Recipe Indexing and Whole 30 Prep

Recipe Indexing

love cookbooks.  And cooking magazines.  And food blogs.  Which all stems from the fact that I love food.

I have this habit of getting new ones, going through and sticky tabbing the recipes I want to try, but I’m terrible about not checking them when making my weekly menus and shopping list.  This is a terrible waste of resources, particularly when we get stuck in those ruts with what we’re eating and really want to try something different.

I’ve been wanting to shift our diet toward more Paleo for a while, and I’ve convinced hubby to give Whole 30 a try as an epic reset for January.  It’s pretty stringent, so the only possible way for us to pull it off is if I plan menus for all 30 days.  So in preparation for that, I decided to pull all my paleo cookbooks and do some recipe indexing in Evernote.  I created a specific notebook for the purpose and individual notes covering categories like Breakfast, Mains, Sides, Appetizers, etc., then listed all the recipes in each book under the relevant category, with the book and page number.  So I’ve got a handy dandy reference.

Whole 30

I’ve made another notebook to pull together all my resources for Whole 30.  This one is public, so if you happen to want to follow along, you can.  I got super excited to find out that they altered the program in 2014 to include all kinds of potatoes, as well as clarified butter and ghee.  Which just made the program that much easier because I can do a lot with potatoes as a component.   You can do a lot with sweet potatoes, too, but some things just don’t work as well with those.

The hardest part for both of us is going to be giving up the stuff we add in our choice of morning caffeine.  Plain tea of any variety is just nasty.  Same with coffee for hubby.  I haven’t decided whether I’m going to keep trying it plain or if I’m just going to forego it entirely for the month.  I guess we’ll see how desperate I get.

D Day is officially January 4.  Gives us a week to clear out the non-compliant perishable stuff and have anything we’re craving (OMG TACOS).  Then it’s down to brass tacks.  It’s a Monday and back to work for me, as well, so it’ll be part of the normal routine.  And then it’ll be back to the gym, too.  Planning out my new lifting routine is next on my list.

It’s all about getting 2016 off on the right foot.  I kinda feel like I never quiet got in the groove I wanted this year on the health front.  Lots of illness and carpal tunnel and busyness and one thing or another.  Dealing with Daisy’s decline, then figuring out life without her.    I often felt really overwhelmed.  And it was kind of part of my thing this year to just be kinder to myself about not managing absolutely everything.  We’ll just call it a year of transition.

Interestingly, my success with NaNo this year has imbued me with a new-found sense of I CAN.  Which makes me wonder what else I’ve spent time telling myself “I can’t” about that I really can, if I put my mind to it.  So, I’m saying I CAN last 30 days eating whole, healthy foods, no sugar or sugar substitutes, no alcohol, no dairy (duh), no gluten, no processed foods, and no…I’m sure there’s some other restrictions….I’ve got a list, but anyway, I can do it.  It’s just 30 days.  And, frankly, January when I’m suffering from post holiday bloat and the holy crap, why did I eat all that? guilt is going to be the most motivated I can possibly be.  A new lease on Operation Goddess In Training!’

 

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