How to stuff your face and lose weight

Simply take our 5-day health challenge!



We don't always eat perfectly (as you can see in some of our previous posts!) And even though we don't usually splurge on high-fat, junky foods.. we do. That means sometimes we need to make up for it. We may fall victim to cheesy dips, fast food pizza joints (yummy Papa John's white flour thin crust) and french fries or chips and salsa. They won't kill us - or you - but they're certainly not good for you - or us.

That's why I decided we should eat completely healthily for 5 full days. This means eating only fruits, vegetables and spices for 5 days (NOTE: we are having a watered-down cup of coffee in the morning because we are a bit addicted to caffeine from our daily cup of joe.)

DAY 1
Breakfast: coffee, banana, apple

Lunch: steamed russet potatoes, carrots; smoothie made of strawberries, prunes, spinach and banana



[Check out these cranberries! They're scrumptious over boiled sweet and russet potatoes. My favorite! See day 1.]

Dinner: boiled/diced sweet and russet potatoes, water-grilled asparagus, boiled corn, cranberries cooked with juice of 1 orange and zest and a dash of ginger until gooey; smoothie made of strawberries, prunes, spinach and pear

Dessert: pomegranate arils



DAY 2
Breakfast: coffee, smoothie made from mixed pineapple, strawberries, spinach
Lunch: salad with barbacoa jackfruit and grape tomatoes, smoothie made with apple, strawberries, spinach

Snack: cup of tea + lots of seaweed

Dinner: sweet potato, russett potato, brussel sprouts, corn, leftover barbacoa jackfruit and zucchini + lots of spices. Seriously -- the more spices, the better. (Cook potatoes longer to soften. Add other veggies later. Simmer/boil the heck out of it!)



DAY 3
Breakfast: watered-down coffee (Yep, that's it! Amazingly, my appetite isn't what it usually is. Apparently, high-fiber, low-fat foods keep your fuller, longer -- even through the morning!)

Lunch: boiled/marinated sweet potato and russet potato with bullion (yummy!) with steamed broccoli, orange cauliflower and carrots; smoothie with pomegranate, strawberries, spinach and apple

Snack: apple, hot tea and seaweed snacks

Dinner: hot, hot, hot soup of green beans, red potato, corn, carrots, celery and lots of spices with fresh avocado on top (the avocado calms the heat of the soup)



Dessert: blended strawberries + bananas -- frozen for two+ hours and thawed for half hour before eating. Makes a great all-fruit, slushy dessert! **Keep leftovers in freezer. This time you may have to thaw for an hour before eating.



DAY 4
Breakfast: coffee, banana, apple

Lunch: soup made of 1/2 can of diced roasted tomatoes, red potato, two carrots, celery and broccoli; smoothie with pineapple-mixed fruit, spinach, cranberries, banana and water

Dinner: jackfruit seasoned with taco seasoning on top of a bed of spinach, grape tomatoes, diced boiled sweet and yellow potatoes - delicious!

Dessert: Tyler finished the frozen dessert from yesterday and I boiled strawberries, cranberries and blueberries. Cook until strawberries are a gooey mess and cranberries are open. Eat while still warm. BEWARE: Your teeth and tongue will turn very, very blue. So rinse with water soon after and brush well. But trust me, it's totally worth it!

DAY 5
Breakfast: coffee, apple

Lunch: soup to-go -- we're meeting our tax guy today so I have to send something easy back to work with Tyler for his last day of completely healthy eating. We've almost made it! Hot soup + Tyler gets his own avocado. (Since I am actually trying to trim down, I'm eating my sans avo. But yesterday's avo we split was a.m.a.z.i.n.g. Personally I love when we can split them.)

Dinner: avocado sliced, wrapped in seaweed (I find it funny that I ate an entire avocado for dinner immediately after mentioning that I like to split them. Well, normally avocado is added to a meal so I don't want an entire avo. But this time it WAS the meal. And a damn great one. I highly recommend it. Directions: Sprinkle avo with salt and pepper, warp with pieces of nori. Devour.) I didn't take a picture because it's not exactly aesthetically-pleasing. You'll get it all over your fingers. You'll moan while you eat it. Yes, it's that good. You'll just have to trust me.

Dessert: banana



NOTES:

We're calorie-restricting without even trying. Off and on we've both been a little tired. Not exhausted, just a little tired. But no matter how much you eat when you're eating this way -- you get hungry every few hours. That's the beauty of eating good food! You really can eat as much as you want.

THOUGHTS:

I'm sure you all know that one week of completely healthy eating doesn't make up for weeks, months or years of junk. There is no magic medicinal pill you can take that will allow you to eat at your favorite fast food restaurants or even most of the chain restaurants in America. Let's just accept that and move on.

The more healthily you eat, the better your food will taste.

You may have to adjust to it in the beginning but after some time, after your taste buds have had time to heal and learn to taste food again, you'll be amazed at how wonderful these simple meals will taste.

You'll be even more amazed at how wonderful you feel (and look!)



Go vegan: get happy.