Whole30: Week 2

Week 2 came and went and I'm still pressing on. There were a few days this week where I was extremely aware of all of the things I'm choosing not to eat right now... Like on Friday night when my grandma was in town and we all went shopping and out to dinner. *sigh* I ended up having a salad at Panera with just some lemon juice squeezed on it. Surprisingly, it didn't taste bad with just the lemon juice so I'm tucking that little trick in the back of my mind. But I may have been drooling a bit watching everyone else eat their baguettes and scrumptious soups and sandwiches! I will always love bread. The end.

I only lost 1/2 a pound this week too! I weighed in at the end of the second week at 148. That was a bit discouraging. But they say on their website that the second week you might feel some bloating and other intestinal discomforts due to your gut healing... so if your jeans are feeling tighter not to be discouraged! Here's hoping Week 3 I start seeing a bit more magic.

I worked out 5 of 7 days this week too! Yay me! I did P90x workouts 3 days and then went on 2 runs, including a 7 miler at the end of the week. I ate a Lara Bar before my run and I felt much better this week than last. I'll test it out again this weekend for another long run.

Here are some of my favorite meals from the week:

Mango Chicken and Cauliflower Rice:

This was good but also it was sort of a disaster. My kitchen looked like a tornado had gone through it by the time I was done! I didn't have a few of the ingredients (Coconut aminos, habenero peppers and sesame seeds) so it didn't turn out exactly like the recipe and it could have used a bit more flavor but over all it was good and I really liked the cauliflower rice! My chicken isn't as orange and pretty as the original picture because I couldn't find 100% pure mango juice so I tried to make my own by just buying mangoes and juicing them with a food processor... aaaaaannnndd it didn't really work too well. But if I were you, I'd give this recipe a try because the potential was there! I just didn't execute it all that well!

Crispy Italian Chicken Thighs:

Favorite of the week! We actually had this on Monday and then again on Sunday! You just pat the chicken really dry so the skin gets nice and crispy, rub it down with a mix of seasoning (1tbs garlic powder, 1tsp dried oregano, 1 tsp of seas salt) and bake at 425 degrees on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. We have a convection oven so 20 minutes later, out popped crispy skin and juicy meat. I paired it with sweet potato chips but they weren't quite ready when I took the picture. I've been eating double meat portions on this Whole30 since I usually rely on some sort of carb to fill me up, like pasta or dinner rolls.

Sweet Potato Chips:

Thinly sliced sweet potatoes, soaked in water first for about 30 min to get rid of the starchiness, tossed with olive oil and then baked at 425. I can't get the timing just right, I always end up scorching some and they never turn out crispy all the way through, but I still like them. I read somewhere to salt afterwards to increase the crispiness but it doesn't seem to make a difference. 

Vegetable Soup:

Pretty self explanatory. I just made sure to use organic crushed tomatoes and veggie broth for the base and added in organic ground beef with whatever frozen veggies I had in my freezer. I made a huge pot of this and had leftovers for lunch for the next several days!

Pulled Pork Sliders with Sweet Potatoes:

Cooked a seasoned pork roast in the crockpot while I was at work and then made the sweet potato buns sort of like the chips when I got home and then topped with shredded lettuce. It was incredibly easy and delicious. The original recipe explains the process much better than I would. 

Snacks: 

Carrot Sticks and Apple Sauce

Okay, so not necessarily together all of the time, but I had a lot of each this week. I dipped the carrot sticks in guac (Wholly Guacamole that we picked up at Costco) and its sooo good! A lot healthier than dipping it in ranch, so this is something else I'll carry over into my post Whole30 life. And the apple sauce is of course unsweetened and organic.

Also, this picture is severely unappetizing. I get it. A lot of my pictures aren't pretty. But this is real life people. I don't always have time to fancy up my plates for a picture, I just throw it on there and eat! :)

Banana Pancakes:

I'll be honest, these sounded a lot better than they actually tasted. Its 2 eggs, 1 banana, 1/4 cup of almond flour and a pinch of baking soda mixed together. I had a really hard time flipping them without them falling apart and they didn't have the same texture as regular pancakes at all. Which I guess I shouldn't have been expecting but was sort of hoping for. I topped with almond butter for some bites and tried dipping others in my Whole30 compliant apple butter that I got last fall. (I knew I was planning a Whole30 so I picked it up at an apple orchard!) I liked it better with the almond butter for sure.

So that was week 2! I'm already 2 days into a week 3 and doing okay. Pretty excited that after this week I can start a count down to the finish line!!