Yesterday... all my troubles seemed so far away...

My weekdays start early and are generally quite busy--yesterday was one of those. I started off with a 6:30 am boot camp in my studio... now, when you're active you should eat something before you engage in a strenuous workout. For the last few months I have not eaten before my early morning class--that would be fine if I wasn't doing the entire class with the class... but I am, so it's just silly. The reason I stopped eating something beforehand was I usually rushed through my usual toast with peanut butter and coffee (at 6 am) before running off to my class and I would rather take a little time to enjoy my first (and only) coffee of the day. Clearly, I have to find something else to have before my class so that I have enough energy to get through it at the level I would like!

I always recommend people have something before working out--something that includes a small serving of carbs with a little protein and easy to digest--a piece of toast or a couple of crackers with peanut (or other nut) butter, an apple with peanut butter, a small amount of granola with milk or a granola bar... one suggestion from the nutrition class the other day was a half glass of fruit juice mixed with water.

So... class... toast and coffee... 2nd class at 10 am (covering for someone) at the local rec. centre before coming home and having "lunch" -- a bowl of oatmeal with organic blueberries (which I have on-hand frozen), a mix of nuts with dried cranberries and a little raw sugar...

In the afternoon I had a pedicure followed by a meeting at one of our most popular places for meeting... Wheatberries, an excellent bakery/coffee shop. And hence the reason for the muffin at the top of the post. It was maybe 3 hours after lunch and I was starving... I thought I would order soup while there but, alas, they were sold out... which leaves many choices of fabulous-looking muffins, scones, cookies, and cakes... all high-fat, sugary--and definitely not on the "clean" list--I LOVE their raspberry muffins and, had I not been trying to eat well this month, would have gotten a muffin or piece of carrot cake, but I settled for a less offensive decaf, skinny latte. So this experiment has already made me notice how often I go for those types of foods...

I did, however, go home and have another couple of pieces of whole grain toast with peanut butter (are we seeing a pattern here?) before heading off to class #3--Butts & Guts-- at 5:30 at the rec. centre.

I arrived back home after class and (a stop to vote) to make dinner--in my effort to eat more vegetables I chose some organic local greens spritzed with balsamic, a piece of halibut (grilled) topped with a teaspoon of sweet chili sauce, half a steamed yam and half a red pepper lightly sauteed (I used a little olive oil in a non-stick pan for the halibut and pepper).

Oops, slightly blurry...

Portion sizes are one of the biggest downfalls of our North American diet--it's important to remember that, for example, a single serving of meat is about the size of a deck of cards or the palm of your hand--the portion size of my halibut yesterday was approximately 1 and a half that but it was actually the smallest piece available at the supermarket at the time... and I was starving. Lesson of the first two days is start stocking and carrying around healthy things to snack on during the day.

...and a link to a great-looking energy bar recipe!