Weight: 178.7 lbs.

Exercise: Spent 2 hours managing my son’s baseball team and pitching to our team.

Breakfast: Bowl of Nutty Nuggets (aka Grape Nuts) with almond milk.

Snack: Reheated hash brown potatoes with onion, garlic, red and green onion topped ketchup.

Lunch: Reheated baked potato with ketchup.

Snack: Mixed greens, cabbage and spinach salad with Chef AJ’s Husband’s Favorite No-Oil Balsamic Vinegar Dressing (2 servings!)

Dinner: Two potacos made from yesterday’s leftovers topped with cheese sauce #2, salsa verde or salsa roja (both courtesy of Plant Purity)

Synopsis: It helped I had leftovers to fall back on, which is normally when happens when I cook since I am usually the one eating a majority of what I make. I weighed in a bit lower than Day 3, which is to be expected considering the temporary changes I have made for my potato hack.

A bigger improvement has come in the snacking department, as I have either cut it out, cut back or grabbed something better to eat. Case in point, I bought baby carrots to munch on when hungry on Monday and 2 big servings of salad today. Yesterday, as I mentioned I did grab a piece of bread, but more importantly I haven’t bought any beer. I know many think drinking beer leads to snacking, but for me beer leads to more beer, as I am usually in the yard or garage working. I have fallen back on drinking at least 2 liters of Crystal Geyser Sparkling Water a day. So I have taken steps in the right direction again to curb my one vice…again.

I also notice if I bring enough food to work for a snack and lunch, I don’t walk to Chinatown (downtown Oakland) for rice. This was happening too often leading up to my challenge and I fault no one but myself. I have the ingredients at home to make brown rice, beans and all sorts of meals I can bring to work, so eating out, even if it’s rice needs to be cut back.

As for breakfast I did fall back to an old habit, more out of convenience, eating a bowl of Nutty Nuggets on the way to work. Much like some people unable to give up their oatmeal, eating about 15 minutes after I wake up allows my appetite to be satiated until my first break at work, between 9-10AM. Add to that, I had hash brown potatoes cooked up but had intended on that as my morning snack. Preparation is the key when it comes to sticking to your plan.

Lunch was quick and easy, as I reheated a baked potato and added ketchup to it. This happen long before the noon time hour, which left me a bit hungry when I got home from work at 2PM. I had been searching for another quick (and non tofu based) salad dressing to make. Last week I had put straight Balsamic vinegar on my salad and wasn’t too impressed. This week I took Chef AJ’s recipe and thought it was very well done. It was very good, as well as being quick and easy to make. I didn’t intend on 2 big bowls of salad, but I ate them prior to my son and I leaving for a 530PM baseball game.

Getting home about 730PM I debated about eating, as I had to wake up at 100AM to be to work by 200AM. So much for adhering to eating 3 hours before you go to bed, but the alternative was to wait until I woke up. Since I am not trying to lose weight, I reheated two potacos before heading to bed. The salsa roja was awesome today! A day to let the flavors come together, I think I’ve found a new, favorite salsa!

So Day 4 is in the books and so far I have maintained my potato hack very well. The breakfast still has me in a quandary, do I stop eating Grape Nuts in the morning as my breakfast, opting for hash brown potatoes when I get to work or stick with them? If that is the only decision I need to make over the next 2 weeks, then I won’t worry about continuing to grab my nuts before rushing off to work. I don’t believe those to be a culprit in how my way of eating had turned more towards fat plant foods recently than what I had eaten to get me to a point I was happy.

I’ll have to watch this weekend and my days off. This weekend being the holiday, we are invited to our friend’s house. Thankfully she cooks plant-based, in fact she just threw out all her oil and salt after I loaned her Chef AJ’s book, Unprocessed. Chances are it will be a barbeque, as the many of the other people attending are not plant strong. I will need to watch the beer intake, if possibly avoiding it altogether, as that would be a big step in the right direction, but given it is a family get together, this could qualify as a “special occasion.” Then again, now I am trying to “justify” my having a beer.

We will see how it goes. On to Day 5!