DÉFI DIET - 1

Eeeeeeettttttt c’est parti!

Aujourd’hui j’ai pris mon p’tit déj typique : 200g fromage blanc (2pro), 1 pêche (1glu), 2 almonds effilées (0.5 lip), et un grand café....

puis je me suis lancée en cuisine pour préparer quelques recettes Zone à base d’aubergines que j’ai inventée hier soir. Lorsque ce blog peux aussi pratiquement être appelé ‘La Chef paresseuse’, j’ai utilisé les aubergines grillé de chez Picard (aka congélé)… un sac de 300g m’a donné assez d’aubergines pour 2 blocs de glucides (1½ verre d’aubergine cuit par bloc).

Ingrédients:

Recette 1 : Parmigiana aux aubergines [3 blocs]

1 ½  verre d’aubergines [1glucide]

1⅓ verre épinards cuit (aussi de Picard) [1 glucide]

1 tomate [1 glucide]

28g de fromage râpé [1 protéine]

1cuillière de café d’huile de coco [3 lipides]

100g de tofu firm – ecrasé avec une fourchette [2 protéine]

Recette 2 : Mini-Pizzas à base aubergine [3 blocs]

1 ½  verre d’aubergines [1 glucide]

1⅓ verre épinards cuit (aussi de Picard) [1 glucide]

1 tomate [1 glucide]

28g de fromage chèvre [1 protéine]

1cuillière de café d’huile de coco  [3 lipides]

100g de tofu firm – coupé comme tu veux [2 protéine]

Directions :

pour les 2 recettes:

-       -   Faire réchauffer les aubergines à la pôele avec l’huile (tout, pour les 2 recettes), puis divise en 2 parts égaux

-       -   Faire cuire les tomates avec épices et herbes aux choix (j’ai utilisé du corriandre) jusqu’au point qu’ils soient presqu’un sauce.

-          Recette 1 : fait des couches avec les aubergines, épinards, ‘sauce’ de tomates, et tofu, puis fini par un dernier couche de fromage râpé.

 Recette 2 : met les aubergines sur un plaque et les traitent comme base de pizza par mettre du ‘sauce’, des épinards, des morceaux de tofu, et des morceaux de chèvre là-dessus. 

      Et voilà, deux repas végétarienne de 3 blocs chaqu’un, à base aubérgine. Si vous voulez éviter le fromage, du fromage soja pourra être utilisé à la place du fromage dans les deux recettes.

The final Countdown...

Last day before the défi!

Today I sent in my pictures and measurements for the challenge. I have to do the same at the end of each week to see if the diet is working or not, and to 'compete' to change the most over the span of 8 weeks.

Today also involved a revamped breakfast. I made it a proper 2 blocks all around by subtracting the cereal and the almonds from my fromage blanc, and after calculating that 100g was 1P, 0.5C, 0.75F adding a peach and 2 almonds worth of slivered almonds to 200g of fromage blanc. Very tasty.

Lunch was a picnic by the lake for me of 4 Blocks protein powder, 1 orange (2C), 1 pear (2C, and 12 almonds (4F). I had a hard time eating all that fruit, which means that 4 blocks might be a bit much for me all in one meal.

I got hungry about an hour earlier than I expected (probably because the liquid protein is digested much faster than solid proteins), so I decided to allow myself my final 'cheat' meal before the diet begins tomorrow and had a big Mcdonalds Salad which would be allllmost zone if it didn't have fried onions and if the goat cheese wasn't breaded and deep fried too. I also had a piece of toast with a borderline obscene amount of nutella on it and a cup of chocolate milk (which is 1 block protein, and 2 carbs, so I can theoretically incorporate it into my diet on occasion if I add a dash of protein powder or a boiled egg). And voila,with both fast-food and chocolate fixes taken care of, I'm now ready to face this 2 month challenge!


Tomorrow I'll be back on track for the whole day. Starting with grocery shopping for some more tofu and protein powder, boiling a half dozen eggs, and making another enormous batch of Zone pancakes, and so on. Tomorrow will also be my first day attempting to balance out my dinner with a protein shake, as well as attempting to keep portion sizes appropriate to block sizes without being able to weigh or measure, or without knowing how much of ingredients like olive oil or cheese are actually going into the dish. I guess I'll see after a few weeks if the attempts to compromise dinner are working or if it's not balanced enough to prevent night-time fat storage...

Anyway, to any an all preparing for this or any other diet challenge, bon courage!

Day 12 - learning more about the zone and getting sad news about my breakfast...

Today we had a meeting at the Box about the diet and the challenge. It is 2 months long, Starts Monday, and involves sending in pictures and measurements weekly.

I also learned ways that this challenge is going to be harder and ways it will be easier than I thought given my current living/eating situation in the evenings. First of all, it will be easier because of the addition of Protein powder to my evening meals when I go to my room after dinner means that I can manage to almost balance out dinners like what we had tonight (Tarte au roquefort and pâtes au carbonera...eg. 10 tons of unfavourable carbs and fats, zero healthy fats and almost no protein)... however bad news is I am not measuring the things like crème fraiche and grated cheese that are going into these types of dishes, so I actually have NO idea of the proportions I'm eating to be able to accurately get the 40/30/30 balance of (respectively) carbs, proteins, and good fats.

I did get a handy list of foods and their zone block amounts so that I am not constantly having to bring my computer into the kitchen to cook, and we chatted a lot about different things - including how to calculate your block needs for the day:

Sedentary:  weight in Kg x 0.75 = _____, then /7 = # of blocks
Moderately active (2-4 workouts a week or so): Kg x 1 to 1.5, then /7  = # of blocks
Very active (5-7 workouts a week or so) Kg x 1.5 to 2, then /7  = # of blocks
Insane: (8+ workouts a week) Kg x 2 to 2.5, then/7  = # of blocks

(the workouts numbers are just my guesses based on the categories... you may need more or fewer blocks depending on workout intensity, the rest of your daily activities, etc.)

Anyway, I have calculated myself around 14.5 blocks using 1.3 as my 'activity' number, so we'll say about 14.

Sad news about my breakfast...We also talked about fromage blanc, which is what I have been using as my breakfast protein. As it turns out it is not just a pure protein block - depending on the composition (eg. say your FB is about 7g protein, 4g carbs, and 3g fats), you have to take into account the other nutrients as blocks as well (eg. that FB would be 1P, 0.5C, 1F)... which means tomorrow morning I'll have to take a look at my brand of FB and adjust my daily accompanying foods accordingly.

Anyway, looks like this is going to be QUITE the challenge after all....especially with the aforementioned lack of control over dinner... but one quote in the Zone presentation struck me particularily today, and that was the following:



Coupled with the new Crossfit Montpellier NO EXCUSES shirts I'm seeing all around town (natually, as I go all around town with montpellier crossfitters), it made me realize that if I don't even try I won't have the chance to be surprisingly successful, or even just half successful... so I'm gonna try everything in my power to control what I can and manage what I can't as best I can, and hopefully I'll still see some results over the next 2 months!

Some food for thought for all of you too I guess... now speaking of food, my last cupcake before the challenge starts awaits! (Juuuuust kidding...after all that pasta and cheese at dinner I already feel like I ate a sponge)

And so, talk to you folks tomorrow!!

Ah, and ps. ce blog va aussi être de temps en temps en français  pour que les autres BAMs (Bad Ass Montpelliérains) sur le mission 'Défi Dièt' puissent aussi le lire et apprendre de mes obstacles et succès en essayant de manger Zone sans viande ni poisson. Pour ces lecteurs francophones, svp ne me jugez pas trop pour les erreurs grammaticaux, les phrases un peu maladroit, ou les mots inventés... Je vais faire de mon mieux, mais je suis à base bien anglophone!

Day 11 - the 'Défi Dièt' has begun!

Hi all!

So after a bit of a lax week, the Défi Dièt (Zone Diet Challenge) has officially begun at the gym, so I'm back to being strict on my zone blocks and avoiding processed foods etc.

Today I had my usual 2 block breakfast - fromage blanc, almonds, and a wee bit of Trésor cereal (so not healthy... but so so good) with black coffee.

I then launched into creating a big ol' stirfry using tofu, mushrooms, and packets of mixed frozen vegetables (peas, snow peas, broccoli and spinach). It was while I was trying to figure out how many blocks each things was that I realized how massive blocks of vegetables are compared to blocks of grain carbs etc.

For example, 1 block of flour is 1.5 TEAspoons, but for that same one block, you can have 3 cups of mushrooms or 4 cups of spinach! So my stirfry, which has 4 blocks of protein, I figured would end up 4 or 5 blocks of veggies when I started, but to actually get that many vegetables in there I had to add a cup of mushrooms because I wasn't going to get there on the frozen veggies alone - even with peas which are only 0.5cups to a block. The end result being my stirfry is HUGE and only 4 blocks, so I can either eat it in two 2-block meals, or as one 4-block meal if I'm super hunger after crossfit this afternoon.



Seriously though, lesson of the day: EAT YOUR FRIGGEN VEGETABLES. First of all, you get WAY more food out of it, and second of all you get way more nutritional value in terms of vitamins etc., plus the water content helps keep you hydrated... basically, there is way more benefit to eating cups and cups of veggies than there is in eating a weesie little serving of grain carbs.

Lesson learned for me, so I will definitely be working to incorporate more veggies and fruit into all my meals and snacks from now on....

Day 5 and onward so far...

Still working on getting used to the different block sizes... especially the part where grain carbs are like 1 tbsp=1 block, but tomatoes are 1.5 cups=1 block. On the plus size, an ounce of cheese counts as a protein, so I'm not going to get sick of eggs after all (I've been eating a LOT of boiled eggs lately).

In general, I have been making my typical fromage blanc/almond/cereal breakfasts with a salad of boiled eggs, lettuce, and tomato for lunch - yesterday I added some couscous to the salad to change it up a bit. Dinners have been a mixed bag, as I had anticipated, but healthier than not actually. The tough part has been when I have to replace my fromage blanc with yogurt or milk because it adds an extra carb block which means I have to find a protein block somewhere (and boiled eggs and cereal for breakfast is not super enticing as a combo). I still have a good few pancakes left in the freezer from last weeks cooking extravaganza so I have snacks for on the go and dessert when I need. Usually I'm ok after dinner, but after lunch when I'm starving after my 11:30am workout and there's lemon tart in the fridge it can be a bit hard to resist.

My gym is doing a 'défi dièt' starting next monday, and everyone will be following either the zone or paleo diet so I'll have a little support group to talk to and keep me accountable etc., which is why I've been a little more lax this week on the blocks etc.... cause I know I`ll have to seriously tighten up on my meals and snacks soon!

In other news, in a totally non-zone move, I went to the all-you-can eat sushi and chinese buffet with the crossfit folks. I actually ended up eating mostly seaweed dishes because they were seasoned with some sort of spice and were SO GOOD, but there were also mucho california rolls consumed, and obviously not a whole ton of protein (some cream cheese rolls, but cream cheese counts as a fat rather than a protein in Zone blocks).


 I appear to be losing my taste for chocolate, as I had a piece of lindt today and it tasted like plastic to me, and last night I went to bed craving salad instead of ice cream or chocolate which is definitely a first! I still love my chocolate cereal with yogurt or milk though...


anyway, I'll try to keep this as up to date as possible... going to have to get some more tofu today because I can already feel myself getting sick of eating boiled eggs all the time, and cheese with cereal for breakfast is equally unappetizing.

Anyway, off to crossfit now!

as per usual, lemme know of any recipes or anything like that that you can think of that I can modify to be 'zone' (equal proportions protein, fats, and carbs... the more veggies and fewer grains the better!)

Day 4

Okey dokey. The challenge continues.

Today I realized that while I have been trying to balance my meals etc, I could still be eating way too much or way too little overall... so I hunted down a 'block calculator' to see how many blocks I should be eating in a day...apparently I'm meant to be eating 15 block per day! It seems like kind of a lot to me, and the block calculator that I found at http://www.dbhonline.com/zoneful/p_calculator.htm doesn't distinguish between male and female.... so I kept on looking and found this article http://library.crossfit.com/free/pdf/cfjissue21_May04.pdf which uses the following chart:




So based on this chart, I think I'm going to go with 11 blocks on days that I don't work out, and 12 blocks on days that I do.

Today being a 12 block day, I have had the following so far:

Breakfast 1.5 blocks:
0.5 cup fromage blanc (1 protein)
3 almonds (1 fat)
1 big spoonful of cereal (1 carb)
2 zone pancakes (0.5 block all 3)

Snack 2 blocks:
1 boiled egg (1 pro)
1 yogurt (1 pro 1 carb)
1 spoonful cereal (1 carb)

Lunch 4 blocks:
1 flour Tortilla (2.5 carb)
1 tomato (0.5 carb)
2 tbs hummous (1 carb 1 fat)
1 egg (1 pro)
2 egg whites (1 pro)
1 oz tofu (1 pro)
1 oz cheese (1 pro)
1 tsp olive oil (3 fat)

which brings me up to 7.5 blocks, giving me lots of leeway for an afternoon snack and trying to balance out whatever we have for dinner with some of hard-boiled eggs I prepared for that very purpose.

I'll let you know how the dinner thing works out!

Day... 3, I guess?

well hey there folks! Sorry, I guess it's been almost a week since the last post... a great week in terms of life living and spontaneity, however not such a great one in terms of zone diet following.

After a BBQ to kick off the new season of soccer (I brought a veggie burger and had a little rice with it - not really zone, but not bad), I headed into town to stay at a friend's house before my super early train to Paris for my flight to Scotland.

I was very well prepared for the actual travel TO scotland - I had a whole batch of raspberry zone pancakes travelling with me so I was fine until getting on the actual plane around noon, when I had finished them in case I wasn't allowed to bring them on. Then I managed to resist the temptation to buy snacks in the terminal or on the plane, or upon landing.

Scotland was wonderful, and I ate relatively healthy foods for the most part, but being on the move touring around all the time meant quicky lunches of cheese and crackers, lots of snacks (not prepared zone ones), and going out for dinner - I picked healthy-ish things like goat cheese and apple salad (the goat cheese was in fritter form though), and a fresh spinach and mozzarella pizza (the round italian kind, not the shredded smother the whole pizza kind), but still not particularly balanced.

Upon my return, the family was also back, which means that I also had the obstacle of our 'typical' lunches and dinners of pasta, quiche, roasted potatoes, etc. For example, last night's dinner was roquefort pie, homemade pizza, and some green salad. It's not mcdonalds, but it's also not zone, which is the whole idea behind this blog.

That being the case, I am finally back on track with the original plan, which is to have 2 zone meals per day (generally breakfast and lunch), and then manage with the dinner provided as best I can. I have also decided to try and make my 4pm snack zone too, to try and cancel out the effects of an unbalanced dinner as best I can.

Today's 1.5 block zone breakfast was:

1.5 cups fromage blanc (1.5 protein)
5 almonds (1.5 fat)

plus a little clean crumble from yesterday's snack
1/4 apple (.25 carb)
1/4 peach (.25 carb)
1/2 seving muesli (.5 carb)
1/2 serving oats (.5 carb)



I also had a mid-morning half slice of pizza because it is really good... a little weak, I know, but I have a zone lunch prepared already of stir-fried tofu, spinach, and new potatoes to eat after crossfit, and I'm going to make a double batch of the raspberry pancakes and freeze a whole bunch so that I always have zone snacks/desserts on hand.... these things are actually a life-saver!

 I cook them in a little coconut oil instead of vegetable oil or butter and it makes them taste even better!

Tomorrow I'll be on the hunt for some new recipes to try next week. Let me know if you have any ideas!!