Earlier this year, I posted some of my goals for the year 2011. So far, I've done okay, but I have definitely not eaten vegan nearly as much as I wanted to. Since I just moved to DC and there is an awesome organic/health food store pretty near my apartment, I am considering this a fresh start (minus the milkshake I had on my way home from the store.....it's like a billion degrees here, I couldn't help it! lol).
I bought tons of healthy food from the store, including oatmeal, brown rice, sweet potatoes, apples, zucchini, cucumber, kale, and more. I have to say that I really enjoy shopping at this store save for one thing: the semi-judgey produce guy I encountered today! I asked him if the store sold any peaches, because I was really craving a peach, and he was all like "well when we do, they are locally grown and organic, but it's a little EARLY for peaches, we USUALLY don't get them until AUGUST...." oh, sorry I'm not a FARMER, dude, I just assumed that since it's 5 thousand degrees here and basically almost summer that maybe you'd have a peach! lol. Nah, he wasn't that bad, but he did make me feel slightly dumb for wanting a peach. In any case, I plan to make and bring my lunches to the Library of Congress, and hopefully I will lose a little weight from eating a healthy, vegan, whole-foods diet and walking around DC so much!! :)
Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vegan. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
This week, on days of our lives...
...I wouldn't know what happened, I don't have cable. But this week so far has been pretty interesting! I did a lot of grocery shopping/appliance buying in order to make myself eat food that is good for me! The first thing I bought is a salad spinner. It basically looks like this:
Now, I'm sure you know what a salad spinner does, but just in case you don't, it is a handy device that makes it really easy to wash and dry lettuce (and spinach, and other stuff) before you eat it. I made a salad with it tonight that looked like this!:
It was okay, it didn't have any fancy ingredients, just the lettuce, some cucumbers and the dressing. I wasn't very hungry since I had pasta again for lunch, and some of these delicious Back to Nature cookies for dessert :)
They may not be the healthiest food, but they sure are delicious! :) I bought them instead of Oreos (which, surprisingly, are vegan, but I kind of wish I had never found that out lol I need to cut down on desserts!).
I also bought a blender.
Now, the first blender I bought was a total fail, so this is blender #2 after I returned blender #1. Blender #1 honestly took ten minutes to blend (by pulsing) the very small amount of frozen fruit and juice I put into it, and even then was not all broken down! I bought the blender(s) so that I could make my own smoothies instead of going to Jamba Juice all the time.
For those unfamiliar, Jamba Juice is a national chain that has mainly smoothies but also now serves coffee and some lunch sandwich type of items. I used to only get this one chocolate smoothie from Jamba back when I didn't eat a wide variety of foods, and believe it or not this chocolate smoothie is one of the WORST drinks for you nation-wide! So I have expanded my Jamba menu and now just get the all-fruit smoothies, and am trying to make my own at home by blending frozen peaches, mangoes, and strawberries together with ice and some apple or orange juice, or maybe some vanilla soy milk.
So that's about it! I've been doing pretty well with project vegan so far, the only non-vegan items I have had are the remainder of some Dove chocolates I bought before going to the movies with a friend this past weekend! My friend Holly and I also went to the Chicago Diner this past weekend where I had some (vegan, of course) roasted garlic gnocchi in sun dried tomato pesto sauce. It was SO GOOD! We also had a slice of (vegan!) chocolate mousse cake for dessert, and it was hands down seriously one of the best chocolate cakes I have EVER had!!!!!
Now, I'm sure you know what a salad spinner does, but just in case you don't, it is a handy device that makes it really easy to wash and dry lettuce (and spinach, and other stuff) before you eat it. I made a salad with it tonight that looked like this!:
It was okay, it didn't have any fancy ingredients, just the lettuce, some cucumbers and the dressing. I wasn't very hungry since I had pasta again for lunch, and some of these delicious Back to Nature cookies for dessert :)
They may not be the healthiest food, but they sure are delicious! :) I bought them instead of Oreos (which, surprisingly, are vegan, but I kind of wish I had never found that out lol I need to cut down on desserts!).
I also bought a blender.
Now, the first blender I bought was a total fail, so this is blender #2 after I returned blender #1. Blender #1 honestly took ten minutes to blend (by pulsing) the very small amount of frozen fruit and juice I put into it, and even then was not all broken down! I bought the blender(s) so that I could make my own smoothies instead of going to Jamba Juice all the time.
For those unfamiliar, Jamba Juice is a national chain that has mainly smoothies but also now serves coffee and some lunch sandwich type of items. I used to only get this one chocolate smoothie from Jamba back when I didn't eat a wide variety of foods, and believe it or not this chocolate smoothie is one of the WORST drinks for you nation-wide! So I have expanded my Jamba menu and now just get the all-fruit smoothies, and am trying to make my own at home by blending frozen peaches, mangoes, and strawberries together with ice and some apple or orange juice, or maybe some vanilla soy milk.
So that's about it! I've been doing pretty well with project vegan so far, the only non-vegan items I have had are the remainder of some Dove chocolates I bought before going to the movies with a friend this past weekend! My friend Holly and I also went to the Chicago Diner this past weekend where I had some (vegan, of course) roasted garlic gnocchi in sun dried tomato pesto sauce. It was SO GOOD! We also had a slice of (vegan!) chocolate mousse cake for dessert, and it was hands down seriously one of the best chocolate cakes I have EVER had!!!!!
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Vegan powers---activate!!
Hello, fellow internet dwellers! Life has been rather interesting lately. I've been hopping back and forth between school and my hometown, visiting friends and also volunteering at school since I am between summer class sessions right now. I also just finished reading the Scott Pilgrim graphic novels because a) they sounded awesome and b) I wanted to read them before the movie comes out. They were hilariously awesome and I 150% recommend them!
If you are not familiar with the Scott Pilgrim story, let me give you the basics which will lead me to the main point of this blog entry. Scott Pilgrim is a 23 year old Canadian slacker dude who plays in a band and falls in love with this girl Ramona. Ramona has 7 evil exes, as in ex-boyfriends (mostly), who Scott has to fight and defeat in order to keep dating Ramona. One of the evil exes is named Todd Ingram, and his superpowers come from the fact that he is....wait for it.....a vegan!!
BAHAHAHA!!! The reason I found this so funny is because about a month ago I read this book:
It is called "The Kind Life" and was written by the actress Alicia Silverstone, notably of "Clueless" fame. Half the book consists of literature/her personal story chronicling the health benefits of becoming a vegan or even of becoming a "superhero" (that's right, get it now? lol) by following a macrobiotic diet. The other half is recipes, which are (obviously?) all vegan.
One of the reasons that I read the book is that my awesome friend Holly (find her blog at http://meatlesswithmia.blogspot.com) recommended it to me. About a year ago (can't believe it's been that long!) we made the cupcake recipe from this book and it was SO good!! Completely vegan, i.e. no animal products involved, and they were SUPER delicious!! Most of you know that I am a (mostly) vegetarian who occasionally eats a hamburger or a steak (maybe once a month at most), but you may not know that I am super seriously considering becoming vegan for the following reasons...
Now, this next part might get a little personal and health-related, so if you're not one to be into topics that might be considered "too much information" you may want to skip the next paragraph...lol
Reason 1: personal health
I have never been a huge fan of eating meat. Like I said above, I'll have a burger or even a steak every now and then, but texture in food really affects me and I very much dislike the texture of meat. Despite this I do eat lots of food made with animal products, such as cookies, bread, cakes, muffins, ice cream, and most notably, cheese, usually accompanied by macaroni (lol). Unfortunately over the past 3-4 years I have noticed that animal foods, mostly dairy, have been giving me extreme stomach cramps and unusual....bathroom events, we'll leave it at that. These cramps and other symptoms have been getting worse and worse and worse, and I have also gained some weight which is bad for my back (a whole different story, but suffice it to say I have a herniated disc and being even a little bit overweight is not good). So, as a personal experiment, I followed Alicia Silverstone's suggestions and noticed an IMMEDIATE improvement to these symptoms. Because of this, I have decided (even though it may be hard for me!) to try to go vegan!
Reason 2: animals' health
I'm not going to get all preachy, but we all know that there are some less than ideal conditions in many factory farms and it pains me to know that any animal is being mistreated. I DO NOT, repeat, DO NOT condemn anyone for eating meat, I don't necessarily even think that it's wrong, but I would be lying if I didn't acknowledge that this is another part of the reason why I have decided to give up meat and other animal foods for good.
So there you have it! I will probably blog some more about recipes I try, any health benefits I enjoy, etc. etc. I highly recommend "The Kind Life" if you want to learn more about the benefits of a vegan and/or macrobiotic diet, as Alicia Silverstone does a great job of presenting her case without seeming like one of those crazy paint-throwing PETA activists, lol. Maybe I'll even get some crazy vegan telekinetic powers, just like Todd Ingram!!! hahaha :)
If you are not familiar with the Scott Pilgrim story, let me give you the basics which will lead me to the main point of this blog entry. Scott Pilgrim is a 23 year old Canadian slacker dude who plays in a band and falls in love with this girl Ramona. Ramona has 7 evil exes, as in ex-boyfriends (mostly), who Scott has to fight and defeat in order to keep dating Ramona. One of the evil exes is named Todd Ingram, and his superpowers come from the fact that he is....wait for it.....a vegan!!
BAHAHAHA!!! The reason I found this so funny is because about a month ago I read this book:
It is called "The Kind Life" and was written by the actress Alicia Silverstone, notably of "Clueless" fame. Half the book consists of literature/her personal story chronicling the health benefits of becoming a vegan or even of becoming a "superhero" (that's right, get it now? lol) by following a macrobiotic diet. The other half is recipes, which are (obviously?) all vegan.
One of the reasons that I read the book is that my awesome friend Holly (find her blog at http://meatlesswithmia.blogspot.com) recommended it to me. About a year ago (can't believe it's been that long!) we made the cupcake recipe from this book and it was SO good!! Completely vegan, i.e. no animal products involved, and they were SUPER delicious!! Most of you know that I am a (mostly) vegetarian who occasionally eats a hamburger or a steak (maybe once a month at most), but you may not know that I am super seriously considering becoming vegan for the following reasons...
Now, this next part might get a little personal and health-related, so if you're not one to be into topics that might be considered "too much information" you may want to skip the next paragraph...lol
Reason 1: personal health
I have never been a huge fan of eating meat. Like I said above, I'll have a burger or even a steak every now and then, but texture in food really affects me and I very much dislike the texture of meat. Despite this I do eat lots of food made with animal products, such as cookies, bread, cakes, muffins, ice cream, and most notably, cheese, usually accompanied by macaroni (lol). Unfortunately over the past 3-4 years I have noticed that animal foods, mostly dairy, have been giving me extreme stomach cramps and unusual....bathroom events, we'll leave it at that. These cramps and other symptoms have been getting worse and worse and worse, and I have also gained some weight which is bad for my back (a whole different story, but suffice it to say I have a herniated disc and being even a little bit overweight is not good). So, as a personal experiment, I followed Alicia Silverstone's suggestions and noticed an IMMEDIATE improvement to these symptoms. Because of this, I have decided (even though it may be hard for me!) to try to go vegan!
Reason 2: animals' health
I'm not going to get all preachy, but we all know that there are some less than ideal conditions in many factory farms and it pains me to know that any animal is being mistreated. I DO NOT, repeat, DO NOT condemn anyone for eating meat, I don't necessarily even think that it's wrong, but I would be lying if I didn't acknowledge that this is another part of the reason why I have decided to give up meat and other animal foods for good.
So there you have it! I will probably blog some more about recipes I try, any health benefits I enjoy, etc. etc. I highly recommend "The Kind Life" if you want to learn more about the benefits of a vegan and/or macrobiotic diet, as Alicia Silverstone does a great job of presenting her case without seeming like one of those crazy paint-throwing PETA activists, lol. Maybe I'll even get some crazy vegan telekinetic powers, just like Todd Ingram!!! hahaha :)
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