The Cleanse…It was time!

 I could not have the sauce but I made it for Greg since he is not doing the cleanse. I also made Butternut Squash fries! YUM!!!

Ingredients

In a food processor chop the shallots, oregano, garlic, basil, spinach, lemon zest, salt, and pepper until finely chopped. Put the turkey in a large bowl and stir in the mixture from the food processor, little by little.  I only used about half of the mixture.  Mold the turkey into small patties.  I had 1.25 pounds and made 5 quarter-pound burgers.  Heat up the grill {or some olive oil on a frying pan} and throw the burgers on for about 7-8 minutes each side {until firm and nicely browned}.

YOGURT SAUCE

{Mix all of the following in a bowl}:

• 1 cup of plain yogurt sheep’s or goat’s milk {I used non-fat Greek yogurt because I couldn’t find either of these two}
• 1/2 cucumber peeled and finely diced
• 2 scallions, white and light green part thinly sliced
• Leaves from 2 sprigs of mint, finely slices
• 1 tablespoon of finely chopped chives
• 1/2 teaspoon of coarse sea salt

For dinner I decided to make this shake called “The Almond Butter and Jelly Shake”. Let me tell you this, If I could have this for dinner every night I would be happy as a clam. I guess I will be since I have to make a shake for the next 21 days. It tastes exactly like a Milkshake!

Here is the recipe. I didn’t add cherries because I didn’t have them:

Almond Butter and Jelly Shake

Ingredients

• 1-1 1/2 cups almond milk
• 1 handful of frozen blueberries
• 1-2 tablespoons almond butter (or cashew butter)
• Handful of ice
• 1 packet Cleanse Shake Chocolate
• 1 small handful of cherries, pitted (optional)
• 1 tbsp ground flaxseed (optional)

Directions

Blend until creamy and delicious!

Day 2. I slept well but woke up  HUNGRY! I also woke up to my son sick. No yoga for me. oh well. I made my morning shake and got a TON of work done. At 11am I decided to prepare my lunch. At the beginning of the cleanse Pam sent me the BEST tool ever! She sent me these sheets (example below) where I planned out EVERYTHING I would make for the next 21 days so there was no guess work or freaking out the minute lunch rolled around. Plus it made food shopping for the week simple.

I found this mango chicken recipe and thought I would give it a whirl. I can tell you now after making it, this dish could be one of the best meals I have ever made!!!!

 

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup wild rice
• 1/2 cup brown basmati rice
• coconut oil
• 2 small boneless chicken breasts, cubed
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1/2 mango, diced ( I watched a youtube video on how to cut a mango because I had no idea how, lol)
• juice of half a lemon
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1 tablespoon coconut nectar
• salt and pepper to taste
• generous pinch hot pepper flakes
• 1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped (I didn’t use this because I am not a fan of parsley)

Directions

Soak the wild rice in cold water for an hour prior to cooking. Rinse wild rice and basmati rice, add to saucepan with 2 cups of water and 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer for 50 minutes or until all water has evaporated. Meanwhile coat a skillet with coconut oil and heat over medium-heat high heat. When pan is hot, add chicken, sprinkle with salt and pepper and cook for 5 minutes, then turn each piece to cook the other side. Add onion, cook 2-3 minutes, until golden, then add mango, lemon juice, vinegar, hot pepper flakes and coconut nectar. Toss in rice and parsley. Stir and serve immediately. I actually doubled the recipe so I could eat another day during the week and I could serve to Greg for dinner.

Dinner – I made my amazing shake from Day 1, drank it ever so slowly, watched 2 episodes of House of Cards and called it a night! (BTW – House of Cards – love and hate Netflix… I am going to be done  with the series in a week! UGH! I don’t want it to end)

 

Day 3 (Wednesday)

I had my morning shake and was ready for a yoga class. I couldn’t handle hot yoga on my 3rd day of detoxing so I skipped Power Flow and went to Ignite. I have been practicing yoga on and off for a few years. I would say I am not a beginner but I am in no way shape or form advanced. The schedule did not say “advanced”. It just said “Daniele”. I love Ignite. It is the kind of studio you walk into and you can feel the stress start to come off your body. It exudes calm. I need calm. I am anything BUT calm. So I went to the 9:30 class. I looked around the room and did not recognize one face however everyone else seemed to know each other. SHIT. Daniele, the owner of the studio, I just found out that piece of info, began the practice. Have you been to a yoga class when the entire class goes into Handstand from chaturanga? Um, yeah that would be this class. I know yoga is not about competition but more about being present, mindful and doing your thing HOWEVER, I am not going to lie. It was WAY intimidating. The guy in front of me was like super yoga man. This was him (but not really)

EVERY CHATURANGA went into hand stand. He was doing things I could not do EVER. Talk about STRONG CORE, JESUS! I wanted to scream out in the middle of the class… Am I being punked? Everybody was in unisom but me. Daniele led the whole class in yoga language. For example…instead of warrior 1, she would say Virabhadra 1. I only knew what to do because a) she said the NUMBER 1 and b) it made sense from the flow of the last vinyasa where she was going. Every single pose was spoke in yoga terms. I had to follow the people upside down around me. I wanted to crawl into a hole. LOL. What did I take from this class? 1) I need to educate myself with a yoga dictionary 2) I need to practice A LOT MORE 3) Instead of never going back I will go back every week until I can fricking do that handstand from chaturanga even if it takes me until I am 80. I WILL DO IT. (this is how I get…I know, I am psycho..)

OKAY MOVING ON…. (sorry for the diversion but I had to vent because I felt so incompetent the rest of the day). Lunch I ate out (I had to make sure the grilled chicken on top of my salad was cooked in “olive oil”, not canola…a little embarrassing to ask for that but I did it! )  and dinner I had my famous Shake from Day 1. I am starting to feel LIGHTER!!!

Day 4. Thursday

I went to Corefire in Montclair for the 9:15 class. I probably should not have only because it was SUPER hard and I think I pushed myself a little too much. Your body is supposed to be detoxing not recovering. The class though was awesome and I am saving to write about them in a few weeks when I can go back and really give it my all.

After class I met with Pam and we discussed my progress thus far. My takeaways after 4 days are these

1. I am starting to feel thinner
2. My skin is bright (but I also owe this in part to a new beauty regimen which I am writing about next week, not letting the cat out of the bag yet!)
3. I am NOT starving or thinking about food the way I was just 4 days ago. This is THE MOST important factor for me and I cannot believe it is working!

I am excited  to see what next week brings. I promised I would not weigh myself until Day 7 which is Monday. VERY EXCITED to jump on that thing.

This is the deal….

I am leaving the rest  up to you. IF you want to follow me on this journey, like this article or comment below. I do not want to take up everybody’s inbox everyday for the next 21 days if you could give two shits about my cleanse, what I am eating, and how I am feeling. BUT if  you want some more recipes, daily dish on the cleanse, interested to see if  I dropped weight and most of all how my mental process has changed…like this on Facebook and I will write away and hopefully wither away as well (just kidding).

Until maybe tomorrow Happy Friday! For those on the east coast – it looks like we are going to have a 3 day weekend. Yup, the snow gods are not ready to back down, just yet.

xx

Wholefully Aware, [email protected]