Rocking a Six-Pack Post-Pregnancy

Today's Eat-Clean Diet Vegetarian Cookbook guest blogger is super-fit mom of twins, Natasha Kay. She shares her 85 pound transformation and transition into vegetarian eating. Don't miss her delicious Morning Oats Goulash recipe by checking out her blog. 

Considering myself a “healthy eater” and an active person, I simply accepted my apparent fate of a 5’5” frame that would always weigh around 145 pounds and fluctuate between a size 8-10. But after ballooning to 205 pounds while pregnant with twins, I quickly realized that my idea of healthy wasn’t healthy at all.

Natasha 8 months pregnant with twins. 

Learning to Eat Clean

After some initial success with counting calories, my weight loss stalled and I began losing and regaining the same few pounds week after week.  It was around this time that I read Tosca’s Eat-Clean Diet and learned that weight loss wasn’t just about quantity; the quality of each calorie mattered, too. This newfound knowledge had me experimenting with recipes that once seemed daunting and braving the grocery store for ingredients I had never heard of. Despite some epic fails along the way, cooking soon became a source of pleasure and expression, rather than just another household chore.  After two years of Eating Clean (and taking exercise advice from Oxygen magazine), I busted my calorie-counting plateau, lost a total of 85 pounds, and proved to moms everywhere that even a former 54” tummy can rock a bikini and a six-pack!

Natasha 85 pounds lighter!

When Vegetarianism is the Only Choice
Although happy with this Eating-Clean lifestyle, everything changed when our family moved to Switzerland in 2009.  Just one chicken breast could run you up to $15! I scrapped my usual recipes and started researching more vegetarian options, opting for meat dishes 1-3 days a week. Whereas most families were adopting Meatless Mondays, my carnivore husband started looking forward to what he jokingly called, Meat-tastic Mondays! In time, my kids began to prefer my Black Bean Veggie Burgers over the beef kind and to his horror, my husband realized he was “nearly” a vegetarian -- and actually liked it!

Learning how to be a vegetarian is a lot like learning how to Eat Clean. At first, it’s completely foreign and even a bit awkward. Equipping yourself with knowledgeable resources like Tosca’s Eat-Clean Diet Vegetarian Cookbook is one way to avoid some of those rookie mistakes and have the whole family enjoying more plant-based foods while saving money, too!

Domestically Yours,

Natasha Kay

PS. Interested in an iron- and protein-packed vegetarian breakfast that will keep you charged up all morning?  With a shout-out to my former Meat & Potato ways, check out today’s post at FabulouslyDomestic.com -- Morning Oats Goulash!