The fourth day of this experiment was one where I was really close to breaking it. Stress always requires release, and we want to fall back on our crutches.  That’s booze for some, drugs for others.  For me it’s food.  Combine that with some lack of preparation and I narrowly averted breaking the plan.  I didn’t though, and got the chance to try another new dinner option concocted by my friend.

Third day of the vegan experiment went off without a hitch.  Preparation and familiarity is the key, but ending off with the best vegan “burgers” I’ve made yet was perfect.

Day 2 started off and ended better than Day 1 did.  I was certainly a bit more prepared, but it was still a bit trying due to a heavily compressed schedule.  What I’m looking forward to is trying tomorrow’s new vegan burger recipe, but today’s food was certainly tasty nonetheless.

Maybe I didn’t pick the best day to start Vegan Week, but it is what it is.  I know I didn’t prepare enough for it which is going to make things ever more interesting through tomorrow.  Despite all the problems I actually got through mostly okay, minus one slip up….

I wanted to spell out what I’m modeling my vegan diet to look like for the next week, and what it will probably look like for the three months of the real experiment.  Just as in the other diet worlds there is some variety in terms of what should make a healthy vegan diet.  One thing that is constant across them is the absence of animal products.  No meat, no dairy, no honey will be found in any vegan diet.  That still leaves a lot of room for error, which requires a plan to avoid.

Many of us take supplements or eat foods to ensure better health.  Getting extra omega-3’s (a type of fatty acid) in our diet has been a common problem for people.  We are told to eat fish and certain foods high in omega-3’s, which actually also includes naturally raised and fed chicken and livestock products not just fish.  A way people can get around that is by taking fish oil capsules. According to this study however, you may be doing more harm than good by going this route if you aren’t careful about which manufacturer you are using.

When I was planning my Paleo experiment week last month I had to think carefully about whether I would do it exactly as I would during the year of experiments by avoiding all artificially sweetened beverages, even my favorite diet sodas.  That sounds like an almost silly challenge, but I was actually just in the beginning of trying to taper off of the stuff when I was doing the experiment.  I was down to, yes down to, 4-6 cans a day.  I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to swing it but I actually kept off of the stuff for the entire experiment and then almost a full week more, until yesterday.