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10 things i learned from 90 days of whole30

heyitsbex · March 1, 2020 · Leave a Comment

Complete a whole 90 – in other words, eat whole30 for 90 days. It was an ambitious thing to put on my 29 x 30 list, but I was convinced I could do it. I also knew that whole30 tends to be the only eating plan that actually helps me control my weight.

Here’s what I know about myself. I have absolutely no self-control. If there’s a box of ice cream in the freezer, I’m eating the entire thing within two days. So whole30 is the perfect solution – for me. It matches my needs and my personality type by strictly cutting things out. It also isn’t that far of a stretch from what I eat normally, it just removes the junk food I can’t quit.

What is whole30? If you haven’t heard of it, I highly suggest checking out the book, Whole30: The 30-Day Guide to Total Health and Food Freedom or whole30.com. The basic premise is you eat whole foods and ingredients for 30 days and cut all the extra crap out. No added sugars. No preservatives. No processed carbs. No baked goods. No alcohol. Again, the strict rules are a challenge at first, but for me, I need the set box to work within. Whole foods. I can do that.

To be honest, these past three months weren’t as hard as I thought they would be. I was so determined and I knew if I didn’t do these 90 days, there wasn’t going to be another 90 day window I could achieve the level of strict eating required before my birthday (which would mean I wouldn’t be able to check it off my 29×30 list). Some might say a little insane because I did whole30 throughout the Christmas season. Not a single baked good was consumed, and no Christmas stuffing either. That might have been the hardest part.

So what did I learn? Man, so much! Here’s a list of 10 things I learned or that contributed to my success:

  1. There are weird unnecessary ingredients in so many things. It should not be allowed. Take for instance, coconut milk. Rooster brand has a bunch of extra chemicals, but only costs $1. Another brand, has simply coconut extract and water, and costs double at $2. For me, now that I am aware of the chemicals, this is a cost I’m willing to accept.
  2. This barbecue sauce is the single greatest barbecue sauce. Never will I ever buy another barbecue sauce with chemicals and sugar again. It’s great to grill chicken in and to adapt into a spicy cashew nut chicken sauce. I had a mason jar filled in my fridge from the day I discovered it until now.
  3. Fruit is a powerful cooking ingredient. I started adding pineapples to many beef dishes. Adds a natural sweetness and makes everything so delicious.
  4. Having Mathew live with me helped significantly. I was already in a routine of coming home and making dinner. I strongly believe this was a huge factor in my success. It’s really hard to cook for just one person. Be kind to yourself if you’re in that situation.
  5. Blueberry larabars were a lifesaver. I get anxious in certain situations where I exert myself if I feel like I don’t have enough food. Keeping a larabar in my soccer bag or for after OrangeTheory made all the difference and prevented me from stopping for something quick.
  6. Salsa is a good makeshift salad dressing. It’s far easier to find a whole30 compliant salsa in Canada than it is to find a whole30 salad dressing. I opted for salsa a few times and it was quite tasty.
  7. There’s finally a breakfast meat that is whole30 compliant in Canada! I’m so grateful Maple Leaf came out with this all natural 25% reduced sodium bacon that has absolutely no added sugar! It is the only breakfast meat I can find in Canada that is whole30 compliant. Literally every other sausage, bacon, pea meal bacon has added sugar or crap in it. I ate so much bacon in these 90 days and I’ve never felt healthier.
  8. It’s easier to adapt recipes to be whole and natural than you would think. Take for example my mango curry chicken. We used to use the VH Mango Curry sauce that is loaded with crap. Now, I make the exact same dish with a bag of frozen mangos, a tablespoon or two of curry powder and a can of coconut milk. I’d argue the whole version tastes significantly better!
  9. People are more willing to support you than you could imagine. Make sure you talk to your people about what you’re doing. Help them understand. I may have the best family in the world, but they accommodated my diet restrictions and adjusted our entire Christmas dinner. My brother quite often ensured our Sunday dinners were whole30 for me. Mathew has been so willing to eat what I prepare. The only adjustments I made is he gets pasta if I have zucchini noodles, or actual rice if I’m eating cauliflower rice.
  10. It’s important to follow the program, but living life always wins in the end. In times where life happens, BE KIND to yourself! There were a few times where the oil at a restaurant was probably not going to be compliant. I could either get caught up in this and throw my whole90 out the window, or recognize that my boyfriend’s boss is only going to retire once (hopefully!). It’s more important to share that moment with my people than it is to beat myself up about the fact my vegetables were probably cooked in an oil blend. Does this mean I didn’t do a whole90? Absolutely not. I firmly believe I achieved my goal – not to mention I’ve never been healthier, more muscular, and I’m back to my weight I was when when I was 22. The key is to save this mentality for unavoidable times and changing your lifestyle to complement your eating habits.

Overall, I am so proud of myself for sticking it out for 90 days. I’m so happy with my body, how I look, but more importantly how I feel. The added consciousness of what I’m consuming and how it affects me has changed my life. I believe the 90 days led to a true lifestyle change, not just a 30 day experiment. I’m excited to splurge once in a blue moon, but I’m pretty sure this way of eating is here to stay! Stay tuned and I’ll share some of my favourite whole30 meals.

Have you ever completed a whole30? What’s your must-share tip or recipe?

The ultimate birthday cake.

heyitsbex · March 7, 2019 · Leave a Comment

I love me a good birthday cake. I’m also a sucker for sprinkles. Seriously – have you ever just tried adding sprinkles to your ice cream creation at Marble Slab? Or perhaps toss some sprinkles in pancakes? They have a strange ability of making decently tasty things even more incredible. So this year, when my lovely friend Chelsey told me her favourite cake was anything chocolate or ‘birthday cake’, I obviously jumped at the idea of more sprinkles!

Enter the Ultimate Birthday Cake from ‘Baked Occasions’. This thing is LOADED with sprinkles and my heart couldn’t be happier. After a quick read through the ingredients, I decided it was do-able. I set off to the grocery store after work (which, I had to work late so this cake baking escapade had me strolling into the grocery store at 7:30 pm to raid the shelves and get what I needed.

I made a pitstop at the liquor store to grab a bottle of the good old white wine that Kara has gotten me hooked on, grabbed probably a kilo of sprinkles from Bulk Barn and headed home.

I have to admit, I don’t often sift flour for baking, nor had I ever made basically a meringue for a cake batter mix, but this cake mix, as weird as the steps were to me, was absolutely to die for raw. It looked incredible and somehow tasted better. I popped my cakes in the oven, figured I’d get a few rounds of Fortnite in while they baked. Nope. Wrong. The frosting required 15 minutes boiling on the stove (what?) following by another 7-9 cooling the mixture off in a mixer before adding some butter to it. I told you – instructions – weird.

Needless to say, I pressed on. This cake was going to be the dang best ‘birthday cake’ birthday cakes I ever did make. And let me tell you, it really was one of the best cakes. Chelsey and the boys loved it too!

I will say though, the icing did not turn out as intended. I think I went wrong in the boiling the milk and cream step. Despite it being on medium, and my whisking, it was starting to burn. I think I ended up taking it off the heat before it was thickened enough. It was kind of a happy accident though. Aside from the brown goop of liquid that had collected on the edge of the cake board from the liquid mixing with the sprinkles, the icing ended up kind of melting into the cake in the middle layers and infusing it with a sweet delicious moisture.

Overall, it was a huge win.

Oh, and the best part, even though I didn’t intend for cakes to make up the majority of my ‘trying new recipes’ for my 28×29 list, this one checks that off too! Boom.

What’s your favourite kind of birthday cake? Share your pictures or recipes with me!

garlic ginger ramen.

heyitsbex · January 12, 2019 · Leave a Comment

My Mathew babe was super overwhelmed with work this past weekend, so I was trying to be super-girlfriend-extraordinaire and take care of all the nuisance things that life throws our way so he could focus solely on crushing through some work.

I didn’t really want to cook, but I also didn’t want to spend a fortune on both calories and dollars to get some take-out. So, I did what any technologically-dependent human in the 21st century would do, stood in the middle of the grocery store and googled, “easy cheap and quick one pot meals.” It’s how I stumbled upon this garlic ginger ramen recipe.

The ingredients were straight forward enough, it was also like -35 degrees Celsius outside so it was the perfect fit.

photo from original recipe website

Overall, the recipe was pretty good. I left the mushrooms out as I’m definitely not a fan. It tasted like it might have been missing a little something, but I never could figure it out (maybe it was those mushrooms…)  It would have been nicer to have the flavours simmer for longer, but we were hungry. I’d definitely make it again.  Recipe win.

Do you have any quick and easy one-pot go-to recipes? Share them with me please!

Grain free oatmeal.

heyitsbex · January 5, 2019 · Leave a Comment

At the beginning of the year I made a gutsy goal to try to do whole30 again, but this time for 90 days. For me, having the restrictions with what is allowed keeps me healthy. Otherwise, I have absolutely zero self-restraint.

A few weeks in, I was looking for easy alternatives for breakfast. I was sick of eggs, yet again. Enter grain free oatmeal – which is really just apple sauce with cashews in it to make it a better consistency.

The recipe is pretty straight forward. Cutting as many apples as the recipe calls for is oddly therapeutic for me. The smell of the apples simmering on the stove with the vanilla bean is absolutely heavenly.

The hardest part about this recipe is remembering to soak the cashews the night before you’re planning on making it. They need that overnight soak to get the proper consistency, so it’s definitely not a recipe you can just decide to make last minute.

I’m sure some people will question the calories in this or the number of grams of sugar. In my opinion, it’s healthy, whole foods. I portion it out into 1 cup portions and serve it with a couple raspberries. Trust me, this option is MUCH healthier than my usual bacon and egg mcmuffin from McDonalds, so I’ll take it! Having some containers in the fridge means I can grab them on my way out the door and heat them up at work.

My whole30 experience.

heyitsbex · September 10, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Having seen the whole30 pop up on some blogs I follow regularly and seeing multiple spreads in bullet journals across the internet, I decided I should check it out and see why it was so popular. I read a bunch of information on their website, and after reading a testimonial about a lady who had her trichotillomania cured, I was sold. I ordered my book and one for my mom, too!

What appealed to me about the whole30 was that it wasn’t a “diet”. It was about understanding the psychology of food and the relationship you have with it. It tackles sugar addictions and the bad habits that come with comfort food.

With a start date of August 7th, my mom and I read through all the program rules. She was upset she couldn’t have gum anymore and I was offended the book suggested I didn’t actually like coffee ’cause I added a bit of milk. Despite the intense rules, we somehow convinced my sister and brother-in-law to join, too.

The first two weeks we were all feeling pretty great. We didn’t have many cravings and were actually enjoying the food we were eating. The third week was definitely the hardest for all of us. We were grumpy. Angry. Craving sugar like nothing else. One day I sat and thought of every chocolate bar I’d love to consume all at once, right that moment. Because the program focuses on your mindset and food, it was a very interesting experience to be able to tell myself I didn’t need those chocolate bars. There was about 7 times I can remember distinctly where I would be sitting on the couch working late at night, and despite the fact my tummy was full, I wanted snacks. I didn’t give it though and it felt great!

We finished the program on September 6th and I’ve never felt better! I’m pretty proud of myself for accomplishing this and not quitting halfway through. I’m loving the way my body is looking, but even more so I’m loving the way I’m feeling. Here’s the top 5 non-weight related victories for me from the whole30:

  1. I saved SO much money by not eating fast-food or buying alcohol. I’m so motivated to get my cash budget started and keep the savings going.
  2. My go-to snack is now oranges. I love that I’m in the habit of reaching for fruits or veggies rather than sweets.
  3. I feel like I can tackle anything. The motivation for life that this program has given me is kind of unbelievable.
  4. I am so much more aware of what is in the food we eat. Pretty much everything has added sugars or additives in it. No wonder people are so unhealthy.
  5. I LOVE guacamole. Ask anybody, I hated avocados. I wouldn’t go near them if my life depended on it. Now guacamole is one of my favourite foods. I’ll make some and put it on grilled chicken rather than slathering the chicken in sugary unhealthy sauce.

A few of my staple food items throughout this past month, which I hope to share with you, were:

  1. Black coffee, which I now officially love
  2. Potato salad, made with homemade mayo
  3. Frank’s hot sauce for the days where I just needed to dip in something
  4. Grilled steak, veggies, and cayenne sweet potatoes
  5. Cauliflower rice
  6. Lettuce wraps

Now that the program is done, I don’t think I’ll go back to any of the foods I’ve eliminated. I feel so much better and to be honest, I”m a little worried to re-introduce anything. I don’t really feel like I’m missing out on anything. I love feeling in control of my food and eating habits, and I would much rather make my own food and sauces and know that what I’m eating is actual food without a bunch of unnecessary sugar and chemicals.

Overall, the whole30 was a 100% success. I’d recommend it to every single one of you beautiful people!

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