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Healthy Living in Singapore

June 4, 2013

The day I failed my diet SPECTACULARLY (and am actually proud of it).

June 4, 2013

A week ago, I told everyone I would be embarking on a 21 Day Sugar Detox that sounded fantastic on paper. Rebalance your sugar levels, regain health and vitality and balance insulin levels.

The plan was that I would go on the diet and log via photo taking everything that was passing through my mouth during the day for 21 days. It didn’t sound at all difficult to me because by my standards, I’m generally quite a healthy eater already and didn’t really have much of a sweet tooth, so how hard could a sugar detox be? Heck, just recalling what I had for the past 1 week and I didn’t even have anything with added sugars or refined flour in it so how difficult would it be?

Right?

Wrong.

So wrong. I’ve never been on a diet before and I must say following a diet plan has GOT TO BE THE WORST THING EVER ON THE PLANET.

I started the plan all fired up about it. I read every single detail and knew exactly what was allowed and what wasn’t. It went against what I believed in that there should be no segregation between allowed and disallowed food but I figured that it was only for 3 weeks and wouldn’t matter.

Foodwise, the diet was fine. There was no calorie restriction, nothing. The first day was fine. By the second day however, I was dealing with a little bit of constipation from the lack of fibre from wholegrains and fruits. Things also seemed a bit ‘off’ in some way. I figured it was just a bit of a detox phase I was going through and decided to use WILLPOWER to power through it. When night fell though, I couldn’t take it anymore and gave in to a prune and a ripe banana.

Does this sound bad? It’s just fruit right? No?

Well let me tell you the supreme danger of being on a diet. When you are on a diet, you fail to see food/fruits as it is- whole, real, natural and bursting with nourishing vitamins and minerals. Instead, everything is judged by the ‘allowed’ and ‘disallowed’ list that somebody wrote up. It doesn’t matter anymore whether the food infront of you is a banana or a potato chip. You eat it and your mind races the same way, your heart palpitates and you are overcome by an overwhelming guilt for having done something you shouldn’t. All i could think of was the sorbitol in the prune. Sorbital sorbitol sorbitol. SUGAR! On a sugar detox!

And I was only on day 1.5. What kind of loser was I?

It was made even worse by the fact that I had promised to log whatever I ate. I briefly contemplated leaving it out and decided I was better than this. I COULD RISE TO THE OCCASION! I could eat better! This diet was supposed to be good for me right? I could get back on track. I was caught between berating myself and encouraging myself to do better next time. (On hindsight, how stupid is that? All that self-talk and time wasted over the consumption of a ripe banana and several prunes!? But diets do that to you, they make you self obsessed and unable to function properly like a real human being.)

The next day dawned and I was back scrutinizing every single bottle for added sugar and all other things on the ‘disallowed’ list, even things I usually ate and knew would not have any adverse effects on me. But I couldn’t stop thinking of the sorbitol from the previous night.. and the illegal banana. Somewhere deep down inside, I thought… if I could eat that… what’s a little bit more. Besides, the diet is only 21 days. I could start the 21 days again tomorrow or some other time.  Suddenly, I was craving things I didn’t even usually consume. I had the most horrible craving for CHILI SAUCE and CHIPS and whatnot.

I must stress that these are things I do not normally eat on a usual basis and my diet on the 21DSD, while restricted in some ways, was carefully planned out to meet my usual nutritional requirements. What I didn’t forsee was how much of a mindgame a diet is.

A RESTRICTIVE DIET HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH NUTRITION OR HEALTH. It’s a mindgame you’ll end up losing.

I made it to the end of the week with a few hits and misses here and there and at the end of it, I was exhausted and ridden with guilt. The feelings were so bad that for the first time in years, I slipped back to my old habits of binge comfort eating again. On the sunday after work, I actually skipped whatever I had to do and places I had to go to stuff myself silly. I had long forgotten what it felt like- that same mindless foraging for food. The need to just cram everything down into me as soon as possible. The scary numbness of nothingness. I just needed taste and flavour and I was getting none of it. A year of healthy eating has left my house almost devoid of anything I would consider binge worthy. I was almost on the verge of despair and contemplated running down to the nearest macdonalds to buy burgers I could binge on. I was literally FORAGING for the unhealthiest things I could find. It’s hard to explain and I wouldn’t because I know if you’ve been there you would understand.

Then I found a tube of oreo and my brother had some chocolate milk in the fridge. There was also a pack of instant noodles in the cupboard. (ohmygoodness. I hadn’t had the urge to eat instant noodles in years). That’ll have to do I guess. And just like that. Everything was gone in seconds.

Is chocolate milk bad? Are oreos bad? Instant noodles? By themselves, no.

But what separates disordered eating from healthy eating is the feelings when the act of eating is taking place. I hadn’t felt this out of control in years, this constant obsession with what I should be eating and what I shouldn’t’ be eating. It has NOTHING to do with what you ate. So if you know somebody with disordered eating, and she/he’s seeking for some post binge reassurance, please don’t tell her/him that ‘hey, it’s just a couple of oreos or it was just a fast food meal. No biggie.’ That is likely not going to go down well because it’s no longer about the food. The disorder stems from the stranglehold the food has on the person, the feelings of worthlessness it conjures up, not the food itself.

I guess we all have it in small amounts. That sort of guilt that you shouldn’t have eaten so much… or a particular food judged ‘yummy but unsuitable’ in your mind’s list. As people in society, we subconsciously pass on this message to one another such that by the time we are all adults, we take part in such rituals of judging our food, giving in and compensating over and over again.We subconsciously teach it to our children as well, parents making junk food freely available then telling their children they shouldn’t eat so much of it.

Suffice to say, the magic eroded quickly and once the numbness wore off I was left with nothing but severe bloat, guilt and self hate. In the past, it would turn into a vicious cycle where I would condemn myself and restrict my eating for the next few days before falling once again into binge mode.

I contemplated getting back on track again and starting again for week 2 but just couldn’t. To my surprise, I could actually identify that THIS- following a ‘healthy detox diet’ was not healthy at all. Could I lose weight on it? Would I be skinny? Maybe. But it was doing nothing for my physical or mental health. In fact, over the course of the past week, I had spiralled from ‘healthy eater extraordinaire ready to take on the world all day, anyday!’ with my usual diet to ‘obsessive fearful eater’ afraid of consuming even natural, wholesome food.

It felt like nirvana coming out from that diet cycle. Is it ironic that my usual diet is a detox from my detox diet? Oh life, you crack me up sometimes.

But I am now more sure than ever the message I want to spread. I want to tell everyone, girls especially that food should not have such control over you. You can love yourself more than eat healthy and well for only x amount of days. You deserve to be well nourished and happy EVERY day of your life. The diet mentality will ruin you and it’s a torture you really shouldn’t and don’t have to put yourself through.

In the midst of it all I told a well meaning friend I felt like giving up on the detox and she encouraged me gently in a tone reserved by girls worldwide to tell their friends to get back on the diet bandwagon. “You can do it, it’s only a few more days.After that you can indulge all you want! Eat all the sugary things!”

The moment I heard that, it really brought me to my senses. I almost laughed out at the sheer ludicrousness (?) of the entire thing. If I didn’t do this diet, I wouldn’t have the need to ‘reward’ myself with a mountain of cupcakes at the end of it. It wasn’t even an ‘indulgence’ to me because I don’t even usually want to eat such things! Just because I had restricted myself, ironically, sugar has now become the proverbial forbidden fruit and I feel a sense of entitlement and need to eat copious amount of it to reward myself for my ‘good behaviour’.

Do you not see how a diet can only succeed based on perfect performance? What happens when you fail then? A diet no longer becomes about food or weight loss, it becomes a tool in which it’s lack of success determines and defines your worth as a person. Can’t stick to a diet for just 5 days? You are a loser who can’t even control yourself. How do you even think you can achieve anything else in life? Start again? Why? You are just going to fail anyway.

I really really don’t want that for anyone and most importantly, for you. I want you to live life free from what to eat and what not to eat. Just stick to the basic principles- eat till you are satisfied and eat well. Nourish your body with natural, wholesome food and in the right amounts. Not too much and not too little either. Leap off the diet bandwagon while you can. Health isn’t a 21 day diet. Health is the everyday. And when you indulge, indulge not in chemical and factory made things but indulgence in the best the world has to offer- sashimi made by top japanese chefs, desserts made with real food, unrefined flours or sugar and as close to its natural state as possible, maybe a little more than usual. A burger made from real premium ingredients you usually wouldn’t have- that is true indulgence, not a greasy burger from a drive thru take away .

Love yourself, indulge yourself, because you are very very worth it. And while you’re at it, say bye bye to diets and hello to better, healthier, happier living.

🙂

P.S Interestingly, people are still curious as to what I eat. (I am a novel zoo animal!) In order not to plug up this page which I’ll reserve for articles and recipes, I’ll be uploading all my food pictures from my instagram (@vegsmoothiebunny or search #vegsmoothiebunny) onto MY TUMBLR. Check it out if you’re interested! Will also be posting what OTHER people eat for your inspiration!

Posted by grace 2 Comments
Filed Under: Life, Nutrition, Personal, Physical/ Mental Health Articles, Uncategorized Tagged: detox diet, Detox diet failure, eating disorder, Eating Disorder Singapore, Health Articles, No to the Diet Mentality, Personal

June 4, 2013

BARE YOUR SOLE (BYS) 2013!

June 4, 2013

Bare Your Sole is back again this year for the fifth time and I’m really excited and honored to be part of it once again!

Organised by Habitat For Humanity Singapore and sponsored by Barclays, the Habitat- Barclays BYS is an annual event that helps to raise funds to support children and adults around the world who live in dire conditions. These children and adults often make their way around their disaster stricken enviroments barefooted and live in terrible conditions. The money raised at BYS goes into funding projects to improve these people’s living conditions by building homes and fighting poverty!

A home for everyone. No matter where you live and how poor you are. Isn’t that nice?

Habitat for Humanity is a great organisation because it not only seeks to eradicate poverty and restore dignity to poverty stricken people around the world with no homes, but it does so without making the beneficiaries feel like a charity case. All beneficiaries actually put in 300 sweat equity hours and work for their homes as well. If able to, they assist in the brick laying, painting and overall construction of their new home!

The event is held at Tanjong Rhu and participants take part in either a 2.5km or 5km walk. It’s very carnival like so there are games and bouncy castles, face painting, ballon sculpting, food, drinks, even a foot massage place etc for everyone to enjoy!


 Tanjong Rhu at 7am!

And the warm up led by Fitness First Instructors

Image taken from BYS official page

There are more than 5000 participants!

Image taken from BYS official page

Image taken from BYS official page

Image taken from BYS official page
After the walk everyone can wander around the diffferent stalls and redeem their food and drink coupons. Habit for Humanity has a ‘village’ there that gives people more information about what they do and sell merchandise to raise funds as well! I’ve never actually taken part in the walk itself (I should!) but I do enjoy volunteering to help out at the village. There are always new people to meet and talk to and new friends to make!
Just some pictures from the day!

 

This year, our food and drinks were proudly sponsored by Cold stone creamery, Tully’s Coffee and Milo and Quiznos subs! I didn’t eat any of them because by the time I got to the sub place they were sold out and milo, coffe and ice cream are really not my thing. Too dense, sticky and sweet for my palate the and heat!

They were giving out fruits as well so no problem at all!

Walk- about Entertainers! There were jugglers and others but this guy really caught my eye! He was just walking around letting this glass ball roll and slide all over him like it was light and fluid! Amazing! I was so intrigued, I stared so hard, he let me hold it!

It was actually really heavy! How did he do it?!

‘Business’ is slow when all the participants are walking so I took the opportunity to do some wandering myself and spend some money (great excuse to shop!)

The Habitat Village was selling these bird key chains that came in their little houses. I have a huge thing for these cartoon looking birds and never mind that they are an insane colour. THEY ARE CUTE. 

 
There were other stalls as well and they were all social enterprises such as the the Mother and Child Project, Friends of the Disabled, Simei Care Centre etc selling their handmade products! Super cute! 

The Mother and Child Project is another venture that is very close to my heart as well.
Really love what they are doing!

Okay, enough shopping, back to work!

Back at the booth, someone brought her Dachshund around and the dog was the cutest thing! It was really affectionate and liked to waddle to people so they could sayang her. HAHA. Like if we ignored her for a bit, she would just get up and waddle to the nearest person and snuggle her face onto the person’s foot. Too cute.

Look at those “feed me” eyes.

This is called volunteers eating snake. We tried to get her to answer the habitat quiz! Haha.


It was a great day and I loved just catching up with people I haven’t seen in awhile, talking to the participants as well as working with the habitat staff and volunteers! They are a GREAT bunch of people- so smiley and happy and enthusiastic about life – it’s really awesome!

And thank you SO much to my dear friends whom I dragged along with me to help out at 7am in the morning. It was really heartwarming to know that all of you cared so much as well for the cause as well. THANK YOU.

Come join us at BYS 2014 next year and in the meantime, join Habitat’s HOMEWORKS programme where they help the elderly destitute in Singapore to imporve the safety and sanitation of their living conditions! I never new how much dignity you could restore to a person just by scrubbing their floor and giving them a clean place to live in. Everyone deserves a decent place to live. For more information, visit HFH’s Operation Homeworks Singapore

See you soon! 🙂

Posted by grace Leave a Comment
Filed Under: Life, Social/ Environmental Awareness, Uncategorized Tagged: Habitat for Humanity, Personal, Volunteer Opportunities in Singapore

June 4, 2013

Trip to: BOLLYWOOD VEGGIES + POISON IVY BISTRO

June 4, 2013


Over the Vesak Day holiday, I made a trip to Bollywood Veggies!
I’ve long wanted to go there because it’s a place that really resonates with me. I love the idea that it’s actually possible to have a plot of land in highly urban and modern Singapore and actually grow crops without the help of pesticides and chemicals. No fancy schmancy profit making scheme. No mega food corporation. Just wholesome, natural food organically grown from garden to plate.
How nice!
It is no wonder then that I am in deep deep admiration of the founder of Bollywood Veggies, Ivy Singh and her husband. Not only did they believe in sustainable, organic farming enough to devote their retirement years to actually running one (talk about walking the talk!), their farm and bistro also make it a point to hire special and challenged people, especially local Singaporeans, giving work opportunities to all.  Ivy also helped to establish a new Kranjiside Association to represent local farmers and improve transport around the area. (The shuttlebus makes getting there so convenient!). Everything about the idea behind it and the place itself just really encourages people to continue learning, growing and getting back to the basics. Life can really be so simple and happy.
Environmental sustainability, company of good friends and family, health, education, fun- this place represents everything I believe in as well. ( Pity there were no chickens I could kidnap) Lots of green pictures ahead! It was a gorgeously sunny (almost too hot; we were there till past noon) day and I really had a lovely time. Try identifying the fruits and veg in each picture! I knew I couldn’t. In fact for a really long time, I couldn’t even shop at wet markets because I couldn’t identify one leafy veg from another without supermarket tags. How sad is that? I wonder if the next generation would think vegetables grow in supermarkets? Or chickens are born nugget shaped?
Didn’t drive to the place so I didn’t get one of these. Was so tempted though!
 
Was really happy to see little kids from different kindergatens as well as secondary schools visiting the place! Everybody should make it a point to go and just spend time among the plants. I felt the guides at Bollywood veggies were really good. We explored on our own mostly but trailed a tour group bringing a group of secondary school students around. The tour was interactive and engaging and the kids got to learn (and eat!) about the different plants. Lots of interesting and intriguing facts were dished out! It really made me more appreciative of the effort it takes to grow food and the value of real food.
I NEVER KNEW PAPAYAS/ PINEAPPLES GREW LIKE THAT.  WHERE HAVE I BEEN ALL MY LIFE.
Apparently, the spider is a natural predator of insects and whatnots (sorry, my knowledge about such thing is reeaaaalllly limited) that attack and feed on the jackfruit.
(Another interesting fact gleaned by leeching on one of the tour groups haha)
 Nature is so pretty. Full of SUCH vibrant colours. *happy sigh.
Come to think of it, I never knew how garlic grew either. I always figured they grew in a nice big necklace shaped clump for easy wearing against vampires.
Now I know why so many people consider mother nature the finest artist. Look at the colours, the textures! They can be so gnarled and aggressive looking one moment and yet so sot and fluffy the next. Inspiring!
 
COTTON TREE. When I was younger, I always thought cotton came from SHEEP. Oh dear Lord, please help me educate myself so I don’t ruin the next generation. 
 This is going to be one heck of a creepy place at night.
 Composting!!! Some days when I’m supposed to Pay Attention to Deep Lectures, I put on my Pay Attention Face and allow my mind to wander to the the day I can grow stuff in my HDB apartment and compost my own food scraps for fertiliser. In my perfect world, money spent on creating yet another bomb would be spent teaching people how to grow organic crops in high rise buildings and the miliatry R&D budget can be spent analysing how to make non smelly compost.
I hate bugs, usually. But when you are out there surrounded by all the greenery and all, a bug like that looks almost too cute. I was enthralled for a bit and stopped to watch it make it’s merry way across the road telling itself “left leg 1, right leg 1, left leg 2, right leg 2… left leg 300, wait was it 299?”
Cheerful at the thought that I had quite a good workout by proxy and in need of a drink,  we decided to go check out Poison Ivy Bistro for lunch.
 
Awesome place. The food was really homely and yummy. We ordered pretty standard fare but I must say the highlight of the meal was definitely the…
MORINGA TEMPURA. Seriously. I need to learn how to make this. Does anybody have a recipe? I cannot believe it’s probably just some leaves in batter.  LEAVES!!!
It was non greasy and fried to this really addictive lightness. The chef must have gotten his frying techniques down pat. This didn’t taste greasy at all which made it a happy indulgence. I’m okay with fried food if they are fried properly! Read my previous post to find out why not all fried food are equally bad!
 Other orders included an Aloe Vera drink to cool off in the heat, a serving of brown rice, otah omelette and banana curry. Ordered the banana curry as I had read rave reviews online. While it is tasty and novel, the dish was a little too starchy for me. I’d recommend you try it for the sake of it but I wouldn’t likely reorder it the next time I go. Just twenty take away bags of the Moringa Tempura please.
 Another lovely drink- the Fig Tea! Try it!
 Immensely satisfied, we left the bistro and spotted a little pushcart selling dried goods and the like outside. The lady manning it gave us free bananas! I LOVE BANANAS!! THey aren’t as pretty looking at the ones you get in supermarkets but they taste SO GOOD.
 The boyfriend went off to pay at the cashier after the meal while I made a few calls and came back with this banana cake to take home. I like banana cake in general so I was pleasantly surprised but not expecting much. What I did not expect was HOW GOOD IT WAS/ IS. SERIOUSLY. It was so fluffy and moist and full of banana-y goodness.
Toasted a slice of it in the oven for a minute when i got home and it was so warm, slightly crisp outside, fluffy inside and filled with this gooey melty banana bits.
I only regret not buying more because once my dad got his hands on it, it didn’t last very long.
Comes in chocolate as well! But I didn’t try that!
And that concludes my visit to Bollywood Veggies!  I recommend you go just to get away from the usual shopping mall haunt. It was nice to be out in the sun (very rare for me to say that as I’m a polar bear by nature) and surrounded by all the colours. If anything, just go for the food at Poison Ivy Bistro. It’s unpretentious, hearty, wholesome. Exactly like how food should be.
In health and happiness!
Bollywood Veggies 
9:30am- 6:30pm
http://bollywoodveggies.com/
100 Neo Tiew Rd  Singapore 719026
6898 5001

Closed on Mondays & Tuesdays

except Public Holidays
Shuttle Bus Timings&Info: HERE

Posted by grace 2 Comments
Filed Under: Eat Out!, Healthy Food Places in Singapore, In Singapore, Travel, Uncategorized Tagged: Fun Places to Visit in Singapore, Healthy Places to Eat in Singapore, Poison Ivy Bistro, Sg Farms: Bollywood Veggies

May 31, 2013

21 Day Sugar Detox Day 2

May 31, 2013

 Hola! It’s day 2!

Today I’ve had loads of errands to run. So I was out of the house from 8 in the morning till 10 at night. So while the food is plated in the photos, they were actually eaten from containers on the go. I know, so unglam right. But the plated photos are for the time I write the recipes!

Let’s check out day 2:

Breakfast: Green Apple Peanut Butter Soya Bean Milk Spinach Smoothie

Not one of my favourites. I’m blending the green apple because it’s allowed on the 21DSD. It wasn’t yucky, still okay but meh. Food can be better. I’m going to add back the fruits after today because I don’t think there’s anything wrong with fresh, wholesome, natural food.

Mid Morning Meal: Carb Free Salmon & Prawn Sushi and Miso soup

I LOVE MISO SOUP. Especially homemade ones that you can control the saltiness. THere’s just something SO comforting about a piping hot bowl of soup, wakame and tofu. This is a super easy dish tooo. 3 minutes and 3 ingredients are all you need. Make a large batch at the start of the week and freeze for the week. Reheat in the mornings and bring to work in a thrmos. It’s so good in a freezing office, I promise.

The sushi is actually carb free because I didn’t use rice. I used.. jeng jeng jeng…

CAULIFLOWER!

Haha. Yes, you read me right! When you boil and blend caulflower, it makes a great rice substitute for those trying to shed weight, go carb free, or paleo.

 Check it out. Looks like rice right? Loads of fibre, vitamins, minerals, almost zero calories and no grain carbs that can make some people feel bloated and sick.

 Just put it on seaweed like you ordinarily would and roll!

I packed this is a cooler tub and the soup in a thermos and had a jap lunch on the go 🙂

Lunch: Creamy Broccoli Carrot Soup, Sutchi Fillet with lemon, rosemary and garlic herb butter

Broccoli soup from the big batch I made on Sunday night for the week. Sutchi Fillet you can buy frozen from NTUC. I wrap it in aluminum foil in the morning and place it in the oven to bake while i get ready. By the time I’m done, it’s ready to be put into a container and into my lunchbag.

Dinner: Yong Tau Foo

My yong tau food pic on my iPhone was blurred so I used a random one I found in my photo library. But I usually order the same thing so it’s roughly the same. Most of the other options are too processed. The soup here is half-halved to lower the sodium content! Still tasted great. 
And that’s it for day 2!
The one thing I’ve come to appreciate is that you don’t really need rice to stay full (try telling that to my dad!). In fact, I fin dthat if I eat a meal predominant in rice (by percentage) I get blated and after awhile, feel ravenous again and will start to crave something sugary or crazy like a macdonald’s burger. It’s not that rice is bad or I’m trying to stay away from rice or anything but it can affect different people differently.  
I’ll do another post another time about rice and carbs and stuff to hopefully allay people’s fears about rice and to show you that rice is okay, it’s just that there are better options out there to meet your nutritional needs. 
However, if you are staying away from rice and carbs in general, you NEED to replace it with other things to meet your nutritional needs. Cutting calories will definitely send you on the path to weight loss but think about nourishing your body with enough calories in the form of complex carbs, protein and healthy fats as well!
Say for example you are used to eating eggs, fish, veg and rice for dinner. Omitting the rice will cut your calories and help you lose weight yes but if you are just eating a miniscule portion of meat, fish and veg, it’s not going to nourish you very well. You should try to still meet your daily caloric demands but upping your intake of veg instead. Please don’t fear food. Trust your body. It’ll let you know how much it needs and what it needs as long as you continue to give it a wide variety of fresh wholesome food.
Stop worrying about calories! Start thinking about nutrition! 🙂
With lots of love 🙂

Posted by grace Leave a Comment
Filed Under: Nutrition, Personal, Physical/ Mental Health Articles, Uncategorized Tagged: 21 Day Sugar Detox, Carb Free, Green Smoothies/ Juices, Mains

May 30, 2013

21 Day Sugar Detox Day 1

May 30, 2013

Hello again everyone!

So! I was trying to figure out how to write this food log thing and just decided to write it in chronological order. I’m actually on day 4 of it already and I never realised how much sugar is in everything! If anything, I really recommend this ‘detox’ just to raise your awareness on the presence of sugar in most food products

The one thing I cannot stand though, is that this detox removes all fruit except green tipped banana and green apples. I can understand why it does that because at the end of the day, fruit is fructose and can trigger the same sugar imbalances and cravings but I am used to almost 4-5 different types of fruit everyday, so this has been pretty hard on me.

(Not because I really miss the sugar but.. I miss the soluble fibre. HAHA)

I’ve actually tweaked the detox diet to suit me a little more. The original diet recommends a removal of all fruits except bananas and apples but I figured if I came across a papaya or mangoes (they are in season now), I wouldn’t beat myself up if I consumed them. Also, I’m allowing myself brown rice and wholegrain seeded multigrain buns and the like. Just sticking to the basic principles of no white sugar, white flour etc which is awesome because ‘cept for the fruits parts this is almost similar to the way I usually eat. (Score!) so it’s actually not much of a ‘torture’ for me. Wish I had logged the first time I tried this sugar rebalancing thing a year ago. Now, THAT was hell. 🙂

Anyway! On to day 1! All the photos taken with my Iphone as a quick log so no fancy schmancy anything 🙂

Monday 27 May

Breakfast: Peanut Butter Spinach Smoothie

My FAVOURITE veg smoothie of all time and a GREAT way to start the day. There is just something amazing about peanut butter and banana together! Makes you just feel high and happy and LIFE’S GOOD. Be careful about the peanut butter you choose though. Most peanut butters are packed with unwanted sugars and crazy things. Check out this comparison:

I’m not sure if it shows clearly but you can see that Adam’s Peanut Butter on the left, which I THOROUGHLY recommend, contains only peanuts and less than 1% salt. While the other brand (and most brands of peanut butter), contains corn syrup (sugar!) soy protein concentrate (why?), sugar (more sugar?!), hydrogenated vegetable oils (so bad for you), salt, minerals and vitamins. In the front though, the peanut butter on the right markets itself as ‘healthy’ as it has ‘ZERO PERCENT TRANS FAT!’ My mom bought it because she was trying to eat ‘healthier’. Help your parents and kids make more informed choices!

I also got this from the manufacturer’s FAQ page about its peanut butter. Names have be omitted.

What are the ingredients in (company’s name) Peanut Butter?
(company’s name) Peanut Butter complies with U.S. Standards of Identity for
peanut butter by containing more than 90 percent select roasted peanuts.
It also contains extremely small amounts of vegetable oil stabilizers,
which improve smoothness and prevent the natural peanut oils from
separating from the product and rising to the top of the jar. To enhance
the flavor, the Peanut Butter also contains sugar and salt.

Sounds quite okay right? But no, there are better, more natural options out there! Without the added sugar, peanut butter is a GREAT and TASTY source of protein and healthy fats for you so it’s awesome (and so yummy!)

 I blended it with peashoots and spinach and unsweetened almond milk. Blend with 4 cubes of ice at the end and it’s a creamy dream to have in the morning. MHMM.

Mid Morning Snack: Hot Creamy Broccoli Carrot Soup and Cod + Green Tea

 
To save time over the week, I make my soup in batches. Freeze what I can’t consume in a day in daily sizes and thaw one container overnight for reheating in the morning. Lots of people have been all ‘aint nobody got the time for that girl’ and asking me how I find the time to make all these when they have to work and omg! Waking up is hard enough alr and still have to cook?! 
I actually prepare all my stuff on sunday nights and during the week everything is reheat (while I shower), pack and go. (15 min tops)
Lunch: Shrimp Salad from BBQ Chicken, Rivervale Mall

Lunch was the shrimp salad above. It was the ONLY thing on BBQ’s chicken menu (you know, the korean eatery) that wasn’t slathered in sugar and EVEN THEN, I could tell my prawns were soaked in sugar solution. Most restaurants do that. It helps the shrimp retain a bouncy bite to them. 
The above was my mom’s meal and I ate some of her chicken as well which was way better than the salad. The chicken was pretty well done and flavourful. If I went back, I’d still order the same combi though. The lettuce provided some crisp fresh balance too the flavourful BBQ Jerk Chicken. I think the above set is just too overloaded with salt to consume on it’s own. My mom enjoyed the chicken and rice but the fried cheese sticks were cold 🙁
Mid Afternoon Snack: Pumpkin Brown Rice with jap furikake, Broccoli, panfried salmon spiced with chilli flakes and black pepper 
(I put everything on a plate for a photo but I actually ate this out of a container 🙂 This is a great bring to work meal!)

Dinner: Thunder Tea Rice at Changi City Point

Met a couple of dear friends at Changi City Point for dinner and had a good chat over one of my favourite hawker meals.

So that concludes day 1! Hope this has been helpful. There was probably some sugar in chili sauce here and there and the restaurant food but I wouldn’t stress over it. It didn’t affect me much and I went to bed happy 🙂 Eating right and eating well doesn’t have to be dull and dreary and to the point of starvation. In fact, you can eat a whole lot of unprocessed, real yummy food and your body would know what to do with it. Nourish your body and everything will fall into place!

No exercise for me today :/ I’m trying to work on it for heart health and bone density but yeah.. hehheh.

Good morning world! Have a happy healthy day today!

Posted by grace 1 Comment
Filed Under: Life, Nutrition, Personal, Physical/ Mental Health Articles, Uncategorized Tagged: Green Smoothies/ Juices, Mains, Soups, What I Ate Today

May 28, 2013

My 21 Day Sugar Detox Journey

May 28, 2013

AHhhhhhh. Diets.

What can I say, I really hate them. I hate the thought of restricting myself only to a certain kind of food. I hate the thought of enforced limitation. I hate this constant obsession with what to eat, what not to eat. I prefer to live by principles, not set rules.

But if there is one diet I am intrigued by, it’s the Sugar Detox Diet. Unlike other kinds of diets that have weight loss as a main goal, this detox helps to clear toxins out of the body and most importantly, balance sugar levels. When your sugar levels are balanced, cravings drop and you feel more energetic in general. The decreased level of sugar also helps the body focus on repairing itself rather than looking tired and sallow all the time since sugar binds to collagen which contributes to a duller complexion. Clearing sugar from my diet has really helped me so much. The 10+ kg weight loss has been a bonus of course, but to wake up each day happy and energetic is something I wish for everyone else as well. (That, and a fatter wallet because there is no longer any need to spend on make up! Hurray!)

When I suggested limiting sugar as a starting point for friends who were interested in how to embark on a healthier diet, I was met with much aghast. The 21 day sugar detox recommends breaking away from things that wreak havoc with your blood sugars like white rice, bread, pastries, sweet, anything with refined sugar. The only fruits they allow are green tipped bananas and green apples. Sounds extreme? But only for 21 days! Most of the people I talked to had only one question— THEN WHAT DO I EAT?!

So to help everyone out, I’ll be going on the same detox diet for the next 21 days as well and I will be logging every single thing that I eat with pictures to give you a better idea of how you can do in a laksa- filled Singapore.

I hope that at the end of the day you would be able to see that continuing to eat as you have always done, hawker centre food everyday etc, is really the thing that is limiting you. When you learn to appreciate real food with all its amazing and natural tastes, it’s really like a party in your mouth.

21 days. No sugar. No white carbohydrates. A whole repertoire of food to choose from. I guarantee that in 21 days, you would find yourself more aware of what really goes into your food, all the hidden sugars in everything. Your tastebuds will sharpen and you would be able to appreciate food as it’s meant to be. You would also find that instead of limiting yourself, your food choices have never been so wide or so varied. You would come to appreciate food and the myraid of ways it can be prepared for consumption.

21 days. You ready? 🙂

For more information on the 21daysugardetox or to buy the program, you can visit
Balanced Bites 21daysugardetox

Or for a FREE list and more information, visit Rose Cole Wellness 21 Day Sugar Detox

Questions? vegsmoothiebunny@gmail.com 🙂

Posted by grace Leave a Comment
Filed Under: Life, Nutrition, Personal, Physical/ Mental Health Articles, Uncategorized Tagged: 21 Day Sugar Detox, Detox diet failure, Personal

May 20, 2013

PasarBella- Singapore’s first permanent farmer’s market!

May 20, 2013

YAY!

Singapore finally has a permanent farmer’s market! I love farmer’s markets! I love that everything looks so fresh and brilliant- the colours! wow! The variety! The smells! Mhmm! I love it that it’s a place that treats food with the respect that it deserves and the atmosphere is always so fun and carnival like 🙂

Best of all, I love the almost-tangible passion in the air. The people behind the stalls are what attract me the most. I was a little skeptical about PasarBella because I was pretty sure all the veg and everything would actually be imported rather than lovingly grown by the stall owners themselves and horrors! they might turn out to be no different from people trying to hawk their wares solely for profit and whatnot but what I found at PasarBella was heartwarmingly different. Like at any farmer’s market across the world, the people behind their stalls at PasarBella were passionate about what they sold. You could tell that if they chose to sell bread or meat or oil or flowers that they truly believed in the highest quality of their product. From the girl at the crafts booth selling fabric to the lady selling cheese, I loved the way their eyes all lit up at the mention of their products. The genuine warmth and the vast knowledge- they were all specialists in their field and were truly inspiring!

I would really love to go back on a slow day at the market and just wander around talking to the stall owners!

I was SO TEMPTED to buy dried lavender stalks for $35 a bunch. Told myself I’d walk around the place first before returning and forgot all about them! 🙁 Would definitely be going back to get them. They were so lovely and smelled incredible!

Not a fan of coffee but the coffee smell was still really enticing.

I LOVE OILS pressed from fruit and nuts. MHMMM!

The best part of any farmer’s markets! The produce section!
Hello Barry the broccoli!

Does anybody know what fruits are these? I think the bottom left hand ones are.. pomegranate?

PIXIE DUST!

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We couldn’t resist and stopped to buy a beef/cheddar (?) pie. It was okay. Flavourful I guess but as it wasn’t hot it wasn’t really irresistible. I felt there was too much meat and too little pastry. The balance was off somehow. I managed to snuck the middle part (with the extra pastry deco) so had a nice balanced mouthful of both pastry and filling. THAT part was yummy. haha

I LOVE SPICES!!!!!

Really unique sounding drinks. Lemongrass and Ginger Milk, Lemon grass and Ginger tea and Cinnamon Spice!

I think this was the highlight of PasarBella for me. The Cheese Ark!

It’s tucked away through a narrow corridor next to Bella Bakery.

I love the place! It’s just such a cosy nook filled with all sort of cheese and I really like cheese! The staff (as all the PasarBella staff are) were really friendly as well. Places that sell food AND offer free samples always get my vote 🙂

We asked for Brie but since they only served ‘rare cheese’ they offered an equally creamy substitute- raw cow’s milk cheese! I really liked it! I’ve long heard about the benefits of raw cow’s milk as opposed to pasteurised versions and I guess eating the cheese form is as good as any!

We also heard that they have a sort of ‘cheese degustation/ sampling’ session going on at night at 7:30pm where people can just gather round and sample the cheese. You can also bring your own wine, fruit and nuts etc– sounds like fun! Will totally want to try it out someday!

Most importantly, The Cheese Ark imports cheese from places and makers who still take the time to lovingly prepare their cheese through traditional methods- in line with The Slow Food Foundation‘s philosophy of protecting the environment, defending biodiversity, promoting sustainable agriculture, promoting small-scale food producers and valuing their traditional knowledge etc.

I fully suport any of these sort of ventures and efforts to treat the earth and food right so yay for The Cheese Ark!

Wouldn’t it be lovely if every child in future would be able to appreciate cheese (or any other type of food for that matter) for all the time and passion that went into it rather than a strangely coloured square blob in a package that came from a factory?

Anyway! Moving on!

Bella Bakery Bread!

Huber’s Butchery is also at PasarBella! I’m definitely not a fan of sausages or processed meats in general but we decided to try a Swiss Veal hotdog! I have a weakness for caramelised onions. Haha.

Not too bad I guess. Not something I would hanker for but much better than your run-of-the-mill hotdogs, definitely!

The last part of PasarBella is also a Tsukiji- inspired fish market. Live lobsters were going for 3 for $100. I found out that the founder of PasarBella is actually TWENTY FOUR year old Clovis Lim who is also behind gorgeous eateries like Antoinette and Pique Nique.

He is one of the anchor tenants at PasarBella and runs the fishmarket!


Just as we were heading out, I spied Pantry Magic!!!

Look at the array of gorgeous kitchen ware. SIGH *heart all aflutter*

Unfortunately it was closed for the day but! Gives me a great reason to go back again soon.

Go go go check out PasarBella for yourself! 🙂

PasarBella
Opens 9:30am- 7:30pm
Mondays to Sundays

PasarBella @ The Grandstand Bukit Timah Singapore
200 Turf Club Road Singapore 287994
Phone: +65 6887 0077

Accessible by car, train, bus or shuttle bus!

Posted by grace 1 Comment
Filed Under: In Singapore, Life, Travel, Uncategorized Tagged: Fun Places to Visit in Singapore, Sg Markets: Pasarbella

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Hello There!

Hi! My name is Grace
and I live in sunny Singapore! :D Welcome to Fithealthybunny.com where I share my love for exploring, healthy eating, mindful living and everything in between

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