Breakfast
Day 1 of the cleanse and new fitness routine. Our day started with a frenzy of cooking – the first meal of the day was a 2 egg omelet with carmelized onions, sautéed mushrooms and thyme with one piece of whole wheat toast. I didn’t take a photo of this, we were too hungry and frightened by the lack of food… so we cheated – we actually made two 4 egg omelets for each of us. This was delicious and in hindsight we probably only needed 2 eggs a piece. The struggle with this first meal – not butter or jam for Shannon. Oh and no coffee.
We went to the gym in the afternoon. I ran one of my favorite routines, it’s a basic ladder, running for 1 minute then increasing the speed by .5. I usually aim for hitting at least 3 miles of running (not counting warm up or cool down)
Time |
Speed |
0-1:30 (warm-up) |
4 |
1:30 – 3 (warm-up) |
5.7 |
3 – 4 |
6 |
4 – 5 |
6.5 |
5 – 6 |
7 |
6 – 7 |
7.5 |
7 – 8 |
8 |
8 – 9 |
7.5 |
9 – 10 |
7 |
10 – 11 |
6.5 |
11 – 12 |
6 |
12 – 13 |
6.5 |
13 – 14 |
7 |
14 – 15 |
7.5 |
15 – 16 |
8 |
Repeat |
Repeat |
Lunch time!
We headed back home for lunch – crudities with citrus/vinegar dressing and 1 slice of whole wheat toast with mashed avocado… Needless to say we were again worried about portion size so we add extra veggies and greens to make a salad and we each added 1/2 a piece of toast. But here is the real cheat (for me) – I was only supposed to have 1/4 of an avocado and Shannon a 1/2. Instead we split an avocado and he ‘doctored’ it up with lemon juice, salt, pepper, red pepper and some cilantro.
This was really yummy – this combo actually used to be a go-to lunch for me, but I would eat the whole avocado and add tomato.
Dinner
Dinner – this is where things get tricky. Since Shannon worked that night, we had to prep his dinner for him to take with him. So as soon as we got back from the gym, I started on dinner (which required approximately 4 trips to the grocery store to get all the necessary supplies). Dinner for day 1 was Winter Couscous (the cleanse actually suggested bulgur instead of couscous so we used bulgur). The basic idea of the dinner was Moroccan spices and roasted veggies. This took probably an hour and 1/2 to 2 hours to prep and cook. Everything was going fine until I add way too much Harissa paste (spicy chili paste). Our solution was to add more preserved lemon, greek yogurt, lots of cilantro and some veggie stock. It helped take down the heat a notch or two.
The plan also allows for a midday snack and a nighttime snack. We attempted the date/almond smoothie for our midday snack, but I mistakenly purchased figs – not dates… Uhm… the smoothie was interesting. Let’s just say neither of us finished it. And my nighttime snack was a piece of citrus and roobios tea.
Hardest part for me so far? The amount of time it takes to make everything. The recipes are pretty intense – the ingredient lists are extensive for quite a few items and the shear cooking time means we are going to have to be organized. Organized sans caffeine – is that possible? Hardest part for Shannon? The lack of coffee – this could be his biggest challenge.