Well,
I made an excellent vegetable pasta dish that was just loaded with nutrients. I can definitely say it was an awesome dinner. Felt so incredibly full after just one bowl.
It consisted of whole wheat, high fiber pasta mixed with steamed kale, roma tomatoes, mushrooms, sweet potatoes, baby zucchini, carrots and broccoli. Quite delicious and pretty easy to make.
I had a very, very vegan day. Super nutritious day actually! I had hot cereal with blueberries, a banana and fresh squeezed orange/apple/mango juice for breakfast. Then, for lunch, I made hummus, spinach and tomato paninis with popcorn, almonds and orange slices on the side. Then for dinner, I made a homemade whole wheat pizza with roasted red peppers, green peppers, pineapples and almond cheese. For dessert, I blended four frozen bananas with a little vanilla extract, some oranges and pineapple chunks. This makes a very awesome ice cream minus the cream and the load of fat! I drank close to a gallon of water today as well. Funny thing is I thought I would be starving but actually felt more than satiated and maybe a little stuffed!
Tags: Apple, Super, gallon, blueberries, Day, orange slices, homemade, spinachWell,
After a series of medical setbacks in the last two years, I have decided to go vegetarian. I’m excited and nervous at the prospect, but due to the health issues I have had, I’ve decided that a plant-based diet will help repair my body. I will regularly post updates on my progress. I know it will be hard, as I’m addicted to animal proteins, sugar and salt, but I’m going to do it and improve my overall health.
I’ve had a series of food allergies and I got Bell’s Palsy last year. I had a previously unknown caffeine allergy, so I’m pretty much eliminating anything bad for me. That includes sweets, caffeine, etc. I’m going whole grains and foods and pretty much all plant based. No dairy included. Nothing with animal proteins!
I’m combining that with daily exercise of 2 hours and a heck of a lot more sleep. Although I’m in good shape at 15.6% body fat, I weigh 217.6 lbs I definitely want to get down to 190 as I want to do IronMan, some more marathons and other triathlons this year. It’s too hard to do with 27 extra lbs I’ve gotta lug around!
Tags: bell s palsy, plant, heck, diet, exercise, caffeine, sweets, prospect
Avocado Boats
An unlikely topic for sure, but a great one. As I was making an excellent latin-inspired turkey soft taco dinner this past week, I was also making fresh guacamole as a side dish. I’m slicing and dicing, scooping the avocados diligently lost in processed thought. My daughter Bailey says to me “You should use those avocado shells like bowls to put the guacamole in.” Keep in mind that Bailey is my own personal Martha Stewart, giving the advice of a hostess/sous chef sage since she was knee-high to a grasshopper. I respond to her by saying, “You know Bailey; that is an excellent idea.” So the idea of the “Avocado Boats” started right there from fruition to completion.
So, I started off by completely cleaning the inside of the avocado shells so that they were essentially empty vessels for latin-infused goodness. The idea here was to prevent any kind of bad stuff from growing inside of the avocado shells and to prevent any form of oxidation of avocado remnants. Once I had them cleaned out, I rinsed lightly the inside of the shells to make them nice and smooth.
I then proceeded to put them on a plate and stuck them in the freezer for an hour. When they came out, they were hard shells that could support just about any food dish. I plated the food with Spanish rice in one avocado boat and some of that fresh guacamole in another. Topped it with some cilantro and they were good to go!
As I was taking Bailey’s idea to fruition, I realized that this would be great for those who are on diets and/or worrying about portion control within their diets. Guacamole is high in good monounsaturated fatty acids, but one still shouldn’t eat too much of it. A side benefit of this with regard to guacamole is that it keeps the guacamole nice and chilled. The kids gave a definitive thumbs-up with a cheering “This is a do-again!” approval. Olé! Win for Dad, inspired by Bailey.
Tags: organization, guacamole, latin, freezer, plate, rightHello all,
So for the last six months, I have been super busy starting a new company called build.Automate, Inc. As part of the startup, I was also developing a new product to go with that launch called the XData Toolkit. It was a fairly large venture that took an inordinate amount of time professionally and personally. The XData Toolkit is a WordPress plugin that allows one to, well, here is the product description:
“The XData Toolkit is an XML/XSLT transformation engine that allows one to retrieve data from multiple datasources such as MySQL databases, XML, RSS Feeds and REST-based Web Services. This toolkit is a powerful way to build your WordPress sites faster and more dynamically. Integrate scores of different data sources into your site without the need for custom coding and style it using XML standards-based XSL Transformation. Build queries online with the Dynamic Query Interface Builder. Create stylesheets without expensive development tools!”
Since its launch last week, I have been very pleased at the response to its acceptance within the WordPress community. I have 6 more pre-determined versions coming out in the next two months that will build incremental features. This tool has been a long time coming and will allow just about anybody to create large scale WordPress systems with large amounts of dynamic data. I look forward to its evolution from last weeks’ release to a full scale product suite, which is where it is headed. I plan to take on the big boys of XML editors by offering an open source product that does amazing stuff. I also plan to push the WordPress Content Management System into new frontiers.
My company build.Automate, Inc. has the operating mantra of “Superior User Experience, Superior Quality, Superior Service, Superior Results”. You can get more information at my company’s website at http://www.buildautomate.com .
