Our Longevity Diet

Rather than post our daily food consumption in blog posts, which would get pretty boring after a while, I’m going to update this page daily, at least for this month. Just to give you an idea of the kinds of foods we eat — this is all our normal diet, the intermittent fast changes only the timing — when we eat — not what we eat. This is Mexico, so as is customary, most of our food — especially vegetables and fruits — is prepared fresh. Isabel makes all our meals because, well she is hands-down the best chef I’ve ever known. I was many years a bachelor, and thought I could hold my own in the kitchen, but I abdicated as soon as I found out how well she cooks (which was only after we were married — it embarrasses me now to think of the paltry meals I prepared us when wooing her…)

So here is our daily diet, beginning yesterday, April 4th, 2008. I will try to list everything we eat or drink that has calories. Not listed is the water; this being a dry climate, I drink at least two liters of bottled water daily, sometimes three or even more if I get more exercise than usual.

Friday April 4th

In the morning I have two cups of coffee, but since this is fasting-time I have them without sugar (and I never use milk). We use a typical automatic coffee machine, and put in two teaspoons of fresh ground coffee per cup when not fasting, but on these fasting morning I only use one teaspoon of coffee per cup, since I don’t use sugar with it. Isabel drinks a cup of green tea with no sugar or milk.

Fast ended at 2:00 pm with our main meal: Carne é Papas — pieces of beef and potatoes in a chili sauce made from mild Poblano chilies. Served with guacamole and fried black-beans. I drink one glass of soda (red-pop) with my meal, and Isabel drinks tea with hers. She is allergic to tomatoes, so there are chopped tomatoes on the side that I add to my guacamole. Also ‘on the side’ we have a couple radishes which we eat with the meal. For dessert I have a coconut candy that is about the size of a walnut, yellow with brown on top that is probably from sugar — it tastes like the inside of a Mounds candy bar, only better. Isabel had a candy made from tamarind fruit and sugar — a sweet and tart local favorite — about the same size as my coconut treat.

In the early evening, about 8:00 pm, I have a large handful of salted peanuts. I’m feeling tired, so I have a 500 ml Coke, something I try to avoid drinking too frequently — once a week at most. At night I have four Buffalo style hot chicken wings. That’s four pieces, really two wings. Isabel makes these for supper occasionally, then freezes the left-overs in zip-loc bags for my night-time snack, which I eat about 10:00 pm. I also begin drinking wine about that time, I have three 8 ounce glasses between 10:00 pm and bed-time about 1:00 am. Isabel eats one slice of toasted bread with a slice of melted cheese, and drinks a cup of café con leche — coffee with about 1/2 milk in it; she uses low-fat milk.

Saturday April 5th

First thing in the morning (about 9:00 am) I drink two cups of coffee, black with one teaspoon of sugar in each. For breakfast I have eggs, since it is the weekend. Today it is huevos rancheros, two soft corn tortillas with a thin layer of refried beans and one fried egg on each, topped with a little salsa, today we had green salsa made from jalapeño peppers, so I didn’t use much. I love hot sauces, but stomach objects if I eat too much of it. Isabel didn’t want eggs, so she made a pancake for herself, topped with a pat of butter and a little maple syrup. I had my second cup of coffee with breakfast, she drank another café con leche.

About 12:30 pm I began drinking my daily three glasses of wine, since tonight we will be fasting. Before the fast I always drank those at night — that is one of the biggest adjustments I’ve had to make to accommodate this diet. I prefer my wine just before bed-time, but now can only do that on alternate days. About 2:00 pm we ate supper, today we had cheese-burgers with all the trimmings, plenty of brown mustard, ketchup, sliced tomato (for me, Isabel is allergic to tomato so has to skip those and the ketchup) and onion, as well as leaf lettuce. I was still drinking my wine, Isabel drank a cup of tea. I had two hamburgers, she had one and one-half, saving the other half for another day. I used to eat her left-over half for my night-time snack, but since we had breakfast today there is no snack tonight … maybe I’ll have it tomorrow night.

Sunday April 6th

Broke our fast with dinner about 2:30 pm, today we had spaghetti carbonara one of my (many) personal favorites. If there is anyone out there who does not know this dish, it is Italian, and basically consists of spaghetti with a sauce of cheese, spices (especially garlic and oregano, thought here we use cilantro because fresh oregano is hard to find), bacon and a little sour cream. Today we had mozzarella cheese, though often we make this with local Mexican cheeses. The same as two days ago, I had a glass of red pop with the dinner, and a coconut treat for dessert. Isabel drank tea, and was too full for any dessert.

About 7:00 pm I was a bit hungry and ate a handful of salted peanuts, then at 9:00 pm we watched our Sunday movie on DVD, and I ate a bowl of popcorn. Isabel had a café con leche in the early evening, and another at 9:00 with her bowl of popcorn. Between 9:00 pm and 1:00 am I had my usual three glasses of wine, a dark burgundy.

Monday April 7th

I started my morning as usual with two cups of coffee, one teaspoon of sugar in each. Isabel had a cup of tea. For breakfast we each ate a bowl of fruit (papaya, mango and peaches), I had about 3/4 cup of blueberry yogurt with mine, Isabel had the same amount of cottage cheese with hers.

Soon after noon I began drinking my usual three glasses of wine, and around 2:00 pm we ate our main meal, fajitas. For those who are not familiar with Mexican food, fajitas are basically a kind of taco, where the filling is meat, veggies and spices fried in a little oil, and then spooned into soft corn tortillas. The meat today was flank steak, called arrachera here, and the veggies were green, red and yellow peppers, plus onions and garlic. The green peppers were poblanos, which are naturally quite mild, but sometimes (like today) they get hot because pollen from other (hot) peppers planted nearby cross pollinate the plants. Anyhow, I had five fajita/tacos and Isabel ate three. I drank my third glass of wine with dinner, and Isabel had café con leche. Afterwards I ate my (second to last) coconut sweet described earlier, and Isabel had one of her tamarind-fruit sweets.

Tuesday April 8th

Had sugarless coffee in the morning (and Isabel her sugarless tea), then broke our fast with the main meal of the day about 2:00 pm. Today we had Buffalo style hot chicken wings. If anyone out there does not know about these, they consist of the wings from a chicken, cut into two pieces (a miniature leg-like piece and the flat piece next to that) — the tips are not used. So when I mention ‘piece’ here I’m referring to half a wing. Those are boiled to cook them and get the extra fat out, then coated in a hot sauce and baked in the oven to set the sauce onto the wings. We eat these with cole-slaw on the side. I had ten pieces with about one and one-half cups of cole slaw, Isabel ate six pieces and about a cup of cole slaw. She had room for her tamarind-fruit based dessert, but I left my last coconut treat for another day.

By 8:00 pm I was hungry enough to want a handful of salted peanuts, and Isabel had a café con leche about that time. Then around ten we ate our snacks, she had a piece of toast with a slice of melted cheese, plus a cup of tea with one spoon of sugar, and I ate a grilled cheese sandwich. (Yes, made with real butter — not much, but enough to help the bread toast nicely). Plus I began my usual three glasses of wine.

Wednesday April 9th

After my usual two cups of coffee with one teaspoon of sugar in each, I had a cup of yogurt for breakfast. Isabel had her café con leche and one small pancake with a little maple syrup. For dinner we ate burritos to use up various leftovers, they all had meat and beans, and some had peppers from the fajitas and/or onions. I had four burritos topped with chopped tomato, onion, and cilantro, and Isabel had the same except for no tomatoes and only two burritos. I also had my three glasses of wine. From 3:00 onward, nothing but water for me, Isabel had a cup of tea with no sugar or milk, and otherwise just water, as usual.

Thursday April 10th

The usual two cups of sugarless black coffee in the morning for me, and a cup of sugar and milk-less tea for Isabel — that being so routine that I will not continue to mention those in the future, it is a given that will only bear comment if omitted for some reason. Our supper was ready at 2:30, Chicken Cordon Bleu with a mushroom sauce, and a salad. The breaded chicken consisted of good sized breasts stuffed with a couple slices of thin ham and cheese — Isabel used Mozzarella instead of the traditional Swiss cheese. It is very difficult to find blocks of Swiss cheese here, though the packaged slices are available. But basically, Mozzarella is what we already had on hand, so of course she would use that rather than buy a different cheese just for that meal. The salad consisted of a bed of leaf lettuce, with onion, radishes, cucumbers, pickled beats (and for me) tomato on top, dressed with olive-oil and vinegar dressing. Our drinks were also the usual, and so won’t be mentioned in future posts, café con leche for Isabel, and a glass of red-pop for me. I ate my last coconut candy for dessert.

In the evening I was craving salt, as it has been hot lately (mid-80s) and I worked up quite a sweat on our daily walk to Chapala and back, so I finished off the bag of salted peanuts — there was only one small handful left. Then in late evening I had four pieces of Buffalo Wings, as I described in an earlier post, and Isabel had a slice of toast with melted cheese. She drank a cup of café con leche and I drank my wine.

Friday April 11th

I started the day with my two cups of coffee with one teaspoon of sugar in each, which is also so repetitive that I won’t continue to list it — just assume two cups of coffee for me, with sugar on days we eat breakfast and without on days we are fasting. Isabel, likewise has plain tea on fasting days and café con leche on breakfast days. For breakfast we ate pancakes, I had two small ones and Isabel two even smaller ones, with a little honey.

In the early afternoon I drank my wine — another repetitive habit that I need not continue repeating — three glasses of wine in the early afternoon on days we eat breakfast, or late at night on days we eat a night-time snack. I usually only skip the wine when we are away from home. For supper we had chili rellenos, large poblano chilies roasted and skinned then stuffed with spiced ground beef and cheese, and battered and fried. The peppers are served with a little light gravy-like sauce. I ate three and Isabel had two. These are not like stuffed bell peppers, they are much flatter so there is less filling — the vegetable part (a long green pepper) amounts to about half the meal, while the meat and cheese filling is most of the other half, the batter coating is very thin. As I mentioned when we had fajitas, this type of pepper is usually no spicier than bell peppers, and that was the case with those we ate today. I didn’t eat any dessert, Isabel had her last tamarind candy.

Saturday 12th April 2008

Today we had spaghetti for dinner. Since Isabel is allergic to tomatoes, she made two different versions. For me, she made the traditional tomato and meat sauce; for herself, she made a mix of vegetables and pieces of ham, fried in a little canola oil, which when mixed with the noodles make a version of Spaghetti Primavera, though a somewhat Mexicanized version, since the veggies include several different types of peppers — similar to the fajitas we had last week, but with different spices and some other veggies, like zucchini and eggplant added.

Being the weekend, we watched a DVD movie in the evening, which of course calls for popcorn. Curiously, we have not found any air-poppers here, so she uses the old way of making popcorn with a bit of canola oil in a deep, lidded pot. We don’t add butter, but do use salt. Isabel sometimes adds hot sauce to hers, a habit I find somewhat disgusting. She will do the same with potato chips, though we don’t often eat those; it is a common custom among Mexicans to douse them with hot sauce.

Sunday April 13th

It being Sunday I had a two egg omelet with cheese for breakfast — I usually only have eggs for breakfast once per week, on whichever weekend day we are eating breakfast (it alternates, week by week). Isabel had a pancake with maple syrup. For supper she made lamb chops — they cut them very thin, but large, here. We each had two, though hers were smaller. Those were smothered in ginger-flavored gravy. To use up left-overs we each had one burrito and one-half chili relleno, (mentioned in earlier posts), with our lamb chops.

Monday April 14th

One of my favorite meals for today’s supper — chicken molé — for any of you who don’t know what that is, (you poor souls), it is chicken in a chocolate sauce. No, not some French sweet-sauce, but real authentic Mexican chocolate sauce, with no milk or sugar in the recipe, just ground chili peppers and ground peanuts, plus a bit of corn starch to thicken it. Chocolate is, of course, native to Mexico, so you can buy the pods and make the sauce from scratch here. They also sell it in the markets, and there is a version available in jars that sells in the U.S. and elsewhere. This is healthy stuff, packed with anti-oxidents, but you wouldn’t know it from the taste. Indescribable. It is sometimes poured over whole pieces of cooked chicken, but we prefer to remove the chicken meat from the bones in bite-sized strips and chunks — it holds more sauce that way! The plan was to have rice with vegetables with this, but we we got home too late from our walk to Chapala, so there wasn’t time to cook rice (instant? what’ that?) so we had mostaccioli noodles with cheese. In the night I ate a grilled cheese sandwich, and Isabel had a piece of toast with melted cheese (which is almost the same thing, only about half-so).

Tuesday April 15th

For breakfast I had a bowl of fruit (peaches, mango and pineapple) with blueberry yogurt. Isabel had a bowl of cereal with low fat milk and fruit. For our main meal we had fried brown rice with beef, onions, zucchini and yellow chili peppers.

Wednesday April 16th

For our dinner today we had cannelloni — Italian noodles stuffed with spiced ground beef, and topped with white cheese and a white sauce. I had four and Isabel had two. Served with a fresh salad of leaf lettuce, tomato, onion, cucumber and radishes — Isabel of course had the same but with the tomato left out. Early in the evening I ate one of Isabel’s home-made chocolate chip cookies, that have been in the cookie jar for a few weeks. Still good. In the late evening I ate the two left-over cannelloni, and Isabel had two small whole-wheat rolls that she made weeks ago and had frozen; eaten cut in half, toasted, with a bit of melted cheese on top.

Thursday April 17th

For breakfast we each ate on small pancake with a little maple syrup. For dinner, we had leftovers — we each ate a little leftover rice with vegetables, two enchiladas (OK, so I had three) filled with leftover chicken molé and topped with melted cheese, and one and one-half lamb chops. When we originally had the lamb chops Isabel made a ginger gravy for them, today she made a wine and herb sauce for the leftover chops. I had one of her home-made chocolate-chip cookies for dessert.

Friday April 18th

Had pork-chops for dinner. These are the typical Mexican cut, thinner than in the U.S. by almost one half. Isabel served these with mashed potatoes and for veggies we had carrots and chayote, with mushroom gravy on the chops and potatoes. I had three chops and Isabel had two. For our night-time snack I had four pieces of Buffalo Hot Wings, while Isabel had her home-made whole wheat roll with melted cheese, both of which I’ve described earlier.

Saturday April 19th

Isabel baked biscuits this morning, so for breakfast I had one of those and a fried egg, and Isabel ate one of the biscuits for her breakfast — hot out of the oven it didn’t even need butter to taste great. For supper she made fried chicken, of which I ate three pieces and she had two. Served with another of those biscuits, covered in gravy, and a large helping of cole slaw. I reduced my wine intake in half on days that we have breakfast — to drink the usual three glasses I had to start drinking before our main meal, and that didn’t sit well with my stomach, despite having had breakfast a few hours earlier. So I only drink wine with the meal, which results in my having much less — one to one and a half glasses most of the time.

Sunday April 20th

For our supper today we had chicken enchiladas. That’s it. I had five, Isabel ate three. Now it may seem odd to those whose only experience with enchiladas comes from Mexican restaurants, but these don’t really need any side-dishes, though the restaurant is likely to give you fried beans and rice, they really are fine just by themselves — fresh corn tortillas dipped in a red sauce made of chili mirasol and spices, with a bit of tomato sauce (for mine, Isabel makes hers first without the tomato, since she is allergic), and fried, then wrapped around shredded chicken and onions. The enchiladas are then topped with melted white Mexican cheese. In the evening (about 7:00 pm) my energy was flagging so I drank a coca-cola. Isabel had a couple small pieces of candied fruit. At movie time (9:00 pm) we put on the DVD and each have a bowl of popcorn.

Monday April 21st

For breakfast we had biscuits and gravy. I didn’t mention that Isabel made these biscuits with half whole-wheat, so they are darker and richer-flavored than the plain white-flour variety. For gravy we just used the left-over gravy she had — sometimes she makes special gravy with sausage in it for gravy and biscuits, but today it was just plain gravy. For supper we had milanesas — thin Mexican steak that is breaded and fried, then covered with a white sauce. Since the breading is thick we don’t eat any other starch with that, we just had cole slaw on the side for our vegetable. Isabel made Jamaican water to drink during the fast — it is made from the red jamaica flower (Hibiscus) petals, soaked in water. Kind of bitter without sugar, but we assume it has little or no calories, like unsweetened tea or coffee, and so can be consumed during fasting hours.

Tuesday April 22nd

For dinner today Isabel made calzones. Because she is allergic to tomato, she uses the same kind of sauce as she makes for enchiladas, with mirasol chili peppers. It is a little spicier, but similar in color to tomato sauce, and give a Mexican zing to this Italian dish. As with other forms of pizza, it is a meal unto itself, and so we had no side dishes. In the late evening I had fried chicken — a leg and a thigh — I was kind of hungry for some reason. Isabel had her usual slice of whole-wheat toast with melted cheese.

Wednesday April 23rd

For breakfast I had two biscuits with a little strawberry marmalade, and Isabel had one biscuit. For supper we had left-overs, various fillings in sopaipa or sopapillas, little cup-shaped fried-bread made with white corn flour. The traditional recipe calls for using lard, but Isabel leaves that out — making them a bit more crumbly, but way more healthful. I had four of those and Isabel had three, with a little guacamole on the side (made with just 1/2 avocado and split between the two of us).

Thursday April 24th

For dinner we had pieces of the left-over fried chicken (which had been frozen since the day we had those for dinner) in a lemon and cilantro sauce, over spaghetti. I was a bit dubious about fried chicken in this context, but the breading absorbed the lemon sauce and was delicious. For our evening snacks I had Buffalo wings, which I’ve described before, and Isabel had a small wheat roll with melted cheese.

Friday April 25th

For breakfast Isabel had one of the orange-flavored cookies her mother gave us, along with her café con leche, but I didn’t feel like having anything with my morning coffee. Later, after we had walked to Chapala, we bought a couple 10 oz. vanilla flavored sodas. For dinner we had chunks of the same meat used in the milanesas a few days ago (the unused portion was frozen in the mean-time), but cut into bite-size chunks and cooked in a gravy with onions and chili peppers, with tortillas, guacamole, and fried beans on the side. When frying beans, Isabel uses canola oil instead of the ‘manteca‘ (pork lard) traditionally used.

Saturday April 26th

We went to a child’s birthday party in the afternoon, so we ate lightly beforehand, not knowing when or what there might be to eat at the party. I had a grilled cheese sandwich, and Isabel had a melted cheese sandwich. Then at the party we had a few small glasses of Coca-Cola and potato chips, then a kind of chicken and potato salad on tostadas, with cake and ice-cream desert of course. In the night we each had a bowl of popcorn.

Sunday April 27th

For breakfast we had fruit and yogurt. I had blueberry yogurt and Isabel had plain, and we both had mango, papaya and apple. For supper we had pork in a red sauce that was mostly chili mirasol, with carrots and chayote, and some left over spaghetti in lemon sauce.

Monday April 28th

For supper we had burritos again, like about three weeks ago — the leftovers available this time were pork and a little beef. Isabel bought a different size flour tortilla, so the burritos were slightly larger than last time — I had three and she had one a one-half, with plenty of salad on top, as before. In the early evening I had a couple hand-fulls of peanuts, then for late night snack Isabel had her cheese on toast with café con leche, and I had fried chicken out of the freezer — a leg and a wing, left over from last week.

Tuesday April 29th

For breakfast we had French Toast with a little maple syrup, two slices for me, one for Isabel. Since we will be traveling tomorrow, we had our ‘end of month feast’ for supper. Isabel made fried potatoes on the stove, but everything else I cooked on the charcoal grill. Along with those potatoes we each had a ten-ounce steak, grilled onions, about 3/4 cup of sweet corn and half of a chorizo sausage. Instead of my usual wine I had two beers.

Wednesday April 30th

Since we were on the road we had restaurant food. For our main meal I had a large pork sandwich with tomatoes and mayo, and a side of French Fries. Isabel had a chicken breast stuffed with cheese and wrapped with bacon, spaghetti and mixed vegetable. For the nightly snack we were not hungry enough to eat a restaurant meal, so we had junk food — sweet cakes we bought at a little store.

END OF MEAL JOURNAL

So ends our typical month of meals — except we had no fish this month. We don’t eat enough fish, but we usually have it at least once or twice in the month. This month, we knew we would be going to Colima soon, so we put off having fish, knowing that we would have plenty there — as in fact we did in the first few days of May, eating at restaurants on the beach, under thatched roofed patios built on the sand (palapas) …