piece of ginger, about the size of the lemon, peeled or not but leave some pith if you do peel it

It was tough the first day. I felt like a zombie and my mind was all in a fuzz. My partner slept for most of the day, as did I, and even complained about having a headache. I figured this was our withdrawal symptoms. We weren't necessarily hungry because surprisingly the juice helped curb our hunger as well as our appetite but that would only last for so long.