Yesterday Was Not A Good Day For Eating

Do you ever have a day where something in that day seems to just not go right? Well, that was me yesterday. I woke up late and therefore barely got out of the door to make it to work on time. As a result of running late, I did not have breakfast or my vitamins or anything. So, I was pretty hungry when I was finally able to go to lunch. I ate a hamburger and fries for lunch and then for dinner I went to Hot Dog On A Stick! I knew it was a bad thing! I felt these meals come back to haunt me too this morning! I am thinking I am intolerant to gluten - not allergic, but intolerant, because I woke up with my 3:00AM itches that I used to get in the past. I don't have hives or anything - I just itch all over the place. Or it could have been the starch or peanut oil - needless to say, the foods I ate yesterday made their presence known in a bad way.

Today I decided to start over. Because of my itches I really only managed another hour of sleep or so, so I decided to get up. I had seen a recipe on Pinterest (my new internet love) that I was eager to try. It was a recipe for gluten free, dairy free, and even egg free drop biscuits. The recipe encouraged the person making the biscuits to use a combination of gluten free flours, but most of the gluten free flours are made from things I can't have right now, so I had to use all buckwheat flour even though the recipe discouraged it, but I did anyway. I mixed the ingredients and made the dough and then put the dough on my Pampered Chef stoneware and baked them. Buckwheat flour is kind of dark all by itself so it is really hard to know when things made from it are done. But they did bake up and they looked fine to me. I then cooked up some turkey sausage, sweet potatoes, and an egg for breakfast. I then paired a couple of the biscuits with everything else and also got some almond butter for dipping the biscuits in.

It was like eating a real big breakfast this morning. I typically don't make big breakfasts for myself only but since I had loads of time this morning I decided to get creative. I have quite a few biscuits left, but I have bread now! And the recipe stated that buckwheat flour can have an aftertaste, I didn't really taste one. If you aren't used to the flavor of buckwheat, these may taste different, but they tasted like any other drop biscuit I have had before. And if you dip them in almond butter or any nut or seed butter for that matter, they are even more tasty! I packed some of the leftover ones in my lunch today. I plan to see if my boyfriend and best friend like them. I am planning on using these biscuits as part of my breading for my chicken strips I plan to make tomorrow. So glad I tried this recipe! See pictures below for the biscuits (they look like cookies, but they really are biscuits) and my delicious breakfast!

           

Buckwheat Flour Drop Biscuits

Turkey Sausage, Egg, Drop Biscuits, and Sweet Potatoes

And here is the link to the recipe: http://wholenewmom.com/recipes/easy-drop-biscuit-recipe-w-gf-df-options/

Now The Fun Begins

I have been freed somewhat from my strict diet! I can now enjoy tomatoes, beef, and eggs. I know there are some people who think that is still very restrictive, but having those three items back in my diet open a world of new possibilities! You just have to take time to think about it.

For example, there are eggs. Eggs are versatile little things and can be used to make lots of things. You can just cook them up and eat them or you can use them in a lot of recipes and other things as well. I have made my own chicken strips in the past and one of the crucial things was the egg\milk wash, so now that I can have eggs I can combine them with my almond milk and make the egg\milk wash. And I can make my breading from buckwheat flour, nuts, and herbs. I then pan fry the chicken in olive oil or bake it.

With the tomatoes I can now add more to my turkey burgers and I can have salsa! One of my favorite things to eat is salsa chicken. I take a chicken breast and cook it part of the way on the stove and then I put some salsa on top of it and then finish cooking it in a 350 degree oven for about twenty minutes and it is delish! So I get to have that again! YAY!

I have never been a huge red meat eater so having beef back in my diet isn't really going to impact me much other than I can now have a beef burger if I go out to order one. I can also use ground beef in my tacos at home when I make tacos. I also make these fabulous meatballs so I can use ground beef in those too even though I usually prefer ground turkey!

Well, I will update on how my attempt at my chicken strips went as I plan to make those tonight! Have a great day everyone!

Day 1: Breakfast

Breakfast has always been a challenge for me since I have been out of college. I would rather sleep that extra ten minutes than get up and prepare breakfast. Needless to say my breakfasts are either really bad for me (stopping somewhere and getting fast food breakfast) or I just don't eat breakfast.

The most important thing in this diet I am on is to eat three meals a day and to have snacks if I get hungry between meals. So, I made sure I got up earlier this morning than I usually do so I could make breakfast. This posed another challenge for me as well -- what was I going to eat that would keep me full for more than a couple of hours? I have a job where I can't just get up and walk away and get something to eat whenever. So, this is one of the reasons breakfast has always been challenging. When I was younger and even in college I would just have cereal, but I could eat basically whenever I wanted, so it didn't bother me to only eat cereal. Cereal doesn't keep me full at all these days. I eat it and an hour later I am starving. I find I have to have a combination of carbs and protein for breakfast. If I just eat protein, I am starving in a couple of hours. This morning definitely presented a challenge for me. This is why I started preparing breakfast ideas last night.

I settled on a half of one of the chicken sausage links I bought this weekend, and some buckwheat cooked and mixed in with some homemade canned peaches. Buckwheat is very interesting. I am not sure if I cooked it right or what, but it has a nutty flavor to it and definitely has a hot cereal\oatmeal feel to it. I don't like plain oatmeal, so I wasn't sure I would like the buckwheat plain, so I mixed in some peaches with it and it made it palatable. The chicken sausage was very spicy, but I loved it! So after drinking a full glass of water with my supplements, my "protein" shake (which is not a meal replacement as I don't drink a lot of it), the sausage, and the buckwheat with peaches I was very full. I packed a banana\almond milk smoothie for my morning snack, but I am still very full and not feeling hungry at all.

I am feeling a little dizzy from the supplements, but I am sure I will adjust to that. As for the bad things - I had to have a Diet Pepsi because I can't work with those headaches. Starting tomorrow I will go caffeine free.

Here is the recipe for the buckwheat and fruit and banana smoothie.

Creamy Buckwheat With Fruit
1 1/2 cups of water
1/2 cup of buckwheat
Fresh fruit or canned fruit (if you use store bought, make sure it is no sugar added and in light syrup).

Add the buckwheat and water to a pan. Bring to a rolling boil and then continue to cook for 2-4 minutes until desired creamy consistency. Pour in a bowl and add the fruit and mix it together.


Almond Banana Milk Smoothie
1 Frozen Banana
1 cup of almond milk (unsweetened and unflavored)

Add banana and almond milk to blender or food processor and blend until mixed together.

Again, I will be researching how to cook buckwheat because I don't think I did it right because my cereal looked more like grape nuts than cream 'o' wheat. It was good, just different.

On the menu for lunch: Grilled chicken salad with sesame ginger dressing and grapes. And a baggie of cashews, pumpkin seeds, and sunflower seeds for my afternoon snack. Check back later for the report on that!