What to do with leftover veggies that I don't eat very often...

After finishing the 3 Day Refresh, I had leftover cauliflower in my fridge. Since it's not a favorite veggie, I decided to get creative and loosely follow a recipe for a cauliflower pizza crust. While I won't lie and say it was the most amazing pizza ever, lol, I will say that it was really pretty good and I would eat it again! If I have a craving for pizza and don't need to indulge myself, this is a great alternative that keeps it healthy, but still satisfies that wonderful cheese and tomato sauce taste.

If you try this, let me know what YOU think!

I DID IT!

I completed the 3 Day Refresh and did NOT cheat! That is HUGE for me. I’ve done the 3 Day Shakeology cleanse and I definitely cheated on that one. I went in mentally prepared for this and told myself I could do it for only 3 days. Why should this be a struggle for me, the health and fitness coach, you ask? Because I LOVE to eat! I usually eat more calories than my body needs and because I exercise, have a high metabolism, and am tall, you can’t see much difference. However, that’s not an excuse for not taking care of my body. With the many diseases that run in my family, I choose to exercise and eat healthy to lower my odds of developing any of them.

So, what is the 3 Day Refresh? It’s a very basic program that is at a calorie deficit to train yourself on what to eat and when, as well as cleanse your system, and jump start your weight loss if needed. The great thing is that I was allowed to eat real food, not just drink my food over 3 days. And of course, TONS of water is a must! I had a Shakeology for breakfast each day, followed by the Fiber Sweep drink in the mid-morning. Lunch was a Vanilla Fresh shake that I chose to mix fruit in and then a choice of vegetables and a healthy fat. My afternoon snack was another vegetable and healthy fat and dinner was the Vanilla Fresh shake and a choice of several vegetable based recipes. 

Now to the important part, in my personal opinion – was I starving or cranky or light-headed while completing this? I was very surprised that I was only slightly hungry a few times and was not cranky or light-headed at all. I was eating so much less than what I normally eat, but since the quality of the food was so good, it helped to give me a full feeling. In fact, by the time I got to the afternoon snack on day one, I was just plain tired of chewing! I chose to eat most of my veggies raw and to look at 1 cup of veggies, it looked so small, but it took forever to eat. Check out the pictures of several of my meals!

And here’s the fun part – my results! I took measurements, pictures and weighed on the morning of day one and again on day 4.

	Day 1	Day 4
Weight	130	127
Chest	31.75	31.75
Waist	27.5	27.5
Hips	36	36
Left Arm	10.25	10.25
Right Arm	10	10
Left Leg	19	19
Right Leg	19.5	19.25

Even though there is no change in measurements, I still SEE and FEEL the benefits. I could tell that my stomach was flatter below the belly button. I also FELT GREAT! I felt good emotionally about controlling what I ate and sticking with a program, but I also felt great physically. While that part is not measurable like the chart above, I still know that my body was working the way it was intended. I wasn’t overfed or stuffed from bad food, I wasn’t eating from boredom, I wasn’t eating just because everyone else was eating. 

So today as I look back at the past 3 days I am glad I did the 3 Day Refresh. I have vowed to take more time to really plan out my meals AND snacks, rather than just seeing what’s available for a snack. And tonight, even though I splurged on pizza (my all-time favorite food), I still controlled what I ate. I can eat a whole pizza by myself (no I’m not kidding)! Instead, I limited the amount I ate and about 5 minutes after eating, I got that “I ate just a little too much” feeling. So as much as I love pizza, I need to eat even a little less next time so I don’t experience the “stuffed” sensation.

I’d love to hear from YOU if you have ever done anything like this and how your experience was!