CLEAN Elimination Diet – Day 1

Okay, it’s time!  I am back from a recent trip, and although I have been semi eating off the elimination diet list for the Clean Program, now that I am back, it’s time to get down to business!  So, starting today, I’ll be doing three days of elimination diet followed by the 21 days of cleansing.  I am so excited, because everything that I keep reading has been reinforcing this path, so it’s quite obvious to me that God wants me to be doing this.

In fact, just this morning, I was reading an amazing post over on KitchenStewardship.com about the transformation that good nutritional and toxic-free food had on one family.  This is the same kind of message that keeps coming to me from several different and unrelated stories, so when that kind of thing happens, I tend to pay attention.

Today’s menu:

Breakfast: Cherry/Peach Vanilla Protein Smoothie

Lunch: Lentil Dish (recipe below) – this made a big pot, so I will be freezing a portion of it

Dinner: Salad with Grilled Chicken (pasture-fed, local)

I’ll be posting my journey here for several reasons:

1) Many have told me that they are also interested in this information, and they all want to see how I do first

2) So far my experience has been that cooking with more natural, raw foods is more time consuming, and definitely takes more than one grocery trip a month.  So, I’ll be posting about using freezer cooking methods and other time saving techniques, as well as money saving ideas that can be used for healthier cooking.

3) It holds me accountable!

See you tomorrow!

To your success,

Dr. Laura

Lentil Dish – For the record, I have never eaten lentils until today, and I don’t really care much for cooked spinach either, but I LOVE this recipe!  It is very yummy!  I got it from the Clean Program Forum.

1/2 cup lentils, preferably du Puy or green (I used green), rinsed and drained
1/2 cup uncooked short grain brown rice (I used organic)
3 1/2 cups vegetable broth (I used 2 cups organic vegetable broth and 1 cup organic chicken broth and 1/2 cup filtered water, because that is what I had in the pantry!)
1 bay leaf
1 tsp salt (I used pink/white Himalayan sea salt)
1 Tbsp olive oil (I used EVOO)
1 medium onion (I used three small onions from our garden)
1/8 tsp ground allspice (I used organic)
1 10 oz pkg frozen spinach, thawed and drained (I used 100% natural spinach from a sustainable farm)

Combine the lentils, rice, broth, bay leaf and salt in a medium size pot over medium heat.  Bring to a boil, reduce and simmer, partially covered, for 40-45 minutes, or until all the liquid has been absorbed and the lentils and rice are tender.  Discard bay leaf.  Heat oil in pan over medium-high heat.  Add onions and saute, stirring for 5-8 minutes until golden brown.  Add onions to lentil mixture and stir.  Add allspice to lentil mixture and stir.  Place spinach in the pan used to cook the onions and cook over medium-high heat, for 2-3 minutes until spinach is wilted.  Drain off excess liquid and add spinach to lentil mixture.  Serve warm.  (I also topped mine with freshly ground black pepper.)  You can also serve this with grilled fish or chicken, so for my leftovers, I’ll put in some pasture-fed chicken.

P.S.  I’ve also switched over to glass storage containers, so will be using those to freeze up my individual portions!