Zero Dark 30

Andrew and I have been doing the ‘Whole 30’ diet for the last 30 days. We were inspired by his friends back home in the States who did the diet and recommended it because they noticed improvements in energy, sleep, pain, and weight loss. Basically it involves:

• Eating: meat, seafood, and eggs; vegetables and fruit; natural fats. Ie. any foods with a simple or recognizable list of ingredients, or no ingredients at all because they’re whole and unprocessed.
• Avoiding: added sugars; alcohol, grains, legumes (!), dairy, any artificial anything (e.g., MSG, sulfites etc). Even have to avoid almond milk because as it turns out most cafes use almond milks that have a tonne of additives in them.

Today is our 30^th day. Andrew has lost a tonne of weight and his pants don’t fit him anymore. This means he now has to wear budgies under his boardies (which is what a normal person would do anyway) to save him from flashing the whole beach when his boardies fall down completely. I, on the other hand, actually think I have put on weight. I am attributing this to the exorbitant number of pistachios that I have been eating. However, I can report that I am springing out of bed in the morning and Andrew is the same. Unfortunately no other major improvements to report – we still have temperamental sleep and sore shoulders / backs / elbows etc.

Tomorrow we will be free from the diet and I am giddy about having a flat white and a cinnamon bun for breakfast in the morning. While it has been challenging at times, dinner time has actually been kinda fun – we have enjoyed having an excuse to try a bunch of new recipes rather than just cooking the same old thing all the time. On top of that, Sydney has been in Covid Lockdown so its not like we have had to miss out on dining out in restaurants and bars etc. Some of our favourites recipes are below – we will definitely be making them even though the Zero Dark 30 is now over.

Salad Trio

I originally wanted to use this blog to post about our (relatively) healthy lifestyle but I seem to be drawn to writing just as much about cakes, cocktails and desserts – they always seem more exciting! So to make up for this, I’m posting not one, but three exciting salad recipes. They are exciting because none of them involve lettuce – which I think is so boring. The third recipe for Chicken Pasta Salad with Chilli Lime Dressing, is actually my mum’s recipe which you can also read on her blog  https://lizrecipes.wordpress.com/category/salads-and-vegetables/ #shamelessplug

Dad’s Thai Wombok salad

Everyone reckons that their parents are a bit weird. Especially dad’s – dad’s are particularly weird. And I think that my dad is on the weirder of the ‘weird parent’ scale. On our last visit to Australia, my dad announced that he had become a vegan. And that, since he was looking after Christmas lunch this year, we would be having vegan food unless we wanted to bring non-vegan food to eat.

So this is the dish we were served on Christmas day – Wombok salad. It is a spicy/sweet/sour/tangy bold chinese cabbage salad which is actually fantastic. I was really impressed since the only other thing that my dad makes is Hot Cross Buns which happens once a year at Easter time. So, yes, that’s not weird at all – my dad’s cooking repetoire consists of 2 things: hot cross buns and wombok salad. Here is the recipe for the Wombok salad, we have been making it a lot at home because its super quick, healthy and yummy. Sometimes we add a little bit of minced pork which makes it even better but also less vegan. Thanks for the recipe dad!