Have you guys spiralized vegetables?? This is a great alternative to pasta!
My newest recipe book purchase has a wonderful recipe for Italian Zucchini Pasta Salad. The book is titled Inspiralized (from Amazon). This salad is on my meal plan this week and I had to share with you all! It's super simple too! I haven't made this recipe yet, so I'm sharing the picture from the cookbook to show you how good it looks!
Italian Zucchini Pasta Salad
From Inspiralized
Serves 3 to 4 (you'll want to make more!)
Ingredients for the salad
2 medium zucchini
1 cup quartered artichoke hearts, drained and patted dry
6 cherry tomatoes, halved
½ cup cubed provolone cheese
¾ cup sliced salami
½ small red onion, thinly sliced
½ cup quartered black olives
Ingredients for the dressing
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
¼ cup lemon juice
½ tsp dried oregano
½ tsp dried basil
¼ tsp red pepper flakes
Salt/pepper
Directions
1. Prepare salad. Slice zucchini halfway through and then spiralizer. In a large bowl combine zucchini noodles with the artichoke hearts, tomatoes, provolone, salami, red onion and black olives.
2. Prepare dressing. Whisk all dressing ingredients in a small bowl
3. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss to combine. Refrigerate for at least 15 minutes (best if overnight) until dressing begins to soften the zucchini. Serve chilled.
Week 1 has been a success with my decision to eat no added sugars, no dairy and no wheat products. I’m not thinking of this decision as “something else that I can’t have”. But I’m thinking of this decision as a habit change that will GIVE me more energy, clearer skin and better moods.
Remembering all of those things that I GAIN makes the choice very simple for me.
I’ve been in a rut and started to feel like I had stalled and even taken a few steps back. Last weekend when it all hit me, I knew that it was time to buckle down and get serious. I was honest with myself about how I’ve been feeling. I knew that my nutrition hasn’t been as clean as it should be. I knew that I was eating too many treats, crackers and spoons of peanut butter. I knew that I wasn’t getting enough sleep. I knew that I wasn’t handling stress from work in the healthiest way. I knew that I wasn’t taking care of myself like I should be.
I wasn’t feeling my best. One reason was because I’ve been letting myself eat too much sugar, dairy and gluten. And it’s been happening since Christmas. Eating these foods causes my energy levels to drop, my cravings to skyrocket, my skin look horrible, my mood to change and my complete wellbeing to just feel totally off!
You know when you’ve asked for a sign, then you have the sign blindside you? That happened to me this week. And coincidentally this sign came to me a few days after I had been truthful with myself about my own habits. My sign came to me at work. The sign was “S I K”. These 3 letters, in black and white reminded me that it’s time to make some changes and honor my commitment to my health.
Sugar causes crazy hormone changes, blood sugar swings, mood changes, craving increases, internal inflammation and skin breaks out. Why was I eating so much sugar?
Dairy causes skin break outs and causes internal inflammation. Why was I eating so much?
Gluten really bothers my stomach and causes internal inflammation. Why was I letting myself eat this?
All of these foods, I knew weren’t good for me, caused horrible side effects, unhealthy internal inflammation and just made me feel horrible. But we all know how much cravings can affect us. We all know the vicious cycle.
Then there’s the stress and lack of sleep. Both cause increases in cortisol, the stress hormone. This leads to more internal stress in our bodies, more cravings (because of effects on our hunger hormones), more inflammation and more mood changes (because of brain chemical changes).
I had actually started to feel like a fraud. How can I be a health and fitness Coach and Mentor if I’m not even doing for myself what I know needs to be done?
Then I reminded myself that we’re all human. We all have to balance our own health with real life. Sometimes that balance becomes no-to-balanced.
One thing that I know for sure, we can only make changes when we, ourselves only, decide that it’s time to make the change. Whatever the change needs to be, it’s not going to happen until we’ve completely made up our minds.
I also know that changing one or two habits at the time is what works best for me. This gives me time to concentrate and focus on how to create new habits that will help me continue any goal that I’m working on.
Change one for me, eliminating dairy, wheat, added sugars for 30 days. This commitment is to remind myself of how good I feel without these foods. I’m one week into this commitment and I’m already seeing tremendous changes. My energy is returning to normal, my cravings are resolving, my pants are loose, my skin is clearing, my mood is returning to normal, my abs are returning (yay!) and I’m literally feeling amazing. Just these simple nutritional changes have made such a difference in just one week. Seeing progress like this is definitely motivation to continue with this goal!!
NOW, I love, love, love pasta. And I also love, love, love zucchini noodles in place of pasta. So that trade-off is a simple way for me to not have a wheat product, but still enjoy some of my favorite foods. This week, to inspire my efforts of no wheat products, I ordered a new cookbook and a new spiralizer. The cookbook is full of simple recipes using spiralized vegetables. I’ll keep you all updated about the new recipes! I’m trying two from the cookbook this week!
This week’s meal plan will most definitely help me stay on track. I’ll be eating clean all week because I’m eating out one night with the family and we’re having a family birthday party one night. Anytime I know I’m going to be eating out or be tempted by treats, I make an extra effort to eat clean the entire week.
You’ve also seen me posting this week about my newest strength program. Think it. Believe it. Feel it. Strength Program. We begin February 27th. All of the details are in this blog post Click here
It broadsided me a couple days ago. This sudden awareness that I've been struggling with emotional eating and stress eating over the last few months. I knew that something was causing me to eat foods that I don't normally eat. This is also the exact moment that I realized I can't be the only one who's dealing with this.
Think it. Believe it. Feel it.
The program for strength. Physical strength and emotional strength.
We begin March 20th. Reserve your spot by completing the form at the end of this post.
Working long hours, having a high stress career, being too busy at work to take care of ourselves during the day, staying stressed about demands at work, being too tired to exercise, staying busy with family, feeling like we’ve lost control of our healthy eating, stress eating more than usual, wanting more energy, wanting to feel better, wanting to feel in control of our cravings, wanting to enjoy healthy foods.
Are you able to relate?
Do you often feel many of these things?
This program will provide you with solutions that you need.
Let’s chat about the solutions that you will have with an investment in yourself and an investment in this program.
1. You will have the support that you need from me as your Coach and Mentor. In the beginning of my own personal health journey, I didn’t have a support system and the journey was difficult on my own. This is one of the reasons I became a Health and Fitness Coach, I know the power of support. You will also be connected to a private community of positive, supportive, understanding women also striving to simplify living healthier.
2. A nutrition guide to help you simplify nutrition so you’re able to easily prepare each day to eat healthy. This nutrition guide will simplify the process of knowing what to eat and how much to eat. We all know it’s very easy to overeat with portion sizes. This program will give you a simple portion system to help ensure you’re eating enough healthy foods to keep your metabolism up, help you lose weight or maintain your current weight.
3. This program will include Shakeology, a whole-food, nutritiously dense supplement that simplifies one meal for you each day. This product provides our body with nutrients that we’re lacking, especially when we’re not able to eat as well as we would like. This means that you’ll have a nutritionally sound solution for a quick breakfast as you’re running out the door to work or for a mid-day snack while you’re working. Or even for an afternoon snack to replace those junk food habits and to help with those cravings.
4. This program will provide you with solutions to help you simplify exercise, with a Beachbody home workout program you will enjoy. I will help you choose a program that fits your goals and abilities. We offer an amazing range of programs: yoga, weight training, dance, body weight training, fast paced cardio, total body workouts and so much more! When we enjoy exercise, it becomes so much easier to make time in our day to take care of ourselves. Exercise is an amazing stress reliever and amazing mood booster. With this program you’ll have amazing trainers in your own home on DVD or streaming online. You’ll be able to exercise at any time of the day. This means that you’ll be able to make time for exercise each day.
5. During this program I will also be sharing information from the book Made to Crave. Together we’ll work through the reasons behind our cravings and emotional eating. This book will help us find our “want to” by helping us find the self empowerment necessary to make it happen.
Bonus! Each of you will be given an exclusive daily journal tracker (in printable pdf) that I’ve created to help us remember what we’re grateful for and to help us celebrate successes each day. We’ll use this journal page each day and at the end of our 30 day challenge, we’ll actually be able to see how much we’ve accomplished with our health and fitness.
For those of you who join by this 11 PM this SUNDAY, the 19th, with a challenge pack purchase through my link, I will also gift you the Fixate cookbook! This is one of my favorite healthy, simple cookbooks.
I can’t wait to begin Think it. Believe it. Feel it. Strength Program with you! For 30 days we will be successful each day, together!
If you’re ready to invest in yourself, I’m ready to take this journey with you. Supporting you and walking with you side by side.
All you need to do is complete the form at the end of this post to save your spot in our program. I’ll be in touch with you and together we’ll decide on the best Beachbody program for you based on your own goals. The deadline to join this program is Sunday March 19th.
*If you’re already working with a Beachbody Coach, please reach out to your Coach.
