Habits and the Whole 30 (day 27)

It just so happens that, this month, I've gotten really into the work of Gretchen Rubin, a writer who focuses on habits and happiness. I read one of her books a few weeks ago and am now binge-listening to her podcast Happier, which she hosts with her sister (which is a big part of why I love it). A Whole 30, and the new year in general, is an opportune time to think about our habits and how well they serve us.

Her concept of the four tendencies, which describes how people respond to inner and outer expectations, resonates really strongly with me. I'm a classic upholder, which means I find it relatively easy to meet both internal and external expectations. When I decide to do something, I generally don't have difficulty sticking to it. (My mother might say I have questioner tendencies, which I certainly did as a younger person, but I have drifted away from them.)

I also seem to lean towards being an abstainer, which means I am comfortable with an all-or-nothing strategy versus trying to moderate myself.

These tendencies go a long way towards explaining why the Whole 30 hasn't been too much of a struggle for me. I committed to myself that I'm doing it, so I'm doing it. The plan comprises a set of rules I can follow, which takes everyday decision making out of my hands. I don't have to ask myself each day whether I will have cheese or chocolate or not; I just know those items to be off limits for now.

In tandem with my Whole 30, I've adopted a new daily walking habit this month. I resuscitated my Jawbone UP24 fitness tracker and set a goal of 6,000 steps a day. I realize the goal is low compared to the commonly recommended 10,000 steps, but I wanted to set a bar that I knew I could meet consistently. To ensure I meet the goal, I've started taking a short walk nearly every day before lunch. During this walk, I usually listen to a Happier podcast (self-reinforcing habits)! This strategy has worked really well for me-- I've met the goal each day, and my daily average step count is actually closer to 7,500. The lunchtime walk has the added benefit of giving me a chance to clear my head in the middle of the work day. In February, I will increase my daily goal to 7,000. 

As I near the end of the Whole 30, I've been considering how I want to adjust my eating habits when it is over. Thinking about it through Rubin's lenses has been very helpful. More to come on this in my next post. 

Anticipating the end (Day 23)

Today it was a bit tough to stick to the plan. I took the day off to work on projects around the house, so not only did I have access to off-limits stuff (chocolate!), I also felt that I was doing something to earn a treat. Worse yet, E left for a long work trip to Italy yesterday, so I'm accountable only to myself.

After poking dejectedly around the internet looking for 100% dark chocolate, I finally concluded that a) I was hungry, b) I was thirsty, and c) that I'm a week away from day 30, and I certainly can stick to it for that long. Oh, and also d) if I ordered 100% chocolate online, it probably wouldn't arrive before day 30 anyway.

I wound up eating an extra snack and having a flavored La Croix while I cooked dinner, which seems to have done the trick. Now that I've had a nice bowl of beef stew from my Instant Pot (sans rice flour and wine), I'm satisfied and ready to move on.

A Whole 30 Birthday (Day 13)

One of the only hesitations we had about doing a January Whole 30 is that E's birthday falls mid-month. Normally we celebrate birthdays with a decadent meal out, but that wouldn't be an option on this eating plan. Before we decided to start the Whole 30, we issued an invitation to some friends to have dinner at our place yesterday as part of the festivities. By the time they accepted, we were on board, and so we faced a challenge: What can you make for company that is Whole 30 compliant?

E and I spent a 2 1/2 hour round trip drive to a remote Minnesota town to pick up 2 hams (long story) discussing this very problem. I wanted to be sure it was food that she would enjoy, since it's her birthday, and that I would be comfortable preparing, since I'm the primary chef. E wanted several courses. Sure, why not? Here's what we landed on:

• Walnut-stuffed dates wrapped in prosciutto as an appetizer. I didn't follow a specific recipe, but sourced my cooking instructions (8 minutes at 350) from a different stuffed date recipe online, and that was perfect. We also served olives, cashews and almonds.
• Warm spinach salad with bacon. As it turned out, this was not with bacon, because neither our co-op nor Whole Foods had sugar-free bacon. I improvised and used cracklings from my recent lard rendering adventure as the porky crunch in this recipe. I had served this at a family gathering this summer; it is indeed smashing with bacon!
• Creamy broccoli soup as a starter. This was pretty simple to throw together, but the leeks make it a bit special. An immersion blender saves mess and danger on the last step. 
• Roasted carrots as a side. Carrots tend to shrink up when roasted, so I made lots of extra to make the serving dish look reasonably bountiful. They took longer than the 20 minutes advertised; closer to 40. A stir partway through was helpful to avoid over-browning on one side.
• And the piece de resistance: a stuffed pork loin roast as the main dish! I took a bit of a chance with this one, as I had never attempted to prepare a pork loin roast before (let alone butterfly it and roll it). My trusty Cook's Illustrated Meat Book maddeningly insisted that I would need to brine the roast to keep it moist, which requires sugar. The Whole 30 friendly recipe I linked above turned out tender and delicious even without brining. I used the video linked in the recipe to learn how to butterfly the roast, and it could not have been easier. Like the carrots, it did take a bit more time to reach the right temp than specified in the recipe.
• We were ready to go with raspberries and slivered almonds for dessert, but we were all too stuffed to contemplate eating more.

I knew we had a pork loin roast in the freezer from the pastured half hog we had purchased this fall, so I pulled that out to thaw on Monday. Imagine my surprise at 2:30 pm yesterday when I finally unwrapped the white paper packaging to find... ribs! The butcher had mislabeled the package, leaving me high and dry. I was saved by the kind meat counter staff at Mississippi Market on West 7th, where they were able to cut me a roast to order within a few minutes. 

All told, the dinner party was a success! If I may say so myself, the food was tasty (and not too overwhelming for the chef), and we had a great time talking and laughing with friends. 

So, what's a Whole 30, anyway? Day 11

I realized after I posted the other day that I didn't really properly explain what a Whole 30 is or credit it's creators. The Whole 30 program is a 30-day nutritional program based on unprocessed or minimally processed foods and excluding foods that can commonly impact your health. It's a fairly strict version of the "paleo" style of eating that we normally follow. The idea is that eliminating these foods from your diet for a period of time and reintroducing them in a controlled way can help you better understand your body's reaction to them. There is a ton more information on the website linked above.

So, what does one avoid on a Whole 30, and how is that different from my normal way of eating? Here goes:

• Do not consume added sugar of any kind, real or artificial. 

I don't each much sugar to begin with-- mostly in the form of dark chocolate (I like the 85% stuff), about a bar a week. I had stepped up my sugar intake over the holidays with all the tempting treats, but this one isn't too difficult for me to give up.

• Do not consume alcohol in any form, not even for cooking. 

E and I generally keep to moderate intake on the weekends, a few glasses of wine or the equivalent. But, I will say I look forward to the ritual of uncorking a bottle at the end of a long week. The Whole 30 encourages me to find other ways to unwind and reward myself.

• Do not eat grains. 

I have been avoiding gluten for a few years now, but do eat rice, corn, and other gluten-free grain products on occasion. Again, over the holidays, this was probably more common than I'd like to admit. Now that gluten-free treats are widely available, I can and ought to try harder to limit them to infrequent indulgences rather than a weekly treat (chocolate chip cookie at Seward Co-op, I'm looking at you!).

• Do not eat legumes. 

Even though I'm a former vegetarian, legumes have not been a big part of my diet in a long time. At most, I have an occasional scoop of hummus or some black beans on a stuffed arepa. So, it's not too hard to give them up for a month.

• Do not eat dairy. 

One word for you: cheese. I do love this stuff. As a long-time paleo/primal enthusiast, I regularly eat dairy, but keep it to the high fat stuff (butter, cheese, cream). The fact that E and I had a weekly cheese plate dinner night should tell you how I love dairy. There is lactose intolerance in my family, but I have luckily avoided the worst symptoms. I have noticed that it affects my skin, so I'm willing to give it up for 30 days. I'm not expecting this to be a permanent change, but, as with grains, I should probably reduce how often I enjoy these foods. Ghee is allowed on the Whole 30, so I get a bit of a butter fix that way.

• Do not consume carrageenan, MSG or sulfites. 

Not too hard for me-- just more intense label reading than usual.

• Do not try to re-create baked goods, junk foods, or treats* with “approved” ingredients. 

Also not a problem. I don't miss sweets much on this plan.
So, there we have it! Most of the Whole 30 requirements are not a far cry from my normal eating habits. Mainly, I miss chocolate, wine, and cheese. Anything is doable for 30 days, however, and I know I can enjoy these items again in a few short weeks.

Hey there, blogaverse! (A January Whole 30)

It's been a while since I've used this space (Blogger tells me the last post was December 18, 2014), so if you have found this somehow, hi! I'm doing a Whole 30 this month and have found myself casting about for the right place to post about it. Facebook? Nah, don't want to bore everyone. Twitter? Nope, spambots. Instagram? No way, the world does not need more amateur food photography with a #whole30 hashtag. A personal blog hardly anyone knows how to find? Just the ticket!

It's pretty cliche to do a Whole 30 in January, but, let's face it, the cliche exists for a reason. After weeks of indulgent holiday eating and drinking-- E and I started the week before Thanksgiving by hosting her family for an early Christmas-- many of us are craving a healthier path. Cleaning up your act at a time when everyone else is doing the same is quite helpful for moral support!

I had been toying with the idea of doing a Whole 30 after E's birthday later in January. So how did I come to start it on the 4th? It's all thanks to our friend B. We visited her over New Year's in DC, and found out right off the bat that she was planning to start a Whole 30 on January 4th. She is new to the program and paleo eating in general. E and I eat a paleo-style diet normally (although very lax, lately) and completed a Whole 30 a few years ago. We were peppering B with advice and recipes, and in the process got excited enough to want to do it ourselves. What better way to support B than to join her?

Skipping ahead to today, we are embarking on the 2nd full week of the program. We survived the first week just fine, but the meal planning and prep was a bit rushed due to returning from our DC trip on Sunday late afternoon. This week, I spent much of yesterday doing food prep and we have a good game plan for the rest of the week.

Sunday's cook-up included:

• egg bake
• broth
• roasted sweet potatoes
• red cabbage slaw
• roasted root vegetables
• mini-meatloaves

We had egg bake for breakfast and mini-meatloaves and some leftover purple potatoes (love that potatoes are allowed in the Whole 30 now!) and green beans in our lunches today. Tonight we'll eat seasoned baked chicken wings with some of the leftover veggies from yesterday, because I have an appointment and not enough time to prep a full meal. It's a lot easier to eat this way with a full larder!

So, phantom readers, are any of you making any healthy changes this January? Tell me all about them in the comments.