Gluten Free Pizza

I made this before the trip but didn't have time to post. My biggest fear in not eating wheat is that I will be denying myself things that I love and crave, like pizza. So to comfort myself, I bought a gluten-free/wheat-free pizza crust mix and added some CSA peppers, tomatoes, onions, and basil. The texture is slightly different, but overall it was very good.

I also made one for the hubby with chorizo sausage and cheddar, which he enjoyed.

For a side dish, I put together a take on succotash based on a side dish I had at Rarebit downtown.

It's basically butter beans, cherry tomatoes, sundried tomatoes, fresh corn, feta, and red wine vinegar, salt, and pepper. Easy and really tasty!

Back on the Wagon

Back home from vacation and it's time to get rid of the wheat. Since we had no groceries, I had to wing it the first day with some eggs for breakfast and a 1/4 cup of quinoa with canned salmon and green tea. I was full all day!

Miami - Day 3

For our last day in South Beach, we booked a walking food tour which met at Books & Books Cafe (where we ate the day before, but it's probably the best food we had while we were there) for appetizers, then strolled through the farmer's market and took in the scenery.

After stopping for (strong) Cuban coffee and pastries, we walked down to Espanola Way for some fritter type things that were basically cheese and corn that had been breaded and fried (horrible for you but tasty). Then we walked to a Peruvian restaurant near the ocean for more ceviche, a potato dish, and a steak/tomato/french fry dish. Again, not bad, but not that flavorful and not necessarily something I would go out of my way to eat again. I know I sound like a total food snob, but coming from Charleston, where the culinary scene is exploding (and you can get a crazy good meal for under $15), the bar is set pretty high. Food in Miami was really expensive and I think that set my expectations high also.

Fortunately the tour also took us through some areas we hadn't been yet, and we got to see some more art deco architecture and walk under a really neat hotel pool.

We finished up back at the farmer's market, where we took in all of the beautiful exotic fruit up for grabs.

Our trip wound up with a quick visit with my friend BC, who I have not seen in probably 10 years. He moved to Miami Beach a few years ago, saw we were there on Facebook, and the rest is history. He took us to a great Thai restaurant and then gave us a 'local' tour and took us to the airport.

Adios Miami, it's been fun!

Miami - Day 2

Our second day in South Beach started off with breakfast at Manolos, then some serious pool time. The hotel pool was out of this world. Perfect temperature, great chairs to lounge in, not too crowded. Read my book, took a swim, and just relaxed all morning. Ahhhhh....heaven.

Then we headed back by Espanola Way and tried some Cuban food. This is the point where I started to realize that I'm kind of indifferent to Latin American food. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't very flavorful either. Maybe we were eating the 'tourist' version? John got a paella type dish with chicken and plantains and I got a shrimp appetizer with black beans and rice. The shrimp was clearly frozen and the rice had ham in it, so I made up for it by getting some killer gelato later (that's one thing Miami definitely does right!).

Next, we ventured back over to Lincoln Road for some light shopping and to kill some time before we picked up the Duck Tour.

The Duck Tour was awesome. I've always secretly wanted to do one and it was so much fun. It's the big bus that drives into the water and becomes a boat. So we got a driving tour of South Beach, followed by a boat ride where we saw celebrity homes and the view from the harbor.

After a long day, we called it a night pretty early, grabbing some Colombian food near the hotel (which was better than the Cuban, but still really starchy/meaty) and enjoyed our hotel cable and wrote some postcards. John also had champagne and chocolate cake delivered to the room for my birthday! He truly thought of everything. One more day!

Miami - Day 1

My darling hubby surprised me with a birthday weekend in Miami, a place we had talked about going before but had never visited. After a pretty easy flight (catching up on trashy magazines), we found the hotel (the Anglers Resort, which was amazing), and walked to the corner to grab some lunch at Manolos, a Latin diner of sorts.

I decided this was my farewell to carbs weekend, so I kicked it off with a big bowl of pasta. Not the best I've ever had, not the worst. But I was hungry so no complaints.

Then we walked two blocks to the ocean. After dipping our toes in the water we rented bikes and rode up and down Ocean Drive (where all the cool old Art Deco hotels are), then relaxed for a bit at the hotel before heading out.

Next it was on to Lincoln Road, the main shopping/dining/entertainment district for South Beach. The sheer number of people and activity was overwhelming but fun. We got dinner at an overpriced but good sushi place (the beer was $17....I will spare you how much the entrees were), where I had a quinoa hand roll for the first time (yum!).

After walking to the movie theater and seeing "Elysium," we walked back to our hotel and passed through Espanola Way, a small alley full of restaurants, gelato, and more. It was close to midnight and crowds were just getting started.

Then a good night's sleep so we could get ready for day 2!

Goodbye to Wheat

Now that I've decided to give this wheat free thing a try, it's pretty easy to look back and see that maybe, just maybe, I had a slight problem with wheat. Apparently wheat can be addictive in that you crave it more when you eat it, and it makes your blood sugar spike and then drop, causing you to be hungry about two hours after eating it (sound familiar?). This happens to me all the time. As a long-time vegetarian/pescatarian, I've relied on grains to round out my meals and satiate my sweet tooth. I was going through fairly recent pictures to add to the blog and noticed a trend.

Noodles.

Cookies.

Bread.

Lots of bread!

But basically, wheat. Everywhere. I had no idea how much of it I was eating and the impact it could potentially have on my health. I'm excited to see how I feel over the next few weeks and if my cravings really go away like they say. After a few days without it though, I'm already feeling more mental clarity and less hunger. So long, wheat!

Wheat Belly

I'm always on the hunt for nutritional knowledge and new ways to feel better and healthier. Some theories are difficult to implement, others don't make sense to me. One thing I've been fairly successful at recently is cutting way down on diet soda. I now have one every few days and used to be a 3x a day gal, easily. I've known for a while that carbs are not great for you (or sugar), but let's face it, as a vegetarian those are two easy things to eat a lot of. Then came "Wheat Belly." Even the name made me giggle a little.

The basic theory is that everyone (celiac disease or not) has some wheat allergy or sensitivity, whether they recognize it or not. I, of course, recognized many of the 'symptoms' it lists, such as brain fog, fatigue, chronic allergies/sinus grossness, and aches/pains/head aches. The soda cutback has helped with the headaches considerably. There is a whole host of reasons, which quite frankly I don't care that much about, followed by a tremendous number of testimonials (in comments, in the book, on the blog, online) of people who have dropped obscene amounts of weight quickly by cutting the wheat. Generally they drop their other ailments in the process. This was a very appealing combination, I mean who wouldn't like to have more energy and breathe better and lose weight?

But I love wheat. I love pasta. I love bread. I love desserts. I could go on and on and on. The idea of not eating wheat every day flat out terrifies me. But unlike paleo and other restrictive diets, it does encourage you to eat dairy, cheese, beans, and even rice and other non-wheat carbs. So you have more to work with. As an experiment, I went one day without wheat--a 3 egg omelet with veggies and cheese for breakfast, a black bean burger in a bowl (with goat cheese, tomato, zucchini, and portabella mushrooms) from Sesame with butternut squash soup, and wheat free pizza with veggies for dinner. Maybe it was the placebo affect, but I felt more focused and like I had more energy, and I really wasn't very hungry. That's what I'm most skeptical of, the people who post about all their cravings going away and not wanting brownies any more or saying they were never hungry and had to remember to eat. I can't ever picture that day. I think about food a lot.

So while it's restrictive, I think it might be worth a try. If it works, the outcomes would far outweigh the sacrifices. I'm going on a birthday vacation and when I get back, I think I'm going to be ready to give it a serious go. Fingers crossed!