Land of the Free and Home of the Flavorful

When you live in a country that affords you every personal freedom/luxury under the sun, the natural progression is to embrace it as your right, not your privilege.

We made it to the end of our first 'work week' with no; meats, sweets (including artificial sweeteners, or anything with sugar in it) dairy, or animal byproducts (eggs, etc..), and drinking water as our only beverage. It's crazy thinking that even as restrictive as it's been, that we are still better off than those that lived thousands of years ago. Pretty sure back in the day they couldn't run to their local Trader Joe's and have their pick of any fruit/veggie they desired whether in season or not! Lovin my strawberries about now, and no, I don't care that I paid $5 for the basket of 'em!

Five days in and its glaringly apparent just how much I took for granted!

While I am TOTALLY jonesing for so many amazing flavors, I am actually fairly amazed and impressed by the varied menu we've been able to maintain this week.
Since a couple of you asked, and I'm going to call that "by popular demand"... as I think there are only a couple people that actually read this regularly :) below is what we've been munching on this week.

Monday:
Breakfast: Oatmeal with Apples, Cinnamon, and Allspice (Apple Pie Oatmeal)
Lunch: Lentil soup with veggies for me, and a split pea option for Kev (no meat)
Dinner: Stuffed Green Peppers (Stuffing: Brown Rice, Black Beans, Corn, Cilantro, lime juice, and Cumin)

Tuesday:
Breakfast: Kashi Flakes w/ dried strawberries & Soy Milk
Lunch: Bowls of Grammie Sum's Veggie Soup (sans the meat) (tomatoes, celery, carrots, onions, head of red cabbage, all through a food processor, brought to boil and then a box of Barley. Salt and pepper to taste)
Dinner: Grilled Marinated Portabello Mushroom tops and baked rosemary sweet potato fries.

Wednesday:
Breakfast: Granola with fruit and Soy Milk
Lunch: Brown Rice Tortilla's (found them at Trader Joe's) then made a black bean salsa mixture for the filling w/ lettuce (Black Beans, Corn, Avocados, tomatoes, cilantro, jalapenos, and onions)
Dinner: Whole Wheat spaghetti with a sugar free marinara (surprisingly hard to find), sauteed onions, mushrooms, garlic, and zucchini

Thursday:
Breakfast: Granola again (it was good :)
Lunch: Kev had left over sgetti (That's short for Spaghetti for those who thought Caleb may have just nabbed my computer and started typing) and I had some more of Grammie's Veg soup... I seriously love the stuff!
Dinner: Weird... It was the EXACT same as lunch, except I also made us a each a Strawberry/Romain/Walnut salad to go with our red wine/vinaigrette dressing.

***Notice the theme going here... repetition ;)... Make LARGE meals, then you don't have to keep coming up with NEW stuff, you can enjoy the LEFT OVERS!!! ****

Friday:
Breakfast: Went with raisins in the 'ol Oatmeal this morning... Look out!
Lunch: Decided Lettuce Wraps would be a nice variation (Same mixture as before)
Dinner: Veggie stir-fry in a "curry simmer" I found at the store meeting the ingredient criteria, and will put it over a bed of rice. Salads on the side.

While it does take some creativity, and lower set of standards when it comes to judging dishes as a 'success', its not impossible to maintain a quasi-normal menu!
If you're wondering again what in the world I'm using as my 'guide' on what we can/cannot eat, we found it at the following website: http://daniel-fast.com/.

Next week will be extra tough for both Kevin and I. I will be following the fast while away from the house, being that UBER picky person at the restaurant... and Kev... Well.... He won't have ME! Who else did you think I was making all these varied dishes for... I could eat my Grandma's veggie soup for lunch AND dinner for all 21 DAYS! Don't worry babe, I'll stock you up!