Today is prep day. I pick up my CSA box tonight and will put all those vegetables to use as soon as I get them. But until then, I'm low on a lot. Breakfast was a variety of sauted vegetables with 1/2 avocado and a True Story chicken sausage. I also had a small bowl of fresh raspberries. after enjoying my almond milk latte yesterday i felt inspired to make some homemade almond milk so I could have another latte this morning. It was the first time I used my espresso machine in a very long time and I was surprised it still worked!

I snacked on a handful of nuts around lunchtime and had a large taco salad around 4pm for my early dinner. I did my taco meat on the side and my husband did his on top.

The evening was consumed with a lake swim at Rollins Lake. Afterward, I drank a smoothie on my way home so I could get straight to work preping the remaining meals for the week. I have a meeting every single night this week, plus I leave on Friday for...yes...another race. I figure that I won't have time to cook much of anything the rest of the week, so I preped: salads, pulled chicken (in the slow cooker all afternoon), grilled chicken drumsticks and sausages, sauted vegetables, fresh salsa and fresh basil pesto.

I also soaked nuts all mornings started those in the dehydrator tonight.

In total, it took me about 1 1/2 hours to get all of this prepped and cooked, but I won't spend much more time in the kitchen this week. And in the end, I won't be reaching for something that I know is bad for me because I have all of these good choice to pick from instead.

Happy Sunday! We're still in Petaluma and plan to take our time before heading home. There's a really nice trail behind our hotel, so after a small smoothie (coffee, coconut milk, 1/2 banana, cocoa and Great Lakes collagen) to put something in my stomach, I headed out for a long run. After the run, I had a handful of raspberries and blackberries while I got everything packed up. We stopped at a wonderful breakfast joint in downtown Petaluma before pulling out of town. I started with an unsweetened almond milk latte. It came in a bowl! Breakfast was homemade corned beef hash with a side of avocado. I forgot to ask for no toast (I forget that it comes with every breakfast item you order in the U.S.!).

My husband had a salad with scrambled eggs on top with a spicy salsa and avocado.

Since breakfast was so late, we skipped lunch and opted for an early dinner in our deck. We grilled boneless pork ribs with homemade BBQ sauce and grilled broccoli with olive oil and salt/pepper. The side salad was fresh cucumbers, onions and tomatoes tossed in olive oil, white wine vinegar and mustard.

Today, we travel to Sonoma for another race. We were able to enjoy breakfast at my parents house before we hit the road. We ate spinach sautéed in bacon grease with bacon, mushrooms, onions and topped with avocado.

My husband topped his with 3 fried eggs.

The day slipped away from us as we were getting ready for the race (practice swim, pre race meeting, transition set up, etc). It wasn't until 3pm when we actually sat down in the shade under a tree and ate lunch. A pre-made salad from home with a handful of rice crackers (rice crackers are not RESTART legal...but I'm going to be adding startchy carbs into my diet today to get ready for tomorrow. Rice crackers aren't my #1 choice, but it was what I had in the moment).

For a snack, I had a cup full of organic berries.

Dinner was back to Pub Repuclic in Petaluma where I ate my traditional ore race meal: brick oven chicken over potato and Brussels sprout hash. I had a side of steamed spinach and added butter to it. I started the meal off with a cold Gazpacho soup that was delicious!!!

It's race day (I know....again?!?!) which means that today in off of RESTART (for the most part). I did do my typical race day smoothie in the morning which is a RESTART legal smoothie. It uses coconut milk, coffee, 1 whole banana, Great Lakes collagen and raw cocoa powder.

During the race (56 mile bike ride followed by a 4.5 mile run), I used Ultragen (1 hour before and :30 minutes afterward), Vespa, Skratch Labs hydration mix with 2T brown rice syrup, water and salt.

After the race, I ate 1 chicken breast and 1 hamburger patty wrapped in lettuce with mustard, 1 slice of watermelon, 1 plum and a few grapes.

For dinner, we were back to Pub Republic in Petaluma for dinner where I had seafood pallala for dinner. Yum!

Here is the photo of me and my team coming across the finish line! :)

Today is my Friday, as I am headed out of town after work for another race. This means that I'm going to get an early start to my day in order to fit everything in. As many of you know, I'm an endurance athlete. I'm 18 weeks away from my longest race of the year (Ironman Cozumel) which I expect will take me about 11 hours to complete. I'm well into my "build phase" of training and that means I've already started testing and training my body to get ready for that long day. This means I'm starting to train my body to Eat while workoutibg out. Today, I started off the morning with a fasted blood sugar test. 86mg/dL. Perfect.

Afterward, I made a smoothie with coconut milk, coconut water, 1/2 banana, cocoa, chia seeds, Great Lakes collagen and flax oil. I poured it over ice and drank most of it during my warmup on my bike.

After my workout, I finished off what was left of my smoothie, showered and headed to work. For lunch, I had a meeting at the Holbrook. I ordered a burger patty with no cheese, no bun and no sauce with a side salad with olive oil and vinegar on the side.

Around 4:30pm, I had a snack. 1/2 banana sliced with almond butter. I smashed 2 pieces of banana together and froze them. These are a fantastic little treat!

Dinner was late, but it was yummy! Lamb liver fried in bacon grease with a side of fried bacon, cabbage, bell peppers, onions and mushrooms.

Today was my typical Wednesday. Busy. I started with a fasted swim workout directly followed by yoga. Afterward, I headed over to Briar Patch to grab a few things and while I was there, grabbed breakfast. I had 2 chicken apple sausages on a bed of spinach and hot mint tea.

I ate a late lunch. Salad with grilled chicken thigh. This salad I made earlier in the week with mostly produce from my CSA box. Lettuce, cabbage, carrots, cucumber, tomatoes, pickled beets and homemade dressing with olive oil, apple cider vinegar, salt and pepper.

After I finished work, I did a fairly long run workout. When I finished, I wasn't hungry. By the time I got home and finished up some house chores, I started getting hungry...but it was late. So I threw a couple things in the blender so it would have a better chance of digesting before bed. I used whole coconut milk, 1/4 frozen banana, 1 tbsp chia seeds, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 2 tbsp Great Lakes Collagen and ice.

Since I don't eat eggs, which completely limits my breakfast options, I thought I'd share my husbands breakfast with you guys this morning. 4 pieces of bacon, scrambled eggs with bell pepper and power greens.

My breakfast was very similar, minus the eggs. Instead, I did 2 pierces of bacon, 1 True Story chicken sausage, power greens, and tomato. It was delicious!

This breakfast got me through a 1 1/2 hour workout and my first client this afternoon. At 2:30pm, I ate lunch. Zucchini noodles cooked in kerrygold butter, tossed with basil pesto and grilled chicken thigh. All of this was prepared during breakfast and taken to work in a storage container.

Dinner tonight was all leftovers. The last of the veggie spring rolls, pork ribs with homemade BBQ sauce and grilled squash.

Monday is a prep day for me. So I spent the morning on my computer doing administrative work and didn't workout until much later in the morning. This allowed me to chew, chew, chew my breakfast (instead of drinking it in my normal fashion)! Breakfast was 2 strips of bacon chopped up and then fried. Then I added lots of vegetables (broccoli, carrots, bell pepper, cauliflower, purple cabbage and onion) and 1 True Story chicken sausage.

After a long swim and a little more work on the computer, I ate lunch which was leftover Thai cauliflower rice salad (I'm going to be eating this for a few days) and a pre-cooked chicken thigh.

After letting my lunch digest, I did a strength workout and followed that up with a green drink (handful of organic super greens, 1/4 banana, coconut milk, coconut water, Great Lakes collagen and flax oil).

I spend the later part of the afternoon/evening paddle boarding on Rollins Lake with my triathlon club family. When I got home, I sliced a few pieces of cooked steak and ate that with raw vegetables and leftover roasted garlic artichoke dip and enjoyed it on my deck.

I picked up my CSA box on the way home from the lake...so look for these yummy vegetables in this weeks meals. The water melon and corn will be frozen for future use. :)

Congratulations on getting over 1/2 way through the detox! Whoop whoop!

Here was how day 12 looked for me...started with a smoothie. I realize that majority of my mornings a start out the same way...smoothie. I start off nearly every day with a workout (sometimes two) and the last thing I want is food sitting in my stomach during this. So "pre-digested" food in the form of a smoothie increases digestion and my ability to absorb those nutrients. I'll start trying to mix it up (different smoothie recipes and different meals all together).

I did a 4 hour workout this morning (3 hour ride followed by a 1 hour run). During the workout, I had 2 servings of Skratch (definitely not RESTART legal, but quite necessary for this type of workout) and 1 pocket packet of organic raw coconut butter by Artisana. And lots of water and salt! It was warm out there!

When I got home after my workout, I ate left over spring rolls (Rice paper-a modification, carrots, cucumber, cabbage, kelp noodles and red bell peppers) from yesterday's party with a pre-grilled chicken thigh and chicken wing.

After a short nap, I spent the afternoon picking peaches off my peach tree. Hard not to indulge in them, but instead, I spent the night (and will be spending most of tomorrow) processing these peaches. I plan to dry, purée, freeze and make fruit leather with collagen out of them so the can be enjoyed in moderation after the detox is over.

For dinner, we enjoyed pork ribs with homemade BBQ sauce, leftover Thai cauliflower rice salad and grilled zucchini.

For dessert, we had coconut mound bites (recipe to come soon!).

Today was a party day!  I helped cater a friends bridal shower.  Breakfast was....wait for it....a SMOOTHIE!  In the car, on my drive down to Sacramento.  Since eating and driving is not recommended on many levels (but since we're talking about nutrition, it's not great for keeping you that REST and DIGEST mode), I chose to drink my breakfast once again.  The party started at 11am and lunch was quite the spread.

Our options were (from left to right): vegetable spring rolls with a almond butter dipping sauce; grilled sausage with mustard; Thai cauliflower salad with a almond butter dressing; grilled vegetables; grilled chicken thighs with a peanut dipping sauce; a charcuterie platter and a vegetable platter.  My plate was full and looked like this...

I chose: salami, vegetables with roasted garlic artichoke dipping sauce, Thai cauliflower rice salad, a vegetable spring roll, a few slices of grilled sausage and 2 skewers of grilled chicken with almond butter dipping sauce.  Later that evening, I enjoyed dinner on my deck.  It was grilled burger patty on a bed of lettuce with sliced tomatoes, bacon, 1/2 avocado, grilled onions and a side of left-over Thai cauliflower salad.

Happy Friday!  Today I get to work at the Dental Wellness Center (after starting my morning off with a swim workout).  I did my swim fasted and drank my usual coconut milk cocoa smoothie while getting ready.  I drank hot herbal tea in the morning while working.  Since I never remade my lunch I had planned for today (which I ate last night for dinner), I ran across the street to Briar Patch and grabbed a salad from the salad bar.  Salad dressing is usually the culprit when it comes time to hidden sugar, but I was pleasantly surprised to find 2 dressing on the bar that were RESTART legal!  The Italian Vinaigrette and the Caesar Dressing.  The Goddess Dressing has tofu (non-fermented) which would be better off avoided, and the Honey Dijon Dressing has...yup....honey in it.

My salad looked like this...and included a side of grilled chicken and shredded beef.

Dinner was grilled wild Alaskan Salmon with coconut oil and green curry paste on top of a bed of raw, organic spinach.  We ate a side of grilled squash and sauteed onion, red bell pepper and rainbow chard. 

Today's schedule was full, so I started the day early with a quick breakfast smoothie, then straight into my 2 hour workout. This mornings smoothie was coconut milk, flax oil, Great Lakes collagen, 1/4 frozen banana, ice and a splash of vanilla extract.

Within an hour after finishing my workout, I prepared a second meal (late breakfast/early lunch). I used 2T Kerrygold butter to saute spinach and onions. I sliced a pre-cooked homemade bratwurst and topped it with sliced tomatoes.

After this meal, I ran errands, attended a meeting and worked for a few hours before getting another opportunity to eat another meal. I snacked on a handful of carrots and about 1/2 cup artichoke dip in the late afternoon and was able to get home and eat dinner around 6:45pm. By the time I got home, I was definitely hungry. Thankfully, I had already prepared a salad (which was suppose to be my lunch for tomorrow...but I'll find something different) and topped that with leftover steak from 2 nights before. The salad dressing was a simple olive oil and apple cider vinegar, salt and pepper.

At the end of the day, this was my macronutrient breakdown from myfitnesspal account...

Spent the morning multitasking. While cooking breakfast, I was preping lunch for the week. Breakfast this morning was bacon with organic 2 handfuls of super greens and a few chopped tomatoes. Topped it with 1/2 avocado. Quick and easy.

Lunch was the salad I prepared while making breakfast (spinach, romaine, carrots, cucumber, beets and bacon) topped with olive oil and apple cider vinegar. I had a organic grilled chicken thigh on the side (also cooked during breakfast this morning).

For a snack, I had 4 Brazil nuts. Once class was over, dinner was a pre-grilled wild duck sausage (that I made and froze last month) wrapped in rainbow chard with raw sauerkraut. Afterward, I had 2 squares of 100% dark chocolate and a mug of CalMag.

For those of you using www.myfitnesspal.com for food tracking and are curious about macronutrient ratios, here was my final breakdown:

Wednesday's are always a busy day for me. I started this morning out with a fasted swim workout. Afterward, I had a smoothie to drink between swim and yoga. The smoothie was the usual (coconut milk, flax oil, cocoa, Vit C powder, decaf coffee, and ice). After yoga, I had an early lunch/late brekfast at Summer Thymes Cafe. I order sautéed spinach with bacon and avocado along with an iced coffee.

After seeing clients in the afternoon, I had a late lunch/large snack of left overs from Monday nights dinner (curry ground pork and sautéed vegetables) and a homemade popcycle (coconut milk and banana blended until smooth, then stirred in unsweetened coconut flakes and poured into popcycle molds).

I ran that night with the triathlon club and when I got home, we cooked fajita style tacos with a side of zucchini sautéed in butter (and then more butter on top). I the lettuce tacos, we seasoned a steak with a no sugar spice rub and grilled it. Meanwhile, I sautéed onion and bell pepper on the stove. We sliced part of an avocado on top and enjoyed!

Here is how my fitness pal graph looked at the end of the day...

I don't typically like to eat 73g of carbohydrate, but on a day with 3 workouts, it's what works for me to keep energy levels up.

Today is going to be very focused on rehydrating after yesterday's race in the sun. I definitely have new tan lines that weren't there yesterday. ;)

For breakfast, we stayed at the hotel. Being sensitive to eggs and dairy, eating breakfast at restaurants can be very challenging. This morning, I chose a hash made with potatoes (a RESTART modification), spinach, bell pepper, onion, prime rib, bacon and avocado.

For lunch, we stopped on our way home at Chipotle Grill. I had a salad with chicken, grilled onions and peppers, fresh salsa and guacamole. This is a great place to stop for something fast.

Once home, I rushed to get unpacked before having to run off to two meetings back to back. I quickly mixed a small smoothie for a snack (coconut milk, cocoa, flax oil, pumpkin seeds, 1/4 banana and ice) and drank that during my first meeting. Since the second meeting ran over, and I had nothing prepared at home, I had to pull together a quick dinner. In coconut oil, I sautéed an onion, zucchini and purple cabbage then added green curry paste and coconut milk. In a separate frying pan, I browned ground pork with a bit of green curry paste. I threw it all together over a bed of fresh spinach. The whole thing took me about 10-15 minutes to prepare and cook. I still ate later than I wanted, but I ate nutritious food and that always makes me happy.

Today I raced the Ironman 70.3 Vineman Triathlon. It was a beautiful day in Sonoma County to be racing!!! For those folks following this blog to discover more about the 21 day RESTART sugar detox and what types of food you can be exploring, this is not the day to look at. As a matter of fact, the last 3 days have included modifications to get my body ready for today. But for those of you reading this that are wondering what a food plan would look like for a 1/2 Ironman distance triathlon (1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike and 13.1 mile run), here it is.

Breakfast, 3 hours before race start= 1/2 cup coconut milk, 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut water, 1T raw cocoa, 1 banana, and ice. 8oz water with lemon and sea salt.

1 hour before race start= 1 VESPA CV25

:15 before race start= 1 VESPA Junior, 2 salt tablets and 8oz water

Race swim starts at 7:48am

In transition 1= VESPA Junior

On the 56 mile bike= 400 calories of homemade Freedom Fuel (1/2 c fresh squeezed orange juice, 1/2t sea salt, 3T organic brown rice syrup, 2 scoops of Skratch hydration mix) and 6 salt tablets spread out equally throughout the course + water.

In transition 2= VESPA Junior

On the 13.1 mile run= 1 package of Hiney Stinger gummies and 6 salt tablets + water every mile.

The race took me 5 hours and 17 minutes to finish. Within 1 hour of finishing, I drank 1 serving of Ultragen with water over ice.

Later in the day, I visited with friends in the athlete recovery area and ate 2 chicken breasts wrapped in lettuce with mustard, 5 strawberries and a slice of watermelon + more water.

Dinner was back at Pub Republic in Petaluma where I split charcuterie platter with my husband and had seafood paella for my main meal. All with more water.

At the end of the dinner, I had a cup of decaf coffee (black) before heading baxk to the hotel and off to bed.

Pre- race day! In translation, really means, busy/nervous day. I started off my day with my usual breakfast smoothie and headed straight down to the river to practice my swim. After the swim, a short bike, then a drive to the mandatory athlete meeting and check in. On the way, my favorite snack that lives in my purse in case of emergency...

Artisans has a handful of options for these nut butters including walnut, cashew, almond and a few others. They're a great "back-up plan."

After we finished athlete check in, we headed to lunch at a local restaurant in downtown Windsor called Kin. I had a burger with bacon wrapped in lettuce and sweet potato tots (no ketchup since that had high fructose corn syrup in it). The sweet potato tots are definitely not RESTART legal, but I'm following the RESTART rule today knowing that starchy carbs are exactly what I need for tomorrow. Here was lunch...

Dinner was back at Pub Republic in Petaluma where I enjoyed a house salad with roasted beets, tomatoes and olive oil and vinegar. For the main course, I had brick oven chicken and fingerling potato (a RESTART modification), bacon and Brussels sprout hash.

Before bed, I had a mug of hot mint tea and tried to get some rest before tomorrow's big day. Tomorrow, I will blog my food, but it will definitely not be detox legal. However, for anyone out there interest in what a nutritionist eats for 70.3 miles, there will be no secrets. Off to bed!

Since I was staying at my parents house for the night, I had an opportunity to make a quick breakfast before I left for my conference. Bacon, spinach (sautéed in the bacon grease) and topped with 1/2 avocado).

Lunch at the conference was my prepared salad with my home made sausage. I had a few carrot sticks with artichoke dip (roasted artichokes, roasted garlic, sea salt, olive oil and tahini) on the side.

Dinner was at a restaurant and really marks to the start of my "carb loading" for my race on Sunday. You'll see a few modifications in my meals from now- Sunday evening. Dinner was a grilled sirloin steak with a side of Grilled zucchini and a bacon, potato and Brussels sprout hash. I wasn't sure what was in the sauce, so I didn't use it. Better safe than sorry. Sugar is hidden in 80% of our food, but especially sauces!

The alarm went off early today to head to my nutrition conference. For that reason, I decided to stick with a liquid breakfast on the road. Smoothie with coconut milk, collagen, vitamin C powder, 1/4 frozen banana, cocoa and ice. TIP: to keep your green tipped bananas green, chop them into quarters and freeze them like this...

Freezing banana in this way makes the bananas easy to use in smoothies and you don't have to use the entire banana!

I enjoyed my pre-cooked vegetable "hash" for lunch with raw sauerkraut and a homemade bratwurst.

Dinner was with a friend at my parents house tonight and was roasted chicken with a mixed green salad and sautéed squash and green beans with butter.

The chicken carcass went straight into a stock pot to be turned into bone broth. YUM!

Wednesday, 7/8 marks the first day of a 21 day sugar detox. Since I have a race this weekend, these first few days of the detox will include modifications (mostly sweet potato) as I will need it for Sunday. Here was what day 1 looked like:

5:30am fasted swim workout

7am 12oz black coffee and smoothie with 1/2 cup whole coconut milk, 2T collagen, 1/4 banana, 1T Cocoa, Vitamin C powder, ice and water.

Lunch was a pre-made salad with beets, tomatoes, cucumber, carrots and sprouted sunflower seeds. The dressing was homemade with olive oil, apple cider vinegar and sugar-free mustard. I reheated 2 chicken thighs with homemade Bbq sauce (sugar-free!) and grilled broccoli and carrots.

At 6pm, I had a tablespoon of coconut butter before my evening workout. And at 7:30pm, dinner was cauliflower rice (with onions, bacon, green beans and broccoli) and liver breaded in coconut flower and pan fried in butter.

Before bed, I had a mug of CalMag.

It's the day before the start of the 21 day sugar detox for the RESTART Program. Today is all about preparation. They say, 'if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.' I believe it. So...today I made 3 salads for future meals. I also sautéed some veggies and ate some for breakfast with a True Love chicken apple sausage like these...

I topped it with raw saukraut and enjoyed it on my deck. For lunch, I ate one of my salads I made earlier in the day with leftover grilled chicken from a 4th of July BBQ. Tonight for dinner, all left overs. Salmon, grilled squash with butter and cabbage and carrot salad.