I’ve finally gotten up my final diary and menu of the last week of my vegan Whole 30. Which is pretty much the same as a vegetarian Whole 30 but without eggs. Some people do a “modified” veggie Whole 30, but I went the whole hog and kept it as compliant as possible.
And yes, this does mean I basically survived on nuts, seeds, fruit and vegetables for a month. Check out my earlier article if you’re interested in learning more about doing a vegan or vegetarian Whole30 (or finding out what possessed me to do it).
(Psst if you’re just joining me you can check out my weekly reports, menus and my final results here in my whole 30 section).
I also documented weeks one, two and three, writing what I ate and how I felt, pretty much the same as this entry. Except that this entry will actually be for 9 days,as I’m including week four plus days 29 and 30.
My next article on Whole 30 will sum up everything I learned, things I liked and didn’t like, and… drum-roll…whether I lost any weight and how much. I know weight loss should not be the focus of a Whole 30 but it certainly mattered to me.
Read on to see my what I ate and how I managed on the home stretch of my vegan Whole 30.
WHAT I LEARNT DURING WEEK 4
Unfortunately, one my greatest revelations this week was that you CAN get sick of cauliflower. So glad this newfound hatred of cauliflower only kicked in during the final week, not sure how I would have coped in previous weeks.
Even as I write up this intro from a post-whole 30 life, cauliflower and I are still not really back on speaking terms.
The lesson to be learnt here obviously being what we all know but I ignored in my food desperation: too much of anything is bad.
In other news, my skin broke out again and continued to be TERRIBLE. I read on the Whole 30 forums that a lot of people saw an improvement in their skin after cutting out nuts, but honestly at this late stage I would still rather not restrict my diet even further.
Any cravings had completely disappeared at this stage. I thought I would be counting down the minutes until I could have a pizza-fest but nope. Find out what I ate below.
WHAT DID I EAT DURING MY FOURTH WEEK OF A VEGAN WHOLE 30?
This week I definitely made more of an effort when it came to cooking, especially when compared with my cooking-mutiny last week. I just had one or two lazy days when I relied on frozen veg and tahini to get me through, or a bit of a Whole 30 snack selection.
| Day | Breakfast | Lunch | Dinner |
| Monday | Melon, berries, mango, with coconut milk, chia seeds and mixed seeds. | Cauliflower sushi | Arrabiata courgetti with nutritional yeast |
| Tuesday | Melon, coconut milk, nuts and seeds | Arrabiata courgetti with nutritional yeast | Baked potato slices, guacamole, pico de gallo, jalapeños, cashew red pepper chili blender sauce. |
| Wednesday | Same as Tuesday | Leftover cauli rice, a handful of olives, almonds, and fresh pineapple. | Roasted broccoli and potatoes with cauliflower mash and raw romesco sauce |
| Thursday | Melon, blueberries, coconut milk, nuts and seeds | Leftover Roasted broccoli and potatoes with cauliflower mash and raw romesco sauce | Modified chickpea spinach curry with cauli rice |
| Friday | Plum, almond, banana coconut milk chia seed smoothie | Modified chickpea spinach curry with cauli rice | Modified chickpea spinach curry with cauli rice |
| Saturday | Completely disorganized – handful of almonds | Potatoes with quick curry sauce | Modified bolognese and courgetti |
| Sunday | Banana coconut milk chia seed smoothie | Tweaked chickpea spinach curry with cauliflower rice | Kale chips |
| Monday | Melon with coconut milk and chia seeds | Frozen Carrot, broccoli cauliflower mix microwaved with tahini lemon sauce | Green salad, baba ganoush, quick stir fried cauliflower, basque chili peppers (guindillas) and sundried tomatoes. |
| Tuesday | Banana melon chia seed mix | Leftover salad, cauliflower and baba ganoush | Baked potato slices with fresh salsa, avocado and flash-fried veggies. |
08/07/2019 Day 22
Getting low on fruit in the house, for breakfast I had chopped melon with some berries and mango, mixed up with coconut milk, chia seeds, and some other mixed seeds. Lunch was cauliflower sushi, it was good but even soggier today, very filling.
Can’t face the thought of any more damp nori right now. And I used up the last of my expensive coconut aminos for dipping them in.
I popped into Carrefour supermarket on the way home, searching for sweet potatoes (just one, for the love of god just one please!) but no dice. However, I did find Perrier flavored sparkling water that is Whole30 compliant and promptly bought a case of peach and another of cucumber lime.
Lots of blog work to do in the evening, so handsome hubby did me a solid and made my arrabiata sauce and I had it with some courgetti and lashings of nutritional yeast. It was really tasty. I don’t normally like courgetti as:
- When they’re raw they’re a bit much.
- If you cook them at all they release a ton of liquid
- Salting them just produces tiny wet noodles.
This time I just popped them in the microwave for two minutes with no lid on, then mixed them with the sauce.
There was still a little liquid released but the noodles were the perfect texture, and the added nutritional yeast helped turn the extra liquid into even more yummy sauce. A total win.
I straight up did not know until today that nutritional yeast has 51% protein! That is a SERIOUS amount of protein! In addition to all the other minerals and vitamins it has.
As protein has been a bit unattainable while on a strict vegan whole 30, I really wish I had known this from the start because EVERYTHING would have been sprinkled with it.
09/07/2019 Day 23
Breakfast was melon, coconut milk, nuts, and seeds. Lunch was more tasty arrabiata. We went to the cinema later on and the kids had bags of snacks and junk, but I prepped some baked potato slices and brought them in a Tupperware box with guacamole, pico de gallo, jalapeños, and a quick cashew red pepper chili blender sauce.
I also brought two bottles of peach Perrier water, and I didn’t feel left out or deprived at all.
I did have a few danger moments while preparing the snacks though, where I nearly absentmindedly put crumbs or leftover popcorn in my mouth. We got home late so put the kids to bed and got an “early” night.
10/07/2019 Day 24
Realized I hadn’t prepared my lunch for today and panicked slightly in the morning. Breakfast was the usual melon pudding, but lunch?
Did not have time to whip anything up so brought a tiny container of leftover cauliflower rice, a handful of olives, some almonds, and fresh pineapple. Could smack myself for not being prepared.
Today I noticed that my PMS had been pretty much non-existent, no water retention, no crazy temper issues (albeit still not my most pleasant self). Made me realize how much the food I usually eat must be disrupting my hormones
Had originally planned an evening out with the girls for a few drinks on my birthday (Thursday 1st), but today when I thought about it I was shocked to discover I just didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to drink at all. WHO AM I?
Dinner I roasted some broccoli and potatoes with cauliflower mash and some raw (read lazy) romesco sauce. I couldn’t find any prepared roasted peppers without sugar in them and didn’t feel like investing the extra time and effort to make my own, so I just used a raw red pepper.
It was still delicious, my family had the sauce but with some pork chops my husband had cooked (can’t win them all, unfortunately), and everyone was licking their plates and asking for more sauce.
11/07/2019 Day 25
The usual chopped melon, chia seeds, and coconut milk, with some frozen blueberries thrown in to be a bit different. Rebellious even. Go me.
Lunch was leftovers from yesterday, yummy, except the cauliflower mash. Cold cauliflower-gruel greeted me upon opening my lunchbox, so I just kind of ignored it and pushed it to the side, promising myself I’d eat it later if I was hungry again (I didn’t).
Dinner was my chickpea spinach curry, with the chickpeas subbed out for aubergine and carrot, with cauliflower rice. No longer enjoying cauli rice, think I’ll start just eating curries, etc. by themselves.
12/07/2019 Day 26
I totally forgot to fill this entry in, had to come back to it later. Fruit was running quite low, so for breakfast, I had a wrinkled plum, a handful of almonds, and a banana coconut milk chia seed smoothie.
Lunch was better organized, some yummy leftover curry and cauliflower rice. I gave up for dinner, in no mood to cook, and had the same again as there was plenty of leftovers.
However, I may throw up if faced with smelly cauliflower again. Wave a cauliflower at me at your peril.
13/07/2019 Day 27
Totally out of fruit today, had a plan a few days ago to roast some butternut squash up with cinnamon and have it with cauliflower grits for breakfast, but:
- I’ve been too lazy to peel and roast the squash, and
- As I mentioned I’ve quite gone off small pieces of cauliflower á la cauliflower rice, couscous, etc. Had to happen, I’ve been eating so much.
I totally managed to stay in bed two hours more today, I woke up at 8 but WILLED myself back to sleep (it may have taken 1.5 hours and I only caught an extra 30 minutes of sleep, but heck, I’ll take that victory).
As it was late and breakfast options were few, I just grabbed a handful of almonds and made lunch a bit earlier.
Today I had a lot of cauliflower to use up, so I roasted it and some cubed potato and made a quick curry sauce to pour over it.
The kids and hubby had the same but over couscous. It was really really tasty and simple, I must put up the curry sauce recipe. Did not have the same issues with roasted chunks of cauliflower that I do with the rice, go figure.
Dinner was my bolognese, without wine and lentils of course, with extra chopped carrot and celery over zoodles, and lashings of nutritional yeast.
It’s quite hard to come by nutritional yeast in Spain and expensive, but I’m definitely going to be making the extra effort since I now know it has a TON of protein.
14/07/2019 Day 28
Lazy breakfast today of bananas blitzed with coconut milk and chia seeds. I mean to make it with a new brand of almond milk I’d discovered that seemed compliant, but noticed at the last moment that it contains canola extract (why world, why?).
Dithered over adding it or not (NO-ONE WILL KNOW UNLESS I WRITE ABOUT IT) but in the end decided that with only two more days to go, why risk a setback now?
Quite over this now. No new amazing changes, I sleep the sleep of the dead, eat nice food, am not hungry anymore …have the odd craving for bread or a drink followed by an evaluation.
I definitely consider more WHY I want to eat things, and weigh up if it’s worth it. The conclusion tends to be not really. Not enough.
Lunch was leftover zoodles with bolognese. I had a handful of olives when I got home and spent quite a while working on the blog and making dinner for everyone, followed by a quick 15-minute swim before the pool closed.
I wasn’t really hungry at dinnertime so I skipped it and made a handful of kale chips at around 9.30 p.m. to eat instead.
15/07/2019 Day 29
Banana coconut milk chia seed smoothie over some cubed melon for breakfast.
For lunch, I just microwaved some frozen mixed vegetables (carrots broccoli and cauliflower) and had them with a quick tahini lemon sauce. For dinner, I made my family my spicy feta dip as a spread, hummus, baba ganoush, socca and a greek salad with no feta.
I had some salad and baba ganoush as well as a side of quick stir-fried cauliflower, basque chili peppers (guindillas) and sun-dried tomatoes.
It was delicious, but I couldn’t eat much, just not that hungry again.
16/07/2019 Day 30
So today is the day. Felt like grabbing someone’s sandwich and waving it around in celebration in between taking delicious-processed-carbohydrate bites, but if I’ve come this far, what’s another 24 hours? (Edit: I totally typed 30 hours there by accident, I’ve got 30 on the brain…)
Breakfast was banana melon chia pudding, as usual, lunch was leftover salad, cauliflower and baba ganoush. Questioning about the Whole 30 intensified today from my workmates, think there might be a few converts there…..
Realized today that even though our grocery bills have been pretty high during the Whole 30 (about €130 versus the usual €80 for a family of 5), I have actually saved money.
I would definitely spend €30 a week on snacks, coke zero, the occasional lunch at work, and the odd drink after work. Easily another €30 on takeaway once a week, another €50 on going out for tapas once a week, €30 on pizzas and drink and junk food for Friday night…
Wow, that sounds really bad now that I think about it…Well anyway, our food shop cost increased about €200 a month, but our overall expenditure decreased by €560.
That’s a big difference, €360 less spent. It probably helped quite a bit that I am vegetarian as well, given how much meat costs here in Spain.
Dinner was a celebration, baked potato slices with fresh salsa, avocado, and flash-fried veggies. I did it!!! I can’t deny that for about a millisecond there I was tempted to toast my success with a glass of champagne, but whatever! I’ll take the win!
Planning to step on the scales tomorrow (finally!) and reintroduce legumes, followed by two days of eating Whole 30 style again (reintroduction protocol). Then I will see what I fancy introducing next and how everything affects me.
Come back later and check out my Whole 30 results, and I’ll also be doing a one month post-whole 30 update!
Thanks for reading and I hope you gained something valuable from these posts. If you have any questions, just shoot me a line in the comments, on my Facebook page, or using the contact form.
Week 4 (+ 2 days) done and dusted!