CHINATOWN

CHINATOWN.  It had appeared that my daughter had nixed the idea of seeking a Chinese Restaurant to visit on  Christmas Day.  However, I was successful in 'selling' the idea to my family that not only should we go to a Chinese Restaurant, and not only should we go to Chicago's Chinatown to find a restaurant, but we should also walk there and back.  And that is precisely what we did.  What could be more Jewish than a family having dinner in Chinatown on Christmas Day?  (I will skip asking my Chabad Rabbi friend this question as yesterday was the Shabbat - and it is highly likely that he might think it would have even been more Jewish to go to Friday Night Services!)

There i am standing in the middle of the street under the iconic 'Welcome to Chinatown' sign

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From our home to Chinatown, we walked 5 miles and the trip took only 80 minutes.  The trip home was accomplished at a slower rate.  That route was 6.25 miles and the trip took 124 minutes.  No matter how you slice it, walking is a healthy pursuit at any speed.  I was very happy that not only did I encourage my wife and daughter to eschew the subway for the return trip, but that it did not take a great deal of effort on my part for everyone to the conclusion that walking would be a healthier, more rewarding, preferable mode of travel.  The interesting thing about walking to Chinatown is that before we started our urban hike, I did have to check a map to find out precisely how to get there... It turns out that it is practically a straight line south from our home.  The more that I walk around and through the city of Chicago, the smaller an more intimate the city appears.  

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THE CHINESE RESTAURANT
LITTLE LAMB

LITTLE LAMB.  MONGOLIAN CUISINE, HOT POT, BARBEQUE, NOODLES

THIS WAS THE HOT POT THAT WAS ON A BURNER IN THE CENTER OF OUR TABLE.  IT WAS IN  THAT COOKED OUR FOOD

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Your Food Diary For:

Friday, December 25, 2015

BREAKFAST	Calories	Carbs	Fat	Protein	Sodium	Sugar
Malt O Meal - Honey Nut Scooters, 120 g	480	96	6	12	840	36
	480	96	6	12	840	36
L U N C H
Campbells Home Style Soup - Italian Wedding Soup, 2 cup	200	26	5	12	820	8
libby's - Sweet Corn, 1.75 cup	210	32	5	7	700	25
fresh express - Baby spiniach, 3 cups	20	3	0	2	65	0
Kroger - Stuffed Scallop, 1 shell	200	17	11	9	550	2
	630	78	21	30	2,135	35
D I N N E R CHINATOWN CHINESE HOT POT DINNER
Shrimp - Raw, 5 medium	32	0	1	6	44	0
Crab Salad - Imitation Crab, Deli, 0.25 cup	56	5	1	7	170	1
White Rice - White Rice, 1 cup	205	44	0	1	0	0
Generic - Chinese Almond Cookie, 1 cookie	100	11	6	1	20	0
Wegmans - Deli Roast Beef, 6 oz (aprox.4 slices)	180	0	6	30	690	0
Mollusks, mussel, blue, raw, 0.5 cup	65	3	2	9	215	0
Kind Fruit & Nut Bar - Nut Delight, 1 Bar	200	17	13	6	10	9
	838	80	28	60	1,149	10
S N A C K S
365 Everyday Value - Organic Dried Mango, 40 g	110	26	0	1	0	21
Lindt Lindor - Milk Chocolate Truffle (Updated 12/13/2015), 6 balls	450	33	36	3	75	30
Ghiradelli - Intense Dark Cherry Tango, 10 piece	600	73	40	7	0	56
	1,160	132	76	11	75	107
Totals	3,108	385	131	113	4,199	187
Your Daily Goal	5,779	722	192	289	2,300	216
Remaining	2,671	336	61	176	-1,898	29
	Calories	Carbs	Fat	Protein	Sodium	Sugar
	*You've earned 3,849 extra calories from exercise today

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Your Exercise Diary for:

Friday, December 25, 2015

Cardiovascular	Minutes	Calories Burned
STAR TRAC ELLIPTICAL	92	1,696
TREADMILL WALKING 4.7mph	13	125
Walking, 3.5 mph, brisk pace	81	796
Walking, 3.0 mph, mod. pace, walking dog	124	940
MFP iOS calorie adjustment	N/A	292
Daily Total / Goal	311 / 30	3,849 / 590
Weekly Total / Goal	1213 / 210	17,143 / 4,130

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total calories consumed 3108 calories

total calories (92 minutes elliptical, walking) 3557 calories

total net calories 449 calorie deficit

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fitbit day 114

36001 steps

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Long before the decision was made to walk back and forth to and from Chinatown, I had already logged my traditional daily workout.  In the morning, I spent 92 minutes on the elliptical machine and before I left the fitness room, I hopped onto the treadmill for a quick one mile session at 4.7 mph.  This was only a 13 minute addition to my workout.

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This is from the 'About Us' page on the website for Little Lamb Restaurant

Our Mongolian Herbal Broth comes from an ancient legend…

In the time of the Nomads, there lived a Monk who traveled with Mongolian armies in the Chile Valley, northern part of China. He was highly respected because of his extensive knowledge of medicine and astrology, as well as his leadership and ability to care for injured soldiers.

Proficient in Tibetan and Mongolian medicine, he made a broth from lamb with special herbs for the soldiers. Not only did it taste delicious, it greatly strengthened the soldier’s bodies and helped them conquered the world. Later on, the recipe became popular among Nomads in the area. Since that time, his hotpot broth has been a favorite of the Mongolian people and has been respected as a “sacred” soup for thousands of years.

Our recipe for Hotpot Broth inherited from the Sacred Broth. It embodies traditional Chinese cooking methods based on nutrition, using Chinese herbs such as astragalus, liquorice, desert cistanche, sand- shallot seeds, and others to enhance the flavor and rejuvenate the body.

As you savor our broth, we hope you taste the rich flavors of China’s ancient heritage and are filled with the strength of the nomadic warriors. Enjoy!

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JEWS AND CHINESE FOOD ON CHRISTMAS DAY

from theatlantic.com

If there’s a single identifiable moment when Jewish Christmas—the annual American tradition where Jews overindulge on Chinese food on December 25—transitioned from kitsch into codified custom, it was during Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan’s 2010 confirmation hearing.During an otherwise tense series of exchanges, Senator Lindsey Graham paused to ask Kagan where she had spent the previous Christmas. To great laughter, she replied:  “You know, like all Jews, I was probably at a Chinese restaurant.”Never willing to let a moment pass without remark, Senator Chuck Schumer jumped in to explain, “If I might, no other restaurants are open.”

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216.5 lbs

I weigh 216.5 lbs.

I allegedly lost 1.5 lb this week?

C'mon....my doctor weighed me on his $2000+ scale this week and with clothes on and I only weighed 213 lbs... So what gives?  I do not know.  Water weight?  Perhaps I ate too much too late last evening?  It matters not.... It is crystal clear that everything that I own that is supposed to fit still fits... I can not be driven crazy by my wildly fluctuating weigh-ins at home.  Nevertheless, I will continue to weigh myself weekly (at least) and on January 1, 2016 I am going to weigh myself and use that as my baseline for my weight loss goals going forward... I am going to partially 'retire' the fact that the journey started at 309 lbs on December 24, 2014.  Since that person no longer exists, and that person will never again exist, it is seemingly becoming more and more pointless to have my current weight compared to the weight of that person...  

I have lost 92.5 lbs in 367 days. Today begins Day 368.

I will always be at the beginning of a journey that never ends.

I weigh 216.5 lbs (367 days ago I weighed 309 lbs)

I have lost 29.9% of my weight since Dec 24.

I have a BMI, body mass index of 28.96

I had a 42.0 BMI on Dec 24 just 353 days ago (Class III obesity)