Sirtfood Diet - The First Three Days of Phase I
In previous posts I mention that in Phase I (why do I always think of Star Trek phaser guns when I say that?) of the Sirtfood Diet consists of a LOT of juice and only a few meals. The first three days of the week-long phase is only one meal per day...and some chocolate so yay that. I scoured the various recipes available that are high in sirtfoods to find the ones that would A. sound tasty to me and B. use up items I already have in the house. I gathered the recipes that I planned on making, opened each in a separate tab on my computer and laboriously jotted down everything I would need to buy and in what quantities for my shopping list. I was going to post that here for you but then realized you probably have a very different pantry than I do. The bf is a cooking aficionado and is partial to Indian food so we have a lot of items the average person might not have. Massive shout out to Chef Veena for the most incredible recipes, inspiration and instruction (we took an amazing class with her) if you are interested in learning how to cook Indian and other crazy flavorful foods.
I like to use Google Sheets to plan out my diets so I thought I would just copy and paste it here for you to see. I am such a nerd (could you tell from the photo above?). I love to make spreadsheets. It's like a hobby for me. I love to insert all the little check boxes and everything.
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| It might be a bit small there but I will give you the links to the recipes I decided to use. |
Day 1 - The Matcha'll Getcha
There isn't much to say about drinking green juice except that it is there, it's green(ish), and you drink it. I found the flavor palatable at least. I had added the matcha to the entire batch which I will not do the next batch because it is a lot of caffeine to be drinking all day long. I was a little hungry towards the afternoon so I ate my 15-20g of chocolate...and when I say 15-20 g we all know I mean 20g so who do I think I'm trying to kid here? The chocolate and taking my dog to the park helped me forget I was hungry until I got home and started to look at recipes for the next week.
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| Each square of Lindt chocolate is 10 grams. You get five 20 gram servings per bar |
The meal I chose for this day is the Baked Salmon With Creamy Mint Dressing. It has 80 grams of mixed greens and spinach so I used a container of baby kale and spinach for the lot. It also called for spring onions which I put in one of but then I thought of putting in some red onion since it is a sirtfood. There is also a handful of parsely which is a sirtfood. So in my slightly modified version there are three servings of the top 20 sirtfoods in it. And it was tasty. It was HUGE but I happily ate it all and I am not a salmon fan normally. I slept horribly if you even want to call it sleeping. I accredit that to the matcha. Moving forward I stopped drinking the juice in the afternoon until I was out of the matcha-rich stuff.
Weight loss: 3.6 pounds. Not surprising when one who considers a pint of ice cream one serving basically stops eating for a day.
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| It looked good enough to eat before the mint yogurt dressing! |
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| I added a few extra mint leaves to the yogurt sauce for more flavor. |
Day 2 - TOO Much Food?
This day was much more difficult due to the lack of sleep that was mostly my fault and not that of the diet. Fair warning to anyone who reads this though...do not add the matcha to the whole juice. The next juice I make I will add the daily dose of matcha to the first juice, mix it in and drink it in the morning only. If you have read any of my other posts you might know that I suffer from an illness that provides me with unlimited chronic pain. When I am tired I feel the pain all the more. Day 2 for me was not my favorite day. I rested most of the day between naps and barely dragged myself to the dog park so my corgi pupper could see his friends. Being at the park and seeing (from a great distance and through a mask of course) my dog owner friends really picked up my spirits. There is something about getting outside that can rejuvenate the body and spirit. This gave me the energy I needed...well, that and 20 g of dark chocolate...to cook the night's meal, Miso Marinated Baked Cod With Stir-Fried Greens.
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| Asking for 7 oz of cod seemed to perturb the butcher but if it was a small amount, it sure filled me up! |
It was my first time making buckwheat and I overcooked it a little but the taste was still there. I actually made twice the amount I needed to add to a future meal. With the buckwheat, miso, olive oil, celery, parsley, thai chili, kale and soy sauce this meal is freaking packed with sirtfoods. I feel like, even though my favorite veggie is green beans, they could have been left out because it was just way too much food for one person to eat. The plate had to have weighed 10 pounds! It did taste alright but I had to add a lot more soy sauce and salt to get the flavor I am used to in there.
Weight loss: 1.6 more pounds for a total of 5.2 pounds. I will reassert the fact that this means little since I am starving myself of food. This rapid loss will end soon I am certain.
Day 3 - Mistakes Were Made
Sleep still eluded me and I still think it is a caffeine thing because I am wired. I have been staying up late on my new patio playing games on my phone and watching TV shows with the bf. It has been super hot out the last several days and the evenings spent outside have been lovely. I honestly think about just staying out there all night. Then I remember how many deer and skunks and mice come into the backyard at night. If not totally convinced by that I then hear the howling of the foxes and coyotes and think better of it.
Tonight's one meal was Sesame Chicken Salad. It was terrific....well, it was terrific after I spruced it up. Sorry that the recipe is on facebook. It was the only place I could find it isolated. If you are not a member of FB, first of all, I commend you, and second, here is where you can find it as well, you just have to do a bit of scrolling. I made a few pretty big mistakes. I added more honey, sesame oil and soy sauce than was asked. The big mistake I made was making and eating too much. The two previous recipes I had followed were for one serving, despite them being gargantuan. Since this recipe produced yet another giant plate of food I didn't stop to notice that it was two servings. I ate the whole thing. Do I regret it? Not really, I was hungry and it was yummy. But I did gain a little weight. With kale, olive oil, red onion and soy sauce, this had a few servings of sirtfoods. Which means I had several servings. Which should be better! I call foul. Oh well.
Changes I made to the recipe (aside from eating double the amount I was intended to) were as follows. I added at least double the sesame oil and soy sauce. I also could not handle eating more raw kale so I sauteed the kale and pak choi (which I am pretty sure is just bok choi but I bought a bunch with both words on the label to be certain I was using the right ingredient) in some olive oil until they wilted and turned bright green. I then cooled them down in the refrigerator for a few minutes before I added them to the salad. You may also notice in the photos that there is a little buckwheat added in there. I had to use up the extra I cooked the day before so I figured why not in there.
Weight loss: 0.8 lb gain for a total loss of 4.4 pounds.
Summary
I have chosen to not print the recipes here in an effort to keep the posting shorter. I have mentioned the changes I made in each recipe in the paragraphs following. This does not mean you need to make the changes as well but I thought I would be as transparent as I could be. I am accustomed to a lot more salt. Perhaps that is due to my use of the keto diet which calls for excessive amounts of it to stay healthy.
I made a few mistakes, some on purpose (is it still a mistake then?), some by accident but in the end I have managed to stay steady on the diet. I lost a total of 4.4 pounds which is not bad for 3 days. I have also read that drinking water is a good idea and I feel like I may have not been doing that as much as I should have.
I mentioned the match and it's sneaker caffeine so if you are sensitive to it be sure to watch out for it. Another tip is to make sure you drink your juice while it is still cold. A warm slurry of vegetables is good when it's called a soup but not when it's a juice.
