3-day Detox Sugar Cleanse before the holidays: Live Primal



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Loosen your belts and clear your fridge for leftovers; here come the sugar and carb onslaught of the holidays. I definitely believe in guilt-free indulgence (I never count calories- click here for more info on my food philosophy) and never count calories, but I also hate that slogging gross feeling you get after ingesting too much sugar and crashing from the high. As someone who has the world's biggest sweet tooth, I have experience in that aspect.
So join me as I cut out all sugars, artificially refined foods, and factory-processed foods for the next 3 days starting tomorrow! I promise you'll feel so much better afterwards and I hope this might even inspire you to live a healthier lifestyle with fewer processed foods when the cleanse is done.
It's hard, and I can't say it'll be pain free, but at least you'll feel better about indulging when the holidays hit and you accidentally have too many cookies.


RULES: (Inspired by the book Fat Cat by Robin Brande, with a few of my own adjustments)
1.) May only eat foods that prehistoric people ate; no yeast, sugar, or factory-processed foods such as saltines, diet pop, or coffee
2.) May eat the KINDS of foods prehistoric people ate, fresh fruits, nuts, veggies, unprocessed meat (they actually ate carrion occasionally before the discovery of how to use fire, but I'd rather not go there...) home-baked yeast-free whole wheat bread/pasta/pizza. Milk and honey are okay even though cows and honeybees weren't domesticated until many, many years later. Spices are fine to make your food palatable.
3.) May NOT count calories - but must make sure you have all the necessary nutrients your body needs, see below.
4.) I will be drinking organic green tea made from freshly brewed tea leaves, as to keep my sanity throughout my classes.

CURRENT EXERCISE:
Totally into intense cardio intervals and jump rope right now, squeezing in long walk/jogs with my dog when I can.
Intense cardio workouts 4 times a week with the less intense workouts the other 3 days including dance and tennis. When I have time, 30 minutes of strength-building yoga and a light three mile run makes for a nice weekend stress-releaser.

NOTE(S):
*I am not a certified health professional and if you have any specific needs regarding your body then please check with your doctor to make sure you're getting the iron, zinc, calcium, and other nutrients your body needs.
*Your body actually suffers physical/mental withdrawal symptoms if you suddenly cut back on artificial foods and go from a junk food diet to a healthy one devoid of sugar. I did a sugar cleanse once and god I'm telling you it was hell the first couple days. However; push through the first two days and you'll start feeling really energized and kinda like that annoying yoga-addicted friend who keeps preaching about the evils of sugar and somehow has boundless energy. (A.K.A. me on some days... only I love sugar too much to be an unbiased speaker on the topic.)

Thanks for your support and I hope y'all join me on these three sugar-free days before the holidays!

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies

This is another one of my treats I make for Synergy, a recycling and volunteering club that meets once a week. The club flyer proclaims that there is food at the meetings, but when I went, there wasn't! So I did my best to remedy that by promptly bringing in pumpkin chocolate chip muffins to the next meeting.

These cookies were born from the mixed occurence of a craving for dark chocolate brownie batter and seeing my dog lick up peanut butter from her toy (one of those rubber thingies you put treats in and your dog tries to lick out.)
The chocolate cookies are absolutely divine on their own and if you're just going to make those, then only bake for 8-9 minutes (these overbake easily); if you're making sandwich cookies you're going to want them a bit drier and more biscuity so bake for 9-10 minutes.

Chocolate. Peanut butter. Heaven. ;p
Enjoy!

RECIPE: (from food.com; makes about 36 cookies)
*1 1/4 cups butter or margarine
*2 cups sugar (I used 1 cup)
*2 large eggs
*2 teaspoons vanilla extract
*2 cups flour
*3/4 cup unsweeted cocoa powder
*1 teaspoon baking soda
*1/2 teaspoon salt
*About 1 cup peanut butter
*If you're making these on their own, add nuts or chocolate chips or whatever you want. Have fun with it!

PREPERATION:
1.) Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2.) Mix together butter, eggs, sugar, and vanilla
3.) Mix in the dry ingredients
4.) Drop by teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet
5.) Bake for 8-9 minutes being very careful not to overbake; 9-10 minutes if you want them hard and biscuity.
6.) Set cookies out to cool on a wire rack
7.) After cookies are completely cool, place a dollop of peanut butter on the center of a cookie, top with another cookie and press down lightly to form an oreo-like sandwich!

Pumpkin Bread

Felt like doing another pumpkin recipe today, as a test run for my new camera and pretty much also because I feel like I'm the only food blogger on the entire blogosphere to not have done a post on pumpkin bread yet. Just telling y'all ahead of time: this bread is seriously addictive. I found myself consuming about half a loaf today, no joke. The taste of pumpkin is nicely rounded out with spices and sweetness.
This classic pumpkin bread can be made even better with cream cheese filling; will definitely add that next time!


RECIPE: (from allrecipes.com) yields 3 loaves
*3 cups pumpkin puree
*1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
*4 cups sugar (I usually only use 2-3 cups)
*6 eggs
*4 3/4 cups flour
*1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
*1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
*1 1/2 teaspoons salt
*1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnammon
*1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
*1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves

PREPERATION:
1.) Preheat oven to 350 degrees farenheit
2.) Mix together vegetable oil, pumpkin, eggs, and sugar
3.) In a seperate bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnammon, nutmeg, and cloves. Combine with wet ingredients
4.) Bake in 3 greased and lightly floured pans for 45 minutes to 1 hour; the bread should lightly spring back when pressed

Holiday Detox Breakfast (a.k.a. the omelette that fell apart)

I have a feeling we're all going to be bloated and overstuffed by the end of the holidays.
It's inevitable- it takes superhuman control to resist another slice of your aunt's award-winning black forest cake or cream-stuffed strudel. As for me, I'll be gone on a cruise exploring the carribean during Christmas, where I shall regain my tan and my sanity after weeks of cramming for semester finals.
Anyways, it's always nice to start your Monday off right, so here's a super healthy omlette I made myself for breakfast while playing with my new camera. It always feels really nice to do something that you know is good and healthy for yourself, and it was a great start to my day even if it fell apart :(
Just looking at the un-greasy, brightly colored vegetables make me feel cleaner and less guilty for all the sugar and carbs I consumed during thanksgiving.

RECIPE: You can pretty much throw in whatever you've got at hand; cranberries, apples, tomatoes, onions, leftover turkey etc. I kept it simple and light and just used
*2 eggs, beaten
*1 teaspoon of vegetable oil
*1/2 a carrot, finely diced
*1/2 a stick of celery, finely diced
*A pinch or two of shredded low-fat skim mozzarella
*A pinch of oregano
*Pinch of salt and pepper

PREPERATION: (Come on guys, I'm sure you know how to make an omelette! But if you don't...)
1.) Beat eggs and fry in vegetable oil or use cooking spray
2.) Sprinkle in veggies and cheese on one side of omelette
3.) Sprinkle salt, pepper, and oregano
3.) Fold and flip.

QUICK NOTE:

I'm going to be honest with you guys- I've been shrinking the pictures I post due to the fact I had been using a really crappy camera which produced grainy shots. Now that I've got a new and much better camera, I can make all the pictures larger and let y'all get to enjoy seeing way better quality and bigger pictures!