Breakfast "Cereal"

Good Morning!

Ok, you have heard me talk about the Thrive books ~ here is the first recipe I tried as I began to include those new pantry ingredients in my everyday life. 

At first you might feel like you are swimming in muddy waters, because you will have to pick up some new ingredients that you may not have in your pantry yet~but that is okay.  Change is good.  This is not painful...just go to the store with a list, and you will be fine.  There are people working in the store who are nice...they will help you find your stuff.  Promise.  Once you start eating more in the "new way", it will become old hat, and you won't feel weird buying hemp anymore...you know, the legal stuff......

Every morning, during the week, my husband and I eat the same thing {sometimes on the weekends we have eggs or something...}.  There can be slight variations, of course, but sticking to a "no-brainer" kind of meal for breakfast is key for me.  I don't want to think about much in the morning~I'm trying to deal with 3 kids, and that's enough.  If I don't plan in advance, I will make a crummy choice or not eat at all.  Both options are just not good, and will leave me hunting for chocolate...

Routine = no thinking {good}

Making choices with my eyes closed while trying to think in the morning = {bad}



Routine is good.  Do yourself a favor, and plan.  Below is our breakfast cereal, adapted from Brendan Brazier's book, THRIVE The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life.  We don't always have every ingredient on hand, but we do have definite staples in our pantry now, so I will give you what we have created from the original recipe in the book.  This is what we have come up with from the book recipe,  "Ginger Pear Cereal". 

Once you understand the general components of putting this together, you can add/delete ingredients easily, as we have, and enjoy the benefits of a supercharged breakfast.  The protein, fiber and energy will keep you going, and you won't feel hungry in an hour. 

Another thing...you are not going to want to chop up this stuff every morning...don't add something else to your morning list.  My husband and I make a 5 pound container of this, and keep it all chopped up and ready to go in the fridge.  It keeps beautifully~all you have to do is scoop it out into your bowl, and pour a little almond milk on it, and eat it. 

See?  No thinking for like 2 weeks.  Then you will need to make it again....

Morning Apple Cereal

• 1~5pound bag of gala apples {or pears} chopped

• 1c Organic ground flax seed
• 1c Hemp protein powder
• 1/2c Carob powder {or cocoa powder} *carob is optional, give a nice taste, though
• 22 {approximately} Medjool dates, chopped
• 1c sliced almonds {or whatever kind of nut you like}

Step 1: Chop everything up...apples, dates..

Step 2: Mix everything else into bowl with the chopped apples and dates.

Step 3: Stick it in the fridge and stop thinking about breakfast for about two weeks.  Yes, it's a big container, but if you don't want to make as much as we do, just chop a few apples, a few dates, and sprinkle on a few Tbs of each of the dry ingredients to get the same result.  Add milk, and enjoy!

Give it a try...you will love it!

Have a great day!

{Jenn}







Thrive

What the heck are you eating? 

Face it, even if you think you are eating well, you probably have no idea of the extra calories in your diet {I didn't}.  You know, the ones keeping you bloated, and feeling unhealthy?  The one thing I know for sure, is you can go to the gym for as many hours as you want, and if you over indulge in even what you think is healthy, you are setting yourself up for failure.  I am living proof. 

After having three daughters in the span of four years, let's just say my "last 20 pounds" did not seem to go away.  Well, it did go away, a couple of times, then creeped right back on to my behind.  Why?  How could this happen?  I felt like I was eating all the right things: protein powders and energy bars before (for stamina) and after workouts (for recovery), fruit and veggies, not too much pasta, and the like.  I wasn't sitting around eating ho-ho's.  It just didn't add up for me.  The weight on my licence was more of a pipe dream than reality (and NO, I felt no need to tell the DMV of it's inaccuracy).

I don't mean to pull out the Oprah card, but I did see a show where her entire staff went vegan for a week.  I was amazed at how they all were commenting on how fit they were feeling, and no longer had bloating issues.  They seemed to have more energy, and said they felt better than they ever remembered.  The best side-effect?  Weight loss.  Like, a lot of pounds dropped.  So I started investigating... how I would even go about becoming a vegetarian? Would I even be able to figure it out, and still feed my carnivore husband and children at the same time?  I should also tell you that my husband is a triathlete who competes in Ironman distance races, and the man can eat.  How could I convert him as well, and still get him enough nutrition to get through long, vigorous workouts?

In my online hunt for all things vegetarian, I came across this site, No-Meat Athlete, where this guy hit the nail on the head for me.  Not only was the site geared towards vegetarians, it was basically vegan as well.  And the guy was an athlete.  Bonus~that gives him instant street credit with my husband.  It was full of recipes and ideas for leaning into this healthy change in lifestyle.  But the best part about finding the No-Meat Athlete site was coming across the post he wrote about the Thrive books, written by Brendan Brazier.  It's a great website, check it out.

Brendan, you made this lifestyle part of my everyday life, and I promote your book to everyone who asks, "Jenn, how did you lose the weight?".  Because guess what?  It's still gone.  I've had to buy all new pants.  All-new-pants....in a single digit size.  Want to know the secret? 

Stop eating crap. 

By that I mean acidic food.  The entire American diet is based on eating highly acidic foods, and until you start eating foods that produce an alkaline body, you are going to feel like crap, and not like how you look in pictures.  It's just a fact.  There is quite a long list of the crummy acidic foods we feed ourselves, and our children everyday in the book, and I will talk about them more as well.  Basically think of everything that's in your pantry....about 85% of it is probably on the acidic list.  Yes, I still have some of that stuff around, but we focus on it way less than we used to, before we knew better.

Please don't think that your family is all big boned and it's not going to work for you.  Or that you have "bad genes" and you can't do anything about it.  Just because your family might be bigger people, doesn't mean YOU can't decide to be healthy.  They are probably eating many of the same foods that are producing crummy health for all of you.  That's like saying that gravity only works for most people, but not for you.  It will work, I promise you.  I KNOW so {no, I'm not a doctor, but I can google like one}.  I just hope you might be willing to lean into the lifestyle a little, and the results will come.

The weight on my licence is actually over what I weigh now...funny how now I am ready to march up to the DMV for the new picture and get the weight corrected on my licence now.  When I was was working out like crazy, I was frustrated that I never lost enough weight~I know now it was my diet that held me back.

I'll be talking more about the Thrive books, and how they have changed the way I eat, and the way I feed my family.  First stop?  Breakfast.  Stay tuned~it's not the "breakfast cereal" you're used to.  And, yes, my husband eats it too!

Have a great day...and eat some extra veggies today!

{Jenn}