Pregnant and Raw: Food that is. Part 2

I just called in what I hope will be my last insulin refill.

If you missed part 1 here is a link.

Borrowed from Medical Daily

I have been injecting insulin for four years. I do not like taking up to 8 shots of insulin a day. I do not like the fear that comes with running out of insulin before I am able to refill it. Insulin as it turns out, is not the answer to healing diabetes. The answer is FOOD. 

Food has been my enemy almost my whole life. I have been overweight from the age of twelve on. I believe I hit 200 pounds sometime around thirteen or fourteen. I am tall so no one ever thought I was that fat. 

I ate my feelings.

I would eat "comfort food" ie: cheesy and fatty and carb-o-licious.  I would eat to celebrate, in a big family this usually means birthday cake! I would eat if I had a bad day. I would eat if I had a good day. I didn't just eat when I was depressed, I would eat when I was bored, or tired, or thirsty! It's a well known fact that Americans as a whole are dehydrated. We mix up our thirst signals for hunger and so we eat. 

Back to topic. 

Food is still my enemy. I am sitting here eating carrots. I would much rather be working my way through a dozen hot wings with bleu cheese dressing! (It doesn't help that I am watching "the chew") I crave  food that  is BAD! 

Bacon Cheese Fries from Nathan's? Yes please!

<---- This is what I would want to eat. Daily if possible. I may eventually have gotten sick of bacon cheese fries, but I guess we will never know. 

As I have been surfing blogs lately for raw food recipes I have come across a new term. The "Standard American Diet" ie: the SAD.... Sad, it's kinda true huh? Fast food, convenience food, schools that refer to french fries as a vegetable! SAD! 

My diet was SAD. BUT, <----that's a big but!

I am happy to say that I am now in day 3 of my raw food 30 days. I have already lost 7 pounds. For those of you freaking out b/c I am pregnant and losing weight, worry not! I am that overweight that in pregnancy it's actually healthy for me to lose weight. As long as I am eating enough calories for the baby and I am getting all of the right nutritional components for the baby, weight loss is actually a positive thing! 

Eating raw is not easy. I don't know if you can tell, but I am a little food obsessed. I love raw veggies and I love salad. I also love whipped cream and oreos (not necessarily together, but maybe!). I know this is the right thing for me. I know this is the right thing for my body. I know this is the right thing for my baby! 

cucumber slices topped with nut taco "meat" and avocado slices

Pardon the grainy photo, but this was dinner the first night. --->

It was better than I was anticipating! Flavors were good. It's been so dang hot here that a cool dinner is welcome. I can do this. You would be amazed what you can do with some nuts and seasoning. 

Join me on my journey. I will post what I am making and hopefully I can come up with my own recipes soon. 

In the mean time I am scouring the interwebs for raw recipes. I have found a few blogs that I am adoring right now. 

My next adventure in raw eating is to somehow find all the ingredients to make young thai coconut kefir and yogurt! This is not an easy task in my small New York State town. 

On the menu tomorrow:

Breakfast smoothie: Spinach, strawberries, blueberries, and grapefruit juice. 

Lunch: Whatever I can find at the farmers market.

Dinner: The same.

Snacks: Fruit and veggies and perhaps a lara bar!

I know this blog is all over the place, but so am I! Keep me in your prayers while I continue this journey. I need all the help I can get!

Pregnant and Raw: Food that is. Part 1.

 18 weeks pregnant with #3. 

Expecting Baby Number Three!

Surprise! I mean, it certainly was for us. I am diabetic. I don't know if I ever mentioned this before. Being pregnant and diabetic is not easy. I was diagnosed when I was 20. I wasn't even able to legally drink yet! So not fun. I have been on insulin since week 12 of my first pregnancy. This was summer of 2008. I gained negative weight during that pregnancy. Negative 5 pounds. I ate really well and my body tolerated the insulin really well. Then I lost 35 pounds in the first six weeks post partum. With my son, (pregnancy #2) I got pregnant in early August of 2009. My daughter was 6 months old when I found out I was expecting again! I gained 50 ish pounds during my second pregnancy. What can I say. All I wanted was fries dipped in mayo! I was perfectly happy for 25 years hating mayo. My son, apparently thought the stuff was wonderful. I lost all of 10 pounds from my second pregnancy. My son weighed 10 pounds 7 ounces. Yeah... in other words, I didn't lose any of the weight I gained while I was pregnant with my son. 

So, I say all of this to say that I started this pregnancy all WRONG!

I had become lax with my blood sugar levels. My son had self weaned at 17 months. He is now just older than 2! Now that my breasts weren't being used for food, I would drink wine occasionally* (dude, I know... alcohol?!?!) YES! Wine! It's not bad for you (well, YOU anyway) It is bad for me because I am diabetic and drinking wine is like eating spoonfuls of refined sugar for my pancreas! I ate poorly, I would eat CHEESEBURGERS! I would eat pasta and ice cream and drink super sugary coffee drinks and everything else that is on the DON'T TOUCH IF YOU ARE DIABETIC list. Long story short: (don't say "even longer"? please?) My blood sugar levels were not ideal far baby making.

Apparently it didn't matter that I was being awful to my body. 

*sigh* 

Yay!!! Baby number 3 is on the way. From the moment I found out I was expecting I changed my diet. However, my goal of being off insulin by the time I got around to baby number 3 seemed to be a loss. I FAILED. I got pregnant with an overweight and diabetic body again! I felt shocked, then guilty, then depressed, then... I got over it. 

I decided that pregnancy lasts awhile and I had time to make up for a bad beginning. At first, I started with a no carb diet. After a week this did not help my diabetes in the slightest, which alarmed me. You would think that if no carbs(sugar) were being consumed that my blood sugar would be normal. My Doc told me to steadily increase my insulin doses. This worked well enough until just before week 12. At week 12 my Doc put me on a sliding scale with my insulin. This means that I had to give myself a shot before every single meal and snack. This was the best control for my blood sugar yet. I was able to eat what I wanted (within reason) and not have the worry of high blood sugar. You would think this was the answer for me. I could eat well, or not so well and just take insulin in a similar manner to how my pancreas works, right? Wrong. Shooting insulin is not the answer. For a short while, it's not a bad thing. It is not the only answer to a diabetic though. Insulin is a treatment, not a cure.

My food habits needed a change. Taking up to 8 shots of insulin a day is no way to have a healthy pregnancy. Eating whatever I felt like led to a weight gain of 16 pounds by week 16. Any weight gain for me in pregnancy is not advised as I started out really overweight. I managed to gain weight even though I was really sick from week 6-16. 

I needed a better option for food. I needed food to heal me and not to hurt me. It was suggested that I check out a documentary and so I did. 

I watched the documentary titled "Simply raw: curing diabetes in 30 days".  This movie has changed the way I think about my diabetes. 

'Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food' - Hippocrates

Stay tuned for Part 2

*No drinking occurred during pregnancy to my recollection. 




For Part 2 click here!

I have not abandoned my blog.

Hello all. We have been making some big changes in our household. After watching forks over knives My husband and I decided to transition into a vegan lifestyle. I have a lot of recipes that I am trying and I am making some up as I go along. I will be posting a lot more in the future. There are so many great things you can do with whole grains and veggies! So stay tuned and prepare for the onslaught of deliciousness!

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Rollin' rollin' rollin'...... SUSHI!

We left off with some perfectly cooked Sushi Rice. Now it's time for the roll up! Gather all of your ingredients! I chose seaweed wraps (nori) and I like some crunch so cucumber and green onion, I prefer smaller scallions, but the supermarket didn't have any? Weird right? Beautiful tuna on the non wooden cutting board. Spicy mayo, wasabi (I prefer the powder, but the DH couldn't find any). Below is my set up. From left to right: bowl of water, soy sauce, spicy mayo, sushi rice vinegar, tuna mixture, sushi rice, veggies, sharp knives, sushi rolling mat, plate for finished product, wasabi, plastic cutting board for fish, and sushi nori.

Everything you will need to get rolling!

Yes I plastic wrap my sushi rolling mat, it's not exactly eco friendly, 

but doing a non-nori wrap roll  would be super tough without it.

You will notice the meat of the fish runs in parallel lines. As shown below cut with the grain, opposite of beef and chicken. I started by cutting some pieces of sashimi (raw thin slices). Then I cut long thin strips to roll into the sushi rolls. I also cut some tiny cubes to mix with spicy mayo to make a spicy tuna roll.

pretty sashimi: don't knock it till you try it. 

mmmmmmmm.....

cubes for spicy tuna and strips for plain tuna roll

So when you're ready to roll, wet your hands, you do not want to attempt to spread sushi rice with dry hands.   

I also put droplets of water on the sushi rolling mat to help my pre-folded  nori stick to the mat. 

I didn't measure the rice, I just grabbed a couple of hand fulls. You can have as much or as little rice as you want there's no rule here as far as I know. 

You want to leave about 1/2" to 1" of nori at one end without rice so the nori will stick to itself. 

Then add your roll's innards: fish first then veggies. 

Flick a little bit of water on the exposed nori at the top, this will help the nori stick to itself.

Get rolling!

Turn the mat tightly over until the nori wraps over itself.

Squeeze the mat with both hands from the center out. Do this a few times until it feels compressed enough, you will know that it's too loose when you go to cut the roll and it just kinda falls apart. 

Roll the mat out and you should see a whole sushi roll like below.

Beautiful!

Wet a very sharp knife and with a sawing motion just till you break through the nori then a straight slice downward all the way through. You can slice the roll however you want, again no rule here. You can see I use my hand to hold the slice I'm making and the rest of the roll, I find it helps the roll stay together. 

Again... beautiful! 

And... pause.

Okay now that the DH and I have eaten at least half of that roll I can continue with the next roll.

The no nori rice roll.

This is not for the faint of heart.

Take some rice and spread it out like before. Wet hands again!

I used a little less rice this time the roll was slightly less big around.

Plain tuna this time. Same veggies though.

Oh yum.

Now, because you don't have the same foundation this roll will be slightly tougher to well... roll.

Take care to make sure the innards don't move. 

Also, lay the fish down about 1/2" further in on the rice bed this time.

Roll it up!

Same squeezing motion as before, but don't squeeze so hard that you make your 

sushi mat poop and puke at the same time, that wouldn't be as nice.

There you have it folks!

Wet sharp knife again.

These slices will not be as pretty, as the rice may fall apart a little. 

Yeah... yum... again!

Close up!

Traditionally the Japanese eat sushi with their hands, but chopsticks look pretty. 

mmmmmmmmm.... sashimi.... 

Alright enough already, go make your own! Stop drooling on your keyboard!!!

Next I'm thinking breakfast?

Sushi!

It's been awhile, apologies all around!

It's the beginning of summer time! When summer rolls around I want salads and fresh foods and crunchy stuff. I went grocery shopping today. I had Fiona in the cart and Henry tied to my back. (Does that sound bad?) I mean, I had Henry in his comfortable amazing mei tai carrier that I made by the way. In any case, I was perusing around the fish counter and I saw the most beautiful tuna steaks...

Inspiration hit me. sushi........SUSHI!!!

I finished shopping.

By the way, my kids behaved like little angels for the hour and a half we were in the crowded supermarket.

Here's what you need to know about Sushi rice. It's not difficult to make. Let me repeat myself, it's not difficult to make! I used brown rice because it's healthy. Fiber and whole grain and all that you know.

I made a lot of rice, if you want to make one or two rolls the recipe follows:

Sushi rice:

2/3 cup rice
salt
a little more than a cup of water
Japanese sushi rice vinegar 2 Tbsp.

Place the rice in a bowl and rinse it 3-5 times until the water is clear. Place the wet rice in a sauce pan (one with a heavy bottom preferably) Add the water (I actually didn't measure the water, I stopped when the water was about 1" above the rice)

Add salt dash style I suppose. I didn't add too much.

Without a lid (yet) bring the rice to a boil. As soon as it's boiling add the lid. Turn the burner down as low as it goes.

Now, here's the part that may be difficult for some, read: me or anyone else with patience issues. You need to leave it alone. For like 45 minutes at least. Wait till all the water is absorbed and then keep the lid on and let it sit for at least ten more minutes off the heat.  

After all that you should have warm perfectly cooked brown rice. It should be sticky and sticking together, not mushy, but sticky. Place the rice into a wooden or glass bowl. Not metal, vinegar will react with metal bowls. Splash the vinegar on the rice and stir. And voila!

Sushi rice.

This is only part one of Sushi rolls. The rice. Tomorrow *fingers crossed* I will post about rolling sushi.

Here's a teaser photo or two!

Stay tuned....