Challenge Weekend One

We're closing in on week one of my husband's 30 day vegan challenge.  In my last post I mentioned that I thought this would be his most difficult weekend, and...well if I was right, then the rest of this challenge should be a breeze.  

I don't have any pictures so I won't bore you with too many words, but Saturday we had a cookout at my aunt's house with some of our relative who are visiting from Italy.  We brought veggie burgers, so we had them on whole wheat buns with some rice salad that my aunt made.  Plus there was the raw veggies out.  Oh, and then fruit salad...watermelon...yumm.  It was really a lot of fun to meet them, and was all around a good day!  

Sunday we went down to my husband's family to see his sister off (she is going to Greece).  We now live exactly halfway between both of our families, so its kind of convenient.  Anyway, they were cooking out too, so we brought veggie burgers, but I didn't even end up eating them because my mother in law had gotten a tofu recipe from a friend of hers that was really good (thankfully...I don't think they had really tried tofu before). That with brown rice, corn on the cob, some polenta and vegetable pie she made, baked potato wedges, etc, was plenty for me.  My husband still ate two veggie burgers (Southwest flavor Sunshine burgers.  I've never had them, but he said they were good), along with everything else though.  Oh and there was dessert too!  My sister in law is gluten-free, so we had two options for vegan and gluten-free dessert.  Impressive.  

My in laws have a really awesome natural food store near their house, and as much as I love Wegmans, I do miss the local places.  So we went on our way home.  I didn't really get too much, but I did get these olive oil...things.  

I can't explain them, and I ate them all already (they were REALLY good).  I guess they are kind of like a mix between a pastry/cookie and a cracker.  Like, a sweet cracker.  But round, and sprinkled with sugar.  What put them completely over the top awesome though was the ground anise and anise extract.  Soooo good.  I have never seen them there before, and they were this special "imported" item, so I don't know if they'll be there next time, but if they are...you KNOW I'll be buying some more.  

Today we got up EARLY and went to spinning at 5:45.  We got there at 5:40 only to find out we were actually 10 minutes late because they moved the class up to 5:30.  I totally LOVED it!  It was so much fun.  On top of that we're going to be lifting tonight.  It sounds like a lot, but because of his job, my husband almost always works out twice a day.  Since I have the time now, why not?  On days we don't lift I am going to do yoga.  I've found a place around here called Yogawood that does an Ashtanga style flow, which is what I am used to, and what I love, but I think I may try a Bikram place tomorrow.  By the way, I want to clear up something I said on Friday, that the yoga didn't keep my legs very strong, and I think I should mention that "strong" is a pretty relative term.  Yoga keeps your muscles fit and relatively strong...but not strong enough to squat 100 pounds.  I hope that makes more sense.  To ME, that is STRONG.  Warrior poses don't really do much of anything to my leg muscles (my hips, that's another story).  I lost much more strength in my big legs lifts than I did in my upper body lifts.  But, every kind of exercise, every practice, whether its yoga, running, lifting, etc they all have their own benefits, and they all make you strong in some way.  Which explains why I'm always trying to do a little bit of everything!      

After spinning we have breakfast, which has been "interesting".  Since all I have is a Magic Bullet (no blender), I have a very limited volume capacity.  My smoothies always consist of six ingredients:

1.  Banana

2.  Spinach

3.  Protein powder

4.  Non-dairy milk

5.  Frozen fruit

6.  Water    

Well, as you may imagine, this does not fit in the Magic Bullet very well.  So I've been making them in pieces, and we end up with a green component (spinach, banana, water), and a fruit colored component (today was purple---blueberries!!).  When you pour them together it looks all swirly.  

I just think it looks cool, but my husband likes it like this because he says he can taste the separate components.  Okay. 

In case you were wondering, we're not using the same protein powder.  I'm using the same stuff I've talked about a bunch of times.  My rice and pea blend, sweetened with stevia, from trueprotein.com.  He is using a GNC soy protein isolate.  I can taste such a difference.  His is sweetened with sucralose, I believe, and it is so much sweeter.  I don't like it because it reminds me too much of whey.  So if you are trying to move away from whey, this stuff may be the way to go.  

One last update.  I stopped at my parents this weekend before going to my aunt's house.  I talked about the baby birds living on their porch a few days ago.  

Well this was my mom's most recent picture of them, just a week after that first picture. 

 And this was my picture of them this weekend.  

They're gone!  The babies have officially grown up and left the nest (and my family can use the front door again).  

As far as the vegan challenge, so far it is going very very well.  He says he's feeling really good, and...well that's about it, what else do you want?  Yesterday on the way to my in-laws, I had him listen to Colleen Patrick-Goudreau's podcast, Vegetarian Food for Thought.  Now, I know I have  mentioned her in passing before, but I seriously love this podcast.  The one I really wanted him to listen to was one of her most recent episodes, and its one that I suggest everyone listens to.  I know I have people who read this who aren't necessarily vegetarian or vegan, I'm talking to you, too.  It may not be something that you want to hear, but I think its worth the 40 minutes to just listen.  Not because I want you to be vegan.  But because I want you to be sure you are YOUR definition of healthy.  You can take from it whatever you want, but I think it should be required listening.  And I will never beg you to listen to another one of her podcasts again, I swear.  You can even do it through iTunes, just search.  So, go download:  Vegetarian Food for Thought, Diseases of Civilization.  Now.      

My husband was really unhappy I was making him do this, but once he started listening to her, I think he is hooked.  He takes a lot of pride in being well educated, and her podcast present information that he has never really looked into before.  It is very well research, and it isn't presented in an angry way, so its hard not to listen.  We listened to it the whole way there, and then he told me I could put it on "if I wanted to" on the way home.

One last thing (I swear).  I get really tired of say "my husband this", "my husband that", etc.  I know that other bloggers have other names for their significant others or family members (BoyfriendLovlie from VeganLovie, CD from Heather Eats Almond Butter, and Mama and Papa Crunk from Vegan Crunk come to mind), but I got nothing .   Any ideas?  

Allright, NOW I'm done.  I hope everyone is having a wonderful Monday!!

Vegan Challenge: The Workout

On Wednesday I talked about my husband's foray into veganism for the next 30 days.  So here is the second half of his vegan challenge.  Not only eating vegan, but lifting and maintaining an active lifestyle as a vegan. 

When my husband and I were living in Hawaii together, we went to the gym together.  A lot.  I was really stressed out during my last student teaching experience, so I cut out the lifting and stuck mainly to yoga.   

Last night was my first night back to some serious lifting, and while it went well, I definitely am noticing that yoga did much more for my upper body than my lower body.  My arms, back, and chest are still fairly strong, but my legs were getting spasmatic after two sets of deadlifts.  

My husband however, was lifting more than ever while he was in Iraq, so I let him choose this workout plan.  I don't necessarily love it, but I definitely missed lifting, so its good to be back at it.  Plus, I get to pick the next program...heheh.  It will probably be something equally as complicated as the 5-7-9 program I made awhile back.  

Since his is simple, it should be much easier to follow.  The idea was to do the exact same workout three times a week.  Well, I got him to change that at least a little bit.  There are going to be two rotating workouts, and while the big lifts will change a little, the smaller lifts will be staying the same:

Workout 1:  

Deadlift 5x5

Barbell Bench Press 5x5

Dumbbell Military Press 5x5

----------

Pullups 4x8

Dips 4x8

Barbell Curls 4x8

Workout 2:

Back Squats 5x5

Dumbbell Bench Press 5x5

Barbell Seated Shoulder Press 5x5

----------

Pullups 4x8

Dips 4x8

Crunches 4x8

If you knew my workouts well, you would see my obvious influence on this program.  Since you don't, I will tell you.  First, I refuse to do anything more than 8 reps, I get incredibly bored and antsy.  Second, the way it is split into two parts, with the bigger lifts first, and the smaller lifts second...very "me".  As is the way there are fewer, but longer, sets for the second half.  What can I say, he asked my opinion.  

Post workout last night was dinner.  I let him pick something out of The Vegan Table, and he chose the Pan-Grilled Portobello Mushrooms with Herb Infused Marinade.  What a mouthful.  These were possibly some of the best portobello mushrooms I've ever had.  I know it seems so simple, and to a degree it is, but the marinade was totally delicious, and the way they were cooked made it really soak in and just taste awesome.  

We had the mushrooms with roasted asparagus and mashed cauliflower (hummus is a good addition to this, if you were wondering).  

You'll have to excuse the lighting in our apartment for awhile.  I still need to play with it to find the best place, but I didn't want my food to get cold!   

He's got what I think will be some of his biggest challenges coming up this weekend.  Tomorrow we are having a BBQ at my aunt's house with some family that is in from Italy.  He'll have food to eat, no doubt, but I think it'll be hard for him to watch everyone else eating meat.  On Sunday we're going to visit his family.  It should be fine, they're really open to my being vegan, but I still think its going to be a challenge for him...but that was what he wanted, right??

He Goes Vegan

While my posts have been scattered as of late, if you've been following you know that my husband recently got out of the military, and after two long years, we finally moved back in together again.  

Last we were living together I was a vegetarian.  He's always been open to eating anything, and definitely had tofu and tempeh while we were living there, but he was definitely dismayed when he learned I would no longer be eating cheese or eggs.  

So, imagine my surprise last week when he tells me that, if I cook/pack him food, he will eat vegan during the week.  Okay.  They say that it takes about a month to break a habit, so I saw his challenge, and raised it to 30 days straight.  And so Vegan Challenge 2009 begins.  

Today was the official starting date, although he technically ate vegan yesterday also, so he's already got an edge on the non-existent competition.  

Our kitchen is still kind of in shambles, with pieces of it scattered across the country (our stuff that we had in Hawaii has been in storage since August 2007, and it is now in California waiting to be shipped to us here), but I finally broke out the few tools that we have, and made my first recipe from The Vegan Table.  I mentioned it a week or two ago, and I honestly wasn't planning on buying it...but once I saw it, I had to.  People, it is beautiful.  Plus...TONS of pictures!!  I'm way more likely to make recipes if there are pictures.  

So, for dinner tonight we had the French Onion Pie.  

Sadly, it was about as gloppy a mess as it looks in the picture.  Maybe because I cooked my onions in a wok (again, making do with what I have), they were really wet, and the resulting pie was really wet.  It tasted good, but it was not very pretty.  And I think it goes without saying that I couldn't get the onions to caramelize...I can't even do that with the proper equipment.

The salad is nothing special but I just wanted to say "Oh my gosh the strawberries here are amazing" one more time.   

If you're anything like me, you may be wondering why he agreed to do this.  The impression that I get from him is that...he wants the challenge.  It also may give him some insight into something that is important to me, but for the most part he wants to see if he can do it.  He wants to see if he can eat vegan for 30 days, and more importantly, he wants to see if he can maintain or gain muscle on a vegan diet.  I, obviously, know that it is possible, but he wants to see for himself, and why would I deter him?!?  So here goes.  We're also going to start lifting together again, so I'll post our workout tomorrow.  

Also, I am behind on everyone's blog, we just got our internet hooked up today (and its not even wireless yet, I feel so lame).  I'm also REALLY sorry if you sent me an email and it took me awhile to get back to you.   You can expect me to be around with some regularity now though!!