This past week was a tough one, and if it weren’t for paleo in my life it might have been worse. All in one week I came down with a sinus infection, had to go to a conference in Philadelphia for work, and the CrossFit Games Open started. My body was really taxed this week, and I am so grateful to know what to do to mitigate the effects of a stressful modern life on myself. Being paleo has become a source of empowerment and control for me to feel like I can take back my body when it has been pushed to its limits. I can control what goes in it, I know how the food I eat will affect it, and I can even make specific choices to aide in the recovery process when I’m in need of it. And this week I was happy to have this knowledge.
I’ve developed some pretty good food preparation habits that really came in handy this week. Lynn P. from the gym asked me previously how I go about meal prepping and I actually found it kind of hard to answer her, because I’m not as good and strict about it as bodybuilders (I don’t weigh it or count macronutrients, or follow the Zone Diet), but what I do do is really effective for me. Generally, I cook two to three meals per week – usually on Sunday night, Monday night and Wednesday or Thursday night. I don’t really always even follow this schedule, but I cook when I feel like it, I plan ahead when I grocery shop, and I make MASSIVE quantities of food when I do cook. I also try to make meals that preheat fairly easily – for example, a steak or ribs might be something I make when I don’t feel like eating whatever I’ve already meal-prepped but not something I’d make to store and eat later because they don’t reheat well.
Most of the time I’m making pretty elaborate dishes, maybe something in a crockpot or a stew-like mixture of meat and veggies. Cooking these usually takes me quite a bit of time I admit, so my life is pretty much work, gym, cook, eat, sleep. If I want other activities thrown in there I have to meal prep for it. For those of you out there who have kids and other life responsibilities, I feel for you. You not only have to make considerably more food (or there is just less food left over for you to use as lunch or dinner later, meaning you have to cook more often), you have to make meals that everyone will eat, and you have to find time within your family’s schedule to make them. I very much look forward to becoming a wife and a mother but I wonder about how sustainable my current lifestyle will be at that point. Eventually I anticipate I will probably have to let something go from my list of activities. So “kudos” to any of you who can make meal prepping a habit in your busy lives too.
To prepare to leave town for three days for my conference I made three meals, froze them, boxed them up in individual containers and packed them in a cooler to bring along with me.
You can see here in the picture of the cooler that I piled a bunch of snacks and vitamins on top, so it’s hard to actually see the boxes of food, but believe me, they’re in there. Also, FYI, the aluminum foil has a bunch of cooked bacon in it too, because a true Paleo goes nowhere without a steady supply of bacon!
I also called ahead to the hotel to make sure that my room had a refrigerator and so I could request a microwave as well. I also brought various snacks, my own coffee, tea and plenty of water. So that I could keep working out and even do the Open workout if I needed to out of town, I researched nearby CrossFit boxes in the area around my hotel and found one within walking distance that I could go to in the evenings after the conference. I contacted them ahead of time to let them know I was coming, which was their policy, but also added a sense of accountability to actually going. I did all this just to prepare to maintain my lifestyle for three days in another city.
Now I should give credit where credit is due – a lot of this was inspired by Robin Gonzales, my housemate and fellow Old Cityzen. I have gone with her a number of times to CrossFit competitions and events. She competes fairly often and always packs several large bags of food, snacks, protein supplements and water for these events. She is never without a healthy paleo supply of sustenance, which I really admire. She even bottles cucumber-lemon-infused water in mason jars to bring with her to competitions so she’s always got the most delicious water with her! Watching Robin do this time and time again made me realize I could easily do this for the conference, especially since I’d be staying in a hotel room that had a refrigerator and microwave. And it was very convenient (and cheap!) to have food ready for me every day throughout the conference. Thanks Robin for the inspiration!
As for my sinus infection, I knew that I needed to make something to ingest daily that contained bone broth, and I had some lovely rainbow carrots in my fridge that I found at the market last week…
…so I made this rainbow carrot soup. Before I give you the recipe, I should warn you, my obsession with bone broth is ever-present. It will probably surface regularly throughout subsequent Neighborhood Paleo posts. Bone broth has so many benefits to the body it is my go-to solution for almost all ailments. I read the book Clean a few months ago which basically advocated the message that all health in the body begins with the gut. Since bone broth is so beneficial for the gut I make it any time something ails me. I included it in this carrot soup and ate it for breakfast every day while at the conference. For a basic bone broth recipe, see the link above. I usually just make it for about 12 hours in a crockpot. You can just drink it straight from a mug like tea or coffee or mix it into a soup like this delicious recipe below!
Julianna’s Rainbow Carrot Health Soup
Ingredients:
3 cups of bone broth
15 rainbow carrots, peeled and chopped
1 apple (I used Pink Lady), diced
1 large shallot, diced
1 inch branch of ginger, peeled and diced
2-3 cloves of garlic, peeled
1 can full-fat coconut milk
2 TBSP local honey
1 tsp salt
¼ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp paprika
1 pinch of cayenne
1 tsp cinnamon
1 pinch of black pepper
Directions:
- In a soup pot, boil bone broth with carrots, apple, shallot, ginger and garlic until carrots are very soft
- Transfer contents of soup pot to a food processor or blender and blend until a smooth soup is made.
- Return soup to the soup pot and add coconut milk over low heat.
- Add salt and honey, tasting to make sure it is to your liking (use less salt if your bone broth is already salty – I make mine without any salt)
- Add spices – this soup will be a little spicy from the cayenne pepper, so if you don’t like spicy, you may want to eliminate that. I like to eat spicy foods when I have colds and congestion
I freeze the soup in individual-sized Ziploc cups for easy transportation and portioning. Or you can freeze in Ziploc bags and heat on the stove later if needed. This soup has a lot of strong flavors with so many health benefits so it’s really nice to eat when you’re not feeling well.
I made it throughout the conference, ate my soup every morning, and was feeling better by the end of the weekend. I recuperated enough to do the first Open workout and start the whole meal prepping process all over again for the following week. Paleo was with me every step of the way and helped me recover pretty quickly from the difficult week last week. Now I’m looking forward to spring and the rest of the Games Open! To those of your participating, good luck! And to the rest of the Old Cityzens in the Neighborhood, be well and be paleo!