Sonoma sun Archives | Eat Bread 90

April 28, 2017June 28, 2017 by Lin Carson

The Sisterhood of the Travelling Loaf: Day 26

I looked at my half-eaten loaf of Sonoma Sun bread from Alvarado St. Bakery and said, “You’re coming with me.” I have to go to Seattle this weekend to meet a couple of my convent high school friends, one of whom I haven’t met for 30 years. I packed my bread up and headed to the train station.

The traveling Sonoma Sun loaf in my bread bag.

The accompaniments in the bread bag.

I have to admit, I was fearful and excited at the same time. I had never boarded an Amtrak train before and I really don’t know what is proper train etiquette. Plus, this is the first time I am traveling on a bread diet. You know how diets are ruined with travels!

lin - eat bread 90

I started the day really disciplined, until I saw Ivar’s clam chowder soup at the Bistro car. Yes! My mind was saying no, but my taste buds were screaming for a taste of delicious creamy and chunky clam chowder. So, this happened.

Ivar’s Clam Chowder with slices of Sonoma Sun bread is the ultimate Amtrak combo!

That was truly a bad choice for my diet, but I doubt it would be the last bad choice I’ll make this trip.

I immediately went for a 2 mile run upon reaching my destination. Wished I could do more, but I had to meet another friend of mine for dinner at Anchovies and Olives (a seafood tapas restaurant). My challenge was to make sure that I consumed the rest of the bread in the restaurant.

Grilled sun choke salad with Aioli, scallion and mint (top left), smoked fish crostini with pickled onion (top right), and grilled macrina foccacia with bang caudal (bottom): my meal at Anchovies & Olives.

Did you know that you can judge a restaurant by the bread it serves? This restaurant had no clue what a foccacia is. Their grilled focaccia was a glamorized ciabatta with grill marks. I could hear my husband say, “Don’t be a bread snob,” and I really needed to consume my fill of bread for the day, so I had to eat it—regardless of whether or not it met my standards of foccacia. It just puzzled me why they can’t just call it grilled ciabatta.

Here’s what I ate on Day 26 of EB90:

Food	Portion	Calories
Brioche French Toast		800
Grand Central Baking Rye Sourdough	4 slices (50g)	560
Egg		300
Ham	1	105
Macaroons	2 pc	120
Potato Roll	80g	120
Meat plate		300
Tomato Basil soup	1/2 C	75
Caramelized Brocolli	1 1/2 C	150
Tiramisu		250
Prosecco	1 glass	90
Port	1/2 glass	50
Coconut water	2 cups	90
Walk 8 miles		-800
Total		2210

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April 27, 2017June 28, 2017 by Lin Carson

Food Trucks and Donuts: Day 25

Sonoma Sun from Alvarado St. Bakery.

The Sonoma Sun loaf from Alvarado St. Bakery was my bread of choice today. The bakers at Alvarado St. Bakery sprout their own grains to make their Sonoma bread. I tried it with something different today: Avocados. My nutritionist Connie wants me to eat avocados (listen to podcast #2).

I’ve never liked the bland taste of avocado, and I felt it is best eaten in guacamole. I am surprised that it is so rich in potassium and it helps me counteract my sodium levels. So today I mixed it up and tried avocado slices with Greek cream cheese on Sonoma Sun Bread.

Avocado with Sonoma Sun Sprouted Bread.

Today, I had friends from out of town visiting me and I brought them on a food truck tour. Unfortunately this time, I had to skip most of the eating. However, when we stumbled on the poke bowl shop, I had to try one. Can I say, it was a taste explosion in my mouth!

What’s a Poke bowl? It’s rice and raw tuna mixed with fish roe, seaweed greens and sesame brittle with a sweet sauce. The Poke originates from Hawaii, so it has that tangy and sweet taste to it.

A colorful Poke bowl with bigeye tuna, roe, sweet onion, avocado, sea salt, sesame brittle, cucumber, mixed seaweed and classic Hawaiian sauce.

Our last stop was Blue Star Donuts. The thing about Blue Star that is not known to many people, is that if you buy three donuts, and you’re really nice to the cashier, they give you an extra donut (yes, do that next time). Their donuts range for $3-4 apiece, but these are my favorite donuts in town. They have by far the best (brioche) dough, and the highest quality fillings and toppings. If I were to bring a box of Blue Star to you, you’d know that you’re special.

$Valhorna Chocolate Crunch (bottom center) is a custard filled donut.\$

Valhorna Chocolate Crunch (bottom center) is a custard filled donut. It is truly the star of this bunch from Blue Star Donuts.

Here’s what I ate on Day 25 of EB90:

Food	Portion	Calories
Alvarado St Bakery® Sonoma Bread	5slices (43g)	600
Sprouted wheat bread	200g	420
Banana	1	105
Dickinson’s® Lemon Curd	2 Tbsp	120
Tilamook Butter (Salted)	2 Tbsp	200
Homemade Pesto	1 Tbsp	80
Avacado	1/2 cup	184
Greek yogurt spread	1 Tbsp	22
Blue Star Donuts	1	200
Poke Bowl + Chips	1	150
Steamed Brocolli	1C	30
Calcium Supp
Bike		-100
Total		2011

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April 16, 2017May 9, 2017 by Lin Carson

Why Raw Kale Can Make You Fat: Day 14

Sonoma Sun from Alvarado St. Bakery.

I woke up feeling very hungry, so I made a ham egg and cheese sandwich with Sonoma Sun from Alvarado St. Bakery for breakfast this morning. That really hit a spot. Sometimes it takes a good hearty sandwich to start the day right.

Someone critiqued my menu choice and said I don’t eat enough salad and raw green vegetables. I personally am not a salad person. I just find it too troublesome to prepare salad for my whole family, where I could prepare the same amount of nutrients and antioxidants by just blanching some green vegetables and serving it with delicious butter.

“But eating raw vegetables are good for you, all the fresh vitamins and antioxidants are killed in the cooking process.”

I hear this and see kale and spinach salads and smoothies gaining popularity these days. Did you know that eating raw broccoli and kale or other cruciferous vegetables could be harmful to your thyroid? These raw vegetables contain chemicals that block the production of thyroid, and can be harmful to people struggling with their weight, not knowing that they could have hypothyroidism. If you love eating raw kale and arugula, and you’re having weight and depression issues, go check out your thyroid hormone level, and stop eating these raw.

In addition, raw spinach contains oxalic acid which blocks iron and calcium absorption. In order for you to reap the benefits of iron from spinach, you have to cook it. Yes, that is why Popeye got his spinach from a can! I don’t know which health guru started this eating-raw-vegetable trend, but obviously, they didn’t study the science of nutrition. I did try to get a green smoothie the other day, but the lady behind the counter told me she couldn’t blanch my spinach before putting it into a smoothie. So I moved on.

Some other raw veggies that I turn and run from:

Edamame: Yikes! Protease inhibitors! They reduce your digestibility of proteins.
Mushrooms: Gross. Do you know what these are grown on? Horse manure.
Sprouts: Food safety alert!! The water that sprouts grow in are the best medium for E.coli. Why? Because the workers don’t clean their hands when they plant these sprouts. My stomach churn for people who eat organic sprouts because they are not chemically sanitized!

I truly believe that is why humans grew bigger, stronger and lived longer when fire was discovered. We physically used fire to make more nutrients available to us, and this killed all the necessary bacteria that made us sick. So let’s use some heat and logic, to make food more nutritious.

Now, back to bread eating. Bread, a perfectly safe food to eat that is rich in nutrients that are readily available.

My dinner tonight included steak, caramelized onions, portabella mushroom, asparagus and Puratos O-tentic Baguette. Note: my steak is always well done because its proteins are more easily digestible.

Steak, veggies and O-tentic Baguette.

Here’s what I ate on Day 14 of EB90:

Food	Portion	Calories
Alvarado St. Bakery® Sonoma Sun	5 slices (43g)	600
Puratos O-tentic Baguette	285g	750
Tillamook® Salted Butter	2 Tbsp	200
Mango		200
Egg	1	78
Tillamook® sliced cheddar	1 Slice	45
Smucker’s Sugar Free	1 Tbsp	10
Dickinson’s® Lemon Curd	2 Tbsp	120
Skippy® Peanut Butter	1 Tbsp	95
Orange	1 orange	25
Asparagus	1 C	27
Steak & Onions	3oz	271
Almond Breeze® Chocolate Almond Milk	1 C	40
Easter Candy		250
Run		-200
Total		2531

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April 15, 2017May 9, 2017 by Lin Carson

You Must be Cheating: Day 13

Sonoma Sun from Alvarado St. Bakery.

You only eat bread all day? How can you finish so much bread in a day? I don’t believe it, you must be cheating on your diet. There’s no one who can eat so much bread and not gain weight.

Honestly, these are some of the more common remarks that come at me every day. Yet when I started this challenge, I knew it would be controversial and turn people’s heads. Which brings up the real reason I’m eating so much bread: I did this to make a point! I’m showing others (the doubters and believers) that anyone can eat this amount of bread, and still not gain weight.

For those who don’t believe that I am eating this large amount of bread, just hang out at NedSpace—the co-working space where BAKERpedia is headquartered at. You’ll see me stuffing my face all day. I place a portion and calories table at the end of each blog to show all my followers that eating bread can be fun, and it can be done with a variety of bread. So no cheating is needed.

Open faced cheese and egg sandwich to launch my spring training day.

It was a beautiful day in Oregon, and we had to clear some brush (due to the windstorm that came by last week), so we started a campfire in our backyard. Today is also the start of my Spring training. As you can see, I expanded quite a lot of calories, so I treated myself to roasted marshmallows tonight.

Roasted marshmallows on a slice of Sonoma Bread.

Yes, I ate that with bread too (as you can see in the picture). Honestly, it didn’t taste that great, but some chocolate would have pushed the envelope on calories. I really did this because I had to finish the last slice of the day.

Here’s what I ate on Day 13 of EB90:

Food	Portion	Calories
Alvarado St. Bakery® Sprouted Wheat Coffee Pumpkin Cranberry Bread	4 slices (32g)	400
Alvarado St. Bakery® Sonoma Bread	8 slices (43g)	960
Kraft® Marshmallows	8pc	200
Egg	1	78
Tillamook sliced cheddar	1 Slice	45
Nutella®	2 tbsp	200
Nature’s Hollow Sugar Free Strawberry Jam	2 Tbsp	160
Skippy® Peanut Butter	1 Tbsp	95
Apple	1	95
Green Beans	1 C	31
Hebrew National® Beef Hot Dogs	2	340
Bike & Run		-550
Total		2054

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