These muffins are quick to whip together and they are so nice and warming as the cool weather settles in. Spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice, its like the best part of a pumpkin pie is in muffin form making it totally acceptable to eat for breakfast. 
Prep: 10 minutes
Bake: 25 minutes
This biscotti recipe has gotten me a lot of praise. It is gluten free, sugar free and most importantly: simply delicious.
Prep: 10 minutes
Bake: 40 minutes
Well, ending the sugar free challenge on Halloween was definitely not one of my smartest ideas. This post should actually be called ‘The Sugar High’ or ‘The Sugar Crash’ rather.
Let’s not dwell on the sugar binge that occurred last night (candies, pizza and beer) and again this morning (pancakes and maple syrup for breakfast)… Here is a glimpse on my final week of The Sugar Free Challenge and my general conclusions from the whole experience.
This week went much smoother than Week 2 but still not quiet as smooth in comparison to how well Week 1 went.
Aside from Tuesday when Dan marinated Salmon with a winning, sugar-filled combination of brown sugar and soy sauce (eye roll!!), I stuck to the sugar free diet for the final week of the challenge.
I stuck with easy snacks that required little preparation – nuts, almond butter on rice cakes and fruit. Lunches involved homemade soup, salad or leftovers from dinner.
My favourite meal of the day is breakfast though and this Portobello mushroom and egg combo was by far the winning meal of the week. It’s one of those meals that seem like a treat even though it is full of healthy ingredients. And when you’re cutting back on treats… a meal like this definitely helps.
I was able to resist the bake sale at work and just barely made it through the week. Knowing the end of the challenge was near and also having slipped up pretty majorly on Tuesday, my motivation to finish the sugar free week was dragging.
It’s not that I was craving sugar so badly that I couldn’t wait to eat it again… I just found that restricting my diet for so long was really starting to wear down my drive. It wasn’t enjoyable anymore.
This brings me into my conclusions of the sugar free lifestyle…
During Week 1, I put effort into preparing healthy sugar free snacks, lunches and dinners. Our whole household went sugar free so we worked together to set ourselves up for a successful week.
This week we were much less prepared… lunches were mapped out for the first half of the week but because of some conflicting evening plans we did dinners separately. My snacks in Week 2 were limited to fruit and assorted nuts. My dinners were sporadic as I was often out in the evenings, so I ate very random bits and bobs by the time I got home… like goat cheese or almond butter on rice crackers.
By Thursday/ Friday my diet was limited to lattes, oranges and chips (fries). NOT HEALTHY… but sugar free…
I’ve gone into the grocery store and opted out of buying a pre-made salad or soup for lunch because I saw sugar was on the ingredients list. So being this strict for the purpose of being sugar free, might not be the healthiest option for me.
Well it has certainly been a learning curve. I’ve become so much more aware of how many things have sugar as a key ingredient in them and also how many things have a decent percentage of sugar making up carbohydrates.
This week I didn’t eat anything with refined sugar, no fruit and no processed carbs. My diet involved a handful of dense carbohydrates a day (quinoa or basmati rice), eggs, meat, non processed cheeses, nuts/seeds/beans and lots of vegetables.
Why no fruit? The idea is to adjust my palate to crave sugar less; just as our palates have been conditioned to crave sugar… they can be conditioned to crave it less… It’s truly amazing how many things in life can be boiled down to habit.
Firstly, Happy Canadian Thanksgiving Everyone!! Thanksgiving is about celebrating the harvest and other blessings of the past year with family and friends. I have so much to be thankful for and am excited to share this year’s Thanksgiving feast with an old friend of mine who lives up north near the Lake District here in England. Kelly is preparing a feast today and I cannot wait to indulge!
Starting tomorrow however, I will be attempting a sugar free diet for the rest of the month. And I challenge you to be conscious of your sugar intake as well.
Until doing some research, I would have said I have a very low sugar diet. I don’t have much of a sweet tooth and I make most of my meals and snacks with no added sugar. It turns out however, that though my sugar intake may be lower than average, it is much higher than the recommended daily sugar intake, which is 6-9 teaspoons.
Going sugar free was my roommate Kailee’s idea after a recent chocolate binge in Switzerland (can’t blame her!). We have been reading up on it and plan to use many of the recipes and advice provided from Deliciously Ella.
At a high-level, here are a few high-sugar items which you should consider cutting out of your diet completely…
Getting more meticulous, keep an eye on your intake of the following very nutritious but high in sugar foods…
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