The ups and downs

What a yoyo week it has been! In food wise. Monday I started the day with green smoothie, and continued the day fairly well - huge sprout salad for lunch and baked salmon with veggie and couscous mix for dinner. Then on Tuesday I had no desire for smoothie at all, so I had toast for breakfast. I then ended up having vegetarian sandwich for lunch and as I got home late, I didn't have time to cook any proper dinner. I threw a pie and few chips into oven for my hubby, and ended up having huge salad with couple of chips (couple=10). Naughty, I know. But it proves the theory that if you start day healthily, you're more likely to stay on track of healthy food rest of the day. 

So yesterday to "balance" the naughtiness, I started the day with 1.5 litres of green juice (recipe below), continued with 1 litre of green smoothie and for lunch I had sprout and seaweed salad with salmon sashimi (I only managed to eat couple of pieces as that particular salmon tasted extremely raw fishy and not very pleasant!). I didn't choose sashimi because it had raw salmon in it (I'm not THAT dedicated raw foodist yet), I just fancied sushi, and wanted to opt out the usual rice that's in most of the sushi. For dinner I had rice noodle and tempeh stir fry with loads of veggies. It was my first encounter with tempeh, and I must say I like it (not keen on tofu though). This particular one was organic marinated tempeh from Planet Organic. Like tofu, tempeh is made from soybeans, but tempeh is a whole soybean product with different nutritional characteristics and textural qualities. Tempeh's fermentation process and its retention of the whole bean give it a higher content of protein,dietary fiber, and vitamins. Guess who spat it out at dinner table?

This morning I was in hurry so had to skip the green juice, but had lovely protein green smoothie. Roasted halloumi and quinoa salad for lunch from my favourite salad bar - Tossed. When thinking what to have for dinner, I just felt I had to have mashed potato! Don't ask me why. It was so good. I tried to ignore the accusing stares from Kate Wood, Victoria Boutenko, Natalie Rose and other raw food author's books from my book shelf while enjoying my mash, but they seemed to shout at me: that is not raw! Get those organic carrots out from fridge instead and dip into raw almond butter NOW! :-)  But I did have over 1 litre of green smoothie this morning, so I wasn't phased. 

Wednesday's Green Juice

1 smallish or half of large head of romaine lettuce
5-7 leaves or large handful of kale (I used purple kale as it's in season now and easily available)
1 unwaxed, organic lemon, skin on (if waxed and not organic, then peel it)
2 apples (organic if you have, I didn't so I scrubbed them hard)
2 organic carrots (easily available and cheap)
1/2 organic cucumber
1 stalk of organic celery

This yields 1,5 litres of delicious green juice.

Blackcurrant Green Smoothie

250 g Blackcurrants
Handful of frozen mango chunks (or use fresh mango and ice)
Juice of 2 large oranges
Handful of organic spinach
Couple of dates for sweetness
1 Tbsp of maca powder (optional)
1/2 Tbsp of bee pollen (optional)

The verdict? Still quite tangy and sour, could've done with more dates or maybe a splash of agave syrup. It was also quite thick, almost like a pudding, so more orange juice or maybe water would've been nice. Otherwise a great smoothie, no trace of spinach neither in taste or colour (gourgeous purple colour!), so excellent for those who gringe when hearing the words Green Smoothie.

Peachy Protein Smoothie

3-4 peaches

2 smallish frozen bananas (or fresh ones and ice)

4-5 kale leaves, stalks removed

1 Tbsp of hemp protein powder

1 Tsp of raw cacao powder

200-300 ml water

Happy blending!

Oh, nearly forgot: our little angel has been in monster mode again this week, I start to see pattern- one week nice, one week not so. Tomorrow is my last day at work before 2 weeks leave, so it will be nice spending some time with Maya, complete my to-do list for which I never have time for and then go for a short beach holiday with K, K and K. Can't wait!