BREAKFAST: 10am, 2 pancakes, 4 pieces bacon, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
I had 4 pancakes on my plate, and as I was working into the 2nd one, realized I really didn't need to eat the other 2. Thinking of my mini-rant yesterday about global food shortages and a new American perspective on food, I've been wondering how I can put my money where my mouth is (figuratively and literally.) As for these pancakes, "Damn, this is enough pancake to serve 2...or have a 2nd meal!" So I plopped the two in a freezer bag and into the ice chest it went. It'll make an easy lighter breakfast later in the week, or a non-sweet snack at some point. It's from scratch, all organic with fresh milk, whole wheat, unrefined sugar etc etc, how insane would of it been to trash them.
LUNCH: 12:30, half a pastrami sandwich, half order of fries, pickles, 2 bowls, hunger 4/5
Easily could of eaten a whole sandwich and whole order of fries, but would of felt icky after. Everyone around me was packing in loads more, but the bacon and 2 pancakes were still with me.
DINNER: 7pm, shrimp in garlic sauce with black beans and yellow rice, spinach salad, water, 2.5 bowls, hunger 4/5
Ordered in on a quiet Saturday eve.
Showing posts with label bacon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bacon. Show all posts
Saturday, April 12
Thursday, April 3
Donut, Interrupted
ADDENDA:
Heading out on a bike ride around 11am, my first thought was, "Let's go get a donut!" My neighborhood shop, the Doughnut Plant, has some of the best artisan donuts in the entire city. Previously, I would 'balance' my healthy activities with indulgences in unhealthy habits. Looking back, that's kinda retarded - I want to cancel out my healthy activities?! Donuts, like other ornate sweets, alcohol, magical brownies, 5 course meals etc should be saved for special ocassions with friends, not a semi-regular bike ride.
So I paused and munched down an apple to help me get going.
BREAKFAST: 7:15am, good yogurt with honey and vanilla, banana, .75 bowl, hunger 3/5
AM SNACK: 11am, apple, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
AM-PM WATERING: 11-3pm, 20 oz water, 15 oz water/gatoraide mix
Brought along my camelback as well as a bottle of half purple gatoraide and half water - still haven't found a healthier satisfying replacement for this chemical brew.
PM SNACK: 1:30pm, bag of chips, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stomach not ready for lunch, but hungry.
PM SNACK: 3:30pm, homemade powerbar, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 5:45, boca burger on superhippy bread with pickles, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
After ride, home to change quickly, but I was uncomfortably hungry, so I had to eat something.
DINNER: 6:30, 3 pieces of good bread with butter, duck confit amuse bouche, appetizer of crispy 'bacon' pork fatback with apple dressing, lamb loin, roasted onions, a couple of brussel sprouts, garlic risotto, weird mushrooms, 1.5 glasses prosecco, water, chocolate tart, meyer lemon beinets, 3.5 bowls, hunger 4/5
Dinner with B & a friend at Craft, probably my favorite NYC fine-dining establishment. I misordered by getting the bacon appetizer, which on an near-empty, hungry stomach, kind of made me feel all greasy and coated on the inside, I would of done better to of started with a raw fish.
Heading out on a bike ride around 11am, my first thought was, "Let's go get a donut!" My neighborhood shop, the Doughnut Plant, has some of the best artisan donuts in the entire city. Previously, I would 'balance' my healthy activities with indulgences in unhealthy habits. Looking back, that's kinda retarded - I want to cancel out my healthy activities?! Donuts, like other ornate sweets, alcohol, magical brownies, 5 course meals etc should be saved for special ocassions with friends, not a semi-regular bike ride.
So I paused and munched down an apple to help me get going.
BREAKFAST: 7:15am, good yogurt with honey and vanilla, banana, .75 bowl, hunger 3/5
AM SNACK: 11am, apple, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
AM-PM WATERING: 11-3pm, 20 oz water, 15 oz water/gatoraide mix
Brought along my camelback as well as a bottle of half purple gatoraide and half water - still haven't found a healthier satisfying replacement for this chemical brew.
PM SNACK: 1:30pm, bag of chips, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stomach not ready for lunch, but hungry.
PM SNACK: 3:30pm, homemade powerbar, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 5:45, boca burger on superhippy bread with pickles, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
After ride, home to change quickly, but I was uncomfortably hungry, so I had to eat something.
DINNER: 6:30, 3 pieces of good bread with butter, duck confit amuse bouche, appetizer of crispy 'bacon' pork fatback with apple dressing, lamb loin, roasted onions, a couple of brussel sprouts, garlic risotto, weird mushrooms, 1.5 glasses prosecco, water, chocolate tart, meyer lemon beinets, 3.5 bowls, hunger 4/5
Dinner with B & a friend at Craft, probably my favorite NYC fine-dining establishment. I misordered by getting the bacon appetizer, which on an near-empty, hungry stomach, kind of made me feel all greasy and coated on the inside, I would of done better to of started with a raw fish.
Sunday, March 23
Eat-ster
ADDENDA: B & I went to deep dark NJ to a friend's family's house for Easter dinner, my first. It's an eating holiday, and there was about 3x more food than necessary for the 7 guests. After a huge spread of appetizers, I got B & her friend out on the 3 rusty bikes in the garage to pedal around the neighborhood for a wee bit, but when we got back were confronted by a gob-smackingly large dinner. It was fun but goyishly weird.
The other day at Grimaldi's Pizza, the server was slow with refilling our water glasses. Around us, almost every person in the place had 20-oz bottles of coke, diet coke and 7-up at their sides. For a hot second I wished I had a bottle of diet coke to wash down the pizza, then it hit me in another hot second - diet coke tastes like battery acid, what I really want is hydration and a palate cleanser, for which either still or sparkling water is ideal. It's the consumer culture, the push to charge me more, which tries to present sodas as the logical choice, when really it's quite insane and unhealthy.
BREAKFAST #1: 8:30am, fuji apple, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
B still asleep, feel 100% better, glad I didn't go out last night. Don't feel like eating, but the slight pangs in my tummy say otherwise. Apple beats caffeine hands down.
BREAKFAST #2: 10am, waffle, bacon, homefries, 2 bowls, hunger 4/5
Dragged B out to the East Broadway Cafe in our hood, a Polish diner of the old school where I used to go regularly with my parents on weekends. The food was definitely better (and less pretentious) (and a whole lot cheaper) than the place we went to brunch yesterday. Bacon was too salty, given, but sitting in the same seats where I used to sit with mom and pop with B at my side, made any sin of bacon a lot more tolerable.
DINNER: 3-9pm, shrimp cocktail, fritos with various dips including 'caviar pie' and chili cheese goop, bread with sundry dried meats and cheeses, water, prime rib, potato au gratin, asparagus, spinach, salad, chocolate, apple & blueberry pie, vanilla ice cream, weird spicy cookie, short bread, 1 glass wine, 1 glass prosecco, water, 4 bowls, hunger 4/5
So many tchokes on the table, we couldn't find the salt & pepper...
Sunday, January 13
Family
ADDENDA:
Going up to Albany with B today to visit my religious brother and his large family, stopping by my parent's gravesite on the way up. Tomorrow I go to Detroit for a couple of days to spend some time with my father-in-law, then B & I fly out for a week to London & Amersterdam. Haven't slept well the past couple of nights, must be careful as getting sick now would be a disaster.
BREAKFAST: 7am, bacon on sprouted wholewheat, hunger 4/5
Went down to the local diner around the corner at 6:45 for a BLT & homefries, but was still closed. So I cooked up 6 slices of my good organic naturally low-salt bacon and slapped them on 3 pieces of sprouted wholewheat, a triple-layer sandwich that just had 2 components, really brought out the flavor and texture of both without being messed with.
And if I'm going to spend a good part of the day in a kosher household, I better get some bacon in me!
AM SNACK: 10am, everything bagel, hunger 4/5
Noshing in the car.
LUNCH: 2pm, onion bagel with fresh homemade hummus, handful of vegetables, water, hunger 4/5
Had my brother collect all the kosher ingredients, and I made hummus with my nephews and nieces, was very cute.
DINNER: 6pm, french fries, large eggplant parm sandwich, hunger 4/5
At a rest stop in NJ on the way home. I ordered half a sub, but the thing was a full foot long!
Going up to Albany with B today to visit my religious brother and his large family, stopping by my parent's gravesite on the way up. Tomorrow I go to Detroit for a couple of days to spend some time with my father-in-law, then B & I fly out for a week to London & Amersterdam. Haven't slept well the past couple of nights, must be careful as getting sick now would be a disaster.
BREAKFAST: 7am, bacon on sprouted wholewheat, hunger 4/5
Went down to the local diner around the corner at 6:45 for a BLT & homefries, but was still closed. So I cooked up 6 slices of my good organic naturally low-salt bacon and slapped them on 3 pieces of sprouted wholewheat, a triple-layer sandwich that just had 2 components, really brought out the flavor and texture of both without being messed with.
And if I'm going to spend a good part of the day in a kosher household, I better get some bacon in me!
AM SNACK: 10am, everything bagel, hunger 4/5
Noshing in the car.
LUNCH: 2pm, onion bagel with fresh homemade hummus, handful of vegetables, water, hunger 4/5
Had my brother collect all the kosher ingredients, and I made hummus with my nephews and nieces, was very cute.
DINNER: 6pm, french fries, large eggplant parm sandwich, hunger 4/5
At a rest stop in NJ on the way home. I ordered half a sub, but the thing was a full foot long!
Wednesday, January 9
Onwards
ADDENDA:
The weather was too nice yesterday to sit like a lump and get into a deep depression. Today, not so nice! Slept pretty well, wondering when the other shoe is going to drop. Perhaps after going through the loss of my parents, going through the loss of a job isn't nearly as daunting as it could be for some...
BREAKFAST: 8:30am, good pancakes with good bacon, hunger 4/5
Cut back on the milk to make 'em fluffy.
BP 10:15am, 130/84
AM WATERING: 11am, 24 oz still
Thirsty. Busted out my ex-work sippy bottle. Weird drinking from it at home.
LUNCH: 2:30pm, small green salad, homemade shrimp in garlic sauce, homemade roasted potatoes, 2 tofutti cuties, hunger 4/5
Spent the morning cleaning up, doing laundry. When I got hungry, read through a few cook books, found a recipe for shrimp in the NY Times seafood cookbook, a simple recipe for potatoes in the Batali cookbook. When I left the house to pedal over to Wholefoods, I was shocked by how warm it still is out - damn, I should of spent another day on the bike avoiding depression!
I've basically made both of these recipes before by winging it. I must say, both came out 2x better this time. The shrimp would of been acceptable in a good restaurant. The potatoes had an extra step of blanching which made all the difference.
PM WATERING: 3:15pm, 24 oz still
DINNER: 8pm, carrot sticks & homemade hummus, 2 twoboots slices, 2 twoboots cookies, hunger 4/5
Felt restless, but didn't feel like cooking (oddly enough.) To order from Twoboots, there is a $10 minimum, guaranteeing too much food for one person. So I hopped on the bike, and was back with hot slices before 20 minutes passed. B mooched a small piece of pizza and a quarter of a cookie.
EVENING SNACK: 10pm, 4 vanilla lemon goyisha macaroon-like vegan thingies, hunger 4/5
Snacking with wifey.
The weather was too nice yesterday to sit like a lump and get into a deep depression. Today, not so nice! Slept pretty well, wondering when the other shoe is going to drop. Perhaps after going through the loss of my parents, going through the loss of a job isn't nearly as daunting as it could be for some...
BREAKFAST: 8:30am, good pancakes with good bacon, hunger 4/5
Cut back on the milk to make 'em fluffy.
BP 10:15am, 130/84
AM WATERING: 11am, 24 oz still
Thirsty. Busted out my ex-work sippy bottle. Weird drinking from it at home.
LUNCH: 2:30pm, small green salad, homemade shrimp in garlic sauce, homemade roasted potatoes, 2 tofutti cuties, hunger 4/5
Spent the morning cleaning up, doing laundry. When I got hungry, read through a few cook books, found a recipe for shrimp in the NY Times seafood cookbook, a simple recipe for potatoes in the Batali cookbook. When I left the house to pedal over to Wholefoods, I was shocked by how warm it still is out - damn, I should of spent another day on the bike avoiding depression!
I've basically made both of these recipes before by winging it. I must say, both came out 2x better this time. The shrimp would of been acceptable in a good restaurant. The potatoes had an extra step of blanching which made all the difference.
PM WATERING: 3:15pm, 24 oz still
DINNER: 8pm, carrot sticks & homemade hummus, 2 twoboots slices, 2 twoboots cookies, hunger 4/5
Felt restless, but didn't feel like cooking (oddly enough.) To order from Twoboots, there is a $10 minimum, guaranteeing too much food for one person. So I hopped on the bike, and was back with hot slices before 20 minutes passed. B mooched a small piece of pizza and a quarter of a cookie.
EVENING SNACK: 10pm, 4 vanilla lemon goyisha macaroon-like vegan thingies, hunger 4/5
Snacking with wifey.
Friday, December 28
My Wife Done Leave Me
ADDENDA:
Only for the week, though, to be with her momma while I stayed behind to attend to work! Feel good. Starting to miss B a little - it's nice having her flittering around the house, getting ready for work as I emerge from the fog of sleep. She's kinda easy on the eye, too. And a lot less furry than Rufus, who woke me up by pushing his side into my face just gently enough not to wake me up, but so I couldn't breathe.
BREAKFAST: 8:30am, wholewheat pancakes and good bacon, hunger 4/5
Good night sleep, whipped up a new batch of pancake mix using 2 different kinds of whole wheat flour, unexpectedly yummy. Why are whole-wheat recipes so hesitant to use 100% whole wheat?
AM WATERING: 11:15am, 24 oz still
Rolled into work late after communing with Erikka's cat all morning.
LUNCH: 1pm, 3 potato samosas, cold pumpkin noodles with tofu, turkey chili over brown rice, hunger 4/5
A nice hunk o' food from the organic hot bar trough at Green Symphony. Had the turkey chili just to have something different, was surprisingly enjoyable, though the meat is so processed as to be generic "meat stuff" - it might as well be a soybean-derivative.
PM SNACK: 3pm, large chocolate chip cookie, hunger 3/5
Got the sugar cravings, haven't felt them in a while, so I indulged it. All that was available was a grocery store generic cookie in cellophane, no ingredients listed. YUK! I ate it, my stomach felt icky for 2 hours. Never again.
DINNER: 8pm, 1/2 pastrami sandwich, matzoh ball soup, mound of cabbage salad, 2 pickles, handful of fries, large piece of chocolate babka, water, shot of chocolate soda, hunger 4/5
Went with my friend Yana to the new 2nd Ave deli, where we used to go regularly when it was located on 2nd Ave. Food just as good, memories of me and my dad eating there a lot, too. Unfortunately, though I tried to limit myself to just a half sandwich and soup, I over-ate anyway. I wanted to share 1 slice of babka, but Yana insisted on getting our own. Oof! Chocolate Babka is a magically delicious food stuff, but next time, I'm going to insist on sharing a piece!
PM SNACK: 10pm, half a pint of beer, hunger 1/5
Out at a bar with a good DJ with Yana and friends, but I was just too full to fit in more than 8 oz of beer. Even then I didn't feel good. But there was a photobooth!
Only for the week, though, to be with her momma while I stayed behind to attend to work! Feel good. Starting to miss B a little - it's nice having her flittering around the house, getting ready for work as I emerge from the fog of sleep. She's kinda easy on the eye, too. And a lot less furry than Rufus, who woke me up by pushing his side into my face just gently enough not to wake me up, but so I couldn't breathe.
BREAKFAST: 8:30am, wholewheat pancakes and good bacon, hunger 4/5
Good night sleep, whipped up a new batch of pancake mix using 2 different kinds of whole wheat flour, unexpectedly yummy. Why are whole-wheat recipes so hesitant to use 100% whole wheat?
AM WATERING: 11:15am, 24 oz still
Rolled into work late after communing with Erikka's cat all morning.
LUNCH: 1pm, 3 potato samosas, cold pumpkin noodles with tofu, turkey chili over brown rice, hunger 4/5
A nice hunk o' food from the organic hot bar trough at Green Symphony. Had the turkey chili just to have something different, was surprisingly enjoyable, though the meat is so processed as to be generic "meat stuff" - it might as well be a soybean-derivative.
PM SNACK: 3pm, large chocolate chip cookie, hunger 3/5
Got the sugar cravings, haven't felt them in a while, so I indulged it. All that was available was a grocery store generic cookie in cellophane, no ingredients listed. YUK! I ate it, my stomach felt icky for 2 hours. Never again.
DINNER: 8pm, 1/2 pastrami sandwich, matzoh ball soup, mound of cabbage salad, 2 pickles, handful of fries, large piece of chocolate babka, water, shot of chocolate soda, hunger 4/5
Went with my friend Yana to the new 2nd Ave deli, where we used to go regularly when it was located on 2nd Ave. Food just as good, memories of me and my dad eating there a lot, too. Unfortunately, though I tried to limit myself to just a half sandwich and soup, I over-ate anyway. I wanted to share 1 slice of babka, but Yana insisted on getting our own. Oof! Chocolate Babka is a magically delicious food stuff, but next time, I'm going to insist on sharing a piece!
PM SNACK: 10pm, half a pint of beer, hunger 1/5
Out at a bar with a good DJ with Yana and friends, but I was just too full to fit in more than 8 oz of beer. Even then I didn't feel good. But there was a photobooth!
Sunday, December 16
All Day Breakfast
ADDENDA:
Woke after 10 hours of weird dreams and felt terrible. Spent a few hours in the bath with the Sunday paper and realized I was in no shape to go to yoga at noon. Cooked pancakes and couldn't move far from the couch. After pistachios, fell asleep on the couch and missed a Grand Street News event at 4pm, which B woke me up for...at 3:55.
Why did I eat that brick o' Chinese last night, when I wasn't even that hungry? Partially because I felt like I needed a proper third meal but my kitchen is too jammed up with supplies for tomorrow night's office-cum-house party to cook anything healthy. Partially because it's a personal ultimate comfort food. Partially after a crazed weekend in Las Vegas and an upsetting week at work, just needed that calming familiarity.
BRUNCH: 12:30pm, pancakes and bacon, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 2:30pm. handful of unsalted shelled pistachios, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 4:30pm, toasted onion bagel with good butter, hunger 4/5
DINNER-LIKE SNACK: 6:30pm, a few meatballs on toothpicks, 1/2 a cosmo, 2 cups of seltzer, small portion of homemade mac n' cheese, two squares of weirdly greasy cheese n' onions on white bread toast, 2 fistfuls of crappy Hershey's kisses, hunger 3/5
Holiday party at a friend of B's, known for it's drinks-over-food policy, so this year I brought a tray of mac n' cheese. Tasted a bit bland to me, but will pump it up next time I make it....which will be tomorrow. This is the third time I've been to this party, definitely enjoyed it the most - this particular clutch of B's femmy friends are actually pretty cool.
Woke after 10 hours of weird dreams and felt terrible. Spent a few hours in the bath with the Sunday paper and realized I was in no shape to go to yoga at noon. Cooked pancakes and couldn't move far from the couch. After pistachios, fell asleep on the couch and missed a Grand Street News event at 4pm, which B woke me up for...at 3:55.
Why did I eat that brick o' Chinese last night, when I wasn't even that hungry? Partially because I felt like I needed a proper third meal but my kitchen is too jammed up with supplies for tomorrow night's office-cum-house party to cook anything healthy. Partially because it's a personal ultimate comfort food. Partially after a crazed weekend in Las Vegas and an upsetting week at work, just needed that calming familiarity.
BRUNCH: 12:30pm, pancakes and bacon, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 2:30pm. handful of unsalted shelled pistachios, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 4:30pm, toasted onion bagel with good butter, hunger 4/5
DINNER-LIKE SNACK: 6:30pm, a few meatballs on toothpicks, 1/2 a cosmo, 2 cups of seltzer, small portion of homemade mac n' cheese, two squares of weirdly greasy cheese n' onions on white bread toast, 2 fistfuls of crappy Hershey's kisses, hunger 3/5
Holiday party at a friend of B's, known for it's drinks-over-food policy, so this year I brought a tray of mac n' cheese. Tasted a bit bland to me, but will pump it up next time I make it....which will be tomorrow. This is the third time I've been to this party, definitely enjoyed it the most - this particular clutch of B's femmy friends are actually pretty cool.
Friday, December 14
Not the book to read when feeling down
ADDENDA:Going to movies/dinner tonight with peeps, so I took the bus to work this morning, finally getting back into "The Omnivore's Dilemma" after a pause. Great book, but not a happy read. Reading about the wet-milling of corn to make those 20 extra ingredients that appear on the label of a processed food. The industrial food complex just seems so....inescapable. But as they say, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, so I better move on and finish book, hopefully it proffers a sunny side!
BREAKFAST: 8am, 4 pancakes, 6 strips of bacon, hunger 4/5
Sleeping 10 hours and no sweets the day before will do this to you. The bacon is the organic nitrite-free kind from the farmer's market. Amazing how much tastier and, ummm, baconier it is than the stuff I got served in Vegas.
AM WATERING: 9:45am, 24 oz still
BP: 10:15am, 130/84
LUNCH: 1pm, chickpeas, black lentils, saag paneer, rice, naan, yogurt sauce, raw onion, hunger 4/5
Kept reading over lunch, it just gets scarier. Now he's recounting the history of the 'super-sized' meal, and our evolved predilection not to eat till we're full, but to eat as much as possible to get ready for the lean times that don't come anymore.
PM WATERING: 3:30pm, 24 oz still
PM DRUGGING: 3:30pm, 2 extra strength tylenol
Feel a little parched, headachey, almost a pre-fever state. Thought the sleep last night would knock out whatever was up, but I guess I better take it easy this weekend. If I get sick, it's all Sumner Redstone's fault!
PM SNACK: 6:15pm, 1 saltless wholewheat pretzel, half bag of salty popcorn, hunger 4/5
At da movies
DINNER: 9pm, pasta with pesto, few bites of wild boar lasagne, chickpea pancake thing, few bites of duck salami, 1 glass presecco, water, hunger 4/5
Nice dinner with B & Danny in Hell's Kitchen. Good upbeat way to close down an otherwise crappy week, due to work.
EVENING SNACK: 11:15pm, salad, 2 slices cheeseless mushroom pizza, hunger 4/5
Still hungry. Kinda craving sugar, but the chocolate in the cupboard will keep me up. Ate these left overs, very satisfying.
Sunday, December 9
Lost in Las Vegas
ADDENDA:Las Vegas was a lot to take in by itself, meeting my buffet-crazed father-in-law made for an interesting overlay. We managed to wrangle him into a nice eatery, the San Marco at the Venetian, the Las Vegas Batali outpost. Note in the picture our next-table neighbors with the hats. Them cowboy hats were everywhere. Also note that it was not actually al-fresco dining, but a not-that-amazing simulation in a large vaulted room with the ceiling painted like the sky, with the walls to give the impression we were in Venice...if Venice were packed with cowboys and branches of NYC restaurants...
Friday
BREAKFAST: 9am, 1 pancake, 1 cheese blintz, potatoes, 1 apple crepe, bacon, biscuit w/sausage gravy, smoked salmon, banana, small donut, water, hunger 4/5
The buffet at our hotel was pretty horrible food, and such large portions. The bacon was incredibly salty, and the sausage gravy tasted like someone dumped a whole shaker of salt in it by accident.
PM SNACK: 1pm, half a G&T, hunger 2/5
At the MGM Grand, my father-in-law advised that if we looked like we were gambling at the slots, we could order $1 drinks instead of $5 at the bar. So I toodled away the first gambled dollar of my life as we waited to place an order.
PM SNACK: 2pm, bite of crappy everything pretzel, hunger 3/5
At the 'New York, New York' casino. If they tried to serve this pretzel on the street in NYC....well, I guess tourists will eat anything, he he. I was tempted to get a slice of 'NY style pizza' there, but LOOK at it! My god, man!!
PM SNACK: 4pm, crappy chocolate gelato, hunger 3/5
The Bellagio is trying to be all hoity-toity, but the gelato in my neighborhood totally trumps that gooey crap.
DINNER: 7pm, chips, guac, salsa, shrimp with rice & refried beans, water, hunger 4/5
Crappy Mexican back at the hotel, me and B were happy with how the way went but too exhausted to go out to hunt a proper meal. The 'fancy' option in the hotel was Bennihanna....
Saturday
BREAKFAST: 7am, waffle & bacon, water, hunger 4/5
Room service, same crappy food at 10x the price.
LUNCH: 12:30pm, bread, prosciutto, zucinni flowers, small slice of goat cheese pizza, veal & ricotta meatballs w/ polenta, chocolate malt gelato, water, hunger 4/5
At the San Marco at the Venetian. Really yummy, as good as anything in NYC. The pizza was Batali-style, which I don't like that much, but interesting.
DINNER: 6pm, 1 sip of wine, shrimp cocktail, fried shrimp, eggroll, California rolls, carrots & cucumber, 3 bites of prime rib & stuffing, 1 small bite scary pizza, chocolate ice cream with choc syrup, hunger 3/5
Final crack at the buffet, wasn't very hungry but it was all about the company, not the food. However, the small bite of the buffet pizza was perhaps the worst ever...
Sunday
BREAKFAST: 7am, waffle, bacon, potatoes, water, hunger 4/5
In the diner at the hotel, getting ready to go, saying good byes.
AM SNACK: 11am, small Pizza Hut pepperoni pizza, hunger 4/5
The flight had no meal service, so this was the least evil of options near the gate. Pizza Hut pizza is very....greasy.
PM SNACK: 2pm-1pmish, airline cheesy crackers, airline cookies, good saltless wholewheat pretzels, small apple juice, hunger 4/5
DINNER: 10:30pm, chana sag with basmanti, pakoras, nan, seltzer, hunger 4/5
Starving when I got home. Ordered cheap Indian food from the hood, very satisfying.
Friday, November 16
Dessert-Fast, Day 5 (Or: It may be all in my head)
ADDENDA:So here is day 5, and I'm fine. As I pedalled to work this morning, feeling my body wake up to a brisk (but mellow) effort, I realized my physical state was fine all week. Cutting out my daily dessert was more of a challenge to my sense of entitlement than any sort of physical addiction, though I sense a bit of that too. That said, I think I will go for the Ilsa-recommended 7 days....if my sense of entitlement is anything, it's strongest on the weekends when I'm off and trying to relax.
BREAKFAST: 7:45am, good pancakes and good non-nitrate bacon from the farmers market, a banana, hunger 3.5/5
Didn't feel like waiting for the weekend. Gonna try to take it easy this weekend, as Thanksgiving will be upon us soon.
AM WATERING: 9:45am, 24 oz still
I like how carbonated water has become a treat that makes it special at home.
BP 10am: 122/85
LUNCH: 1:15pm, shrimp curry with daal and jasmine white rice, small piece of naan, a few lentil crackers, water, hunger 4/5
OK food, good company.
PM DRUGGING: 4pm, 2 extra strength tylenol, hunger 1/5
Have a headache that has been brewing slowly all day, nose is stuffy, not hungry for the apple n' cheese I brought to work at all...
PM SNACK: 5:30pm, apple & one small piece of cheese, hunger 3/5
Didn't want to feel desperate for dinner later.
DINNER: 7:30pm, steak au poive w/ fries and salad, shrimp cocktail, water, hunger 4/5
B & I went to a nice French bistro in the 'hood. Indulged in the previously forbidden fries because I felt the need to reward myself for being dessert-free for 5 days. Fries were just OK, nothing special. About 3/4 of the way through the meal, I started looking forward to dessert before I remembered, oh, I'm not having dessert. The dessert menu looked good, too!
Tuesday, November 13
Dessert-Fast, Day 2 (Or: Cheesy Apple!!)
ADDENDA:So had the first of two "cooking" classes at the Natural Gourmet Institute last night. Unfortunately, it was a 3.5 hour lecture on the basics of how to eat healthy - pretty much everything I've been reading about in various books for the past few years. Still, there were a few things that were good to hear again - like how easy it is to over-buy at the farmers market then let it sit all week at home till it becomes inedible or much less nutritious. So when I got home last night after 10, I set up a bunch of fingerlings with mushroom, onion and dried tofu to bake on a timer while I slept.
She did mention controlling the effects of food on bloodsugar (from where all sugar-lust comes) and how she has a weakness for dark chocolate (snooort!). She mentioned how cocoa-nibs are an excellent snack - hmmmm.....I can have a refined sugar-fast AND eat chocolate?! I think I need to go and investigate ASAP.
So far so good. No sugar-lust yesterday, undoubtedly satiated by the fruit. Kinda looking at this like it's a 100-mile bike ride. Once you've started, no point in worrying if your up to it or not. The first half should be easy. And be aware of what your feeling at all times, as a little pain now will be a huge friggin' deal-breaker a few miles down the line.
BREAKFAST: 8am, toasted sesame bagel with cream cheese and gravelox, seltzer, banana, hunger 3/5
AM WATERING: 9:45, 24 oz still
BP 10am: 126/88
PM SNACK: 12:30pm, apple and a few small pieces of raw edamer cheese, hunger 4/5
Oh my. Oh oh my. -arm flap-. I think this is a breakthrough. Oh oh oh my. I refrigerated the apple, and it was much more crisp (why does B like them at room temp?) and delicious. After that, I immediately ate some small slices of raw-milk edamer cheese I picked up at the farmers market. Wow, I never quite appreciated cheese like I'm feelin' on this. And the combo with the apple....next time I will eat them together, bite for bite.
LUNCH: 1:30pm, roasted potatoes with mushroom, onion and tofu, green salad with carrot dressing, hunger 4/5
Potatoes were just eh today, too much oil and too much lemon juice. However, as an experiment I put in whole cloves of garlic and they came out all creamy and nicely garlicky.
PM SNACK: 4:45pm, 2 samosas and a little brown rice with veg curry, hunger 4/5
Felt hungry ever since lunch, but not in a sugar-lust way.
DINNER: 6:30pm, bacon cheese burger and onion rings, water, hunger 4/5
Quick dinner at an indie fast food spot before a show at BAM with sympathetic refined-sugar faster the Hungry Vegan Society. Not a huge fan of burgers or suspicious chopped meat, but if I am to live in this world, once in a blue moon is not gonna kill me.
Sunday, November 11
Bagels and Donuts and Pickles and Fish, oh my!
ADDENDA:
Spent the morning at various L.E.S. emporiums, picking up the various fresh supplies to make a good brunch. Wish my parents were around, they loved this stuff. Except maybe the donuts, they'd think that was too decadent - they were of the generation where decadence was a bad thing, he he.
BREAKFAST: 7am, organic whole-grain cheerio-like cereal with good milk, hunger 3/5
BRUNCH: 11:30am, 2 pickles, bagel with sable and sturgeon and onion and tomato, slice of gravlox and Scottish salmon, 1.5 donut planet donuts, 2 farmers market cider donuts, 1 glass champagne, bottle of seltzer
DINNER: 5:30pm, bread & butter, mushroom spatzel, scallops over a chirizo ragu, 1/2 a beer, water, hunger 3/5
PM SNACK: 8pm, 2 bacon-wrapped dates, hunger 3/5
Disappointing snacks at the Corduroy Club annual meeting. Was expecting more corduroy-like foods. Only after eating them realized that the dates may of had refined sugar in them. Fine way to start a sugar-fast...
Spent the morning at various L.E.S. emporiums, picking up the various fresh supplies to make a good brunch. Wish my parents were around, they loved this stuff. Except maybe the donuts, they'd think that was too decadent - they were of the generation where decadence was a bad thing, he he.
BREAKFAST: 7am, organic whole-grain cheerio-like cereal with good milk, hunger 3/5
BRUNCH: 11:30am, 2 pickles, bagel with sable and sturgeon and onion and tomato, slice of gravlox and Scottish salmon, 1.5 donut planet donuts, 2 farmers market cider donuts, 1 glass champagne, bottle of seltzer
DINNER: 5:30pm, bread & butter, mushroom spatzel, scallops over a chirizo ragu, 1/2 a beer, water, hunger 3/5
PM SNACK: 8pm, 2 bacon-wrapped dates, hunger 3/5
Disappointing snacks at the Corduroy Club annual meeting. Was expecting more corduroy-like foods. Only after eating them realized that the dates may of had refined sugar in them. Fine way to start a sugar-fast...
Saturday, November 3
Prepping for Tomorrow's 1st Annual Noah Pizza Festival
ADDENDA:
Wanted to sleep more, but after 6.5 hours, was ready to get up. Ilsa forwarded me an interesting article that underlined the relationship between (the lack of) sleep and obesity. I put myself to bed early and set my alarm to give me 8.5 hours, but I can't force myself...
Spent the morning prepping salad, processing ingredients to make lemon sorbet tomorrow (making any kind of ice cream from scratch seems require preparations 24 hours in advance.) Went to the farmers market and Wholefoods to get ingredients to serve a variety of guests (including the Hungry Vegan Society) 4 different pizzas...
BREAKFAST: 7am, organic cornflakes and good milk, hunger 3/5
BREAKFAST #2: 11am, pancakes & good no-nitrite bacon, hunger 4/5
I have a cousin from Israel staying with me, he was all about the bacon!
PM SNACK: 4pm, small bag of conventional potato chips
LINNER (DUNCH?): 5pm, pesto penne with shrimp, bread, water, hunger 4/5
EVENING SNACKS: 9pm, 2 small pieces cheese cake, 1 beer, 3 slices fancy sausage on small pieces of baguette, 2-3 olives
Birthday party in Brooklyn. I wanted to ride there, B wasn't having it.
Wanted to sleep more, but after 6.5 hours, was ready to get up. Ilsa forwarded me an interesting article that underlined the relationship between (the lack of) sleep and obesity. I put myself to bed early and set my alarm to give me 8.5 hours, but I can't force myself...
Spent the morning prepping salad, processing ingredients to make lemon sorbet tomorrow (making any kind of ice cream from scratch seems require preparations 24 hours in advance.) Went to the farmers market and Wholefoods to get ingredients to serve a variety of guests (including the Hungry Vegan Society) 4 different pizzas...
BREAKFAST: 7am, organic cornflakes and good milk, hunger 3/5
BREAKFAST #2: 11am, pancakes & good no-nitrite bacon, hunger 4/5
I have a cousin from Israel staying with me, he was all about the bacon!
PM SNACK: 4pm, small bag of conventional potato chips
LINNER (DUNCH?): 5pm, pesto penne with shrimp, bread, water, hunger 4/5
EVENING SNACKS: 9pm, 2 small pieces cheese cake, 1 beer, 3 slices fancy sausage on small pieces of baguette, 2-3 olives
Birthday party in Brooklyn. I wanted to ride there, B wasn't having it.
Wednesday, October 31
I'd Like to Give the World a Pizza
ADDENDA:
Cooking last night was really satisfying. B is a really good sounding board for trying my pizzas! May have to get a 2nd stone so I can make two pizzas at once...a proper pizza peel is in the mail to me as I type....
BREAKFAST: 7am, good pancakes and good non-nitrite bacon, hunger 4/5
Woke up at 4:30am...felt good, excited to meet the day. Things going good at work, the pressure is still on but it's manageable. Despite the chocolate last night, woke up hungry. Waited till 6:30 to start cooking. Hopefully this heavy food early on will help with hunger later. Try to make this a sweets-free day...
AM WATERING: 9:30am, 24 oz still water
LUNCH: 1:45pm, scallion pancake, curried soy protein with potatoes, carrots, funky rice, 2 spring rolls, water, hunger 4/5
Went to the midtown Zen Palate. Now that the Union Square location shut down because of the rent increases, this is a good regular lunch option. Didn't really need that pancake, though.
PM WATERING: 5pm, 24 oz still
Still feeling full, slightly craving sugar but this water is knocking it out.
DINNER: 7pm, family style chinese dinner, kale-like veg in sauce, salt & pepper fried squid, curnchy noodles in goopy sauce, odd seafood salad, a little white rice, a little water, hunger 3/5
Dinner with B, my friend Yana and her parents at Congee Village. Me and B were the only white people there. Ate a medium-sized meal, but between the large breakfast & lunch and being tired, just wasn't too hungry. I wonder if my lack of sleep lead to the heaviness of my first two meals...
A weird warm red-bean sweet soup was served after the meal. I tried half a teaspoon, but wasn't even in the mood for sweet, and this was the furthest from chocolate you could get.
Cooking last night was really satisfying. B is a really good sounding board for trying my pizzas! May have to get a 2nd stone so I can make two pizzas at once...a proper pizza peel is in the mail to me as I type....
BREAKFAST: 7am, good pancakes and good non-nitrite bacon, hunger 4/5
Woke up at 4:30am...felt good, excited to meet the day. Things going good at work, the pressure is still on but it's manageable. Despite the chocolate last night, woke up hungry. Waited till 6:30 to start cooking. Hopefully this heavy food early on will help with hunger later. Try to make this a sweets-free day...
AM WATERING: 9:30am, 24 oz still water
LUNCH: 1:45pm, scallion pancake, curried soy protein with potatoes, carrots, funky rice, 2 spring rolls, water, hunger 4/5
Went to the midtown Zen Palate. Now that the Union Square location shut down because of the rent increases, this is a good regular lunch option. Didn't really need that pancake, though.
PM WATERING: 5pm, 24 oz still
Still feeling full, slightly craving sugar but this water is knocking it out.
DINNER: 7pm, family style chinese dinner, kale-like veg in sauce, salt & pepper fried squid, curnchy noodles in goopy sauce, odd seafood salad, a little white rice, a little water, hunger 3/5
Dinner with B, my friend Yana and her parents at Congee Village. Me and B were the only white people there. Ate a medium-sized meal, but between the large breakfast & lunch and being tired, just wasn't too hungry. I wonder if my lack of sleep lead to the heaviness of my first two meals...
A weird warm red-bean sweet soup was served after the meal. I tried half a teaspoon, but wasn't even in the mood for sweet, and this was the furthest from chocolate you could get.
Sunday, October 7
Recovering with Mofungo
ADDENDA:
Nice ride today with my friend Erikka, about 60 miles. From Prospect Park to the Verazanno, around to Coney Island, down to the Rockaways and Breezy Point, back over through Broad Channel and back through East New York and a lot of sketchy neighborhoods.
I introduced Erikka to cycling years ago, and now she's a much stronger, faster rider than me. I took my fully-geared roadbike and she road fixed single-speed, and still moved faster than me with more energy by the end. It was fun to ride a little outside my comfort zone, though it was probably a little slow for her.
Hot day, weirdly summer-like. Drank over 150 oz. of water through out the ride.
BREAKFAST: 7:30am, half a good organic dark chocolate bar with salt-free peanut butter, hunger 3/5
Hang-over sweets desire from the night before.
SNACK #1: 9:15am, 1 and a half good donuts from the local shop, hunger 4/5
Imported the donuts to Brooklyn to help us start off right.
SNACK #2: 10:30, handful of cheese fries from Nathans, hunger 3/5
Erikka needed to eat at Coney, so she went to Nathans and got cheese fries and a huuuge diet coke. As she smoked her cigarette, I thought it cool that despite our radically different approaches to eating (not to mention bike nutrition), we're pretty much BFFs.
SNACK #3: Noon, handful of saltless wholewheat pretzels, hunger 3/5
LUNCH: 1:30pm, BLT on whole wheat bagel, small side of macaroni salad, water, bite of breaded chicken cutlet, swig of diet coke, hunger 3/5
Erikka was chowing down on an overstuffed chicken cutlet sandwich, so I had a bite. It was OK, but it reconfirmed my taste opinion that chicken is pointless. She was on her 2nd huge diet coke, which made me think that only 3 months or so ago I'd totally be there with her, enjoying a bottle with her. So I had some of hers, swished it around my mouth and grimaced. It was pleasantly sweet, but over-carbonated and tasted so acidy. Yik! I guess I could relearn to like this stuff....but why would I want to?
DINNER: 6pm, breaded shrimp with yellow rice and black beans, mofungo with spicy red sauce, full bottle of pelegrino
Ordered in from the local Spanish restaurant, heavy but suited the mood perfectly. Mofungo is so weird but so yummy - it's mashed plantains with lots of garlic and pork skin. VERY heavy. Lots of mofungo left over, good for dinner tomorrow... Kind of want sweet, but none in the house.
EVENING SNACK: 7:30pm, about half a large box of Entemann's chocolate chip cookies, water.
Went out and got some. I need to stock some frozen cookie dough so to avoid eating boxed stuff in the future.
I think I should have an 8pm sweets curfew...
Nice ride today with my friend Erikka, about 60 miles. From Prospect Park to the Verazanno, around to Coney Island, down to the Rockaways and Breezy Point, back over through Broad Channel and back through East New York and a lot of sketchy neighborhoods.
I introduced Erikka to cycling years ago, and now she's a much stronger, faster rider than me. I took my fully-geared roadbike and she road fixed single-speed, and still moved faster than me with more energy by the end. It was fun to ride a little outside my comfort zone, though it was probably a little slow for her.
Hot day, weirdly summer-like. Drank over 150 oz. of water through out the ride.
BREAKFAST: 7:30am, half a good organic dark chocolate bar with salt-free peanut butter, hunger 3/5
Hang-over sweets desire from the night before.
SNACK #1: 9:15am, 1 and a half good donuts from the local shop, hunger 4/5
Imported the donuts to Brooklyn to help us start off right.
SNACK #2: 10:30, handful of cheese fries from Nathans, hunger 3/5
Erikka needed to eat at Coney, so she went to Nathans and got cheese fries and a huuuge diet coke. As she smoked her cigarette, I thought it cool that despite our radically different approaches to eating (not to mention bike nutrition), we're pretty much BFFs.
SNACK #3: Noon, handful of saltless wholewheat pretzels, hunger 3/5
LUNCH: 1:30pm, BLT on whole wheat bagel, small side of macaroni salad, water, bite of breaded chicken cutlet, swig of diet coke, hunger 3/5
Erikka was chowing down on an overstuffed chicken cutlet sandwich, so I had a bite. It was OK, but it reconfirmed my taste opinion that chicken is pointless. She was on her 2nd huge diet coke, which made me think that only 3 months or so ago I'd totally be there with her, enjoying a bottle with her. So I had some of hers, swished it around my mouth and grimaced. It was pleasantly sweet, but over-carbonated and tasted so acidy. Yik! I guess I could relearn to like this stuff....but why would I want to?
DINNER: 6pm, breaded shrimp with yellow rice and black beans, mofungo with spicy red sauce, full bottle of pelegrino
Ordered in from the local Spanish restaurant, heavy but suited the mood perfectly. Mofungo is so weird but so yummy - it's mashed plantains with lots of garlic and pork skin. VERY heavy. Lots of mofungo left over, good for dinner tomorrow... Kind of want sweet, but none in the house.
EVENING SNACK: 7:30pm, about half a large box of Entemann's chocolate chip cookies, water.
Went out and got some. I need to stock some frozen cookie dough so to avoid eating boxed stuff in the future.
I think I should have an 8pm sweets curfew...
Sunday, September 23
Sundays with Betsy
ADDENDA:
Because of riding, didn't get to hit up the greenmarket in Union Square. Went to the local greenmarket this morning, pretty scarce, but did buy more local honey for yogurt, the upcoming oatmeal season and a future tofu pie. Bought ingredients for a full salad at Wholefoods, mostly organic.
The check-out kid asked if the romaine lettuce was green-lettuce, fair enough question. Then he asked me if the celery was asparagus! When he rang up the $4/lb shallot as a yellow cooking onion ($.99/lb) I didn't correct him... maybe I'm not as unknowlegable about food than I thought....
Spent the day with my wife, was really nice. We pedalled over to Brooklyn for brunch walked my friend back to her house and found ourselves on the edge of Prospect Park. We grinded up a wooded hill, found a spot to read the Sunday Times for a while, then pedalled out of the park through Clinton Hill to the Williamsburg Bridge. All evening I de-jewelcased my record collection into little plastic sleeves while she did work, it was very comfortable. (However, I only got through about 1/10th of my collection, oy....)
BREAKFAST: 6:45am, yogurt with honey and peanuts, hunger 4/5
Left over hunger from yesterday's exertion.
AM SNACK: 10am, banana, hunger 4/5
Forgot about these. Flecked with black, perfectly sweet and firm. Does this count as a sweet? I guess in competition with gelato, donuts and cookies, Ilsa would say "No"....
AM SNACK: 10:45am, 2 pieces whole wheat toast with hummus, hunger 4/5
LUNCH: 1:30pm, 2 huge pieces of french toast slathered with nutella in the middle, bacon, small glass of OJ, a few sips of tea, water, hunger 4/5
Brooklyn brunch with friends, this dish came with a side of syrup, a side of dulche de leche, and caramelized banana on top. The chocolate inside already made it ridiculously sweet and deserty, who the hell would want all the other sweets on top of that? Yuk!! Real meal or no, this was definitely the sweets for the day.
PM SNACK: 5pm, 2 pints of water
DINNER: 8pm, 1 spinach knish with mustard, one small frozen pizza, hunger 4/5
Freezer fishin'. Unlike the past, this frozen pizza has been sitting around for a full month - usually, they'd disappear at a rapid rate. Wasn't very good, in fact was quite crappy, and this was a fancy expensive gourmet brand that I used a pizza stone to get the crust cripsy/chewy. I gotta make my own...
EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, 2 large squares dark chocolate, hunger 3/5
Sweet craving. Eh, it's Sunday, a little indulgence won't kill me.
Because of riding, didn't get to hit up the greenmarket in Union Square. Went to the local greenmarket this morning, pretty scarce, but did buy more local honey for yogurt, the upcoming oatmeal season and a future tofu pie. Bought ingredients for a full salad at Wholefoods, mostly organic.
The check-out kid asked if the romaine lettuce was green-lettuce, fair enough question. Then he asked me if the celery was asparagus! When he rang up the $4/lb shallot as a yellow cooking onion ($.99/lb) I didn't correct him... maybe I'm not as unknowlegable about food than I thought....
Spent the day with my wife, was really nice. We pedalled over to Brooklyn for brunch walked my friend back to her house and found ourselves on the edge of Prospect Park. We grinded up a wooded hill, found a spot to read the Sunday Times for a while, then pedalled out of the park through Clinton Hill to the Williamsburg Bridge. All evening I de-jewelcased my record collection into little plastic sleeves while she did work, it was very comfortable. (However, I only got through about 1/10th of my collection, oy....)
BREAKFAST: 6:45am, yogurt with honey and peanuts, hunger 4/5
Left over hunger from yesterday's exertion.
AM SNACK: 10am, banana, hunger 4/5
Forgot about these. Flecked with black, perfectly sweet and firm. Does this count as a sweet? I guess in competition with gelato, donuts and cookies, Ilsa would say "No"....
AM SNACK: 10:45am, 2 pieces whole wheat toast with hummus, hunger 4/5
LUNCH: 1:30pm, 2 huge pieces of french toast slathered with nutella in the middle, bacon, small glass of OJ, a few sips of tea, water, hunger 4/5
Brooklyn brunch with friends, this dish came with a side of syrup, a side of dulche de leche, and caramelized banana on top. The chocolate inside already made it ridiculously sweet and deserty, who the hell would want all the other sweets on top of that? Yuk!! Real meal or no, this was definitely the sweets for the day.
PM SNACK: 5pm, 2 pints of water
DINNER: 8pm, 1 spinach knish with mustard, one small frozen pizza, hunger 4/5
Freezer fishin'. Unlike the past, this frozen pizza has been sitting around for a full month - usually, they'd disappear at a rapid rate. Wasn't very good, in fact was quite crappy, and this was a fancy expensive gourmet brand that I used a pizza stone to get the crust cripsy/chewy. I gotta make my own...
EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, 2 large squares dark chocolate, hunger 3/5
Sweet craving. Eh, it's Sunday, a little indulgence won't kill me.
Tuesday, September 18
The Bloom is off the Blog
ADDENDA:
I think the newness of changing my diet and keeping this blog is starting to wear off, the same way the newness of a bike ride wears off after 30 miles, then you realize you still have another 70 to go before you can rest. I think this is a good thing, it'll be clearer what my real habits are.
Without giving too much thought, I made a healthy going-away breakfast for Mariko. Mariko was semi-complaining how unlike all the times she spent in my home before, this time there was no stash of potato chips, ice cream or cookies. Huh. Yesterday was almost a desert-free day! And not on purpose, either!
The award ceremony yesterday, held in the lobby of a bank, was bittersweet. It was very-much a community gathering with lots of folk from my mom's Y where she was the executive. Some familiar faces, who I haven't seen since her memorial service, were there and said hello. I got a nice framed certificate for the fund I set up, and had a minute on the mic to tell people how happy my mom would of been to see them all there helping the Y thrive, how she'd compliment the new executive on his hustling, and how her idea of how social justice is measured - by how society treats it's least-privileged and least-able, like children and senior citizens. I was intensely uncomfortable there, the 3 cookies I ate didn't really help me - I think in the past I would of snarfed more of the unlimited cookies.... But Betsy had a wide-beam grin shining on me the whole time, kind of made it worth it.
Today I wore a sweatshirt with an abstract drawing I designed, based on a picture of my mom when she was young and hip in the early 60s. (There is a similar one of my father on the back, with a rather square flat-top from the same period, he he)
BREAKFAST: 7:30am, superhippy bread with good butter, a large dollop of yogurt, 2 crispy pieces of bacon, dirtpill, hunger 3/5
Made the bacon just so it seemed like I cooked something and not just prepared.
BP 9:15am - 129/86
Not perfect, but better than the last measurement. I think stress was elevating it last time. Just completing freelance work, everything is shaking out. I woke up at 6:30 this morning, got to work an hour early, and it feels like a really late starting day!
AM SNACK: Noon, 24 oz still water.
BP 12:15pm - 126/83
Just made an appointment with my MD next Thursday to see if these numbers are legit...and we'll see what all this pork and yogurt is doing to my cholesterol....
LUNCH: 1pm, pork tonkatsu with white rice and curry sauce, side of raw white cabbage and weird pickle bits, water, hunger 4/5
Waiting in line at Sapporo on 49th St (off 7th) with Erikka and Mariko, have avoided this place because of the line but because Mariko is leaving today, we waited. It was well worth it - the breaded pork cutlet was tender and tasty, the Japanese curry was flavorful and the right balance of sweet/salty/spicy and the raw cabbage was a nice palate cleanser. The place is more known for their ramen soup, but those are total salt traps...
After lunch, said a final goodbye to Mariko, then walked back. Started thinking about my Mom, the pleasure I used to get from introducing them to new cuisines in their later years - they spent most of their lives with Chinese food as being as 'exotic' is it got. They love love loved Indian food, though Ethiopian was a bit beyond the pale for them. They liked the cooked Japanese stuff, but thought eating fish raw was uncivilized. It was a bit embarrassing as a snobby snotty teen, but really every time we went out to restaurant together, it was a bit of an event. They didn't grow up with eating at a lot of restaurants, so eating out was special. The ceremony of sitting down with out distraction in a nice room other than your house, being served, given "free" bread (which my mom would embarrassingly wrap up and take home).
Our thing was that after the meal but before desert, we'd all guess how much the bill was (without tip, with tax), and whoever got closest got to pay the bill. My dad was closest EVERY time. I think in my entire life, I only got it closer once, but my dad insisted on paying anyway. I wish I pushed back and paid myself.
DINNER: 8pm, green salad, broiled bay scallops with butter and olive oil, small amount of baked small red-jacket potatos, a few bites of not-fresh corn, half a mini chocolate fudge cake with 2 scoops of malt gelato, 2 glasses of water, hunger 4/5
Went food shopping with B after work, was fun inventing the dinner menu with her on the fly. Let's hope the (non chocolate) gelato sticks around a bit longer, or I may really have to get that locking mini-freezer....
Used a garlic press on this heirloom garlic I got at Saturday's farmer's market, it was a 'German Red' or something like that. Still a little dirty, roots on the bottom. I noticed a remarkably large amount of liquid squirt out of them when I pressed them, and gave a scalliony less-sharp garlic flavor to the fish....really nice.
EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, one saltless whole wheat pretzel with organic saltless peanutbutter, hunger 3.5/5
Funny thing, when B made the potatos, I knew it would not be enough food for me, so I threw on the corn that has been sitting around since Saturday morning. The corn wasn't really good, and I only had a few bites. When 10:30 rolled around, I was hungry in the way that I knew would interfere with going to sleep. Normally, this would be an ocassion for desert round 2, but that didn't even appeal to me at this moment.
I think the newness of changing my diet and keeping this blog is starting to wear off, the same way the newness of a bike ride wears off after 30 miles, then you realize you still have another 70 to go before you can rest. I think this is a good thing, it'll be clearer what my real habits are.
Without giving too much thought, I made a healthy going-away breakfast for Mariko. Mariko was semi-complaining how unlike all the times she spent in my home before, this time there was no stash of potato chips, ice cream or cookies. Huh. Yesterday was almost a desert-free day! And not on purpose, either!
The award ceremony yesterday, held in the lobby of a bank, was bittersweet. It was very-much a community gathering with lots of folk from my mom's Y where she was the executive. Some familiar faces, who I haven't seen since her memorial service, were there and said hello. I got a nice framed certificate for the fund I set up, and had a minute on the mic to tell people how happy my mom would of been to see them all there helping the Y thrive, how she'd compliment the new executive on his hustling, and how her idea of how social justice is measured - by how society treats it's least-privileged and least-able, like children and senior citizens. I was intensely uncomfortable there, the 3 cookies I ate didn't really help me - I think in the past I would of snarfed more of the unlimited cookies.... But Betsy had a wide-beam grin shining on me the whole time, kind of made it worth it.
Today I wore a sweatshirt with an abstract drawing I designed, based on a picture of my mom when she was young and hip in the early 60s. (There is a similar one of my father on the back, with a rather square flat-top from the same period, he he)BREAKFAST: 7:30am, superhippy bread with good butter, a large dollop of yogurt, 2 crispy pieces of bacon, dirtpill, hunger 3/5
Made the bacon just so it seemed like I cooked something and not just prepared.
BP 9:15am - 129/86
Not perfect, but better than the last measurement. I think stress was elevating it last time. Just completing freelance work, everything is shaking out. I woke up at 6:30 this morning, got to work an hour early, and it feels like a really late starting day!
AM SNACK: Noon, 24 oz still water.
BP 12:15pm - 126/83
Just made an appointment with my MD next Thursday to see if these numbers are legit...and we'll see what all this pork and yogurt is doing to my cholesterol....
LUNCH: 1pm, pork tonkatsu with white rice and curry sauce, side of raw white cabbage and weird pickle bits, water, hunger 4/5
Waiting in line at Sapporo on 49th St (off 7th) with Erikka and Mariko, have avoided this place because of the line but because Mariko is leaving today, we waited. It was well worth it - the breaded pork cutlet was tender and tasty, the Japanese curry was flavorful and the right balance of sweet/salty/spicy and the raw cabbage was a nice palate cleanser. The place is more known for their ramen soup, but those are total salt traps...
After lunch, said a final goodbye to Mariko, then walked back. Started thinking about my Mom, the pleasure I used to get from introducing them to new cuisines in their later years - they spent most of their lives with Chinese food as being as 'exotic' is it got. They love love loved Indian food, though Ethiopian was a bit beyond the pale for them. They liked the cooked Japanese stuff, but thought eating fish raw was uncivilized. It was a bit embarrassing as a snobby snotty teen, but really every time we went out to restaurant together, it was a bit of an event. They didn't grow up with eating at a lot of restaurants, so eating out was special. The ceremony of sitting down with out distraction in a nice room other than your house, being served, given "free" bread (which my mom would embarrassingly wrap up and take home).
Our thing was that after the meal but before desert, we'd all guess how much the bill was (without tip, with tax), and whoever got closest got to pay the bill. My dad was closest EVERY time. I think in my entire life, I only got it closer once, but my dad insisted on paying anyway. I wish I pushed back and paid myself.
DINNER: 8pm, green salad, broiled bay scallops with butter and olive oil, small amount of baked small red-jacket potatos, a few bites of not-fresh corn, half a mini chocolate fudge cake with 2 scoops of malt gelato, 2 glasses of water, hunger 4/5
Went food shopping with B after work, was fun inventing the dinner menu with her on the fly. Let's hope the (non chocolate) gelato sticks around a bit longer, or I may really have to get that locking mini-freezer....
Used a garlic press on this heirloom garlic I got at Saturday's farmer's market, it was a 'German Red' or something like that. Still a little dirty, roots on the bottom. I noticed a remarkably large amount of liquid squirt out of them when I pressed them, and gave a scalliony less-sharp garlic flavor to the fish....really nice.
EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, one saltless whole wheat pretzel with organic saltless peanutbutter, hunger 3.5/5
Funny thing, when B made the potatos, I knew it would not be enough food for me, so I threw on the corn that has been sitting around since Saturday morning. The corn wasn't really good, and I only had a few bites. When 10:30 rolled around, I was hungry in the way that I knew would interfere with going to sleep. Normally, this would be an ocassion for desert round 2, but that didn't even appeal to me at this moment.
Saturday, September 15
I Love You, Fatman. Now Shuddup!
ADDENDA:
There was a fat man with a large round bald head with little round eyes and a little round mouth sitting behind me at dinner last night. I did not notice him until he was in the midst of a very long, very loud monologue with the poor woman who poured him water, who made the the mistake of asking him how his meal was.
He ranted about how offended he was by the poor service he received the last time he was there. He claimed to be a regular at Craftbar next door, and when the manager called him to inform him there was an opening at the proper restaurant, he expected to be treated as a regular. The head waiter sat him, and the first thing he noticed is that the menu had 30-day cote-de-beouf, not the usual 45 day. When he mentioned this to the head waiter, the head waiter simply responded, "We have 30 day cote-de-beouf." He was appalled by this rudeness, and went on to complain that even though he was paying for a table of ten and spent 1$1,4000, the white truffle pasta was brown truffled and barely had any. When the plates were taken, he asked to have the bones wrapped for his dog, because that is what he always does. He never got them, and when he got home he called the restau....and on and on and on. Wow.
Truly in love with his own voice. He makes it sound like the event of going to such a wonderful restaurant is such a labor, why the hell does he do it? A few minutes later the poor shmo pouring water asks him how his dinner was, to which he replied, "Wonderful!" then goes into another rant, telling this guy his opinion about how the salad dressing had a little too much of this spice, this dish could of been better this way, etc etc.
He was with a fat woman, who also had small round eyes and a small round mouth - judging by the nelliness if his voice, this had to be his sister, he he.
When the woman who poured him water came to our table to clear our dishes, she asked us how our meal was. I said, "Absolutely fantastic, as near to a perfect meal as I could of hoped for,", then I slammed my hand on the table really loudly and proclaimed, "and I don't think I could complain about a thing!" Betsy, looking a little embarrassed by my display, said, "We ate too much, but it was too wonderful to stop!". Then the fat man turns around, leans over and says to Betsy, "Didn't we all, dear!"
I kind of both despise and love that fat man. A true NY character/absolute asshole.
BREAKFAST #1: 5:45am, small bowl of generic rice-crispies with whole milk, hunger 3/5
Got to bed 10ish. Tomorrow I hope to be on bike by 5:30, so gettin' ready. Should be able to hit the farmer's marker in Union Square at 8, then be home to make the good pancakes for my house guest Mariko when I get back.
I bought a box of hippie rice crispies at Whole Foods the other day - the only two ingredients are rice and malt - no salt! It's amazing how hard it is to find salt-free breakfast cereal.
AM SNACK: 9am, super hippie bread with natural peanut butter, hunger 4/5
Me & B walked to the Union Square farmer's market and got there at 8am. We loaded up the granny cart veg and more lamb sausages and fresh bacon and pork chops and flowers and baby red potatos and all that good stuff. Got a loaf of whole-wheat 8-grain bread with all sorts of cracked grains in it, cost $9 bucks, at first I thought the guy was joking but wasn't. But I said what the hell, you only live once, let's see if you get what you pay for. It was actually really really good tasting, reminds me of a lot of the good bread I eat in the UK.
Spent an hour chopping up a huge salad for the week, prepping celery for B's peanut butter fantasies. Betsy made some chocolatey oatmeal squares using the recipe on the back of an oatmeal jug, involving sugar, coco, evaporated milk (I had a can in the cupboard from Thanksgiving) butter and peanut butter. A few minutes of boiling in a pan, then straight into a dish for cooling. Kinda weird, too sweet. I'm going to remake it at a later point with rice crispies instead of oatmeal, half the sugar and maybe crushed peanuts.
BREAKFAST #2: 10:30am, 2 pancakes, 3 pieces of bacon, half portion of the good yogurt with a small squirt of honey, hunger 4/5
The bacon from the market is great tasting and fresh, a wonderful smokey flavor, but is full salt and has nitrates. I noticed another vendor also had fresh organic bacon but was nitrate-free. Next time, gonna hit that one up. I've been eating all morning but still a little hungry....
PM SNACK: 12:30pm, 1 small choco-oatmeal square, hunger 4/5
Too sweet, the oatmeal is not full-bodied enough.
PM SNACK: 2:30pm, 1 wholewheat saltless pretzel, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 3:30pm, 2 ears boiled corn w/o salt or butter, hunger 4/5
Fell asleep, hungry but think gonna save the lamb sausage for pasta I'm gonna make myself tonight. Really sweet, something really satisfying about it's sweetness, much more satisfying than the the oatmeal sugarbomb.
PM SNACK: 4:45pm, slice of hippie bread with thin layer of good chocolate hazelnut spread, hunger 4/5
The bread has a tang, a little bit like yogurt. Weird eating like this, little snacks all afternoon...
PM SNACK: 6:45pm, small green salad with italian dressing, hunger 4/5
DINNER: 8pm, 4 or 5 assorted fried Vietnamese appetisers, vietnamese crepe with pork and shrimp & salad, several glasses of water
Road the tandem over to Williamsburg with my houseguest Mariko, we joined others for dinenr at a Vietnamese restaurant owned and run by a friend of Mariko's. It's nice being introduced to the main person of a restaurant you're about it eat at, everything seems a bit more personable and personal. I've gone to Franny's in Brooklyn several times with B - despite it having some of the best pizza in NYC, it's even more fun because B knows the Franny of the namesake from her publishing days and we always say hi. Not exactly the same as home cooking or a meal at a friend's house, but the next best thing.
EVENING SNACK: 10pm, 3.5 home baked chocolate chip cookies from frozen dough, hunger 3/5
Seriously craving sugar. Gotta be up and out of the house on bike tomorrow by 5:30am, bicycle adventure with Tamar awaits!
There was a fat man with a large round bald head with little round eyes and a little round mouth sitting behind me at dinner last night. I did not notice him until he was in the midst of a very long, very loud monologue with the poor woman who poured him water, who made the the mistake of asking him how his meal was.
He ranted about how offended he was by the poor service he received the last time he was there. He claimed to be a regular at Craftbar next door, and when the manager called him to inform him there was an opening at the proper restaurant, he expected to be treated as a regular. The head waiter sat him, and the first thing he noticed is that the menu had 30-day cote-de-beouf, not the usual 45 day. When he mentioned this to the head waiter, the head waiter simply responded, "We have 30 day cote-de-beouf." He was appalled by this rudeness, and went on to complain that even though he was paying for a table of ten and spent 1$1,4000, the white truffle pasta was brown truffled and barely had any. When the plates were taken, he asked to have the bones wrapped for his dog, because that is what he always does. He never got them, and when he got home he called the restau....and on and on and on. Wow.
Truly in love with his own voice. He makes it sound like the event of going to such a wonderful restaurant is such a labor, why the hell does he do it? A few minutes later the poor shmo pouring water asks him how his dinner was, to which he replied, "Wonderful!" then goes into another rant, telling this guy his opinion about how the salad dressing had a little too much of this spice, this dish could of been better this way, etc etc.
He was with a fat woman, who also had small round eyes and a small round mouth - judging by the nelliness if his voice, this had to be his sister, he he.
When the woman who poured him water came to our table to clear our dishes, she asked us how our meal was. I said, "Absolutely fantastic, as near to a perfect meal as I could of hoped for,", then I slammed my hand on the table really loudly and proclaimed, "and I don't think I could complain about a thing!" Betsy, looking a little embarrassed by my display, said, "We ate too much, but it was too wonderful to stop!". Then the fat man turns around, leans over and says to Betsy, "Didn't we all, dear!"
I kind of both despise and love that fat man. A true NY character/absolute asshole.
BREAKFAST #1: 5:45am, small bowl of generic rice-crispies with whole milk, hunger 3/5
Got to bed 10ish. Tomorrow I hope to be on bike by 5:30, so gettin' ready. Should be able to hit the farmer's marker in Union Square at 8, then be home to make the good pancakes for my house guest Mariko when I get back.
I bought a box of hippie rice crispies at Whole Foods the other day - the only two ingredients are rice and malt - no salt! It's amazing how hard it is to find salt-free breakfast cereal.
AM SNACK: 9am, super hippie bread with natural peanut butter, hunger 4/5
Me & B walked to the Union Square farmer's market and got there at 8am. We loaded up the granny cart veg and more lamb sausages and fresh bacon and pork chops and flowers and baby red potatos and all that good stuff. Got a loaf of whole-wheat 8-grain bread with all sorts of cracked grains in it, cost $9 bucks, at first I thought the guy was joking but wasn't. But I said what the hell, you only live once, let's see if you get what you pay for. It was actually really really good tasting, reminds me of a lot of the good bread I eat in the UK.
Spent an hour chopping up a huge salad for the week, prepping celery for B's peanut butter fantasies. Betsy made some chocolatey oatmeal squares using the recipe on the back of an oatmeal jug, involving sugar, coco, evaporated milk (I had a can in the cupboard from Thanksgiving) butter and peanut butter. A few minutes of boiling in a pan, then straight into a dish for cooling. Kinda weird, too sweet. I'm going to remake it at a later point with rice crispies instead of oatmeal, half the sugar and maybe crushed peanuts.
BREAKFAST #2: 10:30am, 2 pancakes, 3 pieces of bacon, half portion of the good yogurt with a small squirt of honey, hunger 4/5
The bacon from the market is great tasting and fresh, a wonderful smokey flavor, but is full salt and has nitrates. I noticed another vendor also had fresh organic bacon but was nitrate-free. Next time, gonna hit that one up. I've been eating all morning but still a little hungry....
PM SNACK: 12:30pm, 1 small choco-oatmeal square, hunger 4/5
Too sweet, the oatmeal is not full-bodied enough.
PM SNACK: 2:30pm, 1 wholewheat saltless pretzel, hunger 4/5
PM SNACK: 3:30pm, 2 ears boiled corn w/o salt or butter, hunger 4/5
Fell asleep, hungry but think gonna save the lamb sausage for pasta I'm gonna make myself tonight. Really sweet, something really satisfying about it's sweetness, much more satisfying than the the oatmeal sugarbomb.
PM SNACK: 4:45pm, slice of hippie bread with thin layer of good chocolate hazelnut spread, hunger 4/5
The bread has a tang, a little bit like yogurt. Weird eating like this, little snacks all afternoon...
PM SNACK: 6:45pm, small green salad with italian dressing, hunger 4/5
DINNER: 8pm, 4 or 5 assorted fried Vietnamese appetisers, vietnamese crepe with pork and shrimp & salad, several glasses of water
Road the tandem over to Williamsburg with my houseguest Mariko, we joined others for dinenr at a Vietnamese restaurant owned and run by a friend of Mariko's. It's nice being introduced to the main person of a restaurant you're about it eat at, everything seems a bit more personable and personal. I've gone to Franny's in Brooklyn several times with B - despite it having some of the best pizza in NYC, it's even more fun because B knows the Franny of the namesake from her publishing days and we always say hi. Not exactly the same as home cooking or a meal at a friend's house, but the next best thing.
EVENING SNACK: 10pm, 3.5 home baked chocolate chip cookies from frozen dough, hunger 3/5
Seriously craving sugar. Gotta be up and out of the house on bike tomorrow by 5:30am, bicycle adventure with Tamar awaits!
Monday, August 27
Suppressed Memories: I Grew Up With a Tomato Patch
BREAKFAST: 7:30am, 2 pancakes and 4 pieces low sodium bacon, dirtpill, glass of seltzer, hunger 3/5
Made my favorite breakfast for B, Tania and Eli - even though we wrote "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" in frosting on it and had a piece of bacon for a mouth, he wasn't interested, as he was lunching on junk food all morning.
AM SNACK: 9am, 24 oz still water
Back at work. Gotta get my game on, yo.
BP 9:15am: 126/78
LUNCH: 12:30, half pastrami sandwich on rye, small cup of matzoh ball soup (didn't drink soup), small dish of vinegar slaw & 2 pickles, glass of water, hunger 3/5
If my normal well being is 10, and my sickest day was 1, today I feel 8.5. Work is going well - it's pressurized due to my absence, but I work with cool people and I feel like I understand where the pressures are coming from and why. Feel a bit low energy in the body, but my mind was so stultified by not leaving the house Tues-Sun, feel focused. But I needed this comfort food, desired red meat, a real craving! (My first non-sugar craving in memory!) Also, to be able to sit alone and read....
I'm into Kingsolver's book where she's describing the annual cycle of when vegetables are in season, and she spends a lot of time talking about tomatoes - big red hard industrial ones and boring Big Red Tomato seeds, vs. heirloom tomatoes. Then a large shard of memory just popped over my head, dousing my whole train of thought in tomatoes.
I grew up on Staten Island, with 2 parents and an older brother. We lived in a big 3 story house on a quiet street on a hill, with a terraced front yard and a nicely sized rectangular backyard, one side of which was fenced to avoid people falling off the wall to the driveway, the otherside a dirt-hump up to the neighbor's yard. When I was really young, probably 4 or 5, my parents grew vegetables on about a third of the space. All I remember is the tomatoes - how they made a big deal of the big red tomatoes they grew, always chopping them into salads. At some points they'd have too many, and give them away to friends. I think there were a few other vegetables they grew, but I don't remember what they were.
After a couple of years, they stopped, I don't remember why. I distinctly remember at the very end, my brother and I moved away and they sold the house to move into smaller digs - the grass on the 1/3 of the backyard that they grew vegetables was thicker, greener and longer than the grass anywhere else in the yard after all those years.
I really was a typical disgruntled kid growing up bored in the suburbs. Little did I know that little vegetable patch connected us to the entire history of the agricultural world in such a direct, tasty way. I wish I could talk to my parents about this, find out what they were thinking. They were so not just a boring, typical middleclass Jewish couple like I snottily assumed then, they were doing something quite cool and thoughtful, especially for the mid-70s. I was such a little dumbass, I miss them so much.
BP 3:30pm: 129/81
I noticed today is pressurized, and I'm feelin' the heat. Indeed, my bp is a little bit up. I wonder if there is a psychological method to lower my BP at times like this. Ilsa's breathing thing, perhaps?
PM SNACK: 4:30pm, bag of Robert's Smart Puffs, hunger 3/5
Tired. Good productive day, train only wobbled, never left the tracks. Gonna go home early.
DINNER: 8pm, small pork loin, quarter of kinish, mushrooms, one corn on the cob with butter and salt, one scoop of gelato, 1 small piece of homemade poundcake, hunger 4/5
Home made meal with the B and the guests. Nice. Kid is on a crazy eating schedule so had to wait till 10pm to serve up his birthday cake. Really yummy and dense, a little too sweet.
EVENING SNACK: 11pm, small piece of pound cake, hunger 2/5
Here is a new one: I wasn't craving sugar! I popped this in my mouth with a goal - I wanted to taste my cake with a clear palate, free of pork or icecream or whatever, to appreciate it's flavor. I (with the help of a hyperactive 4 year old) made this from scratch, and I was curious to focus on it's taste, not scarf it for it's sugar. I followed a recipe strictly, and I think on the next go around I'll reduce the sugar and up the lemon flavor...
Made my favorite breakfast for B, Tania and Eli - even though we wrote "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" in frosting on it and had a piece of bacon for a mouth, he wasn't interested, as he was lunching on junk food all morning.
AM SNACK: 9am, 24 oz still water
Back at work. Gotta get my game on, yo.
BP 9:15am: 126/78
LUNCH: 12:30, half pastrami sandwich on rye, small cup of matzoh ball soup (didn't drink soup), small dish of vinegar slaw & 2 pickles, glass of water, hunger 3/5
If my normal well being is 10, and my sickest day was 1, today I feel 8.5. Work is going well - it's pressurized due to my absence, but I work with cool people and I feel like I understand where the pressures are coming from and why. Feel a bit low energy in the body, but my mind was so stultified by not leaving the house Tues-Sun, feel focused. But I needed this comfort food, desired red meat, a real craving! (My first non-sugar craving in memory!) Also, to be able to sit alone and read....
I'm into Kingsolver's book where she's describing the annual cycle of when vegetables are in season, and she spends a lot of time talking about tomatoes - big red hard industrial ones and boring Big Red Tomato seeds, vs. heirloom tomatoes. Then a large shard of memory just popped over my head, dousing my whole train of thought in tomatoes.
I grew up on Staten Island, with 2 parents and an older brother. We lived in a big 3 story house on a quiet street on a hill, with a terraced front yard and a nicely sized rectangular backyard, one side of which was fenced to avoid people falling off the wall to the driveway, the otherside a dirt-hump up to the neighbor's yard. When I was really young, probably 4 or 5, my parents grew vegetables on about a third of the space. All I remember is the tomatoes - how they made a big deal of the big red tomatoes they grew, always chopping them into salads. At some points they'd have too many, and give them away to friends. I think there were a few other vegetables they grew, but I don't remember what they were.
After a couple of years, they stopped, I don't remember why. I distinctly remember at the very end, my brother and I moved away and they sold the house to move into smaller digs - the grass on the 1/3 of the backyard that they grew vegetables was thicker, greener and longer than the grass anywhere else in the yard after all those years.
I really was a typical disgruntled kid growing up bored in the suburbs. Little did I know that little vegetable patch connected us to the entire history of the agricultural world in such a direct, tasty way. I wish I could talk to my parents about this, find out what they were thinking. They were so not just a boring, typical middleclass Jewish couple like I snottily assumed then, they were doing something quite cool and thoughtful, especially for the mid-70s. I was such a little dumbass, I miss them so much.
BP 3:30pm: 129/81
I noticed today is pressurized, and I'm feelin' the heat. Indeed, my bp is a little bit up. I wonder if there is a psychological method to lower my BP at times like this. Ilsa's breathing thing, perhaps?
PM SNACK: 4:30pm, bag of Robert's Smart Puffs, hunger 3/5
Tired. Good productive day, train only wobbled, never left the tracks. Gonna go home early.
DINNER: 8pm, small pork loin, quarter of kinish, mushrooms, one corn on the cob with butter and salt, one scoop of gelato, 1 small piece of homemade poundcake, hunger 4/5
Home made meal with the B and the guests. Nice. Kid is on a crazy eating schedule so had to wait till 10pm to serve up his birthday cake. Really yummy and dense, a little too sweet.
EVENING SNACK: 11pm, small piece of pound cake, hunger 2/5
Here is a new one: I wasn't craving sugar! I popped this in my mouth with a goal - I wanted to taste my cake with a clear palate, free of pork or icecream or whatever, to appreciate it's flavor. I (with the help of a hyperactive 4 year old) made this from scratch, and I was curious to focus on it's taste, not scarf it for it's sugar. I followed a recipe strictly, and I think on the next go around I'll reduce the sugar and up the lemon flavor...
Sunday, August 19
A Conservative Sunday, Except for Excessive Pasta
BREAKFAST: 8:30am, 3 burnt pieces of bacon, 1.5 bialies with sable, seltzer, soylent green pill, hunger 4/5
Feel good! Sore, but good.
LUNCH: 2pm, guacamole with soft tortillas and chips, grilled shrimp with rice and pepper sauce, hunger 4.5/5
Spent the day returning gifts. (If you're someone who gave us a gift, don't worry, yours is great. It's all the other ones that we exchanged!). By the end of it, starving to the point of feeling woozy, and the sore legs and stingy shoulders from yesterday's exertion didn't help. Went to Rosa Mexicana on 18th street, the guac was made table side, saw the good 1/2 teaspoon of salt poured into it! That's 25% of my daily right there. Noticed the saltiness of the shrimp and rice I ate - funny, as I was eating it thinking how the saltiness was kind of icky - it made the flavors a bit cartoony and loud.
Though normally I would have desert, I realized I wasn't hungry - I could comfortably skip it at the moment and try to have one desert today, despite it being the loosy-goosy weekend!
I haven't hit a 5/5 on the hunger scale since starting this log. Basically, when I just lose it from hunger and will eat anything to get unhungry, that'll be a 5/5. I once fasted for 4 days, the morning of the second day was a 5/5, but by the afternoon it disappeared. Unless my circumstance prevents me from eating all day, I hope to not have to experience a 5/5 anytime soon.
PM SNACK: 4pm, large hunk of varhona dark chocolate, hunger 4/5
We went food shopping, through this in the cart. When I got home, rolled up on the TV and thoroughly enjoyed it. I had a slight headache between lunch and coming home. I thought this chocolate might increase it - it actually made it go away about 20 seconds after chomping on the chunk. Hmm.
DINNER: 7pm, large green salad, whole wheat pasta with pesto and grated cheese, hunger 2/5
Looking back, I wasn't very hungry, I ate this meal more out of habit of having to have "3 squares a day" like my parents insisted. Perhaps I would of been better off with just the salad and a handful of pretzels...
Feel good! Sore, but good.
LUNCH: 2pm, guacamole with soft tortillas and chips, grilled shrimp with rice and pepper sauce, hunger 4.5/5
Spent the day returning gifts. (If you're someone who gave us a gift, don't worry, yours is great. It's all the other ones that we exchanged!). By the end of it, starving to the point of feeling woozy, and the sore legs and stingy shoulders from yesterday's exertion didn't help. Went to Rosa Mexicana on 18th street, the guac was made table side, saw the good 1/2 teaspoon of salt poured into it! That's 25% of my daily right there. Noticed the saltiness of the shrimp and rice I ate - funny, as I was eating it thinking how the saltiness was kind of icky - it made the flavors a bit cartoony and loud.
Though normally I would have desert, I realized I wasn't hungry - I could comfortably skip it at the moment and try to have one desert today, despite it being the loosy-goosy weekend!
I haven't hit a 5/5 on the hunger scale since starting this log. Basically, when I just lose it from hunger and will eat anything to get unhungry, that'll be a 5/5. I once fasted for 4 days, the morning of the second day was a 5/5, but by the afternoon it disappeared. Unless my circumstance prevents me from eating all day, I hope to not have to experience a 5/5 anytime soon.
PM SNACK: 4pm, large hunk of varhona dark chocolate, hunger 4/5
We went food shopping, through this in the cart. When I got home, rolled up on the TV and thoroughly enjoyed it. I had a slight headache between lunch and coming home. I thought this chocolate might increase it - it actually made it go away about 20 seconds after chomping on the chunk. Hmm.
DINNER: 7pm, large green salad, whole wheat pasta with pesto and grated cheese, hunger 2/5
Looking back, I wasn't very hungry, I ate this meal more out of habit of having to have "3 squares a day" like my parents insisted. Perhaps I would of been better off with just the salad and a handful of pretzels...
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