Day 17: It's Friday Night, and I Feel Alright

Friday was an unusual day.  As the beginning of the weekend, it is typically a day meant for leaving work as early as possible, and going to do something fun.  For me though, it was a day of getting out of work to eat, workout more, and then go out for a friend's birthday party.  Luckily, the party didn't start till 9:30, so we had some time to get ready.  The pre-party workout also allowed us to burn off some calories before we decided to consume a few tasty drinks.

An always persistant opponent of a healthy diet is soda.  Soda is basically just sugar high-fructose corn syrup water.  Nothing but carbs, sugar and calories.  Almost none of it is useful to your body for growing muscle or shredding fat.  So I have been doing a decent job of avoiding it all together until Friday.  The bar we went to was a place called Townhouse, which we initially confused for meeting at someone's townhouse, but that's another story altogether.

It's a cocktail bar so it was pretty much exclusively mixed drinks, and some really crazy stuff like catnip infused vodka.  So I broke down and had a pegleg and some gin based drink that I don't recall now.  I assure you, they were well worth the empty calories.  Sometimes you just need to cut yourself some slack, and focus on enjoying yourself.  The process of getting fit shouldn't be 90 days of hell.  It should be enjoyed as well.

Menu:


Breakfast:
Protein Shake

Snack 1:
Lemon Cliff Builder's Bar

Lunch:
Tomato soup
chef salad (3 cups romaine, 1/4 cup hearts of palm, 1 roma tomato, 1/2 package tofurkey deli slices)

Snack 2:
30 pistachios

Dinner:
Vegan lasagna
side salad

Day 16: Off Day

Day 15 was the last day in the workout cycle, so today was a rest day.  We debated if we should take the day off, or keep going through the next week, since we just took off two days over the last weekend due to the road trip, but we decided to rest and get back on the normal cycle of workouts.  It was nice to have a little bit of free time at night, but I didn't let that go to waste.  I decided to try to make a vegan lasagna.  I'll post the recipe depending on how it turns out. I made it to throw in the oven for dinner the next night, so I won't know till later if it's trash or treasure.

On a physical note, I felt sore during the rest day, even though I felt like the Kenpo wasn't really giving me the workout I wanted.  I guess it did and I just didn't know it.

Menu:


Breakfast:
tofu scramble
1 cup soy milk

Snack:
Cliff Builder's Bar (mint chocolate)

Pretty tasty bar.  I don't think I'd want it every day, but it will be good to add to the repertoire.

Lunch:
"bologna" sandwich
2 cups tomato soup

Snack 2:
30 pistachios

Dinner:
Spaghetti and "meat" balls
side salad with romaine, tomatoes, cucumbers and goddess dressing

I realize that I forgot my fruit for the day.  I'll have to make up for this with some watermelon tomorrow.

Day 15: A Long Day

This day was a bit of a struggle for myself.  I was working at the library today after work, so I didn't get home until after 7:30, and on top of that, it was storming outside.  Nothing makes me feel like just crawling under the covers and doing nothing like a thunderstorm.  Alas, it was not to be.  After making dinner, eating, and cleaning up, it was already 9 PM, a great time to just turn in.  Instead of turning in, we turned it up, and busted out a set of Kenpo X.

Fortunately, this is a light day of workout.  Just one hour of calisthenics, and even when I bring it with full force, I don't seem to feel as tired afterward as I do with legs and arm workouts.  So it was a good day for kickboxing.  After peeling ourselves up and showering, it was bedtime.  Not a bad day, but a busy one.  When you go from waking up, to eating, to work, to more work, to making dinner, to working out, to bed, it makes for a long day.  There was a bright spot.  I found that REI sells Cliff Builder's Bars, and if you buy 12 or more, they're only $1.68.  Still kind of pricey for my mid-morning snack, but they are so tasty and chock full of protein that I don't mind.

Menu:


Breakfast:
Protein shake (banana and blueberry)
2 soysage patties

Snack:
Cliff Bar (peanut and chocolate)

Lunch:
Tomato soup
"bologna" flatbread

Lunch was really tasty.  Even after subtracting most of the olive oil from the soup recipe, it was still flavorful and filling.  The flatbread I made with some greek style bread that I found has 6g of protein in each piece, a nice little find.  Top that with a half package of "bologna", some tomato, cucumber, and veganaise, and it makes for a tasty sandwich.

Snack 2:
1/4 cup cashews

Dinner:
Tofu stir fry
cup soy milk

Restaurants: Local Burger

Local Burger is a really awesome concept place in Lawrence.  The whole concept of the place is to provide food that is nutritious, and raised in a humane and sustainable manner, and the menu is pretty diverse.  There is something sure to please any type of eater in your party, from the vegan (veggie burger) to the wild game lover (elk burger).

The best veggie burger in the world didn't quite live up to it's name, but it was far from the usual Boca burger at most places.  Crispy on the outside with softness on the inside, firm, without being dry.  Topped with a whole grain bun, it's great for the health conscious eater as well.  The real treat was the vegan Caesar salad, which to my suprise was also topped with warm, seasoned tofu, giving a much needed protein boost to the salad.  The greens were crisp and tasty, and the dressing was spot on, not too heavy, not too light.

My wife tried the standard burger, and seemed a little unimpressed.  It wasn't the biggest looking burger out there, much to the chagrin of my brother-in-law, so the carnivores seemed a little less than impressed.

I finished off the meal with a chocolate peanut butter ball.  I didn't verify the veganness of the chocolate, but it was fairly standard.  It was peanut butter covered in chocolate.  Pretty tasty, but nothing special. 

On a second visit, I was so impressed with the vegan salad that I decided to try another.  The Buckaroo salad, which is ranch dressing (vegan!) with greens, fried onions and tofu.  It was just as tasty as the Ceasar.  To top off the meal, I also went with the baked tofu fries, which were out of this world.  Crispy on the outside, firm, but tender on the inside, with a wonderful orange dipping sauce.  I was on cloud nine the rest of the day after these fries.  I could seriously eat them with every meal.  If only they had a Local Burger in Austin.

I gave this place 3/4 stars.  I couldn't give it any higher, as the carnivores in the group seemed a little disappointed, but if you are veg/vegan, this is definitely the place to go for some lunch grub. If you haven't tried it, and live anywhere near Lawrence, go there now.

Score: 3/4

Location: 714 Vermont Street Lawrence, KS 66044 

Day 14: Back To Work

So it was my first day back to the grind after the four day weekend, which means one thing, getting back in the rhythm of my workout schedule.  It is so much easier to be back on the schedule of work, eat, workout, sleep.  It's so much easier to plan out.

It was a fairly normal day, legs and back today, with ab ripper afterward.  However, I ran out of gas halfway through doing abs.  I just couldn't go on any longer.  It's not like I was in too much pain, but that I didn't have the stamina to make it through.  My diet thus far has been low-carb and high protein, so I think I'm going to switch it up a little in the next few days and get some more carbs in there to help get me through some of these workouts.

I also spent some time making more soup last night.  I tried a tomato basil this time, quadrupling the recipe here for everything except the oil, which I left out of the caramelize step, leading to my tomatoes not caramelizing, but just kind of drying out.  I of course left out the cream and substituted no-chicken broth instead of chicken broth.  No-chicken broth is like vegetable broth, only tastier according to my sister-in-law, so I'll have to give it a shot.  I'll have it for lunch tomorrow, so we'll see how it turned out.



Menu:


Breakfast:
Tofu scramble
cup of soy milk

Snack:
Cliff bar

Lunch:
Vegetable soup
Salad
Veggie burger (no bun, no condiments)

Snack:
1/4 cup cashews

Dinner:

Field Roast sausage with sauerkraut

Grilled asparagus

Grilled zucchini and squash

1 cup brown and wild rice

1 cup soy milk

Dinner was awesome tonight.  I love these field roast sausages, and when you add a little sauerkraut in there, it adds a bit of bite to the sausage which tastes great.  This may be my new favorite main dish, low fat, high protein, and delicious.

Day 13: A Hard Day's Work

Monday was Memorial Day, so to all of those who have honorably served this country, thank you for your service.  You provide us with the freedoms we often take for granted.

Today was definitely a day of work for the wife and I. After getting back from Lawrence, we discovered that our lawn looked like complete crap.  It hadn't been mowed in about a month, and the weeds were up to 4 ft tall.  So we took to action, me on the shovel digging up all the Dallas grass weeds in the back yard, and her on the mower, tearing through the vast swaths of St. Augustine.  We were out there for a solid 8 hours, mowing, weeding, putting in new soaker hoses, trimming, edging, planting new grass and getting new rose bushes for the back yard.  After that long of a day in the sun, you would think that a break would be deserved.

Not so with us.  We knew that after missing two days of workouts, we couldn't afford to miss another.  So we plowed on through an hour and a half of yoga following 8 hours of yard work.  Words cannot describe the exasperation we both felt after our workout, but we were both glad that we kept pushing through, and are staying focused on our goal of completing these 90 days.

Menu:


Breakfast:
Protein shake

Snack:
Cliff bar

Lunch:
Salad (romaine, tomatoes, hearts of palm, Balsamic dressing)
2 Boca burgers (no bun, no condiments)

Snack 2:
Cashews

Dinner:

Spaghetti with "meat" balls

salad with balsamic

Used some Nathan's "meat" balls to add some protein to this dish.  Limited the amount of spaghetti, so I don't get too many carbs. Definitely waited to exercise for a good hour after this meal.

Day 12: The Road Home

So even though we had a blast at the wedding, we still had to head home to Texas.  So we had another 12 hour day of driving ahead of us.  Fortunately, the time seems to fly by when you have good company, so neither me nor the wife minded in the least.  I think she liked it because there's no way I could get away.  Not that I wanted to.

We scheduled this day as an off day, as it would be nice to have Sundays as our normal rest day.  So we're going to plow through the rest day this week, especially needed since we've missed two days in a row.

Again, preparation leads to success.  We brought fixins for sandwiches on the way back, as well as healthy snacks like nuts and fruits, and of course, Cliff bars.  We made some up in the morning before we went to breakfast, and were good to go.  Unfortunately, I broke fast again today, as we headed to what my sister-in-law claims are her favorite vegetarian biscuits and gravy.  We walked down to the cafe, but they didn't open till 10 on Sundays, so we had to scrap that and headed back to Mirth Cafe.

I could have gone back to my granola, or even done the beans and rice, but once I had Bs and Gs in my head, I couldn't get them out.  This was not only a failure for my vegan-ism, but also for the diet.  They were as tasty as I'm sure they are fattening.  Imagine a plate covered in biscuits and smothered in creamy, spicy gravy with soy sausage.  It was so good, yet so bad.

I mentioned this to my wife in the car, and found some recipes online for vegan Bs and Gs, which I'll have to try and share at some point.  We also looked for a place to have dinner when we stopped near Dallas.  She found a place called the New Start Veggie Garden, which is the "ultimate vegan buffet".  (Review here)

Overall, not the best of days.  We missed workout, I broke fast, and we were dog tired after all that driving.  After a night of rest, and some relaxation, we should be able to get back on track.

Menu:


Breakfast:
Vegetarian Biscuits and Gravy (Mirth Cafe)

Lunch:
Vegan "bologna" sandwich
watermelon
cashews

Snack:
Cliff bar (macadamia nut, yummy)

Dinner:
New Start Veggie Garden buffet