We Are What We Eat

Written by Jesse

If your body is anything like mine, you can feel the positive and negative effects of food. 

Back in Fall of 2017, I went vegan, and boy oh boy did I see a difference. I can’t tell you for certain how much weight I lost in what amount of time, but I remember an almost immediate change.

At the time, I was working as a gymnastics coach and immediately saw a spike in my energy level; not only could I teach class after class, but I could also teach myself, and my gymnastics got better. At one point I had even joined Planet Fitness and would go work out in the mornings before going to work at the gymnastics gym. I was totally killing it and damn my body looked fire. As I cut out the meat and dairy, the inflammation in my joints lessened if not disappeared altogether, and landing back and front tumbling didn’t tweak my knees the way it used to. Running around the city became less of a chore and more of a joy. It was like my 21 year old body was 10 again. 

Granted, where I come from in New York City, there is no shortage of vegan restaurants, whether it’s a sit down dinner or a quick on-the-go bite. It was incredibly easy to eat healthy, to stay away from those meats and cheeses. Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s offered me a shmorgasburg of vegetables and fruits to survive on, as well as snacks like organic hummus and grain chips. I had my special meals that I would continuously cook, and surprisingly never got tired of. But don’t get me wrong, it was expensive, as fuck. I remember there was this brand of ice cream I always used to splurge on, $10 a pint. So needless to say, cutting out the dairy and meat was definitely not the cheapest option, but damn was it worth it! 

The physical changes I saw were incredible. Almost all of my acne disappeared, my face slimmed down, along with the rest of my body, leaving me with only muscle and little to no fat. The cloud that had fogged my mind and memory for years was suddenly gone, and I was sharp as a tack. There was no more haziness. I felt unbelievably good. And I couldn’t help but wonder, if all these miraculous physical changes have been going on, what’s been going on inside? I felt I had liberated myself of all the toxins, hormones, and general shit that I had been eating my whole life. Shit that we had been told is good for us, will make us stronger, to keep eating it. Remember those “Got Milk?” ads? They impregnated our minds from a young age that milk was a necessary source of calcium for our diet, in order to grow big and strong. As I came to find out, that was all a hoax. 

What fueled my move from carnivore to plant eater was a Netflix documentary called What The Health. If you haven’t watched it, I highly recommend it. But just know, it will probably change the course of your eating habits. As a kid, I ate meat and dairy products daily, and my whole life thought I was eating healthy; I never went to McDonalds or any fast food chains, so I was good right? Not exactly. It was What The Health that completely shifted my mindset. In this documentary, they go into detail about what happens inside of your body when you consume meat and dairy; the inflammation that occurs, what happens in your bloodstream, the diseases they cause; the cancers, the heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, the list goes on. They tell you the horror stories of the hormones chickens are injected with, and describe cheese as coagulated cow puss.  

While explaining the dangers of meat and dairy consumption on the human body, through interviews with doctors (who were willing to expose the truth) and reviews of studies, WTH simultaneously follows the lives of three individuals who have diseases such as diabetes or heart disease and place them on a strictly plant based diet for 1 month. The results were astonishing. These people had actually reversed the diseases they had fallen ill with. Food became not only a means to feed their bodies, but a means to heal it. While the pharmaceutical industry is set on treating the symptoms rather than the causes, food itself treats the cause, because well, it is the cause. 

In What The Health, they also take a look at the environmental impacts of animal-based diets and the reasoning as to why companies are not so quick to tell us the consequences of eating animal products. In my opinion, this is an investigative documentary film that every person should watch. It will truly change your perspective, and I argue, for the better. 

When I met my husband, I fell off the vegan wagon. Growing up in Vallarta, my man is a meat and cheese fan, and to be fair, meat and cheese in the states is WAY different than meat and cheese in Mexico. Here, it is a lot less processed, a lot less stuffed with hormones. Before going back to NYC in mid-January of 2019, I had stayed in Vallarta with him for 2 weeks, a vacation in which I indulged in animal products. So, naturally I kept it going when I got back to NYC. After totally ditching my vegan ways, I could immediately tell a difference in my body. I gained weight, but not the healthy light muscular kind. The flabby, heavy kind that makes you want to just sloth around. My gymnastics got worse, the same flips that were once effortless for me, became difficult. The landings were brutal, my knees ached. And all this happened in a matter of weeks. I had detoxed my body only to fill it up with poison once again. 

When I moved to Vallarta in April of 2019, we got pregnant almost immediately. I was still eating meat and cheese but my body kept telling me to quit it. So I did, I made the leap back to purely plants and occasional fish. And to be honest, my pregnancy was a breeze. My recovery was even better. I was fortunate enough to give birth naturally and about a week after giving birth, my body was about 90% back to normal. I started to see my abs poking through and I had no one else to thank but the food I was putting into my body. 

Currently, I don’t eat meat or any dairy products. If I’m making my man a sandwich, I might sneak a piece of cheese or if at Sonora Prime, might steal a couple bites of meat off someone’s plate. I eat fish, 8 Tostadas is a personal favorite; I’ll usually get a couple marlin tostadas or a fish fillet depending on the day. A pescatarian diet, while not as healthy as an all plant based diet has worked best for me so far. Not to mention, we have access to the freshest fish here in Vallarta.

For those looking to improve body health and function, help the environment or just spice up their meals, I’m going to add some vegan cooking resources.

Instagram profiles with fantastic vegan recipes:

-@schoolnightvegan

-@the_blossoming_vegan

-@veganbowls

-@thefoodietakesflight

These profiles have AMAZING step by step, easy to follow recipes, and their feeds will have your mouths watering. 

A few things I’ve learned:

-An easy and delicious replacement for butter is coconut oil. 

-Not all non-dairy cheese is inedible. I actually found a great one at La Comer (the brand is Heartbest, it’s free of soy, gluten and dairy. Tres quesos is the best flavor, the parmesan is not so good).

-Mushrooms are the meat of plants.

-Costco sells Beyond Burgers. While they are super processed, they are a healthier alternative to meat itself. 

-Plantmilks have higher calcium levels, leave you with no mucus, and are way tastier!

-Holistik ice cream bars are out of this world!

A couple of my fave recipes:

1. Sautéed kale and mushrooms

• Ingredients:

  • olive oil

  • garlic

  • onion

  • mushrooms (I buy Portobellos from Costco, they have a huge pack for like 40 pesos)

  • kale (two bags, I buy Vegeta Listos from La Comer)

  • coconut aminos (available at Organic Select)

  • lemon

  • salt/pepper

• Steps:

  • in large frying pan on low heat, heat olive oil

  • add chopped garlic and onion

  • once translucent, turn heat on high and add chopped mushrooms, stirring occasionally

  • after about 5 minutes, add kale

  • add coconut aminos, salt and pepper and stir occasionally so it cooks evenly

  • sauté until almost crispy

  • plate and add lemon

  • OPTIONAL: add pasta (I use tri-color fusilli)

2. ”Cream” of Broccoli Soup

• Ingredients:

  • garlic

  • onion

  • olive oil

  • broccoli

  • coconut milk

  • vegetable broth

  • lemon

• Steps:

  • In large pot, on medium heat, heat olive oil and add garlic and onion

  • Once translucent, add chopped broccoli and stir occasionally so it cooks evenly

  • With flame on high, add 3 cups coconut milk and 3 cups vegetable broth

  • Stir occasionally and let it come to a boil

  • Let simmer for a few minutes and then put into blender (I blend about half of the pot, so it has some broccoli chunks)

  • Put it in a bowl and top it with lemon and salt and pepper to taste

In writing this article, I hope I have inspired someone to try a plant-based or pescatarian diet. If you have been suffering from any kind of chronic illness or disease, if you have inflammation, or just feel sluggish all around, give it a try. You have absolutely nothing to lose and so much to gain. Not only can you help the environment of the planet, but also the environment of your body. 

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