and the next I’m ready to step away from it. And if I’m confused then I can only imagine what anyone reading the past few posts might be thinking…But moving on to being predominantly 80/10/10 is such a big move that I’m happy to forgive myself for feeling a bit uncertain about staying on it. However, the hands that drive me to the organic food stores and reach inside my bag for my purse don’t seem to have the same problem. Perhaps it’s the lovely fresh feel of ripe fruit or maybe my stomach is dictating what it would prefer! I’m not sure but I do sense that regardless of my worm farm still being swamped by what I provided two weeks ago and the rapidity with which my freezer fills up with fruit scraps, some part in me seems to be perfectly happy to continue, and so I’m going with the flow.
I do notice the difference between where I am at right now and where I was at just a few weeks ago. Over Easter, I cleaned out 5 tomato tubs and the accompanying connections when one month ago I could only handle cleaning out 2 tubs. Admittedly towards the end of my 3-hour marathon, I was starting to falter. However, that still doesn’t take away from what felt like a significant increase in energy.
I’ve stopped logging everything I eat in Nutridiary. Instead, I aim to eat 400 calories of fruit at each meal, which this morning was handled by eating 5 prunes and then a rock melon followed by 3 small apples accompanying some quinoa. Later in the morning, I enjoyed a soy cappuccino.
For lunch, I had some persimmons followed by a mandarin, while I started my dinner early by enjoying 7 mandarins mid-afternoon followed by a large plate of lettuce, celery, tomatoes, parsley, mint and lime juice a while later.
Even though I’m not logging my intake every day, I’ve just decided to check how I’ve gone today. Even with the inclusion of the cooked quinoa and the soy cappuccino, I am well within the 80/10/10 diet
guidelines but have eaten 81% raw foods today. So I’m nowhere near being able to use the tag of 80/10/10 rv which means that I’m complying with the 80/10/10 guidelines and also am eating raw vegan food. But at least I have something to aim for!I think I’m doing too good a job in getting enough calories as today’s intake has far exceeded the amount I believe I need to maintain my weight. Fortunately, if I exclude the soy cappuccino and cooked quinoa then I’m just under my daily quota. I’m not worried about being over the quota today as twice in the past week I’ve been under the quota, so today is a good opportunity to make up the difference. But what I’m pleased to see from checking out today’s consumption is that when I move off the cooked grains and cappuccinos I’ll know how much I need to eat to meet my caloric requirements.
For the moment I’m still holding onto the grains. I used to love cooked rice with milk and honey as I was growing up and this transformed into my preferred breakfast of cooked brown rice with a piece of fruit. It’s such a pity that brown rice is a grain and therefore frowned upon within the 80/10/10 diet. Otherwise, it would be a perfect food for me to eat as it fits the 80/10/10 guidelines.
Unfortunately, I keep reading that grains are not good for me as they are not easy to digest. I still have some brown and basmati rice in my fridge along with the quinoa that I recently cooked and once I finish these off, I don’t plan on buying any more.
I’m starting to settle into a pattern with how I’m sourcing my fruit and salad items. This week for the first time I have bought a family size box of fruit from Food Connect, which amuses me as anyone looking at me would wonder where I would fit it all. But fruit is such an easy food to devour that I know there won’t be a problem at all. In fact, in addition to the family size fruit box, I have also bought additional kilos of persimmons and mandarins, along with an extra rock melon and some figs. For my night-time salad, I have taken on a kilo of tomatoes and two lettuces. I picked up the family sized box of fruit with the extras on Tuesday and by my reckoning, I’ll be buying more fruit by Saturday if not before.
The best part is now that we’re past the summer months I have moved back into growing veggies on my patio. In the past couple of weekends, I have planted out 5 new tomato plants along with a tray of snow peas and 2 trays of both lettuce and celery seedlings to complement the 2 trays of herbs that I’ve managed to keep alive over the summer. One of the herb trays has mint in it so I have an excellent example of how mint spreads out to fill the available space. In sympathy for the basil that is in the same tray as the mint and fighting to keep its space, I have planted some extra basil seedlings in the parsley tray. I’ve set myself a goal of controlling the mint’s growth, but I’m not sure who’s going to win.
So it looks like I’m set to continue on my predominantly fruit journey. I do feel a bit sad that I’m not using my Thermomix quite as much as I was, but it proves to be very helpful when friends or family visit or when I need to provide a few meals to my Mum as she recovers from shingles. I have also noticed that Douglas Graham has included recipes in his 80/10/10 Diet book that would suit being made in the Thermomix that I must try in the near future.
It feels strange to be on predominantly fruit. When I’m dining out it’s hard to find a meal that is acceptable under 80/10/10, so I have decided on two options. If I’m out for breakfast or brunch then I’ll have scrambled eggs on toast. I know, I know, totally against the 80/10/10 guidelines but an easy way to handle things and also an opportunity for a little break. For lunch or dinner I would have some fish on a green salad which is also against the guidelines but again I don’t mind having a break occasionally.
I judge how my journey with raw food or more specifically 80/10/10 is going by how well I sleep. When I’m being “good” – and I’d consider the fruit, salad and extras I’ve had today as being “good” - I pretty much sleep right through for 7 hours or more. When I’m not, I’ll wake up in the early hours of the morning and find it difficult to get back to sleep. I’m enjoying this journey because I feel like what I’m doing is starting to make a real difference to how I wake up in the morning and how much energy I have during the day. I think this lifestyle is a keeper!
No comments:
Post a Comment