Staying Healthy: Eating & Exercise (5/30-6/5)

Our meat supply is slowly dwindling, but not quickly enough for me, honestly. We have been enjoying our meatless meals but quite a bit of meat protein still remains to be used. I’ve added some more ingredients to our pantry for future meatless meals: cashew butter, tahini, falafel mix, and bulgur wheat and am looking forward to creating meals with those in the future (the cashew butter though is for me to have on toast for breakfast). Amazon is the most cost effective place for us to find natural pantry items for the most part – local stores’ prices other than Costco or Walmart are usually way too expensive. Walmart, we’ve discovered, for as small as its grocery section is has a surprising amount of natural and organic options at very reasonable prices.

The first vegetarian cookbook I reserved at the library, Mark Bittman’s How To Cook Everything Vegetarian, came off of hold and I’ve been going through it, although it sadly appears not to be a good fit with a Kindle. It takes a while to maneuver through the book and find different recipes. It’s maybe a book I’ll have to buy (or suggest for a Christmas present). The America’s Test Kitchen vegetarian book has also come off of hold, but I haven’t been able to go through it yet. I hope it will work better with the Kindle. My best source for vegetarian/vegan recipes continues to be the Internet, and I’m just getting started looking on Pinterest.

Below are what we ate for dinner this past week. There were four meals that included meat, three without. The carrot salad on Wednesday was the biggest hit of the week – I will post the recipe for it soon. Both Brett and I could have eaten the entire bowl of it in one sitting and I cannot wait to make it again. The leftovers were great on the roasted marinated artichoke sandwiches we had a couple of days later – very yummy!.

Sunday: Grilled Italian sausages; pasta with marinara; roasted zucchini

Monday: Hamburgers; 3-bean salad

Tuesday: Grilled teriyaki chicken; zaru soba; cucumber slices

Wednesday: Italian sausage & artichoke mini pizzas

Thursday: Chicken-less nuggets; steamed artichoke; carrot & cilantro salad

Friday: Cheese board

Saturday: Roasted artichoke sandwiches; 3-bean salad

We’re enjoying the baked oatmeal for our desserts. We started off the week with a blueberry-banana version, and finished the week with a strawberry-banana one. They’ve been much more satisfying than a regular piece of cake or ice cream, and healthier too!

Below is what’s planned for dinner next week. I almost can’t believe that in this warm weather we’re having soup not once but twice, but it is what it is. Depending on what kind of mini pizzas get made we could be having four meatless meals versus three:

• Chili pork sauce with baked sweet potato
• Red pepper & tomato soup with toasted cheese sandwiches
• Mabo dofu
• Chicken & pasta soup with vegetables
• Mini pizzas
• Cheese board
• Bulgur Mexicana

Our week of walking started out well, and other than one day spoiled by rain we got in good walks every day. We took our usual Sunday off, and then did a long walk at the park on Memorial Day, around the perimeter. On Tuesday we walked two miles on the Waiokapua Trail at Barking Sands, and on Wednesday we walked three and a half miles on the eastside beach path after my hair appointment. It was hot, hot, hot at both those places but there was also a breeze both times that helped made the temperature bearable. Rain kept us home on Thursday, but Friday and Saturday we did perimeter walks at the park again. We love going later in the day when things have cooled down a bit and we get shade almost the entire way on the perimeter walk. There are also fewer people at the park, almost like we have the place to ourselves.

All is well with our health otherwise. I’m getting labs done this week for my annual cholesterol check, and all lab work for Brett looks good following his surgery. Hopefully we’ll have our teeth back in shape soon as well. Coming back to Kaua’i has been very good for our health overall – we’re stronger, we’re eating better, we’ve lost weight. Noho’ana hau’ole: life is good.