Meal of the Day: Cinnamon Oatmeal with Strawberries

I finished W1D3 of the Couch to 5k this morning.  After dragging my butt back in the door - I'm good until I get back to face the hill up my driveway and the monster set of steps we have!....I got cleaned up and fixed a quick breakfast.  I have errands to run today, so didn't have a whole lot of time to spare. 

I picked up a bag of the Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Quick Rolled Oats awhile back at Kroger just for mornings like this.

So, I combined this:

Photo Courtesy of Bob's Red Mill @ www.bobsredmill.com

with my fresh strawberries, a bit of cinnamon sugar, and turned it into.....

Yum!!

Couch Potato and other ramblings

I finished week 1 day 2 of the Couch to 5k program this morning.  I dabbled in this once before, but was in much better shape at the time and just kind of blew through it.  This time around....I've very much let myself go and have no fitness level to even speak of at this point.  I'm hoping that by following the program as written, I can get back into running and a fitness program of sorts.

This is hard!  I don't remember it being this hard the last time around, and that's probably because I had already been doing 30-60 minutes on the elliptical a couple of times a week.  I don't have access to an elliptical anymore, so while I'm noticing that the effort with running is the same as it was when I started on the elliptical, I feel it much, much more in my knees and quads.  I've also found that knowing that I'm so very out of shape, has made it easier for me to procrastinate getting out of the house in the mornings to do my daily workout.  The only thing that keeps me going this early in the game (when I'm not seeing huge results, yet!) is the feeling of accomplishment once I'm done.

I'm also trying to track what I eat.  This is twofold for me....firstly, I've gained a TON of weight with the move, and secondly, I'm a struggling, recovering gluten eater and this keeps me accountable for both calories and gluten content.  I'm currently using My Fitness Pal to track what I eat and my exercise.  I'm not sure if I'll continue to use it or not.  I find it hard to put in gluten free foods and to be sure of calories.  While I'm not counting calories persay, I find that the with focus on calorie count on this site almost forces you too.  I'm more interested in getting to a healthy lifestyle of moderation and just generally having good eating habits than I am the exact calories.

One of my favorite things lately is the Yoplait Greek Yogurt.  I think this is pretty new, because the stores near me just starting carrying it.  The texture and taste is better than some of the other greek yogurts I've tried, and the price is excellent.  They run about $0.99 a cup at my stores, and I think it was around $3.00 for the pack of four that I picked up.

The absolute best thing about these, is that they state that they're gluten free right on the package!  Yoplait has always been good about labeling their products, and this is no exception.

Comfort Food and a Bellyache

I found Purely Decadent Dairy Free Ice Cream in the Cookie Dough flavor the other day at my local Kroger.  They were on sale two for $5, so I had to try them!

Photo courtesy of Turtle Mountain (http://www.turtlemountain.com/products/product.php?p=purely_decadent_cookie_dough)

Now that I've tried it (and by "it", I DO mean the entire pint!)....I realize that I've had this before.  The flavor was good, though not quite the same as normal ice cream.  It has a nice vanilla flavor to the "ice cream" though it doesn't seem quite as creamy as cow's milk ice cream would be.  The cookie dough is delicious, and some of the best raw gluten free cookie dough I've had.

I did end up confirming my suspicions that I have at least a slight intolerance to soy products.  It didn't make me sick right away, but after consuming the entire pint over the course of the day (horrible! I know), I was in some major pain last night and this morning.  I don't know exactly what this means for me.  I've been limiting soy milk for awhile now because it's consistently given me a stomachache.  It has never been quite this bad though, so I'm hoping it was simply a quantity thing.  I have to figure out now, whether it's safe to consume small amounts of soy or if I need to eliminate it entirely as I need to with gluten.

I'm very much a recovering gluten addict.  I've been cheating on and off for over a year, and this blog is my attempt to stop that.  For now, I'm going to focus on eliminating ALL of the gluten and gluten cross-contamination from my diet, and then I'll think about eliminating soy entirely.  I need baby steps here to succeed, and since gluten is the hardest for me, I'll start there.  In the meantime, I will either have to ration out the other pint, or give it entirely to my husband, and find a pint of the Purely Decadent made with Coconut Milk, in Cookie Dough, that also gluten free!