Today, I reach another little milestone in my shake-based experiences: this week all my meals have been Queal or Joylent shakes. I have had multiple-day streaks several times, and the majority of my meals have been shakes for about a month, but this is the first full week. Now might be a good time to stop thinking in streaks and just let things flow as they want.
Now might also be a good time to clean the fridge.
Flavours
Surprisingly, I have not become bored by the taste, texture, or the fact that my meals are not warm. I have grown tired of a few flavours - banana especially - but I have soon got through all the less exciting bags and sorted them out from future orders. Hopefully I will not grow equally tired of all flavours one after another … The fact that I get no cravings helps a lot too. In fact, that alone makes me hesitate a bit about returning to a more standard way of eating. It is just so nice to not get those urges.
I also have some bars coming in, as well as some vegan Jimmy joy. Both in part because I really wanted to get another Jimmy joy shaker. Yes, even after a month of regular use of both, the Jimmy joy shaker is just that much better. Queal itself is a lot more to my taste, but that shaker … too many nooks and crannies, too narrow an opening. Maybe next iteration they will nail it.
Energy
It is worth noting that I have lost a bit of weight. My colleague the dietician noted as soon as she saw the bags that the daily energy intake seemed a bit low for me. I was not as sure, but this week I have got some exercise every day and the trend is definitely down. I am not aiming to lose weight, so if returning to a more mixed diet does not fix the balance by itself I will have the very nice need to simply eat a bit more.
Hunger
That feeling of my stomach being empty without me actually being hungry is a recurring event. It has never been much of an annoyance, except a few times when I think it has made it difficult to fall asleep. I write "think" because the night I recall have had other things contributing to sleeplessness as well, so I am not sure which things were causes and which things I noticed because I could not sleep in the first place.
Moving on
I feel as certain as can be that I will keep shakes in my routine going forward. The convenience is just so great, especially for breakfast and lunch. Then come the additional, less direct benefits and motivations. Never buying food or planning food for example, that is quite a bit of time spent, especially those periods where I have felt I should try and cook more and better. Alcohol and soft drinks getting sorted away sort of automatically is nice too. Also, various kinds of fast food feel less interesting than ever, because I know that everything I can choose to eat will be worse nourishment-wise and less well balanced than having that shake. And of course, everything I buy finished is significantly more expensive too.
My plan is simply to buy, cook and eat other food when I really feel like it, and perhaps even spend more on better things when I do. The rest of the time, I will keep enjoying perfectly balanced shakes.
Sounds pretty nice to me.
Recommended study material
The more I look, the more material about people using shakes long-time I find. Eat health Lee is the most interesting I have found so far. Lee has the interest, education and the scientific mind to document everything very thoroughly (including, to my delight, reminders about things like this sample size being way too small). Lee also has a Youtube channel to go along and provide additional information.
Plug
Shameless referral: if you want to get a €10 discount when ordering Queal you can use this referal link: http://queal.refr.cc/fredrikb. That gives me a discount too, so everyone wins.