Author Archives: Lisa Eirene

About Lisa Eirene

About Lisa Eirene Lisa lost 110 pounds through calorie counting and exercise. She swims, bikes, runs, hikes and is enjoying life in Portland, Oregon. Her weight loss story has been featured in First Magazine, Yahoo Health, Woman's Day and Glamour.com.

Mediterranean Diet Recipes

Posted by Lisa Eirene

I wanted to share some of the recipes we did for the Mediterranean Diet. These were really good and I would definitely make them again. I did the Mediterranean Diet for almost a month. I know I just posted about this diet yesterday (I forgot I had it in my drafts!) but after taking about 2 months off from the keto diet, and trying a different diet (which I liked A LOT), I am going back to Keto.

I hate to admit it but, I just failed. I gained weight. I wasn’t going crazy with carbs but apparently I did enough to gain weight. So clearly my body just does NOT work with carbs. Period. It’s disappointing. I was hoping I could try something different and find a medium ground…but for now…back to what worked. This time, no modifications. Following the keto diet properly.

In the meantime, here are some recipes we liked a lot.

#1- (Taste of Home) Mediterranean Chicken on top of cauliflower rice

It was really delicious! We both liked it a lot. I added crumbled feta because, duh. The cheese really made it awesome.

#2 – Mediterranean Bowl (modified)

Absolutely delicious! Instead of quinoa or rice, I sautéed kale as the base. Then added roasted chickpeas, orange peppers, tomato, red onion, cucumber, hummus, Falafel from Trader Joe’s, topped with feta and a little Goddess dressing. It was so good! I loved it. But this is my flavor profile. Michael said it was good but not his favorite (I think he would have preferred chicken in it).

#3 – Frittata

It was a “use up whatever I had in the fridge” kind of frittata. Keto and Mediterranean diet friendly. Paired it with a side salad of mixed greens and Primal Kitchen Green Goddess Dressing.

It was SO delicious! Eggs, heavy cream, cheese, ham, orange peppers, spinach, onion, garlic, seasonings, topped with ricotta.

I wanted to get this posted before I forget again 🙂 and will be sharing some new recipes soon from my keto reboot!

Mediterranean Diet

Posted by Lisa Eirene

Recently I talked about wanting to try the Mediterranean Diet.

I’ve been doing keto on and off since February. It worked really well in the beginning. I lost about 10-12 pounds or so in the first few months and I honestly felt really good! I cleared up my psoriasis, I had energy and felt pretty good. I definitely felt better and more satisfied than when I tried low-carb diets in the past.

What I didn’t like about keto? It takes a LOT of tracking. It’s hard to stay under 25 grams of carbs for the day. It takes a lot of mental energy and planning to stay on track with your macros and meal planning. It was also a little triggering. I found that I started to look at certain foods as being “Bad Foods” and then feeling anxiety or guilt if I ate them. I don’t think that’s a healthy way to look at any food. I can see that someone with a history of anxiety or eating disorders could get very obsessive on a diet like keto.

I started reading about the Mediterranean Diet and it sounded really good. It wasn’t new to me. There are a lot of benefits to this diet. It’s helpful for heart health, controlling blood sugar, it might protect against cancer and depression. Supposedly it’s good for your brain, too.

It’s fairly simple to follow, which is also a plus. It looks to me like you can basically eat MOST things in moderation, unlike keto that is very restrictive.

Avoid these Foods

  • Sugar (soda, candy, etc)
  • Refined grains (white breads and pasta)
  • Trans Fats and Refined Oils (margarine, soybean oil, canola oil, etc)
  • Processed meats (sausages, hot dogs, etc)
  • Highly processed foods (anything that is “low fat” or “diet)

Foods to Eat

  • Vegetables and fruit
  • Nuts and seeds
  • Legumes
  • Tubers (potatoes, sweet potatoes, turnips, yams)
  • Fish and seafood
  • Poultry (chicken, turkey, duck) and eggs
  • Whole grains (brown rice, rye, barley, whole wheat, corn, buckwheat)
  • Dairy
  • Herbs and spices
  • Healthy fats (EEVO, olives, avocado, avocado oil)

Looking at these food pyramids, I don’t know that I am 100% on board with it. One of my takeaways from doing keto is that I DO agree, that limiting carbs is a good thing. It just is. Maybe you don’t need to do extreme low carb, but maybe just cutting out bread and pasta and getting your carbs from vegetables, sweet potatoes, fruit and beans. (So basically a variation of Slow Carb).

The good news is that this diet is basically ME. I love all of those things. I love Greek food. I love hummus and plain Greek yogurt. I eat a lot of seafood. So basically I need to limit red meat, cut out sugar and it’s not a huge change from what I used to do before keto!

So I recently spent a few hours perusing websites for recipes and meal plans and created my own meal plan for three weeks. I found some REALLY delicious-sounding recipes I was excited to try.

I am still going to try and limit my carbs (bread and pasta). Maybe the pasta dishes are just once a week. I definitely won’t be eating pasta daily!