Day 5?

I had a few busy days so I haven't posted daily as planned. I'll keep it short:

Foods
I'm still eating vegan and I don't have any issues with the foods. The recipes are yummy and easy to prepare. The only thing is: it needs planning and time. I found out that preparing my lunch the evening before works best. I often make a double batch from a dinner and then change it up a bit for lunch by adding some veggies, salad or some carbs. Lots of people believe that eating vegan costs a lot of money. I've noticed that I spent a lot of money on some basics (seeds, nuts, oils, supplements, super foods, etc) but that the weekly costs only consist of veggies and fruits. Furthermore I spend way less on lunch and drinks at work as I don't buy any sandwiches or drinks anymore. I actually think I spend less money on foods than with my previous vegetarian diet. I must say that I am 'freestyling' a bit, I don't just eat recipes from the VFF book. I use the basic principles and mix it up with ingredients that I have in stock. I replace nuts with other nuts, veggies for veggies, etc. But I keep to the principles of eating low carb at night, eating breakfast daily, eating vegan, and not eating after 19.00.

Sports
I went to sport once this week. I'm planning to attend a Zumba class tomorrow night so that's 2 times in one week, my goal :)

Drinks
I drink a lot of matcha shakes, water and green tea. I sometimes spike my water with some fruits, freshly squeezed juice or some organic apple sauce. I always drink tea without sugar so that's not a problem at all. I drank some coke this week, but am quite satisfied with how little. From today on I am sticking to the non-coke plan.

Smoking
Yeah that's hard. I still smoke, but I smoke about 10 cigarets a day, sometimes less, not more. For now I am happy about that, but I still want to reduce it until I quit smoking.

Results
I haven't stepped foot on a scale yet so I don't have any results thus far.

Next few weeks
I like eating this way and hope to continue it for longer as the prescribed 30 days. I am not sure I'll be eating vegan for 100%. I must say I have broken the cycle of eating tons of cheese, and I don't want to go back. I still eat gluten free and I notice so many changes in my body. The stomach aches are gone, I have more energy, etc. So yeah I do want to make these changes for a long time, but I think I'll eat cheese at dinner parties etc., but not at home or work. I haven't quite decided yet, I'll figure it out in the next couple of weeks. I have some dinner parties and in 2 weeks I'll be taking a weekend-trip with some colleagues and I'll see how eating vegan turns out then.

That was my recap of the first few days, time to go make my salad for lunch tomorrow ;)

Course and Vegan for fit Challenge

Well I'm back from the course! I actually got back saturday night but didn't have any energy to write anything until now. I had a very nice lazy sunday and started work again today. The only thing that wasn't so nice is that I didn't have any fresh fruits or veggies yesterday as all shops are closed on Sunday here. But today I went to the supermarket and bought me some yummy fruits and veggies.

The course
I loved it! I met some lovely people, had tons of fun and learned a lot. Normally I have trouble concentrating, but maybe because of all the healthy foods (and omega-3-plant-acids) which are good brain-foods, I could focus and concentrate so much better! The topic of the course was knee-surgery and knee-implants. The only thing that bothered me during the course was the fact that we had to learn doing these surgeries on cow bones!

I was totally not expecting this as we normally learn surgeries on 'fake bones' made out of some kind of plaster-plastic-mixture. But this particular surgery involved cartilage-surgery, and we needed cartilage to learn it on. I considered not doing it, but I thought about it and had some other thoughts:

1. the cow wasn't slaughtered for this, it's only a rest-product from slaughter for meat (ok this argument sucks and is also used by meat-eaters for other crap
2. I do need to learn this and don't want to fail the course
3. If I don't do it they will throw the bone away unused anyway

Well, I decided to do it, but hated doing it so much I was distracted. It is just so strange for a vegan to use a part of an animal for something. I hated it, but I learned from it as well. Totally strange situation.

The foods during the course

I had some vegan and some non-vegan, definitely all vegetarian-foods. The first day I had a big salad for lunch (carrots, lettuce and cucumber, boy can cooks be uninspired when it comes to vegan-salads...). For dinner we went to a restaurant and I had a salad and some pasta with veggies, as a desert fruit with yoghurt, I only ate the fruits. The second day we had some cheese-dish for lunch (Käse-Spätzl), for dinner a salad as appetizer and some pasta with veggies as main dish. For dessert we had cocos with fruits. The third day I had a sandwich with camembert (the other option was goulash-soup which of course wasn't an option. For dinner I had a salad at a restaurant during my travel back home. So yeah not quite vegan. I noticed that my body really hates eating gluten and non-vegan foods, so I am happy to be home and vegan again :)

The Vegan for Fit Challenge

As I wrote before, I am starting the VFF Challenge as of tomorrow (I ate vegan today but needed to do some shopping before starting the challenge. In short, the VFFC is a book from a vegan Chef called Atilla Hildmann (I hope I spelled that correctly) and is focused on weight loss by using a vegan low-carb diet. The main points are (but hey if you are german: buy the book, it's cool!):

- eating vegan

- omitting all sugar (replacing it by Stevia or Agave Nectar)

- no carbs at night, only for breakfast and lunch

- no unhealthy carbs (white flour, white rice and pasta)

- sport

- no eating after 7pm

- making everything fresh, no preproduced products

- drinking a lot of water and green tea

- drinking matcha tea

There are tons of recipes in the book, but as I have so many ingredients left, I'm not planning on following only the recipes in the book. I will also make it gluten and soy free. So I will sometimes use different nuts or nut butters, oils etc. until I have used all the other organic vegan produce I have left. But I'll follow all the rules, just maybe with some different ingredients. I'll also remain eating my superfoods (bee pollen, maca powder, raw cacao, chlorella, spirulina) and will take my supplements as before. I will refrain from most produced products. My main goal remains weight loss and health. I guess this challenge for me is about eating a healthy vegan diet. It's so easy to eat a junk-vegan diet full with cookies, bread, pasta etc. Also it's easy to eat a junk-vegan diet meanwhile drinking a lot of coke and red bull (hello me). So that's it, a healthy diet for me as of tomorrow. I will post a (mostly) daily update here!

 

Course and sucky sucky cheese and gluten

Usually when a vegan post concerns a course, it is about a spiritual/yoga or a vegan cooking course. Well I'm not that lucky but I am excited about leaving for a work-related course tomorrow. It's always good to leave work behind for a few days. So as of today I won't be going back to work until next monday!

The only thing I am concerned about is the food.... When I decided to eat a vegan diet again I decided not to concern myself with vegan (always vegetarian of course) foods when I'm out for dinner, or at a party. However, the more I read, the more I get into it, the less I want to eat anything else. Yesterday I had lunch with a friend and had a big goat-cheese salad. Although goat cheese has always been my favourite in the cheese department (and I ate a lot of cheese...), I felt bloated and unhealthy afterwards. I  had the (sorry yet to the nasty part) worst stomachache, diarrhea and gas the rest of the day! I thought about it and one of the following must be true a) cheese is bad for human beings, b) maybe I am lactose-intolerant? c) maybe your body can't digest cheese so easily after not eating it for a while (but that seems strange as my body never needs to remind itself how to digest an apple), d) all of the above.

I have always had stomach/colon/digestion problems. However, when I eat vegan I don't have them at all (only when I eat soy, I know my body can't handle that and I have been tested allergic for soy). When I was 16, I was tested positive for celiac disease (gluten allergy). As a student I didn't much care for the dry gluten free bread and expensive-pasta and started eating gluten again. I always knew it was bad for me but didn't think twice about adopting a gluten free diet again. When we handled celiac disease in medical school I felt a pang of guilt but forgot about it afterwards. Then I read 'the crazy sexy diet' from Kris Carr, and she not only talks about the health benefits of a vegan diet, but also about gluten intolerance and how it effects your body. She listed about 10 symptoms of celiac disease, and yeah I have to say I have 9 out of 10 (except the fact that most people become skinny from the disease, why o why is that the only thing that didn't happen to me.... :( )which isn't that strange as I have been diagnosed with it. How unhealthy can it be to just deny a disease? Well apparently very unhealthy, as it is known to give a 30% increased chance of colon cancer and causes many vitamin deficiencies etc. So I guess it's time to accept it for what it is and stay the hell away from any gluten.

That means a vegan, soy free and gluten free diet. Which sounds worse than it actually is. Luckily veggies and fruits don't contain any of them. But a lot of vegan products and recipes contain soy or gluten. I am happily in love with rice- and almond milk. Rice, quinoa and rice-noodles are all gluten free and inexpensive. And there are so many gluten free products in the market at the moment! I found an organic gluten free brand which I am quite happy about.

But how can I obtain such a diet in strange surroundings? I emailed the course directors secretary and she told me there are lots of fruits and veggies available during the day. We have two dinners in different restaurants and I assume that they will serve a buffet which usually contains rice (probably white rice but hey I'll take it over anything non-vegan) and a salad bar. So I am hopeful, but packed lots of snacks, fruits and gluten free crackers to take with me.

I guess it's time to go packing. I'll be back on sunday and probably won't be posting until then. Have a good and healthy week!