DONNELLE: Day 1 – Germany Saves the Day!
February 6, 2018
Alright, bear with me, this one’s gonna be a long one cuz I’m all NEW in town.
Breakfast at 8:30 – I am PSYCHED for this because I’ve been loving eating egg cups nearly every weekday morning for the next month (you know, where you scramble eggs with accoutrements and bake them up in a muffin tin). Sure, they were chopped up into a tortilla and converted into an incredible breakfast burrito each time, and sure, I forgot to buy spinach yesterday for these, but my favorite jarred salsa of all time (Green Mountain Gringo Roasted Garlic!) is still compliant, AND I’ve lined the bottom of the egg cups with roasted breakfast potatoes, so this should be a walk in the…
Bland. Bland?! How are these so bland?!? …Oh no.
I didn’t measure the salt.
Usually I put in a teaspoon per 6 eggs and it’s like the Golden Ratio of Salt to Egg. This was just done by eye in the middle of 4 or 5 prep stages for other items. I wasn’t paying attention. Oh no. I have an entire week of these to munch through. Ahhhh meeeee. On the first day? Really?
Guys, listen, I want to say something right now that a lot of people are just not aware of: SALT. YOUR. FOOD. Look at this awesome book I got for Christmas from my dear husband (Note: I had to steal this pic off the Internet because I’m posting while I’m not at home. But I own it, I swear!)
It’s a best-selling book about the four foundational elements of cooking that harmonize to create flavor and balance and how you can master them. I haven’t been able to read it yet because I jumped into 2 consecutive months (LOLOLOL) of diets immediately after the holidays and have been focusing on understanding and prepping for this diet instead of reading my usual food publications, but I read far enough in to get the gist of “Salt more than you think you need. And now more than that. And now a little more. That is the proper amount of salt to bring out the flavors of the dish.”
Am I worried about sodium levels on this diet? Not in the least. When you’re preparing everything from whole foods, nothing comes with any added salt until YOU add it, and you will not add too much for your body to handle because you’re not trying to cover up any weird preservative flavors. Believe me, I grew up thinking just because I never table salted anything, I didn’t love or need salt. I was wack. I was WACK. Read this book (or at least the first few pages like I have so far) and become enlightened. SALT. IS. CRITICAL.
Sooo yeah, when I underseason, I overly hate myself because I know effing better. There is no excuse. And you just can’t fix it after it’s been cooked all the way through. I’ll have to drown these puppies in salsa for some attempt at flavor.
10 AM – One saving grace on this diet is I don’t have to change my coffee habits one bit. Trader Joe’s Cold Brew Concentrate is my absolute JAM with some (compliant, phew!!) Silk Plain Unsweetened Almond Milk. Ahhhh creature comforts. <3
11:30 AM – Suddenly frozen berries (feat. their friend pineapple) – previously enjoyed with plain low-fat Greek yogurt – have to stand in as a treat all by themselves. A TREAT! Like I’m some woman laughing alone with salad!
PS this wasn’t a planned part of the day, this is emergency rations. Because I’ve been nervous about…
1 PM – This salad. This is the first recipe I decided to prepare from my spankin’ new copy of Whole30 Fast & Easy, buuuut the store didn’t have the broccoli slaw, so we subbed romaine. Also I effing hate how tuna smells and I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about the solid white albacore? Also I never make my own salad dressing and I was afraid it’d be bland? I had a lot of concerns.
But I’ll tell you what, you feel like a BISH in CONTROL when you roll up with your salad packed into four separate compartments.
Anyway, happy to report this salad is pretty decent! I def miss the broccoli shards because I really needed something carb-ier than romaine lettuce, and the dressing reeeeally could use some ginger and salt and pepper to pump up the flavor, but the STAR here is the tuna with the oranges.
They’re secret best friends, turns out! I mean it makes sense, lemon and tuna have always been compadres, but please let me turn you onto tuna and oranges. Tuna and oranges/adventures together/what will they learn TODAAAAY?! When is Kimmy Schmidt coming back?
Anyway. Without the needed carb in that salad, I’ve been hungry all day. I’ve never quite been NOT hungry. So far, not so good. Clearly I’m not eating the proper carb/fat/protein balance I’m used to.
3 PM – Ate a palm full of cashews like a rabid squirrel.
3:25 PM – Boss just broiled something with Swiss cheese on it in the toaster oven and it smells like a grilled cheese boutique in here. I want to cry.
8:00 PM – After MUCH food prep that will be discussed later, we ended the night with a CRAZY-DELICIOUS sheet pan dinner that I would highly recommend to anyone. This is also from the Whole30 Fast & Easy book. Basically you make an absolutely **MOUTHWATERING** sauce out of clarified butter, compliant dijon mustard, and minced garlic, coat it all over cut red potatoes and wedges of cabbage, and bake it all up on a pan with the sausage savior of the Whole30 movement, Aidell’s Chicken and Apple Sausages. I have long, long loved these sausages and could not CONTAIN my joy when I found out these are preeeeetty much the only ones that work with the diet. Honestly, it’s a blessing.
The good stuff. My house smells heavenly. And the sausages blistered up perfectly.
And here are the two aforementioned recipes in case you want ’em.
Alright well that wraps my first 1,000 words on Whole30. Good lord. Brevity tomorrow, I promise!
Dana and Donnelle spend altogether too much time thinking about food. They’re in a burger club called Team Burger; the club is not going to be excited about this Whole30 development.
First off, your John Mulaney reference has not gone unnoticed.
NOOOOO, SAAAAAAALT!
GODDAMMIT, I’ve been nearly buying this book for months, and now I have to. Hey, hey, ask Andrew if he knows about flavor balancing? *tiptoes off snickering* (I tend to expostulate on this topic with some frequency.)
One thing I’ve been vigilant about is salting each component of my food as I prep and pre-cook them, and it is making loads of difference.
Yeah, chop those egg cups and drown em in salsa.
I want to make you a t-shirt that says “BISH IN CONTROL”
WHY IS COOKED CABBAGE SO GOOD. UNNF. Dammit, now I want cabbage. That sheet-pan meal looks BALLER.
And PSSHH, this blog hasn’t prided itself on brevity yet, and there’s no reason to start now. We are LADIES WITH OPINIONS and this is our damn blog. No power in the ‘verse can stop us.
1.) Of course you did. <3
2.) KHAAAAAAAAAN!
3.) Really?!? I thought you told me you already had it! Maybe I'm starting to confuse my life with yours. This is entirely possible.
4.) YES. Each component needs to be seasoned. It makes SUCH a difference. I'm still getting my head around doing this automatically, and, sadly, still learning to taste as I go (Cooking 101. Sigh.) But I'm WAY better about it than I used to be.
5.) Honestly I would chug that salsa out of a water bottle. It fixes eeeer'thing.
6.) Cool do it!
7.) I DON'T KNOW BUT I HAVEN'T COOKED CABBAGE IN 7 YEARS FOR NO REASON!!! Regrets!!! But DOOD the ghee/Dijon/garlic sauce. Critical. I am def going to use it on carrots, broccoli, and cauliflower too at some point. It's like the goopy equivalent of the magical Red Roasted Carrots rub.
8.) Right? This is OUR minutiae and personal anxieties food blog. Die mad about it.