FMD Phase 3: Shamrock Shake Recipe

A long day of running around with my two beautiful kiddos, workout, business, and then dinner at the pool... all to be capped off with the most delicious dessert. Oh and the best part? It has no sugar or sweeteners added AND it has veggies. Seriously, it was almost too sweet for me and that is saying a lot because my sweet tooth is about as big as they get! I am definitely making this one again. :)

I saw this recipe over here at detoxinista and knew I needed to try it. I LOVE (I don't know how I can emphasize that more ha!) shamrock shakes. March is the only month of the year I patronize McDonald's because I need at least one each year. If there is a legitimate substitute I am going to be all over it. St Patrick's Day 12 months of the year!!

The verdict: YES. YES. YES. It is a winner! :)

I am working on this Fast Metabolism Diet and Phase 3 is perfectly timed for the weekends, to indulge a little bit but you have to find healthy alternatives like this one. So here's the breakdown for this recipe:

1/4 avocado
1 cup Almond Milk (I use unsweetened)
5 dates pitted
1 handful of spinach
1/4 teaspoon of peppermint
1 big handful of ice

Dump it all in the blender and blend until it is smooth. Here's a tip from my wonderful sister... soak the dates for about a half day to soften them. They will blend easier! I accidentally spilled a little more peppermint in the blender so it came out almost too sweet but it was definitely delicious.

So go run out to the store now if you don't have all of these ingredients and treat yourself to something sweet without feeling guilty about it!

Have a great weekend! :)

<-Kassy->

Fast Metabolism Diet: Week 1 Review

So I made it through the first (of four) week of the Fast Metabolism Diet and I think like most changes there were positive and negative so this second week I am trying to put an upside spin on those negatives. Here are my thoughts on each of the phases:

Phase 1: Fruit & Carbs

This was a pretty easy start. Who doesn't love fruit all day? I love fruit and carbs are decently easy but keep in mind it is not the carbs you might think of... it's gluten free and no added sweeteners. I turned to organic brown rice, quinoa, and sprouted grains. I tried this recipe on Haylie Pomroy's (creator of FMD) website for brown rice flour tortillas. Yuck. Seriously gross. But overall, the phase was pretty easy. Here are my phase specific tips:
- Plan your cardio right after a snack/fruit to feed off of that boost in blood sugar. If I didn't then I got lightheaded.
- Keep it easy if you have to pack a lunch. I found individual microwave packs of brown rice that cooked in 3 minutes.

Phase 2: Veggies & Protein

I imagine this phase is difficult for about 90% of the people attempting this diet. It is pretty difficult to eat almost only vegetables and protein for two days straight. I literally forced myself to eat on that second day but started finding some hacks that worked pretty good. Here are my tips:
- Use your seasonings!
- Make a dressing-less salad less dry with fresh lemon or lime juice.
- Find a jerky that you love. It is so worth it for those snacks. The jerky protein bars I tried were not good! But it is probably just personal preference. See picture for reference.

Phase 3: Healthy Fats
The weekend is so difficult, especially over the summer. We are on the go and have parties and barbeques (we're just that popular... hoping you are picking up on my sarcasm!) and it makes it hard to stick to this regimen but I found myself dedicated to at least making better choices. For instance, we had a boating outing with our small group and I stuck to only two gluten free items and one gluten free beer, Omission. It was pretty good! And I only had one. :) On Sunday after church we went on an impromptu shopping outing and the food court had zero options (big surprise) so I went with what I thought would be the path of least damage and got a fruit and non-dairy smoothie. I do believe they added sweetener but wasn't positive. It is something I need to nail down for the next weekend! Here are my tips:


- Stay on top of your meal plan... carry your snacks with you. A little baggie of raw nuts is perfect.
- Don't be afraid of one cheat... be afraid of one cheat at every meal or even one a day. When you give yourself slack you just fall back into old habits.
- Make yourself something "sweet" and tasty. This is a great phase to feel like you're treating yourself. I made a PB Chocolate shake for breakfast Saturday morning and it was perfect. Recipe to come!


A picture of my son making friends with all of the mannequins when shopping on Sunday... He is pretty funny! "Anoter fake person! Take a piture pease." He was making friends everywhere we went. :)

Here is a link to my meal plan from last week. I tried updating it to reflect what I actually did so you would have an idea. But it should be used for just that- ideas. I will post my meals each week and you can see what I did to help with your own meal planning. I highly recommend trying new things each day and finding favorites that you can plug in later. I worked up Week 2 meal plan with a couple of favorites but still incorporated new ones. I want to come out of this with meal options that the family will love and that I can continue to make without reverting back to old habits.

Overall the first week was a success. I am going to slide this in at the end because I don't like it to be the main point or highlight. This diet as, I mentioned earlier, is more focused on eating right and getting your body back on track over weight loss, though it is likely to be a positive consequence. I lost about 8lbs in those 7 days. I feel pretty good, have energy, not starving, and I love that I am losing some of my squishiness haha but most of all I am starting to feel better about saying "NO" to sweets. That is my number one goal here!

Let me know if you decide to try the diet, if you have questions, or if you have ideas for that crazy phase 2!

<-Kassy->

Fast Metabolism Diet: Getting Started

A lot of changes in the last two months! I have accepted and started a job at a defense contractor doing a similar job that I previously did before I was a full time mom. AND my husband is now a full time dad. It is always difficult during transitions but it's all been filled with blessings! That is the reason, though, for my lack of posting. It's been busy working out a new groove, a new routine. Now that I am settling in I want to share about a new "diet" I started.

Let me start off with saying that this "diet" is less what you think of a "diet" and more of encouraging good choices. A diet, based on the dictionary definition, is "food or feed habitually eaten or provided". What you normally eat can be a good diet, a bad diet, a weight loss diet, or a lean diet. It is not just weight loss but it can be! In general, based on the normative American diets, we generally associate a diet as an action to lose weight and eat healthy. The Fast Metabolism Diet is very similar. The goal is not to lose weight per se but more on the side of eating healthy. The premise behind the FMD is that you reset your metabolism, clean out your system, and have a fresh start. While I need all of those things I also read that people stopped having sugar cravings (mine are so awful) and maximized their workouts.

I started the diet this past Monday (July 6) and it has gone surprisingly well so far. I am on day 6 of the 28 days and on day 2 of phase 3 in the first week. A mouthful there right?! So here is the basic premise of how it works.

There are 3 Phases in each of the 4 weeks for 28 days total. Here are the phases broken down:

There are phase specific exercises to do as well.

Phase 1: Cardio... goes well with all of those carbs!
Phase 2: Strength Training... to pair nicely with your protein.
Phase 3: De-stress Activity... which matches the laid back weekend attitude!

For me I focused on running for phase 1 cardio. Some options are intervals (help you recover if you aren't a runner just yet), elliptical, spinning, or just plain running! On phase 2 you can pick a strength workout to try. Since you are only doing strength once per week you will want to do multiple muscle groups during your workout, more dynamic strength training. There are plenty of at-home, body weight workouts on YouTube. For phase 3 my choice is yoga but meditation, quiet/no tech time, a massage will all work too.

Every week you follow this routine with a few other rules and it helps to reset your metabolism, get rid of your sweet tooth, and give you more energy. It is also an opportunity to get your regular diet back on track.

Here are a few more rules:

1. No caffeine
2. No alcohol
3. No sugar or sweeteners (with two exceptions)
4. No gluten
5. No dairy
6. Eat 5 times a day
7. Eat within 30 minutes of waking up
8. Eat organic produce and nitrate free meat (when possible)
9. Drink half your body weight in ounces every day
10. Do the phase specific exercises

I know I know. No one likes rules but these are for your benefit. So if you are dedicated to making a change then jump in... if you're not then you might not be ready for this yet.

I will post some recipes and a recap each week + menu for the next week. Hopefully that will help spark some ideas if you are interested in trying this out. Let me know if you try it and how it works for you. Keep in mind it is important to plan ahead. When you have to eat every 3 hours you need to be ahead of the game. Also, meal planning and prepping is key.

Tomorrow I will post on my review for week 1and the meal plan I used (with links to recipes). I'll give some information on what my results have been too.... You won't want to miss it. I've been surprised!

See you back here tomorrow! :)

<-Kassy->