Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa

My mouth is watering as I finished typing the title to this post. One of my all time favorite meals I think. Ever. It is a little time consuming because you have to peel the mangos and chops everything for the salsa, but it is so worth it!

Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa

For the salsa:

3 ripe mangos, peeled and diced

1 red bell pepper, diced

3-4 Green onions, diced

Handful Cilantro coarsely chopped

Juice of 1 Lime

Dash garlic powder

Salt and Pepper

Mix all together and let marinate while you cook  the fish

Rest of the Taco:

2-3 Corn tortillas

Any kind of fish (I buy a big bag of frozen tilapia and used one fillet)

Heat a frying pan on high heat and spray with olive oil cooking spray. Fry the tortillas on each side for about 10 seconds (make sure they don't burn) and make sure to re-oil the pan for each tortilla. Then wrap them in a clean dish towel until you are ready to assemble the tacos. I know this sounds like unnecessary extra effort, but trust me, it makes the tortillas taste fresh! Re-oil your pan and fry the fish on each side for 3-4 minutes or until cooked through. Divide the fish among the tortillas and pile high with mango salsa! YUM

Sugar - A wolf in sheep's clothing

After blogging on here 8 days straight for the fruit/veg fast I guess I needed a break from blogging! My diet has gone back to the way it was, which was pretty healthy, but I really haven't done the sugar thing with Ethan. Seriously it is dead hard trying to eat 30g (or less) of sugar a day! And that's me, a fairly healthy person saying that. I do not know how Ethan is doing it! He is pretty much dying to have a soda and he totally deserves one at this point for doing so well, BUT he is determined to go 100 days without and I am so proud of him. Being sugar conscious has been really eye opening. You would not believe how many foods are hiding sugar in them and in high amounts. The hardest part so far for Ethan is not being able to drink anything except water and water flavored with these all natural stevia drink mixers I buy for him. Most drinks have a ton of sugar in them, even fruit juice has almost as much as soda. As I was about to go grocery shopping one day, Ethan asked if I would get some milk for him to drink, even if it had to be skim milk (which both of us assumed would have less sugar than 1% or 2% milk). I have a bunch of coconut and almond milk, but he says he can't drink it. Cow's milk isn't the greatest thing to drink in my opinion (whole other post there), but for him it was a much needed change from water. So I get to the store and sure enough even skim milk has 11g of sugar in 1 cup! Not to be discouraged, I had a look at the other milks which were in their own little section (for the minority of health weirdos I'm sure) and I found a low carb one that had only 3g of sugar per cup. Yes, that means my husband is actually drinking a step down from fat-free milk....fat-free low-sugar milk! This says a lot about goal setting and how focusing on that goal will affect the decisions you make on a daily basis. I wouldn't have bothered even looking for an alternative if it weren't for that one little ingredient we are trying to be more aware of.

As we have been more sugar conscious I have also been taking a deeper look into how sugar affects the body. In a previous post I mentioned sugar is the enemy when trying to lose weight, but the more I research the more I learn about even worse side effects. I found a really good LINK I wanted to share about this subject. There is a super long video all about sugar but then below the video is a written article about different types of sugar and the chemistry of how sugar effects the body. I really used to think all this stuff was just tree hugging leaf eating extremist kind of health information, but it is quite the opposite, it is fact based on science and biology! It is really interesting to see the connections between sugar and diseases. I totally understand that you have to die someday from something, be it a disease, cancer, heart attack, accident, whatever. To me it is about improving my quality of life while I have it and taking control of my health by recognizing how cells react to food, reproduce and die. If you read this blog you do not have to take my word for anything or believe anything I know, but I challenge you to research for yourself the effects of sugar!

After the fast...

Since finishing the fast we have continued to juice every morning and are eating pretty healthy still, except now we are including protein and grains and trying to stay away from sugar! Our first day off the fast I really didn't know what to eat, it was weird, Ethan made bacon and eggs for breakfast and it tasted heavenly. We had decided to splurge just a little and go out to dinner that night, plus I had my piece of cake from memorial day in the fridge that I had been saving and dreaming about all week. We ate at Texas road house, neither of us could finish our dinner, however Ethan managed to finish the water...a first for him!

Then we came home and I dived into my cake even though I was still pretty stuffed from dinner. It was good but I was so full I had trouble really enjoying it like I thought I was going to. I ended up scraping most of the frosting off and just eating the cake. Maybe my taste buds had changed over the last 8 days and it really wasn't that good in the moment? I don't know. All I know is a few hours after eating the cake I felt so SICK and ended up spending a while on the toilet (sorry TMI!). Over the next three days it felt like someone punched me in the stomach, it wasn't a throbbing pain, just felt like my insides were all bruised. I am sharing this to tell you DON'T DO THAT! Not only did I feel physically horrible, but it kinda felt like I flushed the last 8 days down the drain. Anyway, we are back on track and doing good. I was so excited to go to one of our favorite produce markets that has the best prices on fruit and veg. I got all this for $25! 2 pineapples, 12 ears of corn, kale, cucumber, 3 eggplants (all 3 for $1, figured I could afford to experiment with them), carrots, 3lbs of strawberries, raspberries, zucchini, red and green bell pepper, apples, pears, butternut squash, mushrooms, celery and asparagus. 

Also found this recently and LOVE it! I've never liked almond milk, something weird about the taste I can't get used to, so I usually drink coconut milk which I really like, but the texture is just a little too thick. This stuff is the perfect mix! Has the smooth texture of almond milk without the weird almond milk taste.

Our main focus the next 12 weeks is to minimize our sugar intake to 30g or less. Ethan has not touched soda still, although he did admit to me he came very close one afternoon after having a really stressful morning at work. I am so proud he resisted the temptation! 

Fruit/Veg Fast - Day 8

Last Day!....

Juice - beet, carrot, spinach
Leftover vegetable soup
2 Bananas
1 peach
2 packages dried Mango
Spaghetti squash with vegetable marinara sauce
Popcorn

I feel really good about accomplishing this and I am so proud of Ethan who really was my rock over the last 8 days. I was amazed at his focus and determination to do it and it really paid off for him because he was able to break away from soda. Of course he would still love to drink it, but at least now he has energy without NEEDING to drink it. I accomplished my goal to support the hubs and to detox while overloading with nutrients in fruit and vegetables.  I do notice that my stomach seems more lean. The skin seems flatter now where as 8 days ago it seemed like it was more bloated on the surface. Now we are onto a 12 week metabolic diet with the main focus being a restriction on sugar. More on this later!