Jack & Hill: A Beauty Blog - make-up, cosmetics, perfume, and the substance of style

What 30 Days of Raw Vegetables Looks Like

My 30 days of eating raw are up, and the results pretty much speak for themselves here. No, I did not photoshop this picture, which was taken in broad daylight!

My skin is exponentially improved, and I've lost four inches from my waist (I don't do well with weighing, so I measure instead), and today I am wearing my skinny jeans. And my energy level is absurdly high--my first day back to running I easily banged out 3+ miles.

I had a single hormone-related blemish this week, and a small flare-up of my dermatitis, probably related to being at the mercy of restaurants in Las Vegas last week (I did my best, but heaven knows what's really  in a Vegas "salad", and I do believe there is some kind of city ordinance that requires one to eat at least one slice of prime rib a day).

I'm in for another 30 days of raw, and this time Chris is joining me. A special thanks to Kimberley, for all of her encouragement from day one.

More pics after the jump.

What 15 Days of Raw Vegetables Looks Like

This is me with not a stitch of makeup on my skin. No color correction, no concealer, no foundation, nothing. The most noticeable change since starting the 30 day raw food challenge has been the improved condition of my skin. Today I got out of the shower, put on my usual eyes, MAC Paint Pot shadow in Bare Study and Zoom Lash, then reached for the foundation... and put it back. The redness in my cheeks has abated, my chronic dermatitis is gone, and I don't have a single blemish anywhere.

Here's a link for more on raw foods. Note that I am not a vegan, and consider sashimi to be a perfectly acceptable raw food, but I've been eating at least 95% vegetables, nuts and fruits.

30 day raw food challenge

This is Kimberly on a raw food diet--her "after" picture. Click here to see the "before." This may be the most dramatic transformation like this I've ever seen, because it is so total. She's slimmer, but it's much more than that: she's 20 years younger, exudes health, and is a stunning beauty. Seeing these pics and reading Kimberly's story, along with the success of my new kale-based breakfast routine, inspired me to take the leap and sign on to the 30 Day Raw Challenge.

I have high hopes of success, because I think my expectations are modest--I really only want to look one year younger--to be back where I was a year ago. I went up a dress size over the winter, and feel puffy and icky.

For the past two years, I've leaved with the world's unhealthiest vegetarian (pizza, pp&j, pancakes, you get the drift). Left to my druthers, I'd eat steak and green salad four days a week, and figuring out how to cook things we both like has been a challenge. My interest in Raw food began after I ate at a local raw take-out joint, Que Se Raw Se Raw, and was shocked to find it the best food I'd had in ages, and something I'd actually be interested in learning how to make.

My problem with most genres of health food has always been that the food just isn't very good. I love food, and cooking, and the sophistication and artistry of real cuisine, and while the chunky, beany soups I make from my Moosewood cookbook are good, they aren't sublime the way my chicken curry is sublime. My forays into raw have so far managed to engage the palate at a far higher level, and I'm learning to work with vegetable preparation in ways that are as elegant and showily spectacular as some of the Indian cooking I do.

So, onward. In 30 days I'll post my own before and after pictures, come what may. I don't think I'll ever give up steak for life (I like mine practically raw anyway), but if I come off of the thirty days with thirty new ways to make fresh vegetable entrees, I'll be a happy girl.

The Hacker's Diet

I'm getting tired of looking at my own ass (there is, after all, a reason it's behind one most of the time), so thought I'd put up another post about something--anything!

What I came up with, in part as a result of having just made such an--ahem!--large ass of myself, is a novel diet plan, designed by a multi-millionaire software engineer, John Walker, who describes the origins of The Hacker's Diet thus:

The absurdity of my situation finally struck home in 1987.  ``Look,'' I said to myself, ``you founded one of the five biggest software companies in the world, Autodesk.  You wrote large pieces of AutoCAD, the world standard for computer aided design.  You've made in excess of fifty million dollars without dropping dead, going crazy, or winding up in jail.  You've succeeded at some pretty difficult things, and you can't control your flippin' weight?''

Six months after this aha moment, Walker was down from 215 pounds to 145, and stayed there.  His diet book is a free download. I haven't read the whole thing yet, but I like the idea of diet as an engineering problem. Though I still have my doubts. There seem to be plenty of nerds who treat sex as an engineering problem, and look where that's gotten them....