And We Are OFF!

Finished up with our last rule for a while. Attempted to stay clear of all four-legged animal meat and limited all other meat consumption significantly. With the excitement of our trip growing I have to admit that we have not paid very much attention to our food rules. Last night we went out to dinner and Ryan asked, "What's our rule again?" I do have to say that I was impressed with him earlier this week because he ordered a veggie sandwich (that is huge for him, actually I believe it's a first).

I now have two days of unemployment. During this time I plan to transform my body into that of a superwoman, pack a month's worth of gear into a bag half the size that I actually need....or maybe want......and mentally channel the spirit of Pocahontas (don't ask). The Great Food Experiment will resume the first week of November 2010!

Pear Crazy

This past weekend we got a bag full of asian pears from Ryan's parent's tree. Because we only have a week left before the big rafting trip I have officially gone pear crazy. It started with a delicious pear tart with a walnut crust. We then had pear sandwiches with blue cheese and caramelized onions. AND then I added pear to a macaroni and cheese dish and it was surprisingly good--Ryan even requested that I make it again. Also, I can't forget the pear smoothie (Brooke, it wasn't green but it was a smoothie!) and the number of pears we have just eaten plain or in salads. I would have taken pictures but all of this dishes have already been devoured. I am currently about to make a pear spice cake. Any other suggestions for pears? I'm thinking pear butter or jam would be a good way to store what we don't eat.

Rule #24.....Our Last Rule For a While

Rule #23 went well. On one occasion we ate lamb chops (at Ryan's parent's house) but we were sure to eat more veggies that night and I only ate one chop (Ryan ate two but refrained from a third!). It was just one of the many delicious meals we had this weekend at their house! Ryan continues to state: I don't think we ate much meat to begin with. And I continue to think he is in lunatic. Our next rule: Eating what stands on one leg (mushrooms and plant foods) is better than eating what stands on two legs (fowl), which is better than eating what stands on four legs (cows, pigs, and other mammals). Very similar to this past week but differentiating between the meat. We will try to continue to eat mainly veggies. Also, this will be our last rule for a while. We are going on a trip to raft the Colorado River and will not get a choice what we eat. Basically, we will be eating what is offered and what is offered will be dependent on what can keep in the 100 degree heat for multiple weeks......We will post pictures of some of the food when we get back. I'm thinking a lot of canned items and thawed stuff. We will be back at the end of October and will resume our rules then!

Some random foodie pictures from this week:

The co-op by Ryan's parent's house lets you grind your own flour! Never seen this before but was curious if fresh ground flour tasted better......


The raspberry pie that Jill, Ryan's step-mom, slaved away all day making for us (Ryan and I picked all the raspberries from their garden).

"Well, That Would Look Weird"

Ryan just made me laugh so incredibly hard that I decided I would have to blog about the incident. As I was in lying in bed and quickly checking my emails before going to sleep I realized I had an email from a friend that I am having dinner with tomorrow. She sent me the name of a restaurant where she suggested we dine. I mentioned this to Ryan, because I had never heard of said restaurant and he wanted me to look it up. I then started reading him the menu. He thought it sounded good until I told him that we might not be able to get any of the entrees, as they all have meat as the main course and would not fit with out rule. He then exclaimed in a panic, "Oh no! What are we going to eat then?" "Ryan, the entrees have all the meat dishes, we can always get a salad or something." He then replied, "Well, that would look weird!" (this is the comment that made me laugh uncontrollably. Maybe it was the tone of his voice, and the undertone of sheer panic or maybe it was picturing my carnivorous boyfriend ordering a salad. Either way, I was in a state of hysterical disbelief). "What?!?!! Why would getting a salad look weird? Who cares? This is what vegetarians have to do all of the time," I responded. "But Zoe, we are not vegetarians, so it would look weird." Ryan continued to be insistent on this point. I have no idea what he will do tomorrow but I guess I am going to look weird because I already have my salad picked out.

Leaf crazy and Rule #23

This past week we had leaves everyday....chard, kale, various types of lettuce, arugula, spinach, etc. etc. We added leaves to things we would normally not just to make this goal and everything turned out to be very tasty. In terms of the eating mostly plants part of the rule.....we were pretty good about this too. I thought I was going to have to take back the part about this being hard for Ryan because we ended up cooking ZERO meat this week. However, when we went to our friend's pool party with spicy black bean garden burgers in hand, Ryan ended up backing out and eating a beef burger and hot dog. To his credit he also loaded the burger up with veggies and had two salads so all in all I am not complaining. He impressed me. See some of our leaf pictures below.

This next week the rule is pretty similar to last week's: Rule 23: Treat meat as a flavoring or special occasion food. This means we will not eat any meat as a main course unless a special occasion arises. The only special occasion I can anticipate would take place at Ryan's parent's house this weekend, as they are known to cook amazing dinners with locally farmed meat (Ryan's step-mom has a fantastic rule where she only eats meat if she knows where it came from).

One of our many salads this week.....


We never figured out what the darker leaf was in this picture--it was really stringy, bitter, and I almost wondered if I was supposed to cook it before eating.




Ryan's veggie quiche complete with spinach leaves


When we went to my mom's for brunch she used one of my favorite leaves (arugula) to make savory crepes. They were amazing.

Rule #22...bring on the leaves!

Rule #21 I did not like and I did not seem to pay much attention to. Really, what it boils down to is that I did not understand this rule. Is there any food that is pronounced the same in EVERY language? When I was in India they had Subway but the sandwiches were all changed around to incorporate Indian specialties. And I am pretty sure they did not call them sandwiches.

This upcoming Rule #22 I am much more excited about: Rule 22: Eat mostly plants, especially leaves. . For this week we are going to try and eat a leafy dish every day. Also, we will have all our main courses be plant based. When discussing this rule with Ryan he seemed to think it would be easy for us, saying "I think we eat mostly vegetarian anyway." I have to disagree. Ever since I moved in with Ryan I have found myself eating a lot more meat. I attribute this to Ryan's willingness to touch/cut up/clean all the dead animals. When I lived by myself I really only ate meat when I went out to dinner or if it was pre-prepared (not saying that makes eating meat better....just saying I rarely ate it). These upcoming rules will limit our meat consumption considerably so it will be interesting to see if Ryan objects.

Rule #21

This past week was pretty easy. We drove to Bend for the weekend, and YES, it would have been more convenient to stop at a fast food joint to fill our tummies and keep us awake. However, doing so would have caused us to miss out on the excellent fry bread we had in Deschutes Crossing. And the homemade ice cream in Sunriver was better than a bizzard. All in all, this was a great rule to have this past week.

This upcoming week, Rule 21: It's not food if it's called by the same name in every language (Think Big Mac, Cheetos, or Pringles.), will force us to do some research. I am guessing mostly food served by big food cooperations will go against the rule. I am also pretty sure that hamburgers and pizza are universal terms. Can you think of any others that we might accidently not think about?

Rule #20

Rule #20: It's not food if it arrived through the window of your car will be incredibly easy for us. We rarely eat fast food aside from a yearly (or so) trip to Burgerville to get pumpkin milkshakes, sweet potato fries, spicy black bean garden burgers or their sweet walla walla onion rings! I still hold the claim to fame that I have never eaten at a McDonalds (Yes, I am that girl, and yes, my mother is so proud!). Although, when I was daydreaming about making it to this rule as we were driving a few days ago, I stated to Ryan, "I can't wait for this rule because I will be able to eat anything....and the first thing I want to eat is a DQ cookie dough blizzard!" Ryan was like, "Dear, that is the one thing you will not be able to eat it." Damn, my dreams were dashed. Store bought ice cream will have to suffice for the heat wave.

Last week's rule (#19) Ryan hated. Note to Margot: we ended up agreeing with you and decided that wine could not be considered as being made in a plant, but we decided against big cheese companies, which equally killed him. Also, we could not drink beer because apparently our friend who works at Deschutes informed us that the place where their beer is brewed is called "The Plant."

This week we anticipate eating a lot of salads because our food bin arrived with HUGE heads (yes, plural) of lettuce. Also, who wants to cook in this heat???? Another thing I just realized, thanks to a visit with Ryan's dad and step-mom, is that we have not been making enough/any smoothies for breakfast. A perfect alternative to hot oatmeal when you are trying to stay cool on a summer morning. Ryan's dad even puts ground up walnuts in his smoothie concoction!

Rule #19, Take Three

Late. The days are going so fast, it's hard to keep up with them. Rule #19: If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don't, is very similar to the last two rules. Bottom line: Don't eat foods that are processed in factory settings. The confusing thing about this weeks particular rule is that some things are made from plants and come from plants. The big question in Ryan's mind: Can we drink wine? Answer: Undetermined. Wine is made from grapes (plant) but it is processed with preservatives (made in a plant). Oh the dilemma. Also, do bakeries count as plants? In my mind, a local bakery is not a plant, whereas I am sure that Wonder Bread has an impressive plant.

In other news, Ryan got the urge to cook "Cornish Game Hens" in 80+ degree weather. I don't know who cooks "Cornish Game Hens" in the first place and much less in the summer!

"Why would anyone think to eat this?!?!"

Ryan thought I was trying to poison him last night when I gave him a raw red dandelion green to try (picture of his face after eating below!). The greens showed up in our food bin and I almost put them in a salad. Luckily, I tasted one first and realized how bitter they were (quite the kick!). I did some research and realized that if you saute them in bacon fat it takes out a lot of the bitterness.


We also cooked the vegetable that we had no idea what it was. We cut it open and sure enough, no seeds, and yellow rings. It was a GIANT beet (Allison, I think the picture looked deceiving but I appreciate the research you did....now I want to try one of those crazy squash!).


Aside from the two veggies I made homemade foccacia bread topped with roasted garlic. Ryan loved it evidenced by the fact that we have NONE left.


The next night we had a meal of ALL veggies. This was pretty new to us because we usually always have some type of meat or bread-like substance (rice, noodles, etc). The meal included grilled corn on the cob, portabello mushrooms (which were cheaper than regular mushrooms! Not sure what was up with that but we took advantage!), sweet potatoes, and kale with caramelized onion.

The Prettiest Carrot in all of the World!

Wouldn't you agree?



Also, wish us luck. I am going to cook with these tonight.

Red Dandelion Greens. Super bitter.


***I must apologize because I have not yet cut open the mystery food pictured a few posts ago. Giant beet or crazy squash yet to be determined......maybe I will figure it out tomorrow......

Hello August, and Rule #18

I felt very healthy following last week's rule. It made you forgo things like the ice cream at the company picnic, the non-stop starbucks desserts at work, and the candy from the occasional candy dish. When I was hungry I would often find myself eating an orange, some watermelon, or a handful of cherries, and surprisingly (only if you know me) I was okay with it. This upcoming week our rule is very similar but perhaps a little harder because the "cooked" catch is not included. Rule 18: Don't ingest foods made in places where everyone is required to wear a surgical cap. This will mean basically anything that is made in a plant. We are taking the "made" part of this rule very literally because many foods go through a processing plant where people are required to wear surgical caps, but these places do not make things such as apples, which we think are okay (obviously we always try to buy locally so this issue may not even come up....but just in case we want to make our rule clear).

Mothers are Wonderful, Especially Mine

In the craziness of last week I forgot to mention how my mother saved me from complete destruction. I think I have mentioned a billion times how important it is that I eat every 4 hours. The reasoning behind needing food on such a regular basis is that I suffer from hypoglycemia. It does not matter how big of a meal I eat that day, four hours later I promise you I will need to refuel. Some days I need less food than others and I am not sure why. Some foods make me feel better than others and it usually does not make sense. I can also go throughout the night and feel fine in the morning, not sure what is up with that. The only thing that I know to eliminate the bad mood-tremors-dizzy-can't think straight-feeling like I am going to hurl-and then passing out cold--is regular eating. Last week was near impossible because I ran out of farmer's market snacks and became too busy to get more. This left me with a time span of 12:20 (usually when I finish lunch) to 7pm (usually when we eat dinner) gap. It was not good....huh Ryan? On one particular hypoglycemic day I visited my mom and was feeling like I was going to die. Instead of dying, I came to a table that looked like this:


My mom had gone to the farmer's market for me and picked up a tamale and a homemade raspberry vinegar soda! THIS is why mothers are WONDERFUL, especially MINE!

In other news, we made pesto pasta for dinner tonight. I can assure you it was ALL cooked by humans because Ryan and I made everything! Here is some of the pasta that was drying. We made so much that we almost ran out of counter space drying it all. The basil in the pesto was from our garden! aaaaaawwwww..........love.






Also, we got our Organics to You bin today and are wondering if anyone can tell us what this vegetable is????? GUESSES PLEASE? Also, if you know what it is.....how about recipes to use it? Allison, I'm looking at you! :)

Rule #17 & Hello Monday

I was not able to post this on Sunday because we got back from a weekend in Seattle too late. Eating snacks only from farmer's market was the most inconvenient thing ever. Yes, Portland does have farmer's markets almost every day of the week. BUT NO, these farmer's markets are not easy to get to, as they are at the most useless times ever. They seem to run strictly during the day, while Ryan and I are stuck at work. OR when Ryan and I are trying to get home from work and beat rush hour. I would like some early morning farmer's markets. Or some late night one would be nice. But when they run 2-6.......ugh. And the second most inconvenient thing in the world is that you must have cash money. I never have cash. WHO carries cash anymore? This means that going to a farmer's market during the weekday includes getting off work right on time, driving to the bank to get some cash, then driving aalllllll the way across rush hour traffic to get some produce. Let's just say I love to shop in farmer's markets on the relaxing weekends but on the weekdays my hungry tummy is thankful for having the convenient neighborhood supermarket.

Our next rule, Rule 17: Eat only foods that have been cooked by humans, is a toughy. We are counting ingredients in this rule, which means that anything cooked by non-humans (meaning corporations) is an OUT. We will be living off of fruits, veggies, rice, eggs and.....hopefully we will discover some other stuff. Ryan is being very supportive of this rule, most likely because wine is not cooked by corporations.

Included in the picture below is our cooking this past week. We managed to use all four burners! QUITE the feat!

Buffalo Steak

We had an amazing date night dinner the other day. Ryan grilled the buffalo steak to perfection. We didn't marinade it or use any seasoning. The flavor was amazing. This is like the farm egg situation in that we can't go back to white store eggs.....we can't go back to beef. If you are reading this then you should stop because you will start wanting things you never knew you wanted and you down right cannot afford. If anyone knows how we can get buffalo for cheap PLEASE let us know!





Farmer's market snacking has been difficult because maybe it is psychological, in fact I am sure it is, but fruit does not fill me up! Perhaps the point of snacking is not to get filled up but to hold you over....it's amazing what revelations you have due to blogging. I think I need to start playing some mind games and change my whole philosophy around snacks. I am one of those people who needs to eat every four hours or I become extremely cranky. You can only eat so many cherries and apples before the sweet taste causes you to crave something more substantial. This rule has caused me to be more conscious of why I am wanting to snack. I probably don't realize how often I choose to snack due to boredom. When you have to think carefully about what you can snack on it opens a whole new can of worms.



We are down to apples and cherries from the farmer's market. This means that I will be heading to another one to re-fill on snacks. Portland is fortunate enough to have a farmer's market on almost every day of the week. See the following website for details: http://www.portlandfarmersmarket.org

Crazy Week and Rule #16

So, usually when it starts off as a crazy week and you complain about it to everyone you know, it starts getting a little better. Instead, my week just got more insane. After being in extreme pain and hardly able to move with my "broken spine" my family got attacked by a dog. By family I mean Opiedog, Mom, and Dad (who got the worst of it and saved Opie's dear life!). My sister was safe and sound in LA. Aside from daily hospital visits, and concerns over my dad's health, my family was also attempting to entertain my 16-year-old cousin, who is here visiting and I am sure bored out of her mind. Between Ryan and I helping out with everything we hardly had a chance to explore all of the various food options while avoiding the supermarket.

We did manage to live off of our bi-weekly farm bin from Organics to You, went to a farmer's market, ate a few things from our garden, and shopped at a cooperative food store. In all honesty, most of our meals were at my parent's house and cooked by my mom. We even lucked out and brought my mom some of our farm fruit and she made us a pie (she definitely got the short-end of the stick in that deal!). See some pictures of our adventures below. We realized that farmer's markets are a lot more accessible in Portland compared to the middle-of-no-where we live. If you need something a lot more driving is required compared to venturing to the local supermarket. Also, some items are hard to find outside of the supermarket, such as tortilla chips to go with Ryan's homemade guacamole, which is still oddly sitting in our fridge because we had nothing to go with it. Usually this would be gone in mere minutes.

The PIE


SO many spices. We bought some saffron for a sauce we were making.


Sampling food at the PSU Farmer's Market


One of the first pepper's from our garden


Our next week's rule is another exciting one: Rule 16: Buy your snacks at the farmers' market. I snack a lot so this one is going to be tricky for me. At the farmer's market this weekend we were reminded how expensive things are. We bought two buffalo steaks for $40 (a real splurge for date night!). I really wanted some nuts to snack on but they were $7 for a tiny little bag. I think we will be snacking on a lot of fresh veggies and fruit this week! If it's not from the farmer's market and it's not part of a meal we won't be eating it this week!

Soap Box Rant Fail

This week is not turning out to be as fun as previously anticipated. I woke up at 3:30am the other morning, turned my head to the right, and heard CRACK. The loudest sound I have ever heard coming from my spine....because spines are not supposed to make a sound FYI (in case you have not noticed). The next noise came out of my mouth and sounded something like: "RYAAAAANN, I just broke my spine!!!!" A groggy Ryan was surprisingly (and very sweetly) concerned. The next two days I was not really able to do much. As far as exploring food options outside of the supermarket we have so far failed. Even the place we advertised on this blog as providing the rainbow colored fresh farm eggs has been a no go. Apparently we told too many people because all of a sudden they are always out of eggs. We can't go back to the white store eggs. We tried. But once you have had the amazingness of farm eggs the white eggs just taste too Blah. You can tell the difference! We tried to rectify this issue by ordering eggs from our food co-op. Sadly, our order of produce came and there were no eggs. They must have forgotten to include them. OHHHH, and while we are are on random rants, can we discuss samples at supermarkets? I have decided they are the devil. It's good we are out of the supermarkets this week because if I see a nice lady with a hair net cutting up random substance and placing the tiny bites on little pieces of of individual wrapper I AM IN! Before I know it I have eaten X, Y, and Z and completely have broken the weekly food rule and if we are at Costco I have probably eaten the equivalent of a whole meal. Okay, soap box complete. As soon as my back feels better we are ready to explore some different types of food vendors......

Excited for Rule #15!

We survived Rule #14 with ease despite Ryan's nightly, "Are you sure we can't drink wine this week?" "Only wine without Sulfites...."

I am SO excited for Rule #15: Get out of the supermarket whenever you can. We are going to take this to the extreme and say that we are not going to buy any food inside the supermarket. Goodbye Freddy's, Safeway, Trader Joe's, Albertson's and Whole Foods. We are going to be looking to farmer's markets, our neighborhood farmers, and food co-ops. Any other ideas of places we can buy food?

Our Fourth of July Buns Plus Some

I have not been good about blogging with my new job. Now that Ryan and I have the same work schedule (gasp, I thought the day would never come) I find myself wanting to spend time with him instead of being on my computer. Due to this lack of blogging I have not shared the story of our Fourth of July buns! Remember how I said that we were going to be cooking buffalo burgers and I hoped that we could find buns that fit with our rule? Well, there were no buns. We went to several stores including Whole Foods and apparently all buns require salt. SO, we decided to make our own buns! I found a recipe, mixed some ingredients, let the dough rise, and put the buns in the oven! We 1/3rd the recipe because we didn't want the 24 buns that the original recipe produced. Because of this change I did not know how big of dough balls to form because it just said "form 24 balls." I was left to guesstamation and if you know me then you know that I am the world's worst approximator (Ryan just informed me I am making up words left and right but it's not my fault there aren't words to describe what I need to rely to you all!). So, please see the pictures below to see our finished product. They might have been tiny but damn they were good!!!!






Last night we grilled steak and finished it on the stovetop by lighting some Jack on fire. I didn't get the most impressive pictures but any cooking involving lighting the food on fire I must document.

Whoops, Happy 4th and Rule #14

We had a lot of "Whoops" moments this week. It was hard to determine a definition for "rot." For example, baking powder loses it's leavening effect as it ages but it never really rots (we ended up deciding that counted as rotting because it's food purpose deteriorated). Salt was another tricky one. If salt is exposed to moisture it hardens but it does not rot. Apparently, it can be broken apart and be just fine (we determined salt was out, but we accidentally used it a few times). We made our own wings this week with homemade bar-b-que sauce and blue cheese dipping sauce. AMAZING. Then we realized that vinegar (in our organic ketchup) never rots. Another WHOOPS. I took pictures of the beginning of our wing-making experience but was so excited to eat them that I forgot to take pictures of the finished product.






Happy Fourth of July everyone! Our mission today is to find hamburger buns we can eat, I hope stores are open today because we did not plan ahead on this one......

For next week our rule is: Eat foods made from ingredients that you can picture in their raw state or growing in nature. At least we can eat salt because I can definitely picture those Salt Lake City salt flats.

PS: We are dog-sitting my childhood puppy this week and I have to include a picture of him because I think he is the prettiest and best dog in all of the land. Here he is playing in the meadow next to our house:

Cheaters! And Rule #13

Well, you could say that we cheated this week. But you could also say that we followed the rule 100%. Turns out, we didn't even go to the grocery store this week so it was pretty easy to avoid those middle aisles. This week we turned into social butterflies....eating at baseball games (thanks Tim and Rosanne), breweries, street fairs (thanks Cimone and Erin), and Ryan's parent's house! Tonight we are hoping to throw some meat on the grill and have some friends over. I must say, however, that I don't think I like this rule because baking supplies are usually on middle aisles. So, thank goodness for friends, family and sunshine.

Next week will be a challenge and we have not been challenged for a while: Rule #13 Eat only foods that will eventually rot. So, does anybody know if salt ever rots? Or any spices for that matter? How about oils and vinegars? We are hoping that the portland sunshine will continue and we can just have a week of grilling because we know veggies and meats rot most definitely.

Rule #12: Avoiding the Middle

I had my first work week post-graduation and was super bad about blogging. Ryan and I tried to watch some TV....The Bachelorette.....Wipe Out......random shows while working out on the elliptical. Our list of no-no foods remained virtually non-existent despite Papa Murphy's pizza and Yoplait yogurt (we were only writing down foods we might otherwise be eating and even these two foods we have not eaten since starting this challenge). How proud were we that this rule did not effect us in the slightest. Or have they just stopped advertising food on TV?

In other news: Purchase of the week:

A Pineapple Corer


Ryan grilled an amazing meal of braised beef in the middle of the week. Little did I know, or he know more importantly, that this meal had a prep time of like 8 hours. When you start cooking at 6pm please plan on having a VERY hungry (and grouchy) girlfriend by 10:30 pm (he actually started the prep during his lunch break...). I didn't get a very good picture but I can honestly say that it might have been worth the wait...



This upcoming week we are on Rule #12: Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle. Hard to believe it will be 3 months down! Sorry this post is so boring. I have just been adjusting to normalcy with a Monday-Friday 9-5 job.

Zoe, MSW, and Rule #11

Biggest news of the week: I graduated!!!! After graduation we enjoyed drinks at Mint before heading to our family restaurant, Ciao Vito. We had an amazing dinner there and then I went to my best friend's birthday party and ended the night with dessert back at my parent's house. It was a perfect day with lots of excellent food and drink.












I intended to take more pictures of the food we ordered but only got the appetizers. Sorry! The alcohol kicked in and I was distracted.








Our rule did not affect us much this week. I am excited for our next rule: Avoid foods you see advertised on television, because it is more straight forward than our previous few rules. The one issue is that neither Ryan or I watch much television. So if our readers can help us out and let us know about advertised food to avoid that would be great. We have started a list to write down no-no foods. So far it's blank.

With all my free time that school used to consume I have started working in my garden again. Maybe you will see some homegrown produce in the hear future. We also bought more farm eggs today and went shopping for groceries for the week. I was alarmed when I returned to our shopping cart and found the following box inside:



This would be the work of Ryan. I refuse to eat any of this and hope to find it advertised on television so Ryan can't eat it either!