This is my fourth time doing the 21-Day Sugar Detox, but this is my first time doing it the vegan way. For the past few months, I’ve pretty much cut out eggs and cheese (the two things that got me through the last three detoxes). Aside from resetting my body, I hope that after this, becoming vegan will be simple after having done it for 21 days without sugar. I also hope that by sharing my journey on this detox, I can give vegans recipe ideas allowed on this detox (since the recipes in Diane Sanfilippo's 21-Day Sugar Detox book are mostly centered on non-vegan/non-vegetarian diets).

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I got up early to go to Trader Joe’s before it turned into a madhouse. I bought $50+ worth of food to make meals for the next couple of days. Among the items I got were kale, shredded carrots, cauliflower, lemon, hemp seeds and raw pecans. I decided to go with the Queen of Quinoa’s detox salad recipe for my next few lunches and dinners. I made some adjustments to omit the ingredients not allowed on the 21DSD. Side note: I’m so glad I stumbled upon the Queen of Quinoa’s site because, as a vegetarian (and as of today, vegan), quinoa has been my #1 staple. When my fridge and pantry are empty and all else fails… quinoa it is!

Breakfast: Chocolate Banana Coconut Smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 frozen green bananas
• 1/2 can of unsweetened organic coconut milk
• 2 tbsp + 1 tsp of Sunfoods Super Foods Raw Cacao Powder
• 1 cup crushed ice

Cut up green bananas and place them in the freezer for about 2 hours (the longer, the better). Put the ice in the blender first, then the bananas, coconut milk and raw cacao powder. Be sure to shake the can of coconut milk really well because I forgot to do this and my smoothie came out super thick. On the plus side, it ends up tasting more like chocolate mousse if you put it in the fridge.

Lunch: Zucchini Stir Fry

I just had some leftover zucchini stir fry from the night before. The original meal had tempeh bacon, but for the leftovers today, it was just zucchini, onions and seasoning. 

Dinner: Queen of Quinoa’s Detox Salad (with some modifications)

For this recipe, I omitted quite a few ingredients to simplify it and to make it sugar-detox-friendly. These are the ingredients I used:

• 1/2 cup parsley
• Juice of 2 1/2 lemons (I like it really tart)
• 3/4 cup chopped raw pecans 
• 1 bag of cauliflower florets (from Trader Joe’s), chopped
• Hemp seeds to taste (a few sprinkles)
• 1/2 bag of kale, chopped
• 3 tbsp of rice vinegar
• 2 cups of cooked quinoa, seasoned
• 1-1/2 cups of shredded carrots

Cook 2 cups of quinoa (I used a rice cooker). Wash all the veggies. Using a food processor (I used a Ninja), chop up the cauliflower, parsley, kale and pecans separately.  Put the chopped kale and parsley into a bowl, squeeze the lemons, mix and let it soak for about 45 minutes. 

Once the quinoa is cooked and cooled, mix everything in a bowl. Start with 2 tbsp of rice vinegar and add more based on your preference. Season with salt and pepper to taste. 

I loved the fresh, clean flavors of this dish, which I'm sure I'll be making more of throughout this detox. The prep time takes a while because my Ninja is pretty small so I had to chop things up in batches. On the plus side, it's a salad so you don't have to cook anything after all the prep work!

Day 1 Summary

I found the first half of the day to be the most challenging. I always wake up hungry, so not having something hearty and readily available to eat was the hardest part of Day 1. I woke up at 8 AM but didn't actually eat anything until 11:30 AM, which is pretty late for me. I just felt continuously hungry throughout the day.