hello from the other side! + my meal plan

Hello! It’s been SO LONG since I posted, and now baby Rae is with us, a mind-blowingly beautiful wonderous being from a magical place somewhere in space, growing fast, already nearly twelve weeks out of me. Life is so full of her I can hardly believe it is real, only that

she is truly wonderful!

Now super chubby, she is full of the good stuff, and I am… also super chubby.

This is my motivation for writing and reconnecting with the blog at this time. I need change. At the end of my pregnancy my avoidance diet mostly went to pot. Right now I am strictly avoiding gluten and lactose as ever, I have to – although I have recently realised that I am intolerant of my own milk and a life spent kissing milky cheeks is making me ill! I am again avoiding nightshade fruit and veg, which have a big impact on my arthritis, but I am eating grains such as rice and corn, eating some soya and too much sugar. We had a week in hospital after Rae’s birth and it got to the point where we were lining up the Lucozade bottles, something I never imagined possible! I’ve started drinking Lilt. HELP!!! I’m feeling the affects of this culinary landslide on my well-being and it’s time now to summon the motivation to really go for it and be as healthy as I can be. To reassess and to take control of myself and what I am putting into my body. We’re not talking a total overhaul here as I am eating well, but about cutting out foods that I am intolerant to to whatever degree. It’s not an easy task but I have done it before, The Whole Food Rainbow is that story.

i need to get back on the wagon.

And the wagon is going pretty fast. And I’m knackered. I’m only just getting out and about really as the labour et al really took it out of me (I won’t go into the gory details, although I’d totally love to) and while I am having so many incredible moments as a mother I am also having some omg-I-am- a-fat-hideous-ogre-and-will-never-recover and it’s-a-downhill-slope-to-the-grave-from-here moments. The first thing I need to do is to lose weight and to energise and reduce my pain as much as I can. Babies watch and learn from faces, especially their mother’s and I want her to see confidence and happiness at all times. You shouldn’t diet or fast when breastfeeding, I don’t think I could anyway right now, but breastfeeding itself uses up lots of calories a day and so if I can just eat normally, i.e. lots of whole foods, and cut down on any extras, i.e. soya ice-cream, chocolate buttons and excessively big carb-obsessed breakfasts, then I should slowly, steadily lose weight, can tone up (please?) and try to find my best new physical self and be happy with it.

I spent time going over the blog the past few weeks, looking at the recipes that you are enjoying most (beaming smile amidst feelings of self-worth 🙂 ), and so I thought for my first post I would put together a meal plan of sorts, menu style, for myself, and anyone, foods that Dan and I can batch make and so will help us in every way.

BREAKFAST

Green Juice

Buckwheat bread toast

Roast squash baked beans with fancy veggie sausages

Tahini and a chickpea pancake

LUNCH

Lemon + lime spinach hummus and buckwheat flatbread with a quinoa rainbow salad

Cream of flagolet bean, lemon + cauliflower soup with seeded buckwheat bread

Mushroom fried kasha

DINNER

Green lentil vegetable stew with lemon + dill

Chickpea, courgette + sweet potato curry

Green bean, garlic + ‘parmesan’ buckwheat noodle nest

SWEET THINGS

Toasted coconut + apricot dark chocolate bark

Raw cacao coconut balls

Vanilla coconut ice-cream

Stewed summer fruit

The key I have found, and need to clutch onto more than ever, is making extra of versatile things like soups, sauces and curries, foods that can be kept in the fridge, and/or frozen, making for easy and delicious future meals. Just bulk making pseudo-grains, or baked squash and sweet potato, which is so often the base of a sauce, stew or soup, makes such a difference. Whip up loads of pancake batter to sit and improve in the fridge ready for a super quick meal. Batch cooking in this way is such a great thing, and means you can easily make gorgeous food, even when time is short.

Roast squash, salt, lemon and vegan cream cheese on a pancake or savoury biscuit is heavenly to eat, especially when easily thrown together…

oh, it’s so good to be back!

I’m not putting any pressure on myself or Dan blog-wise as all our energy is flowing into Rae first, and with my disability and health challenges that can be all-time-consuming, but The Whole Food Rainbow will help me be as good a mother as I can be by filling myself with nutrients to make super milk, and being as healthy, happy, balanced and fulfilled as I can be by eating well and doing the things I love, so I am truly delighted to embrace it. And if I could help someone else do the same, or just make them happy for a moment, it’ll be worth it. Sending out my love ♥

I’ve been listening to… womb sounds