Salad

Ever since I started the Juicing journey, I have been eating more salads. It is a new thing for me as I did not grow up in a family that eats salad as part of a meal.  We eat luttuce and herbs and other hard veggies such as cucumber and hiccama with cooked meat or egg rolls and rice pasta though. Just not a salad before main dish.

Then I came to America.

I first learned to eat sushi and I found out I like it but unfortunately I am the only one in my family who likes the raw fish.  Joshua will eat the California rolls but that's all from the Japanese cuisine.

I still miss my noodles and rice soup for breakfast from time to time - those are my comfort food in the morning.

Then I discovered the organic food world.  That has changed our entire eating habit. We now shop at Trader Joe's and Lassen's almost exclusively except for a few canned green chilies for a certain recipe I have to get at Pavilions and certain type of cheese from Costco. Our immune system has improved greatly due to a healthier diet.

Then entered the raw foodies I found on blog land.  I read about them but eating raw food all the time is just not my cup of tea so I discounted it.

Lo and behold, after juicing for almost two months now, I have been eating many salads before dinner.  Yeah... lettuce and all other raw veggies... I also have become a very discriminated salad eater.

~My salad has to be colorful and nourishing. Period.~

I can't just eat a green salad, it somehow just does not please my palates.  I have to have the colors of green, red, white, yellow (no blue though) and something crunchy like croutons (most of the time I made them from scratch) in my salad bowl and the ingredients have to be nourishing at the same time. I normally put avocado pieces, sliced eggs, cransins, pine nuts, carrots, mushroom, green onion and of course Romain lettuce (please quit eating iceberg lettuce, it has no nutritional value what so ever.  Romain on the other hand is a more hearty green for your health - just Google it and you will be surprised at the goodness this lettuce provides.)

Here is a blurry picture of my half eaten colorful salad...

 Yummy...! and I eat a smaller portion on the main meal. So yeah, I still eat everything as I used to before my juicing life but now in a moderate portion (except the salad).

I purchased this book because I really like the author and her In-Law family.  Of course I like the book as well as it is full of whole food info and just overall a very enticing book for a salad newbie as myself. Go check out her website. You will be glad you do. :)

Juice To Health

I have come to an end with myself about what I have been putting into my body in the past twenty years.

My body has altered more times than I wished for. After four childbirths and not an avid exerciser, my weight has been in the biggest fluctuation in my adult life. 

My energy level... well, there was no level.  I was mostly flat.  As women we sustain so much changes with our body in a life time. 

My back started aching, my right shoulder was out and it seemed like I am in the bad mood more than I am in a good mood most of the time. Something need to be done but I was not sure what and how. 

So one night I Googled about health, and one thing after another, I ran into this documentary film "Food, Inc." (this link is for the trailer) after I watched that, I completely lost interest in eating "ground beef" ever again.  But what really inspired me to get into this Juice cleanser thing was another documentary film by Joe Cross, an (wealthy) Australian man who came over to America to loose all of the unhealthy weight he had gained because he got his priority in life upside-down.

Granted, I do not have that much weight to loose as Joe Cross (trailer of the movie he made) but it is enough to make me say, "I need to get on a healthier diet" to regain my energy so that I could better serve my family.

By the way, if you are thinking "Oh no, she is going to jump onto that "diet bang-wagon" and crash and burn in a few days!" Rest assured, I have no intention of launching a new eating project just because I was inspired.  Instead, I prayed and asked the Lord to give me patience and to teach me that self-discipline is actually a key being played in this project.

So, I started this Juice To Health (JTH) on Monday October 10th (happened to be on the day of my twenty-four year old son's b-day).  All I have been doing so far is drinking more water everyday, making myself move around more often (the dancing lesson on Tuesday evenings helps a great deal on the moving around part) and noted how much sweets I have been eating everyday, researching for a good juicer AND I weighed myself: 175 lbs. Ouch.

The number cracked the scale! No, just kidding. Something heavy dropped on the scale and cracked it.  I will just use this one until I see some progress before buying a new one.

So welcome to my journey of JTH.  I am indirectly asking you to hold me accountable with this project. LOL! I will try to keep you posted weekly as to see what eating healthily could change my life and the lives around me (namely my family).

Press on!

                                                               ~ This post is linked to
AP Tuesday at Amy's
TNAT at Alicia's