Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Deerfield Trading Co. Gourmet Soda

Per the suggestion of a friend of mine, I recently tried Deerfield Trading Co. Gourmet Soda.

This "gourmet soda" (whatever that means) is a Walgreens exclusive. Walgreens is headquartered in Deerfield, IL (thank you Wikipedia) so I guess it makes sense that they carry a brand from their hometown. My friend found at the Walgreens in Culpepper, VA and I found it in Columbia, SC so I think it's safe to say that it's everywhere - in the central Atlantic region, anyways.

Here's our Facebook conversation about it:

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As you can tell, he really likes it. And I have to say - I pretty much agree with everything he said. I bought the vanilla cream (not sure if he got the same one, his might have been regular cream soda), strawberry cream, and black cherry. There was also grape & root beer but I don't really like either of those two flavors so I passed on them. All of the sodas are made with cane sugar, and are decaffeinated - for those of you who are into knowing that kind of stuff.

The vanilla cream - awesome. It tasted exactly how I wanted a cream soda to taste. I don't know if that's because it was vanilla cream instead of just cream, but whatever the reason it was fantastic. Way better than any other cream soda I've ever had. I'm not usually partial to cream soda, but I highly recommend this.

I was expecting the strawberry cream to be super sweet, but it wasn't! It was perfect. I can't really describe it. Sort of like cherry soda, but not. I wouldn't say that it tasted like strawberries... more like strawberry flavor, if you know what I mean. Either way, it was still good.

The black cherry was kind of eh to me. I usually like cherry soda, but this one didn't impress me much. I don't know if that's because I was so blown away by the other two or because it really was sub-par. Either way, I would definitely pick up s Deerfield Trading Co. cream soda of some kind the next time you're in/near a Walgreens.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Post-Master Cleanse

Well internet, I asked you all to vote for what my first meal should be post-Master Cleanse. You left me some comments and voted on my Facebook. You have spoken, and thus it was done. Today, for my first post-master cleanse meal, I had:

BBQ! Specifically, a chicken barbeque sandwich from Maurice's. Before any of you South Carolinians judge, it was the only place we could find that was open on Sunday. I also had some leftover roasted potatoes from last night and fruit salad. Yummy!

This was my first attempt at eating meat and so far so good. I'm a little tired, but don't feel as woozy as yesterday and I still don't want to barf. Great success!

Well folks, I guess that concludes my journey through the Master Cleanse. Thanks for reading, and for your comments and posts on my Facebook. Couldn't have done it without you all!

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Master Cleanse Ease Out - Day 3

Started the day off with half of a banana. I wanted to dip my toe into the solid food ocean before I jumped in. Didn't barf or feel nauseous, so I was hopeful for the rest of the day.

The boyfriend and I hung out with his family, since his sister graduated. We went to Carolina Wings for a late lunch. I had the soup & salad bar. It was easier than ordering a salad and asking them to take everything off. It was the first time in a long time that I ate a salad without salad dressing. And you know what? I didn't care. I was so happy to eat solid food, and was so busy appreciating all of the different tastes, I didn't even notice that I didn't have salad dressing. I ate a cup of soup and about two bites of salad before I started to get full. I muscled most of the way through my salad throughout the rest of lunch because I knew I was going to be starving by the end of graduation 5 hours later.

Felt fine while I was eating. Once we got home and sat for a little while I started to feel a little woozy and really tired. I've attributed this to the blood rushing to my stomach. I wasn't nauseous by any means; I didn't want to hurl. I just felt... weird, and different.

Later that night for din din I made a tomato, lettuce, and onion sandwich. I basically wanted to eat a BLT and convince myself that the onion was bacon, haha. Felt much better after eating this. I wasn't woozy or anything. We also roasted some potatoes (I ate about 1/2 of a potato) and put seasoning on them - delicious!

At the end of the day, I didn't puke so I consider solid food a success.

Friday, June 3, 2011

Master Cleanse Ease Out - Day 2

About a quarter of the way through the juicing process.

Today was juicing day. We had a storm last night and lost power. I was freaking out, thinking 'What if the power isn't back on tomorrow? What if I can't use the juice? What am I going to eat!?' I could see the blog post: 'Due to unforeseen circumstances, I have skipped day 2 of the Ease Out and gone right to live foods.' Luckily, the power came back early in the morning and I was able to juice my fruits and veggies.

I pulled a few recipes off of carrotjuice.com and added them together. These were my ingredients:

8 Large Fresh Cleaned Carrots
4 Large Fresh Cleaned Celery Stalks
4 Large Peeled Bananas
2 Large Fresh Granny Smith Green Apples
2 Large Fresh Skinless Cucumbers
2 Cups Of Plump Ripe Strawberries
2 Large Fresh Peeled Oranges

This was supposed to make about 6 servings (not sure what a 'serving' is but I assume it's a cup/glass, so around 8oz).

Rainbow of pulp.

Looks at those colors!

The boyfriend thought it smelled bad, but I thought it smelled fine. Either way, it tasted amazing. You could taste each individual ingredient, but they came together to make a terrific blend of fruit and vegetable.

Juicing: success.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Master Cleanse Ease Out - Day 1

Today was the first day in 10 days that I have consumed something other than lemonade. The orange juice was definitely too much so I added some water this morning. Fresh orange juice tastes different from store bought. Not necessarily different bad, just different. It kind of took some getting used to. I've drank almost a half a gallon so far. mmm, mmm, good

Tomorrow I'll be consuming a veggie & fruit juice medley. I'm gonna throw some carrots, celery, cucumbers, apples, bananas, strawberries and oranges together. Then, after I try some, I'll add more of whatever I think will make it taste better. I'm going to try to keep a 60:40 veggie to fruit ratio. We'll see how well that works out. That ratio may end up swapped.

And now, the moment you have all been waiting for. While on the cleanse I have lost a total of 9.8 lbs. That's almost a pound a day. I know people who have lost more, but I didn't exercise or anything during the cleanse. I wanted to see how much I could lose from the cleanse alone. I was hoping to lose at least 10 lbs. I was close! My weight loss really lessened toward the end of the cleanse. My waistband is different, but I my weight is back to what it was before I came to college so yay for that. Hopefully I'll be motivated to get my fitness on and lose ever more weight now.

Don't forget to leave me a comment voting for what you think my first meal should be after the ease out!

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Master Cleanse - Day 10

Well folks, I did it. Ten days of nothing but lemonade. And today is my last day. I wish I could say I'm sad, but I'm not.

Went to the grocery store with the boyfriend and bought a ton of produce for the next couple of days: oranges for tomorrow; carrots, celery, cucumbers, apples and strawberries for Friday. My hands and pruning, and smell like orange rind. I have half of a gallon of orange juice to drink tomorrow. The website doesn't say that I'm supposed to add water, but it looks very... thick. We'll see how it tastes. I might end up adding water anyways.

Now I need your help, internet. Help me decide what my first meal should be when I'm done with the Ease Out and off of the diet completely! Leave me a comment telling me what you think my first meal should be. I'll take a picture of me eating said meal on Sunday.

Don't forget to check in tomorrow to see how much weight I lost on the cleanse!