The Skeptic’s Whole30: Day 13
Saturday, March 3, 2018
This post is part of a series. For the previous post, click here. For the whole series, click here.
With my black coffee, I had a yellow plum and the 5 leftover tiny kugelettes I had made the day before. This was quite satisfying and I left for Big Kid’s tae kwon do and swimming lessons feeling like I had had enough to eat.
During tae kwon do, I took a walk down the block toward the library. It was chilly, but sunny and nice, and while I walked I started to feel that high feeling again, the one I had experienced on Monday. The one where I’m all tingly and fluttery and full of feelings of excitement and hope. I wanted to go to the library but it turned out it was closed until noon. However, I felt so good that I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood before going back to the tae kwon do studio.
My spirits were high during the walk, but when I got back I felt as if I had exerted myself too much. I felt wiped out, almost dizzy or out of breath. Sitting quietly while Big Kid had his swim lesson helped to some extent. Having lunch, after we got home, helped a lot more. I had the leftover pork and zucchini noodles from the night before, with a dessert of dried mango.
Tonight we’re having company. This is something new. I’m making a spaghetti squash Bolognese for myself (and whoever else wants it) and we’re serving ordinary baked ziti and salad as well. It’s just two people coming — my husband’s old friend E and his wife, L — but we don’t know what they’ll want to eat so we’re offering them options. E was my husband’s best man at our wedding, and we haven’t seen them in several years. E has three kids, the youngest of whom is in college and the older two are in their twenties. The first time I met them, they were 7, 3, and 1 — almost 20 years ago.
After lunch I made a spreadsheet for Week 3, similar to the one I had made for week 1, to generate a shopping list, and I have to go to the supermarket and do the week’s shopping (plus the shopping for tonight) before our guests get here. I wonder how well that’ll work. We’ll probably still be cooking when they get here, but that’s OK.
Well, I went to the supermarket, and made a stop at the health food store along the way to pick up the few special items I didn’t think the regular store would have. While at the health food store, I spied some housemade nut-and-fruit snacks that were labeled “paleo.” They included cocoa and promised to be both chocolatey and filling, two things I prize in a snack. The only potentially forbidden thing about them was that the included dried apricots, it said, “may contain rice flour.” Since the rice flour was only a maybe, and would occur in such small amounts even if it was in there, I figured the benefits of the snack outweighed the potential pitfalls.
If stuff like banana-egg “pancakes” and baked goods made from non-grains are considered “Sex with Your Pants On,” i.e. violating the spirit but not the letter of the Whole30, then the types of cheating I’ve done — a sip of passion-fruit juice, cashews cooked in peanut oil, salad with dressing that has honey in it and pieces of probably-not-approved bacon, snacks that may contain a tiny bit of rice flour (but may not) — are the opposite: violating the letter but not the spirit. So…”Appearing Naked in Public”?
I ate the delicious snack on the way to the main supermarket and then my husband texted me to pick up a bottle of whiskey and two bottles of wine on my way home, and by the time I got home it was 5:30, the time when E and L were supposed to arrive. They weren’t there yet, but they showed up when the kitchen floor was still covered with shopping bags.
But they didn’t mind just hanging out and catching up with us while we put away the groceries and cooked, and they even offered to help with the cooking. While I made the Bolognese, my husband was making two pans of ziti. I thought he was crazy to make that much ziti, especially since I wasn’t eating any, but he carried on with the two boxes of pasta and four jars of sauce that I had bought at the store.
Meanwhile, I chopped onions and garlic while I chatted with E and L about our lives. They were delighted by our kids and sort of nostalgic for what it was like to have little kids at home. The boys ran around the house. Big Kid was thrilled and excited by the fact that E and L knew a lot about Harry Potter, having read it with their children when they were young, and Big Kid tried to keep them talking about Harry Potter as much as possible.
As I was making the Bolognese sauce I suddenly noticed that at the bottom of the recipe it said “let simmer for about an hour.” I hadn’t realized it would take that long, but I guess I had no choice anyway since I hadn’t gotten home until 5:30 with the ingredients. I ended up sitting there with my empty salad plate for a while while everyone else helped themselves to the ziti, but it wasn’t so bad. I had about 25 minutes to go when the ziti was served. When mine was ready I got up and served myself, and everyone was just sitting around the table and being convivial, so I had plenty of time to enjoy dinner while still feeling like I was having dinner with everyone else.
After we were done eating, my husband and I and E and L sat around the table talking, and the kids ran around the house laughing and playing. It was way past their bedtime but we figured we would rather just let them stay up late rather than trying to fight with them about going to bed while our guests were still there. It was 10pm when they finally headed out, after a delightful and relaxed evening. It had gone really well, in every way. We got the kids into their pajamas and they fell asleep more quickly than I had ever seen them do before.
I have tons of leftovers of the spaghetti squash Bolognese. I’m very happy about this. It’ll serve me well for many meals to come.
Tomorrow: My hatred of cooking with raw meat is becoming more fine-tuned.
