Day 5

My main man and I went to the Home and Garden show.  We started our trek through the booths on the side opposite the food.  The toughest part were the roasted nuts for sale in a booth in the center of the exhibition.   Their sweet smell permeated the middle of every isle.   The last two isles were filled with all kinds of food vendors, with samples galore.  Normally, we would have made our way down the isles, grazing as we went along.  But since everything was served with crackers or bread (so much for tasting the olive oil and balsamic vinegars) or was loaded with sugar, we avoided it all.  We planned ahead, however, and packed a Whole30 healthy lunch (I say Whole30 healthy because chapter 5 in the book, It Starts with Food, really debunks my understanding of healthy food).  Instead of sugar filled treats, we ate tuna salad, made with homemade mayonnaise (yes, sugar is even found in most mayonnaise), raisins, apple chunks and chopped pecans.  We ate it on romaine lettuce.  We also had veggies and some fruit.    Although I missed all the yummy delicacies, I did not miss that guilty and stuffed feeling I would normally have felt afterwards.

Chapter 5:  Healthy Hormones, Healthy You

Wow, this was a long chapter.  And not as easy a read as the preceding chapters.   The authors do an excellent job providing examples and images to help the reader understand  some of the harder concepts.   They discussed four important interacting hormones: insulin, leptin, glucagon, and cortisol.  When these hormones are functioning properly, our body is in balance, but when certain factors drive them to over or under produce, bad things can happen, like obesity, heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and even alzheimer’s disease.   Interestingly enough, many of the so-called “healthy foods” we have been taught to eat are major contributors to knocking these hormones out of balance.

Overall
Ok.  So I caved a little.  Not a big cave and kind of within the Whole30 list.  I really wanted some coffee in the morning.  However, black coffee is just too bitter.  I found a website (http://www.livebetterforever.com) featuring a recipe for almond milk.  The Whole30 book warns against making a sweet concoction out of coconut milk to have with coffee and I wonder if this would fit into the same category…  But I decided to try it anyway.   It consists of water, almond flour, 2 dates and vanilla.
Soap box time!  After I added the teaspoon of vanilla, a thought occurred to me: surely “they” wouldn’t put sugar in vanilla.  Seriously.  I checked.  And was stunned.  The store brand “pure” vanilla we bought had sugar listed as the second ingredient.  Sigh.  Since I’m only on day 5, and its a minuscule amount (vanilla doesn’t “taste” sweet), I decided to let it slide.  But I will be on the look out for vanilla-only vanilla extract (or make my own from vanilla beans).
Back to the almond milk and the coffee.  I tasted the almond milk and it’s pretty good, definitely cheaper than the store-bought kind.  And a splash in my coffee made it not bad.   (I can’t really say good yet because my taste buds are still rebelling from sweets being eliminated).  After I drank a cup, I realized I was satiated and didn’t need a second cup, like I often crave.  There just might be something to this.

5 down, 25 to go.